2 Guys And A Chainsaw

We were saddened by the passing of Paul Reubens, known the world over as Pee Wee Herman. Would you believe he did a horror movie? Well, technically it’s a horror comedy, but of course Craig was chomping at the bit to discuss one of his favorites from long ago. AND to gush over the incomparable Mr. Reubens – with perhaps more of the latter than the former. Enjoy!

Expand to read episode transcript Automatic Transcript

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)

Episode 357, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw

Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig: And I’m Craig.

Todd: Man, Craig, it feels like we’re doing tribute episode after tribute episode. We’ve just seen some people go, and probably none more famous this year than Pee Wee Herman, otherwise known as Paul Reubens. I should probably say that backwards, but, uh, honestly, Paul Reubens is Pee Wee Herman in my heart.

Yeah. And, uh, it sucks that he’s gone. I saw the news, and it was just one of those circumstances of really strange timing, in that I had just watched, about a week before, him, for the first time in a long time, uh, as himself, which, you know, when he started out doing Pee Wee, he pretty much insisted that he just was Pee wee everywhere all the time.

Out in public, on talk shows, everything like that. He hardly ever appeared as himself. Later on, he relaxed on that, and then, kind of in his later life, you know, he was playing other roles, and he was on talk shows as himself. And I saw him guest starring on a episode of Somebody Feed Phil, which is an awesome food thing on, um, Netflix.

And, I was like, My God! I think this is the first time I’ve seen this guy as anything but peewee, and he just seems like the coolest guy in the world. He was funny, he was fun, and then a week later, I found out that he died. And for this man who was so much of my childhood… Growing up to hear that he died even just a week after being reminded of how special he was to me Uh, yeah, man, that really hit me a bit.

It hit me hard So we decided to do Buffy the Vampire Slayer in honor of Paul Reubens believe it or not I never seen this movie before even though I think I’m probably the only one my age who hadn’t seen it It was in my consciousness growing up and in high school and everything like that, I just never, never managed to watch it.

I also, for the record, never saw a single episode of the TV series. Until after this movie, I figured I’d better watch at least one. So I did that to prep. I know you’re a huge fan of the TV series and you proposed… That we watched this movie in honor of Paul Reubens and, uh, here we are today. So, uh, what’s your history with this 

Craig: movie?

Oh, the movie? Who cares? Paul Reubens. You know, it’s been almost a month since he passed. And we’ve been talking, you know, we, we decided pretty much immediately that we wanted to do something for him. But we already had something else lined up, uh, for a week or so. I’ve had some time and, uh, we talked about it a little bit last week, outside of the regular show.

And I said that it was probably an algorithm thing. You know, like I’m scrolling through social media. Every time I saw something about Paul Reubens, I probably stopped and read it. Or liked it or something. And so I was getting all this, uh, Paul Reubens content. And it just hit me really hard. And honestly, like…

I’m still a little bit gobsmacked, like, it’s a little bit hard to talk about, like, he was such a cool guy, and, It’s one of those things where you don’t, I don’t know, I mean, I’ve always thought Pee Wee Herman was cool, Um, I always thought Paul Reubens was cool as an actor, as a guy, but then I’m reading all of these things about him, And all of these, uh, you know, people who knew him.

Um, even in the most casual way, like, you know, all these celebrities are coming out now and talking about how one thing that seems to have been kind of his thing was he would always find out people’s birthdays and then spam them with Uh, memes and birthday messages, like, all day on their birthdays, like, all day.

I’ve seen, you know, a couple of these celebrities, uh, post it, because it wasn’t just memes and stuff, like, he would record really personal, funny… But sincere video messages for these people too, and I, I saw a couple of them, and they weren’t things that were intended for the public, but you could just feel his, uh, sincerity, and just his humanity, and he’s also just such a funny person.

You know, I saw a couple of those stories, and then they kept coming in. Like, I don’t know how the man did anything else, you know, like, it wasn’t just people that he had close relationships with. It was people that he would have crossed paths with once or twice, but he always remembered everybody and remembered their names and their birthdays and made them feel special.

And it did make people feel special. And I think that that’s, uh, a big part of his legacy for me is Pee Wee Herman made it okay to be different and weird and he had a childlike nature and it was, you know, that, that was all a persona, but I think that that persona stemmed from something inside that man and, uh, For sure.

Todd: It had to. He came up with it during improvisation with uh, Groundlings in the 70s. He’s as old, he was born basically almost the same year my dad was born. You know, I mean, the guy lived to be 70 this year, my dad is 71. It sounds like just from a very early age, like from the age of 5, he was asking his dad to build him a stage in their house so that he could goof off and make people laugh.

He loved reruns of I Love Lucy and things like that. Right. He was in theater when he was in… High school, and then, you know, he joined this, this improv, this famous improv group, The Groundlings, and, and apparently 

Craig: this little improv group, The Groundlings, 

Todd: this tiny little thing, it’s nothing big, Phil Hartman apparently was a good friend of his and helped him develop the Pee Wee Herman character, and in fact, I think later in his life, Phil Hartman was, was critical.

He was frustrated. He was like, look, man, You’re way more talented than just this one character. Why is it that you’re only doing this? But I don’t know it just must have felt like Either his calling or just, you know, put all your eggs in this basket and it sure worked for him Uh, my first exposure to peewee herman, I think was god.

It was either the tv show or the movie I don’t remember which peewee’s playhouse. Everybody loved it. Yeah, everybody loved peewee’s playhouse when it came out and it Even now watching it. I just I get a kick out of it. It’s fantastic. Yeah, it’s so much fun He took like these kids shows from when he was growing up like like my dad You know my dad’s age like Howdy Doody and this kind of stuff where you know It was just sort of a variety show these wacky characters coming on you have puppets and things like that but just sort of updated it for the late 80s and Made it fun.

You know, now it’s, it’s very common to have kids entertainment that also speaks to adults. Jokes that are in there for the parents watching it with the kids, that go over the kid’s head, but really land with the adults, and so everybody can enjoy watching it. And Pee Wee’s Playhouse, I think… I’m probably wrong, but it seems like it was one of the first television shows to really embrace this ethos and do things for both.

