Welcome to ZombieStrains, the podcast that watches all the zombie movies. In this episode, we have a true hero. “It's Hercules himself.”

 Our first heroes' quest? “Far beyond the garden of the Hesperates, you must seek a living stone, at his shining in the depths of Hades.”

And an evil villain with underperforming henchmen. “I should have known better than to put my trust in weaklings and cowards, we did all we could, you dog.”

 That's right. It's Hercules in the Haunted World.

You know, I've seen people act like that in pictures. What do they call them, zombies or something?

Zombie. What's a zombie?

Just what is a zombie?

Well a zombie…there’s um... ...Mr. Bill there’s... ...the living dead.

They are the living dead.

Get me the zombies!

Against an army of zombies, no armies could stand.

Because a Zombie has no will on his own.

What is wrong, what is wrong.

Hey everybody, welcome to zombie strains as we dive back into the beef cake. I'm John

I'm Andy

and I'm Brad

yes, here we go. Not our first Italian beef cake movie, though the cake is a little beefier in this one than in the last one if we're honest. I don't know who that actor was, who was supposed to pass as the tough guy in Rome versus Rome. But, uh, man, this guy could take him. This guy could chuck him across the room. This guy's a Mr. Universe. Yes. Yeah. He's got a pedigree. He does. So what do we watch in today, guys? So first of all, the title is confusing, but it's hercules in the haunted world. And what year is it? 1960. 61. 61. All right, but before we get to that, does anybody have anything they want to talk about movie or zombie related in the last week since we talked to our adoring fans? I don't think so, not on my end at least. I did go see a cold storage, which is the news army movie starring Liam Neeson and I forget the actors name, but Steve the hair from Stranger Things, you'll recognize him. Yeah. I saw it with a friend of the show and horror comedy, a Fishingado, Erin, and we both laughed a lot. It was fun. It's a very small-scale movie. It's all shot in one location, and it's just funny. So, you know, if you need a good time, go see Cold Storage. That sounds really fun. And it's Joe Kiri. Joe Kiri, thank you. Actually, you know what I will say, is that all the leads, like everybody, brought it and was charming and knew what they were doing and made it fun. Like like Leslie Manville was there playing like this cigarette smoking like old tired up CIA operative. Like she was in the crown. She played Princess Margaret in the crown and she's she was hilarious here. So the whole thing is just kind of everybody just seems to be having a good time. That's what I'll say. Yeah, that sounds really fun. Yeah. Well, Andy, this is our first real mythological movie. Yeah. So why don't you tell us a little bit about the myth of hercules? Yeah, we got a little bit. We got close to it with, remind me the name of the last sword and sandal movie we watched. Rome against Rome? Rome against ruins, but that wasn't quite mythology like that. And that wasn't Hercules, that was just a guy, that was just a centurion. Yeah, so we're going to ask where you guys beg into Greek mythology as kids? Oh, yeah, okay. Both cultures mythology plus D&D's, D&D's and Demi gods. So, oh, yes, for sure. So, you know all this stuff, and maybe our listeners do too. But, I thought it might be useful to take a couple of quick minutes and just remind ourselves who these characters are. Yes, and why they're important. So this movie, Hercules in the haunted world, is very loosely based on two of the 12 labors of Hercules. Do you guys remember the labors of Hercules? I do. I don't have the memorized, but I remember there were 12 of them. I remember the stables. Yes, there's like three famous ones and then a bunch of ones that are less impressive sounding when you read about them, right, but this movie is again super loosely based on, I think the 11th and 12th flavors are herkity, herkities. The 11th is herkities had to retrieve three apples from the disparities. He gets one apple from them in this movie. And the 12th labor was to capture Cerberus, the three headed guardian of Hades. I do remember that one. which he doesn't do in this movie, but in the myth, he rescues theses from Hades, who had been stuck down there since going down there, trying to kidnap Persephone Hades wife, who he falls in love with in this movie. So it's all a little bit messy. So they have these like names and myths, and they are just sort of rearranging them. Yeah, also they refer to the places Hades, but the God is Pluto, which feels like a crossover to me. Yeah, well, it's the same thing, it is the same thing, but it's like a mashup. Yeah. So I just jotted down a couple of things about our main characters here. So obviously the star of this movie is Hercules. You guys know that Hercules is the greatest Greek hero basically. He's a semi-god, right? Yeah. He's the son of Zeus and a mortal mother. And the Greeks were pretty interested in this idea of kind of half divine heroes like this. And I think that's the plot of like I think we still are interested in that because isn't that what Percy Jackson yes is all about yeah it's all about that actually and all the kids who are half God go to camp together that's the So Hercules' deal is that he is incredibly strong, but key to his character, and we do see it in this movie, is he uses his wits sometimes to solve problems, not just his strength. Yes. So he doesn't have that, like, big, strong, of vibe so much. She's more of like a conan type person. He's like really tough and physically capable, but he's also can be clever. Yes. So he's obviously super important culturally. There's like cities and festivals and people named after him. Can you answer a question for me? Possibly. It is. Is the difference between Hercules and Heracles just a one of pronunciation or are they completely different things? I think they're the same things just cut down differently. Yeah. All right. So he did Hercules did. I mean, he went on a bazillion adventures. like the ones we see in this movie. He did fight against a bunch of corrupt kings, but I don't think I think they made up the corrupt king Christopher Lee in this movie just for this movie. Yeah, likeo. I did look up likeo and there's no actual likeo and Roman or Greek mythology. Yeah, there's likeos and some similar names, but no, no name. No identical name. Exactly. And the driver of this plot is rescuing his wife Dianara. I don't know if they're married yet in this movie. I think he makes a comment early to Thesis that like he's he's on his way to marry Dianara. That's right. Okay. So yeah, so he does marry her in mythology as well as along with other people. She ends up Unfortunately, being the cause of his unintentional death which is a little, adds a little tragedy, if you you know, spoiler alert, the movie ends with him kissing romantically on the beach. So I just know that not too long later, she Yeah, Greek, Greek heroes never die in bed of old age. Just, you know, so that's right. So, Herculee's sidekick in this movie is Theceus. Theceus is best known for slaying the minitar. That's right. I don't really think that he paled around with Herculee's very much. No. He did. He's a horrible liability in this film. Like I, Herculee's, I wrote, I took a note, does Herculee's have any friends that actually help, with one of the notes that I took? Great question. Yeah. So this movie in this movie, he goes, he falls in love with Persephone, Hades, so they call Persephone Hades daughter, I think, in this movie. Am I right? Is that to me? Yes, she's chosen daughter. Less creepy than Hades' wife, so it's not like he's hitting on Hades' wife, right? And I don't remember that part of the myth, but it felt more like Orphus and agreed. He did go into the underworld though in mythology to kidnapped Persephone and he got stuck. Do you remember do you remember the trap that got him? No, I don't. It like it's a I'm the details are a little fuzzy. It's like a chair of forgetfulness. He sat down on a chair and then he got stuck to it on a sheep. Yeah, it's it was a good good trick. All right. Yeah. Only a couple more people then we'll get back to the actual movie. So they have like a comic relief guy in this movie. Oh, my God. I think his I heard him recalled to Lemicus at one point. Is that right? Yes, my notes just calm that other guy. Yeah, I'll try to remember to call him telemic. He's super. And finally, he's even less useful than Thesis as far as side kicks go. This is the son of Odysseus. Oh, okay. I didn't make that connection. I don't know really anything else about him. If he did cool stuff or not. Persephone, I'm almost done here. Persephone is the woman they find in Hades that falls in love with these years, and they bring her back out to the mortal world. In mythology, she's the goddess of the spring, she's the daughter of Zeus, so she's like a half-sister to Hercules actually. Hades abducted her to be his wife, um, and then Thesis later tried to abduct her from Hades to be his wife. It's a mess. It's a mess. It's the Greeks. I'm like, one of the, yeah, one of the things I've always loved about Greek mythology, even when compared to like Norse