Diana (00:39.589) Hello everyone, I apologize. You have to see my messy apartment. Please forgive me. Carmen! (00:43.756) Not at all Diana (00:50.843) I don't know if you can see this, but I everyone to know I wore my BTS hoodie for this event. It felt very important to me. I was like, I don't think I can discuss this like without wearing a BTS hoodie. Carmen! (00:55.932) Yeah! Maria (01:02.648) Me? it thinks I'm on the headphones. Okay, I'll have headphones. Diana! Carmen! (01:10.942) does this sound okay? Maria (01:13.942) I don't know, we have to ask Joe, I'm sure it's fine. Carmen! (01:16.616) Okay. Maria (01:19.218) my god. Diana (01:20.005) phone in. Maria (01:22.318) I went to the gym today. Diana (01:26.792) that's wonderful. Good job. Carmen! (01:26.901) Hell yeah. Maria (01:30.112) I know. I know. Diana (01:32.923) I'm so sorry, I'm like shoving food in my mouth, I apologize. Carmen! (01:33.324) channel. Maria (01:35.928) Go for it. It's early over there, I know. Diana (01:39.351) I know. I was like, I just need to this one protein bar before recording. I can do it. Maria (01:44.27) Hi Joe! Carmen! (01:48.396) Bye. Maria (01:50.926) This is Carmen, don't know if you've ever met. My door to- Carmen! (01:53.642) Mm-mm. Maria (01:58.99) You Diana (02:00.027) Amazing. Flaming Hydra (02:02.906) Maria Carmen Diana Maria (02:05.048) Yes, sir. Carmen! (02:07.412) Yeah! Diana (02:09.327) Bye Joe. Flaming Hydra (02:13.456) Hi everybody. All right, Maria. Diana (02:15.675) Hello. Carmen! (02:15.744) Hello? Maria (02:18.658) Yes, All right, I'm going to start hosting you guys. They're posting you. Hello everyone. And welcome to the flaming Hydra round table podcast. I am here with Diana Moskowitz and Carmen Johns experts. Experts in the film, K-pop demon hunters, which I also have just seen. Flaming Hydra (02:20.09) You're the host. Diana (02:23.684) Okay. Diana (02:36.571) Hello? Carmen! (02:38.657) Hello. Maria (02:45.87) I highly recommend watching it before you start your day to charge you up and feel like you can take on the universe All right Carmen! (02:54.828) Absolutely. Or listen to the soundtrack before you start your day. Diana (02:57.787) Oh my gosh, I did listen to the soundtrack right before this recording actually. I was like, can you listen to Golden too many times? I don't think so. No, no. Carmen! (03:02.934) Same. Hmm. Maria (03:09.256) No, I would like everyone to know the three of us are actually in mid-air like at the end of the film right now even as we speak to you. Carmen! (03:10.193) Nah. Diana (03:20.324) Nice. Carmen! (03:20.413) Yes, with holographic ribbons of rainbow powers, like propelling us up altogether. Yeah. Maria (03:26.476) Yeah, you need to picture us like that as we speak about this film. Diana (03:26.735) Yes. Diana (03:32.399) love that visual. love that visual. that is, it's, you know, are we going to have to pick like who is who? Because I feel like, you know, everyone's going to want to be roomie. Maria (03:40.034) Yeah, tell us, Start. I don't know. I don't know that it. Carmen! (03:45.899) two buttons so I'm Zoe automatically. Yeah. Yeah. Diana (03:47.611) You are Zoe, you're straight up, yeah, you're automatically Zoe. I feel like I'm Mira, I would be honest. I feel like you're our roomie, Maria. You're roomie. You're roomie, yeah. Maria (03:50.819) Yeah. Carmen! (03:54.867) Yeah, I think you are. Maria (03:55.214) Okay. I can't sing, but okay. I'm a part demon. I'm part demon. Diana (04:00.443) But like, but spiritually, you did- Carmen! (04:00.797) No! Carmen! (04:04.528) You're definitely part demon Maria (04:07.982) All right, our listeners here have no idea what we're talking about. So let's clear this up. Diana wrote a really beautiful piece of Flaming Hydra about her sort of connection to K-pop. And that is how I knew what a light stick was in the film. has, yeah, yeah, yeah. Carmen! (04:11.338) you Carmen! (04:15.626) you Diana (04:27.415) my God, I was helpful. That makes me feel so good. Yeah. No! I feel so empowered now. Wow, thank you. Carmen! (04:29.492) same. Your piece is actually also why I knew. Yeah, definitely. Maria (04:39.48) Okay, so tell us about your K-pop journey and then tell us about your feelings about the film and we'll go from there. Diana (04:47.067) Okay. So, I live in Los Angeles and so I live not far from the Koreatown neighborhood. So I feel like in a way I have like an unfair advantage. And so actually, I've lived in Los Angeles for a long time and again, living so close to Koreatown, I was constantly hearing about BTS, but just didn't have the time. And then during the pandemic, was a couple of months in, like with a lot of things, I felt, well, I have the time now. I have so much time. I have all the time in the world to figure out BTS and fell down the rabbit hole and never really came back, honestly. So it was just during the pandemic, I had time because I do think, and