S3E01 - Revenge of the Living Dummy (HorrorLand #1)

Andy and Alyssa are back! They kick off the new season with Goosebumps HorrorLand #1: Revenge of the Living Dummy.

Follow @saypodanddie on Instagram, and get in touch at saypodanddie@gmail.com // Theme music by Haunted Corpose

[00:00:04] It was about twelve inches tall. The face was shriveled like an old prune and was a vomit green color. There were tiny slits where the eyes had once been. Thin wisps of black hair stood straight up from its scalp.

[00:00:17] Awesome, Ethan said. Can I hold it?

[00:00:19] I don't think so, Mr. Molloy replied. When I tell you the story of this doll, I don't think you'll want to come anywhere near it. He chuckled as if he'd just told a good joke.

[00:00:28] Dad, this is really gross, Molly said, shaking her head. She turned back to the case. You're not going to keep it here, are you?

[00:00:35] Let me tell you the story, Mr. Molloy said. The doll is called a mind stealer.

[00:00:40] The legend goes that if you touch it, you are doomed. Its eyes will open and glow. You will hear a loud, painful buzz, and it will steal your mind right out of your head.

[00:00:49] My mouth suddenly felt dry. I wanted to stop staring at the ugly thing, but I couldn't take my eyes off it.

[00:00:55] They say the doll has already claimed 20 minds, Mr. Molloy said. 20 poor victims who were left brainless, empty, blanks.

[00:01:12] Hello. And welcome. To Say Podcast and Die.

[00:01:16] It's the long-awaited third season. Of the podcast where two queers sit in their closet and talk to you about goosebumps.

[00:01:23] I'm Andy. I use they-them pronouns. I'm Alyssa. I use they-or-she pronouns.

[00:01:28] And we do not remember the last year of our lives.

[00:01:31] The last two years.

[00:01:33] Yes. We put out a second season. If you have any follow-up questions about Series 2000, we, the toddler plus the move plus the career changes mean we couldn't really tell you what happened.

[00:01:46] But that's okay, because I don't think R.L. Stine could either.

[00:01:51] Yeah. We're thinking of that as our lost season, but that's okay because we're moving on to Goosebumps Horrorland.

[00:01:57] And it's so cool right now. Like, I mean, we're only, we've read two of the books so far and it's interesting.

[00:02:04] The setup, for those of you who don't know, is you have a slightly shorter version of a Goose book and then a add-on story that seems to be a chapter play, as Annie Wilkes would put it, serialized with picking up main characters along the way from the different books.

[00:02:21] Yeah. The idea is that later on down the line, they will all, it'll all converge into a Horrorland story.

[00:02:27] Yeah. And I think this was supposed to be a tie-in with a website-based game.

[00:02:31] Enterhorrorland.com.

[00:02:32] Did you ever play that?

[00:02:33] I did not. And I went to go visit it the other day, but it is now defunct.

[00:02:38] Did you try emailing the email address in the back of the book?

[00:02:40] No. Did you?

[00:02:41] No. I wonder. Okay. We'll try it.

[00:02:44] Oh, we're in a closet now again.

[00:02:45] Yeah. Yeah. It's back to our roots, back to our old intro. And also, let's talk about this cover.

[00:02:53] So we've got a new artist, Brandon Doorman, and he, what do you, do you think the slappy is scarier or less scary than the original?

[00:03:03] Just different. There's a lot more 3D happening in this one.

[00:03:06] So, for me, I mean, it's hard to really separate the classic slappy of my childhood from whether I find this more or less scary.

[00:03:17] It's, you know, it's menacing. There's a really good green Horrorland sort of mouth over it.

[00:03:23] Some carnival games in the background.

[00:03:26] I like the fortune teller lady and the one-eyed ogre. Those are nice details.

[00:03:29] Like, there's a good detail like Tim Jacobus does.

[00:03:32] And I think there's some, you know, nice allusions to Tim Jacobus. I mean, Tim Jacobus didn't do the fortune teller lady and be careful what you wish for, but it's clearly an allusion to that.

[00:03:40] There's something that looks like a mummy. It is also signaling what's coming in that we're going to be playing some of the greatest hits.

[00:03:48] And it's also just kind of confusing because you're like, what story am I being told?

[00:03:52] This cover is not about the story, most of the story that we're reading.

[00:03:56] That's right.

[00:03:57] I would say the difference between this slappy and classic slappy is this slappy looks like he's going to bite you.

[00:04:04] Whereas the other slappy looks more like he's going to steal your soul.

[00:04:07] Yeah.

[00:04:08] Well, we get a lot of good background on him in this. Also, it's 2008, so things are different.

[00:04:13] Yeah. We are going to see some technology that we have not seen before. It is a whole thing.

[00:04:19] So, Andy, do you want to give a bird's eye view of just the main plot?

[00:04:23] Yeah. The bird's eye view, our main character is named Brittany Crosby, and she has an annoying little cousin named Ethan who shows up with a slappy doll.

[00:04:35] He's hilariously named Mr. Bad Boy.

[00:04:38] And the typical slappy hijinks ensue. You don't know if it's slappy or Ethan who's doing it. Turns out it's Ethan who's doing it.

[00:04:47] But the fun twist is Brittany's best friend's dad has a problematic doll collection of stuff he's basically stolen from around the world.

[00:04:56] And one of those is this mind stealer doll.

[00:04:59] He also happens to have research books where Brittany and Molly are able to figure out what slappy's story is.

[00:05:06] So they think, okay, we're going to recite the words that put him back to sleep.

[00:05:09] They recite them, but it wakes him up because it's been Ethan pretending he was alive all along.

[00:05:13] So they wake up slappy. Slappy's like, I've been paying attention this whole time.

[00:05:16] I'm going to go get a mind stealer doll and steal your mind to help me in my enslavement project I'm always working on.

[00:05:23] But the mind stealer doll ends up stealing slappy's mind.

[00:05:27] That's right.

[00:05:28] Right. Or does it? I have follow-ups.

[00:05:31] And GoosePunks, because the format of this is a little different, we're going to start with the main story.

[00:05:35] And then we'll talk about the Horrorland part separately after we do that.

[00:05:40] Yeah.

[00:05:41] New formats for everyone.

[00:05:43] Oh, and speaking of novelties, R.L. Stine, on the inside cover of this book,

[00:05:49] would like you to know that the right of R.L. Stine to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him.

[00:05:55] That's right.

[00:05:56] Right. The scholastic lawsuit seems to have been settled.

[00:06:00] And there is no question now about who is writing these books.

[00:06:04] Well, I would say it doesn't say that he wrote them.

[00:06:06] It just says the right to be identified as the author's work has been asserted by him.

[00:06:10] Yes.

[00:06:11] That ambiguity has been cleared up.

[00:06:13] Yeah.

[00:06:14] All right.

[00:06:15] So regardless of who wrote it, he's the author.

[00:06:18] My very first note of season three is, whoops, we have the British version.

[00:06:21] Yeah.

[00:06:22] I know.

[00:06:22] So did you know that in Britain, they call a walker a, was it a Zimmer frame?

[00:06:31] Something like that.

[00:06:31] Yeah.

[00:06:32] Zimmer frame.

[00:06:33] So I had to do some searching.

[00:06:36] Yeah.

[00:06:36] Translating.

[00:06:37] Yeah.

[00:06:37] Well, we open with an action scene.

[00:06:40] Brittany Crosby, our narrator, and her best friend, Molly Malloy, burying something in

[00:06:45] a graveyard and then a hand reaching up to grab them.

[00:06:48] And then we flashback to two weeks earlier.

[00:06:50] And a couple notes on that opening in Medias Res scene.

[00:06:54] First of all, we get Brittany's main feature, which is that she has a wild imagination.

[00:06:59] She's sort of the Lovecraftian hero whose mind is running away with them, hypersensitive

[00:07:08] to scares.

[00:07:09] I have some character notes on that later on, though.

[00:07:11] Okay.

[00:07:11] Well, I have some related notes on Molly and her artistic tendencies, which also have a

[00:07:17] Lovecraftian bent towards them.

[00:07:19] And so there's a family of raccoons with glowing eyes watching them very intently.

[00:07:23] And I'm wondering later on when we get to the Horrorland horrors and realize they've

[00:07:28] been watching, could it be these are actually horrors disguised as raccoons gathering information

[00:07:33] about them?

[00:07:33] Ooh, or like animatronic spy cams.

[00:07:36] Yeah, exactly.

[00:07:37] Also, folks, you might hear some hammering in the background.

[00:07:40] It is only the beating of the infernal heart we've buried in the walls of this closet.

[00:07:45] Don't worry.

