Paddington 1 and 2 with Demi Adejuyigbe

Jamie finds Caitlin at a train station and brings her home so they can talk to special guest Demi Adejuyigbe about Paddington and Paddington 2!

(This episode contains spoilers)

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
The Dog Cast. The questions asked, movies have when and
in them? Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands?
Do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef in best start
changing it with the cast. Hello, welcome to the back
dol cast. Jamie, you got me a marmalade pillow. You

(00:23):
made it, I made you marmalade pillow. And I got
I got a second. I got a little companion over here. Please,
this bitch got crafty. I did it. I did it. Yeah.
I'm also caused playing as Patton for the listeners at home,
but I am going to tell you was like, I'm
truly a brilliant move for our audio podcast. It looks incredible.

(00:44):
I'm I mean, it's Caitlin's birthday. Give it up for David,
give it up for her birthday. It's her Jordan ear,
it's her christ hear. She's living in a class of nine. Right,
Really incredible stuff. Thank you so much, thanks for coming
to the bachel Cast. Thank you. We're so excited for tonight.
It's paddingtons big night for U. So so quick survey

(01:11):
clap if if you've listened to the back to cast
before amazing and then clap don't be shy if you
are the person that has been dragged here by someone else. Yeah, okay,
we gotta hesitated. Yeah, there, there's it's always a trickle.
It's always someone who's like, I'm a coward, Like, uh cool, well,
thank you for being here. We're psyched that you're here

(01:34):
out of curiosity. Is there anyone who has not seen
The Paddington's don't raise your hand, you clap, it's an
audio medium. Oh wow, not on the show movie? What's
going on here? Well? I had only i'd only seen
the movie watch it on Christmas. Yeah, so you know,

(01:58):
we're all on our own paddingtons're ernie. That's true, that's true.
I don't want to shame anyone but Ron Plaz who
has seen the Paddington's. Ah, you've only seen one. Yeah,
just just hit yourself. That seems like a reasonable compromise.

(02:18):
So the Bechtel Cast for the two people who are
here and everyone at home, We are a podcast that
looks at popular movies from a feminist perspective, using the
Bechtel test as a jumping off point. That's right, and
the Becktel test, if you're not familiar, requires that two
female identifying characters have names there in the movie together,

(02:39):
they have to talk to each other, and they can't
talk about men or Paddington's unfortunately, although I think any
conversation about Paddington's still passes the Bechtel test. I disagree,
it's my birthday, but fine, disagree. Uh can we demo
the Bechdel test? I do have a beck to test

(03:01):
relevant questions? Okay, Hi Caitlin, Hi Jamie. Do you think
Nicole Kidman's wig is is more egregious in Paddington one
or Big Little Eyes Season one? I have not seen
Big Little Eyes. If you've seen the poster, you've seen
the whig. Okay, I'm gonna go with Big Little Eyes then,

(03:21):
because everything about Paddington is perfect, Okay, fair, fair, At
least in Paddington. I'm like, it's supposed to look like
it's a wig, whereas a big little lies it's very distracted. Um,
well that was my beck to test. We did end
up talking about Paddington. You ended up well, Paddington One.
I guess the movie not Paddington the the movie is genderless, yes,

(03:45):
genderless icon Paddington's movie. Should we bring out our guests?
You know him from being a TV writer. He is
the co host of Punch Up the Jam podcast. He's
also been a previous gust of ours on our Star
Wars Force Awakens episode give It Up for Demi? Did you? eBay? Hi?

(04:12):
Thanks for coming back. Thank you for having me back. Also,
in defense of you saying that Paddington doesn't count for
Beck told cast it's you. You can't talk about a man, right, yes,
a boy? Oh true, little baby boy. We found a loophole.
We had to start the podcast over. Great. Great, So,

(04:33):
DENNI thank you so much for being here. What's your
history your relationship with the Paddington movie. I feel like
you just asked me grandpa, tell me a story about
the war. And I'm like, oh, Paddington, but like a
really wonderful war that we all love so much. This
is how this is how Titanic starts. And I just
leave out the everything after the sex. I'm like, no,

(04:55):
that didn't happen. It's just a nice boat, right, um.
Basically Paddington. People were like for hang out about Paddington two,
and I was kind of like, okay, well everyone seems
to really on ironically love it. I'm gonna go see it.
And I went to see it with a bunch of
friends and then I was like, wow, that was delight,
but I haven't seen Paddington one. So I went home,
like the next day watched Paddington one because on Netflix,

(05:18):
and then I was like, I think you texted me
going like have you seen Paddington I was like, no,
but I want to see it again. And we went
and saw Paddington two in theaters again. I think it
was my second time, your third time at the time. Yes, yes,
And I was just like, this movie is very good,
very good. It's just so pleasant. Didn't you get kicked

(05:39):
off of Twitter for yes? Yeah? For defending his honor.
This is the war part of the story. I basically
a friend of mine, ben Con, was tweeting one day
that he was jokingly saying, well, guys, just finally saw
Paddington two, and I gotta say that bear kind of
a naive dipshit and I no, fair point, half a

(06:02):
fair point, he's naive, but we love him for no.
So basically I responded to him saying, as a joke,
I just said I will kill you Benjamin, and Twitter
don't like that. So someone basically started like abusing the
reports stem and got me kicked off, and then everyone

(06:23):
was like, what are you? Why are you know? Hey,
that's not how it works. And Twitter was like, yeah, okay, sorry,
Well I'm glad you're back on Twitter. O me too,
Victory Jamie, what's your history with Paddington You harassed me
until I watched it on Christmas? I liked I did
remember I watched there was a TV series that I watched,

(06:43):
and when I was younger and I read some of
the books, it wasn't like it was weird. I was
more attached to Babar kid. You don't know him as
babe Bar baye Bar. I don't, well, I know, I
think it is bay Bar, but really, oh, I just
looked at someone like that. I was trying to cross.

(07:04):
I feel like, this is a moment when I realized,
why did I confidently correct you mid phrase? This is
like when one time I thought I knew how to
say you and McGregor's last Oh my god, Elwen, it's
you win, you win. That doesn't make it. You kept
saying I guess I said it. Really, I said it

(07:26):
really conivident. I was like, I like he was named
by ARNLD Schwarzenegger, so Gregor. You know, there's no way
to know how Babar. I don't even know who bab
bar ishant. Okay, I know British elephant suit crown, what

(07:48):
you want? I'm learning things there. Anyways, you know we
gotta get that friend. Where's the social justice bay Bar franchise?
Good question? To make it happen? So I made you.
I harassed you into watching it, both of them back
to back on Christmas, and I did love them, and
then I watched them back for this and I still

(08:09):
love them. It hasn't been that long. Yeah, what about Well,
I really you know that I love these movies. I
saw the first one, not right when it came out,
but I would say like late twenty fifteen into I think, Yeah,
I saw Paddington two in theaters four times, and I

(08:32):
just love it so much. It makes me cry. Even
when I'm watching it. The parts that don't make me cry,
I just think about the parts that do make me cry,
and then I cry. Anyway. So the act of crying
through Paddington has become like a sort of meta exercise,
and that crying is so much a part of it
that you have to think of either the fact that
you are crying or the lack of tears. Yes, yeah,

(08:54):
I appreciate when a movie tells me when to cry
via music, because sometimes you're like, oh, wait, I'm heartless,
how do I know? And then the movie goes like
n and you're like, oh, I'm yeah, that was Avengers Endgame.
I didn't know what the funk was going on. Oh yeah,
characters I've never heard of? So wait, did you watch Endgame?

