Nothing can force me to marry you.

Not even the life of your brother.

Wow, the life of your brother. I don't know, Paul, this seems pretty intense. Pretty intense. How are you doing, Paul? You seem a little bit tentative about today's movie. I don't know. I'm very happy about today's movie. But you, I can just tell that you don't want to give in to it. There's something holding you back from giving into your joy. What is it, Paul? What's going on?

I mean, there's this very strange, cackling cauldron of unbridled delight mixed with sort of abject dismay. Dismay?

What, like Albert Pion let you down? Is that? Wow.

I don't know that that's really fair to put on him given his impressive oeuvre. I don't know how anyone could necessarily be disappointed in his consistency of deliverables.

Okay. Let's give the audience a clue about what we're doing here, because I feel like you and I have gotten very deep very quickly. Paul, you and I are talking about one of the greatest films ever made, The Sword and the Sorcerer.

Oh, is that what we're doing?

We are. It is just a feast and a banquet. Paul, I think perhaps we should just get on with it, because I think that today is going to be a very interesting session. So, Paul, I think because this film has clearly stirred up emotions in you that you don't talk about in cocktail parties. Let's get on with it. I'm Javier Grillo-Marxuach.

And I'm Paul Alvarado-Dystrom.

And this is...

Multiplex Overthruster: Summer of '82.

You know, Paul, there's Star Trek 2, there's Conan The Barbarian, there's Blade Runner, there's Tron, but I feel like we finally found a movie worthy of this theme.

I was gonna say, as we've plumbed deeper and deeper into the depths of the summer of 1982.

Wow, we did not expect it to get this dark, did we?

We have excavated something, I don't know, that I feel like has not been exposed to sunlight in a long time and has kind of flourished in this strange, fungal, um, revolution. I'm utterly fascinated and still processing the, um, puzzling phantasmagoria that that is the Sword and the Sorcerer and the Sorcerer. And I'm still looking for the Sorcerer.

Well it's Juxa.

It's, it's, uh, Yeah, kind of, but I'm like, we're getting ahead of ourselves.

Yeah, it's like Juxula, but I'm going to call it Juxa, like the kids game show host from Brazil. Oh, yes. Uh, Paul, here's the thing. So we are talking about Albert Pion's 1982 masterpiece, The Sword and the Sorcerer. And I think only you could really recap the plot of this film. Let's just do this, Paul. Let's get in, because I'm dying. I am elated by the sheer joy of this film. And your feelings are so much more complicated. So please tell us what this movie is about, Paul.

So despite the fact that every fiber in my being is crying out for me to run away screaming, rather than try to recap this plot, The Sword and the Sorcerer is about this guy who sees his mother slain before him as a child, much like a young Conan.

Looks like a young Conan, yeah.

But kind of takes a very different path fast forwarded in life where he is kind of enlisted to rescue people and sort out this rebellion thing.

Wow, Paul.

To get revenge and it's just a-

Paul, I think what you're trying to say is that Talon, the son of King Richard who was ousted by the evil Cromwell, and had to see his mom decapitated in front of him, is hired by Princess Alana to help her and her brother overthrow Cromwell. Not to realize that Cromwell's power comes from having summoned a horrible sorcerer that has helped him win all of his battles. And that sorcerer is now hidden in his court and dying to betray Cromwell. How will Talon survive?

Dare we say in a night court?

That's right, because we'll get to that. You know what, Paul, I think we need to just get to the belt. Because I am, first of all...

Thank you for bailing me out.

Orgiastic phantasmagoria. Is that what you said? Because that is exactly how to describe this film, isn't it?

You got that half right.

What kind of phantasmagoria?

I'll let you go with it. I was... I don't remember. It was perplexing or dismaying or something.

I think it was a perplexing phantasmagoria to you. Okay, okay. Producer Brad. By the way, Producer Brad has a great story about his own personal relationship with this film. We're not going to get into it now.

Oh.

I'll talk to you later, but I think...

Suspense.

We're going to find out a lot about Producer Brad today.

This is more suspense than we had in the film.

I can't believe you remember that story.

Of course I do. I've been dying for us to cover this movie so you could tell that story. Okay, let's get to the bell.

Bell? We gotta ring the bell.

We gotta ring the bell.

Ding ding.

Okay. So, Paul, this film is a sword and sorcery fantasy film directed by Albert Pion, who is a well-known and much sort of beloved maker of schlock films. And we've described the plot, and I think we should just get into it, because the movie starts with the conjuring, the bringing back to life of this sorcerer, Xujia. Xujia? Xujia. I'm going to call him Xujia like the Brazilian kids show host. So Xujia is brought back to life by King Cromwell, who wants Xujia's black sorcery to win the wars and gain control of the entire whatever the fight. I don't know if it's a continent. Is this film set on earth, Paul?

Do we even?

So I have to say, I quite like the opening of this film. And we are inundated with expository narration right out of the gate, as one should be for a fantasy D&D type of movie.

Any good fantasy movie has to start with a voiceover, a stentorian guy going, it was the dawn of the time of the people of the place with the thing, you know?

Yeah. We're also seeing a lot of fog, cause you gotta have fog.

Gotta have fog.

And there's this boat arriving through this fog at what I believe is Tomb Island.

Tomb Island, because subtlety was not in the lexicon of the island conquistadors of the time. It's next to the devil's throat over by the Skull Gulch.

Exactly. Lest there be no mistake, like you just have to know what this island is all about.

It ain't Flowers and Butterflies Island, my friend.

Nothing else to see. It's all about the tomb. That's the big tourist attraction at this island. So we have, let's just say, delicious Richard Lynch as sir Titus Cromwell.

An actor who showed up on so many things.

Also, the Soul Saturn Award winner for this film. He won Best Supporting Actor for this film.

By the way, I just want to say, Cromwell is a bigger character in this film than Talon. You actually see more of Cromwell. And Richard Lynch, one of those wonderful 80s character actors, always played a villain, he holds this movie on his broad, mighty shoulders, my friend.

I have to say, he gets the gold star for the film. Also, of the period, as you said, there's no one I can think of in 1982 that you can put up on screen and immediately telegraph vile villainy.

Oh yeah, oh yeah, that Richard Lynch.

He's so perfect for this.

Now, Paul, much like you and I are spending a fair bit of time discussing this, what's really the teaser for the movie? The witch who's going to bring back the Sorcerer's Rouge is actually taking her sweet time, which leads to clip number one, producer Brad.

Get on with it, witch.

Yes, so we've entered this creepy cave, we find this creepy tomb covered in creepy faces.

Yes, great like latex 1980s face effect where they're all covered in blood and they're like.

It's actually really cool. And then at sir Cromwell's, Titus Cromwell's bidding, the creepy witch.

Yes.

Then awakens the slumbering demon force, Richard Malle.

Yes, creped by bull from night court in a mask, the best.

It's glorious and he rises out of the goo. He is Susha of Delos or something. Yeah.

And Susha of Kits Television in Brazil. Go on.

And then we get, I believe, just a very simple plot engine.

Yes.

Of the equivalent of an I Want song.

Yes.

In this brief exchange.

Let's do it.

Who art thou?

Titus Cromwell, king of Aragon.

What is wished of me?

We need your help in conquering Aden. It's the richest kingdom in the world and I want it.

I mean, one of the things I love about this movie, and I understand that you don't feel like there is much to love.

There is.

One of the things I love about this movie is how everyone in this movie has a different idea of how people in fantasy movies should speak.

Yes.

They're all doing it their own way. One of the things I really enjoy about this, it's like being in the world's best D&D game, in that everybody just thinks that they know how people talk in this land. Richard Moll from Nightcore is like, the and thou and that. Richard Lynch is like, I would like this to be here, and I would like that to be, he speaks like Regis Philbin in Mid-Atlantic. I mean, it's phenomenal.

Just wait till we get to the best one later.

Oh, the greatest.

I'm so excited.

Well, I think that almost as suspenseful as the story about Brad, this movie has the greatest line delivery in the history of line delivery, and we will get to it. And I hope the suspense is killing our listeners right now.

I'm curious if we're both thinking of the same thing. I don't know that we are.

It is the same. Yes, it is. It totally is. It has to be.

But then, you know, to demonstrate his power, which is under some strange question, which I don't understand given he just rose out a goo and is looking the way he's looking, Xuxa promptly dispatches the witch, who tragically, the only black woman in this movie.

Oh, yes.

It was a great opening scene and it's like, oh, but immediately, no, she's...

This is the 1980s, Racists and Prevails and black characters and... Actually, not all black characters, because there is a black character who's pretty important to talk about later.

Captain Morgan, who shows up later.

Let's...

Spoilers.

That man, that is... That man is involved with the thing I discussed earlier. But he literally telekinetically rips her heart out of her chest and the gore effects are...

Yeah, and I do think that this opening scene is very effective in terms of setting the mood and the tone, showcasing some great makeup effects and prosthetics and they really went for it right out of the gate to say, this is hardcore D&D campaign that we are all in, even if not all of our D&D players are consuming the same substances.

But the thing is, there's a real theatrical... This movie was clearly made for about two bucks and that's being generous. But I think that one of the things that's really interesting is it's very theatrical. As you said, fog, there's also a lot of like theatrical lighting, like just bright green and red lights, sort of like sharp angles in this tomb, a lot of smoke. I mean, as bad as this film is and can be, and as much as it embodies the tropes and bullshit of the 80s, the racism, the rapiness, I mean, the rapiness is horrible in this film.

There's a lot of misogyny.

A lot of misogyny in this film. This film is sort of the epitome to me of a genre that more vulgar people than I refer to as boobs and blood. Like you and I discussed in Conan, how we basically went to these movies to see nudity and violence as kids. I think that Conan was sort of the classy version of that. And this is like the grind house of that. You know, like Conan was all like, blah, blah, all the actors spoke in some accents and stuff like that. But this is like grind house.

It makes, I think, just a perfect double feature with Conan because there are two sides of the same point. In Conan, you feel them reaching for something more aspirational in terms of a sword and sandals epic, kind of more classical, whereas this is just pure straight on exploitation.

Then they leave no fantasy trope unturned. Every cliché, that's kind of why I think this movie is actually so much more fun to watch than Conan because it's very clear that the aspirations of these filmmakers are nowhere in tune with their actual talent. I mean, they have reached so much further than their grasp in terms of their budget, in terms of just, but in spite of the blazing misogyny and rape culture, which we have to get into because it's so horrifying. It's what is diverting about this movie is it? Well, I mean, it's disturbing, but it's no different than Conan, which has a lot of misogyny in it too. I don't think we forgive it, but I think it's a classier production, I suppose. But I find this movie so much more fun to watch because it is so cheesy, it is so earnest, it is so intentionally and unintentionally exactly what it is, which is like just a bunch of kids playing their D&D module. We watched this movie, producer Brad and I did not go see this movie in the theater because it was R-rated. I did not see it in the theater. Did you see it in the theater, producer Brad?

I saw it over and over on the movie channel.

Yes, so did I. Paul, I'm going to assume you've never seen this movie before that your experience of it is limited.

I will admit, I have been woefully remiss in not seeing this movie until yesterday.

Oh my God, this is the first exposure to this film. No wonder you're so shell shocked, Paul.

Exactly. I do not harbor the deep well of nostalgia that you too enjoy, which I frankly envy. But I will admit, this is partially because I was too young to see it when it came out in the theater in 82 and I never caught up with it. I think because I was maybe a little turned off by the cheesiness and the cheapness of it which were superficial judgments that were, I was going to say unfair, actually not unfair.

Not unfair.

Not unfair at all. But just as a matter of taste, it just never quite, I've got a long list of movies that I aspire to see. This just never ranks sufficiently high.

So what you're saying is like Fitzcarraldo, aguirre, The Wrath of God, Burden of Dreams, like those things are, you know, Wings of desire. You know, you got a lot of new German cinema in there you haven't seen and you're going to prioritize that over World in a wire, perhaps Fassbender's movie.