[00:07:46] We flash back and we get the setup, which is cousin Ethan is coming to stay with Brittany's

[00:07:53] family.

[00:07:54] And we also get a sort of a bigger breakdown of the differences between Brittany and Molly.

[00:08:00] Yes, because it wouldn't be a Goosebumps slappy book if there were not some twinning

[00:08:05] happening.

[00:08:05] Mm-hmm.

[00:08:06] Exactly.

[00:08:07] Yeah, this is really very much a mid-2000s reboot situation.

[00:08:12] Mm-hmm.

[00:08:12] So Molly is, quote unquote, more serious.

[00:08:16] Her parents are divorced.

[00:08:16] And she has the fantastical imagination, I would say.

[00:08:20] And also, Molly has, is taller, right?

[00:08:25] One of them's taller.

[00:08:26] One of them has more coppery hair.

[00:08:28] Brittany says she has a better sense of humor.

[00:08:30] I don't really see that borne out anywhere.

[00:08:32] Yeah, I feel like Brittany has a little bit of an inferiority complex next to Molly.

[00:08:35] What's also strange about this book is it's almost like there are two parallel Goosebumps

[00:08:40] books happening.

[00:08:41] You know, Brittany is in this drama with Ethan and Slappy slash Mr. Bad Boy.

[00:08:47] And Molly is in her own world with a Mindstealer doll.

[00:08:50] And we sort of get glimpses into that.

[00:08:52] But there's this weird also twinning of plots happening.

[00:08:56] Totally.

[00:08:56] Yeah.

[00:08:56] And it's like there's this whole story.

[00:08:58] I mean, it's appropriate when you're going to this expansive gameplay universe to have

[00:09:01] multiple plots going on that you don't get to see the whole of, right?

[00:09:04] Mm-hmm.

[00:09:05] Also, folks, if you hear a power drill type noise, it's only because that heart is also

[00:09:10] power drilling.

[00:09:11] I think it's doing renovations under the floorboards.

[00:09:14] Everyone's got to work, you know?

[00:09:16] Yeah.

[00:09:17] Well, Brittany's called away from Molly's house.

[00:09:20] And we meet Brittany's mom, whose main characteristic is that she drops a lot of stuff.

[00:09:27] She's also like, OK, so we've got different versions of like families that are kind of weird,

[00:09:33] right?

[00:09:33] Yeah.

[00:09:33] So we linger a lot on how good she looks, particularly for her age, and how she's the same size as

[00:09:40] Brittany and they can wear each other's clothes.

[00:09:42] Yeah.

[00:09:43] And Brittany's like kind of uncomfortable about it.

[00:09:45] She's like, I guess that's fine.

[00:09:46] It's weird.

[00:09:47] Yeah.

[00:09:48] And she's like, my mom looks really good, I guess.

[00:09:51] And it's like, Brittany, it's weird that you're telling us that.

[00:09:54] Well, I think she's feeling a little weird.

[00:09:56] You know, she's hitting adolescence.

[00:09:57] She seems to not be super interested in girly stuff.

[00:10:03] She's very interested in her best friend.

[00:10:05] And also she idealizes this like really muscly metal band leader, right?

[00:10:12] Mm-hmm.

[00:10:21] Mm-hmm.

[00:10:23] She's at the very least going to be cool, if not cool and queer.

[00:10:28] What she's seeing when she's looking at her mom and being uncomfortable is probably either like,

[00:10:32] yeah, something about like, oh, I'm supposed to look like that soon, or I'm not going to look like that,

[00:10:37] or I'm noticing what female bodies look like generally.

[00:10:42] Well, she's basically around –

[00:10:43] Or I should say like AFAB bodies that go through estrogen puberty.

[00:10:47] She's also around two women who get lots of attention.

[00:10:53] Molly for her imagination and her artwork, her mom for her looks and also for dropping stuff.

[00:10:59] Yeah.

[00:10:59] And it feels like she's being squeezed out a little, which we're also about to see with Ethan coming up.

[00:11:05] Because we learn here that Ethan's parents, quote, had to go away or something.

[00:11:09] And so Ethan's coming to stay with them.

[00:11:11] And Brittany acts like it's a visit, but there are all of these clues that it's going to be something more permanent

[00:11:17] and also that she's a little bit being replaced or edged out of her spot in the family.

[00:11:21] Yeah, she got put in mom's sewing room, which is hard for me to believe that this mom sews.

[00:11:26] But she has the sewing room.

[00:11:27] But, yeah, Ethan's in her bedroom.

[00:11:30] Like they moved – they rearranged the whole house so he could stay in her bedroom.

[00:11:34] Yeah.

[00:11:34] Well, they didn't rearrange the whole house.

[00:11:35] They just kicked her out of her own bedroom and put her in the spare room when they could have just put him straight in there.

[00:11:39] But she has to move her own stuff out.

[00:11:41] But they all feel bad because in addition to Ethan's parents not paying attention to him, they were ill, it sounds like.

[00:11:47] We don't know what exactly happened.

[00:11:49] But we know that Ethan had a hard life.

[00:11:52] Well, Ethan shows up.

[00:11:54] And Brittany is dreading this because he's a big prankster.

[00:11:57] And she finds him very annoying.

[00:11:59] Yeah, and there's a really weird line.

[00:12:02] I'm going to just kind of say it and let it stand there without a specific follow-up.

[00:12:06] Molly is the only person who understands what a pain Ethan is because she's met him and she has two bruised knees to prove it.

[00:12:14] Alyssa's face right now looks disappointed in me for pointing out that line.

[00:12:18] I forgot about it.

[00:12:20] No, I'm not disappointed.

[00:12:21] I just – I wanted to let it linger there with the dead air so everyone can absorb that line.

[00:12:26] If I could say something less disturbing, I would like to point out some foreshadowing where Brittany says that her and Molly, it's like we have one brain.

[00:12:37] All right.

[00:12:39] Well, Ethan shows up and he has Mr. Bad Boy with him.

[00:12:43] Such a good name.

[00:12:43] Yeah, it's slappy.

[00:12:45] And he immediately smacks Brittany with it.

[00:12:49] Brittany's mom immediately says, why don't you go take Ethan to do something?

[00:12:52] So, you know, get out of my house.

[00:12:53] Yeah, Brittany's mom doesn't want kids in her house.

[00:12:56] That's the overall impression I get of Brittany's mom.

[00:12:58] Yeah, she's like, I'm going to keep breaking things until you leave.

[00:13:00] And she pinches Brittany's cheek like too hard sometimes.

[00:13:03] It's really weird.

[00:13:04] Yeah, I feel like she's feeling some aggression and trying to find acceptable ways to express it.

[00:13:10] Yeah, and isn't totally sure what it means to be the parent of a 12-year-old, I feel like, because you don't pinch a 12-year-old's cheek.

[00:13:15] No.

[00:13:15] Well, anyway, they go over to see Molly.

[00:13:17] And Molly's dad has just gotten back from How I Got My Shrunken Head.

[00:13:21] Yeah, basically.

[00:13:22] There's a lot of references back to old Goosebumps books, which I'm sure someone had to tell Arla Rolstein, like here are some references from your prior books you could throw in.

[00:13:30] Because they were also simultaneously re-releasing the classic books as these were coming out.

[00:13:35] Something I appreciate about how Brittany describes Professor Malloy is she says he's kind of famous.

[00:13:42] He works for museums.

[00:13:43] Quote, he says he's a folklore expert.

[00:13:45] Yes, that is the line.

[00:13:48] And he just got back from a place called Mumba, and he brought back what he calls the Mind Stealer doll, which I just want to point out is a shrunken human head on top of a doll's body.

[00:14:00] So he brings back human remains to keep in the house with his daughter.

[00:14:05] Yeah.

[00:14:05] And I'm just so confused by what exactly he studies because it says he brings back dolls, toys, voodoo stuff, and skulls and things.

[00:14:15] And I was like, okay, the first part I could see being like, maybe you do children's cultural history.

[00:14:21] And then it's like, oh, maybe history of medicine or something.

[00:14:25] But then why is he bringing back skulls?

[00:14:27] Just takes people's bodies.

[00:14:29] And also brings them to his house, which suggests to me it's not a super legit operation.

[00:14:35] Yeah, I feel like he's violating some professional conduct standards.

[00:14:38] He is sloppy looking, and he doesn't blink when he talks to you.

[00:14:44] It's kind of horrifying, to be honest.

[00:14:46] Yeah.

[00:14:47] Well, he shows them the Mind Stealer doll.

[00:14:50] And Brittany is very freaked out.

[00:14:52] Ethan kind of pushes her into it.

[00:14:54] And then she thinks she feels it's stealing her mind.