that's something we could talk about, because it's interesting to me how they cross that bridge in the movie because Maria (05:24.129) Mm-hmm Diana (05:43.611) Um, cause sort of with K-pop, do say like there is, there can be a really high learning curve, right? They have not, despite what anyone tells you, like Americanized it to the point where you could just figure it out. Like they're going to make you learn some Korean. You know, you're going to learn some Korean language, some Korean culture. You know, they're, they're not just serving it up on a platter to you. You, do have to do the work. Um, so yeah, I, you know, you have to learn about the, the TV shows and the contests and. Carmen! (06:07.913) totally. Diana (06:13.739) At the time now it's moved to a different app, but what a VLive was. But I had the time, like I was sitting at home, right? And this was really early on when we didn't know if people could even safely congregate outside, right? I had all the time in the world. So yeah, I just totally fell into BTS. I joined the BTS army, which is the name for the fandom. Every fandom has a nickname. They did not tell us what was the name for Huntrix fans of the movies, but we'll set that aside for now. But I do have that question. What's the name of the Huntrix fandom? us. Maybe we could come up with one here actually. But yeah, and ever since then, just been a great, I don't know, source of happiness for me. I've made friends through BTS and then through K-pop in general. Again, I have the advantage of living in Los Angeles. So most K-pop acts, they go on a tour that comes to US at all. They come to LA. Carmen! (06:49.354) Ew. Diana (07:14.043) And there are stores here that carry all the merchandise. yeah, I know it's pretty much it. just really got into it and kind of never got out. You know, I found it to be not a perfect community, but still, I don't think any community is, but still a lovely community. Some of, have really great friends now through it. Uh. And I really liked the music. I don't know. It's really great music. And I do say this, especially if you're really into bands, because I feel like here in the U S we don't really have it. We do have bands, but if you look at the top of the charts, it's mostly solo artists. So it's really fun having bands, right? I don't know. I love a good boy band. I'm still like a sucker at heart for a good boy band and there's plethora of them in K-pop and girl groups. Carmen! (07:54.28) true. Maria (07:57.645) Yeah. Diana (08:08.027) K-pop does kind of flip that dynamic on its head. feel like here in the US, even when there's a group, there's always this understanding of, okay, but the most talented one, they're gonna go solo, they're gonna go solo. And in K-pop, artists do go solo, but they tend to be at their most popular as a group. It really flips that dynamic on that. that, flips that dynamic on its head. Maria (08:29.474) I was, I'm gonna pop in here and just say one thing, cause I was at the gym this morning and the kid, I was trying to explain to Stuart at the gym and I was like, it's like the monkeys or like the beetles where they're almost like mascots, you know, like each one has sort of a character and you sort of identify with that one. And that's like your one, like we were just talking about, like, you know, this is, yeah, this is, that's your bias. Diana (08:34.361) Yeah. Carmen! (08:42.44) You Diana (08:50.211) Yeah, or your bias. If we want to teach people lingo, that's your bias. That's your bias. Yeah, that's the official lingo. That's not so when you're like, and you can have, you know, more than one bias. And then there's a phrase for if you have no bias. So like, it's a little bit different, but like, for BTS, you would say like, well, I'm OT seven, which means I just love all of them equally. Or you could say, I have a bias and it's, you know, so and so. Yeah. And it's just. Carmen! (09:15.335) cute. Maria (09:17.602) Yeah, we should. Diana (09:17.847) Yeah, no, I mean, it's always been true, right? Like I have a child of the 80s, so very, so, which I think works out because I feel like that's kind of when boy bands first really, there's always been boy bands, but you know, like the Beatles were a boy band, but, yeah. So like, we've always had that, right? Cause you would just say, who's your favorite member of New Kids on the Block? You know, Maria (09:38.926) Sure. Carmen! (09:39.304) Yeah, and for me it was N'Sync and Backstreet Boys and we would fight over who got to have Justin Timberlake as their boyfriend when we played at recess. N'Sync Boyfriends, yeah. Diana (09:41.945) Mm-hmm. Diana (09:52.483) Ray, yeah, I think that's like, still think that's part of the power of K-pop now is that, like, I still think kids want boy bands and girl groups. We just don't really, but who was like the last boy band in the US? You know, it was One Direction. We haven't, we haven't been