Let's just say, yeah, my tastes tended to be slightly more elevated. And I'm not saying that that's a good thing or a bad thing. It just is, it's me.

I am delighted by this because you, of all people, are often so eager to embrace the cheese. I mean, I think that we can look at the films that Paul Lovato and Dykstra loves and not say Paul is unwilling to embrace the cheese factor.

But I do, and I have to say, speaking of which, getting back to the film, we come to the civilized peaceful realm of Aedon, which I insist we have to refer to as Aedon, as in the Dutch cheese for the just utter cheesiness of the whole film.

And also your part, Doug.

Yes. And tragically lactose intolerant at this stage in my life, which I wrestle with on multiple levels while watching this film. We then are finding this other setting of Aedon. We're introduced to the kind and goodly bearded, mustache-less King Richard, who looks strikingly, he looks strikingly like producer Gary Kurtz.

Yes, he does.

He does.

You're right. And also, now one of the great things about this movie is fake beard. And you can't have Good Sword & Sorcery without really fake beards.

Fake hair in general, but yes. Oh, fake.

Oh, my God. Like such Bible movies and Sword & Sorcery movies have just the best, like King Richard's beard should have its own film. It really does. It is a character on its own. It emotes.

I just want to say before we get before we get past it, it just strikes me that I have to decree.

Yes, please do.

King Richard's facial hair is a proscenium of majesty. I just couldn't let that go. Anyway, we cut back and Cromwell has unleashed Shusha. We only see the aftermath because they don't have the budget to show the actual battles that ensue and the destruction that he unleashes across the realm.

It's literally somebody walks in the room and says, the battle is horrible. I can't begin to describe the carnage.

Yes, and we just see glimpses of the aftermath according. Now, for some reason, Cromwell is shocked by this and is concerned that he has let the genie out of the bottle and the Pandora box has been opened and that maybe this was a bad idea.

Oh no, unleashing a demon to help him win a war?

Yeah. Like he didn't think this through. So then he decides, well, maybe I need to kill Susha. And so he clumsily stabs him conveniently on a side of a cliff that he throws him over. So then word makes it back to King Richard of the horrors that are being imparted onto the realm. And we get news thusly.

Yes. Okay, Haggis literally has like a stab wound on his chest, and King Richard's like, get a leech. I'm like, dude, I think you got bigger problems than that.

At this moment, I love this movie so much. His name is not Haggis, but it sounds like Haggis to me. I feel like his name must be Haggis.

That is our story, and we're sticking to it.

Stumbles in, wounded, and it's just great. Now, here's where it gets confusing to me, and I need help explaining this, because I couldn't be bothered to go back and study.

I think I can help you with this, go ahead.

Because this is all taking place in sort of the before times of the main continuity of the film later, because we're going to flash forward not too long from now to...

Well, this is the preamble. This is Conan before he grows up. Yes, we know this.

Exactly. And so we're seeing young versions of characters that we're going to meet grown up later.

Because Haggis' brother happens to be the young Talon.

Yes. And so Haggis and Talon are... Am I wrong? Are they not sons of King Richard?

Yes, they're sons of King Richard, yeah.

Okay, so Talon is a prince and an heir to the throne.

You're searing one of the big plot holes of the show.

Okay, okay. This seems like an important detail that is very strangely ignored for the rest of the film. And then there are... Anyway, so the good King Richard, I'll come back to this later, but I'm glad... I just want to clarify that I was not...

No, you're not.

I didn't misunderstand it. So the King vids his wife to escape with Talon, who wants to stay and fight, but he's too young, and he reveals, the King reveals to Talon the sword.

The sword.

One of the coolest swords, as flimsy as it appears to be in film.

One of the coolest swords ever that it's impossible to fight with actually.

It appears very clunky.

Let's describe this sword. This sword is like a giant hilt, right? And on top of this hilt are three blades mounted sequentially, right? Parallel to each other, right? And the blades, we find out in the action scene as Talon is trying to escape, is that he can actually push a switch on the sword and the blades fly out as if powered by jets.

It's like a sword harpoon gun.

It's a projectile weapon and a sword.

We don't know this yet, but we do because presumably we've all seen the trailer and the sword being able to shoot things, blades, is the big selling point of this movie.

It sure as shellac is, my friend. Yes, it is.

And I have to say, it says a lot that despite the compelling incentive of a harpoon trident sword, yes, that it still took decades for me to see this film. Anyway, so hands off the sword to Talon, which seems like a strange choice because you would think the king probably could use that sword. Given what's unfolding, then there's an aftermath of yet another battle that we didn't get to see. We're just seeing whatever. And then of course, because this is epic hero's journey, cliched storytelling, Talon has to witness his father being murdered by Cromwell. Yeah. And then he manages to escape. And then in short order, Cromwell kills another son who's escaping by boat. Does he kill him? Like, there's this whole thing by the river in the boat, then lets the daughter live and escape. And is the daughter Alana? I don't know.

I honestly don't know. I have no, I mean, honestly, like...

Because I'm thinking, as I'm watching this and trying to connect these dots, who are these other brother and sister in the sequence? And are they not Micah and Alana? And would that not make Talon their brother?

Yeah, no, I don't think so. No, no, no, no, because it's explained later in the movie. No, no, it's explained later in the movie that Alana and what's the other guy's name?

Micah.

Micah and Alana are the son and daughter of one of the courtiers of King Richard. And they are, because they were the last ones perceived to be alive, they're considered to be the legitimate heirs of the throne. They're not Talon's brother.

Yes. But it is very confusing.

Profoundly unclear. Oh, profoundly unclear. Yeah.

This brother-sister pair grown up later after being shown this other brother-sister pair.

I like to think of it as like a mystery box, Paul. I like to think of it as a-

Because the other daughter escapes.

Yeah.

And then if that's not Alana, we never see her again.

No, no idea. No idea.

And I'm like, what the hell? Anyway, so at this point, I'm starting to get frustrated with the film. The Queen. Yes.

The movie is The Sword and the Sorcerer, not the plot and logic.

Not the plot and the logic?

I'm clearly imposing unfair expectations on the film.

Well, we have been a half hour of this podcast. We have not gotten to Talon. Let's go.

The Queen stabs Cromwell in vain.

Yes, yes.

Cromwell, of course, kills her Talon, also witnesses this as he's arriving.

Of course he does.

He has the sword though, which he seems not quite old or big enough or accomplished to wield well. But then we have the moment, and I wrote this down, holy shit, his father's sword shoots blades. Yes, it does because it's cool. But then he gets his hand pinned to a tree by an arrow. Then has to rest it free to escape in one of the most exquisite bits of foreshadowing.

It is, Paul, I thought about you when I saw this because I'm like, this is foreshadowing. Paul is going to be so happy about this.

Yes. I was like, this has got to be foreshadowing something. And boy, howdy, does it ever.

Does it ever.

Then we finally get to cut to, okay, the years past and...

Wait, wait, wait, Paul, Paul, Paul, as with Conan, there is a narration that covers Talon's growing up experience. Producer Brad, can you please give us clip number four?

Years passed and rumors began to rumble through the outland kingdoms of a fearless adventurer, a warrior who roamed trackless deserts, mighty mountains and shining seas. These rumors grew into legends about this man who was at once a buccaneer, a slave, a rogue, a general.

I just have to say, okay, so puncturing the sweeping majesty of this epic narration and swelling score is the revelation that Talon has grown up to become Matt Houston, Lee Horsley.

By the way, and here's the thing, Matt Houston was a very typical 1980 show. He was like a Texas lawyer, doctor lawyer cop who chased after somebody.

Something.

But in Matt Houston, he had like facial hair and he was always dressed in these Burt Reynolds suits, like kind of semi cowboy suit and a big cowboy hat.

Yes, yes, a perfect 80s mustache.

And Matt Houston was a wealthy oil man who solved mysteries.

Of course he was. Of course he was.

So we have now what may be a historic milestone in cinema, which is a fantasy adventure film.

Yes.

Whose main character is Texan.

Yes.

I have to salute the film for that bold choice.

Very little effort is made to kind of make Lee Horsley. I mean, Lee Horsley's mid-Atlantic accent makes Tyrion Lannister's alleged accent sound.

Yes, but it's about to be taught because we are then introduced to Talon's Band of Merry Men.

Oh, yes.

That is led by Joe Regalbuto of Murphy Brown.

Yes.

Who makes no attempt.

No attempt.

At hiding or altering his New York accent, which is howl at this moment.

We meet them in a brothel.

Oh, my God.

He literally just like stepped off of like some theater class, some theater workshop he was teaching for fledgling actors in New York, got on set and went, what am I doing here? Let's, we got to hear the clip. No, there's no clip. Oh, my God. Oh, actually, he has one of the best clips, but it's for later.

It's later. But yeah, I just want to interrogate for a moment.

Yes.

Choices were made in this film, as in any film, and it's one thing to say, you know what, for our epic fantasy adventure, steeped in kind of vaguely Euro-mythic vagueness, we're going to cast Lee Horsley as our lead, this manly Texan, but to then say, you know what, let's take it even a quantum leap further, and his lieutenant is going to be Joe Regalbuto.

Joe Regalbuto.

That's just, I mean, I love me some Joe Regalbuto, of a big Murphy Brown fan, not the manliest of men, to be portraying a, let's say, heroic adventurer, kind of right hand of this hero. I'm dazzled with dismay at this choice.

But one of the great things about this movie, again, is that, well, not one of the great things. We talked about this, like, everyone's in a different movie. Regalbuto has literally just walked off of an episode of Murphy Brown, where he's being that brash, New York kind of character. Lee Horsley is being the magic, I mean, Lee Horsley wears a pelt for most of this film, and it is-

He has a lot of hair and a lot of fur.

It's kind of like in Gladiator, when Maximus at the beginning is wearing that pelt, and you just kind of wish he'd wear that pelt all through the movie. This is the movie for you.

Yeah. He's got the fashion sense of Sylvester Stallone in 1982. Transposed to this ancient mythic period. Anyway, so they have their little rally, whatever, but there is a spy. A spy is watching them. And then skulks away to another creepy cave, past another creepy witch, who I got to say, fleetingly, quite fetching. And then, oh my god, surprise, surprise, after all these years that have passed, Shusha is alive.

Shusha is alive? And no, how could he survive the epic fall and the conniving stabbing?

Yeah, he got stabbed and thrown off a cliff. And yeah, he's somehow this creature of evil has survived.

Insane.

And he still is quite pissed off at Cromwell. He's been nursing this for 11 years, I believe.

Who among us would not? I mean, Cromwell had sucker stabbing, I mean, come on.

And now he gets his version of his own I Want song.

Oh yes, let's hear it, please.

The Heart Wants and I love the film for that. I have to say, this sets up the most intriguing kind of plot triangle in this film, which is very unexpected to me, is that you have not these two opposing forces, which is sort of typical, but you have three. But one of them is hidden to the others, even though it should be obvious.

What you have in this movie is this plot structure. You've got Cromwell, right? Now, he's going to try to marry this princess, Alana, whose brother he's holding hostage, or he will later on in the movie, to solidify his reign over the Four Kingdoms, and he's plotting this coup to make sure that he gets all the power. Meanwhile, Talon is going to come after him. But at the same time, the third plot vector, which is quite clever, I might say, is that Dujla has been hiding, perhaps in plain sight, in the court of King Cromwell.

What a concept.

Oh my God, undermining the state. We got to get into this film. Paul Flaubert, give me more.

And who on earth could he be posing as, as we then cut to Cromwell in a state of ennui, despite having conquered Aedon, the land of cheese.

The land of Dutch cheese, yeah.

We meet his right hand, the hand of the king, played by George Maharris of Route 66 fame.

No, that's King Richard. George Maharris is King Richard. This is Simon McCorkendale of Manimal fame.