[00:14:57] But it is actually her cell phone vibrating in her pocket because we have cell phones now.

[00:15:01] Oh, but isn't she right on some level that the cell phone is the one that's ultimately going to be stealing her mind?

[00:15:08] Thanks, R. Alstine.

[00:15:09] Yeah, I mean, it's only 2008, but smartphones are what, like three years away?

[00:15:12] It's later that year, I think.

[00:15:14] Oh, is it that year?

[00:15:15] Maybe even the previous year, but it's around then.

[00:15:17] Did you catch what Brittany's dad calls Mr. Malloy?

[00:15:22] Wild Man Malloy.

[00:15:23] Yeah, one of several kind of sexy nicknames the adults in this book give each other.

[00:15:28] Wait, do you remember dad's nickname?

[00:15:30] Oh, yeah, I have it.

[00:15:31] What is it?

[00:15:32] It's, oh, the Blonde Freak.

[00:15:34] Yeah, mom calls him her Blonde Freak.

[00:15:36] Yeah, I was just like, ooh, that feels like I'm being privy to something I'm not supposed to know about.

[00:15:41] Yeah, the Blonde Freak and Wild Man Malloy.

[00:15:43] Mm-hmm.

[00:15:44] And who knows what they get up to with mom.

[00:15:46] Roz, by the way, is her name.

[00:15:47] They're Roz and Sean Crosby.

[00:15:49] Some good, um, what do you call that?

[00:15:53] Assonance.

[00:15:53] Nice assonance.

[00:15:55] Mm-hmm.

[00:15:55] You know?

[00:15:56] In those jeans.

[00:15:58] Okay.

[00:15:59] So, uh, there's also in the attic, along with the Mind Stealer doll, there are two little crying blue dolls with blonde hair.

[00:16:09] I was wondering if those might be previous Goose Kids.

[00:16:11] Oh, you're thinking about that Tails one where they sort of get absorbed into dolls.

[00:16:16] Maybe.

[00:16:16] The Dolly Jolly.

[00:16:17] Yeah.

[00:16:17] Just more twins, right?

[00:16:19] Yeah.

[00:16:19] That's true also.

[00:16:21] Well, mom has texted Brittany saying, come home for dinner.

[00:16:25] And when they get to the house, mom basically tells Brittany to get the rest of her stuff out of Ethan's room.

[00:16:32] Mm-hmm.

[00:16:32] Again, this is, like, really overkill for a temporary stay.

[00:16:35] Her old room was in the attic.

[00:16:37] What color were the walls?

[00:16:38] Yellow.

[00:16:39] Yeah.

[00:16:40] Mm-hmm.

[00:16:41] She's feeling the closing in of the, um, sidelining that could be in her future under patriarchy.

[00:16:49] C.F. Charlotte Perkins Gilman.

[00:16:52] So she also has a white shag carpet, which I feel with the yellow walls, it's like, it's like you're inside a furry egg.

[00:16:58] Okay.

[00:17:00] While they're up there, Ethan does his Mr. Bad Boy act.

[00:17:05] And Brittany loves it.

[00:17:06] Yeah, she thinks he's really funny.

[00:17:08] Is he funny?

[00:17:09] I mean, I think the funniest thing he says is when she invites him to, um, go to the retirement home with her to do his act because their school has to do one hour of public service.

[00:17:20] His response to learning they have to do public services, that bites.

[00:17:24] I thought that was funny.

[00:17:25] It's a good response.

[00:17:26] It's of, of, well, I was gonna say it's of the moment, but I think it's actually of the 90s.

[00:17:30] Yeah.

[00:17:31] I don't know.

[00:17:32] Maybe people still said that.

[00:17:33] I didn't know what people were saying in 2008.

[00:17:36] So we learned that Ethan's a really good actor.

[00:17:38] He's acting really scared.

[00:17:40] Like, he doesn't know what, like, it wasn't him that he's scared of Mr. Bad Boy.

[00:17:46] Yes.

[00:17:47] He, he is pretty convincing.

[00:17:49] And this is also when we learn about the Skull Boy poster.

[00:17:52] Skull Boy is the band and the posters from when she saw them at Radio City Music Hall.

[00:17:56] That was surprising.

[00:17:56] Yeah.

[00:17:57] Um.

[00:17:57] Doing high kicks in Christmas.

[00:17:59] Yeah.

[00:18:00] And her favorite bandmate is Buzzy.

[00:18:03] Mm-hmm.

[00:18:03] And she likes the picture of him with his shirt off and his tattoos showing.

[00:18:07] A point of disagreement between her and Molly because Molly hates Buzzy.

[00:18:11] Mm-hmm.

[00:18:11] Um.

[00:18:12] She also has an oil painting of her dog, Phoebe, who passed away.

[00:18:16] And so, again, like, things that make me think she might be queer.

[00:18:20] Prize possessions are, like, this punk band and a picture of her dog.

[00:18:26] So they go down for dinner.

[00:18:27] Mom has dropped a jug of apple juice.

[00:18:30] I also noticed just mom is really hot and dad doesn't look like his child.

[00:18:36] No.

[00:18:36] Dad has fuzzy blonde eyebrows, though.

[00:18:38] That's why he gets the blonde freak nickname.

[00:18:41] He just looks different from everyone else in the family.

[00:18:43] Really skinny.

[00:18:45] Well, maybe.

[00:18:46] Oh, damn.

[00:18:47] Maybe that's why Brittany and Molly look so similar.

[00:18:50] Just putting it out there.

[00:18:52] Mm-hmm.

[00:18:52] At the same time, blonde freak suggests to me that their sex life is just fine.

[00:18:56] Yeah.

[00:18:57] So their dinner is milk, chicken, and mashed potatoes.

[00:19:01] Classic.

[00:19:02] And they basically, Slappy slash Mr. Bad Boy, actually Ethan, does a whole routine about

[00:19:10] how gross the cooking is and makes vomit jokes, which, you know, I just got a warm feeling

[00:19:15] of returning to the familiar because it wouldn't be a Slappy book without vomit references.

[00:19:20] Yeah.

[00:19:21] And Brittany finds it funny and then she gets in trouble for that.

[00:19:24] Yeah.

[00:19:25] It doesn't make a lot of sense.

[00:19:25] I think they can't take it out on Ethan.

[00:19:29] So, you know, it's going to be a really great living situation for all involved, I'm sure,

[00:19:33] going forward.

[00:19:34] Yeah, totally.

[00:19:35] So the next day at school, we're in art class and this is where we learn Molly draws

[00:19:39] really cool fantasy scenes, but Brittany has to draw from life.

[00:19:43] And I wonder if that's a little bit why she falls for this because she's about to become

[00:19:48] convinced that Mr. Bad Boy is alive.

[00:19:51] Her first impulse is to just believe it.

[00:19:54] Yeah.

[00:19:54] Oh, to believe about Mr. Bad Boy?

[00:19:56] Yeah.

[00:19:57] I mean, her first impulse is to question it, but she does change her mind pretty quickly.

[00:20:03] I actually felt like she stayed a skeptic for, like, we got more of a skeptic's perspective

[00:20:08] than we usually get in these Slappy books.

[00:20:10] But it is true that she does believe quickly.

[00:20:15] Doesn't have as big of an imagination as Molly, it sounds like.

[00:20:18] The one thing I was going to say about Molly is that she's kind of got a Pickman's model

[00:20:23] type of thing going on.

[00:20:25] Yeah.

[00:20:25] In terms of Lovecraftian heroes.

[00:20:27] She draws these wild scenes.

[00:20:29] And then she also prints out pictures of celebrities from movies and music and pastes them into her

[00:20:37] drawings, which is kind of cool.

[00:20:38] Mm-hmm.

[00:20:39] Yeah.

[00:20:39] Mixed media artist.

[00:20:40] Mm-hmm.

[00:20:41] Well, that night, Brittany goes over to Molly's and we get the first appearance of social media.

[00:20:47] Face place.

[00:20:48] Face place.

[00:20:49] Yeah, I was so surprised.

[00:20:50] And it's one of those things like, can you believe she posted pictures from this party?

[00:20:54] Her parents are going to be so mad.

[00:20:55] I'm like, what happened at this party?

[00:20:58] You know?

[00:20:59] Mm-hmm.

[00:20:59] Like, what do you think they did?

[00:21:00] I don't know.

[00:21:00] They're 12.

[00:21:02] Mom and dad are having popcorn for dinner because it's low calorie.

[00:21:07] Yeah, also of that moment.

[00:21:09] And then when Brittany goes to her room, her room is trashed, including the poster.

[00:21:13] And I found this really sad, the portrait of her dead dog.