giving the kids their boy bands, you know? So to me, there's like a weird part of this where I'm like, I don't know why, you know, I'm not that deep of a music reporter, but whenever I think about the growth of K-pop. Maria (09:52.61) Great. Carmen! (10:10.758) Wow. Maria (10:11.959) Wow. Diana (10:22.091) And I see who are the young kids who listening to it, think. it's, they're like, again, I live in Los Angeles. I'm not going to say this is the, where we have an advantage here, but I, even if I just take the train, I'll see really young kids with like all their K-pop swag. And, like I'll see little girls in BTS shirts, you know, or some of the more recent groups like Stray Kids, ATEEZ. And, I just think it's kind of like filling a void, like. I'm sorry, eight year old girls want boy bands. We got to give them the boy bands. You know, like they're going to find them even if it's not in English. Like this is just a truism of the universe. feel like, sorry, like they're going to find their boy bands. they're, K-pop is providing them, you know, and in some ways even like at this higher level than we ever had with like, yeah, and sync her new kids on the block. You know what I mean? Because I did not have a light stick. Big mistake. Where were the light sticks? Maria (10:53.166) Yeah, the same way. Carmen! (10:54.173) period. Absolutely. Carmen! (11:04.698) Absolutely. Maria (11:14.114) this. Maria (11:18.702) it's so wonderful in the film. This is where I want to jump in and say this film has streamed together all these threats that you're talking about, Diana, because it's a boy band versus a girl band. have like, right, this similar like dynamic of these, the way that the girl band themselves are swooning over these kind of like feminized boys, like exactly like we did. Carmen! (11:19.146) you Diana (11:31.383) my God, I could talk about that for hours. Right? Diana (11:43.855) Mm-hmm. Maria (11:45.836) You know, so it's like, it's really nostalgic for me because it sort of looks like sort of David Cassidy or whatever. It's the same kind of aesthetic. They've got all this hair and their face and their, all the girls are swooning and it, and then they have the fandom. So there's this whole meta and the plot is based on like the world is saved by the fans. We're going to spoiler you guys like crazy. So you're going to have to, you're going have to watch the movie. The it's the Diana (12:08.833) yeah, we should have worn that. Right. But in defense, does anyone think this does not end with them saving the world? mean, come on. Like, come on. Carmen! (12:10.671) true. Maria (12:17.366) Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's the idea though. It's the fans that save the world. And I love that. Diana (12:23.211) Mm-hmm. Yeah, and our love of them. Yeah. Carmen! (12:26.02) It's there, it's lighting, it's the ability of the demon hunter, of huntrix to light their hearts with love and power. And then all of their light all like builds together into this mega light that saves the world. Diana (12:33.729) Mm-hmm. Diana (12:40.484) Yeah. Maria (12:40.928) It's deeply, deeply pro-democratic political statement to be coming out of Korea of all places. actually is this beacon to planet Earth of protecting democracy and love for each other. It's like, boom, watching this movie. It blew my mind. mean, you know, they're like that wonderful, timeless image of them hoisting that. Diana (12:53.228) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Diana (13:00.986) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (13:02.073) Mm-hmm. Maria (13:10.552) guy over the wall to go and like save the nation. It's like freaking cool. I know. So I've sort of reliving all that while I'm watching this anime of this K-pop Demon Hunter cartoon. Seriously, man. All right. Carmen! (13:15.783) my gosh, yeah. Carmen! (13:25.517) Absolutely. Diana (13:28.827) Well, I kind of want to know since I'm almost like too much the target audience, Like woman living awesome. So I kind of want to know because like I I remember like knowing like being in like group chats with friends who I made through BTS and we're like, right. Like we're going to watch this 500 times. Right. Like we know, you know, but for y'all, I'm kind of wondering then like what is it about it that you love or even just like what made you watch it? Because obviously Carmen! (13:36.034) No! Diana (13:59.375) This has been like why Netflix did not think this was going to get this big. Like this is surprising. Maybe not me and my group chats, but like just about everyone else, you know? So I'm kind of wondering. Yeah. Maria (14:10.798) Let's hear from Carmen. Yeah, it has a history with so many of the threads here. Carmen! (14:11.991) Absolutely. Carmen! (14:19.511) Yeah, history with, I'm a cartoonist and a zinester and I'm a big cartoon head. And I actually avoided K-pop Demon Hunters. Netflix was really trying