The School for Good and Evil

[00:00:04] Speaker A: This Film Is lit, the podcast where we finally settle the score on one simple Is the book really better than the movie? I'm Brian and I have a film degree, so I watch the movie but don't read the book. [00:00:15] Speaker B: And I'm Katie, I have an English degree, so I do things the right way and read the book before we watch the movie. [00:00:22] Speaker A: So prepare to be wowed by our expertise and charm as we dissect all of your favorite film adaptations and decide if the silver screen the or the written word did it better. So turn it up, settle in and get ready for spoilers because this film is lit. The School for Good trains the heroes, the School for Evil the villains. It's the School for Good and Evil, and this film is lit. Foreign welcome back to this Film Is lit, the podcast where we talk about movies that are based on books that Intro Quote this is the first time this has ever happened. IMDb does not have a quote section because nobody has submitted a quote for the School for Good and Evil literally has never happened before. So I just watched through the trailer and picked literally the only quote that wasn't like a sentence fragment or like, you know what I mean? Like. And so I just picked that one also because I thought it was fitting in its blandness. I guess maybe would be the right term. We're gonna get into it though. We have every single one of our segments. Plenty to talk about if you have not read or watched the School for Good and Evil, we're gonna give you a quick summary of the film right now. Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up. This summary of the film is sourced from Wikipedia. Twin brothers Rion and Rafal founded the School for Good and Evil to groom fairy tale heroes called Evers and villains called Nevers, respectively. Dissatisfied with the evil's constant submission to good, Rafal attacks Rion using blood magic. They both seem to fall off a cliff, but presumably Rafal dies years later. In the village of Gavaldin, best friends Sophie and Agatha learn about the legendary school from the bookshop owner. While Agatha is skeptical, fairy tale obsessed Sophie dreams of escaping ordinary life and becoming a princess. Nights later, Sophie attempts to run away from Gavaldon in secret. When Agatha finds out and tries to intervene, a giant stymph snatches them both, flying them to the Magical School for Good and Evil. To their dismay, however, Agatha is dropped at the School for Good, while Sophie is delivered to the School for Evil. Agatha protests, wishing to return to Gabaldon, while Sophie insists she belongs in the Good school. Both girls seek out Schoolmaster Rhian and the magical Storian pin. He says he will only allow Sophie to switch schools if she can prove herself in Ever by attaining true love's kiss. She casts Prince Tedros, the son of King Arthur, as her true love and enlists Agatha's help. Agatha and Sophie struggle in their respective classes and are outcast by their peers. Though Agatha is vocally critical of good superficiality, Everdeen Clarissa Dovey argues her sense of empathy sympathy makes her the first true princess in a long time. Meanwhile, Rafal manifests as a wasp swarm and defends Sophie from another student's attack. Never Dean Leonoro Lesso interprets this as Sophie's unique potential for winning a victory for evil, something thought impossible for centuries. When Sophie tries to get close to Tedros, Lesso cuts her hair to break her spirit. Under Rafal's influence, Sophie undergoes a radical change in appearance and personality, gaining the favor of the Nevers and rising to the unofficial position of leader of evil student body. Though she diverges from Agatha, the latter still tries to aid Sophie by using magic to bring her and Tedros together. An Ever and a Never being together causes chaos between both schools. Rion determines a trial by tail to settle the issue. During the trial, Sophie ends up proving inept in defending herself and Tedros, prompting oh my God, it's the names are killing me. Sophie ends up proving inept in defending herself and Tedros, prompting an infiltrating Agatha to save her in her stead. Save him in her stead. This results in him rejecting Sophie for choosing self preservation over him. With the prince starting a relationship with Agatha. Convinced by her fall that Agatha is her enemy, Sophie accepts his offer of blood magic. Sophie incapacitates Dovey, Lesso and the other school staff and crashes the Evers Ball. Now physically transformed into a hag, she threatens Agatha and goads Tedros into attacking School for Evil. However, by attacking the Evers, Break the Law of Good defends evil attacks, resulting in the Nevers and Evers magically switching appearances and a battle breaking out. Sophie attempts to seek revenge on Rion, who reveals himself to have been Rafal all along, having survived the fall and killed Rion. Assuming his identity and manipulating good stories to weaken it from within, favoring evil. He then proposes he and Sophie rule together, declaring her his true love. As they kiss, both schools start collapsing, horrifying Sophie. When Agatha arrives, Rafal tries to impale her with the story, which he had forced to put in the story. It was Rafal tries to impale her with the storian which he had forced to put in the story it has written. What is that saying which he had forced to put in the story it has written? What does that mean? Can you parse that sentence? [00:05:34] Speaker B: Either that he forced the story in to put itself in the story or to put it stabbing Agatha in the story. [00:05:43] Speaker A: Agatha arise. Rafal tries to impale her with the story in which he had forced to put in the story it has written. I sure. I guess that's what that means. I cannot figure out what that sentence means. Sophie pushes Agatha out of the way and takes the fatal hit. Her sacrifice undoes both the Rafale spell and and already written fate on Agatha saving everyone. Agatha with a dying Sophie and Tedros help kills Rafal with Excalibur. She then kisses the dying Sophie goodbye. This demonstration of true love revives Sophie. The Evers and Nevers reconcile and he restored and the restored school staff decide to unite the two schools into one. A portal to Gabaldon opens and Agatha kisses Tedros before crossing over with Sophie. Returning to their old lives. However, a portal opens, piercing the veil between worlds and an arrow flies through with Tedros pleading he needs Agatha the story and then states that this is only the beginning. The end. Thank God. That was a nightmare. All right, we do have a guess who this week. Oh, God, there's so many of them. Good Lord, I'm gonna remember none of these characters. I'm gonna get like every one of these wrong except one. Anyways, let's do it. Let's play guess who. Who are you? No one of consequence. I must know. Get used to disappointment. [00:06:59] Speaker B: Her waist long hair the color of spun gold didn't have its usual sheen. Her jade green eyes looked faded. Her luscious red lips a touch dry. Even the glow of her creamy peach skin had dulled. [00:07:13] Speaker A: I assume that's Sophie. [00:07:15] Speaker B: Yeah, that's Sophie. [00:07:16] Speaker A: Yeah. Makes sense. [00:07:19] Speaker B: Her hideous dome of black hair looked like it was coated in oil. Her hulking black dress, shapeless as a potato sack, couldn't hide freakishly pale skin and jutting bones. Ladybug eyes bulged from her sunken face. [00:07:34] Speaker A: This doesn't really apply to anybody in the movie. Except maybe the portrait. Not even then. Maybe the portrait of that one girl's mom on the wall. I don't. I. I'm going to guess that this is Agatha. But it's nothing like Agatha in the movie. [00:07:53] Speaker B: It is Agatha. That's her description in the book. [00:07:56] Speaker A: Yeah. Nothing like. [00:07:58] Speaker B: Nothing like what she looks like in the movie. She looked up at a tall girl with greasy black hair streaked with red black lipstick, a ring in her nose and a terrifying tattoo of a buckhorned red skulled demon around her neck. [00:08:12] Speaker A: Well, I assum is the girl with the hag mom. Don't know her name. [00:08:15] Speaker B: Her name is Hester. [00:08:16] Speaker A: Hester? I thought she said Hest in the movie, but yeah, that girl. Cuz she has the tattoo. [00:08:24] Speaker B: Okay, this next one is actually a description of two people because I couldn't figure out how to separate it. Okay, an older woman in a chartreuse high necked dress speckled with iridescent green beetle wings and a younger woman in a pointy shouldered purple gown that slunk behind her. The woman in chartreuse had a grandmotherly beehive of white hair, but luminous skin and calm brown eyes. The woman in purple had black hair yanked back in a long braid, amethyst eyes and bloodless skin stretched over bones like a drum. [00:08:57] Speaker A: These are the two Deans. [00:08:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Dovey and Lesso. [00:09:02] Speaker A: Yes. [00:09:05] Speaker B: She studied his high cheekbones, silky blonde hair and thick tender lips. His broad shoulders and strong arms filled out with his blue shirt, tie loosened and collar undone. [00:09:17] Speaker A: I assume this is the print. This is Tedros. [00:09:19] Speaker B: Yeah, this Tedros. See, look how this is easy because. [00:09:22] Speaker A: It'S just all the main characters except for like that one girl and they're in the order of appearance, so that makes it easier. [00:09:28] Speaker B: All right, I'm going to start mixing these up. [00:09:31] Speaker A: I always mix them up, so you. Yeah, I do that because it makes it too easy if they're in order, in my opinion. [00:09:36] Speaker B: All right. He wore silver robes that billowed under his hunched, slender frame, hiding his hands and feet. A rusted crown sat off center on his head of thick, ghostly white hair. A gleaming silver mask covered every last shred of his face, revealing only twinkling blue eyes and wide full lips curled in a mischievous smile. [00:09:59] Speaker A: Well, this doesn't match anybody in the movie. I'm still gonna guess that this is Rafal Rion. One of those. Assuming they're in the movie or the book, because I'm trying to think who. Silver Rose abilities. Hunch children. Nobody wears a mask. [00:10:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:10:24] Speaker A: Or wears a crown. But I'm gonna guess that this is the villain. So. Rafal. [00:10:31] Speaker B: Yeah, it's the schoolmaster. So. Yeah, you're right. [00:10:34] Speaker A: Yeah. Yep, there we go. Yeah, that was pretty easy. I was worried when I saw seven that there were gonna be a bunch of like, minor characters, you know what I mean? Like just random, like Gregor or something. I'm like I don't know. Anyways, okay, I have a bunch of questions. We're gonna jump right into them as I find out. [00:10:53] Speaker B: Was that in the book Gaston? May I have my book, please? [00:10:56] Speaker A: How can you read this? [00:10:58] Speaker B: There's no pictures. Well, some people use their imagination. [00:11:01] Speaker A: So the film opens with a flashback, or I guess not a flashback, but we start hundreds of years before our main story with these two brothers who seem to be magical beings of some sort. And I thought the movie was very strange because the way it opens because they're like fighting. And initially you think they're like actually fighting. Then it turns out no, no, no, they were just like playfully dueling because they're brothers. But then they immediately go from that two actually fighting. And I wanted to know if the opening of the book started that way because I like the. With where the one brother tries to kill the other one after they are seemingly like playfully dueling. I thought everything about that opening scene, like, not everything, but the, the way that the, the, the motivations changed so suddenly within the scene was very jarring. And that was continued throughout the movie, in my opinion. But I wanted to know if that came from the book or if this is an issue of the movie trying to truncate a sex 600 page book into two and a half hours. [00:12:12] Speaker B: I think that is the issue. The book does not open with this backstory. We learn about the brothers, like 200 pages in ish, and we don't ever actually see their fight in the book. Most of the world's lore is communicated through paintings in galleries that are in both schools. So we know that the brothers existed and that they fought and that one survived, but we don't know which one survived. Everyone just assumes that it was the good brother because evil hasn't won anything since their fight. [00:12:44] Speaker A: Okay, interesting. I think it makes sense to show it. Like, I don't, I don't necessarily have a problem with starting it that way. I think they maybe should have just started it with them actually fighting. [00:12:58] Speaker B: Yeah, I would have to. [00:12:59] Speaker A: And then like, you can even do some dialogue where he explains, like, but you were my brother, Bob. Whatever. Like, you can do that if you want. But the whiplash I got from like, oh, they're at their, well fight. Oh, no, they're not actually fight. Oh no, they are actually fighting was just like, okay, I was exhausted, like three minutes in the movie, just like not going to be able to keep up with this at all. Again, mainly my issue and we'll get to it. But I just had so Many issues with not knowing what anybody's motivation was. [00:13:28] Speaker B: I had some similar issues in the book at all. [00:13:30] Speaker A: Like, I just never knew what anybody's goal was or, like, what was. [00:13:34] Speaker B: Like, there's a lot of. And this will become clear as we continue to discuss the book and the movie. There's so many ideas in this property. Just, like, so, so many ideas. And I struggled to parse what people's motivations were and, like, what was important and what wasn't important. [00:13:57] Speaker A: Yeah. And I think that was clear that. That they struggled with that in the adaptation because they just included too much, in my opinion. They needed to cut some of the side plots. [00:14:08] Speaker B: They cut so much. [00:14:09] Speaker A: I can imagine they cut so much. But they needed to cut more, in my opinion, and just make it more obvious who was doing what for what or why people were doing the things they were doing. We'll get to it more. But this is kind of gets right to it immediately. Like, my issue is. So there's a line here that I want to know if it came from the book, because we're introduced to Sophie and Agatha, these two girls who are friends. We're introduced to Sophie. She seems to be like a peasant girl, kind of like with a vaguely Cinderella backstory of, like, living with a stepmother who doesn't really like her dreams of being a princess but is just like a peasant girl. But then we're introduced to Agatha, who, to me felt like the exact same type of character, who's like a peasant girl. She doesn't have dreams of being a princess. She lives with her mom, who people call a witch. And she says she doesn't know if she's a witch because her