(09:16):
Having not seen any of it, I'd seen like three
out of twenty, and then I went to see Endgame
and I was in I was weeping, but only when
I was told that is just it's I feel like
I'm getting off on a different thing here. But I'm like,
that is fascinating because I feel like, even with three
you kind of get it all, you understand. I mean,
it's easy to be like, oh, they're friends. Yeah, um

(09:39):
should I do the recap? Let's do it. So I'm
gonna recap both movies in a slightly less detailed way
than I normally do because we we have a finite
amount of time for the show. We got two movies
to talk ad here we go. So Paddington one, it's
about a little bear. I'm already crying. Um. He immigrates

(10:04):
to London from Darkest Peru. He's trying to find a
new home after an earthquake destroys his home that he
lives in with his aunt Lucy and uncle Pastuzo. Uh.
He goes looking for the explorer who his aunt and
uncle had met when the explorer went on an expedition

(10:25):
to Peru. And this explore discovered that the bears can talk,
and he introduces them to Marmalade and he teaches them
English and he is clearly actively trying to call any
and he's a cologne. But then he doesn't, so we
love him. He thought about it, but then he's like,
they can speak English. I won't colonize that he's bad.

(10:50):
So anyway. Uh. The little Bear arrives in London and
people aren't as welcoming as he thought they would be.
But eventually a family finds him at Paddington Station, which
is basically the Ellis Island of this movie. Right, It's
like if everyone who came to Ellis Island was named
Ellis Island. Yeah. Uh, and this is the Brown family. Um,

(11:16):
it's Mrs Brown who names him Paddington. Mr Brown, their
kids Judy and Jonathan and then a relative Mrs Bird,
who we meet a little later on. Is that Rown Mom? Yes,
that is Julie Walter's Yeah. Also in Mamma Mia. Yeah.
In Mary Poppin's Returns, whoa her career? She's had a salute, Julie, Yes,

(11:44):
what a strong four years. So the family takes Paddington
home and they promised to help him find this explorer.
Important to note that Mr Brown is pretty racist towards Bears.
He's a full on xenopope, I think, honestly in the
Brown family in the first movie, you're like, the Brexit

(12:05):
vote is split in this household. Yeah, it makes you
wonder why Mr and Mrs Brown are married. I wonder
this whole franchise why she doesn't dump his as. Yeah,
oh my god. This movie is the cute version of
Green Book because in that same sense, Linda Cardlini is like, no,
my husband's thrown a my spoiling green Book for anyone.

(12:27):
I'm just kidding. It spoils itself. Basically, he like throws
away two glasses that's like two black construction workers drink
out of, which is just a vile act of racism.
It's like they touched this, I can't have it in
my home, and she just looks it in the trash
and I was like, my husband like, she's just like, oh, racism,
such an inconvenience, wasting so many glasses. Learns to love

(12:49):
the manly just like Mr Brown well Sally Hawkins. I mean,
in that relationship, she must be addicted to emotional labor,
because that's all that is for her, is her being
like in the first movie, she's like, please don't be racist,
and the second movie she's like, please don't hate people
who got a prison so much. And every time Mr
Brown gets to be do the cathartic speech at the

(13:10):
end and be like I figured it out, I shouldn't
be racist, and we're like, yes, she's just gonna be
like ha ha, yeah, yes, yep, he did it. Good job.
So one of the reasons that Mr Brown isn't a
big fan of Paddington is that he does mess up
their house a lot because he's a clumsy little Berry

(13:32):
can't help it. Cute, but allegory falls away at this point,
by the way, and then meanwhile, Nicole Kidman is in
the movie with a wig. Nicole Kiman and Nicole Kiman's wig.
Please don't forget they're saying they are credited separately. Yes, yes, yes, yes,
the wig higher billing. Yeah, the wig is Union baby.

(13:54):
She finds out that this little bear is in town,
and then she goes looking for him because she wants
to kill and stuff him. And then there's also a
racist neighbor, Mr. Curry, who's trying to help Nicole Kidman
because he also hates bears. Meanwhile, Paddington and the Browns
continue to try to track down the explorer with the

(14:15):
help of Mr Gruber and Paddington's hat that leads them
to the Geographer's Guild, and then they learned the name
of the explorer, Montgomery Clyde. So then Paddington is about
to go like find Montgomery Cline, but then he overhears
Mr Brown being like, Paddington sucks and he's putting our
family in danger, and then Sally Hawkins is like kind

(14:36):
of so Paddington leaves and we cry. Then he goes
to the last m Clyde in the book, and it's
the same house that Nicole Kidman lives at and her
wig and her wig she kidnaps him and it turns
out that she is the daughter of the explorer, and

(14:56):
she is bitter that her late father refus used to
collect the specimen of this species of bears who can
stem with Daddy issues man home run. So then the
Browns go to rescue Paddington because they realize how good
this we better is for the family. And then Paddington

(15:19):
almost dies, but then the Browns save him and they
bring him into their family. Is one of their own.
The end of the first one of the first one, Yes,
and now onto Paddington to the best movie ever made.
Um Allegory is back. Yes, a different one. It appears

(15:40):
for a few all right, the first act set up,
it's gonna be just like this thing's like all right,
But what about when he's like making sandwich is all right?
It's it's a different movie. Then, I like, Wendy, I
want to imagine like the Paddington two pitch of like
someone busting down the door. They would be like, this
is an indictment of the prison industrial complex. They're like, yeah, sure,

(16:03):
hello listeners. It was at this point during the live
show that something happened to our recording the connection with
Curse Indoors. Yes, but it was only for five minutes,
so we only lost five minutes of audio. At this point,
the assassins came into the room so we were fighting
them off and Hugh Grant came in and it was like, yeah, um,

(16:26):
so here's what you missed. Yes, so we're just gonna
we're in the studio now, we're filling in the gaps.
Mind the gap because Britain, because of British Yes. Okay,
So here's the recap to Paddington two. Um. Paddington has
been living with the Browns for a few years now.
They all love each other. Everything is great until Paddington

(16:49):
is in the wrong place at the wrong time and
he likely story just so typical of Paddington um. And
he is accused of stealing a pop up book of London,
which is the same book that he was saving up
money for to buy as a gift to his brought Lucy,
Yes from Mr Gruber um because he wants to give

(17:10):
something to Aunt Lucy for her birthday and I also
had a birthday icon paying it forward. Less, we find
out that the actual thief is their new neighbor, Phoenix Buchanan,
played by Hugh Grant in the role of a lifetime
really incredible. Seeing Hugh Grant in this role made me
think about how he should have been count all off

(17:31):
in a series of unfortunate events. He's doing basically the
same character and doing circles around new Patrick Harris and
Jim Carey. Yes, yes, so Phoenix Buchanan stole the book
because it turns out that it's a treasure map to
Madame Koslova's fortune that Phoenix is also planning to steal.
But Paddington is tried, convicted, and sent to prison very

(17:55):
quickly this all happens, and honestly, I was just like, damn,
Parliament is so much more efficient. They were American justice
system in our in America, it would have been a
three month long televised event, right, But there's just a
female judge is like, fuck, you gotta jail. No, it's
a it's a male. It's a female lawyer in Paddington too,