to like advertise it to me. And I thought the animation style looked really unappealing for me personally. And I kept away from it because it reminded me of the 3D animated style Barbie show that they came out with, like pretty exactly. I... I really kept away from it and it wasn't until two kids that I really trust told me, a nine year old and a seven year old, told me I have to watch it. And then my friend chimed in who's also in their thirties and was like, oh my gosh, yeah, you have to, you're gonna love it. But it really took kids recommending it to me for me to be like, okay, I need to take this seriously. And I watched it five times. Maria (15:13.644) And meanwhile... Carmen! (15:14.181) The first time, the first week that I knew about it, I had seen it five times. And I also work as a nanny and the kids that I watch is five. And I played her the soundtrack the day after I watched it. was like, this is the music from my new favorite movie. And every day that week, even though she hadn't seen it yet, she was like, can we listen to your favorite movie? Can we listen to your favorite movie in the car? And then I showed it to her and now she's Diana (15:14.629) They got you, wow. Carmen! (15:44.163) absolutely just beside herself. Just we can't watch anything else. We can't talk about anything else. She quotes the movie all the time. When we cheers, she imitates lines from the movie. She says, happy honeymoon. And every time we cheers, anything. And what really hooked me other than what I ended up falling in love with the animation style, the thing that Maria (15:51.66) her hair. Diana (15:57.099) my gosh. gosh. Carmen! (16:13.549) that really got my attention from the beginning is we're introducing, well, first of all, we start with the fans. The whole movie opens up interviewing the totally giant crowd of just this like bubbling overflowing with joy and excitement fans. And each one of them is being interviewed or the fans are each being asked, who's your favorite of the three Diana (16:16.763) You Carmen! (16:42.67) girls in Huntrix. And so that's the way they get to introduce each character. And I was like, that's cool, that's cool. They're beautiful. They have different personalities, whatever. But then when we actually get introduced to the members of Huntrix, they are fully like acting goofy, silly, stupid and ugly and stuffing their faces with food. And they're not beautiful little perfect princessy sparkly. They're like totally Diana (16:53.659) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (17:12.8) they're total goofballs and they love each other and they're so annoyed that they have to deal with hunting demons. They just want to eat their Ramyan. Like they just, you know, they just want to be left alone and before they have to play this big concert. But, and so the fact of them being like really relatable, cool people and not just like hot girls in cool outfits, beating up bad guys, Maria (17:42.316) It's a thing that, yeah, it's a, that's, love, we love the hot girls beating up bad guys though. Carmen and I grew up on Powerpuff Girls and Charlie's Angels. I was telling Stuart at the gym this morning how like, Carmen watched like Charlie's Angels, 750 million types. And we would be in front of the TV doing the moves, you know, and like doing kick that, you know, like totally, yeah, that's, we've been in training for this for decades. Carmen! (17:42.327) which I feel like we've had too much of. Diana (17:53.497) Hmm. Diana (18:04.601) Nice. Diana (18:12.741) So funny. Carmen! (18:13.379) Our Goof Powerpuff Girls and Charlie's Angels are goofballs and love each other. Yeah, also. And that's what makes them so awesome. Diana (18:16.847) They are. Maria (18:18.412) Yeah. What did I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Diana (18:22.107) Right. That's so interesting. It's funny because when I watched this, my brain was immediately comparing it to the Disney animated movies I watched when I was growing up, right? Because I kind of grew up right during like peak Disney animated movie, like Little Mermaid to Beauty and the Beast to Aladdin to The Lion King, right? Like that was my childhood. And I was thinking about how. What was cool to me was how. Carmen! (18:41.411) Mm-hmm. Diana (18:47.941) different that was from those, right? Like I love how the ending is, like it sounds cliche, but I still think we see this a lot where I'm like, you know, they weren't saved by a boy, they saved each other, right? They were saved by figuring out how to accept each other and work together, you know, and the ending is just, you know, essentially getting back together as a group. Huntrix did not break up as reported on TV. You know, and going back to their fans, like the closing scene is literally them with, you know, their fans doing, you know, fan service. And I just thought like, wow. Like this is just. Yeah, I don't know. I really liked