spells don't work. But it is revealed that they are friends because we see a school bus full of kids. They do ye olde school full of kids, like, yelling and making fun of Agatha. And then it's revealed that Sophie is friends with her and is like, hey, they suck. Whatever. And the voiceover says a friendship between two such different girls seemed unlikely. And I was like, in what way are they so different? Because they both. And this even happens later. That line happens even a little bit later, after we learn a little more about them because, like, we see a whole interaction where some school kids walk up to him. They're sitting outside of a tavern or something, I don't know, at a table, and, like, a school kid walks up and is, like, talking to him, and they're both kind of, like, bantering. And again, the line goes, a friendship between two such different Girls seems unlikely. And I was like, why are they so different? They both seem to be peasant girls who are kind of smart and snarky and like, too cool. Like, much cooler than the other kids in this town. What do you mean they're so different? Does that line come from the book? And if so, how are they so different? [00:16:11] Speaker B: I don't think that line is in the book. I don't remember it being in the book. And I do think that they at least feel a little more opposite in the book because Agatha is more like goth than she is in the movie. [00:16:26] Speaker A: Well. And based on the description, she's more visually distinct from. Sophie is like, traditionally beautiful, and Agatha seems not to be in the book, whereas in the movie they're just both traditionally attractive people. [00:16:42] Speaker B: Right. Yeah. No, I agree with you that in the movie it does not seem all that far fetched that they would be friends. But I actually overall preferred their friendship in the movie because in the book it kind of doesn't seem like they're that good of friends at all. So I agree that this is a weak point. [00:17:02] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I can believe their friendship in the movie. I don't have an issue believing their friends in the movie. It makes sense that my issue is why does the movie tell me it doesn't make sense? I'm like, no, they seem like they would be friends. They seem like they have similar interests and are like, on each other's level, like, you know, with. In terms of wits and stuff. Like, and are kind of are both, like, seemingly good people who don't, like, care about, like, the. The nonsense that all of the other kids in town do who are much more like, traditional. [00:17:31] Speaker B: You know, they're both Belle. [00:17:33] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. And so I'm like, why wouldn't they be friends? Again, I believe their friendship in the movie. I think it's fine. Like, it works fine. I just don't like. Why would you include that line then? Because they don't seem that different. I don't. I don't get it. So then we move on and we realize, and this is where I guess we start to see a little bit of their difference, which is that Agatha, I guess, is like, fine staying in this town and living with her, staying with her mom or whatever. But Sophie really wants to escape. Escape and. And lead a grander, more magical, interesting life. And so she makes a wish. After they find out about this school for good and evil, she goes to a tree and makes a wish that she wants to be taken away or, you know, that she can Leave and go to the School for Good and Evil. And as it's happening, the true. The wish comes true. But then as it's happening, Agatha shows up and tries to stop her from being taken away, only for both of them to get swept up and taken away by a giant undead vulture. And I wanted to know if that's how they got to the School for Good and Evil in the book. [00:18:35] Speaker B: So this is pretty close. The main big change is that Sophie doesn't make a wish like we see in the movie. In the book, the town has a backstory that every four years, two children vanish. And the prevailing lore is that they get taken to these schools, which some of the people believe and some of the people don't believe. [00:18:58] Speaker A: Right. [00:18:59] Speaker B: But Sophie believes in it, and she desperately wants to be chosen to be taken to the school for good. So she basically tries to make herself as available as possible on this night that supposedly two children are going to be taken, but Agatha does not want her to be taken, so she tries to stop it. And they both end up in the woods, at which point we catch back up to what the movie shows, and they get snatched up by the giant bird. [00:19:27] Speaker A: That makes sense. And I feel like that lore is. Is in the movie, but not explained, I feel like, until later, Like, I feel like there's. Because, like, once we start finding out about, like, readers and stuff, which isn't really fleshed out enough in the movie, in my opinion, I feel like that ties into this idea of, like, well, there's this world of normal people. Like, I feel like the movie does not do a good enough job setting up that they don't. That there's this, like, separate world of, like, the fairy tale world and the world they live in. [00:19:58] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:19:59] Speaker A: And then the movie fails in a lot of ways, in my opinion. But I just felt like it did not do a good job setting that up, but that it was still there. And so I was a little bit confused as to, like, so how much do people know about this? Like, is it a thing that. And what you're saying makes sense. And again, the movie kind of later gives some of those breadcrumbs in a way that clarified it a little bit, I guess. I don't know. Anyways, the bird thing takes him away to the school, and it drops Agatha. They're very excited. Drops Agatha at the good school, but then unexpectedly, drops Sophie at the bad school, the evil school. And I wanted to know if that was how it played out in the book. I assume that seems like the main premise of the story. [00:20:43] Speaker B: So, yeah, that plays out in the same way. Right down to Sophie dropping into this disgusting moat around the school. [00:20:50] Speaker A: Okay, speaking of it, do they call the normal kids who end up in the evil school readers? And I guess this is all the kids. Maybe. I don't. I couldn't tell in the movie if they said that about in the good school. I guess they called Agatha that. I can't remember. But is that a thing? Because I thought that was. Again, I don't think the movie did a good enough job setting up this lore and this world in a way where when they said that, it just made me roll my eyes. Whereas I think I know what the book is going like, what the story is going for there. Because this is a world where fairy tales exist and all these other people, they read these fairy tales, they don't live in this fairy tale world. I don't think the movie did a good enough job setting or explaining and maybe I just missed it. But of explaining that there are these two worlds and that at. Anyways, does the readers thing come from the book? [00:21:44] Speaker B: Yeah, it does. They do that at both schools. And one of the things we find out is that like, Sophie had always assumed that the schools were entirely populated with kids from like the real world, from like different villages, but then finds out that actually they're the only ones from the real world and everybody else is already from fairy tale world. [00:22:06] Speaker A: Yeah, I think that the issue that I have with the movies this is that they like, they kind of dance around this idea of what it means to be a reader, but never like explicitly say, like, oh, so what happens is. Or maybe they did in my mind, just because there was so much happening that I bet that's actually a big problem is that there's so much going on in the movie because there's so much in it that a lot of this stuff probably does get very briefly explained in like a sentence. [00:22:33] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:22:33] Speaker A: And I just. It was too much for my brain to register all of it. But I felt like they did not do a good enough job being like, okay, so this is a rare weird thing where these two non magical people showed up at the school. And that is a thing that happens every, would you say, four years or something like that. Like, they don't go into any of that backstory in the movie in a way that I found. So I'm just kind of left wondering, like, okay, so I know they're different in some way, but is this super uncommon? Is this normal? Like, what is. You know what I Mean, like, I just, I just felt lost and I just constantly felt like I was trying to find my mornings of like, what are the rules of this world? Like what is it all gets back. My main critique is that this, which I read in one of the reviews, this should have been a freaking TV show. [00:23:21] Speaker B: Yeah, no, it shouldn't have been. [00:23:23] Speaker A: Whoever's decision to make this a movie as opposed to a TV show needed to be fired. Like, like a lot. It's, it makes. I could totally see this show, this story working as like an 8 to 10 episode, 40 minute per episode TV show because you would actually have time to do everything that you need to. But as it is, I just, I felt like I was scrambling to figure out what the heck was going on and just was never able to catch up. So I was constantly missing things and. [00:23:53] Speaker B: Like, anyways, and we talked about in the prequel, the director. Not like, what was the quote? [00:24:01] Speaker A: Yeah, it doesn't want people to have to. People shouldn't have to know anything coming into the movie. Basically the implication being like, you shouldn't have had to read the book. [00:24:09] Speaker B: Deeply ironic. [00:24:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Failed miserably at that. And like again, I think the details may all be there, it's just there's so many of them that a normal person watching it one time would just be like, what? [00:24:23] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean the thing is though, like similarly to what we were discussing before, I had kind of the same strength in the book because there's just so much to take in and it's like moving at a mile a minute. [00:24:37] Speaker A: At least in a book you can stop and reread and you know what I mean, you can kind of take your time and digest it on your own, your own speed in a movie, unless you're pausing every 10 minutes, you only immediately moving on to the next thing. If I read something in a book and I'm like, wait, what's going on? I can stop and try to parse it out and then like go back and like reread a section if I want. And like, I guess you can kind of do that with a movie, but it's just not how you're supposed to consume a movie. So it feels weird to do that. And if you need to do that in a movie, you fail. I think arguably if you need to do that in a book, it kind of fails too. But like, it's a different kind of thing. I don't know. Yeah. So then we get into the story proper and they, they are now at these two schools and they, they tried to get out. Or whatever. But they're basically. Or not. I think they've tried to leave yet at this point, but they. I think they've started going to classes at this point. Sophie. It meets, like, the girls in her year, I guess. [00:25:32] Speaker B: Or they're like her roommates. [00:25:33] Speaker A: Classmates. Her roommates or whatever. And they're the other evil girls. And one of them is Hester, who we talked about or was mentioned in the Guess who. And one of the things she does in the movie right away is she gets on their bad side by. She sees a picture of a witch lady on the wall and calls her, like, an ugly hag or something. And then Hester is like, that hag is my mother. How dare you. And hates her. And, like, gets really mad at her about this. And I was like, wait a second. Don't you guys like being evil? And. And shouldn't you be fine with her calling your mama hag? You have a whole class about how to be ugly. Why is it a bad thing that. Is that from the book? Cause that drove me crazy. It's also an issue. I think I mentioned this before that I have with Wednesday, that whole, we're evil, so actually bad things are good and good things are bad, but then it just never holds up because it's impossible to do that. And so that was one of the issues I had a lot with this movie. Just like, okay, so what's actually. Are you evil? Do you like evil things or do you not like evil things or bad things and gross things and ugly things? What is. [00:26:51] Speaker B: Anyways, so I don't think this exact exchange happens in the book. I went back to the scene and I couldn't find that exact line. But I absolutely agree with you that the beautiful, ugly dynamic thing does not work. It doesn't work in the book, and it doesn't work in the movie either. [00:27:11] Speaker A: No, not at all. It's just constantly fluctuating back and forth between, like, well, it's. [00:27:16] Speaker B: They want to be ugly, we like being ugly. But then also we're mad that you're calling us ugly. [00:27:24] Speaker A: But also some of us are just hot. And it's like, what is it? What? And then, like when. Like, for instance, when Sophie goes full, full evil mode, she gets hotter. And I don't understand what. Like, I don't get the idea here at all. Meanwhile, Agatha is. Goes. I think she. [00:27:46] Speaker B: She's, like, sneaking around, sneaking around, and. [00:27:48] Speaker A: She ends up in the library or something, and she sees the spirit of Rafal, the evil brother who we assume is dead. At this point. Cause we saw him fall off a cliff, and we saw his body laying on the ground at the beginning of the movie in the flashback. And she sees him, and he basically tells her that Sophie has a destiny with him. Like, he appears and he's like, she has a destiny. She belongs with me. Or something. And then, like, explodes into a giant ocean of blood. And I wanted to know if that happened in the book. [00:28:18] Speaker B: No, none of that is from the book. [00:28:20] Speaker A: Okay. I'm just gonna move on. I don't care. I have too many questions, and it's already gonna be too long an episode. I'm already talking too much because this movie really frustrated me. Is there a narrator? This is one of the things I liked in the movie. Is there a narrator that ends up being. Being a Quill that speaks the narration within the world and is writing the story of the story we're watching? Because I thought that was fun. Compliment sandwich. And by compliment sandwich, I mean it's, like, the only compliment I'm gonna give this movie. One of the only ones. [00:28:54] Speaker B: The story in Quill is in the book, and it does start writing Sophie and Agatha's story as they're there. I don't recall that. It narrates out loud. [00:29:06] Speaker A: Okay. [00:29:07] Speaker B: But I. I actually liked that, too. [00:29:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:29:08] Speaker B: I thought that was fun. [00:29:09] Speaker A: I thought that was fun because we hit a narrator, and it's, like, classic. Like, oh, yeah, sure, fine. [00:29:13] Speaker