mythology is the, the Greek guys are just so petty and like, horny and just like, they're not just like people with superpowers, like they have no moral superiority or anything like that. They just, you worship them because they're Yeah. Now, there's one other character who appears in this film that I really want to talk about. But I think I can't wait until he actually appears. Okay. Do you, do you, do you, you maybe know who I'm talking about? I think so. Yeah. Save it. It'll be, it'll be fun. All right. Sounds good. So, I mean, my final thing here is, uh, so, I read the Wikipedia entry for this movie and I read some reviews at the contemporary reviews that kind of sneered at how badly it butchers mythology, but I've always felt that mythology like this is just meant to be remixed and messed around with and so and also I would say that like both inches was the definitive book that captured all this mythology And what I think historians have learned is that it's not as clean as that book makes it. It's a bit of a mess. There's overlapping characters change, like yes. It really isn't as clean cut and decisive as it appears to be. So if you're complaining based on both inches, you know, like, like forget it like that's that's the cleaned up version. That's like yeah yeah. These are stories and people that are archetypal and so we over the centuries in millennia, people reuse them to reflect you know whatever their contemporary concerns and ideas are. So yeah. This movie has many problems but I I'm not going to ding it too hard for not being very faithful to the I always referred to the big oversize book I had as a kid. To tremor the author, did you have that one with the color drawings with all the myths? Yes. It's also a very famous one. I don't know. It's a delaroos or something. It's something like that. I know what exactly you're talking about. And it's a wonderful book. I think my kids have a copy of it. Oh, nice. We'll put it in the show notes. Okay, so hey, that's your mythology primer. I hope that wasn't too confusing. Let's hear about this movie, Brad. You wanna tell us how this thing was made? Yeah. Well, first I'd like to add some confusion to what you said, uh-oh. Only in the American version was a Persephone. Oh, wow. In the other version, it's a character name, Maya Zotiti. Oh, wow. And she is someone who revered Persephone helped lured her to the underworld. Oh, interesting. That changes things a bit. And also, the title of why is this called Hercules in the haunted world when the title cards at Hercules at the center of the earth? Well, you're about to get to that. Sorry. Let's jump to the production. Yeah. We'll resolve that. Hercules in the 100 World was released in Italy on November 16, 1961, and in the U.S. in April of 1964, it's sometimes titled Hercules at the Center of the Earth, which is a direct translation of the Italian title. But the working title of this film was Hercules versus the Vampires. Oh, wow. This is the second Pat Blum we have watched after war of the zombies. Pat Blum also called Sword and Sandal Films, where genre of Italian films Hercules was released first before where there's zombies, but it doesn't show up in a zombie list that I use for a reference, and I only stumbled on it while researching last week's terror creatures from the grave. As we go through the discussion, you also tell me if we got lucky finding it if this was an unnecessary detour. You know what? I had one opinion throughout the film, and then it changed right near the end. I'm not so sure those two categories are separable from each other in Brad. Well, you can tell me that too. All right, Mario Bava, not only wrote and directed the film, he was also the cinematographer and did the special effects. Bava was a long-time cinematographer in Italy. His first credits were 1939 and two short films by the famous Italian director, Roberto Rossellini. He works steadily as a cinematographer through the 40s and 50s. In the late 50s, he worked on Evampiri. A film, many considered to be the first Italian horror film since Silent Phones. And he also worked on the day the sky exploded. The first Italian science fiction film. That's a pretty great title for a movie. It was about meteors coming to crash into the earth. He was the cinematographer on the 1955 film, Ulysses, starring Kirk Douglas in the 1957 film Hercules, starring Steve Reeves. Both films are considered catalysts to the Peplum genre. So if you're keeping track, he was involved in the first Italian horror film was sound. He was involved in the first Peplum film. and the first science fiction film. And he directed Black Sunday. And then the first film credited to Baba is the 1960 Gothacore film Black Sunday, starring Barbara Steele, who we saw last week in terror creatures. Black Sunday was a big independent hit in the U.S. and released in 1961. In the early 60s, Baba made both Peplum and Gothacore films. And in 1966, he directed the sequel to the American Beach party film, Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini machine. What's starred Fabian? Do we get to watch that one? It goes on our podcast about movies with hotels. That's for sure. That was the sequel to Dr. Goldfoot in the girl bombs. It was a mixed genre as Beach Party and Neurospons. The stars were Vincent Price and Teen Idol Fabian. Okay, that sounds incredible. Yeah. How many movies were in that series? Was that a whole thing? There were at least two, I mean, when I was researching our beach party, it came up a couple times. I just couldn't figure out how to work with it. It's Dr. Goldfoot, like a riff on Goldfinger. Of course. Of course. Yeah. Now, he was an incredibly influential filmmaker. We mentioned already, all the first he was involved in is 1971 film, Bay of Blood, is considered one of the most influential films in the Slasher Film genre. In fact, Friday the 13th, the Part II copies two of the murders from Bay of Blood, the most notable being the couple being impaled by the same spear while in bed together. I remember that one. They ripped that straight from Bay of Blood. Can I just, for a moment, I think we're the last generation to be this unsupervised. Who here watched the Friday the 13th movies on cable when they were way too young to see them? I did. I did. And my mom dropped me off at the theater to see one of them unreleased at. Yeah, I was more going to like it in you guys. I'm sorry. I didn't watch them until until later And I didn't watch them until I was too old to be scared by or thrilled by them unfortunately Yeah, and I remember watching in middle school. I was like sleeping over to guys Asked me just watch like the fourth one. I think just just watched it on his TV like it was nothing Is there anything more subtle than a good Friday the 13th murder? I mean, that's no, but I know. I think part of the reason we were allowed to see it or our parent's ignored us is I don't know about you, John, but my parents saw Halloween. Yes. And that's not the straight slasher film as all the other. No, it's not about the teen sex and everything. So in their mind, Friday the 13th was like Halloween. Right. They never saw the Friday the 13th know what the content truly was. But once you saw it, you let them know, right, Brad? I told them, can I see the next one? You said you were right, family, it's fine. Let me see the next one. All right, lastly, Mario Bava will return to Zabi Strange. When we watch his 1971 film, Baron Blood. All right. Okay. The score was composed by Armando Traveoli. He was very prolific with over 200 composing credits and many Peplum horror and spaghetti westerns. And you've probably heard his work before, if you saw Kill Bill, Yeah, Tarantino used a lot of cues from spaghetti westerns and in the sequence where we see or an ECE flashback, the animated sequence, a cue from his 1967 film Long Days of Vengeance was used. Now, Hercules in the haunted world is the sixth Hercules film of the era. The American bodybuilder Steve Reeves was the first to play Hercules in the 1957 film Hercules. Mickey Hargit Hay, husband of Jane Mansfield, and father of Mariska Hargit Hay, played Hercules in the 1960 film, The Loves of Hercules. You can tell they're all body builders unlike our hero from Rome vs. Wright. Redge Park played Hercules in this film. This is his second Hercules film after the 1961 film Hercules in the conquest of Atlantis. Park was an English body builder who won the Mr. He was in only five films and four were Hercules films. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he was inspired to be a weight lifter after seeing Park in the Hercules films. And Park became a mentor to Schwarzenegger and Schwarzenegger even moved in with Park to train for a pair of love. And they were lifelong friends. He looks like he's got this. He's got that build like he's just enormous. Like the enormous packs and the huge arm muscles and yeah. I'll post a link to an article about it. We're Schwarzerger said he just stared at that body and was mesmerized. Yeah. Oops, a little intense. Christopher Lee plays the villain, Liko. He had an incredible career. A young Christopher Lee was a trip. Can I just say? He is, he's hard to recognize. I mean, I knew it was Christopher Lee, but yeah, I don't know. He was like 40 at this time. And, you know, let's see, youngest, I've seen him in a long time. Let's just put it that way. Well, it's unfortunate that it wasn't his voice because he was dubbed even by another English actor. Lee had an incredible career. He became famous for the 1957 Hammerfilm, The Curse of Frankenstein. He played Frankenstein's monster, opposite Peter Kushing. Lee went on to star's Dracula in seven Hammer Films. He played the villain Scaramanga in the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun. Lee's cousin Ian Fleming wanted him to play Dr. No in the first James Bond film. Can I just pause there and who play it against? Christopher Lee and all those Dracula movies is van Helsing. Peter Christian from also the question. Yeah, yeah, Lee turned down the Leslie Nielsen part and airplane, which he later regretted. I don't regret that because Leslie Nielsen was so perfect. So I don't know how anyone else does that. I, yeah, but yeah, fascinating. Chris really played Count Ducu and the Star Wars prequels and Solomon and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. And, Christopher Lee will return to zombie strains with Peter Cushing. They were both in the 1973 film Horror Express. Oh, well, thank goodness. Uh, last note on this in 2010, an opera was commissioned in Oregon as a companion piece to the film, but they referenced the original name Hercules versus the Vampire. The opera wasn't a satire and it was played straight five years later in 2015 the Los Angeles opera at stage the same opera and those are your production notes for hercules in the haunted world question about these so this movie's cast is like maybe half Italian actors and half English speaking actors, right? I think it's two English speaking and everyone else is Italian. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I think it of the main characters. So was this all dubbed in Italian? Did those English speakers speak English on set? And then it was dubbed into Italian for an Italian audience? Or how did the language is worth? Like, just trying to read lips. I felt like Christopher Lee was speaking English. Like, I was trying to read lips. And some of them were definitely speaking English. Yeah. Well, if we recall in our production notes, I'm Roman Genshrom, all Italian films back then were dubbed. Yeah. So, if you had actors from different countries, they would say their lines, sometimes in their own language. And so, everyone knew that it would later be dubbed whatever market it was going to, whether it's English, French, German, Italian, everything was duplicated. Right, it is just, and maybe everyone on set spoke some English, but it's just kind of interesting to imagine acting with someone who's speaking a different language. Yeah, you're speaking English and she's speaking Italian in life. Yeah, that wouldn't surprise me if that happened in this movie. Well, so, hey, are we ready to jump in, guys? Let's do it. All right, I'm leading the discussion on this one. Woohoo. Thank you. Let's grab our, not our Togas. What is the paraphernalia that I greek here over? How about sandals? How about sandals? How about sandals? And weighed in. Yes. So how about sandals and body or something? There you go. What are you saying, too? All right. we have an introductory scene here that just introduces the characters of hercules and thesis and just let's us know a little bit about their characters here so thesis is making out with a woman and later we find out that her name is jacosta which is actually uh... from what is it at a king at a bus no it's from what is it from it's from one of the Greek tragedies. I cannot recall. Also a character in the Marvel universe, but they just randomly pull this Greek tragedy name out of there and they've heard Jacosta, which I thought was hilarious. Yeah, we meet hercules and thesesias both. We actually, it's a little weird. We actually kind of meet, we get more time with thesesias here at the beginning than we actually do with hercules. Yes. So we learn right off the bat that thesesias, he's gonna be like the young sidekick of hercules throughout this movie. And he's like a womanizer basically is his main character trait. And, They, I don't know if they were traveling together, if they just kind of came across each other here. I think they were traveling together. Okay, they got separated because DCS saw a beautiful woman, I guess. Yes. But there's a big fight scene as the Hercules, or as DCS at least is ambushed by a bunch of thugs. We're going to learn shortly that these thugs have been sent by the evil King Liko, who Christopher Lee, right? Yeah. Did you guys have something to correct me on? I was just to say you missed that Thesis has an actual role in the hay. He does. Okay. He's not a euphemism. He and the women are rolling in the hay together. Yes, everyone's looking for thesis, Hercules calls for him in the guys on the ground or like here help us and he's he's too busy making time. So, so they have a big fight scene. That's a pretty fun fight. I would say. Yeah, it's it's it looks kind of comical and cartoony, you know, this isn't a grim and gritty movie at all. but there's a lot of jumping around and sort of acrobatic moves and Hercules shows up to save Thesis just as he's he's doing well. He's holding well against this like doesn't thugs, but he starts to kind of get swarmed by them and then Hercules shows up and John, what is Hercules? What feet of strength does Hercules do? His first in this movie. He lifts a giant wagon like 12 feet across and throws it and knocks over like a structure that all the bandits and assassins are climbing on and they all flee. It's pretty fun on it. It is pretty fun. Yeah, I enjoy this very it looks very the cart flying through the ear. I don't know how they did it exactly that it looks really goofy I love that Mario Bobba did the special effects because they're all they're fun. Yes, they're all totally fake, but also fun Yeah. It's fake, but it's still believable in the face, which is what makes it fun. Absolutely. And so the thugs when they realize they're up against Hercules, most of them survived having the structure fall on them. When they realize they're up against Hercules, they're like, oh, it's Hercules, like we are getting out of here. Yeah. So they bail. And that's how our two heroes team up. We learn that Hercules is on his way to, did you guys catch the I think they just say a Talia, a Talia, okay. Yeah. He's on his way to marry Dianara. and then we get, we switch back to the thugs reporting their failure to King Liko, which is at that quote, you had at the beginning, there's a really delightful scene where one of the thugs reports his failure to Liko and Liko choose him out and then he does a fantastic villain move John. Can you just tell us what payment for his services does the henchman get? Yes, he says, uh, first of all, it's, uh, Liko is played by Christopher Lee, and he literally looks like like I know the Romulance and Star Trek are based on the Roman Empire. He literally looks like a Romulant commander. He's got short black hair. He's wearing all black and like leather and like, yeah, he, it's, he's playing the Romulant King of Italian, yeah. But his trick is he's like, oh, there's a there's a chest full of treasure and you should go over there and take anything you want for your service And the guy like an idiot walks over there starts pawing through the treasure and And Lico pulls this lever in this stabbing trap where six swords at different angles come out and stab the band it and Then Lico laughs in pleasure as he's killed the band it Yes, it sets up the character of Liko pretty well. Yeah, I wrote my note here about that said, so he's bad. Yeah, that's he's just a straight through villain. So then we get something I did not expect. And that is Liko heads down into a crypt full of coffins. Yes. And he summons. And they're more like, but they're like, sarcophic. Yeah. Like giant, I don't want to give people the wrong impression. They're giant stone. Yes. Things. Yeah. Coffins are wrong words. sarcophagus is the right word. Yeah. So there's a bunch of these sarcophagi down here, but he summons Dianara, and she rises from one of the sarcophagi. Like it looks I love this effect. It was great. They use it for like Dracula and stuff in later movies where you rise like it's like they're rushing up on their heels. Yeah, the board. Yeah, it's a delightful little effect. And then she moves towards him. Also without her legs moving she's just floating through the air. It's pretty fantastic. It's actually a great scene She's and combine the way eerie way she's moving and she's wearing sort of an ethereal white outfit And she's in some sort of a trance like state. So we were she's dead. Like I think she's dead. Well, so all right, so here's my question. Yes. When Brad gives us these movies, we know there's a zombie in them somewhere, but he doesn't be the cruel person that he does. He does not tell us what the zombies are or where they show up in the movie. Right. So that means me and John spend these movies watching for the zombie. Correct. I thought this was our first zombie. As did I. Yeah. So let's so on the theory that this might be a zombie. Well, let's