that. It felt at least to me like a very different message than the one that I grew up with, which was like very much about marrying someone and having children. like, this is. They're not. Maria (19:39.854) They're not passive. They're not passive, but they are saved by a boy. And I will, I will, I will put forward, this movie is basically Titanic. And, and that's why, that's why it is so overwhelmingly popular because what girls want to see is not, they are not always going to have to be the one that sacrifices for a boy. Like if they're, Diana (19:45.125) That's true. Carmen! (19:46.338) They are. Diana (19:52.237) Whoa, I did not have that in my notes. Maria (20:09.664) If somebody is gonna love you back, then they are gonna sacrifice something for you. They don't actually have to burst into flames or drown, but, you know, thematically. Like, you know, please. Diana (20:12.219) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (20:15.029) Wow. Diana (20:16.111) Wow. Diana (20:20.187) Can I add something to that? Which is that, I don't remember the name of the academic or the paper. I just remember reading this like at some point again, something that got floated in a BTS group chat. There was an academic who did this huge study on K-pop. And I think she very specifically focused on boy bands and fandom and how they worked. It's killing me. I don't remember it. But one of her observations, and I remember this because I read it, it like smacked me in face, was that like what boy bands sell is the fantasy of male responsibility. Carmen! (20:53.521) Wow. Yeah. Diana (20:55.61) Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And like, it's just one of those sentences that like smacked me in the face. You know, like that's what their selling test is this fantasy of like, and it's true. Hey girl, what's your fantasy? What do you need? Of course I'm always on time for the concert. You know what I mean? Like they're so, you know, like when, you hear that, you're like, oh yeah. I mean, it's male responsibility with washboard abs, of course, but like, right, right. Hot male responsibility. Carmen! (21:18.817) Totally hot, hot male responsibility, yeah. Maria (21:22.71) Yeah, hotmail responsibility in a house in the clouds. Diana (21:24.525) And like, so when you, when you, when you say that Maria, I'm like, yeah, like that's it. It's the fantasy of like, male responsibility of like, you don't have to make every single sacrifice, you know, like, and that's so into boy bands. Maria (21:39.338) You might find somebody who would you in that same kind of, who would reciprocate those feelings. Diana (21:48.609) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Carmen! (21:50.613) That's the really unique thing too about Gnu, the main, the front man of the boy band in the movie, Saja Boys. He finds out, he expresses his hot male responsibility with the front woman of Huntrix, the female, the girl group lead. It's all very private when that moment happens, when Gnu first recognizes like, Diana (21:57.627) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (22:20.627) that Rumi needs help, that Rumi first of all recognizes that Rumi is a demon, which is super under wraps. And then with wordlessly decides to completely protect and save her from her own friends. And so they share this really like private and it's a secret from everyone else the whole time that the movie is taking place, their relationship with each other and. Diana (22:26.106) Yeah. Carmen! (22:47.873) I think that's a really important part of what makes the trademark hotmail responsibility like extra exciting and fascinating and like deep and intoxicating, especially for little girls, like that someone would, without being asked, would rise to the occasion to protect you and know you and not be even though you're enemies. I met a little, I met a five year old girl recently who gushed to me, said, she was saying, was like, oh, what are you watching? I always ask kids, oh, what are you watching these days? What are your favorite characters? Blah, blah. And she was like, well, know, K-pop demon hunters. And I was like, oh my God, girl, same. And she was like, she goes, she pauses me, she puts her hand, she goes, I'm in love with Jeenu. Diana (23:26.52) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (23:50.624) A little five-year-old girl I was like in love with. Okay, girl. But yeah, it's captivating, man. Diana (23:56.729) my gosh. It's like little girls change and also they don't at all. know what I mean? Cause also I'd be like, yeah, I'd be a five-year-old girl. I'll be like, excuse me. I'm in love with Gina. Like when I was five, I watched, this is such an embarrassing story, but I'll tell it anyways. But like the monkeys were being rerun on Nickelodeon and I watched every single episode. And I remember telling my dad, like, I am in love with Davy Jones. And my dad was like, those are reruns