B: You can have it. And then I like that they get into the room and the narration gets louder. [00:29:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:29:17] Speaker B: And, like, sounds like it's in the room with them. And you're like, oh, that's fun. [00:29:20] Speaker A: Yeah, there's a narrator. I totally had no issue with that. I was on board. One of the things that this movie does a little bit, and it's. It actually feels very accurate to the. To Paul Feig. Like, this being his movie is that it constantly lampshades how silly this all is in a way that I found very annoying. And one of the ways is that we get this line where it's when Sophie and Agatha go up to talk to the headmaster of the school about her being in the wrong school, and he's like, well, okay, maybe that's true. But if you need. In order for me to switch you, you'll need to prove it by getting true love's kiss or whatever. And Agatha says to him, so you're saying. And I can't believe I'm actually saying this, that Sophie needs true love's kiss. And I wanted to know if the book also did this sort of detached, snarky, like, lampshading of itself throughout. Because, no, I don't like that. [00:30:30] Speaker B: I would say that the book plays it pretty sincere, actually. Or at least that was the vibe that I got from it. I did not notice any ironic lampshading as I was reading. If anybody else who read it did, let me know. But I did not pick up on anything like that. [00:30:46] Speaker A: Now, to be fair, it is mostly Agatha that does that in the movie. And the idea is that she finds this all ridiculous or whatever. So it's. It's not as obnoxious as it could be. But I still wasn't a big fan of that. I don't know. I just. It just felt like that. That it's the sin of. If you're gonna make this movie, don't be embarrassed that you're making this movie. Just make this movie. You know what I mean? Like, and it. It feels like there are times where the movie felt embarrassed about the movie it was making. At times I don't think it completely falls into that. Like, it's not like a weird or ironic thing the whole time, but just every now and then lines like that. I'm just like, I don't need that. Just have them all be like, they live in this world and whatever. Anyways, we already kind of mentioned it, but I wanted to know if the Ugly and Beauty classes came from the book. [00:31:43] Speaker B: Yeah, they do. [00:31:45] Speaker A: Okay. It's dumb. Then we get to see some of their other classes and another class they have is they need to go into the Fairy Tale woods in order to see what's out there. I don't even learn how to survive. Learn how to survive in the Fairy Tale woods or whatever. And so we're introduced to seemingly the groundskeeper of the School for Good and Evil, who is a giant bearded man who is a bit of a joyful oaf. And I was like, woof. Like really not beating those allegations. And boy, does it continue to not beat those allegations. I have another question about it here in a second that gets even more into it, but is that a thing from the book that they have to go into the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid? [00:32:33] Speaker B: So they do have a. I think it's actually called Surviving Fairy Tales or something like that. But it's basically Surviving in the woods class where they, like, go out and learn about, like, different magical things that exist in the Fairy Tale Forest, but it is taught by a regular sized gnome. In the book. [00:32:50] Speaker A: That would have been better because it would have been less. There's the number of times I rolled my eyes. Thinking back to how much Paul Feig was like, we don't want it to be like Harry Potter. And I was like, readers. It was a lot like Harry Potter. And just again, it's like some. Especially finding out that the book. And now I will say, although this wouldn't have been a weird studio thing, but I will say that on big movies like this, who knows how much creative control the director even has on stuff like that. Because the studio execs go, we want the next Harry Potter, so make it as much like Harry Potter as you can. So choices like this may, you know, who knows how much of that is studio meddling versus other things. But, man, I was like, yep, that. Okay, cool. Very original. We then get back to Sophie, who's up in her dorm room and she has a. Or I think this is in a class. This is in one of the other classes. They're in, like, I don't know, their version of transfiguration or something. I don't know what they're doing, but they're. They're doing magic with. With Charlize Theron. And one of the girls gets real mad at Sophie and summons a wyvern out of her neck tat. She has like a neck tattoo of a dragony wyvern looking thing and it comes to life and jumps out of her and attacks Sophie. And I wanted to know if that came from the book. [00:34:17] Speaker B: Yeah, it does. Hester has like a giant demon tattoo that comes to life and crawls out of her skin. [00:34:23] Speaker A: It was kind of cool. [00:34:24] Speaker B: Maybe one of the coolest things in the book. [00:34:26] Speaker A: I thought it was kind of cool. I was like, that's gnarly and interesting. I wish we would, like, learn more about that and figure out what her whole deal is, because that's kind of interesting. But whatever it is, fine. Speaking of another line that is in the movie, and I believe this is in the book. I think I found it on Goodreads, by the way. But we literally get this line in the movie. It's not who we are, it's what we do. Sophie. And I was like, okay, that's literally like maybe the most famous line from Harry Potter almost verbatim in this. Does that come from the book? [00:35:02] Speaker B: I'm positive that there's a very similar line in the book. I couldn't find it and I couldn't get an ebook copy of this one to search for it. I'm not sure if it's in the same context as it is in the movie. But I'm positive that this line is in the book. [00:35:17] Speaker A: And I will want to stress, too, it's not that Harry Potter was even the first thing to do all of these things. [00:35:22] Speaker B: Right. [00:35:23] Speaker A: That line, that quote is older than Harry. Like, that idea is much older than Harry Potter. It's just if you want to make something that you were like, this isn't Harry Potter. Boy, you're sure doing a bad job. [00:35:35] Speaker B: Well, and I mean, within the context of, like, middle grade, young adult fantasy novels that take place in magical schools. Yeah, you're gonna get compared to Harry Potter. It's gonna happen. [00:35:48] Speaker A: If you're gonna. Yeah. Maybe a good idea would be to make it as hard as possible by not just literally pulling some of the most famous quotes from Harry Potter and just doing them again. I don't know. It's okay. The movie is very different in a lot of ways. It's not like by any stretch, is it anywhere close to, like, a copy paste. It's not remotely like anything close to even copying Harry Potter in any way other than the idea of it's like a magical school again, which Harry Potter didn't invent. It's just that, because it is that you have to, like, why would you open yourself up to that by being like, I'm just gonna write maybe the most famous line from Harry Potter into my book? I don't know. It's just. Yeah. Does the school do the thing from the Witcher where they turn all of the failed students into fish? Because I thought that was funny. [00:36:44] Speaker B: Yeah. All of the failed students become other fairy tale beings. They get turned into magical animals or magical household items or other magical creatures. [00:36:56] Speaker A: Does that ever get addressed in the movie or in the book as like, boy? Because, like, the movie alludes to the idea of Agatha being like, well, this is really fucked up. [00:37:05] Speaker B: Yeah. The book does go more hard into that being like, what the fuck? [00:37:09] Speaker A: What are we doing here? Yeah, because it's very clearly a fucked up thing in the Witcher when they turn them all into electric eels and throw them in the basement or whatever to power the magic or whatever. I can't remember something like that. But in the. In this, like, Agatha is like, boy, this seems messed up. But then it just kind of gets ignored. Like, we don't touch on it again the rest of the movie. I guess it's not that important, to be fair. It's just kind of a side plot. But whatever. Speaking of, does Agatha pull a fish girl out of the lake because she wished for home? She's in the movie, she, like, they're all making wishes at the lake. And then if you touch the lake and you make a wish, it like, shows you. [00:37:51] Speaker B: It shows you what your wish is. And if your wish is pure enough, it'll come true. [00:37:55] Speaker A: Right. [00:37:56] Speaker B: And all of the other girls wish for boyfriends or whatever. [00:37:58] Speaker A: Yeah. And she goes up and she says, I wish for a home for all of us. [00:38:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:05] Speaker A: And then touches the lake and then the fish swarm around her arm and turn into a girl who was, I guess, one of the failed students who ended up in the lake as a fish. Did that come from the book? And what was she wishing for and why? I didn't understand why she wished for that in that moment. Necessarily in the movie, I don't know. [00:38:30] Speaker B: So this is directly from the book. And Agatha's wish is to go home, but it ends up getting a little garbled up, partly because she's upset and partly because she's trying to, like, cover all her bases with this wish, because she also wants Sophie to go home. So she ends up just wishing for home, which is what frees the girl. [00:38:52] Speaker A: Why? [00:38:53] Speaker B: I don't know, man. [00:38:56] Speaker A: No, I'm just like. I think the movie actually makes it make more sense because depending on how it's worded in the book, because her just wishing for home, I don't understand why that would transform the fish girl back into a human. But I can kind of understand in the movie why her wishing for a home for all of us might do that kind of. Even then, it's still loose. And I'm not really sure why you would think it would just show her that coming true down the. [00:39:28] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:39:28] Speaker A: I should stop trying to figure this out. I don't. It's one of those movies that I just find incredibly frustrating because I don't even know how to really talk about it because it's just a mess. But, like, not even in a. It's hard to describe. It's not like a mess in a way that, like, I think it's bad necessarily. Like, there's parts of the movie that are okay, but it's just trying to figure it all out makes me feel. It's a movie that makes me feel stupid. But it's. I know it's not. I think that's what it is. It's a movie that makes me feel stupid because I'm very self conscious about being overly judgmental when I think maybe I just didn't understand what was going on. And so it's hard for me to talk about, because I am worried that maybe I just missed a detail or missed something and that it's all very obvious. But then I'm like, no, that can't be the case because this is the kids movie, and I watch very complex movies and can understand them very easily. The fact that I can't understand this movie must mean that it's just, like, a poorly made and poorly told story. Anyway. I don't know. I don't know. [00:40:46] Speaker B: But I really. I felt the same way reading the book. [00:40:50] Speaker A: Okay. [00:40:51] Speaker B: There's just. There's a lot of lore. And the book is also very long and very repetitive. [00:40:58] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:40:59] Speaker B: And I struggled similarly with, like, parsing what I was supposed to get from different things. And I think the answer to that question is I'm not sure the author always knew what he wanted me to get from things. [00:41:16] Speaker A: Okay. Okay. [00:41:18] Speaker B: Unfortunately. [00:41:19] Speaker A: Okay. [00:41:21] Speaker B: So I think the. I think that on a lot of these issues, the movie didn't really have a chance. [00:41:27] Speaker A: Okay. Interesting. All right. So we had met this character named Gregor who is the son of Prince Charming. [00:41:35] Speaker B: Yes. [00:41:35] Speaker A: I think. Who gets fucking murdered in this movie. And that's never addressed. [00:41:42] Speaker B: Yeah, not really. [00:41:44] Speaker A: Prince Tedros just throws a sword into. Anyway, so Gregor gets turned, I guess, because he runs away in the forest. [00:41:51] Speaker B: He gets three fails. So he fails and gets turned into a magical. [00:41:59] Speaker A: Did he say he had failed twice before or something? Okay. [00:42:02] Speaker B: I missed that they talk about that. [00:42:03] Speaker A: Because I was like, boy, that seemed sudden. He ran and he just ran out of the class and got it. He, like, vanishes. And we don't know what happened to him. But then he shows up here and he is one of the. In this lake scene, he is one of the. What did I call it earlier or something? The big flying undead vulture things. He turns into that and then shows up and Agatha realizes it's him and is trying to, like, talk to him. And then Tedros shows up and is like, look out. I'll save you. And throws a sword in his chest and murders him. And this obviously pisses Agatha off, but not very long because she gets over that pretty quick and is like, ah, Tedros, you seem great. It's like he murdered that kid earlier and you guys, nobody ever. Okay. I wanted to know if that happened in the book. [00:42:49] Speaker B: So Gregor is not in the book, although I liked the addition of his character. [00:42:54] Speaker A: Okay. [00:42:55] Speaker B: There is a similar scene in the book where Agatha realizes that one of the gargoyles that's on the school is also a transformed previous student. And Tedros kills Him as she's trying to figure out how to save him and is like, no, I saved you from that gargoyle. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Very similar. I liked this change. I think showing what happens with. I think showing that happening with a character that we already like. [00:43:22] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:43:23] Speaker B: Was a good choice. [00:43:24] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. It makes sense for it to. Yeah. To be a character we've seen already. Yeah, 100%. Well, then right after that, a thing that I thought was really strange in the movie is then Kerry Washington's character, Professor Dovey. Dovey, who's the dean of the Good School or whatever, like, confronts Agatha and is, like, seemingly really mad at her initially, but then, like, halfway through the conversation is like, actually, I've just realized that you're the first true princess we've had here in a long time because you're super empathetic. And I wanted to know if that scene came from the book, because that was another one of those moments where I'm like, the motivations and, like, the character writing feels incomprehensible of just, like, what. What. What is. Like, it just. Everything changes on a whim for what the story needs. And none of it feels motivated by characters that I understand. Like, I do not understand why the characters believe or think or do any of the things they do for the most part. Occasionally there's a few characters where I understand that. But Dovey, I'm like, what is your deal? Who are you wor. Like, what is your goal? What is your. You're the dean of the school for good. But, like, what is your aim? Like, what are you trying to do here? And then, like. And again, she gets really mad at Agatha and then is like, oh, actually, you're. You're so empathetic. You must. You're the only true princess we've ever had. Does that scene come from the book? And is it any. Like, is it maybe work better? Maybe it's, like, multiple scenes in the book or something. [00:44:57] Speaker B: I think it might be multiple scenes. [00:44:59] Speaker A: Because that would make one. [00:44:59] Speaker B: I think the movie might have crushed these two scenes together. Cause I'm also positive that Dovey and Agatha have a similar conversation about, like, empathy. And her empathy meaning that she actually does belong in the school for good and she's not in the wrong place. But I don't recall the exact context of that from the book. [00:45:17] Speaker A: Okay. [00:45:18] Speaker B: But I think the movie might have, like, sandwiched those two things together. [00:45:23] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:45:23] Speaker B: Because I agree that it doesn't really work in the movie. [00:45:26] Speaker A: I just felt like, again, I was just like, well, that just switched on a dime and I don't. Okay, sure. Now you like her. I guess. I don't know. And again, you like her even though you're fully on board. Seemingly Dovey is fully on board with all of these weird rules that the school has where they like turn kids into. [00:45:47] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:45:47] Speaker A: And she wasn't remotely upset about Tedros killing that boy like Gregor. But then in an instant is like. But you. You're really empathetic and that's great. Even though I seemingly am not in like that. I don't. [00:46:08] Speaker B: It's a mixed message in the book too. [00:46:12] Speaker A: Yeah. So then we start moving down the path where Sophie starts getting like lured in by the spirit of Rafal, who is like this evil, the evil brother. And she keeps seeing him in mirrors and stuff and she's kind of being lured to the dark side by him. And then at some point, and I don't remember what the impetus for this scene is, Charlize Theron, the dean of the evil school, like, realizes this, that she is like potentially like the chosen evil one or something. And in order to like push her down this path, she. She ties her to a chair and cuts her hair off so that she can really embrace her evilness because then she won't have her. Her golden hair, her good golden hair anymore. And I wanted to know if that came from the book. I'm sorry. I'm trying. I'm sorry. It's really hard. This is one of those episodes where I. I really wanted to enjoy this movie more than I did. And I. And then when we get into the episode, I have a. So many of our episodes are so easy because I'm very enthusiastic about what we're talking about. I have no enthusiasm for this. [00:47:35] Speaker B: I'm sorry. [00:47:35] Speaker A: I'm trying my best to keep it interesting, but I just. And again, I really wanted to find this movie at least enjoyably bad. And I didn't even find it enjoyably bad except for a very few brief moments. I think it's not bad enough is the problem. It wasn't bad enough for me to enjoy it in that way. And it was too self aware and too, too self deferential. It wasn't camp enough. I don't know. [00:48:04] Speaker B: Anyways, so Sophie's hair does get cut off. It's not less so that does it, but more on that later. [00:48:12] Speaker A: Okay. Okay. So this was interesting, at least kind of because it was different and unique and not something I'd ever seen before. They. In order. They have a ceremony where they like, start to unlock their. They first unlock their magical powers because everybody here has, like, the ability to use magic, but they haven't been able to do it yet. But this is the day. And in order to do that, they first have to master a thing called their finger glow, which is basically the teachers activate their magical fingers by stabbing them with a pin, like a little needle, like a knife in their finger, and that activates the magic in their finger, and then they can do a little bit of magic, and then eventually they will be able to do full magic. It's like a. It's a. It's a. It's a magic learner's permit. [00:49:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:49:07] Speaker A: Is basically the idea. [00:49:08] Speaker B: Yeah. All of that is from the book. Yeah. It's explained in the book that the finger glow is kind of like training wheels. [00:49:15] Speaker A: There you go. Training wheels. [00:49:16] Speaker B: Yeah. For learning to use their magic. And then as they master it, it eventually goes away. [00:49:21] Speaker A: Okay. [00:49:21] Speaker B: And they don't have to rely on the finger glow anymore. [00:49:24] Speaker A: That was fine. I didn't mind that. That was a fun little unique world building I was on board with. In this moment, though, after the hair chop, they're all doing the magic ceremony or the finger glow ceremony, and Sophie has decided that she is going to embrace the evil side. She had a conversation with Mira Rafal, who's like, look, everybody's telling you that you don't belong in the school for good. And the only way you can prove them as or, you know, prove that you do belong there is by doing stuff that are, you know, embracing. I don't remember what he says. Anyways, she embraces, like, the evil side. And by embracing the evil side, I mean, she decided to start shopping at Hot Topic, and I wanted to know if she gets an evil makeover in the book. [00:50:15] Speaker B: Yeah, she does give herself an evil makeover after her hair gets cut off. I did not like her haircut in the movie. In the book, she gets, like, a pixie cut. So I thought the movie should have gone farther with it, but I appreciated. I felt like. Well, I felt like the movie was trying to make her look like chilling adventures of Sabrina. [00:50:35] Speaker A: 100%. [00:50:36] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. [00:50:37] Speaker A: And also, this would have been so much better if any of the people who directed and wrote that series had worked on this because, oh, my God, that series is so much better than. Well, at least some of the early series of that are kind of lost its way a little bit down the road. [00:50:52] Speaker B: It got a little lost. [00:50:53] Speaker A: Yeah. But early first couple seasons of that show were good. [00:50:57] Speaker B: I did appreciate that. The movie combined her makeover with the finger glow ceremony because in the book she just like struts her stuff across the quad on a random day. And I think if it's gonna be a cheesy makeover reveal, might as well lean in. [00:51:14] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely. And we might as well talk about it now. It's in our odds and ends. But this is the moment where it happens. I was ill prepared for the youe should see me in a crown needle drop. And oh God, my eyes almost rolled out of my head. [00:51:35] Speaker B: I was actually prepared for that needle drop. I knew that was coming and it still took a year off my life. [00:51:43] Speaker A: It's another one of those moments. And I will say this is one of those moments where I'm glad the movie at least is not self conscious in this movie. The movie really thought it was doing something here. The movie was like, yes, this is awesome. And I, I, that was that. And that's. I, as much as it made my eyes roll out of my head, there were more moments like this in the movie. I would have enjoyed this movie a lot more for being like a ridiculous piece of trash. But. And it's particularly like, funny because. And now this isn't the movie's fault because this movie came out like a year before Agatha all along. But Agatha all along had already done the. The villain becomes the villain. And yes, we do the you should see me in a crown needle drop. And now, again, to be fair, this movie did it first, but that show did it way better to where it actually works kind of dramatically in the moment. And boy, in this one, it is. And I think, I think, and I don't want to be mean, I think maybe this movie's biggest. One of the things that makes this movie not work. And I'm sure she's a talented actress. She was on Broadway. She's in. She was like the star of the Beetlejuice musical. But the actress who plays Sophie, she does not have the sauce for this character. Yeah, she does not have. [00:53:02] Speaker B: I would agree with that. [00:53:04] Speaker A: I don't know what it. Maybe it's a direction. I don't know. [00:53:07] Speaker B: I don't think she was terrible. [00:53:08] Speaker A: No, I don't think she was terrible, but she just, she feels like a little girl play actor. [00:53:13] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't think she had, had like the gravitas. [00:53:16] Speaker A: No. Like this, this moment, like it feels, it makes you cringe because you don't believe it. Like, you just. At least that was my thing is like when she comes strutting out, I just, I Don't know what it. It's hard to describe. And I think the best way I can describe it is that she. And we use a term that the kids are using. She lacks aura. She does not have. You know what I mean? Like, I think that is it like she just for whatever reason. Well, and also I could. And it's not fair to her, but I could also only ever keep thinking of Ariana Grande in this role for whatever reason. I think because the actress kind of looks like her. [00:53:58] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:53:58] Speaker A: And I think Ariana Grande would have crushed this role in a way that would have made it like camp and incredible. And I just couldn't help but think, like, man, if only. Cause I don't. And it's not that she's bad in the movie. It's just there's something. It's missing something. And I don't know what it is. But maybe she doesn't commit enough. I don't know. I don't think that's it. I just. I was disappointed that. And I just felt like she didn't have the sauce to carry that role for whatever reason. I don't know. Again, I think that also could be. I do think part of that is the directing. I think this movie does not do any favors in the way it is shot specifically just the way it frames those big moments. They also lack aura because Paul Feig is maybe the most auralist director ever. He great comedy director for television shows. You want some fun banter in a sitcom and you want to. Or a TV show that is shot like a mockumentary. Paul Theig's your guy. I don't think he has the chops to do big budget, like blockbuster action adventure. I just don't think he has the visual chops for it. And it just. There's some interest. Like some. You can see what he's going for with some of the camera moves and stuff. But it just. It all falls really flat. And it all felt to me like a director play acting at being. I feel similar. Maybe it's so. Maybe it's him and not the actress. I just felt like maybe his direction falls so short of the moment that it by extension makes her performance feel flat. Because the camera is not living up to the moment that the film thinks it's putting on screen. It's part of the problem. I think I'd have to watch it again and I never will. But I mean, I might watch that moment again because that was pretty fun. But anyways, at this point, Sophie and Tedros end up Kind of becoming an item. He's like, whoa, look at you. Hot goth girl, Hot topic girl. I'm into this. And then they start dating, which causes issues. And the issue is that an ever and a never can't be together. I mean, it's right there in the name. Doesn't make sense. So he. The school is like, well, we can't have this. But they're like, no, we can. And the schoolmaster's like, all right, well, in that case, what we have to do is a trial by tail. Like a trial by fairy tale. And so they put them in the fairy tale woods, and they have to find each other. And if they find each other by sunrise or something, I can't remember what the rule is, then they can be together or whatever to prove they belong together, basically, which is fine. It's kind of a fun idea. I wanted to know if that came from the book. [00:57:13] Speaker B: So this is a little different. In the book, the trial by tale is an event where the top 10 students from each school participate in. And they are basically using their new skills to fight each other in the woods until only one is left standing. [00:57:30] Speaker A: Oh. So it's like we're pulling a little Hunger Games action. [00:57:32] Speaker B: Yeah, a little Hunger Games action. Then Tedros and Sofie make an agreement ahead of this event to work together, because they're like, okay, that'll prove that Sofie's good and that we belong together. But it goes similarly poorly, and Agatha has to step in and save Tedros because Sophie doesn't actually want to fight. [00:57:55] Speaker A: Okay, because that was my next question was, does Agatha step up and help Tedros in the trial by tale after Sophie doesn't do anything? [00:58:02] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:58:03] Speaker A: And then because of that, Tedros decides that he doesn't like Sophie anymore. Instead, relationship with Sophie ended relationship with Agatha begins. And this pisses off Sophie, and she just, like, immediately flips on Agatha and is like, you suck and I hate you. And this was another one of those moments where I just wrote, yeah, this should have been a TV show. Because every one of these motivational, These big character moments feel so rushed and so underdeveloped that you're just like, oh, and now you hate. Okay, sure. Now you hate him. All right. Or hate her. Okay. It's like, if this was a TV show, I can totally see the pacing and the way you would do this over the course of an 8 to 10 to 12 episode season and make it completely work or at least work way better. But, boy, it does not work in the movie anyways. Does that come does that big moment of like the flipping and Sophie deciding she hates Agatha. [00:58:58] Speaker B: Sophie does get mad at Agatha after the trial by tail because Tedros leaves her following this and she perceives this as being Agatha's fault, even though it is super Sophie's fault. [00:59:10] Speaker A: So then Sophie, now in her lowest state, she is. This is, you know, this is the classic moment where the villain shows up and offers her a way out of her, her lowly state. At her second act, low point, Rafal shows up and is like, hey, I got an idea. You should use my blood magic and you can make them all pay or whatever. And I wanted to know if that if she gets blood magic from Rafal in the book and becomes super evil. [00:59:38] Speaker B: No, this isn't from the book. Sofie does not interact with him at all until the final climax scene. More on that later. I'm kind of six of