And Pee Wee Herman himself, so even when I was watching Pee Wee’s Playhouse, I had a cousin, and they had Showtime, and there were lots of comedy shows on Showtime at the time, and the Pee Wee Herman show that Paul Rubens did before he started Pee Wee’s Playhouse and before he did the movie, he was running around with this show, performing for adults, doing, I don’t want to say like, edgy adult material, but he had a, an adult side to him.

He was making off color jokes, he was a little racy and stuff. He played with that character a little bit before he made him just 100% more family friendly. And I watched that too, and I, as a teenager, I thought that was kinda cool, you know? Like, Pee Wee Herman had this other side. You never saw it anymore, but you know, you kinda saw that history of the character.

But it was all consistent. This sort of childlike, weird… Guy, but for some reason you couldn’t help but love him. I know! 

Craig: It almost, it almost defies explanation. I think universally loved, and the thing about the show, you know, I don’t know as much about the development of it. I do know that, you know, in the development of it, it was for adults.

Although he was playing a childlike character. But, the television show and the movies were wholesome! Yeah! And that wouldn’t be the first… Word that you would use to describe it, but it was totally kid friendly and he was kid friendly and I can only assume that he loved children. Otherwise, why would you do such a thing?

I do know that, you know, uh, in the earlier days before the scandal, which we’ll talk about in a second, but he pretty much only publicly it. appeared as Pee Wee, but he hired extra security because he was a heavy smoker, but he hired extra personal security to ensure that he was never photographed smoking in costume because he didn’t want kids to see that.

I don’t know, like, again, like you said, early on he, he typically, you know, appeared as Pee wee. I’ve been watching stuff on YouTube, like, he guest hosted for Joan Rivers when she briefly had her own late night show, and he did all kinds of things in character, uh, but. Within the last 20 years or so, he did more appearances as himself, and as himself, he just seemed like such a soft spoken, not, like, shy or 

Todd: awkward, just No, not at all.

Just 

Craig: very unassuming, and humble. Just 

Todd: seemed so humble. Humble, unassuming, yet funny and witty. So 

Craig: funny. So funny. Self assured. 

Todd: Like, just a very normal, like, Hey, here’s a funny guy, and I’m a funny guy, but, you know, I’m not gonna make a big deal out of it, but I’m, uh, I’m gonna crack some jokes. Like, you 

Craig: would kill to be able to be friends with this guy.

And, uh, last night I was watching, uh, after he passed away, Conan O’Brien talked about him on his podcast. Like, I mean, he could barely… speak, just as I’m struggling now, he could barely speak about him because, uh, they were friends and it seemed like to be friends with Paul Rubens was a real gift. And I think that, uh, the people who were lucky enough to have that relationship.

Oh God, as hard as it’s getting me, I can’t believe, I can’t imagine how hard it’s But I just think he was the coolest. And, uh, so, Transition, the only horror movie that, uh, he was in and it’s really, it’s not even described as horror on IMDB. I think it’s described as like comedy, fantasy. Adventure or something.

Todd: Right. 

Craig: Uh, but it has, um, Paul Reubens in it. Uh, the only thing, you know, I said to you last week, I’m seeing all this great stuff about him and what I’m seeing nothing about are the scandals that he was involved in. The lame ass scandals. Should we just follow suit? Maybe. You know, there were a couple of scandals for, for Stupid things.

Really stupid, innocuous, innocent 

Todd: things. Here’s the thing. Nowadays, this would be nothing. In 1991, he was arrested for indecent exposure in an adult theater for jerking off. Like, that’s what everybody does in adult theater. Right. Why the cops were even in there trying to arrest people is, like, beyond anything.

And even at the time, pretty much 80% of the American public was going… What the hell? Right, leave this guy alone. This is dumb. So, there was that. But, you know, he’s a child’s entertainer and so it’s embarrassing. But like, come on, all of us thought it was bullshit, and it was stupid, and whatever. The other thing was, apparently he was a collector of erotica, and as a famous rich man, he collected a ton of it, and he bought things in bulk, and apparently, at some point, when they were busting Jeffrey, what was his name?

Geoffrey Jones over it. There was some hot tip. Hey, check out, uh, Peewee Herman and they went to his house and went through his 70, 000 things or whatever and happened to find a few things that maybe was child pornography, but he didn’t know it wasn’t. No, but 

Craig: it wasn’t. It wasn’t. When they looked at it, they deemed that it was like, it was, it wasn’t charged.

Yeah. I mean, it was like centuries old erotica. It was, it was not child porn. 

Todd: It just wasn’t. No. Yeah. No sexual activity. Just like, and like you 

Craig: said, he collected this stuff, he bought it in bulk. He did. You know, uh, God, I, I, I hate to even talk about it. Bring it up. It’s just so, it’s just so stupid. But yeah, the point is, I, I do appreciate the fact that people openly had his back.

It wasn’t just the public, you know, his celebrity friends who knew him. Both times, this is ridiculous, this is, we know this guy, he’s a great guy, and I know that sometimes that happens, and it turns out that the person in question isn’t a great guy, but in this case, it was, it was just dumb, it was dumb stuff, I get it, you’re right, it was, you know, like, Getting caught jerking off in a porn theater.

Sure. I mean, it’s embarrassing, especially if you’re a public figure, a children’s entertainer, sure. It’s embarrassing, but come on. You and I were talking last week. I said, this was before this was before the internet, you know, this, 

Todd: you know, I mean, let us all jerk off in peace, 

Craig: right? Like if, if jerking off is a crime, you know, I would have.

been electrocuted centuries ago, you know, come on, leave the guy alone. Jesus. But anyway, that stupid arrest spawned a mug shot that he gleefully used as his inspiration for his look as a vampire in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, because he felt like it was the coolest he had ever looked.

Todd: He’s not wrong, he’s got a goatee, it’s so cool. 

Craig: You know, I didn’t know that at all, I had never even made the connection, it had never even occurred to me that. His look in this movie, um, was reminiscent of that mugshot, but when I read that, it was just one more thing to add to the list of how cool this guy was.

Like, to take such a shitty, embarrassing situation and find the good in it. 

Todd: You want to really look at the, you know, silver lining in all that, it did kind of… force him to take a break from Pee Wee and try some other things. And we might not even be talking about his role in Buffy the Vampire Slayer if that hadn’t happened.