No, no, no, no, no.

No, no, no. Maharris is the counselor. Simon McCorkendale is Micah, the heir. Oh, that's right.

Oh my God. George Maharris is, all this time, I wanted to call him Count Manimal, and it turned out I was looking at the wrong guy.

Oh my God.

I need my 80s card tool. I suck.

I'm proud of myself for tracking this.

God bless you, sir. Oh my God. This is the best day of my life.

They do all have the same haircut, so.

Yes, they do.

They do.

So, now the thing about Count Macchelli, right? I was counting on something.

So, Count Macchelli or Mackelli, as in Machiavelli? Like, could that be any more on the nose?

Oh my God. Oh my God.

He is just, he is so obviously planted as this, an Iago, like, duplicitous fiend.

And his makeup is phenomenal because his face is all the same color. You know, like most people have, like, some variation in their face, you know, like, maybe a little freckle. No, he is completely homogeneously, like, the same kind of shade of beige, and he has these lips, and there's a moment when, well, we'll get into it, but his makeup is amazing. I've got more to say about that. Let's continue.

So, then there is conspiring that happens at this point. It's getting convoluted and confusing. I don't necessarily, I'm like, I don't really care. Soon, then, after, we then encounter a scene where Lord Micah, the rightful heir, is conspiring with Count McKelley, and Lord Micah is none other than Manimal himself.

Manimal, yes.

Simon McCorkindale.

Let's call him Prince Manimal.

Prince Manimal. The whole time, I'm waiting for him to transform. Use your power. Exactly. Exactly. What is going on? Then, why?

Can you guys let the younger listeners know who Manimal is?

Oh my God.

Oh my God.

I pity anyone who does not know the joy of Manimal and wonder of Manimal. The seminal.

The grace and beauty, they re-say.

80s fantasy, horror, drama series. This guy who can transform into animals. And I don't remember what the purpose was, if it was to fight crime or to like, all I remember is like, I have these flashbacks of freaky post-American werewolf in London, knockoff kind of make up effects.

It was a very cheap show.

That they recycled the shots over and over again, just like Battlestar Galactica were recycled. With the spaceship shots, yeah. Episode after episode and he turned into different creatures implausibly and the plot would always conveniently present a necessity for a particular transformation. And it never got tiresome.

The thing I loved most about Manimal, you know, he was some shamp who fought crime by turning into animals. Obviously, in the 80s, you had to do the karate episode for every show. Every show had a karate episode, you know. Chips had an episode where Ponch, Chips the show about the Highway Patrol, Ponch mysteriously knew how to do karate. There's something about martial arts in the 80s. Every show had a karate episode, I guess because you had to. And in the karate episode, Manimal didn't turn into a karate fighting animal, but he learned martial arts by watching videos of meerkats fighting each other.

I totally forgot that.

You assimilated their meerkat martial. So it's just, I mean, it is a feast, Paul.

Yes. It's kind of a parallel universe beast boy.

Yes, it is indeed.

Of Teen Titans. Yes. Anyway, a fascinating.

So Manimal and Princess Alana are conspiring to overthrow Cromwell and take back what's theirs.

So they're plotting a rebellion.

It is, yes.

Because there has to be a rebellion, because we've seen Kim Cromwell is producer Gary Kurtz of Star Wars. So they have to be plotting a rebellion. However, and Princess Alana played by the lovely Kathleen Beller of Dynasty fame.

Yes, indeed.

Another 80s television. This whole movie is 80s TV people.

And I think that's part of what one of the signifiers of its low budget is. You can tell this movie was shot on Topanga Canyon.

During everyone's hiatus.

Yeah, it's like literally everybody was on hiatus. Everybody could just make this movie, sleep at home.

Yeah. And without any care in the world that anyone is ever going to see this movie.

And look, the actors are all committing in their own way. And some of them are quite fully. But it's like literally these are all like TV stalwarts from the 80s who like the summer came and they were like, let's just cash this check. Producer Brad is about to correct me on something.

No, no, no. I was just going to say when looking at the cast list, it's surprising, well, not surprising, but many of them were in Buck Rogers in the 25th century. And then many were in Matt Houston.

Yes.

Yes.

There's a lot of crossover guesting on each other's TV series among this cast, which is really a fascinating rabbit hole to go down on IMDb, if anyone is so inclined. I have to say, Kathy Beller quits herself maybe better than anyone in the film in terms of an actor and a performer, aside from the scenery-chewing Richard Lynch, who's kind of in a different movie. But anyway, just as we're getting the rebellion plot laid out to us, they are busted by Cromwell. Micah is captured because, of course, Count Machiavelli has betrayed them. Big surprise!

Oh no!

Trusting that guy was a bad idea. Who would have thunk it? Alana Escapes kind of is pursued down an alley and threatened with sexual assault.

This genre is a messy and problematic genre.

Yes.

And this rape scene is especially like just, it's not a rape scene, it's sort of like the threat of it, but it's sort of played for laughs. And there's dick jokes in it because when Talon interrupts the rape about to happen, he looks at the guy and says, that's a big threat for a man with so little whatever, with such a small sword. It's like, there's dick jokes happening, there's like threatened rape happening. It's, and it's kind of gross, you know? And it's a sort of part of this genre. It's in the DNA all the way up to all the sexual assault in Game of Thrones, you know?

Yeah. And I will get to an even clearer through line between this film and Game of Thrones, which I find quite striking. Yeah, that casual misogyny in this film, again, hindsight is 2020, but it's really toxic. This movie is really, really bad. And it's modeling behavior that is so reprehensible. I cannot in good conscience do anything other than cringe. When I see it, it's just reflexively revolting.

Yeah.

And in part because it is played so casually and kind of comedically and it's like, it's not really funny as much as they try to make it.

So, but yes, literally the line that presages the attempt at sexual assault is, now I'll poke you with my dagger.

It's just, it's not even well written. It's just bad. I will say to Alana's credit, there are two things in the scene that strike out. We do get another bit of a setup to a later payoff that Alana does have one self-defense tool in her tool belt.

Yes, he does.

Which is kneeing assailants in the crotch.

Well, she gets close to them like she's gonna give in. And the setup in the first two times it happens, happens three times in the movie, is the guy says, I'm gonna do this and that to you. And she goes, with what? And then boom, knees him in the groin.

Yeah, exactly. And you elucidated a very important detail and texture to her approach, which is cunning, which is that first, keep trying to resist and flee. Once she realizes she is outmatched by her assailant, then she pivots into playing to their ego, by feigning attraction and giving in to then get them to let their guard down so then she can knee them in the crotch. It's very satisfying. And I have to say, I appreciate that there is at least some empowerment to this degree for our female lead in the film.

Yeah, such as it is.

Which is refreshing. It doesn't go far enough because it's like the problem with this is that what happens after you knee the guy in the crotch. You just piss him off and you put yourself in greater danger that she then cannot escape.

Look, groin kicks are horribly painful. For those of you who do not have balls, it is literally a horrible design flaw in the masculine body. So we all know that it's incredibly painful, but really it's about 30 seconds of and she never takes the 30 seconds to run. She needs the guy, but she stays there. I feel like there's a real lacuna void in her plan.

A little bit and I find that very frustrating, but thankfully for her, Talon intervenes as he's been hanging out in the next door tavern, I guess with his band of brothers. You don't seem to miss him for the entire next stretch of the film for some reason, and he is chomping on, is this a leg of lamb or a leg of cow? Like it's this huge leg of something.

Well, at one point, this is the major, and you go like, do you want me to bring you the whole cow or just the leg? And he's like, the leg will do.

He seems to have a thing for legs in any way, shape or form. Anyway, so he rescues Alana. They take refuge in some other, I don't know if it's a tower. I don't know what this other place is, but they're taken in by Crackus, played by the great Jeff Corey.

Tell me more about Jeff Corey.

He's an amazing character actor, who's been in a million things, just looking at his IMDB. But I implore you, read his bio on IMDB. This is a man who was blacklisted in Hollywood for over a decade, then brought back through Spartacus, by Spartacus, in fact. Prior to that, a World War II veteran who was awarded a medal for being on the deck of a... I forget the details, I should have it up. He has just this incredible story and he's just a wonderful character actor, that whenever you see him, you're like, Oh yeah, that guy, he's great. And just on a million credits. Anyway, so then we get the...

Horrible, horrible scene that is supposed to be a dramatic, a meat-cute, but it's just... Talon is so gross. This is the recruitment scene. This is the scene where the princess is going to get Talon to save Prince Manimal from the dungeons of Cromwell. And of course, all that, like literally, all that Talon is thinking about is fucking Alana, even though he's just saved her from a rape, to the point where he literally... It is implied that his erection is so large and powerful that it is lifting the actual table that stands between them.

Off the floor. And that she then has to push back down onto the floor.

Yes. Now this one, this is a woman who's literally just almost been raped. Yeah.

So I've mentioned that our villains, yes, Cromwell and Shusha have each had their version of an I Want song.

Yes, indeed.

And their wants are pretty clear and straightforward and appropriate for the genre and pseudo period, which is that Cromwell wants to rule. He wants power, Shusha wants revenge.

Yes.

Our hero, his noblest want.

His noblest want, his song. He basically tells Princess Alana that she says, I'll give you anything. I'll give you 500 Florians. I'll give you 600 Florians, seven. And he goes, I want more. And she says, I'll do anything. And he says, anything? That kind of bullshit. And then she agrees to sleep with him once. Once, if he saves Prince Manimal. And he says the following is his response. Ready?

You want me to snatch your brother from the King's Dungeons for one night with you?

That's a slim bounty for such a task.

Why, you bastard!

The life of your brother for one night with you. I expect my bounty perfumed and pretty.

He's such an asshole! And this sets up something that's actually, um, Paul, you're dying to speak. I know you're like, literally, you're, go ahead, say your thing. I'll say, I'll say about it in a moment.

Oh, God.

Um, can't speak.

He can't. So he's a villain.

He is.

He's a villain. Our hero is a villain. And I can't believe that the choice of the word snatch at the beginning of that clip was accidental.

Now, Paul, here's the thing. Talon is the close spiritual relative to another one of the great heroes of our podcast, and that is Ace Hunter. One of the things you notice in this movie, and it keeps cropping up as a plot point, is that we haven't really seen a lot of Lee Horsley. This is literally like, you know, he was moved in a bar. He saved Alana from being raised. His dad hasn't done anything.

He hasn't really done anything.

No, all we've seen is young Talon, you know, like failed to save his mom and his dad with.

The only thing too that's strikingly missing, where the hell is the sword?

Where's this cool ass sword?

Yeah, we have not seen it and we don't know where it is. I noted that about an hour later when we still haven't seen the sword. So, Paul, Ace Hunter and Talon have the same thing in common which is that they're so good at everything. Now remember, the narration about Talon was that he was a buccaneer, a slave, a rogue, a general. So already Talon comes from a much better movie than this one. I want to see that movie first of all.

And I was woefully remiss to skip over that. Transitional narration is even more egregious than these shots we get of aftermath of battles that we're deprived of seeing on screen. We get regaled with movies upon movies of epic awesomeness, of Talon's...

That we're not gonna see.

That we're not gonna get to see any of it. Not a flashback, not a montage, nothing. We're just getting the narration and it's like, I just trust us. He's this badass, he's done all these things.

The only thing we've seen Talon do is...

He's dropped on a giant leg of lamb. Yeah.

He knocks out the rapist, I think with the leg of lamb. And then the other guy who's about to rape Alana is so feckless. And he's such a just henchman that rather than fight Talon, he runs into a wall and knocks himself out. Yeah. So Talon hasn't done anything. But like Ace Hunter and Megaforce, Talon is so good at everything. He's so well known. He's been so many places that no matter where he goes, everybody goes, hey, that's Talon. Let's help him. And that seems to be the only way he gets out of anything.