one on this. Sophie spends most of the book flip flopping back and forth between wanting to be perceived as good and trying to embrace evil. But I struggled to understand her motivations every single time she did it. And it was many, many, many times throughout the course of this nearly 500 page book where she would like flip flop back and forth and then everybody else would like flip flop about how they felt about her. And the entire time I was like, I don't understand what's going on. Why are we doing this again? So Rafal corrupting her gives us a clear reason for her behavior, which I like. [01:00:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:00:42] Speaker B: But I also think it kind of shortchanges her character in a way because in the book, despite wanting to be good slash a princess, it's pretty clear right from the jump that Sophie isn't all that good. She's really vain and she's self centered and she's judgmental. And it becomes at least kind of clear that she could be good, but she doesn't want to work at it and unlearn her bad behaviors. [01:01:10] Speaker A: She's none of those things in the. [01:01:12] Speaker B: The. No, she's none of those things in the movie. [01:01:14] Speaker A: And again, it's why Ariana Grande should have played this character. Because you know what? She would have. Now to be fair, that's not the actress's fault. It's the script's fault if we don't see it in the movie. But boy, she would have been great at vain, self centered and judgmental. And maybe this actress would have been too, but that would have been better. And it also would have helped set up why they're quote unquote different in the beginning because Again, they just seem so similar. Like they both seem like night. Anyways. Yeah. Because. Yeah. The movie does not at all set up the idea that Sophie is like vain or like. [01:01:44] Speaker B: Well, no. And I just. God, I just struggled with it in the book and I can't remember now if I have another note about this. So I'm just gonna say it here that I. When this book started, I thought I understood why Sofie had been sent to the school for evil because she's not as good as she perceives herself as. But then all of the other good students are also vain and self centered. [01:02:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Like the kids in the actual good school. [01:02:16] Speaker B: And judgmental. So I was like, okay, so why is only Sophie being punished for this? But it's never really explained. [01:02:26] Speaker A: Yeah, because I felt the same thing in the movie. And that was. I had a note later that was like, okay, what's going on? It was in my odds and ends. But it makes sense to talk about it here where I was like, okay, my guess is the whole twist is gonna be that the school for good isn't as good as it looks and seems and the bad school isn't as bad as it seems. And I think at the end that's kind of what we're going for. [01:02:46] Speaker B: Yes. [01:02:46] Speaker A: But boy, do we not get there in a way that makes sense. [01:02:49] Speaker B: I do think that that is what the book is trying to do is like show that, oh, they're not actually as good as they think they are. And good and evil aren't really all black and white and blah blah, blah, blah. [01:03:02] Speaker A: And. [01:03:03] Speaker B: But it's so garbled and like drowning in stuff. [01:03:10] Speaker A: Well, here's a good example that makes me very confused in the movie that I don't have a direct question about. So I'll talk about it here. At the end of the movie, they decide to combine the schools because, hey, everybody's just a person who's a mixture of good and evil. And that's Agatha's whole thing. The whole time she keeps talking about how like, look, you're a person, you're good and evil. Nobody, just good or evil, like, blah, blah, blah. And that's like, fine, I agree with that, whatever. But so at the end of the movie, they combine the schools and we have this scene where like Lesso and Dovey like unite to like, now we're going to run this school together or whatever. Right. Like that's like one of the final scenes. An hour ago in the movie, Lesso cut Sophie's hair off so that she could head down the path of pure evil to help become, like, the harbinger of pure evil for Rafal. [01:04:08] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:04:08] Speaker A: And that's just never addressed. [01:04:11] Speaker B: I mean, I agree. [01:04:12] Speaker A: Like, Rafal, I guess maybe, like, the idea is that. Because Rafal attacked her, too, I think, like, she was one of the people that got, like, shrunk. Right? [01:04:20] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:04:20] Speaker A: Like, when they. Or whatever. [01:04:21] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [01:04:22] Speaker A: I'm like, okay, so is she evil? Evil, or is she a normal person who has some. Like, Is a mixed bag. But, yeah, it's like you said, it's just so garbled of, like, what are. Okay. [01:04:35] Speaker B: Like, Like. And I struggled with this the entire time I was reading the book, which was a long time, because, as I've said, it's a very long book that had no business being as long as it was. I can see the message that the author is going for. Like, I can see it there. I'm like, I understand what you're trying to do, my guy, but it just doesn't work. [01:05:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:05:02] Speaker B: Like, it just doesn't pan out. And like I said before, I think the movie just didn't really have a chance on some of these fronts. [01:05:10] Speaker A: It feels very similar. Yeah. In the sense that it just, like. Okay, yeah. I get the idea is, like, people are messy and complicated, and nobody's just good or evil. But in the movie, we see some of the evil characters do truly evil things, and we just never address it or talk about it. We also see some of the good people do truly evil things. We never really. [01:05:32] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:05:33] Speaker A: Talk about that. [01:05:34] Speaker B: Really explore. [01:05:35] Speaker A: None of it's ever really explored. We just get to the end and we're like, well, I guess the story's over. It's like, what I. Okay. Like, we never thematically, like, wrap things up. It's just. I don't know. And, like, again, like, a similar moment that I was like, my God, why is, like, at the very, very end. And we'll just get back. I'll get back to my questions here in a second. At the very, very end, when Sophie kisses Rafal and the whole castle starts collapsing, we see it crush and kill. Like, the. The good and evil students are fighting each other. [01:06:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:06:06] Speaker A: We see it, like, crush and kill some of them. But then when it all gets reversed and they, like, come back to life, they look at each other and they're just like, hold hands. What? Why? What motivated that? Like, what. What in. Did they. Did they go to heaven and, like, God was like, hey, cut it out. Like, what happened? Like, why. What occurred in that. In the moments where they were dead. Where they realized. And I guess the idea is like. Well, they realized the folly of their quarreling once. It was a true life and death matter and they actually died. And they realized how silly all of this petty squabbling was. It's like. I guess. But not just. Just. Yeah, it's all just undercooked. Anyways, let's get back to. I have a few more questions. Do we see. So they have the movie. The climax of the movie takes place. It's like the Big ball or whatever. They have the Ever Ball, which is like their big whatever. Meanwhile, we see they run over Sophie or whoever. Agatha goes over to the Evil School, and they are also having a ball. But it is the first annual Never Ball, and I wanted to know if that happened in the book. And I was specifically dying at. When she runs in. They're all dancing, but they're doing, like, the Thriller dance. They're doing, like, creepy dancing. And I was like that. Okay. Which was almost. Almost camping. Fun. [01:07:27] Speaker B: The Nevers do have their own ball at the end. We don't actually see them dancing, so I cannot attest to the creepy dancing. They do have a ball, but they call it the Villain's no ball, which is way dumber than the Never Ball. So I thought that was a good change. [01:07:44] Speaker A: Am I dumb? What is that? Villains? Is that a. Like a pun or something I'm missing? [01:07:48] Speaker B: I don't know. [01:07:49] Speaker A: The villains, the no ball. [01:07:52] Speaker B: Well, it's a pun on. Okay, so in the book, the Evers Ball is called the snowball. Oh, okay, so it's a pun on that. But I also just thought it sounded dumb. [01:08:01] Speaker A: I agree. It is, at least. Okay, that helps. That makes it. I was like, why the no in there? The villains, nobody else. Okay, so it's a play on. Yeah, that makes sense. So then in the big climax, kind of the big moment is that all of the teachers and stuff have been shrunk or something or whatever, and Sophie has gone evil at this point. And so the good characters decide they need to go stop her. Tedros rallies all the good characters to go stop her. So they all rush over to the Evil school and they burst in and they attack her. And then when this happens, violates a rule that I thought the movie did a horrible job setting up, which is that evil attacks good defends. I swear they said that. And I was like, is this the first time I'm hearing this? I think they mentioned it. [01:08:55] Speaker B: I think they say it one other time. [01:08:57] Speaker A: One other time earlier in the movie. But for Such a big moment. I feel like you really should have set that up. Like, this is like a. It's like. Because it's like a big, like, thing. Like, it's this big magical rule, apparently. Because when it happens anyways, does that happen where the good guys attack? And when they do this, it's. It's. Something happens. And it seems like Sophie kind of instigates it in the movie, but it also kind of just vaguely seems like maybe the magical rule or something. And it, like, swaps them all to where all the evil people become good or not. They don't even become good. They just get white clothes and all the good people become evil. And by evil, I mean they get. They look like they're dressed for the black parade. Is that in the movie? [01:09:39] Speaker B: So that does happen in the book. Although it's similarly not clear if it's Sophie that does the swapping or if it's just, like, the rules of the universe. I think it's the rules of the universe. And the idea of evil attacks, good defends, I think is a little better set up in the book than it is in the movie. They at least mention it more than once. [01:10:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:10:02] Speaker B: And I think that the idea of goading good into attacking and thereby it becomes evil is, like, clever in theory. It is interesting. It's interesting in theory. But then I'm not sure how to read the Beautiful Ugly swapping within the context of everything else that's going on. Because I also don't know how to read this story's messages on beauty and ugly. And I hate to say that I think switching appear. The switching appearances thing doesn't work if you aren't willing to commit to fairy tale tropes about beauty. [01:10:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:10:41] Speaker B: I'm sorry. No. And, like, I get why the movie doesn't want to do that. Yeah, Totally get it. But they basically just switch color palettes. [01:10:51] Speaker A: They really do. They're like, wow, their clothes are different colors now. It's like. Like, okay, like, what is. Yeah. And it's just. It's. It's just. It's. I have this note later that. And. And I'm just. I think it talks about here because it really just echoes what you said. Is that this is one of those things. Everything in this movie. I'm like, a lot of these ideas sound good in theory in your head than it does. And they sound much better in theory than they do in practice. And I think this is what you're talking about where it's just like. And I will say this I don't even know if they sound better in theory. I think they sound better as a fun idea for fan fiction or something. They don't really even sound good in theory to me. As actual storytelling elements. The whole premise of fairy tale characters going to a schools for good and evil as like a fun deconstruction of fairy tale tropes and stuff, you're like, yes, there's something there. Like, I get what you're going for. But in practice, unless you are an incredible writer, it all comes off really sophomoric. I think maybe would be the way I would describe it. Like these are, these are the kind of ideas I have about stories. Like if I. If I. A non writer who's not a good writer, that's like the idea I come up with for a story. And that's not a compliment because it's like it's too obvious. Like it's all too obvious. And it. And as a result, unless you do something, unless you're such an incredible writer that you do something really, really clever with it, it just ends up feeling like this movie felt like I was reading a script in my intro to Screenwriting class where it's just a lot of ideas that are like vaguely good ideas. Let's examine fairy tales by breaking down and deconstructing this idea of good and evil char characters in fairy tales. And by doing. And we're gonna do that by having them go to school where they literally teach them how to be good guys versus how to be bad guys. But it all falls apart in practice because it, the. The internal logic of the story world doesn't make any sense. [01:13:36] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:13:36] Speaker A: Like once you start deconstructing it in that way. And maybe that's what it is because it's such a deconstruct, like an on the nose deconstruction of fairy tale tropes, it then cannot also be a sincere, like emotional story about. I'm trying to figure out how to say this. Sorry. [01:14:02] Speaker B: So the big main thing that I struggled with in the book is. And I kind of feel like I'm repeating myself. Yeah, I'm repeating myself too much like the book did. I think the goal was to deconstruct fairy tales. [01:14:21] Speaker A: Yes, clearly. [01:14:22] Speaker B: Because this idea of like, oh, the good guys are always beautiful and the bad guys are always ugly. That's very fairy tale. [01:14:30] Speaker A: Absolutely. [01:14:31] Speaker B: Like your outside reflects your inside. That's a very, very fairy tale thing. But I don't think that Soman Chainani was as good at deconstructing those Tropes as he needed to be to be able to do this successfully. [01:14:48] Speaker A: Yeah, I think that's what it is. Yeah. I get to a point where I'm like, okay, I see what you're. Like, the idea is. [01:14:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I see the idea. I see what you're going for in the execution. [01:14:56] Speaker A: I'm like, so where am I left with this? Like, okay, so Sophie thinks she should be good. She's not actually as good as she. She thinks she is. And I'm just talking about the movie here because I haven't read the book. She starts in