and he's a grown ass man. And I was like, Carmen! (24:08.363) Yeah. Diana (24:25.467) I don't care. I don't know why. Like, again, every, like, little girls will find their boy bands. Like, I'm sorry. This is just like a truism of like, like gravity. I don't know. Like, we stan G2 now, you know? Carmen! (24:30.912) you Carmen! (24:42.272) It's so true. It's so true. And I like hate gender, but I have to admit, it's everywhere. The girls love K-pop Demon Hunters. Diana (24:59.543) One thing I do feel like I have to point this out, because I wrote it down in my notebook, especially regards to Jinu, right? Because Jinu's, so the boys, they're they're they're class, I mean, they come in with purple smoke, which BTS's official color is purple, so it's like, we know what we're doing here. But Jinu, he's not just dialed after K-pop, he's also very K-drama coded. Has anyone else here watched K-dramas? If not, I'll like. Maria (25:27.726) It's just a little. Carmen! (25:28.031) I haven't. Diana (25:29.069) Okay. Which, this is, and this makes sense because Netflix is like the global like funnel for K dramas, right? So if you get into K dramas, like you're watching them on Netflix. And then if you get hardcore, you get the Viki app. But, and Netflix is huge in Korea. Cause I mean, they brought us squid games, obviously that's, but like there's tons and tons of K dramas on there. My friends who watch K dramas, you know, it's, it's, you always start out on Netflix. I have a ton of them. He's really styled like a K-drama boyfriend to the point where, how do I want to explain this for people who have never watched a K-drama before? The scene where he bums into Rumi, there is a tonal shift. That is a K-drama boyfriend intro scene. like, because this is how every woman meets their boyfriend in a K-drama, right? It's like something happens and he casually like grazes you and she's falling and it's in slow mo. is in every K-drama like ever. Like I was watching this, like they completely tone shifted. This is for the K-drama heads. We're not just putting in stuff for the K-pop heads now. We're putting in stuff for the K-drama people, okay, who are not always K-pop people. and she's falling. And what's funny is like, there's this moment in the K-drama where like he is supposed to catch her, right? Like that's the moment and you realize this is your soulmate. Maria (26:38.99) Mm-hmm. Maria (26:49.518) That's what she's thinking. She's, yeah. Diana (26:51.247) But he does it, he lets her fall and then he brushes his little... And that actor, this is how smart this movie is. The actor whose name I have not written down, I should have, but he is in a K-drama, which I have watched called Business Proposal. And the song that is playing in that moment is from Business Proposal. Carmen! (26:54.655) My breast to shoulder. Maria (27:12.13) Wow, that's amazing. Carmen! (27:12.976) What? that's so cool. Diana (27:14.555) Oh, huh. So like the first time I watched this was with my husband who watched Business Proposal with me. And I remember like, I think he paused it because he was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, did it? We've heard the song before. And we looked it up and we're like, holy shit. Like that's the song for Business Proposal. And the actor voicing Genie played the male lead in Business Proposal. So like they completely, totally shifted to K-dramas. And I guess my point is like K-dramas are popular. Maria (27:32.696) Amazing. Diana (27:42.265) growing, also growing a popularity for many, many reasons. And sometimes not with K-pop people. This is like a whole different group. And one thing people often talk about is that they are very, like one of their sources of popularity is that they're very romantic, but what's the phrase I want to use here? Like they're very much a slow burn. Like you're on episode like 11 and maybe they finally kiss. You know what I mean? Like all the boys in the K-drama, they take it slow. They're so respectful. Maria (27:44.696) Mm. Maria (28:07.789) Yeah. Diana (28:11.931) They're always worried, you will her parents approve of me? You know, again, it's this very like idealized in a different way than the boy bands, but like this idealized, you know, image of like a very soft and unthreatening and polite, you know, and wants to take care of you masculine. And he, yeah, they're very romantic. If you miss like romance, if you miss rom-coms, go to K-dramas. Maria (28:19.214) Hmm. Hmm. Maria (28:24.568) Mmm. Carmen! (28:35.976) Love that. Diana (28:39.373) You know what I mean? Like it gives you that feeling. So yeah, he's very much stylized after that. Yeah. Maria (28:40.27) This is, I wanted to go, yeah, it reminds me of, there's Japanese stories like that too. Like Densha Otoko is one of my favorite ones. That's an old one. There's also, they made the same story out of like an anime, film, manga, like, you know, over and over and