This is so confusing because on the one hand, Talon is in hiding in some way still because he's sort of he's he's the heir to the throne. He's a prince. And that seems to be a secret from everybody. But yet on the other hand, everybody knows, hey, it's Talon. He's done all these awesome things. This is another example, though, of without trying to put to find a point on it, but it's just scaring us right in the face that reputation will get you a long way.

A long way. Yeah, that's why you need to be, especially if you're a white man, a straight white man. Oh yeah. The other thing is, if you hear this clip where he says, I want you all perfumed and pretty, the music is indicating romance and meet cute. The music is not indicating this man has just said he'll save your brother from a dungeon and restore you to your true state as a princess if you fuck me.

That's our hero. He is negotiating terms of extortion, of sexual assault by extortion. He's insane. He's a villain. Anyway, so then the plot thickens because-

Oh really? Because I actually wrote the plot thin.

Oh, well, it does both at the same time.

Well, it comes back to that. Another battle has happened that we haven't seen.

Yes. The rebels have been captured. Now, she doesn't just need him to rescue Prince Manimal. She needs him to rescue the rebellion, basically, all the rebels who were captured. And of course, then his price is going to go up. She does have a great line where he's kind of like, what's in it for me, whatever, blah, blah, blah. And she's like, what's the matter? Is your sword too small?

Whoa!

Points for that, Alana. But finally, he does agree to take on the...

Paul...

.skeletal creep, but he agrees for a kiss.

I got to get into this because this is really important, Paul. The rebels are... it's not just the rebels are pinned down. They have been pinned down by Cromwell's Dragon Archers. You know, this is why the princess has to negotiate for this kiss, because this is... these guys are badasses, Paul. Oh, yes. These are the Dragon Archers. I'm sorry to run roughshod over you, but I feel like you're not making this very important point.

They are the Emperor's Crimson Guard.

Yes, they are.

They are equivalent. So anyway, so he agrees for a kiss, which is basically like a sampler at Costco that he demands to kind of get a taste for what he's going to get later. Then he leaves, as soon as he leaves, she is then also captured. Yes. Why not? Like, let's just, yeah, for plot convenience. So yeah, then we cut to... I'll let you take this sequence because, oh my God.

All right. Well, which one are we doing here?

So the Crimson Guard had the Rebels in. They're backed in a corner, in, of course, another cave. There's so many caves. So many caves available in this world.

Paul, when you shoot your low-budget fantasy movie in Los Angeles, the one thing Los Angeles has is caves. Like Paramount has the Star Trek cave. Like literally, I was working... Okay, I'm on the detour for a second, but forgive me.

It involves caves. I'm all for it.

I was working on the show that was in the Arctic, right? And we were at a whole three episodes in an ice cave, right? And the show was shot in Montreal. And they're like, how are we going to do the ice cave? And I'm like, fucking call Paramount and rent the Star Trek DS9 ice cave. Like literally, like every studio has a cave. If you're not shooting in the back lot, you call the studio, you pay them 50 grand, they truck the cave over to you, you spray paint it white if it's an ice cave, brown if it's a rock cave, black if it's a coal mine, you know, like, and every studio owns a cave. And they call me from Montreal and they're like, what are you talking about? Like we don't have caves here in Montreal. And I'm like, somebody has to have like a fucking styrofoam cave that they use for all the low budget sci-fi shows that they inevitably shot there like hours. And they're like, no, we don't have that. And I was furious because we had to rewrite three episodes that were set in an ice cave. And Paul, the day after I had that conversation, we were working at a place called, I think it was called LA Center Studios. And there was a Disney sitcom about superheroes shooting next door to us. A flatbed truck arrives at their stage at the loading dock. And you know what was on that flatbed truck, Paul Alvarado-Dykstra?

A fucking cave.

A fucking cave!

Not just a cave, an ice cave!

God damn it!

Caves!

But the thing is, when you shoot a movie like The Sword and the Sorcerer in Los Angeles during TV hiatus, it is a cave-rich environment. You can rent a cave from anyone and we're in another cave. And the archers are the epitome of what screenwriters do when they're basically told, here's a VFX we can do, can you write it in the movie? Because the archers, they have like firework tips to their arrows and they're sort of light up like one after the other. Clearly some dude with an electric detonator is making them go.

They're lined up very impressive.

Oh my God!

It is really, it's like, oh, we're finally getting some cool costumes. Like, and so Matt Houston is looking down on them, not unseen by all these people who, he's kind of conspicuous in his regalia fur. Watching this, the rebels are about to be burned because they've sent, the Crimson Guard have sent some hapless minions to go pour oil into the cave, and then they're gonna ignite with flaming arrows and then incinerate the rebels. And turning the cave into a pizza oven. But there's a fatal flaw in their plan because they're not watching their flank and Talon descends, spills a bunch of alcohol or something and then basically turns the flaming table on them and sets them on fire. So then he rescues the rebels. And I just have to say, people treat Talon with this sudden kind of overinflated awe and grandeur at repeated turns in this film. And he's always like dismissing it, like, you know, ah, then just take it easy.

The one way that he's not like Ace Hunter is that he's not entirely arrogant and self-involved.

Yeah, but it's strange because it seems implausible that he is not more full of himself. Then the rebels lead him into the, I think it's the Castle Seward Drain, because they've got to get into the castle to rescue Micah. He does not know that Alana has also been captured yet, I believe.

Who could possibly know?

Then we cut to a payoff of the prior Alana corner, seen. Now, we're in the castle. Prince Cromwell is holding Alana captive, plans to marry her to secure his reign.

Yes.

And apparently, I think, to validate his reign. I think that part of his ennui that we witnessed earlier is that he has conquered these lands and achieved this title by force, but yet he has this sense that it is illegitimate.

He's just not respected. He's just not getting, you know, Talon, everywhere he goes, people know him, they respect him. Does Cromwell get that, Paul? Does he get that? No.

He gets, he gets abject disdain.

And nobody likes him.

So his theory, apparently, is that the way I can achieve respectability, yes, is force this princess to marry me.

Yeah.

Then I will legitimately be, have a claim. I don't, it doesn't really make sense.

Paul, if you got your kingdom by awakening a centuries dormant wizard played by the bailiff from night court and used his dark power to gain everything, only to murder him in a callous act of betrayal, of course, you're not going to feel like you've got it all on your own and you might want to feel like, you know, yeah, I mean, I get him. I get this guy. I get him.

And I think this goes to the, to him winning the Saturn Award is he clearly is wrestling with deeply rooted issues of self-worth.

I gotta say, Paul, I know that this movie is a cheese fest and we're mocking it horribly, okay? And I'm okay with that, I promise. But I gotta tell you, Richard Lynch, the thing I love about this guy and he is in every, I mean, literally so many Russian lieutenants, so many Russian generals, so many gangsters in this guy, so many demons, so many science-fictional villains in this guy's filmography. But I gotta say, I never saw Richard Lynch phone it in, you know? This guy always gave it his villainous best. He reminds me, there's another character actor named Billy Drago, who famously played Frank Nitti in The Untouchables. That was a guy who no matter how cheap the movie, he fucking showed up. I just want to take this moment to acknowledge Richard Lynch that. Also, this was the clip we opened with, with you must marry me, I won't marry you, blah, blah, blah. And of course, then Princess Alana sidles up to Cromwell and says, of course, I'll give you everything. And he says, I will love you like no man will ever love you. He has those pieces, I will marry you and I will love you like no man will ever. I have to do this in a Latino accent.

He gets pretty explicit in what he's promising her sexually.

And she says, with what? And she kicks him in the groin. And he recovers 30 seconds later and then tells her, fuck you, I'm not gonna marry anyone and leaves. It's just phenomenal. Now, but here's the thing. Here's another reason why Cromwell is wrestling with these issues of self-worth is that he believes that there is somebody in his court that's undermining him.

Oh, yes.

He knows that Alana and Prince Manimal are being helped by somebody.

At this point, I re-engage with fascination in this film. And it is in large part due to Cromwell, I mean, Richard Lynch's performance. Because you're just like, this guy is tormenting himself with paranoia and questions of self-worth and all this stuff. Instead of just enjoying his ruthless conquest and everything, he's tormented. And so we follow him. He goes down to the dungeon where he's torturing Prince Micah really ruthlessly.

Yeah, by the way, the guy torturing Prince Manimal, the guy who runs the dungeon, his name is Verdugo. At one point, they're like, come here, Verdugo. Now, here's the thing. Verdugo in Spanish quite literally means torturer and executioner. So, you know, like you're a parent living in the whatever era, the Hyborian era of Conan The Barbarian. That's what the... And you name your child Verdugo, you've really hobbled his chances at furthering himself in life. Honestly, it's my big qualm with a lot of these movies. It's like, okay, so if you're like a space person and you name your child Sinestro, of course, they're going to be a villain. Yes. Of course, they're going to be a villain. Name your child Starwalker, you know, Space Magnet, you know, Grand Lord. Like, don't name your child Ferdugo or Sinestro.

Count Machiavelli.

Machiavelli.

That's a problem.

Okay, sorry, Paul. I didn't mean to die.

So then we finally meet another speaking female character in the form of Cromwell's consort, Elizabeth, who seems to have real concern for his lack of self-care.

Yeah, they actually have a relation to self-care.

She's bringing him food and beverage to make sure he's eating and staying hydrated because, you know, it's very stressful being a tyrant. It is. And then Cromwell shares with her his painful paranoia that he believes Shusha is behind this burgeoning rebellion and that Shusha is alive, believes this, that he was not successful in dispatching him 11 years ago, and that Shusha... This is where I just have to give Cromwell's imagination and also potentially his psychic abilities an enormous credit because he's surmising that maybe Shusha is even hosing as a human.

Oh my god, let's hear this.

There must be someone, a mentor, an advisor, perhaps.

There is no one.

He may not look like a demon. In human form, he could look like anyone, but there'd be traces of a serpent in his face, the wildness of a jackal in his eyes.

You're mad.

Okay, so there is one other speaking role, really, that has of any substance in the Court of Cromwell, and it is Count Machiavelli.

Yes.

Whose skin is all the same color, who seems to have no real coloration.

Who's very serpentine.

Very thin lips.

Has eyes like a jackal. He's perfectly describing. He's literally describing Count Machiavelli.

Yeah, yeah.

But who could he be? Yeah.

Some mentor or advisor.

And I have to say, it's so funny, this scene. So he is sharing this paranoia to Micah, to Manimal, who's being tortured and is in chain and has been flayed. And he's talking to Micah as though he's his therapist. And Micah is like, you're batshit crazy. This is insane because Cromwell is convinced that Micah is in league with Shusha knowingly and knows who Shusha is posing as and where he is. And it's so hilarious because on the one hand, he is implausibly describing reality with a psychic specificity of accuracy that is uncanny and wildly unmotivated. But yet to Micah, he sounds completely unhinged and deranged because Micah has no way of knowing any of this. But here's the thing.

Like literally, he is describing the plot of the movie. He's telling us the twist.

Yeah.

And it was like, you're crazy. It's almost like...

He's giving it away. He's giving it away. Although we all already know the moment we see Pam Machiavelli, it's like, oh.

It's almost like if on Revenge of the Sith, you hear Yoda going, you know, there's like a Sith Lord somewhere. We sense him. He's somewhere. He's in a powerful position. He seems to be running everything. Who could it be? Who could be so powerful? It's like, guys, anyway, it's phenomenal. Now, here's what happens. The next section of this movie, I've described in my notes as rats, tedium, boobs, hippie kissing.

We have to have the rats in the sewer.

So basically Talon, he's going into the castle. I think, I don't even know what's happening in the movie anymore, because Talon's going into the castle to rescue somebody. There's an attack by rats. He gets some of the guards eaten by rats, apparently. And finally, he's in the dungeon to free some rebels or something. And here's the thing, he meets, again, he meets the most convenient human being you could possibly meet in a dungeon. Producer Brad, can you regale us with clip number 10, please?