talk about D&R. What is her deal? So apparently she's died, but Christopher Lee's Liko has summoned her from the dead to do his bidding. And the plot of the movie is essentially, Hercules has to go to Hades to get a treasure that will bring her back to life. Okay. That makes so much sense. I don't know why I missed it. I didn't really think that she had died. But now, now the entire movie makes about 80% more sense. Yeah. So he's got to get that stone from Hades that will bring her back to life. Okay. Well, at any rate, Hercules arrives in town, not knowing that something has seriously him missed with his, his, his soon to be his fiancee. And he's greeted like a hero by the masses of the town. and we learn quickly that a DNR is the rightful queen of Italia, but she hasn't taken her throne. Her uncle Liko is ruling in her stead. That's suspicious at all. It doesn't suspicious at all. So throughout all of this Hercules, throughout most of the movie Hercules does not realize that Liko is the bad guy. Yeah, like how he could trust Liko. He's dressed in black. He looks like a bad guy. Like, that's... Somebody once said, I think it was the host of Brad's other podcasts, multiplexed over thruster, about the first Iron Man movie. You know, I sort of said, well, you could kind of see Jeff Bridges was the villain. He's like, who was surprised by that? He's the only character over 50 and he has a shaved head, right? Like, same applies here. It's Christopher Lee all in black. Well, he seems like a nice guy. Yeah, it doesn't. So, Hercules does learn sort of what's going on. So, thinking Liko is, is Soliko is DNR's uncle, I think. Right. So, thinking that Liko's a good guy. Hercules talks to Liko and Liko says that, oh, yeah, DNR has been cursed by the gods. Is it a lot of gods doing cursing in this movie? Yeah, as it should be, by the way. So Hercules demands to see DNR. And Liko says, sure, go right ahead. She's out in the garden. Yeah. And Hercules goes out to find her roaming in a days, and we get this clip of them meeting. Dinara, somato with you. Don't you recognize me? Recognize no one. We here do not even know ourselves. Only he who commands our destiny knows us. He who is our master to whom we give obedience. He is our only ruler. He is our only ruler. He others no longer exist. No other master exists for me. And if he so wills I must go to the So this is like, you think zombie master and control zombies, right? Yep, yeah, her voice is fading there at the end because she's actually walking off into the distance as she talks. So yes, she's just lost in this sort of dream and I suppose the master she's talking about is Hades or Pluto rather? I don't know if she's talking about Lico or Pluto. I think she's talking about Lico. Okay, I think. Well, I think there's a case to be made that she is a sort of a white, a 1930s style zombie agreed, but little did we know what was in store for us later in the film. She did use that we an hour. Yes, not me throughout most of that. Yeah. I thought it was pretty effective actually. I thought so too. This is probably something I should say for the end, but this is a movie that is pretty dumb when you watch it. Yeah. Then when you get to the end, you realize it kind of works. It kind of works. And I want to say something else here because it started to show up or will start to one of the things they do in this movie, in a sort of very stark, good versus evil contrast. And we haven't talked about this kind of thing, I think at all. But the color saturation of this film is so strong and it's just like, let's have some red lights on one side of the characters and some green lights on the other side of the characters. And that's just designed to sort of create contrast and tension. right and also there's sort of a suggestion that green is like good and red is bad though you can turn that on its head you know like I remember seeing this so clearly in actually the matrix uses this strong color saturation primarily green but also red for the for the robots star wars you know the typoiders fire green and the x-winged fire red so there's just laying it on thick, saturated green and red color throughout this film. Yes. All right. So I'm going to try to go just for it quickly to get Hercules actually on his quest. Yes. So Hercules somehow doesn't realize that there's some real shenanigans going taking place in this royal palace. So a friend of Hercules says, look, I've got more to tell you about what's really going on in town. So I'm not going to tell because that would make me too simple. So you should come meet me tonight and I'll tell you what's really going on. But when Hercules does meet him later, this is Kero's, by the way, just some minor character. He has been murdered and very not suspiciously, Liko is like right there. Liko explains to Hercules that a curse has been put on the whole ruling family of the kingdom and that it's going to claim all of them unless Hercules goes off and does something to save them right. So I think this is just Liko trying to get Hercules out of there, and on a quest where he will hopefully die, is that how you understood? I think so. If we assume that he hired the assassins to kill Hercules at the beginning, like he never has, to the films credit, he never has a crackling villains speech where he says, if only I could get rid of Hercules, all of my plans will be successful. But I think that's the point. So Hercules says, he'll need a mighty weapon to fight this menace, and he asks, so is this, is this Medea, I think, so I just called her the Oracle, but I think, yeah, I think it talks to an Oracle. It's a woman in a creepy mask who intends a bunch of Oracle sounding stuff. I also thought this was effective. She's like doing these, she's like sitting in the lotus position and like moving her arms around and like, yes, I don't know. It was kind of great. And the mask is pretty, the mask is pretty great. So he praised his Zeus for help. And he offers to give up his own immortality in exchange for helping help in saving day and hour at. And the Oracle tells him what his quest is going to be and what this movie is going to be about. So let's hear that. Have you the courage to venture beyond the gates of hedees? The domain of the god Pluto? No one has ever returned from the kingdom of a dead. So there we have it so he's got to go into Hades and he's going to learn there is a magic stone there that he needs to bring back out of Hades as always in Greek mythology getting into Hades is the easy part it's getting out of that's right the problem yeah so to get back out to be able to get back out of Hades he needs to first this is like a step request with a bunch of steps yes to go and get I golden apple from the disparities, which is a group of women, they have names that I'm forgetting. I think Nick's is one of them. Anyway, they're kind of like the fates. I think there's three of them. Anyway, they guard this garden that has a tree that has a bunch of golden apples in it. And he has to go get one of them. This is, in obvious reference to his 11th labor in mythology, I think. Yes. So he sets off on this journey to go find himself a magic apple. On the way, he grabs TCS and it recruits him to accompany him. TCS will be nothing but a liability on this entire quest. So I guess this is just because he enjoys hanging out with TCS. Yes, I think so. So they all CCS is useful once. He's a good warrior and when they have to steal the ship at the beginning he does he does fight the owner of the show. That's true. Yes, we also meet a weird comic relief character named Talenakis who is a lot less funny. I think then the film thinks he is. Yeah, if you mean by that, you mean he's anti-funny. Yes, that's a good way of thinking. So he is the opposite of a comic-release character. Yes. His comic-stressor is what he is. Yeah. His job will just be to like go around and say kind of irritating stuff in the background. Yeah. And they do their quest. And fail at all the jobs that Hercules gives him. He's like, you're this thing. And then he's like fails. Like why do we keep giving him jobs? It doesn't matter. So they have to get a boat and the details of this one eluded me just a little bit, but they end up, they need to get a boat from some guy that telemicus knows, but it turns out this guy hates telemicus. So when they show up, telemicus went off to get the boat, but when per here Tlemachus is tied to a couple of horses and is about to be drawn and quarter. Yes. So we get a little action scene here and we see another feet of herculian strength. What does hercules do to show off his strength? So he grabs the ropes that the horses are pulling on and he keeps the horses who are moving in two different directions from ripping this guy apart, which is probably the most tragic thing in the whole film. saving this guy's life. Yes, it's it's it's a Greek tragedy for sure. Yeah. So while this is happening Thesis is fighting the the boat guy and then they they take this guy's boat. I didn't really understand that whole sequence but they have a boat. That's what that's what matters. Well, I think it only makes sense, right? Is if you think of this just as a series of fetch quests, right? You've got to get the boat. You've