And he did a number of other things and he became a little more comfortable just being himself on television and being like, you know, maybe I need to take a break with the Pee Wee character. And, and for what it’s worth, To be honest, like, he did a few things. He was a great actor. He’s fine in all these other roles.

Everything’s going to be under the shadow of Pee wee, just because that was so… It will always be so iconic and just so big that… What’s the point? Right, but I did 

Craig: enjoy seeing him in other things. I mean, even… In the Pee Wee days, he was billed under a false name, but he voiced the spaceship in Flight of the Navigator.

Oh, that was so fun. I loved that movie when I 

Todd: was a kid. Oh, we watch it so much. 

Craig: He was so great in that. He made a cameo as Pee Wee in Back to the Beach, which is another, like, such a stupid movie that I… Loved. Like, I still love that movie. It’s great. It’s the 

Todd: only thing I remember from Back to the Beach.

It’s the best 

Craig: part. It’s the best part. Oh, Surf and Bird. Oh my god. Look at YouTube that, guys. Back to the beach, Pee wee Herman. Watch it, it’s hilarious. Batman Returns, he played the Penguin’s father in a cameo, and, and it was brief, but, you know, re teaming with Tim Burton, who did Pee wee’s Big Adventure, um, and then he was a, he was a creepy guy in Matilda.

What was that, like, weird… Anti superhero movie with Janine Garofalo and Ben Stiller. Mystery Man, Mystery Man. Mystery Man, and he was a disgusting character in that. He was a good actor, like, the guy is talented. He was a talented, hilarious, funny, funny guy. And yeah, Pee Wee Herman was great, and I’m glad that he did everything that he did with it.

But you’re right, maybe it is a little bit of a silver lining. You know, other, his friends, Phil Hartman had kind of scolded him at some point and said, You’re You’re more than this, you know, you’re better than just this, you know, and all that was pre scandal. And so maybe the scandal did, you know, kind of afford him an opportunity to do more.

And I, and I’m, I’m glad he did cause yeah, I enjoyed seeing him anytime he popped up, he popped up, uh, in a cameo in pushing daisies, uh, a TV show that only lasted for two seasons, but was brilliant and only got canceled because of the writer’s strike back. Then, but, oh man, great guy, and, and he’s hilarious in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and I want to talk about Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I really do, but I, I’ve been dying to say nice things about Paul Reubens, because I admire him, like, Todd, I, like, I’ve been thinking, like, where can, where can I get a tattoo, like, I’m not even kidding, like, I’m, Seriously considering getting a minimalist Pee Wee Herman tattoo on my 

Todd: body.

This is the 

Craig: thing. I know it’s good. I think, and I honestly got, I like, I’m, I’m planning it. Like I think on one forearm, minimalist Pee Wee Herman, and then someday on the other forearm, minimalist, minimalist Elvira. And I think that’s going to be it. That’s going to be my, do much worse. That’s gonna be my late in life tattoo.

That’s 

Todd: how you want to defile your body. 

Craig: It is. I want to look at those two every day, because they’re two of my favorite people, and they were best of friends. You know, Paul Reubens and Cassandra Peterson. Just absolute best of friends and it makes perfect sense to me and I wish that I could have been friends with them.

Todd: Fair 

Craig: enough. It’s still my dream to get Cassandra Peterson on this podcast, by the way, just in case, just in case anybody out there in the ether has a connection to Cassandra Peterson. My dream in life, my dream in life to have her on this podcast. 

Todd: Wouldn’t that be wonderful? Paul Reubens. I would rather have her.

on here before we do a tribute 

Craig: episode. Oh my god, please, please, no. She will be with us for another 45 years because I can’t handle it otherwise. She’s still fantastic. Yeah, and gorgeous. So you’ve never seen the movie, and you said you watched one episode of the TV show. Did you watch the first 

Todd: episode?

Uh, yeah. 

Craig: Oh my god. You know, as it is… As it is with most TV shows, you kind of have, like, they need a solid season to find their footing. I get it. Season one of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is not the best season. However, that show, it’s for sure 100% in my top five favorite shows ever. It’s brilliant. Well, 

Todd: all the people my age, who are all friends of mine, you know, in college and all that stuff, like, everybody but me.

Has watched this TV show and gushes about how great it is. So I don’t doubt it at all. Even the first episode I saw, I get it. All the pilots are a little odd, right? But like, it was still ten times better than this movie. The thing about it is, this movie, it’s, it’s kind of cool to be talking about it now.

Because now, the writer and creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Joss Whedon, has had a lot under his belt. Yeah. We get his style. We understand it. The TV show. really led to that. But he’s written and directed a couple, the Avengers, big Avengers movies, Cabin in the Woods, like all these movies, like, we get it, like, he’s a smart guy, he’s got a great sense of humor, he’s always been writing different stuff.

And so, when I watched this movie, 1992’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer, written by Joss Whedon, but not directed by him, directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui, who, before this, had only done a kind of independent Movie about someone who moves to 

Craig: Tokyo and then only did one movie after 

Todd: this I think and you can see why like as a guy Who’s made movies as a guy who’s written some stuff who’s in theater and things like that Like I’m always thinking like I get how this movie comes across but I’m thinking about the words I’m thinking about how the script would look on paper and all that and I thought you know what this movie in somebody else’s hands Directed a completely different way would be way better than this movie.

Like everything that’s wrong with this movie doesn’t certainly number one has nothing to do with the concept. The concept is brilliant. Yeah. The concept sells the movie right away. I love the 

Craig: concepts because what he wanted to do, like he’s in horror movies. These dumb girls are always just running around getting killed.

Let’s flip. Let’s take one of these dumb girls that’s gonna be the one who’s running up the stairs when she should be running out the door and let’s make her the badass who’s gonna take down the bad guys. The concept is brilliant. And it’s 

Todd: cute, and it’s funny, and you get it. Like, even just the title, you hear it and you’re like, oh, okay, I get it.

It’s so smart. So there’s that. And then, like I said, as I was watching this movie, I could pinpoint in every scene where they were messing up. It was either the acting, it was the pacing, it was the editing, it was the, a wrong take on the character, and maybe, again, I have this prism of nowadays Joss Whedon, like, I kind of can see where he was trying to go with these characters.