Who are you?

My name is Istar Devaro. I was once Cromwell's architect. After I built this castle, the king had me imprisoned.

You built this place?

Oh, yes. They threw me in here five years ago to ensure that the castle's secrets would never be revealed.

What secrets?

Oh, hidden passages, secret exits and more, more.

Imagine if in Star Wars, Luke Skywalker, instead of opening Prince Leia's cell, the first cell he opened held Matt Mickelson's character from Rogue One, who said to him, Oh, I have. I totally like put a flaw in the Death Star to destroy. Just come with me.

Yeah, he literally gets handed the Plains of the Death Star on a silver platter, just purely by convenience. And I just have to say, Devereux is played by Patrick O'More, again, another actor worth looking up, incredible career. But Hugh just kills it in this moment, in this scene. That is the most perfectly delivered version of that monologue in any and all realities and universes.

I think you're right. And I think if we were to inherit America Chavez's powers today, we would not find anyone doing this better. And yet, Paul, that is not the greatest line delivery in the history of line deliveries. We have yet to arrive at that. No. And I think as we get closer to it, I think you and I know what it is. But what I want to say is, what's interesting is you can tell this is where they said, we're going to save some money in this sequence and they save their meager budget. Talon sneaks into the castle and goes to a series of rooms filled with naked women. By the way, I want to say one thing. If I'm an evil tyrant and the jury is still out on that, and the architect of my secret stronghold, I want him out of sight so that nobody knows the secrets of my castle. And I'm a guy who has balls enough to suck or stab a demon, right? Why am I imprisoning this guy? Fucking kill him.

Kill the guy. Thank you for bringing this up. So at the very least, you do not put him in with general population in your dungeon. You put him in solitary because you cannot have him share his knowledge. That's the whole point of imprisoning him.

He built the dungeon.

He knows how to get up.

It makes no sense. But thankfully, Cromwell is stupid. And so we get that glorious monologue. Otherwise, we would be deprived.

Stupid because he can't tell that fucking sheath Palpatine is Darth Sidious. He's literally next to you.

Yes.

Oh my God.

But Cromwell is then informed the rebels have escaped. He then leaves and he's like telling a guard to kill everybody. Of course, the guard is Talon in disguise. But meanwhile, we get this twist where his consort, Elizabeth, frees Micah or at least starts freeing Prince Micah, aka Manimal. She's revealing herself to have sympathy for him in the rebellion.

Yes.

He's completely out of the blue because it is. Then Talon helps finish the rescue and escape. He gets them out, brings them to the rebels, then they escape and yes, then Talon has to stay to fight and rescue Alana because he is, I guess, informed at this point that, oh crap, Alana has also been taken prisoner. So his job is not over, which again then affords him the plot excuse and license to then tumble into the topless harem of-

Look, look, look, Paul, Paul, Paul Alvarado-Dykstra, my friend, my good friend, my brother. As a 54-year-old man, and God, I hope you're a 53-year-old man or younger.

Younger.

Younger. God bless you. I know that this is sexist. I know that this is a misogynistic movie. But God damn it if I didn't watch these scenes over and over again on the movie channel when I was, what, 14. Because he literally goes into the topless harem and then he tumbles into where the women, again, either they all know him or they all immediately recognize his virility because they're all swooning over him.

I do have to say the denizens of the harem do seem very happy and content with their place and position in life.

Talon literally flies through a window onto a topless woman. He's on top of her and they kind of have a meet-cute and he kisses her before he leaves and she's okay with that.

She seems very welcoming and willing with that. They just seem to be having a slumber party all day, every day. Yeah, it's a very strange little window into this corner of the world. Pure fantasy and male gaze at the wazoo. It is very short-lived. I guess they couldn't pay all those topless extras for more than a day.

There's a rumor they have the one special concubine, right? Who's like being oiled up or something, right?

Yes. So then he tumbles into another chamber where we find naked Alana being massaged and apparently prepared for her wedding with guards. There actually is a cool moment where their eyes meet and recognize each other. And then he falls backwards out of the window sort of in shock at the sight of her.

And he gets knocked out and captured.

Yeah. He tumbles into a barn and then is surrounded. Then there's the showdown with Cromwell that we think is going to be the... This is also kind of interesting and amusing.

This is very interesting, yes.

We think this is going to be a big epic duel. And Cromwell reveals that he is convinced that Talon is Shusha.

It's Shusha, yes.

And Talon is like... I don't know how or why he thinks that. But I guess just because he's like, oh, this guy has made it through and has survived or whatever. He's the only way he hasn't been killed by my guards.

I'm meeting a new speaking character in this film. This must be him.

He must be Shusha. And Talon is like, what the hell are you talking about? He doesn't have any idea. I don't think he knows, he's ever heard of Shusha. Then they are dueling, they lose their swords, they tumble into a lagoon and then they reveal daggers. They're having this dagger duel in the lagoon, but it is short by none other than Count Machiavelli.

Machiavelli, yeah.

Who knocks out Talon Cold with a rock to the fury of Cromwell, who wanted to have this duel and defeat Shusha, but then realizes, it's just some guy.

Now like Thanos, I'm going to use my Infinity Gauntlet for two things. One of them is I want to stop for a second, because one of the buys that you got to make in this movie, as with every fantasy movie with a huge muscular lead, is that the significantly scrawnier villain is their equal in a sword fight. And you really do get the sense in this that Cromwell could actually fight Talon, which is bullshit, because these two guys... But the other one, now like Thanos, I'm going to close my Infinity Gauntlet, and I'm going to go back in time to the year 1995, in which producer Brad and a young man and a young television writer named Javier Grillo-Marxuach were roommates in a far-off land called Toluca Lake. And producer Brad was working in the staff of a telethon. And producer Brad, will you please, please regale us with the remainder of the story, because as I said, this is the twist.

It's the John Ritter Telethon for Cerebral Palsy, which I did for a number of years. Oh, wow. And the last year, I was actually made a producer of a segment called Pledge Host. And it's a segment we would send to local stations if they didn't have their own live segment when the big show went dark. And they would bring in these celebrities to host it. And I'm on the set, it's dark, the new changeover is happening and new host is coming in, and it's Shelly Taylor Morgan. Then she comes to me in the dark, I say to her, Hi, I'm Brad, have you been to makeup yet? Because we have very little time. And she looks at me and she says, Honey, never say that to a woman who's been to makeup. So I'm petrified because I've made a horrible mistake. And so my brain goes back to I saw her credit list, she was in The Sword and the Sorcerer. So I say to her, Hey, you were in The Sword and the Sorcerer, one of my favorite movies, who were you in that? I'm going to save the day, I'm going to make myself look good. And she looks at me and she says, do you remember the scene where Lee Horsley is running through the castle? I go, oh yeah. And he's being chased by all the goons. I go, yeah. And he grabs the chandelier and he swings across the courtyard. I go, yeah, I remember that. And then she goes, and he lands on top of the topless woman. I go, yeah. She goes, that was me. She toyed with me.

Also, she didn't get the plot of the movie right, but we'll talk more about that later.

But at that time she was known for E, she was on Pure Soap, that Soap recap show.

Well, there you go, Bradley. One of our great crossings with the world of The Sword and the Sorcerer, I might add.

My only crossing. Oh, I take it back. I worked with Richard Lynch on a lower-budget movie than this.

Oh, yes. Was that the movie directed by Yorgo Ogdenovsky?

Yes, the former karate champion of Eastern Europe.

And what was that movie called, Brad?

It had a couple names. One was Warrior of Justice. One was Invitation to Die.

Invitation to Die. That's what I remember. Producer Brad has a long and checkered history of work. But anyway, so Producer Brad insulted the topless woman on whom Talon lands. That is the headline.

Wow.

Now, Paul, the juggernaut that is the Sword and the Sorcerer continues to chug along in spite of our digression.

Yes, cut to morning. And Prince Micah's torture is continuing, even after he's been rescued because-

Prince Manimal is a very sturdy man.

Yes, because the duplicitous consort of Cromwell, Elizabeth, is meticulously and very painfully cleaning the wounds of his flayed back as we are told that conveniently for our plot elucidation, that Alana is to marry Cromwell that night, and Talon is going to be crucified. And I'm like, oh, holy shit.

Wow, that's extreme.

That seems a little harsh.

And not only is he going to be crucified as the centerpiece of a banquet between all the kings in which we find out that Cromwell is actually planning to- Keep the problem with Cromwell. He wants to marry the woman in front of all the kings to get legitimacy, but he's also planning to assassinate everybody.

We don't know that yet, but yes, we'll get to that, which is quite a whole thing. Then, at intermittent points in the film, I'm puzzled by so many things. It's hard to keep track of. But one that recurs persistently, unabated, is the moment we're introduced to adult Talon after the whole prologue, we're also introduced to his band of merry men led by Joe Regalbuto.

Joe Regalbuto.

But then we don't see them. Then they're gone from the moment that Talon rescues Alana for the first time with his leg of cow. We don't see them. We don't hear of them. There's no reference to them. We don't have any idea where did his band of brothers go, who by the way would have been incredibly helpful at every plot, twist and turn. And it kind of seems like the whole reason you have a band of married men is for such instances and occasions.

I think when you look at the resume for one of your married men, the first thing should be experienced Castle Stormer. That means like, totally.

So the whole movie, there's just this weird, inexplicable void of them.

Talent. Oh, no, wait, of them. Sorry.

And it's not explained at all. And I just, it's so frustrating to me throughout the movie. And then we finally, finally get the revelation. This late in the film, where have they been all this time?

Where? Where have they been?

Of course. They've been at the brothel.

Of course.

Yeah, the brothel.

And Joe Regalbuto, who is, let's say, occupied.

I was gonna say magisterial, but fine, occupied plot. Why, sure.

But anyway, but anyway.

They've been at the brothel.

And interrupted by news that Talon has been captured and is going to be crucified. That seems to finally be sufficiently compelling incentive and motivation to get their attention, that maybe we should help them out. And then in one of the great reveals and character introductions.

Oh, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Before we do this.

Yes.

Because I think you're about to do the greatest line in the history of all line. I mean, it's ever told. Raquel Budo, now he's been in a brothel for the entirety of this film with all of the Merry Men.

Presumably, yes.

News is given to him that his buccaneer, rogue, slave, general boss has been taken by the king and is to be crucified as the centerpiece of a banquet. And here's his response. Shall we hear clip 11, producer Brad?

Well, did you find him?

King hasn't been changed. What'll he do now?

Have at one of the king's sluts?

Alrighty then. Loyalty.

Yeah, wow.

The messaging in this film is just so positive and so just inspiring.

There's a version of this movie that I think could be made. Go on.

I want to hear the rest of this.

That would instead model positive masculinity.

Yes, positive masculinity. If it even exists.

I cling to the belief that this is possible, as challenging as it might be. It's moments like this that I yearn for it. Because I can't help but think, again, there's a whole question of media and influence and how much of it is a mirror and how much of it is a influence and blah, blah, blah. But there is so much of this attitude and behavior that's modeled in this era, in this period. I can't help but wonder how our world would be different. If it had not been so.

How would it be different if Gloria Steinem had created Dungeons and Dragons instead of Gary Gygax or Gygax, right? Is that what we're saying?

I wouldn't even necessarily go that far, but you present a tantalizing thought experiment. But Paul, this is the world we're in.

This is all stalling. This is all just us tap dancing. Because right now in front of us, and perhaps we're averting our eyes from it, much as one with the sun or the face of God, is the greatest character introduction and line delivery ever because at the brothel, there is also a band of pirates. Yes, who are brotheling. There's about 20 of them because Joe Regal Budo is worried that they don't have enough men to go get Talon out of it. But it turns out that because Talon is known everywhere, these pirates know him.

Yes.