got to get the apple. Then you've got to go to Hades. You've got to get the stone. And then you have to come back like, like, no, no motivation. Like, why does the stone work? How does the apple let get you into the underworld? Like none of these things are explained. Because it's a myth and it's just magic, right? Yeah, for sure. So they sail off in their new boat and there's some pretty cool special effects for the sky and horizon in this scene. It's very trippy and I kind of enjoyed it. It's like a smoke liquid smoke effect in the sky so like the sky is orange with these black clouds forming in it. I don't know. I thought it was pretty pretty very 60s in in a little psychedelic. Yeah, so the Apple Hercules is again, it's guarded by the disparities, and the movie tells us these are women who have been cursed by the gods to live in darkness. So as they're sailing around, there is sort of this pleasing sense that they're sailing outside the bounds of like the real world. Right a little bit. It gets a little surreal from here. And by surreal, I mean transitions So as they're sailing, I didn't understand what happened. There's a special effect here that I couldn't visually understand. Did you, can you describe what happened? I feel like the boat is like a trench in the water that the boat gets sucked into. That's what it sucks to the island of the disparities. That's what I interpret of it. Yeah, so they get transported to, and they wake up in a cavern, right, the three of them. Hercules, Thesis, Tolamakas, and it's a, I love caves from this era. Yeah, I get a TV. And this is where I put my note about the color. It's like red on one side, green on the other, just like super saturated. Yes. So they wake up here, and the disparities are indeed here, and their queen, Arathusa wants to speak to hercules. So she, I made a note here that she appears to them as if she's just like beamed in from like the 1960s and her promise. It's pretty great. Yeah. And Hercules it turns out it doesn't really have to steal the apple. They're okay if he just takes it. But the problem is it's at the top of the sacred tree. And so Hercules has to fetch it or die trying. Right. So there's an internal scene where he, yes, climbs the tree and then has to climb back down. Yeah, I wrote down that I'm sorry to report to you guys that it is just not very exciting to watch Hercules climbing this journey. No, no, it's not. Other than it just flexes his muscles a bunch, which is exciting to some people just not me. And it's hindered here by kind of bad special effects here. I think the idea is the top of the tree is on fire, right? And so he gets, you watch for about seven hours while he climbs the tree. And then he can't get up to the apple because the top of the tree is on fire. So he goes back down to the bottom right here. We find another, this we see a new side of Hercules that we haven't yet, John. So how do if he can't climb up and get the apple, what does he do to get it? So he takes a styrofoam rock and he takes we'll see again later. I know this exact same styrofoam rock is used in the exact same way later. And he makes a makeshift sort of slingshot, and he throws the rock and knocks the branch that holds the apple off the tree so he can get the apple. So this is purk it is being clever. Yeah. I like this sort of thing. This really reminds me of the sort of hero move that like Indiana Jones does when he shoots that swordsman that like use logic to kind of circumvent this what would otherwise be an impossible task. Yeah. I think that's kind of a charm. I like it. It's like, you know, it's the it's the Gordian knot right instead of going to untie the knot Alexander just cuts it. It's that kind of thing and I kind of love it. I have a quick side tangent in the 60s. My parents went to Universal Studios and we have a photo of my dad holding above my mom a giant boulder, which clearly is styrofoam because they used to have them all over and you could take pictures of yourself holding them. That's amazing and it is not impossible. It was this actual boulder given what you think gets in this movie. Yeah and now in case you were wondering, how producer Brad got this into film, I think now you have some more insight into that. We've heard two great stories about his parents. One is they went to Universal Studios and pretended they weren't a movie together. And also, before Brad was born, and then also, they let him see horrible movies when he was young, and it was great. So, man, if we could all just be producer, Brad, I know. Okay, so while Hercules has been doing this heroic thing though, feces and telemicus have been left back in the grotto where they woke up, and one of the disparities says something like, along the lines of like it's too bad, they're both just going to have to die. Yeah, like apparently not, you know, just to cut to the chase, like there's some dark monster who's made of rocks that is going to take them as a sacrifice. This scene is hilarious if you want to describe it, but I'll, I'll leave it to you. It's incredible. So first though, we do cut back. There's a line of dialogue I want to call out here. We do cut back to the easiest and telemicus or just like hanging out back in that grotto. And telemicus says something. He says, I've always said that anything you do is safer done at home. And that just struck me as a weird thing to say. It's just like something a hobbit would say. Yeah, like that seems that sounds to me like maybe it's like a sort of in another language that doesn't translate because yes, that doesn't make it done a sense. Anyway, oh, yes, but then what happened? This is this is the part I'm most excited to talk about. So something lurches out to attack theacius and telemicus. It is I would describe it. It's like a rock monster, but it's like a stalagmite rock monster kind of. Yes. And it sounds like Mike Tyson. Yes. And by that, I mean, like you look at this giant scary thing. And then it's got a lot of voice like this. It's kind of amazing. It looks very funny. And So I don't even know where to start with this thing. So this is a thing from mythology. This is pro-cresties or pro-cresties. And that, okay, his name means the stretcher. So did you, were you guys familiar with this thing? I was not familiar with this, and I was like, where is this coming from? This is a real thing from mythology. So, Procresti's, his whole deal is he is a villain who in mythology he lives in this fortress and he invites like people that are passing by. He invites them in to be his guests for the evening. And his whole deal is he's a real psycho. He's got these iron beds in his fortress. And when you agree to stay the night at his place, he then fits you into the bed by either squishing you or stretching you or by cutting part it like amputating your legs so that you'll fit in his iron bed. Well, okay. So I would like to say then this seemed like so bizarre to me. It's actually reassuring it's something from Greek mythology because otherwise it was just incomprehensible. Yeah. So I have the audio that basically encompasses this entire scene from where it starts lurching at the two side kicks until Hercules busts in and defeats it. And I will say in mythology, But here, Hercules busted and does it. Let's hear this entire scene where our two side kicks are minis by the stretcher. The end has the rope that I knew Then I will tell you who I'm not No! Of course this is very bad I'll make you Look out, I can easily look out What a strong grab of my dungeon! A stone you are made by stone, you shall be destroyed! Heck yeah, okay. If you're not smiling, there's there's something wrong with you. I get such a goofy scene. It is so bizarre and delightful. I get so corny and like I, you know, credit to the voice actors who are giving real trying to protract real fear in the face of the worst costume with the worst dub in any of the movies you see. So I try to take that back. It's not the costume's not as bad as or a party beach so that's true or that's a hard that's a hard one the need or yeah yeah it's got some competition yeah okay we need to imagine who are party beach with this as the zombie I would watch that I would if we were also directed by Mario Baba I did a lot more to make me watch it again So let's skip along here, long story short, so Hercules has this golden apple now, and they all head off and they continue their journey into Hades, which is basically presented this movie as a underground cavern system with lots of kind of psychedelic lighting. They come across a couple of obstacles here. I don't think we need to go into the Manditale, but first is like a trap where they see a woman who's seems to be chained to a tree, begging to be saved, but Hercules realizes it's a trap. The second is a big lake of fire, and they do a little bit of an Indiana Jones type move here where Hercules jumps into it. It turns out it's an illusion, and he's variable to save this one across it. It's not really an infirm. uh they press on they they come through this like thicket of uh like trees and branches where the souls of the damned have been imprisoned in there you hear all sorts of spooky cries of the damned types sound effects during this sequence. And, you know, just