(18:16):
but it's the male judge who gets his head buzzed
because of Paddington anyway, So he gets sent to prison
for Phoenix's crime, and the Brown's work to clear Paddington's name,
and eventually Mrs Brown figures out that it is Phoenix
Buchanan who's the real thief. But by that time a
few of the other prisoners have convinced Paddington to break

(18:37):
out of prison with them, but not before Paddington has
reformed the prison and made a lot of baked goods there, right,
I do love the prison before message. I will say,
when they escaped prison, we don't know what they're guilty of,
and it may in fact be very dangerous that certain
prisoners might be rapists literally like statists. I mean, at

(18:58):
least one shouldn't have got out of jail. Yeah, there's
plenty of false over convictions. Prison industrial complex is strong, yes,
but at least one there's like seven of them. I'm like,
at least one person really should have stated I'm hoping
they were all there on like minor marijuana possession charges. Yeah,
oh that's nice. Yeah, they just like live somewhere where

(19:19):
it's not quite legal and they got busted like three
years too early. I have no idea if marijuana is
legal in the UK or not. Listeners, English listeners, are
you high right now? And if so, is it legal? Um? So?
They the prisoners have convinced Paddington to break out with
them because they've convinced him that it's his only chance
to clear his name. So Paddington escapes and then he

(19:42):
realizes that they've lied to him, so he goes off
on his own and he contacts the Browns and they
tell him to meet them at Paddington Station. Wouldn't you
believe it? Because that is where the Koslova Traveling Fair
is about to leave from, and that is also where
they think Phoenix Buchanan is about to steal the fortune

(20:03):
from I love a third act. Everyone's got to be
in this location at this time, so they all they
find him. They're chasing after him on various trains, and
they all finally stop Phoenix, but then Paddington almost dies again.
I mean, the train scene is incredibly done. Like I
think for everyone at the live show, it was evoking

(20:25):
something a little bit different. For me, it was the
Bye Bye By music video. Sure sure for me it
was the end of Back to the Future three and
also the beginning of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
For me, it was really just the by By By
music video beautiful. And then Mrs Brown saves Paddington with
the help of the prisoner bodies who come back for him,

(20:48):
and then At the very end, the Browns and the
whole neighborhood get together and they surprise Paddington by bringing
Lucy to London to see him, and we cry, Christ
it is so beautiful. I love this movie. So learn
he respects women, he does seminist icon Paddington. Can we

(21:09):
make that shirt? Please? I guess so. I feel like
he doesn't really, I'm sorry. I mean, he's not really
doing He's not out there at the protest. He's yet,
he's he's I think Paddington does the bare minimum, which
we appreciate, bear minimum, the bear there's the shirt doing
the bear minimum. That's not true. He does the bear maximum.

(21:31):
Can you say that? I think that's a good compromise,
a compromise. Once Paddington shows up at a rally, then
you know he'll achieve feministe. Let's put it to a
vote on our on our Twitter. We're gonna have the
different design options and then let's let the leaves decide. Yeah. Well,
you know they're going to be like, oh look bear,
God damn it, I don't want to make this shirt.

(21:53):
I'll make it. I'm not a very good artist, but
I'll for Paddington. I will design so this Okay, cool,
So we have to go to a quick break and
then we will come right back, and we're back. We're
still in the studio because yes, because the very beginning

(22:14):
of our discussion got cut off. But hopefully we'll find
a way to smoothly transition back into the live show.
Here we go. So, something that's stuck out to me
and I think it's worth, you know, discussing, is in
both of the Paddington movies there is a use of
what I've viewed to be kind of a trophy use
of sudden maternal instinct syndrome in regards to the Paddington

(22:39):
character that will work as an effective transition back into
the live show, which we see in a million movies
of like the second that Mary Brown sees Paddington, she's like,
we have to help him. I am a mummy, and
then in padding to do it kind of even doubles
down on that, where like Aunt Lucy sees padding to

(23:00):
in the little cub and it's like we're not moving
because I'm mommy, Like it's it's it's fairly intense. Yeah,
I choose to see all of that as Mary and
Judy and Mrs Bird just being very active participants in
the story. But I will, I mean, it is like

(23:21):
worth noting that we don't see any male character have
that inherent caring, which I wish they're too busy being
racist against say that. The one time where you do
see that sort of caring instinct from Mr Brown is
sort of shown as a joke where it's like they
go into the hospital with the motorcycle and he comes down.
It's like, oh, everybody, stay away, stay away. A protective person. Yeah,

(23:42):
that's true. It's funny. He doesn't feel that towards anyone
who is not his own children, right exactly. Yeah, Like
he would never extend that caring too, So it's like
caring and and it's like that I don't even know
where I fall on this, but it is definitely a
trope relegated to women of like something turns on inside
of you and you'll just pick up a bear, like
you'll just do it, like we're bringing it home. This

(24:06):
is my son now, Like now I see what you're saying,
And yes, I agree, and I would argue even that
like Mrs Bird ends up being like a caregiver, not
necessarily so much as a maternal figure, but she she
spends most of the movie cleaning up after Paddington, so
that's you know, she's forced into a caregiver type role.
So what I like about Mrs Brown is that we

(24:29):
know what she does for a fucking job that happens.
I was worried that And I don't know if this
is true in the books, like uh if there are
any book hits anyone here read a fucking book before
uh me either, But I think it's cool that, like
she has given a career, we know what it is
the entire franchise. It's not added as like an afterthought,

(24:52):
which because we're kind of given this like nuclear family,
like isn't really a given for for the mom to
even have of a job, much less we know what
it is or like how it affects their lives. And
even in the in the second movie, her job lends
itself to a skill that actually becomes pretty important to
the story because she draws descriptions of the different criminals

(25:14):
who were showing up, and which is what I think
is one of the movie's great strengths is that all
the female characters who we get to know who are
significant to the story are just that they are significant
to the story because they all have skills or interests
or a job that actually like contributes to the events
of the story and that they can, especially in the

(25:38):
second one, because there is like you know, it's like
we are like always looking out for Mary Sue kind
of tropes where in a lesser movie that isn't Paddington too,
Sally Hawkins being able to dive into like the ocean
or whatever body of water it is, and like almost
released Paddington would be like, how the fund does she

(25:59):
do that? But that's set up at the beginning of
the movie that she's been trapped to sing, she's been
swimming a lot, and the same as sort of lent
to um. Judy has has this interest in journalism that
set up at the beginning of the movie that becomes
useful to helping figure out what's happening to Paddington. I
wish that, like in the second movie, like Mary and

(26:20):
Judy should have started like a serial style podcast. Oh
where's this bear at? That? Did odd non do it? Did? Yeah?
That would be fun. Everything that we're describing probably just
sounds like how storytelling should work, you know, like the
female characters contributing to the events of the plot, But

(26:41):
if you've ever heard our show before, you know that
that's actually pretty rare. So get to do one thing
like out of nowhere, right exactly. But in this movie,
like all the female characters pretty much every step of
the way throughout both movies are contributing to the story
and have like skills and interests that pay off in

(27:02):
some significant way. Here's the question, do you think the
maternal instinct that comes from the women in this franchise
is sort of done that way because they need the
women to be the voice of reason and all the
men are like the buffoons sort of in a way
that it's like, if the women are the voice of reason,
they have to find the solution, and because the plot
is saved this child bear, it feels like being the