And God. I love Donald Sutherland. I respect him a lot. We’ve watched a number of his movies here. He’s a fantastic and well respected actor. He’s not always great in everything that he does. A lot of times he does phone it in. Joss Whedon had nothing but shitty things to say about him. Said he was a dick, and entitled, and impossible to work with, and changed his lines, and made things up on set, and whatever, and was one of the reasons why he eventually left.

He was… You know, on set as an advisor, at least for this for a while, and got so frustrated with the way the movie was going that he just left. You can tell this is not his vision, but you can also see the kernel of his vision in it. Yes, 

Craig: that’s, and that’s, you can totally, like, there are moments, because I have watched the series in its entirety several times.

So yeah, there are definitely moments in the movie where you’re like, there it is. There’s Joss’s Buffy. I see it for just a second. I’ll just say it now. There’s a, there’s a moment at the end. There’s a big dance, a big school dance at the end. And there’s sad Buffy at the dance. And, you know, the bad boy love interest comes in and like saves the day.

That f ing happens. Like, exactly. Exactly that exact same moment happens. Season three, Buffy’s prom, and it’s gorgeous. And I cried.

It’s great. So you see moments. There are there. I feel like it probably should be addressed that Joss Whedon is potentially a great writer. I think he’s a great writer and, and probably a good. filmmaker, not so great a person. Yeah. And that’s another one of those things where it’s so disappointing because, you know, the movie did fairly well.

It more than recouped its budget. It, it did fine, but the TV show was a phenomenon and it was so widely praised for kind of being a feminist vehicle. Yeah. Progressive and feminist. Um, as it turns out, Joss Whedon was a PRICK to all the women that he worked with. It’s crazy. Which was just terrible. Just, just absolutely terrible to them.

He was awful to Charisma Carpenter, who’s, I just love. She was great on the show, and I think they wrote her off the show so that she could transfer over to Angel. But, uh, then, she got pregnant and told him, and he was like, well, are you gonna keep it? Like, what a gross thing to say to somebody. Mmm. Mmm.

Then. And not only did he fire her, but he assassinated her character before she left. And that makes me so angry. And if you get on, you know, like read people’s, what people write about Joss and all of that going down, people are just furious at the way that not only was he terrible to her as a person, but he really just destroyed her character in the final.

Season that she was in. Oh god. So yeah, there’s that I you know, I I just don’t again it’s one of those things like do you separate the art from the artist because the show Buffy is Brilliant and it’s brilliantly written and he was such a large part of that and so I want to celebrate that and I and I Don’t think that being a dick Precludes you from being allowed to work if you’re talented, you know, he’s not a criminal.

He’s just a jerk I’m sure there are a lot of jerks in Hollywood. It’s just a Disappear 

Todd: sad. Yeah. Well, it’s like especially disappointing when a guy who writes such, you know, obviously sort of feminist type stuff Yeah, it’s out to be and he 

Craig: really does like he writes strong women now I I do think a lot of that is lost in translation in this movie for sure because 

Todd: God, this movie.

Like, 

Craig: we’re 30 minutes in, we haven’t even started talking about it, and you, you, uh, if I can read you at all, you didn’t like it, you hated it, you 

Todd: thought it was terrible. I just, you know, I just, I think in my head, so having not seen it, like I said, having been surrounded by it but never seeing it, as a, you know, in high school and growing up and like, oh, I need to get back to that because it’s gotta be funny, yeah, I heard it wasn’t that great, like, it was disappointing, but.

Again, this sort of lived in my head as this, yeah, but it’s gonna be this silly, goofy, funny kind of comedy that I’ll get a kick out of anyway, knowing that it’s disappointing and not as good as the TV series. No. Like, I watched it and I’m like, this isn’t even a good movie. It’s so rare that I watch a movie and I can pinpoint all the wrong things about it, and I’m bored.

And I’m frustrated at how bad it is when it never needed to be this bad. Just so much wasted potential, and it’s clear as day what’s wrong with it. First of all, you’ve got this great premise of this sort of ditzy blonde girl who, like you said, flips, flips the switch, right? It’s sort of like what Legally Blonde did right.

You could have this sort of legally blonde thing where there’s this girl but she’s actually not that dizzy like she’s kind of smart but like you know she does her thing and she kind of goes against type and and she kills the vampires and it’s great and I’m sure that’s how the tv series is Actually, I don’t think the TV series, she’s that ditzy, but anyway, You watch this movie, and it can’t even commit to what it’s trying to do.

The first ten minutes of the movie are her, in Valley Girl speak, With all of her friends, being over the top ditzy and goofy, And then the minute she finds out she’s a vampire slayer, She turns into a lesbian. Me . 

Craig: She’s like 

Todd: not at all ditzy anymore. She’s a lesbian. . 

Craig: No, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be stereotypical, but like she goes from like having this bouffant like done hair, tons of makeup.

17 magazine. tight mini dresses and then like she has one training session and she’s in like Timberland boots. She’s like Tomb Raider. Jeans, jean cutoffs, um, flannel shirts, like she is a woodsman.

Todd: It’s so jarring that it calls attention to itself. You’re like, what happened to this girl? Is this the same girl? She walks like 

Craig: she’s saddlesore. I don’t understand. What happens to her. Now I agree, yeah, that’s super 

Todd: jarring. Then we’ve got Donald Sutherland, who is playing Donald Sutherland. Yeah. And he’s Merrick, and he’s the guy who is supposedly multiple times reincarnated and it’s his job to train these vampires.

They, they both are. 

Craig: We’ve seen, we see them in multiple 

Todd: time periods. Flashbacks, yeah, playing themselves. But anyway, you know, he’s self aware, she has to be told. And he comes in and… He’s Donald Sutherland, it’s fine, but you know what, he’s so aloof as a character, and so distant, that there’s a moment where he dies, and all of the characters are like, bawling their eyes out, and I’m like, Who the f k cares?

Like, I had no emotional connection to this guy, nor did I understand why Buffy herself had an emotional connection to him. She’s 

Craig: known him for like a week. 

Todd: Yeah, exactly. And he’s like her trainer. And the funny thing is, is like, again, you could listen to the dialogue, and if you just imagined this character being played a different way, with the same dialogue and the same scenes, you could see how this could totally work.

Uh, 

Craig: yeah, her watcher in the TV show is Amazing. 

Todd: But it’s, you know, the way he plays it, and again, I, I fault the director, I think the director, the directing was totally incompetent. And then, just the scenes, they just, oh my god, like, the action scenes in here, are awful. Whedon 

Craig: said that Sutherland refused to perform the lines as written.