They have worked with him and they're ready to leave the women they're fucking to save him and their leader is introduced to us. Is there anything else I can say? Like Olivier, I think died because he heard this line delivery and knew he could never match it.

Now, contextualized by all my criticisms and concerns and judgments of this film.

Yes.

I will agree with you in all earnestness that a strong case can be made. That this may indeed be at least among.

Among.

The greatest introductions of a character on screen in film history.

I am right there with you, brother. Okay. Producer Brad, let's hear clip number 12, please.

Who are you?

Captain Morgan, or cohort of Talons?

How many are you?

We number only 20.

Surely not enough to aid you. Blast you, Eric.

Spread the word of Talon's plight.

Half the sea dogs in this port owe their lives to him.

Now go.

Okay. In high school, literally, and producer Brad will attest to this, my friend John Corey and I literally would regularly say to each other, Blast you, Eric. Spread the word of Talon's plight.

There's so many colors that I want to paint this with praise. first of all, setting aside the fact that the screenwriters could not be bothered to come up with a more original name for the character than Captain Morgan for the pirate.

Literally, a black man, he's got a weird wig made of, he doesn't seem to have dreadlocks, it seems to be a wig of dreadlocks, right?

It is clearly his hair has been cursed by some sea witch at some point.

Yeah, he's wearing a loincloth and has pecks the size of softness.

He is jacked. Like, this guy is a feast of beefcake that arises on screen, the likes of which we have seen nothing approaching for the duration of the film.

Even Talon is a little bit on the side of more Don Draper than Arnold Schwarzenegger side. I mean, he's like a 2023 body from a Marvel movie put in a 1982 movie.

Yes, and to underline the muscular definition that he is bestowed with and bestows upon us.

Yes, he does indeed.

He stands next to a shirtless Joe Regalbuto.

Regalbuto, yeah.

Let's just say he has many fine talents and attributes.

So many.

But his physique is far, far, far away from them. And it is hilarious.

Literally, Regalbuto, like literally left Arts Deli and got in costume barely. I think he found a vest and he got in here, you know. And Earl Maynard, who plays this character, and sadly, this was his last credit. He's got a lot of sort of Blacksploitation movies, like Badingo and, you know, Truck Turner, Black Belt Jones, you know. But I think like now his performance is so over the top, is so like, you know, theatrical. I mean, he literally stepped into a production of something far more highfalutin than this. And he is in his own movie. And I don't know what his accent is. I don't know if he's playing, is he playing Jamaican, Paul?

I don't know. But what I do know is, he has the most exquisite enunciation.

Yes.

And I don't know where it comes from. I don't know what's motivating it, but it is clearly a choice he is making as an actor. And he is just brilliant. This new hero who has his own, who feels like he's stepping out of his own franchise. He so is.

Oh my God. Like the Captain Morgan movie would be, and where everybody talks like him so that it's actually, it all makes sense.

He's cooler than anyone we've seen in this movie. He just thrives onto the screen with complete assurance and confidence and he owns it.

Now look, his performance is big and it is, some people might call it so bad it's good. You know?

Those people are fools.

They're fools. I think this performance is so great. And my God, I feel like there's a couple of people in this movie who I feel understood the assignment.

You know?

And Richard Lynch is one of them. I think George Maharris is one of them, truthfully. I think he actually plays Count Snakey-Avely really well.

I go Machiavelli, yeah.

Yeah, I go Machiavelli snake face. I think that actually Alana does a very good job. I actually think Lee Horsley is fine in this movie. I enjoy his work in this film, but wow. I mean, I feel like somebody said to Earl Maynard, like this is a fucking fantasy movie. This is your chance to play Lear. And he fucking brings it in a way that is so theatrical and big and overblown and confident and badass. I just, I love it.

And you brought up the important context of his career. And again, knowing this is a black actor in 1982, and if you look at the roles that he's been given up until this point, and this is literally the cherry on top. This is the capstone of his acting career. He is getting to step into a genre that is not usually welcoming to people of color in terms of what awaits them if they're even allowed entry. And it almost feels like the entire runtime of the movie, he has just been quietly off screen warming up and getting ready. Like, let me in, coach. Let me in. And it's just the best part of the movie to me. Seeing him arrive and seize the mantle of this role with such gleeful exuberance, it's wonderful. It's the supercharging nitro injection that this movie needs.

That this movie needs. No, you're absolutely right. His performance just makes me so happy.

Yeah. We also were regaled with the architect in his monologue. I wonder, given the actor's advanced age, did he die at this point in production? Because now would be a convenient time to have the architect help us figure out how to get into the castle. But instead, conveniently, we have the consort, ex-consort of Cromwell Elizabeth, who offers to take them into the castle, and she wants to go with them, but they're like, no, it's too dangerous. So she just is going to tell them, and that seals her fate unknowingly.

This also leads to the best, what I call a Gilligan cut.

Yes.

Now, a Gilligan cut in Gilligan's Island is where the skipper is saying, I'm not wearing the chicken costume. I'll never wear the chicken costume. Then he go, beep, beep, and then he's in the chicken costume going, I'm wearing the chicken costume. But you'd never see any of the maneuvering, the battle, anything that happened between his saying no and then getting on the chicken costume. So in this movie, the concubine comes in and says, I'll lead you into the castle, and do we see a great storming of a castle? Do we see a great fight? Do we see Joe Regalbuto and Captain Morgan kicking ass and taking names before they are tragically taken? No. We literally go from, we say we're absolutely going to follow her into the castle to, boop, boop, boop. Clip number 13, producer Brad.

We should never have followed that bitch in here.

So literally, literally, come with me.

Boop, boop, boop.

Everyone's behind bars. They all got caught.

We didn't see the battle.

It's fine.

It's hilarious. It's kind of ruined by the reprise of Joe Regalbuto's misogyny. That seems excessive at this point. But yeah, they're all captured. And then this hulking guard saunters onto the green mile of the dungeon. And I don't think we have this clip, but Captain Morgan has this great line that I appreciate even as holically challenged as I am, where he says, What's on your mind, potato head? To the guard, to the bald guard. It just cracks me up. The guard demands to know who sent them, which kind of seems not that important. And then I also captured Elizabeth and some other hapless guy. I don't even know that we know who this other guy is.

Yeah, Elizabeth is a concubine. Yeah.

Has already cut off her tongue, he says.

Yeah. No, he's very mean. Yeah.

And threatens to kill her if the prisoners don't reveal information that seems wholly unnecessary. Right. Instead, she seizes the dagger and does not stab the guard, which seemed to be the logical course of action. She instead stabs herself, kills herself, dies.

I mean, a misguided act of heroism, but an act of heroism nonetheless, I suppose.

Of noble sacrifice, heroic sacrifice, if a little misjudged. Then we hope that maybe this opens up Joe Regal Butoh's heart a little bit and softens his misogynist disdain for women.

No, it doesn't.

We don't get that payoff. Then we cut to Machiavelli meeting with Cromwell's generals in the most unsubtle way. And now we get the reveal of the plot to kill all the guests at Cromwell's extortion wedding to Alana.

So Cromwell wants to have it always. He wants to marry the princess and be recognized as legitimate. But at the same time, he's invited all the kings to the banquet. And he plans on putting his archers on the mezzanine to kill them all after she says, I do. I mean, give him a few minutes to like at least hail him or something. I don't know, but he's just going to get them all killed.

I don't understand this, but it doesn't at this point, it's like it's beyond understanding. The wedding ceremony commences on a balcony. And I have to say the staging of this whole sequence of the wedding and the banquet and everything, it is really impressive in terms of conceptualizing and designing the architecture and logistics of the drama that is going to unfold. I really appreciate it. So there's this big banquet hall where all these guests are in, then there's this balcony overseen, and we know the archers and guards are going to be positioned, fire death down on them. And then at the front is this proscenium where they're going to have the wedding on the balcony overseeing it, the central balcony, but then beneath it is the crucified Talon on display like Han Solo in Carmonite.

He's in a St. Andrew's Cross, which already tells me someone on this show visited the Stockroom LA. If you get it, you get it. If you don't, you don't. And what's really interesting is because, you know, he's been crucified. I thought it would be more like a Jesus Cross. It's a St. Andrew's Cross, whatever. It's fine. It's the Cross. And he's the centerpiece of the banquet that all the kings are in.

Yes.

But he's the entertainment.

His crucifixion is not the most appetizing thing to display.

No. Although Lee Horsley's shirtless and bloodied is, and he's got a gag, which is funny. Paul, what is it about gags in movies? They put a strip of cloth around your mouth and suddenly you can't enunciate or breathe. I don't get it.

I don't know. But as we're entering this sequence, after hearing the plot and now seeing the staging of it, the only thing I can think of and I can't concentrate on anything else is how glaringly obvious this movie at this moment screams to us that this was a formative experience for George RR. Martin watching this sequence. Because this is the Red Wedding.

This is the Red Wedding?

This is the-

Oh my God, Becky. I never thought of that. Oh my God.

It is the literal prototype of the Red Wedding. It's inescapable. There's no universe in which you can't draw that line. And there's no way, knowing how much of a fantasy geek George RR. Martin is, that he did not watch this movie over and over and over and over. And that the Red Wedding is an homage to The Sword and the Sorcerer.

There is literally now a Gilligan cut where he's going, never saw it. Paul, there's two things about the scene that struck me as and I think that you are absolutely right. And it had nuts because the archers it had never, it never occurred to me.

But here's the thing.

There's also a cleric conducting a wedding ceremony in this movie. And there's no way that you can see a wedding. Like I'm literally writing a wedding ceremony scene in a fantasy show I'm working on right now. And even pitching it to the rest of the staff.

It was like, and then the guy says, marriage, love, true love.

The Princess Bride has spoiled retroactively and proactively every marriage scene in a fantasy movie ever. Right?

Yeah, it is the strange position of Princess Bride and the Red Wedding in Game of Thrones that are combined. I also just have to say, Alana's bridal outfit is exquisite. The costuming in this film, while wildly erratic and clearly constrained by budget and schedule, has bursts of brilliance where the costume designer, I think, shows very wisely where to focus their resources, time and attention and Alana's wedding regalia is one of them. I think it's gorgeous. Absolutely just fantastic. Then we cut to wenches, for lack of a better term, entering the dungeon to free the rebels, to save Talon. There's no explanation for why they do this, how they know to do this, but it just is a plot convenience. It's like, okay, fine, we need to free them, whatever. Then we get Captain Morgan shoving Potato Head, the guard, into a grindstone that rips off the flesh of his face off camera, just spurting blood everywhere. It's quite a moment. Then we get to cut back to the wedding, and of course we've got all this set up, all the pieces of the puzzle or chest pieces are in place. Choose your metaphor. As Princess Alana is struggling and straining, but about to say, I do, because she knows she has no choice. And as the archers are about to shoot all the guests, Talon, in a payoff of the setup of the prologue from his childhood, when his hand was impaled on a tree by an arrow, summons the will and the muscle to fight through the pain and free...

Un-crucify himself...

.dressed an impaled hand free of the St. Andrew's Cross, as the guests rise up, because some of them, these visiting dignitaries and royals, have recognized that, oh, that's Talon. And they owe Talon for some things that he's done in other movies that don't exist. And the guests rise up, the rebels attack, the plot is thwarted, and then we get a glorious, slow motion battle montage.

Oh my God, well, first of all, before you do that, though, I gotta say something, okay? Please just bear with me. You know how we have said that Talon, though he's done very little in the movie, other than getting knocked out by a rock in the middle of a fight, he's known by everybody. He's the biggest badass in the world. And his reputation, before he even uncrucifies himself, just as Alana is about to say, I do, right? One of the kings in the banquet recognizes him and realizes what's happening. And let's hear clip number 14, producer Brad.

Well, it is him. How can that be? Last I heard he was chieftain of the Black Tribes, helping them to overthrow some slave.

We owe that man too much for them to die like some dog at the hands of Cromwell.