over the same story, very gentle, romantic story like this where it just goes forever. And like, you know, the big drama is he buys her teacups and everybody's like, what? Diana (28:50.254) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Diana (29:01.752) Yeah Diana (29:08.673) Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yes. It feels very Jade Austin or like, or, you know, like an old Meg Ryan rom-com, you know what I mean? Where, you know, you know, they're going to get together. You're just sort of enjoying seeing how it happens. You know? Yeah. So they very much like pulled from that playbook as well with that character, you know, and he is, he's very, I... Maria (29:09.55) You know, it's like you said it's like Jane Austen like she came over Carmen! (29:16.478) You Maria (29:23.148) Right. Yeah. Maria (29:29.646) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Diana (29:37.805) Yeah, that character, he doesn't make her do anything. He never raises his voice. Yeah. Maria (29:42.84) He's challenging in a way, challenging but not threatening. like, meanwhile, you know, like that's like, I used to think, you know, these like bands like the Beatles or the Monkeys or whatever, David Cassidy was so huge at my time, Bobby Sherman, there's like this whole group and they're very sort of like, I wanted to go back to something Carmen said about gender because I kind of used to think that this was like a way to enter into a conventional. Diana (29:48.076) Never threatening. Yeah. Diana (30:11.419) Mm-hmm. Maria (30:11.636) notions, you know, like from being like a little girl and then you're like about to enter into like a conventional notion of sexuality or gender. I'm like now watching this I thought no, this is like sort of like the superiority or like a pre-gender world where nobody has been asked yet, you know, nobody's been forced into conventional role playing and and it's sort of they all Diana (30:36.568) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Maria (30:38.85) all kind of, I mean, there may be abs and there may be like, you know, sort of, they may be like feminized or masculinized in some certain way. And like these, and you know, they look like Barbies and they're made to sell toys. And we all know about this or like Bratz dolls or whatever, but it's also, I kind of felt like it, it, it hurt. It's, it's trying to get people to see the possibility maybe of an idealized world where young people relate to each other kind of pre role play. What do you think about that? Carmen! (31:11.069) I think there's, yeah, I love that idea. And that really goes with sort of how appealing it is for kids who aren't thinking about that yet. I mean, they're living it. They're being thrust into the world of the role of the gender they were assigned at birth. that's something I think about a lot. It's a concept I try to introduce to every kid I work with, because that's... never a conversation that's happening at home with mom and dad. And that's something I'm passionate about. And it really only ends up having to come up when I have friends that are non-binary. then, you know, my kids, watch clock that may ask, Oh, are they a boy or girl? And I'm like, okay, where do we start? What's the what's the best entry point for you know, how whatever age they are, but Diana (32:01.894) Right? Carmen! (32:08.196) I do think that there are, even though we see it as really gender assigned, like the abs guy, you know, they're all still super femme or like Mira, one of the Huntrix girls, she has a really deep voice and she's really a tough cookie. And you know what is really cool actually, every little girl I've talked to, I thought they were all going to pick Rumi, the like main, one as like the one they relate to as their bias. They all love Mira. They all want to be Mira. They all want to be tough. They all want to be, you know, having the most kind of power and agency, I think. And not the one who gets the boy. Exactly. Diana (32:38.768) Hmm? Diana (32:42.971) Diana (32:53.499) and not the one who gets the boy, right? Like you always like, it's Rumi cause she gets the boy, right? Like, and he's the leader of Saja boys too. But yeah, that's so interesting. Carmen! (33:02.937) And she's the leader and he's no, they all want to be the really like the buttercup of the Powerpuff Girls, like the really tough one. I love it so much. Yes, the sardonic one. And there's a scene in the movie where there's a doctor who tries to look with his eyeballs at every one of the characters. And she's the only one who resists him and makes him scared and whimper like a puppy. And they like that. That's what I think. That's what they're trying to Diana (33:06.938) Maria (33:12.622) The sardonic one, the challenging. Diana (33:16.182) Yeah Diana (33:23.18) Yeah! Diana (33:29.69) Mm-hmm. Carmen! (33:34.107) embody, they want that agency and that power and that toughness. And I