[00:21:15] I know.

[00:21:16] It's really upsetting.

[00:21:16] And then when she's upset about it and her dad is like, we need you to be the grown-up.

[00:21:22] It's like, no.

[00:21:23] Yeah, she's 12.

[00:21:25] Well, she goes to find Ethan to rip him a new one.

[00:21:28] And Mr. Bad Boy sits up and says, I don't like you, Brittany.

[00:21:31] And that's when she's like, oh, shit.

[00:21:33] I think that actually this might be for real, for real.

[00:21:37] Well, so that's it.

[00:21:38] That's where the first moment of that is when she immediately goes to her parents and

[00:21:40] is like, the dummy is alive.

[00:21:41] And then, of course, we get the classic, do we need to bring you to a doctor?

[00:21:44] And I get cheated out of a therapy scene again.

[00:21:48] Like, okay, just we need you to be the grown-up.

[00:21:51] Like, no, they're supposed to be the grown-ups, first of all.

[00:21:53] Second of all, why?

[00:21:54] What are they busy with?

[00:21:54] We never see them busy.

[00:21:56] Well, the other thing is they immediately say the dummy's not alive.

[00:21:59] Ethan obviously did it.

[00:22:01] And then they blame the influence on wild man Malloy.

[00:22:04] But it's like, okay, so if you think Ethan is doing it, that's when you have a conversation

[00:22:08] with Ethan, right?

[00:22:10] Well, the next morning, Brittany gets pushed down the stairs and the dummy tells her not

[00:22:15] to snitch.

[00:22:17] And obviously it's Ethan who pushed her downstairs.

[00:22:19] And then Molly calls her and begs her to help her bury the mind stealer in a graveyard.

[00:22:24] Yeah, because like you said, Molly's in her own whole story where she learned someone

[00:22:28] called from quote-unquote Moomba, which is the place that her dad got this doll from,

[00:22:34] and was like, you can't have it in the house.

[00:22:36] It's too powerful.

[00:22:37] You must bury it.

[00:22:38] Yeah.

[00:22:38] And she's like, right on.

[00:22:39] I'll do that.

[00:22:40] Yeah.

[00:22:40] So they go together and we're back at the opening scene.

[00:22:42] The hand that grabbed Brittany is, of course, Ethan.

[00:22:46] And what's interesting is on the first read, I just was like, man, Ethan seems to be all

[00:22:52] over the place.

[00:22:53] And then on second read, it's like, oh, well, obviously he's like just behind it all.

[00:22:56] So it's actually a very good move on Arlstein's part.

[00:22:59] Yeah.

[00:23:00] So they bury the dummy.

[00:23:01] And then we move to the scene at the retirement community.

[00:23:04] It's an appallingly named Sunset House.

[00:23:06] It's a horrible name for a retirement community.

[00:23:08] And then Brittany is doing a painting demonstration.

[00:23:11] And despite a good amount of heckling, she paints a very lovely sunset and she's very

[00:23:15] proud of it.

[00:23:15] Oh, yeah.

[00:23:16] The old people are basically all slappies.

[00:23:18] And Statler and Waldorf.

[00:23:20] Yeah.

[00:23:20] I said that too in my notes.

[00:23:22] And also remember, so there's 20 of them.

[00:23:25] And remember earlier, Mr. Malloy said that the Mindstealer doll had stolen the minds of 20

[00:23:30] people and left them empty brainless blanks.

[00:23:33] Oh, shit.

[00:23:34] Yeah.

[00:23:34] Because these people all seem like they could be inhabited by some version of slappy.

[00:23:38] Or they're just like, why do I need to hold back?

[00:23:41] Like, this is the only entertainment.

[00:23:42] Like.

[00:23:43] Did you see that Great Aunt Ruth is also hot?

[00:23:46] Yeah.

[00:23:47] So Great Aunt Ruth, also hot like mom.

[00:23:49] She looks a lot younger than 85 and has short, straight black hair and wears a lot of

[00:23:53] makeup, bright red lipstick.

[00:23:55] And she's wearing faded jeans with embroidery on the pockets.

[00:23:57] Very cool.

[00:23:59] And a pale blue shirt that tied at the waist.

[00:24:01] Well, Ethan and Mr. Bad Boy do an insult comedy routine that doesn't go over well.

[00:24:07] And then he throws paint on one of the retirees.

[00:24:11] One of my favorite jokes he makes is he asks this volunteer if she's wearing a new skirt or

[00:24:15] if her intestines are on the outside.

[00:24:17] And I was like, oh, man.

[00:24:19] This is really going somewhere.

[00:24:20] Like, it reminded me of funny games where it's like, oh, the humor is turning into like

[00:24:25] something really fucked.

[00:24:27] I mostly just was having a hard time picturing what the skirt looked like.

[00:24:31] Layered, I guess.

[00:24:33] Oh, and do you remember what the volunteer says to Mr. Bad Boy?

[00:24:37] No.

[00:24:37] She says, you're naughty.

[00:24:38] I want to spank you.

[00:24:40] And then he's like, I want to spank you too.

[00:24:43] But your face looks like a butt so I can't tell which end to spank.

[00:24:46] Like, anyway, for some reason, Molly is – I mean, Brittany is grounded.

[00:24:51] Yeah.

[00:24:52] Yeah.

[00:24:52] Again, they're like, oh, well, you must have known he was going to do that.

[00:24:55] And he – no one blames him for any of this.

[00:24:58] Mm-hmm.

[00:24:59] So later, Molly wants Brittany to come over.

[00:25:02] Brittany's grounded, but Molly convinces her to come over.

[00:25:05] And Brittany goes to meet her and Molly is wearing boxers.

[00:25:08] I don't think we've ever seen a girl wearing boxers in this universe.

[00:25:11] I also noted that I'm like, oh, these are cool kids.

[00:25:13] Yeah.

[00:25:13] She's wearing, yeah, a pale blue t-shirt, red and white boxers, and she has a red towel

[00:25:18] around her head.

[00:25:19] Like, she just got out of the shower.

[00:25:20] Yeah.

[00:25:21] And we go into Wildman Malloy's office.

[00:25:24] He has a, quote-unquote, heavy file marked ventriloquism.

[00:25:28] It just made me feel like our filing cabinet system is very inadequate.

[00:25:32] Yeah.

[00:25:32] Also, nerd.

[00:25:33] Yeah.

[00:25:34] So this is where they learn about Slappy and the magic words that put him to sleep

[00:25:38] and wake him up at the same time.

[00:25:40] I don't remember if those words were always the same or not.

[00:25:42] Yeah.

[00:25:43] I thought that I remembered earlier it was, like, we didn't know the words to put him

[00:25:47] back to sleep.

[00:25:48] But, yeah.

[00:25:48] I don't know.

[00:25:49] Well, anyway, they go, they say the words, and then Molly notices something in the pocket

[00:25:55] of Ethan's jeans, which is a remote that controls different pre-recorded sounds.

[00:26:01] So technology.

[00:26:02] Ethan is some kind of electronics genius, is what they say.

[00:26:06] So basically, don't neglect your kids because they will get too good at something.

[00:26:10] Yeah.

[00:26:11] Like computers.

[00:26:12] Right.

[00:26:13] Then they'll use their powers for evil.

[00:26:15] You want them to be mediocre at everything.

[00:26:17] Exactly.

[00:26:18] So turns out she woke Slappy up, of course.

[00:26:21] Yeah.

[00:26:21] And he wakes her up in the middle of the night.

[00:26:23] He's doing his old, you're going to be my slave routine.

[00:26:26] And then he says he wants the mind stealer doll.

[00:26:29] And I'll admit, I was skeptical about how these two plots were going to come together.

[00:26:33] And...

[00:26:33] It makes perfect sense.

[00:26:34] Yeah.

[00:26:35] Yeah.

[00:26:35] And so as she's trying to stop him, she learns for the first time to listen to her intuition,

[00:26:41] which I thought was great for her.

[00:26:43] She heard a voice inside her head, her own voice.

[00:26:47] And it was like, shit, I know a solution to this, which is great.

[00:26:52] So she's like, I'm going to use the mind wiper doll again, Slappy.

[00:26:56] Her parents show up while this is happening.

[00:26:58] They drive up.

[00:26:59] They've been following her and they're like, what are you doing?

[00:27:01] We need to get you help.

[00:27:02] And she's like, just a sec.

[00:27:04] And she smashes Slappy's head.

[00:27:06] And they're like, why are you burying this doll?

[00:27:08] Oh, well, they also say, you can't do that.

[00:27:10] Ethan's really attached to that doll.

[00:27:12] Yeah.