Yes, but the treaty. Damn the treaty. There'd be no kingdoms at all if it weren't for him. It's filming home.

Very well.

Okay, so literally, the world owes its existence to Talon. The political system of this land apparently owes its existence to Talon how? I don't know. But that means that now Talon literally has just by virtue of existing and his reputation gotten allies for the coming fight.

And again, it's one of the strange schizophrenic struggles of the film that we are gifted this grand exposition that expands and enriches the world of the film and the mythology and backstory of the characters. Yet everyone is still ignoring, even though they know that's Talon, that Talon is heir to the throne. He's the prince. heir to the throne. King Richard, why is no one mentioning this? Why is that not figuring into the plot?

And his name was Talon when he was the son of the king.

Yes, it's not like he changed. Exactly, exactly.

No, he went into total Ben Kenobi exile, you know?

It is madness.

It is insane.

It is just absolutely insane. The other thing is, it's the sword and the sorcerer. We got teased with this badass harpoon sword in the...

Haven't seen it yet.

Where the hell has it been? It's been gone. Finally!

Wait, wait, wait. But Paul, Paul, you're so excited by this film that...

This stuff is actually finally happening.

You need to stop and smell the roses because when Talon uncrucifies himself as he does, he proceeds to look up as there's still a spike in his hand and shout. Now, Paul, I think that this is gonna become my standard greeting just when I see anybody, you, my parents, Brad, all the... I mean, wow. It's epic, and I just love it, and it's just...

I can't help but think, given the way this is staged and edited and performed, that everyone involved felt this is the dramatic fulcrum of the film.

It really is.

This is an utterance of heroic exclamation. That is going to echo for eternity as an iconic line and moment of cinema that has been largely, tragically, forgotten and ignored, and never penetrated the culture to the degree that it demands in this moment.

And Paul, especially because it leads to the greatest thing I've ever... I mean, a moment of pure cinema that rivals Coyones Cotsie, really. Because this film does not have the budget to show us the majesty of this brawl that's about to take place in this great hall that they've built, because they probably spent all the money building the set, we cut to a slow-mo montage of Talon in his loincloth kicking ass. And the montage is in slow motion, and it consists of there's a lot of smoke rising everywhere. You can't see a lot of the set.

And red filters.

You can't see.

And red filters. Percata magenta, red filter, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, it's very theatrical. I mean, it's very festive, too. And he's always in the center of the frame. So it's almost like they said, don't worry, just kick the ass of whoever we throw at you. So it's literally Talon sort of standing in the center of the frame, punching people, somebody else comes up and he punches them or he maybe hits them with something or he grabs a prop and hits a guy. And he literally is sort of always in the same place in the frame. So it just looks like they just shot it in about a half hour. And it is very well lit, very theatrically lit, lots of smoke, lots of magenta. And it is accompanied by the following score, which I'm going to play for you in its entirety without dialogue. Producer Brad, may we please hear clip 16. It just keeps going, and it's just slo-mo of Lee Horsley. Every once in a while, they throw a shamp out of him, and he punches him, and then he grabs a goblet and hits another guy. It's slow motion while there's music. And by the way, the greatest thing about this music is how, after the swelling strings, the triumphant trumpets come in on the high end to really bring it home.

And we would be remiss if we didn't mention that the score is by David Whitaker. Clearly, I think this is the high point of his career. It is definitely a score that elevates the film and really aspires to a better film than it gets the score.

I actually think it's a really fun score. And I do make fun of it because the scene is so shoddily staged and yet the music is literally giving it its all. And that contradiction ups the cheese factor so highly.

Again, the score and the narration feel attached to another movie. A much better, bigger, grander or sweeping, epic, meaningful, moving movie than the one it is doomed to be attached to.

And the thing about this movie, Paul, is I feel like anywhere from 60 to 40% of the people making this movie felt it in their bones, like it was the most important thing they'd ever do. But the other 40 to 60% literally were just phoning it out.

Like it's a job.

It's not even like it's a job. It's like they're kind of ashamed of it. And maybe just like it's a job, maybe they're not ashamed.

I don't know. They're probably, I will say, from a screenwriting standpoint, there are many moments that are objectively phoning it in. For example, we finally get the moment where Darius reunites, Dora La Buta reunites with Talon.

Yes.

And like R2-D2 in Return of the Jedi.

Yes, indeed.

Has Talon's sword. Finally. It's being carried on his back. He reunites Talon with his sword. But this makes no fucking sense. So he's been in the dungeon. He was captured. He didn't have the sword with him at any moment. We've never seen him with the sword. It just appears magically on his back when he needs to reunite it with Talon.

The sword that Talon's father gave him when commanding him to avenge his life.

It's just, oh, there it is again. It's finally like it's the Deus ex-sword. It's infuriating and it's stupid.

But there is one thing is that when Joe Regalbuto throws the sword and it flies through the air in slow motion, there are two great swords flying through the air in slow motion moments in the cinema of the 1980s in Sword & Sorcery movies. There's when Percival throws Excalibur back to the Lady of the Lake in Excalibur. You see the sword flying over a black background. It's very imagistic, very beautiful. You're hearing Wagner playing in the background. Then there's this, in which the sword is this three-bladed, completely unwieldy, completely unusable weapon, just flies the air in slow motion to be caught by Talon. As the fight continues, so Talon goes after Cromwell and as the fight continues, Talon grabs the sword and he literally, there are three or four men protecting Cromwell and Talon, slashes through their swords and breaks all of them with the rocket-powered sword.

We also see him wielding the sword now red with blood, that he has spilled from the guards that he has been fighting through to get to Alana. Then at this point, McKelley is-

Snake Aveli?

Let's just say not so subtly, first he's kind of guiding Cromwell and Alana to a safe exit with guards, then they get cornered and confronted by Talon, then there's this fight, whatever, blah, blah. Rodrigo joins the fight. We haven't mentioned Rodrigo yet.

Rodrigo, but apparently there's a Latinx character here.

One of the rebels, and I know we're running long, but I just have to mention Rodrigo, who's the best warrior of the rebels and very earnest in his attitude throughout, is played by Anthony DeLongas, who I actually worked with on a movie called Secondhand Lions. He was our sword master for the Flashback scenes. He has got this incredible resume of stunt and sword and fighting. He did whip training for Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman in Batman Returns. He's done tons of badass, cool shit, and also as a working actor has shown up time and time again, playing heavies and characters that then need to fight or whatever. But he is like a character out of a movie because he is a real swordsman and sword fighter and treats this discipline with such reverence and care and respect in terms of the legacy of cinematic sword fighting that he has been entrusted with to carry forward. And it's a delight to see him here in his youth.

It's always fun to see like there's a guy named Pat Roach, right? Pat Roach is always the big guy that Indiana Jones fights. He's the big guy in Temple of Doom in the Temple, and he's the German at the Flying Wing, you know? And he's also a stuntman, and he's one of these guys that, you know, sort of crosses that. He looks like Vic Armstrong, you know, also one of the greatest stuntmen of all time. And you see him playing characters sometimes in a movie. You see him playing like being in stunts. But it's just you kind of get to know these people who are part of this highly technical part of filmmaking. And they're kind of heroic in their own way, aren't they?

Yeah. And underappreciated. But I just wanted to give him a little tip of the hat here, because he is, he has a small part, but it's delightful. And clearly he's very involved in all the fight stuff and sword play that does enliven the proceedings of this film, briefly. But then we got to get to the catacombs.

Well, you got to get to the catacombs because there in LA there's caves. You got to go to a cave.

So under the semi-distraction of them, this fight that's ensuing on the stairwell and foyer, whatever, McKelley slyly leads Alana away from Cromwell, down into the catacombs. And it just seems implausible that she can in any way trust him at any point because she still thinks that he is working with the Rebellion, even though he's the one who betrayed Micah to the Rebellion. But apparently she's not aware of that.

Not everybody knows everything, no.

And just not aware of his general evil vibe. Like, it just seems wild. And so he's leading her down the catacombs. Micah comes up, he tells her that Micah is dead and that then now he wants her to submit to him and that he's revealing his plot that he's going to slay Cromwell and seize power. And it's, again, it's obvious that, of course, this guy's Susha. Like, we know this at this point. Everyone in this movie is stupid. She then pulls for the third time, because third time's the charm, her textbook trick, where she then turns from recoiling and rejecting him to feigning submission and romantic interest to then knee him in the crotch. But, plot twist, there's like a thunk.

Hollow wooden sound. Which either he's wearing a cot piece or he's just got hollow wooden stuff. I don't know.

It has no effect on him.

Because.

Then she tries again. Which I think is great. Because she's just like, wait a minute. This always, this always works. This is my thing. And I know this works. Why is it not working? She does it again. Nothing. And then we get nothing. The great reveal and transformation of McKelley.

The crowing kick somehow triggers his return to form. And Paul, I have this transformation locked in memory because he's basically wearing the Machiavelli skin and he's Shusha underneath. And between the skin and the Machiavelli skin and the body of Shusha, there is just a layer of petroleum and caviar, it seems. And it's so gory. And I love it because he literally peels off his skin and comes out of Machiavelli skin, but he's literally in a kind of, like just covered in this shit. It's sort of incredible.

Shusha has a serious goo issues. There's lots of goo going on. With him at every turn. And this is a glorious transformation sequence as he sheds Machiavelli's skin to the floor. It is so gross and awesome. Alana is just like freaking out and tries to escape. But of course he is apparently the Sorcerer. I still am like, he's this, he's this monster demon. This is, okay, fine.

You don't think he's a Sorcerer?

Fine. I mean, Sorcerers do Sorcery. And we have not seen him really do Sorcery stuff.

Dude, you are so, no, you're being so parochial, dude. It's like, you know, they don't all have to wear pointed hats and have ropes. You know, Sorcerers come in all forms, dude. You got to like, you got to be less, no, you're editing a little.

And I get like, I get the whole-

Well, I mean, that's not true.

And I get his whole disguise, he in human flesh clearly was a cop through sorcery. Fine. But okay, he's the freaking sorcerer. Then he has the power to immobilize her with his glowing red fingertips. Yes.

And actually, the first time we saw the glowing red fingertips is when he rips that woman's heart out at the very beginning. And now we're seeing it come back and he's going to use it to rip people's hearts out. He likes doing that. And also, Paul, when it happened the first time, all I could do was sing glow finger. I don't know why. I'm sorry.

Missed opportunity.

So somehow Talon winds up in the catacombs to see.

first Cromwell arrives and is quickly neutralized and immobilized by Shusha, again, using his glow finger. Then Talon arrives. Same thing happens to him. But because Talon is a hero who's actually a villain, we have to believe he's a hero, he summons the will. I mean, he was able to uncrucify himself.

So no wonder everybody's so impressed with him. My God, Ace Hunter can do this.

So even under the power of the dark side of the force that Shusha is using.

This guy is literally Palpatine and Mullah Rahm put together. He doesn't even have to put his hand in your chest to rip out your heart.

Yes, it's very, very efficient.

Okay, sorry. I'm movie drunk, Paul.

Yeah, no, this is it all. It's all coming together in the catacombs. He is able to barely like move the sword, like just to kind of point in Shusha's direction, just like bit by bit. He's struggling, he's straining. Just a little, little, little, yeah. So then he can harpoon Shusha with the sword and take him down. Meanwhile, there's this big ass snake. Is it a boa constrictor? Is it a python? I don't know my snakes well enough.

It's interesting. So my son, can I digress for a moment?

Please, please.

My son has become sort of an amateur herpetologist and I watch a lot of snake documentaries of them and his favorite ones are called The World's Deadliest Snakes and they're narrated by an actor named Grant McPavish who plays a role in The Witcher, the show on which I write and I've actually put a hundred dollar bounty on The Witcher, on any writer who can get Grant McPavish to say the line, a monstrous amount of venom. But I'm going to go on the record because of my learning at the feet of Grant McPavish's narration of nature documentaries that this is a reticulated Python. I don't know if it is, but that's all I know.