Like, he rewrote all of his own lines, and uh, To the point where they were just nonsensical, like they just didn’t make any sense. I didn’t notice that specifically, but, like, Whedon hated the guy. Just hated him. Oh, yeah. Alright, let me give you, before we move forward, let me tell you, okay, so… When, uh, I was a kid, my sister and I watched this movie.

Somebody recommended it to us, I don’t remember. But we watched it, and we really liked it, and we liked it a lot, and we watched it a bunch of times. I liked it so much. That when the TV show came out, I was like, Mm, not my Buffy. And I didn’t watch it for the first season. And then my friends, I was in college at that point, My friends were like, My friends were having like weekly Buffy parties.

Getting together, cooking dinner together to watch Buffy. This is so gay. 

Todd: Go on. I 

Craig: was going to say, not my gay friends, but it was.

Oh, that’s so cute. That reminds me, that’s… That’s when Alan and I started, like, flirting, and, like, That’s a different story. You guys made over Buffy. We did. We had a little meet cute over Buffy. Another time. Minisoad. 

Todd: Minisoad? You gotta pay for this. Either the Minnesota or your only fans of K drama. 

Craig: No, my only fans is strictly for nudes.

There you go. So anyway, but then I totally, so I started going to the parties with my friends and I totally got into the show and I loved it and hadn’t watched this movie since then. And planning to watch it with you, I was like, oh my god. I remember it being really stupid. It’s going to be so stupid. I’m going to hate it and I put it on and I started watching it and the first scene is, I don’t know if we have time to go through the whole movie, but there are parts that I want to talk about is a flashback to the dark ages and it’s like this terrible community theater costumed dark ages with What’s her name?

Christy Swanson. Christy 

Todd: Swanson. Yeah, oh god. 

Craig: Don’t get me started. Don’t even get me 

Todd: started. Well, she’s no stranger to the podcast. One of the earliest episodes we did was Deadly Friend. 

Craig: I know and at this point I loved her and I will be fair and say that she’s gorgeous in this movie and I don’t think that she did anything wrong.

She’s fine. I just don’t want to talk about it, but um… 

Todd: We’re talking about how shitty Donald Sutherland is, but we’re not going to talk about Christy Swanson. I’ll get in trouble, 

Craig: we’ll get hate mail, and the hate mail hurts my feelings. So I don’t want to do it! 

Todd: Ha ha! You’re this is like a game of poker.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha! No one to hold em, no one to fold em on certain actors, huh? Ha ha! So 

Craig: we get this history, or whatever. And then the very first scene is a cheer a long… Cheerleading routine. Yes. And so, I’m going into this thinking I’m gonna not like this movie and I’m watching it and I’m like, Chrissy Swanson doesn’t know this routine.

Did you notice that? I was a little unsure. They had to keep, they had to keep cutting it. It’s so cut. Because she doesn’t know it. She doesn’t know the routine and she only knows it one or two steps at a time. And all of the other girls around her are so confident and they have it. And she just has no idea what she’s doing.

They cut it. So you can’t really tell. I don’t remember, but that’s the only negative thing I will say about her performance. In fact, what I will say is I loved it. I loved the movie. What? Are you kidding me? I thought it was hilarious. I thought it was 

Todd: hilarious. This is nostalgia speaking. 

Craig: It is. It has to be, but it also, like, I had forgotten there are so many lines in this movie that I quote all the time, and I had entirely forgotten that they came from this movie.

Doesn’t make them funny. Oh my god, I was dying. And, since we’re not going to have time to talk about the plot, I just have… Throughout my notes, exclamation points, Hillary Swank, right? Ricky 

Todd: Lake, right? Ben Affleck, Ben Affleck. That one threw me for a loop.

Craig: There are so many people and then not only that, but. You can criticize Sutherland. I don’t have any problem with that. I agree. He’s not great in this movie. I think that he’s functional. Like, I just don’t think his art is very important. Whereas the, the Watcher Slayer relationship is so important in the series and like they become like father and daughter and it’s heartbreaking.

It’s, it’s, uh, so good. Anthony Stewart Head is the Watcher. The series, by the way, acknowledges some of the events of the movie. Yeah. Um, but really, really the series. It’s a sequel to the movie that Joss wanted to make. It’s a sequel to the screenplay that he originally wrote, not the actual movie. So, there are some things that the movie says about the events.

That occurred before Buffy came to Sunnydale, that don’t match up with the movie, but that’s because, uh, it was changed from his original screenplay. Right. Donald Sutherland, love him or hate him, whatever, huge star. Yeah. 

Todd: What’s the, what’s the guy, Rutger Hauer. Rutger 

Craig: Hauer, massive. Is basically the Dracula of the movie, the, you know, the major big bad vampire, huge star.

Like, there are huge… There are. 

Todd: Luke Perry at this time was your 90210, he was the heartthrob of the time, of the moment. Rutger Hauer, he’s the big bad guy in this movie. He’s supposedly, like, the final boss. And, there are like three short scenes with him. We barely understand where he came from, why he’s there.

What his goal is, what his weaknesses are, we don’t understand 

Craig: any of this. He’s a vampire. You kill him like you kill 

Todd: a vampire. Yeah, but why is he there? What’s going on? Like, uh, 

Craig: uh, why is he there? Apparently he’s after Buffy because he’s been after her in every one of her lifetimes. I don’t know. Like, what more motivation do you need?

Like, 

Todd: why is he just hanging around? Why is he hanging around? somewhere else. I mean, like, 

Craig: if he knows where she is, there’s no backstory for like, apparent, like in the beginning, it appears that he’s weak and, uh, Paul Rubens, who I’m just going to call that because his name is like amylin or something stupid, which I don’t recall ever hearing being said.

Yeah. Who knows? Paul Reubens is like his familiar, but he’s a vampire too, but like, he’s his lackey. And in the beginning, it seems like Paul Reubens, because he’s got this scene where he’s like, Sleep, master, my own sleep. I have already begun building you a new family. Soon we will be legion. When you rise, we will Hauer is

He’s, his name’s Lothos, he’s like weak or needs to be revived or something, but that’s never explained. And then he just is like, like he, like he can’t get out of his coffin and then he’s floating 

Todd: in the air. Yeah. And then he just kind of is somewhere, I guess, hanging out in his lair or whatnot while Paul Rubens, his character and a couple other guys.