(27:26):
voice of reason is sort of coming off as maternal.
I like where you're thinking, DEMI, I still think that
it's like this movie accomplished, Like this whole franchise gets
to be so nuanced in so many ways, and that's
like one of the few ways where it didn't do it,
where like the men are so cartoonishly uninterested in helping

(27:46):
a helpless child in both of them that it almost
feels unrealistic or so I don't even know if that's
that cartoonish, because I mean this is where sort of
like the allegory comes in. Well, yeah, for especially Paddington One,
where like Mr Brown is just behaving the way a
lot of people would behave to you know, an immigrant

(28:07):
or an outsider, someone who's been mothered in a way
that is unfortunately pretty realistic for how a lot of
people behave. That's fair. I I just I do think
that like the maternal instinct turning on like a light
switch and like just sort of being something that is
integral to the plot, Like there's I don't know, like
there's a more nuanced way to accomplish that, because it

(28:29):
happens in so many movies of just like the man
doesn't have the time for it, and then the female
character is like, no, we have to, and it's like
that is a good thing, that is the thing that
all people should be capable of doing. But it it
does just sort of seem trophy to to relegate it
to her in a completely unnuanced way. But you're right,
like the fact that it is an allegory kind of

(28:51):
does shift that dynamic a little bit. I sometimes feel
like when people do that in movies where it's just like, oh,
the women have to be the voice reason the entire time,
it's because they're afraid that when people watch movies and
see a woman being like funny or even just like
flawed in any way, they'll be like, well, we can't
do that, people hate us for it's not perfect. And

(29:12):
it's like that's not it's not the problem. Yeah. So
there's so many Merry Sue characters too, It's just like
most times there's mary See characters. I feel like it's
written by like guys who are feeling insecure about like,
well I don't want girls to hate me. Let me
just like write a boring as character that gets everything right.
And that's not necessarily these characters. But you know this
movie is written by men. Yeah, so me with with

(29:36):
no mothering instinct to speak of, because like if there
is like an overly maternal character, or like a female
character is characterized in such a way that like she
just she's like the mommy who has to be the
mommy to everyone, like that definitely is something that I
tend to notice. And you know, depending on how severe

(29:56):
it is, will you know, annoy me that amount for
these I see like Mrs Brown, I guess just as
being more compassionate than maternal. But again, I just can't
criticize this movie, so I don't know, but I mean
it tips a little bit that way for me, but
it's like not to the point where I, I mean,

(30:16):
the good thing is, even though I feel like that's present,
there's still so much more to that character that we
know about, especially like between movies one and two, I
feel like there's an even more of an improvement on
how much like care is given to the female characters
in terms of they're always active participants, but in like
how much we know about them were In the first movie,

(30:38):
Judy's storyline is mostly like she has a crush on
a boy and at the end she introduces the boy
to her mom. And then in the second one, I
feel like, and I hope that, you know, all franchises
can kind of move in this direction in a lot
of ways of like, oh, maybe that was a little
bit lazy, and like, Okay, let's give her an interest.
Let's give her she basically starts Jezebel at the Getting

(31:00):
Him this movie, it's like this, She's like she starts
in All female newspaper Boys Loud and Yes, is it
implied that it's because she like felt sad about a
relationship ending. Sure, but that's also why I started in comedy.
So whatever one start. Yeah, I like started to write

(31:23):
a note being critical of that, and I'm like, Jamie,
you fucking did that. But it is cool, Like between
movies one and two it seems like, you know, the
writers were you know, taking notes. Even the first one,
though it's set up early on that she has an
interest in like language, and it's like she's learning Chinese
and she wants to open a small business. She's going

(31:44):
to be a business owner. Uh. And then that pays
off because she starts learned Paddington starts teaching her Bear,
and then she's able to communicate with him in Bear
and ends up helping to save his life because she's like, oh,
we need to go to the roof. He's going for
the roof. So um, at least like she's equipped with
that skill and that interest that again, like you know,
contributes to the events of the story. Um. In both movies,

(32:07):
we get like an overview of the Brown family where
it's basically like Paddington relaying to his aunt Lucie, like
just who the Browns are and what they do, And
I was kind of reminded of what happens in the
Royal tent West. Yeah. It was like the west planbe
Plan movie. Yeah, the West Yeah, the Weston flambe Plan movie.

(32:30):
That movie that is every every frame is yellow. So
in The Royal Tenant Bombs, which we talked about on
the show, there's like this voiceover narration and it's like,
look at all the boys. Here's all the things they've accomplished,
here's all the things they like to do, and here's
how awesome they all aren't, like visually similar to yeah yeah,
yeah yeah. And then for the female characters in The

(32:53):
Royal Tenant Bombs, it's like, here's all the boys that
she fucked at the end, so like that's all we
know about that. And that again does happen to like
a small degree with like Judy because it's like she
has a crush on Tony uh and you like wish
that the information was reversed, but at least the year right,
like the thing with like, Okay, there's at least more

(33:13):
to her than like likes a boy and likes the
boy and learning a language is better than I was
doing it. Twelve Should we just talk about sort of
the allegorical elements of these fine movies? I mean, where
do you kin? Yeah, sure, let's do it. So the
first one, Paddington one, is essentially an allegory for uh

(33:38):
An immigrants experience. I think it's a good allegory, except
that I think the problem might be that this could
have given visibility to an actual brown or black person
who is an immigrant and like seeing their story, and
instead it's a bear, and then everyone else's So wait,

(34:03):
are you saying that instead of Paddington's being a bear
he should have been a I'm not saying that necessarily
because if there's if you're if your take here is,
I can't criticize anything about this movie, however, an indigenous

(34:24):
Peruvian boy. Yes, um, I don't know if I'm communicating
my point very well. I say, I see what you're saying.
I mean, where there could have been visibility to an
immigrant who is from Peru who would probably be a
brown person. Instead it's a bear who speaks the Queen's English.
So I mean I think that that I mean for

(34:45):
this franchise. I don't know how possible it is to
make that edit without it becoming a very different Yeah,
but there is I mean, and then there is such
like a history with I mean, we can go straight
up Sally Hawkins movies specifically with other characters being you know,
like subbed out by like animals or by creatures, and

(35:08):
there's like such a history of that happening, which I
feel like this is one of the gentler examples of
that because you know, you can extend that allegory to
like early monster movies and like a lot of ship
like that were I don't know, Yeah, there's been there's
been a lot of like interesting I've got I've got
some quotes. Sure, there's been a lot of interesting stuff
written about how Paddington is like an other creature that

(35:32):
is representing a different group of people. I got some
hot facts, Jamie's hot facts, Hot facts with Jamie. So,
Paddington has been a political symbol for over sixty years,
uh so since or almost sixty years. Sorry my facts
are bad. But the the author of the original books

(35:53):
has always used Paddington as a as a political symbol.
As recently as two thousand and nine, Paddington was like
the voice of like his character was used in a
campaign to end the arrested detention of hundreds of child
asylum seekers in prison like conditions in the UK. Like
he's a huge like UK like immigration advocate, so me

(36:19):
an icon for a very long time, and like was
I was very curious about in the adaptation, like how
much of the intent was in the book versus how
much was translated. But he was written that way to
be because the author of the books had been a
Holocaust survivor, and like, there there were a lot of uh,
displaced children narratives that went into like the writing of