[00:27:13] Like, what do you even say to that?

[00:27:16] Yeah.

[00:27:16] How is that the response?

[00:27:18] But yeah, so she smashes...

[00:27:20] This is what the parents are seeing.

[00:27:21] She's trying to bury her cousin's doll.

[00:27:24] Then they tell her not to.

[00:27:25] And she's like, just a sec, real quick.

[00:27:27] And she smashes doll's head into a glass coffin.

[00:27:31] So then it's...

[00:27:32] Which they don't know about this coffin.

[00:27:34] No.

[00:27:34] They don't know that the Mindstealer doll is in there.

[00:27:36] And it steals his mind, which is great.

[00:27:39] And then she starts crying, going, it's okay.

[00:27:42] No more crazy dummy stories.

[00:27:43] It's all over.

[00:27:44] And they're like, great.

[00:27:46] Glad it's over.

[00:27:47] They walk away.

[00:27:47] And she hears Slappy calling out from the Mindstealer doll's body.

[00:27:52] I think her parents don't hear any of this.

[00:27:54] They're just like, cool.

[00:27:55] We're going on with our lives and our new boy child.

[00:27:57] They go back and wait in the car while she's like, real quick.

[00:28:00] I got to go bury something.

[00:28:01] Yeah.

[00:28:02] And they're like, that's fine.

[00:28:03] Yeah.

[00:28:03] She goes to bury the Mindstealer doll.

[00:28:05] But yeah.

[00:28:06] Also, I'm glad we got this done in 93 pages.

[00:28:08] I think the full length would have been overkill.

[00:28:10] Yeah.

[00:28:10] It would have been totally unnecessary.

[00:28:12] But yeah, so the doll's going, I'm a bad boy.

[00:28:18] And I have theories about that.

[00:28:21] Interesting.

[00:28:22] Well.

[00:28:22] But yeah, you're right.

[00:28:23] They're like, now we have our new son.

[00:28:25] Yeah.

[00:28:25] Who we love.

[00:28:27] Mm-hmm.

[00:28:28] And this girl who lives in the sewing room.

[00:28:29] Who we had to go and get.

[00:28:31] From the graveyard so that she wouldn't ruin the boy's toy.

[00:28:33] Yeah.

[00:28:33] So CPS wouldn't get called on us.

[00:28:35] But yeah, you're right.

[00:28:36] It's mainly to not ruin his toy.

[00:28:37] Yeah.

[00:28:39] Well.

[00:28:41] Taxonomies?

[00:28:42] Taxonomies.

[00:28:43] The first of our new season.

[00:28:44] First of 2024.

[00:28:46] My first taxonomy category is possessed foreign novelties.

[00:28:50] Mm.

[00:28:51] Novel stuff that you pick up.

[00:28:54] It's scary because you don't know its origins.

[00:28:56] It's scary because you don't understand it.

[00:29:00] Yeah.

[00:29:00] Or its purpose.

[00:29:01] Automatic plot device.

[00:29:02] Right.

[00:29:03] Exactly.

[00:29:04] Gremlins.

[00:29:05] So Annabelle is not foreign.

[00:29:07] But the Conjuring 2's Crooked Man toy.

[00:29:11] And we have Big Warren's energy from the attic.

[00:29:14] Mr. Malloy's attic.

[00:29:16] And the monkey story from Stephen King.

[00:29:19] Where it's a little monkey that claps its hands together.

[00:29:22] And it kills people.

[00:29:25] Yeah.

[00:29:26] Because children's toys can already be creepy a lot of times.

[00:29:28] Because they're poorly made.

[00:29:29] Or old.

[00:29:31] Yeah.

[00:29:31] Or you're just like, why do you move like that?

[00:29:33] Mm-hmm.

[00:29:34] And because they tap into parts of the subconscious.

[00:29:37] You know.

[00:29:38] Yeah.

[00:29:38] In this case, with the twinning, we get a lot of this thing of when a kid has a doll or

[00:29:44] something like that that they get invested in, they also end up projecting parts of themselves

[00:29:48] into it and telling stories into it via it.

[00:29:52] And in this version of the story, there's this fear that you actually would collapse back

[00:29:57] into the doll that it would take parts of you or take you over the same way you've taken

[00:30:01] it over.

[00:30:02] Mm-hmm.

[00:30:03] Well, my first one I called In the Shadow of Existing IP, which is where you kind of shoehorn

[00:30:09] something into an existing franchise.

[00:30:11] Nice.

[00:30:12] Because I think there's a lot of this that didn't, like, could have existed as not a

[00:30:16] Slappy story.

[00:30:17] Yeah.

[00:30:17] Slappy just sort of comes into it at the end, which is true of the original.

[00:30:21] Like, it's a solid reboot.

[00:30:23] Mm-hmm.

[00:30:23] Um, and so some examples I thought of were Troll 2, which is famously about goblins,

[00:30:29] and they just stuck at this Troll 2 to get those butts in seats.

[00:30:33] Um, and then recently we watched a bunch of Amityville sequels where it just seems like

[00:30:40] really here's a separate story, but we're going to somehow try and connect it to an object

[00:30:43] that was in the Amityville house.

[00:30:45] Yeah.

[00:30:45] So including It's About Time, which was about a clock, Dollhouse, which is, you know,

[00:30:50] a dollhouse.

[00:30:51] And one that we haven't seen and that I was shocked to realize existed from 2020, Amityville

[00:30:56] Vibrator.

[00:30:57] What?

[00:30:57] Yeah.

[00:30:58] What?

[00:30:58] Is it about a vibrator?

[00:30:59] Yeah.

[00:31:00] Is it a joke?

[00:31:01] I'm not sure.

[00:31:02] I mean, it kind of looks like it might be.

[00:31:03] Apparently it's...

[00:31:04] Is it a porn?

[00:31:04] It doesn't seem like it's a straight-up porno parody, but it is about a vibrator and apparently

[00:31:08] a bunch of softcore scenes.

[00:31:11] Is it a vibrator from the 70s?

[00:31:13] I have not looked that far into it.

[00:31:15] All right.

[00:31:15] Well, more to explore, I guess.

[00:31:18] Which of the original family members from Amityville did it belong to?

[00:31:22] I don't have that information.

[00:31:25] My next category is Annoying Cousin.

[00:31:29] Uh-huh.

[00:31:30] We've got Fuller in Home Alone.

[00:31:32] We've got Dudley Dursley in the HP series.

[00:31:35] We've got a lot of different cousins in the National Lampoon franchise.

[00:31:40] An opportunity for the child main character to be disgusted at the ways children act, basically.

[00:31:46] It's like children are uncivilized and out of control, and this is a chance for a child

[00:31:51] to see that through their cousin who is, you know, being sadistic or something.

[00:31:56] And it makes sense for that to come from a 12-year-old, right, who's on the cusp of adolescence

[00:32:00] and moving into this new phase of life to be like, uh, I'm not like you.

[00:32:04] Yeah.

[00:32:05] Well, my next one was replacement horror.

[00:32:07] Because, you know, Brittany has this weird situation.

[00:32:09] Her mom can wear her clothes.

[00:32:11] Ethan is moving into her room.

[00:32:12] Molly is very similar.

[00:32:14] Yeah.

[00:32:15] But has these sort of distinct ways that she stands out to others.

[00:32:19] So, obviously, one of the original OG examples of this is the original Night of the Living

[00:32:25] Dummy, right?

[00:32:26] There was a lot of the, like, ooh, we have two kids, but, like, really only room for

[00:32:29] one.

[00:32:30] The Orphan, Single White Female, Hand That Rocks the Cradle.

[00:32:33] This is really a staple of the Lifetime movie network thriller genre.

[00:32:38] Mm-hmm.

[00:32:39] Stepford Wives, which also made me feel like this category is really gender.

[00:32:43] I was just thinking that when you were describing those examples.

[00:32:45] Like, there's some where it's children, like The Good Son, for example.

[00:32:49] Yeah.

[00:32:50] I don't remember if it's a straight-up replacement thing, but, like, it's mostly women.

[00:32:53] I mean, yeah, I was thinking the same thing.

[00:32:55] At first, I was thinking, oh, well, it's because there's final girls, right?

[00:32:58] So maybe just a lot of horror centers on female characters.

[00:33:01] But I also think it's making me think of Sappho and how in a lot of Sappho's poems, there's

[00:33:08] all these stories of when a girl turns, like, 12 or 13 and – or whatever age it's supposed

[00:33:16] to be.

[00:33:17] I think I was told 12 or 13, but I'm like, I don't know if that's historically accurate.

[00:33:20] But anyway, at some point, these girls who have all been living together get married off.