order to become good. She starts getting seduced by the evil in order to, like, as a way to potentially, like, push her. Like, she thinks is a way to achieve her ends of. Of going to the good school and becoming the good, true princess or whatever that she thinks she should be. As she starts doing that, she starts actually becoming hideous. [01:15:35] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:15:36] Speaker A: And again, this is kind of getting back to the specific detail of, like, the ugly and pretty verse is like, ugly is bad, evil coded, Pretty is good coded. And the movie is trying to deconstruct that in some way. But if that's the case, once she starts becoming truly evil in the movie, she actually gets super hideous. [01:15:55] Speaker B: Yes. [01:15:55] Speaker A: And turns into, like, an old hag. [01:15:57] Speaker B: Yes. [01:16:00] Speaker A: But then when the good guys attack them and they switch from being evil into good, the evil people get slightly more attractive. [01:16:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:16:16] Speaker A: But the good people don't get uglier. They just get black clothes. And then at the end, everybody looks. I don't. It's just. It's like, what is. What are we doing? I don't know. I feel great. I felt crazy. Like, what are we saying? What are we. [01:16:34] Speaker B: Yeah, Well, I mean, that was exactly what I struggled with the whole time. Because I, like, I understand what you're trying to say about the way that beauty and being ugly are codified within the world of fairy tales. And I think that could be a very good thing to commentate on. But you're using those tropes at the same time that you're trying to deconstruct those tropes. And I'm left not knowing what the heck you're trying to say about it. [01:17:04] Speaker A: Exactly. I'm like, yeah, exactly. And that's. That's a much more concise way to get at what I was saying. Yeah, 100%. It's just like, what? Okay, whatever. Yeah. And I think that's why I'm so. I left because it's such a mess. I'm left, like, not even sure. How to like, really even talk about it. I'm just like, I don't even know what to get from this because I can't even tell what the point is. When we get to the end, I'm like, what was the message? I don't know. I can't tell because I get what the movie says the message is. But did what I saw on screen actually reflect that in any way? I don't know. Is there a big twist reveal that Rafal actually killed the good brother at the beginning and has been posing as him the whole time? Because that's what it is in the movie is that we think Rion or whatever is the one who. The good brother is the one who survived and has been running the school, when in fact the evil brother survived and has been posing as the good brother to run the school this whole time. [01:18:06] Speaker B: Yes. That is the big twist reveal at the end of the book. The schoolmaster is the evil brother and he had been letting everyone think that he was the good brother. [01:18:15] Speaker A: Okay. [01:18:16] Speaker B: And I have to say that I think the movie did a better job of setting this up. [01:18:21] Speaker A: It definitely sets it up. [01:18:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it's not set up in the book. It literally comes out of nowhere. Like, they go to see the schoolmaster and he's like, haha, I've been the evil brother all this time. And you're like, what? [01:18:37] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it definitely. The twist happens. You're like, oh, okay, I can see that it works. It's fine. It's a totally fine twist. I didn't see it coming. But it's also in retrospect, you're like, oh, yeah, I could see how that all worked and made sense and makes sense of how she's been seeing Rafal this whole time and that sort of stuff. You're like, oh, okay, yeah. So then he lures Sophie to the dark side, she kisses him so that they can be king and queen of the evil or whatever. Right, Whatever. And when she does this, the school starts collapsing and tons of kids are crushed under rock. And I wanted to know if that happened in the movie because I was like, holy shit, all those people just died. And then I was like, oh, never mind. It just rewinds. Like when Sophie dies. Never mind. Whatever. But. But does that happen in the book? [01:19:26] Speaker B: Yes. So Sylvie and Rafal do kiss and she has misgivings about it as it is happening. She's like, oh my God, I think I chose wrong. But the schools don't get destroyed. And I'm not sure what the point of Doing that was if the movie was just going to immediately undo it. [01:19:47] Speaker A: The point in the movie of doing that is it's literally the only shred of motivation for Sophie to change her mind. [01:19:55] Speaker B: That's fair. [01:19:57] Speaker A: We don't know why. Again, because it doesn't fix it. Because their motivations are so muddy and unclear in the whole movie that it doesn't work anyways. But it's literally the thing that makes her go, wait a second. No, I don't want this. This is bad. And, like, makes her, like, realize she made a mistake is seeing the school get destroyed because she's. She's like, oh, I didn't want all these. These are my friends. I didn't want them to die. Or whatever. And so, yeah, that's why they do it. But then, yeah, they just immediately undo it. It's like, okay, well, whatever. So then we get to the big climactic moment where Sophie gets impaled in the chest and is dying. Tedros shows up, tries to kill Rafal, fails, drops his sword. Rafal is about to kill Tedros. He has him, like, pinned to the wall. Pinned to the door. Well, it's a door. It's door, specifically so that they could do the very easy gag of having him on a harness, like, raised. Like, he's on a harness that is fed through the doors, and he's at the top of the door. So that, anyways, doesn't matter. I just thought it was funny that they. I was like, you could have put him against a wall and it would have been like. Like, I thought it was incredibly lazy that they had him in front of a pair of doors, because it's so obvious then how this magical effect is occurring, because the doors are right there. We know, on the other side. As a moviegoer, I'm like, oh, well, he's just on a harness and that is holding him in the air. And it's literally just because he's, like, right on the doors. It's coming. The harness is fed through the doors. Whereas if you have him just against, like, the bookcases or a wall, we still know there's something going on there. But my brain doesn't immediately go, oh, well, I know how he's magically being held. [01:21:37] Speaker B: I didn't notice that. [01:21:38] Speaker A: So it's a little detailed. But it just drove me crazy of being like, that's very lazy. I. Whatever, it's fine. [01:21:46] Speaker B: So then Agatha gets the sword. [01:21:48] Speaker A: Agatha. Well, well, so then what happens is Agatha, like, jumps at him, and Sophie moves the sword, force Pulls the sword with her mind into Agatha's hand. She does like a 360 spin and slices Rafal and kills him. And I wanted to know if anything about that, like, action moment came from the book, because I did not think that moment looked as cool as I think the movie thought it looked. It's not horrible. Yeah, but it's not. I was like, ugh. [01:22:21] Speaker B: So the movie's version, definitely cheesy. [01:22:26] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:22:26] Speaker B: Not as cool and impactful as perhaps they thought I was. However, the book gave me big deus ex machina. So in the book, there's a professor who's not in the movie, who is a seer. And it's set up early on that seers can be possessed by spirits, but it kills them really quickly. And then at the end of the. [01:22:53] Speaker A: Book, it kills the seer. [01:22:55] Speaker B: It kills the seer. Yeah. So then at the end of the book, as they're fighting the evil brother, the spirit of the good brother appears and possesses the seer character and destroys the evil brother. And then the seer dies, and then they're both gone. [01:23:15] Speaker A: Oh, okay. [01:23:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:23:18] Speaker A: So the. So there's just another random. Like, the seer character is just there in this scene for whatever reason. Okay. And the good brother possesses him. [01:23:28] Speaker B: Yes. [01:23:28] Speaker A: And then while inside of him somehow. What. How does he kill the. What does he do? Like, what is he. [01:23:34] Speaker B: Okay. From the sky, the good brother dove and smashed into Satyr's willing body. That's the. The seer character. Satyr shivered, hazel eyes wide, then slumped to his knees, eyes closed. Slowly, his eyes opened, sparkling blue. The schoolmaster backed up in surprise. The skin of Satyr's arms softened to white feathers, shedding his green suit away. Terrified, the schoolmaster turned into a shadow, fled across dead grass towards the lake. But Satyr flew into the air after him, human arms now, giant white swan wings. And swerved down and snatched the shadow in his beak. With a soaring, searing bird's screech, he tore it apart, raining black feathers over the battleground below. [01:24:15] Speaker A: Okay, so he turns into a giant bird. [01:24:17] Speaker B: Y. [01:24:17] Speaker A: That's how. Okay, that's what I was wondering. Like, what does he. Kid, stab him with a sword? Or like, what happens there? He turns into a giant. [01:24:22] Speaker B: He turns into a giant bird. [01:24:24] Speaker A: Okay, sure, yeah. [01:24:26] Speaker B: So movie cheesy. Maybe a little less convoluted than the book. [01:24:31] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely. I would say significantly less convoluted than the book. After Agatha kills him, she gives her one liner, which is the end in the book. [01:24:45] Speaker B: No, it's not okay. [01:24:46] Speaker A: Good. It's fine. I say that I don't know because I will be fair, to be fair to the movie. I keep fluctuating back and forth between wanting the movie to be campier and sillier and not wanting it to be. And so I don't. It's just bad. So it is what it is. I don't know. But I, I, I. That line made me groan. [01:25:12] Speaker B: I was like, it's pretty groan worthy. [01:25:15] Speaker A: And then my final question. Does Agatha bring Sophie back to life by kissing her? Because at this point, Sophie has died. And then Agatha is like sobbing over her body and kisses her and cries on her wounds and like, this brings her back the life. [01:25:29] Speaker B: It would appear, yes. Agatha's kiss does save Sophie. Sophie comes back to life and then says, who needs princes in our fairy tale? They were roommates. [01:25:41] Speaker A: They were roommates. Yeah. The movie definitely at the end. Because the movie at the end has a similar thing where as they're walking through the portal, it's like. And they realize that the true love's kiss was the truest of love, friendship. [01:25:56] Speaker B: Or something like that. [01:25:57] Speaker A: And they were friends, very good friends. Like, okay, I will say the movie goes out of its way. And this one, this is for a movie where the two female leads kiss. No Sapphic vibes in this movie to me at all, in my opinion. I didn't think. I, I know I'm guilty sometimes of over reading that into relationships and movies. And this one, I was like, nope, not in this one. [01:26:21] Speaker B: Yeah, they don't really have that kind. [01:26:23] Speaker A: They don't have that chemistry at all, in my opinion. And the movie goes out of its way at least once or twice for them to be like, and, and she's like my sister. So it's like they literally do the like, well, I love you like a brother thing, like that kind of deal. All right, I have a couple more questions that I wanted to talk about in Lost in Adaptation. [01:26:43] Speaker B: Just show me the way to get. [01:26:44] Speaker A: Out of here and I'll be on my way. Yes, yes. [01:26:49] Speaker B: And I want to get unlost as soon as possible. [01:26:52] Speaker A: Is this story supposed to be set on Earth based on them having our fairy tales? I would assume that is the case. Case. Assuming that's the case. If or when, Slash, where is this supposed to be set? Or is that mentioned? And I asked this because the art design in the movie, in my opinion, was all over the place in terms of, like, time periods. Whereas, like, sometimes the characters look like Sophie and her hut looked like it was supposed to be like the 16th century or something. And then when we get into town, I'm like, is it like the 1800s? Like, what is happening here? Like, the bookshop? And Patti LuPone's character looked like something out of, like, the, like, early 1800s to me or mid-1800s. And I was like, when is this supposed to take place? And the answer may be it's a fantasy book. [01:27:37] Speaker B: So, like, whatever it's, then the book is similar. It's just a mix. Mish mash of things. But I do think I was thinking about this last night after I read your question. We can kind of carbon date it. [01:27:50] Speaker A: It. [01:27:51] Speaker B: Because the most recent fairy tale that is mentioned explicitly is Peter Pan, and that character was first written by J.M. barrie in 1902. [01:28:00] Speaker A: Oh, well, there you go. [01:28:02] Speaker B: But, yeah, it's clearly beyond that. [01:28:04] Speaker A: It's clearly not set in, like, the early 1900s. [01:28:06] Speaker B: It's a mishmash of generic fantasy aesthetics and tropes. [01:28:10] Speaker A: It's Ren faire, Like, core. Yeah, yeah. It's set in ren fair times. Although, just to be fair, I know most ren faires do actually have a very specific year that they take place or whatever, but nobody. It's not yet. I think the actors are, like, required to, like, the people who work there. [01:28:27] Speaker B: Yes, the character actors. [01:28:28] Speaker A: Because, like, the St. Louis Fair, I believe, is, like, 15. I can't remember. [01:28:33] Speaker B: It's typically, like, late Middle Ages European, but everybody else just does whatever the hell they want. Which is fun. [01:28:40] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. And anyways, my point was, in this movie, I was like. Like, we're everywhere in terms of, like, what people are wearing. Because, like, Agatha dresses like. Like a. Like a schoolboy in the, like, early 1800s. And then Sophie dresses again, like Belle from Beauty and the Beast. So I'm like, I don't know what's going on here, but does the book go into more detail about why Agatha seemingly hates the School for Good so much? And just the whole concept of this. This schools and being there as a whole. I don't feel like I know nearly enough about her in the movie to get why she hates the idea of being at the school, period, but specifically at the school for good. She seems to, like, hate everybody there and everything. And on top of that, everybody in the School for Good rags on her appearance and says, like, she's clear she doesn't belong here just from looking at her and stuff. But she doesn't look weird or evil. She just looks like a pretty woman. And I'm sorry, like, she has large hair, is, like, her gravest. I don't anyways, because. And then there's one