(36:42):
this book, So I thought that was interesting. One of
the things that also, like the only criticism from the
original creators of Paddington, the only criticisms of the movie
were the relationship between Paddington and Mr Gruber because apparently
also originally the fact that Paddington is from Peru was
a suggestion of an editor. He was originally from darkest Africa,

(37:07):
and then they were like, how about darkest Peru And
it's like, still fucking weird, still fucking racist, but sure
so originally the Mr Gruber Paddington's relationship was written to
be too Immigrants to London who were bonding, and so
the fact that a white actor was cast as Mr

(37:27):
Gruber kind of irked the original creators because they had
they would always have tea at Eleven's is and I
guess that that was something that Paddington had done in
Peru that was brought to London and they were that
was supposed to be their connection, and that was like
lost in translation in the movie. I literally just watched
this movie yesterday, but I can you help me remember

(37:47):
who Mr Grouper is. Jim Broadbent. He's the guy who
has has the antika, Yes, right, yeah, No, that does
feel like a role that they want you to believe
is like someone who's not from like with the accent
everything you I think they wanted to get the credit
of it being like a foreigner, but not actually give
the role to a person who wasn't from the UK. Yeah. Yeah,

(38:09):
so that was like the one thing that and I said, sorry,
the the editor of Paddington was a Holocaust survivor. The
writer was not. But they were the two people who
shaped the character, and so that was their one note,
which is like better than you know, most adaptations. Sure,
that's Jamie's hat facts. I love it. I mean, it's
no cat facts with Caitlin, it was are the cats

(38:29):
in these movies? There's no cats? Harsh. There's a dog
in the second one, but actually there's a dog in
both of them. There's a dog. Yeah. The dog scene
in the first one almost made me cry yesterday. I
don't know why. When he like picks it up and
takes it on the escalator. Just before that, the part
where he like steps his foot on the escalator and
like pulls his leg back, I almost I just started

(38:50):
being like, he's so afraid right now. I don't know why.
And then like also the scene at the end where
he's climbing up with the vacuums and then like one
of the vacuums stops and he just starts falling towards
the fire. I was like, oh my god, what what
the fund are they doing? I don't know what place
I'm in. But I have multiple points in both of

(39:11):
these movies. First, like I kept because we had like
a Paddington Bear toy at my house when I was
a little and I kept thinking that he was a
toy and not an actual bear, which at certain points
would make a big difference. Yeah, but I yeah, I
kept forgetting that he was actual bear who came from Peru. Yeah,

(39:35):
I guess I want to talk a little bit more
about each of the main female characters who we get
to know, starting with Mrs Brown, because she is kind
of largely responsible for getting the story going. Like she's
the worst time. Yeah, she's the one who approaches Paddington
at the station. She's the one who keeps challenging her

(39:56):
racist husband to like say, it's just help him, like
it's just for the night kind of Yeah, why are
they married? They have nothing in common any sense, Yeah,
Judy and Jonathan, And then in movie Too, in Paddington Too,
it's Mary who like is especially hell bent on trying

(40:17):
to figure out who the actual thief is. She's doing
all the drawing. She goes full Sarcanic. She's like, gotta
fun pinboard. She's like this means this, This means this.
He's just like, holy sh it. She like breaks and
enters into Phoenix's. She really goes like full investigative reporter. Yeah, yeah,

(40:38):
I just I guess I like that how active she
is and how much of a driving force she is
to like keep the narrative going. In both movies, and
both times, like in spite of her husband, she is
continuing to advocate for this bear who becomes her bear son.
And the first one she's like, I'm no, I love

(40:59):
this bear. Also he should be our son. And then
the second and she's like, he's our son, now, please
stop being rude the prisoners and like she does where
like Mr Brown, you can see he does inch forward
as the plot goes on in each movie, which is encouraging.
One thing I do not love about that character is

(41:20):
that he always gets a cathartic speech and moment for
making a very basic human decision where he's like, actually,
racism is bad. And every time like a white guy
says that, they get like a standing oh. And this
movie kind of gives that to him and this it

(41:41):
wins an oscar uh and kind of the same thing.
In the second one, he has like a little cathartic
speech and every time that happens, you're just like, yeah,
well you're your wife has been saying that for five
French well, Jamie. Men need to redeem themselves all the time.
There is a moment um in Ington to where Mr

(42:01):
and Mrs Brown are sneaking through Phoenix Buchanan's house and
then they go up to the attic and I see
like all of the costumes and then Mr Brown is like,
we were right, and then Mrs Brown is like we
because it was only her and he's trying to take
credit for her work. Yeah that felt like a little yeah,
little bone thrown. Sure, um, I guess and I just

(42:25):
like that Mrs Brown um challenges her shitty husband of
the time, it's true. But then there's a moment in
like Paddington One where towards the end there in the
Natural History Museum and he's like someone has to go
out this window to save Paddington and that someone is
going to be me, and he does this like display

(42:46):
of like kind of traditional like macho heroism, and then
Mrs Brown is like, oh, Henry, you're such a man,
and like she gets like all weak in the knees,
which I felt was unnecessary. But then that doesn't really
happen in Paddington Twoad. Mr Brown is like, I'm having

(43:09):
a midlife crisis and I'm getting old and I wasn't
promoted at work. So it's actually about his fragile male ego. Well,
there's also a little too to his credit like that
he there's like a little tiny like he's passed over
because he's older, and that is the first time he's
been marginalized in his life, and it blows his fucking

(43:33):
He becomes such an as he's like, wait a second,
I can't hear what are I fucking want? And then
a book and then he like signing up for yoga classes,
which I thought was funny. Yeah, uh, Judy, we talked
about her sort of like linguistics skills in the first
movie and then like her interest in journalism in the

(43:54):
second one. I like how that character grows. Yeah, she
and I feel like she and she might even be
like a little more integral to the plot than Jonathan is,
but they're about equal and Jonathan the first one. Like
in the first one, I was like, well, why do
we know about Judy's romantic interest in not Jonathan, but
he's younger. And then but then as he ages up,

(44:15):
we don't really find out that much about Like we
don't get his equivalent of Tony. We get Jay Dog, right, right,
Jay Dog might be his equivalent of Tony. That's true,
that's his kind, that's his He's like, listen, I've hit
Puberty's He's like trying to impress this kid, but that
they like bump fist with the fair yeah and spud

(44:37):
bounce Yeah. But what if? What if it's not he's
trying to play cool to this guy that he wants
to be cool with. But it's like he wants to
find common ground with his boy that he has a crush.
I hope, So where is that fan? Paddington's three um

(45:00):
Uddington's is voiced by Queer Icon Ben Wishaw of Cloud,
Oh God remember him, Big Cloud Atlas Room Ben Wishaw
isn't a movie. I think it's called Perfume or something
portrait of a killer in which the final scene is

(45:23):
an enormous orgy, and then up until that point he
has been murdering women and stealing their scent to make perfume.
Out of icon queer Icon Ben Wishaw makes sense, like, yeah,
he's the bear. It's a straight pipeline between those two kids.