long-term, actually, can I just call it one thing which I kind of loved? Wait, they're going through these vines which are blocking their way. And Thesis takes that assorty, slashes them, and there's this scream, and then blood comes out of the vines. And they're like, oh, it's the blood of the souls of Hades. And I just want to pause here and say, that was pretty sweet. like, yes. Yeah. So this movie, this movie isn't, I don't mean sweet nice. I mean, like, like, heck, yeah. Yes. It's a little metal, right? Yeah. Yeah. This movie would have really freaked me out if I'd seen it in like fourth grade. Like, I would have lived rent free in my head for a long time. Like, yeah. Now it looks all kind of, yeah. Okay, anyway, they do find where the stone is that they have to retrieve. The problem is it's on the other side of another lake of lava. And so they use the the boulder, the same boulder they use in the previous scene, to throw a vine across, basically, and they're going to... Yeah, chiming across on this vine. It's like a battering. And I did note here, just as it was not very exciting to watch Hercules climbing the tree, it is not very exciting to watch them slowly shimmy across the van. No, no, no. And then Thesis has to go. And then he has to try to go back and save Thesis in any way. It doesn't work because Thesis falls into the lava. Yeah, it takes forever. And somewhat to my surprise, Thesis falls into lava and dies, although in 45 seconds, we'll realize he didn't actually die. Yeah, but I was in my head was giving this film like credit for having some teeth for a set. Me too. Yeah, I know. I was like, I was genuinely not expecting it. So, so Hercules makes it across, but Thesis does not. And so Hercules grabs the magic rock. But then we do cut back to Thesis. Thesis isn't dead. He opens his eyes and he's in a different cavern. And there's something incomprehensible of how like Pluto didn't manage to grab his soul in time or something like that. It's not really explained why he's not dead. But he wakes up in this another grotto with a woman. I thought this was Diana at first, but it's not. This is Persephone. Yes, but she doesn't say that. Okay. He doesn't tell her to later. She doesn't tell her to go, right? Yes. That's who this is. Okay. Yeah. And so she is another, I mean, I think we could call her, I mean, she's dead sort of. I think we could call her a quasi-zombie. Yes, sort of. Yeah, I was Yes. Well, this is the question I had coming into this film, knowing that Hercules is going to the land of the dead. Are the dead zombies because they haven't risen. They're in the world. We're the dead, we're just doing their thing. He's the here's the weirdo here, right? Yes. So Thesis falls in love with Persephone instantly. And he commits that he's going to take her out of Hades and live with her in the mortal world. All right. So at the end of all of this, though, the quest has been successful. Hercules has the magic stone and he emerges back out from Hades, where he rejoins Talemikas, who has been waiting for them. Thesis, then, who Hercules And it looks like they're all set and ready to head back to the mortal world to save D.N.R.A. So they get back in their boat and they start sailing towards home, but what happens then? What happens when you make the gods angry, John? Well, they throw a storm in your path and your ship gets thrown on, you know, like they try to sync your ship basically as what happens when it we make the gods mad. So do I understand this scene correctly? Did it? Is this what happened for Persephone? Tells them that if they throw the golden apple overboard, it will appease Pluto and he'll make the storm stop. Okay. Yep. So that's what they do. There's a little bit of arguing around. I didn't, I mean, it's a little slightly weird scene. But they head back home. So at this point, there's like 30 minutes left of the movie. And this is like, I wasn't sure what was going to happen, what this movie is going to do with its remaining runtime because they've finished the quest, but Hercules returns home, but things have gotten a lot worse in the time that he's been gone. So people aren't as thrilled anymore to see his return, like cattle are dying and crops are failing. The gods are really angry about something here. Yes. This is where we learn Theasius learns that is new girlfriend is perfect Stephanie. And the tension this sets up is that Pluto will want her back. Right. And that hercules is going to try to convince Theasius. And Theasius swears that if he has to, he'll kill hercules to defend his love. So a couple of things are happening once. So, so Hercules Quest succeeded bringing the rock back DNR as returning to life. Yes. The easiest is getting to know his new girlfriend. And Liko is realizing that his plans are in a pretty bad state. So. He, as sort of a last-ditch effort, he adds back down into his creepy crypt, and he calls on some of the gods of darkness to see if they can somehow salvage his evil scheme. So let's hear that audio clip. Oh, gods of darkness, I beg you. Do not abandon me. Do not abandon Liko, who was King of Eccalia. Imagine how good that would have been if it were actually Christopher. King of Eccalia for all eternity. but so that your destiny shall be fulfilled. On the night when the moon is devoured by the great dragon, you must take into your veins the blood of Diana. Her blood must flow through your veins with her death you shall gain eternal life. So there is the last act of this movie and there's we will actually will be able to move through this fairly quickly because while the stretch is on for a while not a ton happens, so right. And that's probably the reference to empiricism. Yes. Yes. So yeah, so on a certain night. Liko needs to drink Dynar's blood, but to do that, he needs Hercules out of the way, and to his credit, he realizes he really can't kill Hercules. So he just invents us, excuse to get Hercules out of the palace for a little while, right? And I'm trying to think what's really important to talk about here. The other thing I want to point out in this scene is that One of the joys of Christopher Lee is that he has resting villain face like he's just staring at her as he walks across the room and it's kind of scary and then he then he cracks into the smallest of smiles and it becomes super sinister like it's sort of even though this is a sort of crap roll and a crap film like like he's great, like just at being that sort of huge menacing villain that he has become, you know, he just really has remarkable, like screen charisma. Yes. It's just really remarkable. But it's dark charisma. Even when it's not his voice and stuff, he still Hercules, I'm just gonna try to hit the important stuff. So catch me if I miss something that's big. Hercules and Thesis have a fight. Hercules tries to convince Thesis like, look, you got to send Persephone back, right? Because the gods are just gonna kill us all unless you do that. And Thesis doesn't want to. And so they get in a fight, the easiest really, I don't know what, it's actually suggested that like by fighting Hercules, the easiest is kind of just trying to get himself killed almost. Yeah, because there's no way he can be Hercules. Yeah. So they have a big fight and Hercules subdues DCS, but then Persephone comes in and resolves this whole issue and says, yeah, I've got to go back. I can't, I can't stay. So she puts a spell of forgetfulness on Thesis and then she vanishes also as if she's been beamed up back in her prize. So I guess that plot arc is done. And this is where the movie I would say shifts into a late act horror turn. Yes. It's been mostly fantasy action and adventure to this point. I'll be at somewhat creepy fantasy action. This last part where Hercules has to face off with Liko is more of a horror movie. And this is where we If we have some pseudo zombies before we get some real ones here. I know this is like at this point I'm literally thinking to myself this can't like why is this on our zombie movie list and then we get to this bit at the end And I'm like oh, this is why and it's all this five minutes right here So there is some footage of Liko basically chasing Dynara around the palace, but the long in the short of it is by the time Hercules gets back to the palace, Liko has hauled Dynara off into his out to a weird creepy altar where he's going to do the sacrifice and Hercules goes after him. Perkili's goes in down into Liko's secret crypt where all those sarcophagi are. And here is where we get our rather remarkable zombie sequence. I was not expecting. We'd get a pretty cool zombie sequence. Yes. Like, tell us what happens, John. So, um, So Hercules starts to cross the chamber with the Sergrafkeye in it and this huge wind kicks up. And then as he's standing there, the lids of the Sergrafkeye start to rise and hands start to come out of the ground. It's an awesome hand coming out of the loose earth moment. Yes, they grab Hercules ankles and then these zombie-like creatures who are pretty climb out of these tombs and start flying to the air and leaping on hercules like a swarm or hoard of undead creatures. Yeah they're like rabid. Goal, ferole ghouls are yes, and they're tearing him up and he's trying to fight them off, but