[00:33:25] And then it's, like, really, really sad for everybody because their life is about to become

[00:33:32] very hidden and non-agentic.

[00:33:35] And I wonder if some of that's at play where it's, like, on the cusp of adolescence, you

[00:33:39] can see a future where you become less of an individual and more of a function, a replaceable

[00:33:44] function.

[00:33:45] Yeah.

[00:33:46] I was just going to say also that the Mind Stealer doll is a really good example of that,

[00:33:49] actually, because it's literally leaving you a blank, like in Stepford Wives, right?

[00:33:53] Yeah.

[00:33:53] It's like you don't need an individuality.

[00:33:57] Okay.

[00:33:59] My next one was I'm an Unbeliever.

[00:34:02] Uh-huh.

[00:34:03] So this is why I was –

[00:34:04] You're a scully.

[00:34:05] Pushing, yeah, slightly on the, like, well, I do think she's skeptical.

[00:34:08] Like, we get more of a skeptic's perspective than we usually do in these books, in the

[00:34:12] slappy books, I mean.

[00:34:13] Mm-hmm.

[00:34:13] Um, so – because she holds out for a while.

[00:34:16] Yeah.

[00:34:16] Um, so horror stories told from the nonbeliever's perspective.

[00:34:21] These tend to be – I was thinking about in one of two categories.

[00:34:24] You either have a religious story where you have, for example, in The Exorcist, someone

[00:34:29] who's an unbeliever who's being brought back to belief.

[00:34:32] Or you have them from, like, a parent's perspective where their child, who's more,

[00:34:36] like, sensitive to the spirit world, is seeing things that the parent has learned to

[00:34:41] forget.

[00:34:41] But in either case, all of these stories come down really hard on the side of you should

[00:34:45] believe in unbelievable things.

[00:34:48] Mm-hmm.

[00:34:48] And I feel like that's a weird moral value.

[00:34:51] Um, the outlier to this, which is the story I really like – and this is obviously, like,

[00:34:55] coming from a religious background myself, I'm like, yeah, I really hate stories that

[00:34:59] are, like, belief is good in itself.

[00:35:00] Mm-hmm.

[00:35:01] I mean, every fucking Santa Claus story is about this too, right?

[00:35:04] But Requiem, the German movie about Annalise Michal.

[00:35:08] Oh, yeah.

[00:35:09] Yeah.

[00:35:09] Or Annalisa, would you say?

[00:35:11] Annalisa, yeah.

[00:35:11] Annalisa.

[00:35:13] That's based on a true story about a girl who seemed to have schizophrenia or something

[00:35:19] like that and thought she was possessed.

[00:35:21] And she died after a many weeks-long exorcism.

[00:35:26] And this story does – this film does a really good job of pushing back on that impulse that

[00:35:31] so many horror movies indulge in of the skeptic needs to be brought around to belief.

[00:35:36] Yeah.

[00:35:36] It's everything leading up to it.

[00:35:38] We don't see the exorcism, but it's really about her mental breakdown.

[00:35:42] It's a great movie.

[00:35:43] Yeah.

[00:35:44] I wonder if this is maybe the flip side of that, as opposed to being brought back to

[00:35:47] belief.

[00:35:48] My next category is You Fell For It, which is there's an elaborate ruse.

[00:35:52] True.

[00:35:52] So there's Le Diabolique about this, you know, elaborate, like, oh, we're going to

[00:35:57] kill this guy, but then there's this ghost, but he wasn't really dead.

[00:36:01] The Roger Corman pit in The Pendulum, where it's this plot to torment this noble man into

[00:36:07] going mad.

[00:36:08] The 2020 movie Follow Me, which also has the title No Escape, I think briefly on the

[00:36:13] internet, was titled No Escape Room, about this influencer who's going through this escape

[00:36:17] room in Russia.

[00:36:18] And then there's also-

[00:36:19] Oh, that was a good movie.

[00:36:20] It was good.

[00:36:20] Yeah.

[00:36:21] The House on Haunted Hill also has this going on for a little while before it, you know,

[00:36:25] becomes real.

[00:36:26] But it's really about how other people will go to elaborate lengths to trick you and especially

[00:36:33] to drive you mad.

[00:36:35] Fingersmith has a plot like this too a little bit, but it's also commenting on the trope of

[00:36:40] the like, oh, the woman can just be like locked away in asylum or something.

[00:36:43] But what's really scary is not that, oh, there might be a ghost, but people will go out of

[00:36:49] their fucking way to manipulate you.

[00:36:52] Well, and that's the thing I was wondering with Ethan.

[00:36:54] I'm like, what is his motive?

[00:36:55] Yeah.

[00:36:56] Is he just bored?

[00:36:57] Is he angry at his cousin specifically?

[00:36:59] He hates other children.

[00:37:01] Like, what's going on?

[00:37:03] There's something really deeply wrong, like, going on with him.

[00:37:07] And the adults have diagnosed him as not getting enough attention.

[00:37:10] They're not giving him a ton of attention, though.

[00:37:12] That's true.

[00:37:13] They're like, Brittany, go play with him.

[00:37:14] Brittany, take him out.

[00:37:15] Well, we'll send him to school.

[00:37:16] You know, they're just like, well, this will fix itself.

[00:37:19] Yeah, I guess if he's mad at his parents for being absent and his substitute parents

[00:37:23] for being absent, they're not around to take out that aggression on.

[00:37:27] And less safe to take it out on, most likely.

[00:37:30] Mm-hmm.

[00:37:31] So my next one is actually a little preview of the next section of the book.

[00:37:36] So my category is Encyclopedia fucking Brown.

[00:37:40] I, as a kid, hated books that made me work for it, where it's like, did you solve the

[00:37:44] mystery?

[00:37:45] And I'm like, I don't want this to be a test because I don't want to fail at reading,

[00:37:49] you know?

[00:37:50] Stop making me work for it.

[00:37:53] In addition to Encyclopedia Brown.

[00:37:55] And I think there was, like, did Cam Jansen have an aspect like this?

[00:37:59] I don't know what that is.

[00:38:00] It was a girl.

[00:38:01] She's Cam because she's got a photographic memory.

[00:38:03] I think I remember it was like, did you pick up on the same things as her?

[00:38:06] And there'd be answers in the back, right?

[00:38:08] And it always made me feel so, like, put on the spot.

[00:38:11] The one that was my er version of this was hooked on phonics.

[00:38:15] I already knew how to read, but my uncle got me hooked on phonics tapes.

[00:38:18] And I tried listening to them.

[00:38:19] And it's like, can you say the thing before the alphabet kids can?

[00:38:23] And I was like, ah, no, I hate these kids.

[00:38:25] What is happening?

[00:38:27] That's my story.

[00:38:29] I also have a total side note about hooked on phonics if you're interested.

[00:38:33] Sure.

[00:38:33] So first of all.

[00:38:34] The horror of hooked on phonics.

[00:38:36] You heard it here first.

[00:38:37] Yes.

[00:38:37] One horror, Rush Limbaugh, was one of their early advertising platforms.

[00:38:40] Great.

[00:38:41] Yep.

[00:38:43] And that tells you how evil it is.

[00:38:44] And then also they had to enter into a consent agreement in 1995 with the FTC that they would

[00:38:49] stop advertising as though they could quickly and easily teach reading skills without additional

[00:38:54] assistance, which was their whole thing.

[00:38:56] Did Baby Einstein have to do the same thing?

[00:38:58] Because I feel like that's also their thing.

[00:39:00] I don't know.

[00:39:01] They might have been more careful about how they advertised, put more, you know, small

[00:39:06] text in the picture.

[00:39:09] But it was about 10,000 per violation, which is relevant to a point I'm going to bring up

[00:39:15] a little bit later on.

[00:39:16] Ooh.

[00:39:17] So keep in mind, 10,000 per violation for this infringement.

[00:39:21] I'm excited.

[00:39:22] This is a good teaser.

[00:39:23] Yes.

[00:39:23] Well, my last category is called Don't Call the Doctor.

[00:39:27] And it's about the implications of what happens if like a psychiatrist is brought in.

[00:39:31] Yeah.

[00:39:32] We saw that a lot in the original series.

[00:39:34] We might have seen it in series 2000, but I don't remember.

[00:39:39] So Fingersmith, Unsane.

[00:39:41] Also this book apparently that I think sort of gets at like why this is a trope, but it's

[00:39:45] called The Woman They Could Not Silence.

[00:39:47] It's by Kate Moore who wrote Radium Girls.

[00:39:50] This is the description.

[00:39:51] Elizabeth Packard was a housewife, mother, and champion for the disadvantaged and underserved.