I just never got a sense of what the actual danger was that Buffy was up against, what it took to take them down, what the stakes were, haha, stakes, uh, haha. It’s just unclear, except from this general movie thing, Hey, vampires are bad, and she’s the vampire killer, so naturally she’s gonna kill them. I mean I don’t know, Todd, it’s 

Craig: a movie.

It’s a PG 13 horror 

Todd: comedy. Why can the totally vamped out vampire be playing on the basketball team and nobody thinks it’s weird that this guy looks utterly… Crazy. I don’t 

Craig: know. Like, would your first thought be, Oh, look, it’s a 

Todd: vampire. I don’t know. Maybe because I was also raised on Teen Wolf, and I remember that that’s a pretty frickin huge deal.

This guy goes out on the basketball court looking like a werewolf, you know? I don’t know. he could probably 

Craig: get away with the pale skin and the teeth and the weird ears. For some reason, the vampires in this movie have weird ears. I don’t know. He could probably get away with that, but, but floating down from the basketball hoop?

People might notice.

Todd: But you know, not, yeah. 

Craig: Okay. There are things that I do want to mention, but you’re right. Okay. So they’re just Valley girls in the beginning. Hillary Swank is king. Hilarious in this movie, like every scene that she’s in, I am dying laughing cause she’s so funny. This is, I think that she had done some TV.

Uh, I, at some point she did. Yeah, this is her first movie. Oh my God. So funny. As this terrible bitchy valley girl, but hilarious. They all are in the beginning. David Arquette 

Todd: is in this. Oh my God. David Arquette! 

Craig: I know! And Luke Perry, our high school friends. God, we are so… Old. I know. But then eventually, uh, the guy, Sutherland, what’s his name in this?

I don’t remember. Merrick. Merrick comes to Buffy in the gym after he sees her doing gymnastics because she’s a gymnast. And he’s like, I didn’t know until now. I couldn’t have known until now. But just seeing you do gymnastics, you are the chosen 

Todd: one. Just seeing you flip like 15 more times before this movie’s over.

Craig: That does carry over to the show. She is very acrobatic.

But, like, she just has, she has some great lines. Like, he’s telling her this, like, you’re the chosen one or whatever. And she’s like, Does Elvis talk to you? Does he tell you to do things? Do you… see spots? 

Todd: Uh, oh my god. That dates us too, by the way. And he’s like, 

Craig: spots, that’s, that’s it. He’s like, that’s why I couldn’t find you, because you’re supposed to have this birthmark.

And she’s like, ew, that big hairy mole I had that removed, gross. Um, but he takes her to the graveyard. So that she can see vampires come out, and she kills them. One of the big differences in this movie, when she stakes a vampire, they just fall out of frame, and you never see them again. It’s a big deal in the show, when she stakes a vampire, they, they poof.

They just turn into dust. Yeah, I noticed that. And they go away. Which, logistically, makes a lot more sense, because… Otherwise, there’s gonna be tons of dead vampires later on, like, nobody’s gonna 

Todd: notice. There are gonna be questions. The principal’s gonna have a few things to say, yeah. Um, 

Craig: great Salem’s Lot tribute with Luke Perry and, uh, Arquette.

Do you notice that, right? Like, him floating out the window totally assailing 

Todd: the flying thing. Oh, yeah. With a funny line, right? He’s like, You 

Craig: want something? No. Let me in, Pike! I’m hungry! Go home, Ben. I’m hungry! You’re floating! Come on, man! Get away from here! Ha ha! God, that was funny. Um, Buffy, you know, dreams that the Big bad is in her bed, but she wakes up and he’s fine.

Then Donald Sutherland approaches her in the locker room at her gym because she was supposed to come train with him, but she didn’t. And she says, what are you doing here? This is a naked place, which I love that line, but he’s like, okay, fine. I’ll leave. But he doesn’t. And then he turns around and he throws a knife at her head.

You threw a knife at my head. Yes, I have to show you. But, you threw a knife at my head. And you caught it. Only the chosen one could have caught it. Don’t you get it? I don’t want to be the chosen one. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life chasing after vampires. All I want to do is graduate from high school, go to Europe, marry Christian Slater, and die.

Now, it may not sound too sconehead like you, but I think it’s swell. You come along and tell me I’m a member of the hairy mole club so you can throw things at me? I thought that was the funniest thing I had ever heard in my life. And then she punches him, but the fact that she punches him makes her realize that she’s a badass.

And so… Now she’s a badass. They do a training montage to a divinal song. Oh god, it’s a boring 

Todd: training montage. 

Craig: The, the, the band, the group that sings When I Think About You I Touch Myself There’s a… It’s not that song, but it sounds a lot like it. And it’s the same. Band, by the way, 

Todd: training montage, love, speaking of training montage, all of the action in this movie is so poorly filmed.

I don’t know if I’ve seen a movie that it had the intention of being a relatively, you know, action packed film with such ineptly filmed action sequences. What’s the bit where, where she gets on the motorcycle and she goes off. Oh 

Craig: my god, Motorcycle Madness? Oh. Ha ha ha ha ha ha 

Todd: ha ha ha! It’s so bad, it’s I was bored!

During these 

Craig: action sequences. That’s after the basketball game. There’s a basketball game, one of their friends who has been killed is a vampire, he plays basketball with Ben Affleck, and then he runs away, and, uh, she has to chase him, because if the vampires find out her name, then… There’s trouble. I don’t know Because this vampire knows her name she has to chase him but She can’t chase him on foot for some reason and so she beats up a biker and steals his motorcycle and then Luke Perry also happens In this moment, to be near a motorcycle, so he jumps on 

Todd: one, too.

Right. And they 

Craig: both ride their motorcycles to the Pasadena Parade Floats lot. Yes. What?! 

Todd: Like… That’s… They didn’t have an abandoned carnival set that they could have done? I don’t know. And then she just rides her motorcycle in there and instead of parking it and hopping off, she just jumps off of it and it crashes into a parade thing.