even hercules like they're so it's suggested there's so many that even hercules can't fight them all off. He's trying to. Yes, they're they're kind of dragging him down. Yes, sure. Chuck, he can chuck them off of them, but there's just a lot of them sick. The weight of numbers. Exactly. So I was going to ask guys. Is this our first true hand popping out of the ground scene? I know we have had at least one movie I'm trying to remember it that came really close to this. Yes, and plan nine, we notice that was the first hand poking out of the great. Okay. Yeah, but this is like the very familiar one. It's shot in sharp contrast. But even between this movie and plan nine is that Mario Baba is actually a cinematographer. So he does this with really stark lighting. So like the hand is laid on one side and not the other and it sort of claws its way out of the loose earth and then it shoots up in the air and grabs hercules by the ankle. It's pretty great. I think this is a more scary version of the hand popping up because what's scary about the hand popping up that it pops up and grabs your leg, right? Yes. It's like the thing the hand that grabs you from under your bed or something made it night. Exactly. So this is two minutes of actual horror movie film here that's done pretty well, I'd say. Yeah, the only, the only knock I have on the scene is, circulates just sort of stands and watches it all happen. We'll like, yes, yes. But then he gets attacked and it's pretty gnarly. So then the movie, we're just a minute or two away from the finale. Hercules, he doesn't defeat the zombies, but he manages to temporarily trap them back in the room. There's something like, there's like, some walls were closing in, yes, I didn't turn or stand. And maybe with his strength, he pushes his way through a rock wall and then we'll have back on the zombies behind him. But there's still one day for moment where one hand is sticking out from the crevice, one scale of souls on the hand, and that's pretty great. So Andy, what are these creatures look like? So I was trying to get a good look at them. I would say they look like kind of breathes. They are boany and they can fly around as far as their makeup. Was this actors wearing like some sort of a like a cloth over their faces? I think so. And they had, they were all gray. They were all the same tone of gray. Yeah. Yeah. And they looked dead. And they're quite skeletal. They have skeleton arms and hands and stuff. I, it's, it's kind of a merciless shot scene. So probably wisely. They don't, linger on the zombies very much. You mostly see them as they move really fast across the screen. Yes, I thought they looked pretty good. They're not, um, you know, they're not like night of the living dead, looking zombies. I would say they look more like ghost mode more towards the ghost end of the spectrum. Yeah, and to the zombie end, but, um, Anyway, Hercules confronts Lico, they fight for a minute, and Hercules defeats Lico by throwing a, there's a bunch of like stone, like stone hinge. Yeah, stone hinge things. He grabs one and he throws one on top of Lico, which is pretty, yes, pretty great. I would like to say there's one sweet thing that Liko is knife is actually like a skeletal hand with pointy fingers Yes, I know that is a great little a little effect. It's only like one shot. Yeah, like some some props person like spent a lot of time making that really cool Yes, yep Then the zombies come out and just like it wasn't very exciting to watch Hercules climb the tree or shimmy across the vine. You know, it's also not exciting. Watching Hercules throw eight stone plants at to take out all of the zombies. That's more the same stone plant eight times, but he really looks like. Every time he throws one, he takes out a dozen and then another doesn't appear. Yeah, so that does create the impression of a hoard. It's just takes a long time to It does make you think about the third plant you're like, I get, I get it. I think I got, yeah, I got the gist of this. Thank you, movie. But all is well with the world. DNR has been saved. Liko turns out he wasn't killed instantly by me and crushed under that big stone boulder. He's still pinned under there, but he is finally killed for good when the sun comes out and he bursts into flames when the sunlight touches him. So that's a good fitting end for a servant of death Everything is right with the world. Everybody heads up with their girlfriends out to the beach. Hercules and DNR are going to get married. These ceases reunited with Jacosta from the very beginning of this movie. Yep. There's some like not comic comic relief from telemicus. Yucks are had. Kisses are exchanged and the movie ends. Did I miss anything? I know, except for they put these giant sort of dork columns on the beach, which I'm pretty sure that it wasn't a thing because they would fall over, but that's okay. The last comic relief thing is telemicus wanted to marry jacosta but as soon as she saw these years again, she made the right choice and went for these years and the last gag in the movie is telemicus swearing he's going to drown himself and run it out into the ocean and Hercules and DNR have a good hearty laugh at that. Yes, I was like, wow, gold. Yeah, I love in this movie that Hercules is mostly shouting, like the one clip of him you have, but most of these are like shouting like this and like, yes, he's all smiles and shouts is what I put in my notes. Yes. All right. Well, we can move on to our wrap-up questions, unless you had any other comments that aren't getting come up in the course of our questions, John. Just one is that the Roman soldier costumes here are kind of ridiculous. They have, they have these helmets and on there helmets are these black and white striped candy canes essentially like instead of being like a like an arc of of hair coming out of the helmet. It's a it's like a candy cane popping out of the top of their head. It's kind of it's not very dignified. All right, John, in Hercules in the haunted world, here are our closing questions where we sort of try and process what we've just watched. Lay it on your hero party in this movie. Absolutely. Thesis, Hercules, in that really annoying guy. And it's like a party of literal heroes in the classic sense. In the most literal sense, yes. And how does the party do? How many survive? They all survive except Thesis who dies but then comes back. Yes. All right, John, what kind of zombie are strain are we dealing with in this movie? Okay, there's a lot of dead people in this movie. and there's a lot of dead talking people. I think we're really talking about the zombies at the end, who are the most zombie like zombies, right? And they are, and they are, and they are, you know, grasping ghosts like, that they're mythological zombies. They're just created by, they're magical. They're created by Liko's magic, right? He summons the dead, he's the zombie master and they're summoned to kill hercules. So they're magical zombies. I am starting to wonder in these films if we could assert that if you are dead and but retain enough of your own mind to have a conversation, I don't know if you really feel like a zombie anymore. No, I don't think so, and I think, like, D&R here is the perfect example. She's not be like, but she just seems mesmerized to me. Now, I think she's dead at this point. Yeah, but I think we're to the point where we can make a distinction between her and these attacking zombies at the end. Yes. Yeah. All right. So how are these zombies destroyed or killed? There are actually hard to kill, and it's the end of the curse. There's this curse happening at the end with the moon being eaten by the dragon. And once that's over, they disappear. Hercules keeps them at bay by throwing giant rocks at them, but I don't think that kills them. I think that just knocks them over. I think you're right. Is there a zombie hoard? Yes, for sure. He's almost pulled down by one. He's on this hill and they're attacking him. There's probably half of it as an actor, but they shoot it to make it look like a hoard. Yes, and how fast are these zombies slow fast or regular human speed I think they're they're fast humans like they're they're moving a human speed, but they're fast right like they're not wandering around with their mouths hanging open and they can either fly or lunge quickly across the screen. Yes, all right, let's see are there any new zombie strains here or zombie first. not really. I think the zombie stuff here is good, but I don't know what if there's anything super new about it other than other things done better. Yeah. It ties into Greek mythology and I think it's the first true heroes quest. That's true. It's definitely a mythical quest for sure. All right. For Mozambi standpoint, it doesn't seem like there's anything super new. Agreed. All right. Is the world threatened in this many? Yes, because when they anger the gods, the world is threatened, but it's not threatened by zombies. So. Right. Okay, John, at the beginning of this podcast, you identified four pillars of the zombie film. Let's see how many of them can be found in Hercules in the haunted world. In this movie, is there an apocalypse? I'll say yes, but again, it's not a zombie apocalypse. It's