(45:51):
I wanted to talk a little bit about the men
dressing in drag, which happens in both movies. Hilarious bit anyway,
A flawless nothing like such a staple in UK comedy too,
and has been for like a b jillion year like
I was. Unfortunately, I wasn't surprised at all that that happened,
because you're like, if there's more than fifty British people

(46:13):
in the cast, this will happen and you will feel
weird about it. It feels like there's always a moment
where someone goes over to the wreck and she's like,
I was thinking, what if I were a dressed for
this one? Right? And they was like, yeah, okay, like
what we did that happens in of movies made in
this country, so we can do it different. It'll be great, like, no,
we're going to do very tastefully. Well they sort of

(46:36):
didn't in this movie, unfortunately. So um In the first movie,
Mr Brown dresses as a like cleaning lady to get
into the geographer's guild, and then when he and Paddington
are telling this story doing the recap if you will,
to the rest of the family, Mrs Brown is all like, oh,
that sounds so brave, Henry, you're such a man. And

(46:58):
Mr Brown is like, you know, there's a time for
being boring and annoying and there's a time for being
a man. And Paddington says Mr Brown dressed up as
a lady and someone stuck pins in him, and then
the family is like what in address? What? What? What?
And then Mr Brown's like no, and then Paddington is
like it did look like a dress, and then Mr
Brown is like, well if a housecoat, it was quite

(47:19):
liberating actually, right, So it ends on you're like, well
it didn't. Yeah, I love I will say I love
how even in this bad taste joke they find a
way to paint Paddington is like naive in a way
where he's clearly not in on the offensive part of
the joke, like he contributes to this, but we still
love him for right, He's just like stated, yeah, he's

(47:43):
prettin brilliant. It's it's what every all right guy thinks
they're saying, Like, I'm just saying facts. Facts. Sometimes that's
bad what he's like, Actually, I didn't actually say anything
that was offensive. I just said what happened? Proof? Proof? Proof?
What if Paddington? All right? Oh no he's not don't

(48:06):
work Okay? No, seriously, Like what did Paddington vote for
on Brexit? Obviously he's against Brexit? I know, but I
think Mr Brown is like, oh couldus waiting the way Brown,
I'm against voting at all. No, Paddington is very political.
I think that only natural born citizens should be allowed
to vote. What if Paddington got radicalized on YouTube? Oh

(48:30):
my god, don't say three Paddington logs in anyway, I'm
a nice guy and the women don't seem to be
interested in me. No, don't make Paddington an in. So No,
I hope this Paddington is a sexual. Actually, there's a
thing called chats and Becky's it's the school. You're killing me.

(48:55):
I'm dying, Okay, hope if I if I told you that,
I can absolutely here patting saying like all cops are bastards. Okay. Anyway,
So this scene that we just described, it's like it's
another example of like a man presenting as feminine in
some way and then like that being for him. It's

(49:20):
not the worst example we've seen. I'm thinking of like
what women want to where like mel Gibson comes out
and all the stuff, and then his daughter is like god,
and there's literally some that are you know, followed by
dry heaving from the fragile milking right right, Like it
gets really bad. This isn't as bad, but it's still important.
This isn't a side. But did you know What Women

(49:41):
Want cost seventy million dollars to make? Yes, but there
was no scene in that movie that looks expensive. Yeah,
well the cruise that they cut away to for no reason.
Prom that they cut away changed and it's addressed. Really,
there's a scene where sorry, I'm on a totally different
thing now is the scene where is walking by to

(50:01):
talk to Helen Hunt and they stopped in the hallway
and there's like a person there who's waiting to talk
to someone, and it's James Cameron. They don't talk to him.
You don't know he's there unless you are looking for him.
But it's James Cameron. Honestly, I'm always looking for him
and I'm so embarrassed. I know it's usually under the scene.
So I don't blame you for not an eyesore like
I should have noticed him. Director isn't taking it back

(50:26):
to Paddington. Doesn't the guy who was like into Mr
Brown in Address really look like Christopher Nolan? Oh? He does,
and he co wrote the second movie. That's his name
is like Simon Farnaby or something like course. So in
that scene where Mr Brown is uh. In Drag there
is a man who pretty aggressively hits on Mr Brown

(50:51):
dressed as a woman. I'm interested in, like what our
queer listeners think about this, because the same character comes
back in Paddington two and he is very attracted to
Hugh Grant dressed is a nun. I have chosen to
think that it's either that this character is either just
like very attracted to kind of mask women, or that

(51:14):
he's queer and he doesn't really know it yet. We've
got to get a music sting to play under. I
have chosen to think of like do do do do do?
But both times like it's played as a joke and
the movie I to me, the joke isn't so much
that it's like, oh look how weird and wrong it

(51:35):
is that this guy is attracted to like a man
in Drag. It's more that he just simply is attracted
to a man. But I feel like it's written I mean,
it's like written for laughs, it's written to and I
am coming from a place of being you know, cis head.
So we're interested in what our listening think. For sure,
I keep feeling like I I I'm just kinda like, hm, well,

(51:56):
in defense of the more offensive position. But what I
will say about this is it feels like, at least
in the second one, they played the joke more as
the fact that he well, I guess it's still like
that's not great, but they play the joke more as
like it's not oh, he's a woman as much as
it is that like this man is like you are
a gorgeous woman. Like even the moment where he runs

(52:17):
away and it's just like a stop, that incredibly gorgeous woman.
It feels like that becomes the joke of like, incredibly
gorgeous is the part that you're supposed to laugh at.
And I'm like, is it worse that they're like, oh,
this person that he thinks is a woman and that
we are supposed to believe is not beautiful is beautiful
as the joke, in which case I'm like, well, that's
also not great, right. I don't know, I mean, yeah,

(52:38):
I'm not I don't know. I'm not qualified to make
the call. I don't know. Yeah. So if we've got
any people Paddington too complex on it, God damn it.
I wanted to talk a little bit about Aunt Lucy
because she mostly exists off screen. Paddington talks about her,

(53:00):
you know, very lovingly all the time. She seems to
have taught him everything that he knows about being like
a polite consider a little bear. In Paddington two, we
learned that it's Lucy who like spots baby Paddington and
then like jumpson rescues him. That maybe could be argued, Oh,
it's another like very maternal instinct international move. Yeah, she's like,

(53:22):
we're not going to London anymore. We have to raise
a baby again in defense of you. That move is
sort of back ended by that moment where she is
like risking her life to go like to scale down
into the rapids to save a person. I feel like
it doesn't become oh, I must take care of this
child until she realizes it's a child. It's just like

(53:44):
a purely a move of generosity or like out of
empathy for fellow bear. Right, Yeah, it's compassion and not
maternal instinct. But what I choose to think, Okay, And
then the other thing I wanted to say about her
was that I think it's it tends to be more
common for us to see if there's like a male

(54:06):
character who has a relationship with a family member in
a movie, it's often with another male character. Um you know,
it's like father and son or uncle and nephew something
like that. So I like that you see such a
positive relationship between a male and then a female. Relatively,
I feel like we don't see that quite enough. I

(54:26):
think that's true. There are a few, Yeah, I mean
I still I still am sort of like on the
maternal trope wave here, but I do think I mean,
it's interesting because in the first movie, especially, like there's
a lot of attention paid to Paddington and Mr Brown
trying to find their common ground, whereas for Mrs Brown
the common ground is never questioned, so there's really not

(54:46):
as much of a journey for that relationship to take
because they're always on the same page. That's not really
as present in the bare Thing. I feel like Aunt
Lucy and uncles are, see, they seem more grounded in
the allegory than the Browns are a lot of the time,
because they're just like in it less and they're connected
to his life in Peru and a lot of it. Like,