think that has a lot to do with like pre-gender role kind of framework. Maria (33:46.626) think Powerpuff Girls had that same kind of energy and we knew a lot of boys who loved Powerpuff Girls, but do a lot of boys love K-pop Demon Hunters? Or is it more a girls movie? Diana (33:47.739) Right. definitely. Mm-hmm. Carmen! (33:59.164) It's definitely, I'm seeing it really, really coded as a girl's thing. But I'm seeing, so like the kid I watch, she went to her boy cousin's house and showed him the movie or she had a friend come over, an old childhood friend come over. And I asked, was like, what did they think? Like, what did your cousin think? Like, what did your friend Luke think? Like, I'm desperate to know, like, do boys? Diana (34:05.496) Interesting. Carmen! (34:26.619) like this and relate to this and she was like, they're bored. They started playing with something else. Like they, but these, these are five year olds, three, you know, these are like little tiny boys, you know, so, and, and I found with boys that their favorite thing is like, like with inside out, I was so excited to talk to all the boys about like, Diana (34:26.849) Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No! Diana (34:35.982) Yeah, yeah, yeah. wow. Carmen! (34:48.645) Cause all the girls I, when I was a teacher were so thoughtful and interesting in their responses about Inside Out, which has characters that represent each major emotion going on. And I would ask like, who's running the show? Like in your mind, you know, and they would be like, well joy usually and blah, blah, boys every time be like, anger is so funny. Anger is so hilarious. I'm like, okay, but that's not, that's not really what I was asking, but for sure. Diana (34:57.22) Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Diana (35:02.235) Maria (35:09.474) Hahahaha Maria (35:17.005) All right. Okay, we've just got a few minutes left. So I would like each of you to like tell me in closing if there's anything that we need our listeners to know about this film. Diana, let us tell us, we got a couple minutes each. Diana (35:18.701) my god. Diana (35:30.741) I wrote like a whole freaking notebook. my God. This is like, so I watched it last night and I was like, I don't want people to think I don't know what I'm talking about. So I like wrote down like a whole thing of like all my really deep observations. one thing I thought that was super interesting in this movie, fandom can be for good or for evil, right? Saja boys is also really popular, right? That it was. Carmen! (35:34.394) You Diana (35:59.033) I wrote down really thinking this is really deep. This is all about where we put our heartache and do we wanna put it into what the, cause like where Saja Boys gets you is with negative self-talk, right? Which may or may not be a thing I talk about with my therapist constantly. And so I immediately recognized what all the people like when they go and switch to Saja Boys, like it's negative self-talk, right? And so it's all about like when you're down. Like where do you put that energy and do you put it into something that like what Huntrix is doing or does it pull you to Saja boys? You know, but yeah. Yeah, you might get your soul eaten, but yeah. So I wrote down like fandom could be for good or evil because they are both playing off that fan energy, right? In the same way. It's just, you know, then they kind of put it towards different things. And so. Maria (36:35.928) You might get your soul eaten. This is the thing you're. Carmen! (36:38.404) That's so, that's so on point. Maria (36:45.614) you Carmen! (36:51.395) There's a Saja Boy lyric that's in your idol. I'm the only one who will accept your sins. I'm the only one who will, you know, it's very like, it's very toxic. Diana (36:54.69) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Diana (37:04.891) It is super toxic. And so then I wrote down that we sealed the Han moon with self-acceptance. Maria (37:11.022) I love that! Oh you guys, we're making the hanbun! Carmen! (37:11.085) Yeah. Yes. Yes. Mm-hmm. Diana (37:16.687) My therapist is really proud of me in this moment. Maria (37:19.574) Carmen, have you got a closing idea? Carmen! (37:22.361) You I love that. mean, the thing that the main kind of thing that stuck out to me about the ending was in full relation to that. It's all about self acceptance. But what I love about this movie is the villain is shame. The villain of this movie is shame. And it has so much power over everyone if we let it and we have to fight against it and self accept and choose the Diana (37:41.325) Yeah! Carmen! (37:54.883) good, the righteous kind of fandom over the toxic fandom. Maria (38:00.002) Yeah, the fandom that joins everyone's hearts to defeat shame. It's like, it's really an immaculate plot structure. I love it. All right, y'all, are we good, Joe? Diana (38:08.73) Mm-hmm. Flaming Hydra (38:14.683) We will be good.