just that the gods have cursed this country for the misdeeds of these years. So. Yes. No, no, are there tough moral choices? So I'm going to say yes. Now, again, they're not exactly related to zombies, right? But like Thesis has to make the choice to give up Persephone, which he doesn't make Persephone, he makes it for him. So technically, there are, but they're not related to zombie stuff. But they're related to the apocalypse. So yeah, that's all I'll say as soft yes. Yeah, I agree with that. And lastly, does this movie feature loved one's turning against you? This is, again, a yes, but not for zombie reasons. Thesis turns on hercules, but not because he's a zombie, but because he's in love. So the pillars that are here, the really only real one is... None of these are really in the context we meant them. You know what I mean? Yeah, like they're happening parallel to the zombie stuff in my opinion. Yeah, so let's talk about some of your 60s predictions here, Andy. Is there an increase in violence and greediness in this film over other films? I don't think so. Most of the violence is tame and bloodless. Yeah, there are a few patches of what I would call gore. I think we see someone. with their throat slit and some very fake looking blood, we see the vine branches and hatties that ooze blood, but there's one great moment of grittiness in violence. I'll actually call out is that when Aliko kills, Dianara's hand-made Helena? Yes. Dianara finds the body, the bud has pooled, and then you see Christfully walk out, and you see his reflection in the pool of blood. Oh, yeah. That was pretty gritty and pretty great. But other than that, I think, I think you're right. Yeah. So this is 1961, so I'm trying to, we have seen such an increase in this stuff in the by the mid-60s. I'm trying to think where we were in the late 50s. I think this might have registered as a slightly exciting increase in Gore. Yeah. but not not strongly. So do our heroes question authority in this movie? Not really. So Hercules is fighting against a corrupt king, but I don't really pick up the themes of like questioning authority. No, really associate with the sixties. Like Thesis. The thirties is really the And Thesis challenges them, but when they're out of alignment, like they do everything they can to get back in alignment with the game. And when they do, you know, they don't stop, they appease the gods. The solution is to like, to pay to the gods the respect that they are owed. Yeah. And that is the opposite kind of like being a punk. Yeah, rebelling against authority. Do we have a focus on the hero's inner life? Is this more personalized or not really? No, fear of crime, societal chaos and our key. So the hint of this we get is when crops are failing, cattle is dying, this sort of the world is going to pot because people have angered the gods. is turning a little bit against hercules because he's being blamed for angering the gods and I think there are faint hints of like mob, like the mob kind of irrationally singling out a target to as a scapegoat for a problem that's too big for them to really understand. Yeah, that said I think I'm having to stretch pretty far to make that. work. And I think they're probably applies to a sense of looming apocalypse and psychological stress. Yes. And last one, horrors without solutions or lack of clear villains. So no, the villains are clear to us, the villains are, maybe hercules misses it, but there are two villains in this movie that have to be defeated. The one is the character of Lika who is very obvious villain, yes, and defeating him very obviously fixes the immediate threat and problem that he created. Right. The second layer of obstacle, though, are the gods, And that does feel a little murkier in that they appease the gods, but the reality as life is going to go on with oversight of these like fickle jealous forces of nature. So in that sense, they don't defeat one of the big problems facing this world. But that is also asking questions that mythology is not really interested in answering. So no. Okay, John, we're going to close them as I asked the three questions we always use to wrap up our discussion of every movie. Firstly, John, in the world of Hercules in the haunted world, would you and I survive? I don't think so. Okay, I'm not sure Hercules would bring us along. If we showed up anywhere, we'd probably show up in the land of the dead. But all the people in the land of the dead that we see are female. So like no, I think we're not even good enough to rate coming back from the life to tempt somebody. So I think that you're right. And if I ran into, you know, a beautiful goddess in the underworld, I don't think she would fall in love with me such that she wanted to leave her you don't have that ridiculous main of blunt hair like these is. Yeah. All right. John is hercules in the haunted world, a zombie movie or a movie with zombies. I'm going to say it's a movie with zombies because there was zombies only really come up the end. It's pretty some pretty good zombie stuff, but it's just brief and it's at the end. Alright, and this might be a trigger question for us, John, do you recommend this movie firstly to people generally as a movie that you think people would enjoy watching? Secondly, do you recommend this specifically to our Legion of Zombie Loving listeners? So I thought the movie was kind of fun. Like, Like my recommendation is like if you're sitting around on a Saturday like you could throw this on and have a have a nice time it's both heroic and funny and silly it's not bad. I give it a soft yes to recommending it and I'll also give it a soft yes to recommending for zombie fans because the zombie bits in here are actually pretty good. It's just so brief that it's hard to make it a solid recommendation. I have many of the same thoughts about this movie as you jump. I think I'm going to go soft no on both. It is a fun movie. It isn't however like a great movie. No. So it is, I think it would be a little hard to, don't, don't buy the blue ray, I guess. No. There's probably, like as we discussed when we talked about Rome, zombies against Rome or whatever that was. there's probably better like swords and sandals movies out there that are actual classics you could watch that would with Greek heroes and stuff like that watch find one of those and watch that instead so if you want to greet mythology really like class sure the titans is planning cheesy and uh and it's better than this one is so any of those send bad movies yeah they're all they're all better so Yeah, and as for recommending a design defense. So I do think there's two minutes of quite good zombie action at the end of this movie. I cannot in good conscience, tell you to watch the whole movie for it. But if you were to fire this up online somewhere in just skip to like five minutes before the end of the movie, you will find a pretty gnarly kind of zombie scene. Yeah. Yep. Fair enough. So it's that time. It's time for the scariest part of every episode. And that is where producer Brad reveals to me and John, what zombie movie we will be watching next. So with hopeful eyes, I turn my gaze over to producer Brad. As usual, we're going to play the trailer as I hit the poster. This trailer, unfortunately, is not in English. I cannot find an English version. Ha! No! Fermi! Don't enter the castle. Don't try to discover something else in your world. Unless you don't want to go to the end the last war of the world. I'll secret to Dr. Orloff. The list translation of the trailer is no stop. Don't go into the castle unless you want to descend into horror. Nice. That's a good line. It's by New Wave at Films. Ah, yeah. Is this another Spanish language film? Is this a Mexican film? This is Spanish. The English title is Dr. Oraloff's monster. Okay. Interesting. All right. So this movie poster features a pretty Frankenstein-looking guy. Yep. Who might be our zombie. He has a greenish cast to his skin. The cut poster is in color. And he's got a hand wrapped around the throat of a screaming woman. Yes. This might be our most overtly violent poster. Yes, it's, I mean, it's not gross or anything, but it, it's a little like, oh, hey, all right. It's not just menacing the woman. It's strangling. It appears to be strangling her. So yes, is it what year is this producer, Brad? Have we rejoined the main zombie strange timeline? We are back in 1965. We're back in our time. All right. Okay. Next one up. I'm excited. Alright everybody, well thank you for listening to us talk about hercules in the haunted world, and we look forward to talking to you next time about Dr. Orlov's monster. Hey folks, quick update, due to life, we've decided to push off the recording of Dr. Orlov's monster a couple of weeks. So instead you're going to hear a remlease of an episode we did last year. This is the 1966 film The Frozen Dead. It fits in the timeline roughly, so we hope you enjoy that. You've been listening to zombie strains. We'll be back next episode to talk about another zombie movie. If you enjoyed our podcast, please take a moment to rate us in your podcast Apple Choice. Tell a friend, follow us on Instagram at ZombieStrains. All of this helps like-minded people find this show. See you next time.