(55:10):
I don't know that Aunt Lucy seems make me cry
so much because she's like she is a prominent maternal
figure in his life, but she also represents his whole
past life in Peru, and like she seems to like
represent a lot of things to him and represent homesickness
and also he can't write his uncle his uncle died

(55:31):
and so yeah, the aunt Lucy thing that that doesn't
really I mean she she just symbolizes his whole childhood
to him and like everything that is familiar and good.
So yeah, I don't know, I gott no, I got
I don't know how any problem without Lucy. She's so nice. Yeah, yeah,
what do you think Paddington three would like? Allegory wise,

(55:51):
where do you see it extending to? Okay, so we
didn't really talk about I mean like prison reform for
Paddington too. We didn't go into a huge detail about
their simply not time. But Pattington three, oh gosh, I
mean marriage equality. What are the issues that can tackle
I want patting to to stop Brexit? Like do we

(56:12):
have time or is it like the wage gap? I
mean there's so much. Is it an abortion thing? Like
patting gets someone pregnant and then it's like it's your
right to choose and Mr Curry is like, Nope, it
shouldn't be a right to choose. It is her right

(56:32):
to choose. And at the end he's like, all right,
she can choose. An hour and a half later, Brown
is like she should have the right to choose, and
we all collap. Set up, you know how they keep
they set up like what they're good at, and how
it comes back in at the end. In the beginning,
for some reason, they set up that Mr Brown is

(56:53):
a terrific abortion doctor because I don't know, I don't
know if I'm just like weird weird set up. And
then by the animal like, oh, he's like the house
opening section this round is taken to giving a bulstions
to him out of this house because it's no longer legal.

(57:15):
A house has become a bit of an abultion. W
also slip in like, by the way in this world
it's illegal now. Yeah, we got to raise the stakes
in Paddington and also the world. Uh, And I mean
we didn't fully go into it just really quick with
the Milicent Nicole kidman, I think this is like a

(57:38):
villainous trope that we've come up against a bunch at
this point. But it's like in the same lane as
like Ursula the Sea Witch is science adjacent woman who
is a little older. Uh it does not seem to
be in a romantic relationship, has extreme daddy issues and

(57:59):
all this it's up to being a fucking murderer. Yeah,
like that whole it sucks because I mean that performance
is so good and the way the character plays out,
like I like watching that character, but there's so I
like that we get the context for her of like
this is why I feel that way. At least she's motivated,
but it's motivated by daddy issues, So it kind of

(58:23):
ends up just kind of being a wash for me.
The wig really should have gotten an oscar. Now. That said, though,
her performance is if a woman had helped write this movie,
that would have been a better character, right, because we
I mean we've talked about this a little bit before,
but we especially in children's movies it seems or like
family targeted movies because we see this in Incredibles two,

(58:45):
we see it and like you said, like a little
Mermaid and any other like kind of like who are
like stem adjacent and that being villainized often that I
wanted to briefly talk about Mrs Bird Also, she's mostly
seen vacuuming in the movie, but she often will like

(59:10):
swoop in at the end and like do something significant.
I do like that she kind of uses people's biases
against old people against them, because like she shows up
in the at the end of the first movie and
like goes to the security guard and it's like, oh,
will you help a frail old woman out of the cold,
and like she's like, I'm not frail, but he doesn't

(59:33):
know that. And then she gets plastered and it's great.
It's very brave. There's one moment where she pulls a
gun and then at the side gig because it's just foam.
She was going to shoot Hugh Grant in the head.
She didn't know it was a fake gun, and she
was ready to murder him because it was like a

(59:59):
set up. She was like, human is going to walk
in and then I will shoot him. She had a
lot of time to think about, like I'm about to
see a dead fucking fan. It's like I'm still doing this.
Yeahs like she's done it before. She's yeah, it was
very premeditated. I thought she walked like a old friend.

(01:00:20):
I think in the third Paddington movie, they should learn
how to say Paddington's bear name. Oh there's such a
weird whatever. Well, it's like if we're going with the
allegory of he's he's immigrated to this country, there immediately like, yeah,
I don't know how to say that your name is
where we fucking are right now? I think the third

(01:00:41):
movie they should learn how to say his goddamn name.
Mr Brown tries, but he says something very rude apparently,
so I want like the third movie to open with
Mr Brown just like very casually, like looking over like
a Rosetta stone of how to do bear, and then
by the end it's like, okay, he says it in
a way that like Paddington has helped, right, Yeah, I
don't know. That's like if you were born and then

(01:01:02):
they're like, what's up Brocton Samaritan Loft is you know?
I see your point. I see your point. I choose
to think. I choose I think we shouldn't Like, does
anyone have any other final thoughts about either Paddington movie?
Since I asked it, I now I'm like, what would

(01:01:23):
I want to happen in Paddington three? And this is
just a earnest pitch for Paddington three I think it
would be great if something happens with Mr Curry, like
a minor offense that gets him brought into court and
they find out that he's from a different country and
he's going to get deported. Paddington is the one who's like,
but Mr Curry is a part of our neighborhood. We
have to save him. And everyone's like, he sucks, he's

(01:01:44):
a fucking asshole, he's racist as ship. Why would you
do this? And he's like, well, because that's what we do,
and we're part of a community. We look after even
the worst parts because then how are we how are
we any better than them? And basically he goes around
and gets like a petition signed for Mr Curry to
be saved, and the entire time Mr Cray still hang
on him. At the end, he's just kind of like,
this is my friend. People like it? That nice? Yeah?

(01:02:11):
I love it. Did anyone notice what appears to be
the black lesbian couple who live nearby? Yeah, I mean
they don't hardly say anything or do anything, but I
was like, that's sweet. It was it would have been
so easy for them to pass the Bechdel test. Yeah,
they've been allowed to speak have them go like, hey,

(01:02:31):
deb hello Jennifer, we're lesbians, right, Yes, a true passing trailblazing, plazing. Well,
speaking of the Bechdel tests, yes, starting with Paddington One,
does that pass? That one does? Yeah, that one passes,
I think better than the second one. Yes. In Paddington One,

(01:02:54):
Mrs Brown and Judy talk about a Victorian bathing pond.
They talk about the sewers. The sewer exchange is so
fun because I'm like, oh, this scene is passing, but
they're just talking about the sewers in more detail every
time she's like, you know, the sewers, She's like, what
the sewers under the ground? What the sewers under the ground?
We could walk in them? Oh yeah, yeah, you know.