[00:39:55] In the middle of the 19th century, she was involuntarily committed to an Illinois asylum by her husband,

[00:40:00] a controlling Confederate sympathizing Presbyterian minister with whom she had been disagreeing

[00:40:03] publicly.

[00:40:04] So like I think the implication in some cases that like if you say too much, all of your agency

[00:40:09] and freedom will be taken away, which I feel like is probably especially powerful if

[00:40:15] you're a child where you already don't have a lot of freedom.

[00:40:17] Yeah, totally.

[00:40:18] Well, and I think that the families in this case and probably all the Goosebumps books

[00:40:24] have a reason to not want their kid to go to a psychiatrist or a therapist because if

[00:40:28] they do, then they're going to get called out on the conditions they're creating that

[00:40:33] lead to this.

[00:40:34] Yes.

[00:40:34] Right?

[00:40:35] Yeah.

[00:40:36] But that is a really scary outcome.

[00:40:38] Parents have too much control.

[00:40:40] Yeah.

[00:40:41] Our kid would say that too.

[00:40:43] I know because we make her brush her teeth.

[00:40:45] Yeah, we're such assholes.

[00:40:46] I know.

[00:40:47] Theories and queries.

[00:40:48] All right.

[00:40:50] Is Slappy the name of the doll or the consciousness?

[00:40:53] Like is the Mindstealer Slappy now?

[00:40:55] The way that Chucky can be lots of different things.

[00:40:59] I see what you mean.

[00:41:00] I guess it must be the consciousness.

[00:41:03] So like not all Slappy dolls are Slappy because there's like Mr. Wood and stuff.

[00:41:08] Yeah.

[00:41:09] I think not all Slappy dolls are Slappy.

[00:41:11] I think there's one consciousness that was that evil wizard.

[00:41:15] And he goes into different vehicles, although he seems to often end up in the same vehicle.

[00:41:21] A related question I have is I don't know if this is a reboot or if the origins of the

[00:41:26] Slappy in the original series hold, right?

[00:41:28] That wasn't his name.

[00:41:29] But I don't remember when they introduced some misinformation because now we get, oh,

[00:41:32] late 1800s, cursed coffin wood.

[00:41:34] And I think up till now we've been treating that as, you know, applying retrospectively

[00:41:39] to the original.

[00:41:41] But I don't know if it actually could be different universes or a reboot.

[00:41:45] Yeah.

[00:41:46] Horrorland could be a reboot.

[00:41:47] This was an era of reboots, often bad reboots.

[00:41:51] I'm thinking more early 2000s, like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot.

[00:41:54] Yeah.

[00:41:54] Which I have a grudge against.

[00:41:55] It's terrible.

[00:41:56] This really was an era of terrible reboots.

[00:41:58] Yeah.

[00:41:58] And it's about to be an era of reboots with terrible gender politics that are like way

[00:42:03] worse than the original, like Black Christmas.

[00:42:05] Mm-hmm.

[00:42:05] Um, so on this Slappy point too, I don't know how much his consciousness is grounded in something

[00:42:11] material.

[00:42:12] So we know he's made of cursed cotton, uh, coffin wood that was stolen.

[00:42:16] Does that just mean that was a good vehicle to initially do the curse that put this evil

[00:42:20] consciousness into the doll, but now it can move around?

[00:42:23] I mean, remember there was that worm.

[00:42:24] Is that worm or sandwich inside of the Mindstealer now?

[00:42:30] It's a good question.

[00:42:32] This time we didn't really get a good look like inside Slappy.

[00:42:36] Much like the original, it's just a very quick, he shows up and then he's gone, which

[00:42:40] I think in a lot of ways is very effective as a, as a horror move.

[00:42:43] I mean, he's, we know he's coming back at some point.

[00:42:46] So maybe, maybe we just have to wait and find out.

[00:42:50] Well, yeah, I wonder if they'll carry any of this forward.

[00:42:52] Like if they'll actually have some continuity.

[00:42:54] Well, oh, actually that brings up another question.

[00:42:57] I wonder a little bit if Slappy was just playing dead.

[00:43:00] Oh, the whole time?

[00:43:01] Or if there was, well, so here's the thing.

[00:43:05] It seems like Mr. Bad Boy's consciousness went into the Mindstealer doll because he's

[00:43:11] doing the Mr. Bad Boy shtick.

[00:43:13] Oh, it must, yeah, you're right.

[00:43:15] It must be that Slappy was aware of being called Mr. Bad Boy.

[00:43:20] Yeah.

[00:43:20] It's, yeah, it's unclear when that started.

[00:43:22] So is it that Slappy is always inert unless awoken to agency?

[00:43:28] Or is he like, yeah, able to hear things like he's in a coma, but he still knows what's

[00:43:31] happening?

[00:43:32] Yeah, he's like trapped in a bottle or something.

[00:43:34] Well, so one possibility I was thinking is, yeah, he knew what was happening the whole

[00:43:38] time.

[00:43:38] I think it kind of has to be that because he was still kind of doing it when he woke up.

[00:43:42] But the other possibility I was thinking is, what if the Mindstealer doll mistook the computer

[00:43:46] chip that Ethan put into Slappy for Slappy's mind?

[00:43:50] And that's why it's the Mindstealer doll is repeating lines from the computer chip.

[00:43:55] Well, I don't think there would be a computer chip.

[00:43:57] Oh, that's what Molly said.

[00:43:59] That's what Molly said.

[00:43:59] Or Molly and Brittany say.

[00:44:00] Okay.

[00:44:00] But there's something that's – sorry, it's just reminding me of the thing where in

[00:44:04] Face Off, they – the writers as a placeholder said, oh, we put a computer chip in his throat

[00:44:10] to mimic the voice.

[00:44:11] And then they just never changed it.

[00:44:12] And so they're like, well, obviously that doesn't make sense.

[00:44:14] But that's what's in there.

[00:44:16] Okay, fair.

[00:44:16] But whatever it is that Ethan put in there, like this is my theory is that maybe that

[00:44:21] is what is in the Mindstealer doll and Slappy is still inside Slappy.

[00:44:25] And that would allow you to have Slappy moving forward without needing the Mindstealer

[00:44:28] doll to be involved.

[00:44:30] Interesting.

[00:44:31] Or there is something that is unique to Slappy where Slappy is sort of divided into

[00:44:35] two as I think happens at one point in Child's Play.

[00:44:38] Yeah.

[00:44:38] I don't know.

[00:44:39] Yeah, you know how – because he's got a worm brain and you can –

[00:44:42] He's got a worm in half.

[00:44:42] A planaria and two, yeah.

[00:44:44] A flat worm.

[00:44:46] You shouldn't.

[00:44:47] Yeah, don't.

[00:44:47] Freak.

[00:44:49] Do you have any other theories?

[00:44:51] What the hell is going on in Ethan's home life?

[00:44:53] Because like it just feels like Brittany is getting euphemisms, right?

[00:44:58] He has a lot going on.

[00:44:59] His parents were sick.

[00:45:00] And he's acting out in these really bizarre ways.

[00:45:03] And Brittany's parents are really just trying to be like, make it okay, make it okay, make

[00:45:07] it okay.

[00:45:08] So –

[00:45:08] Yeah.

[00:45:09] How are they both sick?

[00:45:11] Yeah.

[00:45:12] Maybe they both have long – no, they can't have long COVID.

[00:45:14] It's 2008.

[00:45:15] I mean, there's also the possibility that sick is a euphemism for something.

[00:45:18] Yeah, like they both have an addiction or something.

[00:45:20] Yeah, I was wondering if it was addiction because it didn't make sense to me that they

[00:45:24] would both have the same like long-term illness.

[00:45:27] It could be a mental illness situation where they need long-term support and that's what's

[00:45:34] happening.

[00:45:35] Yeah, just don't have the capacity to be taking care of a kid.

[00:45:38] Right.

[00:45:38] I think the more fun version of this would be to say that there's a whole other Goosebumps

[00:45:43] book happening on the side where his parents are like werewolves or something.

[00:45:47] You know?

[00:45:48] And it's like, oh, they're sick.

[00:45:49] That would actually make sense because that's a disease you can easily get from your intimate

[00:45:52] partner.

[00:45:53] That's not upsetting.

[00:45:54] They could be vampires.

[00:45:55] They could be werewolves.

[00:45:57] And they're just like reaching out to Brittany's parents being like, look, Ethan's getting

[00:46:00] older and we really need him to be raised in a more normal environment so he can, you

[00:46:05] know, move between both worlds.

[00:46:07] Or maybe we don't want him to become a werewolf or something.

[00:46:10] Or we're actually on some kind of adventure or we are monsters like the darks.

[00:46:15] Yeah.