That 

Craig: set… Peace was, I, oh my God, it was fantastic. These enormous, elaborate, mechanized parade floats that apparently just run all the time, I guess, because they’re moving. The parade floats are like moving, like, except for that nothing, nothing happens. Yes, 

Todd: nothing happens there. Nothing with the float.

There’s a little tiny 

Craig: fight. Yeah, there’s a little fight. And the Watcher gets killed. Sutherland gets killed. For no good reason. That was such a lame, stupid scene. The big bad guy has Buffy, like, in his thrall. The Watcher, Sutherland’s like, No, you can’t kill her. So he, like, walks right up to the big bad guy and, like, goes to stake him.

But Rooker Howard just, like, grabs his… Hand and redirects the stake into him. Like it’s, it’s so anticlimactic. 

Todd: It’s such a stupid thing. This watcher is supposed to be this expert in vampire slaying gets taken down. It takes 

Craig: nothing quickly. And then the vampire Peewee Herman is like, Peewee Herman’s like, aren’t we going to eat and the big bad’s like, nah, she’s not ready.

Like what?

Todd: She’s not ready. Wait till she could definitely kick our asses before we take her down. Yeah. It’s dumb. And they just turn around and walk off. And that’s when you know that nothing makes sense and the stakes are… That… You don’t understand. I didn’t understand. It’s all 

Craig: just… It’s just building to a climax at a dance.

Like, the mean girls are mad at Buffy because she’s neglecting them and her boyfriend is mad at her because he’s neglecting her, blah, blah, blah. What’s his name Luke Perry’s trying to get out of town and his boss is… Thomas Jane?! Exclamation point! I would have not even recognized him. Um, but as hot as Thomas Jane is now in his 20s, Thomas Jane, holy shit.

Like, uh, man, super hot, but, and then Buffy does more training. She walks down an alley and sings. And they make a big deal out of how menstrual cramps are her secret weapon, which they dropped for the show. Thank God. It all builds, like, her friends are mad at her. She’s down to earth now. Like, she was a super silly valley girl before, but now she’s down to earth.

And she just realizes that her whole… pre, before life was stupid and vapid and vain and she’s a whole new person and she can’t relate with her friends anymore and they’re not listening to her real problems and blah blah blah but she decides look I’m still a girl and it’s still my senior year and I’m going to the dance.

Now as stupid as that sounds that really is That’s a central issue in the show. In this show, she is given this enormous responsibility. But she’s just a teenage girl, like, like, she wants to go on dates and have sleepovers and it’s not fair that she doesn’t, like, her work life balance is a major part.

Todd: Well, it’s the spider man thing too, right? I mean, you know, that’s kind of what the appeal of spider man He’s a superhero, but he’s still really just a kid who kind of wants to be a kid too And so yeah, I mean I that that’s fine with me. I just think the movie’s really clunky with it No, it is 

Craig: it is it happens immediately and and You know, she, she just, her character changes immediately and you’re supposed to feel sympathy for her.

Um, but she decides she’s going to go to the dance. So she buys a pretty dress and she puts one of those topsy turn things in her hair. What are those things called? Where you make a donut, where you make a donut on the back of your head.

And she goes to the dance and, uh, her boyfriend is there with. Some other dumb girl, and slashes the DJ, WHAT?! Like, all of this, it’s insane! But then, you know, her boyfriend’s there with another girl, so she’s very sad. And she goes and she stands by, uh, Cut out of a palm tree and she’s very sad. And then, and then Luke Perry comes in in his leather jacket and like, everything’s okay and they’re cute and they dance and it’s super sweet.

And I swear to God, the exact same thing happens in the season finale of season three. Of Buffy. Then the vampires attack and they’re like. They’re so funny. It’s like the United colors of Benetton vampires.

Every race is represented and they call her out and they’re like, we won’t hurt anybody at Buffy comes out, which is totally alive. And she goes out Seth green, who. That was a regular on the series, makes a one second cameo as one of these vampires. And she rips the bottom part of her floofy skirt off, and uh, puts on a leather jacket, and goes out and starts kicking butt.

But then, she gets confronted at some point by… Peewee. Yeah.

Hi, how’s it going? I’m fine, but you’re obviously having a bad hair day. Oh, funny. Admit it Buffy, aren’t there times when you just feel less than fresh? And he had had an earlier scene with Luke Perry where he had gotten his arm cut off and that’s a whole 

Todd: thing and then That’s kind of funny because he gets his arm cut off, but then he’s like, you ripped my jacket or something.

Yeah, my 

Craig: brand new jacket. He talks like that. He does. He’s hilarious. He’s so funny in this movie. He’s 

Todd: good in this. You wouldn’t even know he was Pee Wee necessarily, you know? 

Craig: Uh, I mean, I would recognize him, but… I 

Todd: mean, he’s not… 

Craig: No, no, no, no, totally different. But the best part is they’re fighting and quipping, because they’re both great quippers, and he’s like…

We’re immortal, Buffy. You can do anything. Oh yeah?

Clap! That was funny. Oh my god, and I thought it was 

Todd: so funny. That was the only time I laughed. In this whole movie. 

Craig: Oh my god. And then Lothos like starts playing the violin which puts her in the thrall. Again, and Peewee looks at him like, Oh yeah, thanks boss. And Lothos like looks at him and shakes his head no and stops playing so that she comes out of the thrall for just a second long enough to kill Paul Reubens.

And that death scene was entirely improvised by him. And I don’t care if you hate this movie or not. If you didn’t think that was hilarious, we can’t be friends anymore. 

Todd: I just thought it was out of. Keeping with the movie. Like, the movie, at times, is trying to be funny and quippy, but not this level of goofball.

And so when that happens, it’s like two steps over the edge where it just calls attention to itself as being totally off. I thought. I’m sorry if I 

Craig: thought it was hilarious. Like, he falls down to the ground and he’s out of frame. Ah, ugh. Ah, ah. And it goes on for a long time. And he’s like, he’s like pounding on the ground like, ah, ah, 

Todd: ah.

Well apparently they thought it was hilarious enough to like extend it into the credit sequence after the, after the movie, so. Oh my god. Oh, 

Craig: I thought it was so funny, and then, I don’t know, there’s some poignant moment where Buffy’s in thrall, but then she realized she doesn’t need to be in thrall anymore.