line specifically where they're like giving her about what she looks like. And she says, Agatha says this is what a normal girl looks like. And I'm like, is it? You don't look. You look like a model. What are you talking about? What is it? [01:29:57] Speaker B: I know, I wrote down that exact line. I was like, this is what a normal girl looks like as she sits there being an incredibly beautiful girl. [01:30:05] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:30:06] Speaker B: This is something that works better in. [01:30:08] Speaker A: The book obviously because you can kind of imagine what. [01:30:10] Speaker B: Yeah. Agatha. [01:30:11] Speaker A: And based on the description that you read, like clearly. Yeah. [01:30:14] Speaker B: So Agatha lacks confidence in a big way. And it isn't until she finds that confidence that the other people around her start to perceive her as beautiful. She does get a makeover close to the end, but they start to see her as beautiful like before that makeover happens. So she kind of. She has. She goes on a journey of self discovery in the book. Now I can sympathize that this is harder to pull off in a visual medium, but I feel like the movie didn't even try beyond showing her boots under her dress one time she immediately. [01:30:49] Speaker A: As soon as she gets there, they put her in a beautiful gown and a ton of makeup on her. And even in the. That's the thing that drove me crazy. Even before she gets to the school. School, she's wearing like boy clothes. Like she seems to dress kind of like gender non conforming in their world before they get to the school for good or evil. But she's not even like particularly dirty or like she just, she still looks the same anyways. And then. Yes, as soon as she gets to the school, they immediately put her in a gown and she's just stunningly beautiful the whole movie. [01:31:21] Speaker B: And you're like, what is happening there? No, I think the problem is that she just immediately looks like all of the other princesses. [01:31:27] Speaker A: Yes, immediately. [01:31:28] Speaker B: But the movie insisted, insists that she's somehow different. [01:31:31] Speaker A: He tries to gaslight you into being like she's ugly and you're like, what is happening? [01:31:34] Speaker B: Yeah, I think they should have let her keep her hair like big. [01:31:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:31:40] Speaker B: And like kind of wild looking and maybe done some other things. Like she could like hitch up her skirts or try to make them into pants. [01:31:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:31:47] Speaker B: Or like let her, let her have dirty fingernails or something. Like she doesn't really seem uncomfortable or out of place at all. She just looks like all the other girls. [01:31:57] Speaker A: Exactly. Yes. [01:31:59] Speaker B: Also, I'm glad this movie has diverse casting, but I There's something that feels kind of inherently problematic to me about having a black girl play the character that everyone insists is an ugly witch and, like, doesn't belong there. [01:32:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:18] Speaker B: I don't know what the answer is. Maybe it's not. I don't know. But the dynamic gives me pause. [01:32:23] Speaker A: I think, well, so the movie just goes pure race blind casting because one of the good princesses is another black girl. So, like, right. They. You know, they. They knew enough to, like, not have it all be white girls. But I think even it might have. The answer might have been lean into that. I, like, make that part of the commentary. [01:32:42] Speaker B: Maybe. [01:32:43] Speaker A: Like, that's actual interesting deconstruction of fairy tales. Is the white hegemonic. Like, yeah. The way that we have depicted fairy. [01:32:51] Speaker B: Tales brave enough to do that. [01:32:52] Speaker A: Exactly. Like, that would actually be really compelling. If she shows up there, there, and they drop her in the school for good, and it's all white people and she's like, the one black girl, and they're like. And then. And comment on that and do something with it. That's a whole different angle. Like, there's a whole different thing you would have to do. And I'm grad glad Paul Feig didn't feel like he was the person to write that story, but I think that could have at least been an interesting angle because. Yeah. As is. It's just. It's nonsense. You're like, what are you talking about? [01:33:20] Speaker B: They're like, oh, she's so ugly. She doesn't belong in the school for good because she's so ugly and weird. [01:33:26] Speaker A: Ever seen in your life? Like, what is happening? What are you talking about? So it's so dumb. Well, and again, maybe I think that might be kind of the idea is, like, all of this is nonsense. They just say that because. But. But that's not. Again, it gets muddled again of like, but. No, but what we do clearly have, some characters are, like, physically, like. Like, the Captain Hook sun guy has, like, greasy hair and, like, you know, and stuff like that. Like, some of these characters do, like. Like, they did intentionally make them. Like, Hester has, like, kind of, like, really mangled. Not mangled, but, like. I don't know. It's really, like, tangly, tangly hair and, like, her makeup's always smeared and stuff like that. It's like, you couldn't do. I don't know. [01:34:12] Speaker B: I don't know. [01:34:13] Speaker A: It's. It's just a mess. On a similar note, does the book ever. Or is she as hot? Maybe she's not. I don't know. In the movie, the dean of the Evil school that has a whole class about being ugly is Charlize Theron. [01:34:29] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:34:30] Speaker A: Dressed like a model and being super hot. Charlize Theron. And I was wondering if she's that way in the movie, and if so, if. Or in the book, and if so, if there's any explanation of why the head of the School for Evil is like Charlize Theron. [01:34:47] Speaker B: I don't know that she's supposed to be quite as hot in the book as she is in the movie. We did have her description. [01:34:52] Speaker A: Yes, she definitely is not. [01:34:54] Speaker B: She. That's not Charlie's therapy. [01:34:56] Speaker A: But she's also not described ugly in that. Yeah, I wouldn't say that it's necessarily described as trying to find it here. The woman in the woman in purple had black hair yanked back in a long braid, amethyst eyes and bloodless skin stretched over bones like a drum. That last part, I think you're supposed to see. Imagine her looking kind of skeletal, a little bit. [01:35:15] Speaker B: Yeah. Kind of gaunt. [01:35:16] Speaker A: But nothing about that is, like, overtly, like, hideous or whatever. Yeah. [01:35:20] Speaker B: But like I've said, I don't think the commentary on beauty and ugliness works as well as anyone in either of these projects wanted it to. It. It is a super clunky mixed metaphor, and I am left not knowing what the overall message was supposed to be. [01:35:36] Speaker A: Absolutely good. I can stop talking now. Katie, tell us what's better in the book. [01:35:42] Speaker B: You like to read? [01:35:44] Speaker A: Oh, yes, I love to read. Read? [01:35:46] Speaker B: What do you like to read? Everything. All right, so right off the bat, in the movie, when we meet Sofie, I liked that we showed her interest in sewing up front. She has, like, all the drawings and we see the sewing machine in her room. But I didn't like giving her such a clear Cinderella start. In the book, her father has not remarried. He is interested in a widow in the town whom Sophie hates for no real reason and refuses to give the marriage her blessing. So it was kind of like one of our first indications that maybe Sophie is not as good as she thinks she is because she's unwilling to let her father be happy. [01:36:30] Speaker A: Right. The movie. We just don't have enough time. I didn't even realize, like, what the dynamic of their relationship was really. Like, it took me a minute to, like, maybe she's a stepmother. I think, like, Rachel Bloom is. That was cracking me up. I was like, oh, that's what. Who. Rachel Bloom plays in this? Yeah, she's in the movie for, like, three minutes. Not even she's in the movie, like, 30 seconds. Which was disappointing because I like Rachel Bloom as an actress, but, yeah, Yeah, I didn't think the movie did a remotely good enough job setting up that whole dynamic. [01:37:03] Speaker B: I like the whole town having the backstory of kids getting taken to the school every four years. That felt very fairy tale to me. Also, there was an interesting detail of, like, sometimes when they get new fairy tale books into the bookshop, they recognize some of the characters in the illustrations as children who had vanished previously. That's fun. I thought that was fun. [01:37:24] Speaker A: That is fun. [01:37:26] Speaker B: I didn't really like Lady Lesso being in on the plot to make Sophie the queen of evil or whatever. I just didn't really think that worked well. [01:37:35] Speaker A: I completely agree because one, not having her be in on that would have been super helpful in terms of just streamlining things, I think. But also, it messes with the ending. Like, I talked about, I'm like, I don't understand. Like, so are we just pretending that never happened? Like, yeah. What is her deal now? Because she's seemingly like. And she also never seemed super evil in the movie other than that moment where she's like, cuts her hair off and it's like, you need. You are the harbinger of evil in this world. Go do that. And then the rest of the movie, she's like, like, kind of mean, kind of sn. Sassy, and, like, snarky. But, like, is clearly not evil. Evil, seemingly. I don't know. Is. Yeah. It just didn't make any sense to me. [01:38:20] Speaker B: There's a little detail in the book that the. The princes have, like, a fairy tale gym that they can work out in. And one of the features in it is climbing ropes made of braided hair. [01:38:32] Speaker A: Nice. [01:38:33] Speaker B: I thought that was a great detail. Real. [01:38:35] Speaker A: That's a classic Shrek. [01:38:36] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:38:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:38:38] Speaker B: The book reveals that Professor Dovey was Cinderella's fairy godmother. And she's like, it wasn't even my best work. It's just what I'm most famous for. There's also a reference to the Devil Wears Prada in this book. [01:38:56] Speaker A: Nice. [01:38:57] Speaker B: At one point, one of the students from the school for Good, like, looks at one of the evil students and is like, red eyes for a villain. Groundbreaking. And there's also a late reveal in the book going back to the idea of the failed students being turned into creatures and stuff, that the fairies and the wolves are also failed students whose punishment is that they have to serve the other side. So, like, the Failed good students get turned into the wolves, and the failed evil students get turned into the fairies. [01:39:31] Speaker A: Time to find out what Katie thought was better in the movie. My life has taught me one lesson, Hugo, and not the one I thought it would. Happy endings only happen in the movies. [01:39:44] Speaker B: There's a lot of casual fat phobia in the book that goes pretty much completely unexamined. I appreciated. However, like Corny and Lampshady, it was the moment where they find out that what Sophie has to do is obtain true love's kiss that they just, like, cut straight to that while they're talking to the schoolmaster. Because in the book, we spend an ungodly amount of time trying to figure out what the answer to the riddle is when it is so. [01:40:15] Speaker A: Oh, that one riddle? [01:40:16] Speaker B: Yes. What does good have that evil cannot have? And he asks it in the book, and I was immediately like, oh, it's the love. [01:40:23] Speaker A: Right? [01:40:23] Speaker B: It's obviously love. It's clearly love. And they spend forever trying to figure this out. And I was like, I know this is a book for young people, but it's so obvious that's what it is. I really liked the exchange that Agatha and Sophie have in the cafeteria about their experience in ugly class and beauty class. And particularly when Sophie's like, well, what did you fail? And Agatha's like, smiling. [01:40:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:40:57] Speaker B: I liked the line, you're not allowed to kill anyone until after graduation. I mentioned earlier that Lesso isn't the one who cuts Sophie's hair in the book. It's the wolf man who runs the Doom room, which is like a dungeon where punishments are doled out. Yeah. The face you're making is the same face I made. The Doom room. Yes. [01:41:21] Speaker A: It's terrible. [01:41:23] Speaker B: And then after he cuts off her hair, Sophie fucking kills him. She kills him. She straight up murders this wolf man. And I think it's supposed to show that she actually is evil. But then the book's message on what evil is is so garbled that it ended up feeling completely meaningless to me. So I think better to get rid of it. [01:41:44] Speaker A: That gets back to the core of it is like, what is the. Again? Again? [01:41:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:41:48] Speaker A: What is the message that. What are you saying some people are evil? Or is the message and that. That so that, like, some people. Is the message that some people that appear good are actually evil and some people that appear evil are actually good? Or is the message that everybody is a mixed bag of good and evil? Because it seems like the movie is doing both things. [01:42:07] Speaker B: It seems like we do not know. Yes. We do not know what the message is. Yeah, I. I liked the movie. Simplifying the explanation of the trial by tale and, like, what all of that was. And also a lot of other things. So much happens in the book, and a lot of the events and, like, major plot points are really, really similar to each other to the point that it all started to run together by the time it got to the end. So I appreciated the movie just cutting a lot. [01:42:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:42:41] Speaker B: I liked the conversation that the teachers have. It's really brief, but they have a conversation at the very end. [01:42:47] Speaker A: I thought that scene was one of my favorite scenes in the whole movie. [01:42:49] Speaker B: Where the schools had. The school for good has gotten really shallow. And Michelle Yeoh's character is like, I used to teach history, and now they're making me teach beautification. [01:42:58] Speaker A: That was such a fun scene that I was like, where has this more of that? Well, and it's just never. There's no indication that there's anything like that going on until that one scene. And I'm like, whoa, that's kind of interesting. But we didn't get any of that from Michelle Yeoh's character earlier in the movie that alluded to that or anything. And I'm. Oh. Cause I love that. Yeah. She's like, you think I care about smiling? You think me the way. And she's like, screaming, and she's like, you think I fucking care about