I am so grateful for every facet of this knowledge that you have shared. first of all, Grant McTavish, amazing voice for narration and just a magnificent form of a man. So the big ass snake is crawling all over Alana, looking to probably choke the life out of her.

Or maybe rape her because it's a fantasy movie and she's a whoop.

Yeah, there are also shots that imply there's something like that going on, that's just really messed up. Then Cromwell rises because now Jusha has been knocked out, so his glow finger powers have dissipated. Cromwell now rises up to face Talon, and we're finally going to get this big duel. Talon, in an inexplicable gesture of honor, fires away his remaining harpoon shot into a killer.

So that he may fight Richard Cromwell.

Then they fight, and then there's this duel with a lot of purple sparks.

Before we get to the purple sparkly duel, because that is just the centerpiece of this film. When he fires the blade, what does King Richard...

King Cromwell.

Cromwell's response to seeing the blade fired. May we please see our producer, Brad, clip 18.

Sly sword.

Sly sword. Finally, an acknowledgement that the sword's pretty cool.

And so at this point, still, in this duel, until the end of the duel, Cromwell has no idea who Talon is. But Talon, in this whole movie, knows who Cromwell is. He's the man that should be the focus of his motivation, as opposed to betting Elana, which is revenge for Cromwell slaying his parents. So this duel, I'll let you talk about whatever, because it takes all these twists and turns of blades being broken. Talon's sword has shattered the remaining blade. And to be fair, the sword from the get-go has looked really flimsy.

Flimsy, yeah. This does not seem like a usable prop.

Then he detaches a short sword from the hilt of the shattered sword to continue fighting. And then Cromwell does some switcheroo with a weapon of staff that then blades emerge from. I don't quite understand that.

first of all, the great part of the duel is that every time their swords clash, there's a purple spark. I don't know if that is a visual quality of this particular cave. If it's Albert Peele, let us know that this is the important duel. It really becomes a tone poem, doesn't it, Paul? But what I want to say is like, as we get to the end of this duel, right? Talon wins by doing something that ordinarily villains do in the movie. Yes, the switcheroo. Right? The villain always has the hidden blade in their gauntlet. Like the duel between Fade Routha and Paul Atreides at the end of Dune. It is Fade Routha who has the hidden blade that is going to kill Paul, you know? It's always the good guy has to figure out a way of getting around the hidden blade, isn't it, Saul?

The juxtaposition of this twist from the duel opening with Talon throwing away his advantage, ejecting the remaining harpoon blade to ostensibly have a fair honorable fight, was clearly just a misdirect because this whole time he's conveniently had, and by the way, think of all the occasions during the course of this film where this secret retractable wrist blade could have been incredibly useful and could have saved him from any number of traps and incidents and crucified like all of this. But oh, suddenly, Dayu's wrist retractable blade, he reveals this secret weapon and stabs Cromwell to save himself and to finally dispatch his nemesis.

And he goes, I am Talon, son of King Richard. So he knows he's the heir to this land, but he doesn't want to be because he's been a rogue.

Yeah, Cromwell's dying words are, who are you? He has to know who finally defeats. And we get the revelation. Talon does seem to ignore the existence of his mother, who was also slain by Cromwell. But, but saying, you know, son of Richard, as in King Richard, again, reminding us he's the goddamn prince. He's the heir to the throne of Adab, land of cheese. Right. And yet, whatever.

Yeah, it's fine.

Yeah. But he has more important concerns because of the freaking Python that's having its way with Alana. He has to save Alana. And again, using now his new favorite toy, the wrist blade to violently decapitate the snake, which strangely jettisons like three chunks of snakehead meat or something in a shot that I don't understand the physics of that.

In defense of the hidden gauntlet sword, I will say that RoboCop did dispatch of Clarence Botecker that way in not a dissimilar circumstance, where he is pinned down. So maybe a hero can have a hidden blade if he's pinned down.

Yeah, as a last resort, as a self-defense. But yeah, he's a villain, but also stupid that he has forgotten to use that on all these other occasions. Then finally, Talon has saved Alana from the python. They gaze into each other's eyes and we get what I have to just... Chefs Kiss this movie to a legitimately great, stupid jump scare, which is then popping into frame.

Yes.

Like a rabid groundhog is Jusha, who's still not dead. Jusha. Pops up into frame.

Still not dead.

Talon, again, with his now wrist blade, which again, you're like, wow, he's getting a lot of use of it now. He's making up for a lost time. Of course, stabs him dead, presumably for real for this time.

Well, I do think that this movie elegantly handles the boss battle problem, because the problem here is who's the boss battle? You know, Jusha, the evil that can literally rip your heart out, or Richard, who is strangely as good a swordsman as Talon, even though he's a much scrawnier man. I think that they actually handled it well by having, you know, first, you kind of defeat one boss, you defeat the other, but then you defeat the first. So no one boss seems bossier than that. I think that was actually quite elegant, Paul.

I admire the twists and turns of this whole sequence. I also just relish the idea that through this entire movie, Talon has no idea who Jusha is, what the hell his problem is, what's he want, where does he come from? He's like, this is other creepy crazy guy trying to kill us all. I better kill him too.

But we have not played Clip 17, which explains how they... Basically, Talon arrives, sees Jusha, and we have the following exchange. I'm so sorry, producer Brad, that we missed Clip 17. Go ahead, let's hear it.

I have no quarrel with you. Out of my way. Now we have the quarrel.

Yes. Yes. But that's all he knows. That's all he knows about Jusha. It's like, he's just trying to save Alana and kill Cromwell for killing his parents. And then there's this freaky demon sorcerer guy out of nowhere. And he's like, well, I don't want to fight. I don't want to fight you.

Now we have a quarrel, I guess we have a quarrel.

I think that there was a greater opportunity for comedy by that wrinkle of the plot that we were left wanting. Now we come back to again, another great shot post carnage of the Red Wedding Banquet Hall. There's this pan across just all these bodies and slain people. And from out of frame from above because Micah is there, the prince, returned to the whatever, and Talon tosses Cromwell's stolen crown onto his head from above. And then, of course, we get everyone chanting Talon, because again, everyone knows who he is. But again, it's like so good.

He's so good at it.

But he's the prince. What is happening? He's the actual prince. It makes no sense. Then, OK, so he's rescued Alana. Alana is now kind of swooning for Talon, like is actually thinking like, oh, this guy's pretty cool. He's pulled it off. He saved the day. He saved me. Like she's been faking interest in these horrible men. And she now seems to actually have found someone that she can have genuine interest in, in Talon. I think then she says to him, correct me if I'm wrong, don't we have some business to attend to? Because she is now eager to make payment.

Eager.

And he says that we do. And you're like, oh my God, they're now going to pair up? Like, like, but like romantically now, we're actually going to get. Yep.

Do the thing. I never believed that. I thought he's just going to have the one over there.

And he's an heir and she's a princess. And now, like, I kind of would kind of like it if Manimal gets like shoved to the side and it's like, oh, not going to happen. But we get this glorious romantic flourish of him hoisting her over his shoulder, swings off the balcony on a banner with her over the banquet hall and the cheering masses of everyone he has helped lead and save. And then we cut to, he rides off into the sunset, not with Alana, but with his band of merry men. You fucking moron! What? Standby, King! She's lovely!

She wants to fuck you!

I'm like, this is the worst ending I've ever seen in my life.

The thing is, is that Talon is a buccaneer and a rogue and a slave and a king and a general. And look, he can't be pinned down, my friend. He's a roving man. And he says to his men the following, Britisher Brad Regalus with Clip 19, the final line of the movie.

What do you want?

I want to ride with you.

Well then, that's for you. With a battle at the office.

Kingdoms to save and women to love. Kingdoms to save and women to love.

I don't think he knows what love means, because you don't get it very twisted. I think he wants to have sex with women, not to love them.

Talk about learning the wrong lessons.

Yeah, right.

We got battles to wage kingdoms to save and women to love. But if he loves her, he should probably stay with her.

I don't know.

That's what happened to me.

I...

I don't know.

I hate this so much. I hate this so much. It would be one thing. It would be a glorious and wonderful thing. If the big twisted reveal was, this ending was a great homoerotic anthem and that he was choosing what his heart truly wants, which is the love of other men.

It kind of is that anyway, because they're never going to...

It kind of is that.

They're never going to love a woman. He's going to always love his men and go ride with them, so...

But on the other hand, I'm like, you know, Elana dodged a bullet in life.

Kind of like when Ace Hunter blew up versus Combata's helicopter and still went to the date in London with her after having blown up her conveyance. I think that, you know, I think both women ducked a bullet. I think that's the ultimate lesson of this movie.

They should form a support group.

A support group. Not a support group, but a group of triumphant women who ducked.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

She got his best, because that's all he can give a woman, and then he's gone. He has to deal with him boozing and, you know, whoring. Producer Brad, how did this movie do when it opened?

Well, first, remember this movie ends with, Talon will return in The Tales of the empire, and it took until 2012 for that to happen.

Now, Producer Brad, out of the three of us, you're the one who sacrificed himself and actually watched, because Albert Puhn got into part of his life where he was making movies just against, he'd just invite people to his house, shoot them on a green screen and call it a movie, right?

This movie looks like that.

Yeah.

I'll just say it is really, really bad, not enjoyable bad. The final battle, they don't show it. They just have concept art flashing across the screen with narration saying the battle happened and they win, and that's all you get.

Right.

That's a bold choice. Do any of the actors return for this equal?

Lee Horsley shows up briefly, and the premise is five of his illegitimate children from different mothers come together to save the kingdom.

Wow. Wow. The messaging.

Kevin Sorbo is one of them.

Okay. How did this movie do, producer Brad?

This will open in April. It opened at number five.

It was still in the theaters at the end of the summer, which is why we went to see it. It was at the $1 movie theater.

Right. It was number five, and the next week went to number two, and then it just kept slowly percolating in the top 10 all summer. It never made a lot in the one weekend. The weekend it opened is only in 233 theaters, and it topped out at 660. It never had that luxury. The New York Times didn't review it until August.

Wow, how much money did the movie make all together?

All together it made about 39, which is in the same ballpark as Conan The Barbarian.

Wow.

It was the 11th highest grossing movie of the summer, 16th highest grossing movie of the year behind Annie, first Blood and Conan The Barbarian. It made more money than Blade Runner, Fast Times, The Ridgemont High, Night Shift and My Favorite Year.

Wow. That's mind boggling and presumably cheaper than Annie and all.

This movie was made for $4 million and it made $39 million. That's more profitable movie than Conan or Blade Runner, certainly. Right. So there you go.

Hats and furs off.

Yeah, that's right. So producer Brad, what choices do we have for? Now, also I think part of my glee has to do with, we literally watched the best little whorehouse in Texas. What was the other thing that we saw that was? No, but we saw something before whorehouse that was awful too. That was really difficult. That was hard. I can't remember. Anyway, Night Shift was a fun movie, but I feel like this was kind of a return to our gleeful genre form.

Yes, we're finally back in genre.

So what's for next week, producer Brad?

Next week, we're going to August 13th, 1982. There are two movies opening that weekend.

Oh, dear.

We have Friday the 13th, Part III, 3D, directed by Steve Miner.

Wow.

And we have Fast Times at Ridgemont High, directed by Amy Heckerling with the huge cast of Sean Penn, Jennifer Jason Lee, Phoebe Cates, Judge Reinhold, Forest Whitaker.

Well, Paul, I think, don't we morally owe it to the world to see Fast Times because it's kind of a significant movie or should we just see Friday the 13th? What do you think?

I am very excited to revisit Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

Fast Times it is.

All right.

So, ladies and gentlemen, Paul Alvarado-Deichstra and me, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, will be seeing Fast Times at Ridgemont High. And until then, we will see you in line at The Multiplex.