It’s supposed to have something to do with a quote from Hamlet, but like, whatever. It’s just dumb. Like, oh, I just realized you have no power over me. So up until then, she’s like, been in this thrall or whatever. Now she’s not anymore. And he’s talking to her, and he says, you and I. are one. And she goes, one what?

Cute couple? I don’t think so.

Listen, seriously, Christy Swanson today can fall off a cliff for all I care, but I think she is hilarious. And oh my god, and really, really pretty. Like I had forgotten. Oh yeah, she is. How pretty. She’s so pretty, and whatever she, you know, like she holds up a crucifix and he grabs it and it sets on fire and she’s like, he’s like, this is how you’re going to defend yourself, your puny faith, and she whips out a can of hairspray and says, no, my keen fashion sense blowtorches his 

Todd: face.

Craig: And then they have a super, super anticlimactic battle. On the dance floor. Oh, it’s 

Todd: so 

Craig: bad. It’s so bad. It lasts all of 30 seconds. She does some flippies. And it’s 

Todd: not filmed well. There’s nothing interesting about Oh 

Craig: god. No, it’s very, very anticlimactic. And she ultimately just takes him. Like, it does Silly.

That’s unfortunate. 

Todd: Well, I’ll tell you what’s unfortunate. After all this is done, then now it’s she and Luke, Perry, are now together. They hop on a motorcycle and ride off into the sunset. No. He hops on a motorcycle, she hops on the back, and they go off into the sunset. I could not believe that was the last image that this supposedly, like, badass woman, vampire killer, is gonna go out on.

At least put her in the front! At least have her riding the motorcycle! She’s still a girl, 

Craig: Todd! That is clear! It’s Luke! Luke Perry. Luke Perry is not gonna sit on the back of that motorcycle. Listen, I liked Luke Perry in this movie too. Like, he’s so understated to the point like he’s a little sleepy. But, I didn’t care.

I still thought it was funny. I still thought he was funny. Uh, David Arquette, funny. All these famous people popping up. Ricky Lake, Slash. God, it was funny. I just feel like this. I understand. I was talking to Alan about it because you texted me. You sent me several texts when you were watching this movie like I could tell that it was having an impact on you.

You didn’t like it was the gist of your multiple texts that you sent me. And I told Alan, I was like, I get it. Like if I had never seen it before and I were to watch it now, I would probably think that it was really stupid too. But having watched it when I was a kid, and I just feel like, not only is it nostalgic for me for that reason, but captures a very specific moment in time.

Well, it sure does. Like, this came out in 1992, which, oh my god, is so specific. We were still clinging to some of those things from the 80s, but we were moving more into the 90s, like we were still kind of clinging to the bright colors and big hair of the 80s, but moving into the kind of the grungier and part of the 90s and like Buffy goes through that transition in one scene.

Yeah, 

Todd: and it kind of In a way foretells the edgier, more self aware and, and hip teen comedy and horror movies too, that we were about to get like a year or two later. Yes. But I mean, it’s not there. It’s like the transition movie, right? It’s like the inept little bit that we had to get through, but it foretells that.

And it’s got a lot of the people in it that would go on to be like in these other movies. And so, yeah, in that way you’re right. It’s a cool time capsule specifically for its time. As a movie. Well, 

Craig: I liked it. We should probably just thank Dolly Parton, like, blanket, you know? Like, for just being who she is.

But we can specifically thank her for bringing Buffy the Vampire Slayer into the world because it was her production company that funded both the movie and the television show. Fantastic. Um, this movie had to be produced. In only five weeks, because they had to work around Luke Perry’s 90210 schedule.

You know, he was the huge star. Uh, and God, I didn’t even remember this, but the original, if you go to IMDB, the poster that you’ll see, um, with the title, is the original poster. But, the poster, that was the poster that came out before the movie actually came out. When the movie actually came out, the poster that you saw in theaters was just, Christy Swanson.

in front with Luke Perry peering out from behind her. Totally white backgrounds, nothing else. And they did that just to capitalize on him. And, if you watch the trailer for this movie, the trailer will lead you to believe that this is a movie about Luke Perry. Uh, it’s, he, he narrates the trailer. Uh, it starts out with like, a couple days ago I met this girl named Buffy, but she’s different than other girls.

Like, it’s crazy. It seems like it’s supposed to be about him, but they were trying to capitalize on his fame. 

Todd: Yeah, he was the big guy at this time. Him and the other dude. Who was the other dude who was in 90210? Oh, I don’t know. Basically, you were either team Luke or 

Craig: team that other dude. Brian Austin Green was one of them, and there is another one.

I don’t know, whatever, who cares. With all the cameos that were there, David Bowie and Mick Jagger were supposed to make cameos, but they couldn’t make the schedules work. Why? Like, who did this, who did this, who did these people know that they were even maybe gonna get David Bowie and Mick Jagger? Right.

Oh, it’s crazy. Um, but I said, uh, one of the last things. Last night I was watching clips about Paul Reubens, and I watched that clip of Conan O’Brien. It’s a video clip, but it’s, you know, just a video recording of his podcast. And, again, he was very emotional talking about his friend. But one of the things that stuck with me was that he said that Paul Reubens New that he was loved, he knew that people loved him.

He knew that people loved his character. Um, and he was humble and he was grateful. Uh, and that just made me so happy because really, before he passed away, I hadn’t thought about him in a while. Yeah. You know, I mean, he he… He lives, you know, in my head forever, but he hadn’t been around for a while, and as it turns out, he had been privately dealing with cancer for, for years, for many years, for, I think, like, six years.

Before his death, he penned a note to his fans, and, and, I’ll read from it. Uh, he said, Please accept my apology for not going public with what I’ve been facing the last six years. I have always felt a huge amount of love and respect from my friends, fans, and supporters. I have loved you all so much and enjoyed making art for you.

Ugh. Like, rest in peace. Shh. What a 

Todd: good guy. Thank you again for listening to another episode. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend. You can find us online if you just Google two guys in a chainsaw podcast. Find us on all of our social media channels. Also check out our patreon page patreon.

com slash chainsaw podcast. Let us know your memories of Paul Reuben. Let us know what you thought of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the movie. I would just love to talk with you guys about this. stuff. Drop us a note. Again, thank you so much for listening and share this with someone else that you think would enjoy it as well.

That’s the best support we can get from you. Until next time, I’m Todd, and I’m Craig, with Two Guys and a Chainsaw.