you smiling? And I was like, this is fun. This is interesting. But it just felt like it's one scene where that, like. [01:43:32] Speaker B: Yeah, I liked Sophie's line, quiet, Aggie. The protagonists are speaking. I thought that was funny. And I liked the explanation that the schoolmaster was corrupting good from within to make it shallow and vain. Because I thought that actually made sense with what we see of the School for Good in both the book and the movie. Like, if that is the case, I think that makes sense. [01:43:59] Speaker A: Yeah. All right, let's go ahead and talk about a few things that the movie nailed. As I expected, practically perfect in every way. [01:44:11] Speaker B: When Sophie lands in the moat and she meets Hort for the first time, he asks to touch her hair. Hair and says, they don't make witches with princess hair. Agatha does get bitten by a fairy when she plops down the groom room. And. Yeah, that's really what they call it. [01:44:29] Speaker A: We have the Doom room. [01:44:30] Speaker B: The Doom room and the groom room. Yeah. Agatha does continue to wear her boots with her gowns. The princes do have a little entrance, and they throw roses at the princess. Princesses, Tedros is the son of King Arthur. Sofie's first interactions with her roommates are all pretty spot on. A lot of those lines were directly from the book. Sophie does summon a swarm of wasps to defeat Hester's tattoo creature. She also turns it in. [01:45:03] Speaker A: I thought it was in the movie. She wasn't the one who did that. [01:45:07] Speaker B: I think that is the implication in the movie. [01:45:08] Speaker A: Like, in the movie, it's like Rafal. [01:45:10] Speaker B: She does it herself in the book. [01:45:11] Speaker A: Okay. [01:45:13] Speaker B: She also turns their weapons into flowers during the final battle. The line evil only fights for itself is from the book. And Sophie does sacrifice herself to stop the story and from impaling Agatha. [01:45:27] Speaker A: Sweet. All right, we're gonna get to a handful of odds and ends before the final verdict. We talked about it in the prequel, and I've mentioned it already in this episode, that one of Paul Feig's apparent goals with this film was to differentiate it from Harry Potter as much as possible. And as soon as we started the Movie, the first 5 seconds play, and I was like, boy, if you want to differentiate your film from Harry Potter, maybe you shouldn't have the opening 5 seconds. Seconds be like this ethereal music playing over your golden logo magically appearing in a cloudy sky. Like, what the fuck are we do now? Again, to be fair, that very easily could have been studio, show, studio, a million other. Who knows? Maybe they wanted it to really feel like Harry Potter, to really get people hooked or whatever. But, man, come on. When we. When we. The very first scene in the movie, the flashback to Rafal and Rihanna, I was like, oh, that's who? Kit. Whatever his name, Kit Young or Kit something gets to play in this movie. Jesper. He gets to play twins. [01:46:46] Speaker B: Yeah. Hey, it's Jesper. [01:46:47] Speaker A: Yeah, if you've watched Shadow and Bone on Netflix, which, unfortunately, they got canceled after two seasons, but. So they didn't get to finish the story. But he plays one of the main characters from the Six of Crows books, which is not actually the Shadow and Bones books, but that series is great and combines two book series into one in a really clever way that I thought was a lot of fun. I mean, the book series themselves do that, but whatever. [01:47:13] Speaker B: It's a little different. [01:47:14] Speaker A: It's a little different. But, yeah, it's very clever. And yeah, I like that actor a lot. I think he's really good. I thought he did a good job. [01:47:22] Speaker B: In this movie, too. [01:47:22] Speaker A: I thought he was a lot of fun. Fun as the villain. [01:47:25] Speaker B: One of my first questions watching this was just who was in charge of Sophie's Eyebrows, because they look terrible. [01:47:33] Speaker A: They do not look good. And I looked up the actress and now that she. That actress has dark eyebrows with her very blonde hair. [01:47:39] Speaker B: And she does have a fuller brow. [01:47:41] Speaker A: And they are fuller. But most of the pictures I saw, they were more shaped in a way that felt like they fit her face better. Yeah, I'm not. I won't even begin to pretend to be an eyebrow person, but even I was like, those look weirdly shaped for your face. [01:47:56] Speaker B: Crazy weird 2016 eyebrows in the year 2022. [01:48:02] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:48:03] Speaker B: And it looks bad. [01:48:05] Speaker A: It looks really weird again. I. It just looks strange again. I've seen other photos of her where they don't look like that. So I don't think it's just how she always has her eye. Maybe. I don't know. Yeah. I mentioned earlier that they're one of the good princesses. Was another black girl in the School for Good. Good. But specifically, she's the actress who plays Viv in Sex Education, which I thought was fun. I was like, it's the only other thing. [01:48:27] Speaker B: I've seen a lot of Netflix actors in this. I was laughing also because they made. They made Hort like a cute emo boy in this movie. [01:48:39] Speaker A: Who's Hort? [01:48:40] Speaker B: The main guy. Who? The main evil boy who is like, into Sophie. [01:48:45] Speaker A: The Captain Hook dude? [01:48:46] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:48:46] Speaker A: I don't think he's cute. I did gross looking. He looks great. Well, I don't think the actor's gross, to be fair. I think the actor probably. Yeah. But in the movie, I think they did a good job of making him greasy and gross looking. [01:49:00] Speaker B: But I don't know, I'm kind of into that. [01:49:03] Speaker A: Okay. [01:49:06] Speaker B: But yeah, School for Evil. More like School for Goths. [01:49:09] Speaker A: Yeah. School for mall Goths. Specifically. Not even real Goths. Another thing, again, I couldn't help but do it because we read the quote about how they were trying to differentiate it from Harry Potter. Somebody much. When all the boys show up, the good princes show up in the hall. It's just the Durmstrang entrance from the Harry Potter movies, which is just like less interesting, but less interesting. But they even. They all come in, like, chanting and stomping and then they, like, fight each other. And I'm like, this is just that, man. What are we doing? Also, I thought Tedros was not handsome enough. I would agree with that, Mr. Main Prince loving interest. Not that the guy's not handsome more handsome than me, but it's just. I don't know. He didn't have. I don't think he had the right jawline, if I'm being very honest. [01:50:01] Speaker B: Overall, I did enjoy the costumes and styling. Yeah, like, overall. [01:50:05] Speaker A: Yeah, overall it's fun. It. [01:50:07] Speaker B: Yeah, there were some misses, but overall I thought the costumes were good. [01:50:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it. Yeah, it's fun. It's. It's. It's weird because it's not as it's fun, but it's also kind of forgettable in a way where it's like, it's not great. Like, the costumes aren't great, but they're also not bad in a fun way necessarily. I don't know. I thought they were. They were fine, I guess. I don't know. I was like comparing it to like Once Upon a Time and the costumes in that ranged from like, good to terrible in such a fun way. [01:50:42] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:50:42] Speaker A: Yeah. And this one didn't really do. I don't know. Yeah. [01:50:45] Speaker B: It didn't have that kind of range to it. [01:50:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:50:48] Speaker B: But I like, there was one detail that I particularly liked. I don't know if you caught it or not. After Sofie has her goth makeover in one of the scenes, she's wearing a choker that's made out of her cut off hair. [01:51:04] Speaker A: I did not notice that. No. That's fun. [01:51:07] Speaker B: I thought this movie was fun trash. [01:51:10] Speaker A: I wish I did. I really did. I was hoping it was going to be. And it's. It's almost fun trash. Like, in my opinion, it's almost there. I just don't think it's bad enough. Like, it's fair. It fails by being middling. [01:51:24] Speaker B: It's not as bad as I was hoping it would be, but I still thought it was fun trash. [01:51:29] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. It's not. Yeah, it's. It's right on that line for me. Like, comparing it to Once Upon a Time. Once Upon a Time is fun trash to me. And this isn't quite that fun. But the other thing, Once Upon a Time, and it's hard to compare because Once Upon a Time is fun trash to me. Because there are parts of it that I like and some of the storytelling does work in that and is fun. And in this, none of it works for me. So it's just like, ugh, I don't know. Whereas there's like a heart in Once Upon a Time that I like can at least understand and enjoy elements of. And there are characters in it that I like. I just didn't really like any of the characters. And I think that's the main thing is that the character writing in this is so to be fair, that was one of my main complaints about Once Upon a Time is that I didn't like most of the characters in that show either, but I did like some of them. I liked Hook. I liked, you know, some of the other characters in that show. I'm sure. I really just hated the main two, the Snow White and. Or not. Yeah, Snow White and Prince Charming were. [01:52:36] Speaker B: Well, Prince Charming was insufferable. [01:52:38] Speaker A: The two worst characters in that show are like two of the main characters. But what's her name? The main character is fine. What's her name? [01:52:45] Speaker B: We like Regina. [01:52:46] Speaker A: Regina's great. Sorry. Regina is incredible. Regina's great. She's the best thing in the show. And I liked Hook and I like. What is the main. The main character? [01:52:55] Speaker B: Emma. [01:52:56] Speaker A: Emma. That's. Jesus, Emma. Emma's fun. [01:52:58] Speaker B: I like Rumpelstiltskin too. [01:53:00] Speaker A: Rumpelstiltskin's good. There's plenty of good. That's the thing. Rumble stilts. There's plenty of good characters in that show. This movie didn't really have anybody that is fair. I like the performance of Rafal, but he doesn't really have enough to do. Like when it's Kit Young and Lawrence Fishburne's fine, he's fine. But when it's the young version, he's like super. He's chewing the scenery in a fun way. If there was more of him, I think that would have been fun. Even still. Yeah, whatever. Doesn't matter. I'm done talking about this movie. As always, you can do us a giant favor by heading over to Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Blue Sky, Goodreads, any of those places. Interact. We'd love to hear what you have to say about the School for Good and Evil. Tell me I'm wrong. Tell me this movie is good. I want to hear it. You can also do us a favor by hanging over to Apple, Podcasts, Spotify, Wherever you listen to our show, drop us a five star rating, write us a nice little review and you can Support [email protected] ThisFilmIsLit get access to bonus content and all that good stuff. Katie, it's time for the final verdict. [01:54:00] Speaker B: Sentence fast. [01:54:01] Speaker A: Verdict after. [01:54:03] Speaker B: That's stupid. Once upon a time, there was a girl who had to choose between two stories. One, a hefty tome, a novel that held many delights for a fairy tale reader such as herself, but that included many a plot point that were perhaps unnecessary as well as confusing ill conceived messages about being beautiful and ugly, as well as the natures of good and evil themselves. The other, a Moving picture. An enchanting flight of fantasy that was cheesy and fun, but hobbled by many of the same shortcomings as its literary counterpart. The girl enjoyed both for what they were, but in the battle that followed, one emerged triumphant, bolstered by its virtues. A simplified plot, digestibility, and an improved French betwixt the two main characters. Yes, the hero of this tale was the movie, but only by a mere hair. Despite her struggle in making this decision, the girl lived happily ever after. The end. [01:55:05] Speaker A: Well done. And I didn't expect that. [01:55:07] Speaker B: Well, let me. Let me clarify. [01:55:10] Speaker A: Okay. [01:55:10] Speaker B: I felt like the book and the movie had very similar problems because most of the problems from the movie came directly from the book, in my opinion. So the book had more, but I don't know that the book had better. [01:55:24] Speaker A: Yeah. To me, it sounds like both of them had a lot of flaws, but kind of by benefit of being, like you said in thing, shorter. [01:55:32] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:55:33] Speaker A: And having some, you know, being like a. [01:55:36] Speaker B: We cut some extraneous things, in my opinion, that made it a little more digestible. Although you don't seem to agree. [01:55:43] Speaker A: I know. [01:55:46] Speaker B: And I really did like the friendship between Sophie and Agatha more in the movie than I did in the book. [01:55:52] Speaker A: There you go. [01:55:53] Speaker B: But feel free to tell me I'm wrong. [01:55:56] Speaker A: Katie, what's next? [01:55:57] Speaker B: Up next, we are covering a classic adventure story. We're going to talk about Treasure island by Robert Louis Stevenson, and we're going to have a listener's choice. [01:56:09] Speaker A: So fun. [01:56:10] Speaker B: Between Muppet, Treasure island and Treasure Planet. [01:56:14] Speaker A: Can we just do all three seasons of Black Sails? [01:56:18] Speaker B: That's like a prequel story, but I'm sure we'll talk about it. About Black Sails. [01:56:23] Speaker A: We will. We definitely will. [01:56:25] Speaker B: So get ready for that. So come to our social media pages if you would like to help us decide which movie you want us to cover. [01:56:34] Speaker A: Yes, definitely. I. That's fun. I've actually never seen. I think I've seen Treasure Planet. I've never seen Muppet. [01:56:39] Speaker B: I think I've seen both of these, but when I was, like once when I was a kid, so I don't really remember either. [01:56:44] Speaker A: Yeah. And I. If I think I've seen Treasure Planet, but I don't remember anything about it, I also often get it confused with another movie from that same time period. [01:56:52] Speaker B: Atlantis, I think. [01:56:53] Speaker A: Atlantis. [01:56:54] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:56:54] Speaker A: Yeah. Or. Yeah, one of the. Some. There's another movie from that time period that I'm getting, and I'm not sure which one I've seen and which I haven't, so. Or maybe I've seen them all. Who knows? Anyways, we'll talk all about that on our next prequel episode. And in two weeks time, we're talking about Treasure Island. But until that time, guys, gals, my. [01:57:11] Speaker B: Binary palsy, everybody else can keep reading. [01:57:13] Speaker A: Books, keep watching movies and keep being awesome.