[00:46:15] Yeah, exactly.

[00:46:16] I like that.

[00:46:17] Okay, cool.

[00:46:17] Let's go with it.

[00:46:19] Okay.

[00:46:19] I mean, if they are monsters, maybe it's the it's dad's side of the family, the blonde

[00:46:24] freak side of the family.

[00:46:26] I don't know what kind of monster is a blonde freak, but maybe a Sasquatch.

[00:46:30] Oh, yeah, because they say Ethan's blonde, too.

[00:46:32] He's an adorable little blonde boy is what she says.

[00:46:35] So it must be dad's side of the family.

[00:46:37] Yeah.

[00:46:38] I think that's it.

[00:46:39] Dad's side of the family is Sasquatches.

[00:46:42] Skinny Sasquatches.

[00:46:45] All right.

[00:46:47] So we want to talk about this other whole thing that happened.

[00:46:51] Because instead of having shared universe, we now have enter the horror land first.

[00:46:56] The horror verse.

[00:46:57] Yeah.

[00:46:58] So it's got its own shared universe built right in.

[00:47:00] Yeah.

[00:47:01] So we get this.

[00:47:03] We open with this letter inviting Brittany and Molly and parents to horror land.

[00:47:09] And it's going to be an ongoing series.

[00:47:12] Oh, also, this horror land, one of the first things we learned about it is it has a werewolf

[00:47:17] petting zoo.

[00:47:18] And let's just dwell for a moment on how disturbing that concept is.

[00:47:21] Because you're petting people?

[00:47:22] Yeah.

[00:47:23] And either it's like the human zoo at the Philadelphia Zoo where it's like problematic on the level

[00:47:30] of treating humans like non-human animals.

[00:47:34] Or it is problematic in the sense that these people have chosen to be there because they

[00:47:39] want to get petted.

[00:47:40] Which, you know, is fine.

[00:47:41] But there's children here.

[00:47:42] Yeah.

[00:47:43] Yeah.

[00:47:44] Yeah.

[00:47:44] The children haven't really thought about consent in those ways.

[00:47:47] Mm-hmm.

[00:47:47] The other thing is Brittany and Molly parents go there.

[00:47:51] Parents disappear.

[00:47:51] And then we're left on a cliffhanger where Slappy seems to show up.

[00:47:54] But we just wanted to touch on some of the elements that we're seeing rather than doing

[00:47:57] the blow by blow.

[00:47:58] Mm-hmm.

[00:47:59] But one thing I noticed, some people return alive from horror land.

[00:48:03] Yeah.

[00:48:04] Because they're –

[00:48:04] Justin and Caitlin?

[00:48:05] Yeah.

[00:48:06] Their friends have told them about this werewolf petting zoo.

[00:48:09] But Brittany and Molly have been specially invited.

[00:48:11] Which, it's weird because, you know, Brittany doesn't have a sibling.

[00:48:15] Ethan's not invited.

[00:48:16] Yeah.

[00:48:17] We get this special plus one.

[00:48:18] And I'm curious why – do they always want children in pairs?

[00:48:22] Because we know Billy and Sheena are going to be in the next one.

[00:48:24] That's a good question.

[00:48:25] They also already have masks of their faces screaming in the gift shop.

[00:48:31] I'm just – I'm not sure how they identify what they're looking for.

[00:48:36] But it's clear they're looking for, like, a specific product with certain people, right?

[00:48:39] They seem to have regular troops of Boy Scouts coming through.

[00:48:42] Mm-hmm.

[00:48:43] They –

[00:48:44] Yeah, they have a whole revenue-generating side of the park.

[00:48:47] Yeah.

[00:48:48] And there's another park, like a secret park they have to find.

[00:48:52] Horror slips them a note saying, you know, find the other park.

[00:48:57] And there's a part where they all have to have their screams recorded.

[00:49:01] Yeah, they're high-tech now.

[00:49:02] Their screams have to be kept on file.

[00:49:04] Yes.

[00:49:05] So there's some kind of bigger, I think, profit-generating machine at play here.

[00:49:12] And, Alyssa, I know you wanted to talk about OSHA.

[00:49:14] Making a profit-generating.

[00:49:16] It seems like the workers in this setting are facing some issues.

[00:49:20] Oh, well, the other thing I just wanted to point out is that they do a lot of research, and it just gives me big The Menu vibes.

[00:49:26] Yeah.

[00:49:27] Yeah.

[00:49:27] The Menu – like, I was thinking about that, the trope where someone who's running usually a game where people have to decide who will live and who will die has information about all of them.

[00:49:36] I was thinking – The Menu is a much better example.

[00:49:39] We recently watched Caitlin Cronenberg's Humane, which had one of those scenes where it's like, ah, a father who has done this thing, and he's 42 and has a bad liver, you know?

[00:49:50] And should he die or should this person die?

[00:49:52] That's terrible.

[00:49:53] Yeah, it's really dumb.

[00:49:54] No offense to Caitlin Cronenberg.

[00:49:57] Some offense.

[00:49:57] Some offense, yeah.

[00:49:59] Well, I remember in the original Horrorland, the horrors were pretty strict about breaks.

[00:50:04] And this time we learned they just volunteer that they get paid holidays and they get to eat any kids that they catch, which does seem like it would cut a little bit into the whole profit generation thing.

[00:50:15] I think there's a cat rubbing against me.

[00:50:17] Oh, yeah, guys.

[00:50:18] There's a cat here now.

[00:50:19] I'm a cat person now.

[00:50:20] We got a really great cat named Fortune Cookie.

[00:50:23] He is, I'm told, a standard issue cat, except that he has no tail.

[00:50:27] And I love him.

[00:50:28] He's great.

[00:50:29] Perfect cat.

[00:50:30] The dogs get along great with him.

[00:50:32] Well, yeah.

[00:50:33] So speaking of Osha, there's this big fake out where the family gets in this cab and it seems to be careening off the rails and the horror jumps out at the last minute.

[00:50:42] But ha, gotcha, it's on a track.

[00:50:43] But then we learn that the horror every single time has to jump out while the car is moving at 20 miles per hour.

[00:50:48] Yes.

[00:50:48] And this is where we return to the payoff for lawsuits and Osha Watch, which I hope will be an ongoing part of our Horrorland adventure.

[00:50:59] We can only hope.

[00:51:00] So I would like to start this off by saying that though I am a law student, I am not a lawyer and I am not creating a client-lawyer relationship with you by giving you this information.

[00:51:11] I know you were hoping that you'd have someone who doesn't really know what they're talking about giving you legal advice.

[00:51:16] This is not legal advice.

[00:51:17] It is purely for entertainment value.

[00:51:18] This is not Reddit.

[00:51:19] No.

[00:51:20] So, Osha, Region 666.

[00:51:23] I am issuing a citation for a violation of 29 CFR 1910-132A, failure to use appropriate protective equipment where necessary by reasons of hazards of processes or environment.

[00:51:36] That guy should have a helmet.

[00:51:37] He's hurting his shoulder.

[00:51:38] He's jumping at his thing.

[00:51:39] He needs protective padding.

[00:51:40] That's true.

[00:51:42] And I'd also issue under 29 CFR 1910-132D2, the employer did not verify that the required workplace hazard assessment has been performed through written certification.

[00:51:54] Now, this is me kind of assuming, but...

[00:51:56] I don't know.

[00:51:57] I feel like their break rooms are plastered with, like, work safety posters.

[00:52:01] So you think that they certified that they had given this guy protective equipment, but they didn't actually give him protective equipment?

[00:52:06] Yeah, that sounds right.

[00:52:06] Or they're going to say he didn't, you know, they had it, but he didn't put it on?

[00:52:09] I'm sure they have all the legal compliance posters posted.

[00:52:12] Well, I looked into this prior case that's very similar.

[00:52:18] In 2019, there was a citation issued against iProductions, which I think is CBS, when a stuntman was injured while performing a stunt from a moving vehicle traveling approximately 18 miles per hour without adequate head protection.

[00:52:31] Justin Sundquist was filming MacGyver, which you're like, is that, was that worth it?

[00:52:37] Did MacGyver really need stunts?

[00:52:38] I mean, it depends what generation you're asking, I feel like.

[00:52:41] Yeah.

[00:52:42] Well, part of his skull had to be removed to relieve the pressure on his brain.

[00:52:46] He was in a coma for several days.

[00:52:48] Want to guess how much the penalty was that iProductions had to play?

[00:52:52] $7.

[00:52:54] $9,472.

[00:52:55] I don't know.

[00:52:56] I feel like for the skull, it should be more.

[00:52:58] I think so, too, especially if you have to remove part of it.