(01:03:18):
And then their their third interaction that passes is about
like toiletries. So it's a lot of like bathroom based discussions,
which is like, yeah, I think women should talk more
about bathroom stuff. We talk about it a lot. You
and I often exchange sludge. Yeah, I refuse to get
more content and I also do too, okay um. And

(01:03:44):
then Mrs Brown and Mrs Bird talk about the weather
at some point, and Paddington to however, Paddington two is trickier,
I think from a number of perspective, mainly because Paddington
is not with women for most of this movie. He
is in an all male prison uh and is solving
the prison industrials. It's like four women were incarcerated in

(01:04:15):
the UK. This really wouldn't have been an issue, but
but he like that. That is, like, I think one
of the major things that prevents Paddington too from passing more. Yes,
I agree, Um, there's I think only one conversation that
I found that passed, which was Mrs Brown and um
Madam Coslova talking about the pop up book and then

(01:04:37):
about her great name. We only know the last name Coslova,
so that's a name, okay, um, But still the context
of that conversation station is still like, oh, there's a
bear who's been wrongfully incarcerated. Yeah. I don't think the
second one, but I was saying that second one didn't

(01:04:58):
pass because he only The other conversation of note was
Mrs Brown and Mrs Bird talking about actors being the
most evil and vile people on the planet, which true,
but that conversation, yeah, that conversation has about Yeah, Phoenix
Pachan well, but it's also about it's a meta joke
about the profession of acting, and in that sense is
it It's actually brilliant and it could pass the test

(01:05:20):
they're talking about Hugh Grant. They're I'm ruining Paddington. I'm sorry.
The first one passes, yeah a lot, Yes, the second one.
Paddington's not around women for most of the movie, right,
and a good way. Women are around each other though,
and they don't. They're so focused on helping Paddington that
that's the only thing that's like they're doing. It's weird
because it's like the women in the movie are mostly

(01:05:42):
doing investigative journalism the whole movie, but the subject of
their story is a male bear, So like, what can
you do? Here's my question. When I describe a movie
as a motherly figure mostly doing investigative work to release
an improperly incarcerated family member, am I talking about Paddington too?

(01:06:02):
Or if Real Street could talk the Question of the
Century or Green Book? The first one the second one
better for it? Yeah, that's just proof that it improved
over time. Yeah. I love when franchises slowly learned piece

(01:06:24):
by piece. But the one will have like a light
drag scene. Let's write the movie on our nipple scale
zero to five nipples based on its representations women. This
is tricky. This is tricky because it is the best
franchise ever made. That's exactly what I have people. I

(01:06:44):
can't tell you how often people I say that and
people still think I'm joking. It happens all the time.
I know. But it's got like better hit rates than
the Godfather. Like I don't know what, sixties percent of
the Godfather movies are good. A hundred percent of the
Paddington movies are good. That's true. So yeah, um yeah,
I love I love these movies. I'll give it a three.

(01:07:07):
I mean, they are like allegories for important topics, and
I suppose a way that is more digestible to most
audiences just because it's like there's a cute bear. But um,
the female characters, like we said, they're they're playing an
active role in the story from start to finish. They
are equipped with like skills and interests that are important

(01:07:28):
to the story. But you know, there's those kind of
weird moments where the men in drag and how that's
kind of mishandled. Uh. There is the villainization of a
woman in stem so um three nipples and I whoa,
how many nipples does a bear have? Three? I'm going

(01:07:50):
to give off all three of my nipples will go
to Paddington's. I'm also gonna go, uh three nipples. I mean,
it's so much of the movie, Is it really Paddington
that every female character is by nature going to be
a supporting role? Uh? There are. There were those little
things you were talking about that kind of bugged me.
There was like making sure that the teen girl had

(01:08:12):
a romantic narrative thing that I was like whatever, Like
that didn't impact the story literally at all. But in general,
I mean, it's like it's a lovely franchise and I
feel like the messages that it has are so there's
not a social justice franchise for children that is active
besides this one. Yeah, and you know, it's like it's

(01:08:32):
I mean, the movies are great. I'll give three nippies.
I'm gonna give one to Sally Hawkins, one to Paddington,
and one to the fish from the Shape of Water.
All right, you can yeah, yeah, I didn't realize that. Okay, yes,
all right, I'm gonna gonna give it the total recall
three nips. I think that I think that, like again,

(01:08:57):
like you said, centering this movie around a male character
does sort of mean that a lot of it's gonna
skew mail. But I also think that they are like
smaller parts of the dynamics that I'm kind of impressed by,
Like how the family Unit it feels like a lot
of movies earlier, just a lot of things won't put
like a group together where the balance is upset by
the number of women being more than the number of

(01:09:17):
men because it feels like like, oh, that's that's a
feminine group then, And for it to be like that
with the family before they adopt Paddington into the circle
does feel like a thing that it's like, Oh, that
means they're gonna focus more on women characters when this
family becomes a part of the movie, and I think
that's very cool. But I also think that it's like

(01:09:37):
when they started this, it felt like they definitely like, yeah,
we're gonna make this a franchise. So for them to
be like, well, the first run out, we are still
gonna make the villain a woman does feel like the
kind of like quote unquote risk that Hollywood people would
be like, oh, yeah, yeah, we'll get the diversity in
there if we if we get another one, but this
first one's got to be a man, and like for
them to be like, no, no, no no, we're just gonna

(01:09:58):
We're gonna have like Nicole Kidman play uh, Like Wacky
Woman feels like something I would be surprised to see
in any other franchise because often, I mean we've talked
about this too, that if there's a movie with a
female villain, it's usually in a movie that also has
a female protagonist. It's rare to see a movie where
like could a woman pose a threat to a male character?

(01:10:20):
Could a woman pose a threat to a tiny bear?
Brave questions being asked. You, I agree, it does feel
like yeah, and seeing that dynamic and not in like
a sort of like fem fatale sort of way where
it's like she's gonna fuck the protagonist and that's that's
why she's the villain. Like I think there was a draft,

(01:10:45):
um no, but yeah, I don't know. I think it.
It still has a ways to go, and they do
give a lot of the focus to the male characters
of the franchise, but they also I want It's like,
are we rating this against the average movie or we
rating it against like the idea of a perfect film.
Oh man, I think like five is like our perfect Yeah,

(01:11:09):
then I think of three. It's like it does a
little bit better than the average film does. But I
also think it has some glaring things where like still
the drag stuff, you're like two times okay? Yeah, well, DENNI,
thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for
where can people follow you online? Would you like to plug? Oh?

(01:11:30):
I would love to plug this marmale She's been sitting
in my pocket for the entire show. I uh, it
is getting a little warm, but it's you know, Marmalide's
good in any in any sense. This is smuckers gorgeous.
I gotta shout out the brand. Um. You can follow
me at Electra Lemon pretty much anywhere. Listen to punch

(01:11:51):
Up the jam My podcast. Yeah, you've both been on
it within wonderful guests. Thank you for doing that. And
you know, go for a walk sometimes, joy treat yourself nice, yeah,
self care. Thank you so much for coming to the show.
Happy birthday, Caitlyn. That was our show. Yes, that was

(01:12:12):
the Paddington Show. Thank you again to our wonderful guest
Demi A. Did you eBay so great? Please listen to
his podcast Punch Up the Jam and truly just anything
that he does, he's wonderful, so good. Um, thank you
so much to Sandy Junio for recording the show Friend
of the Pod for us, Friend of the Podcast. Thanks

(01:12:32):
to everyone who came out to see the show, and
in a special thanks to anyone who brought a donation
for Project Caged Birds. Yes, we absolutely you guys are
the best. And thank you to The Ruby as always,
the Ruby for having us saying us And now for
the regular business. You can find us online on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook.

(01:12:54):
If you're still on Facebook, why are you still on Facebook?
What's going on? Uh? You can find us at Bactel
Cast on all of those platforms. Yes, you can subscribe
to our Patreon a k A Matreon, our padding Chin Treon.
That one didn't really work nope, um, but I tried

(01:13:15):
and that's all that matters. I did the Bear Maximum.
There are new design I like the Bear Maximum. I
just I'll make the Bear Maximum. Okay, okay, yeah, okay, good,
thank you so much. So you can buy that that
shirt someday soon on our t public store t public
dot com slash the Bectel Cast, and then back to

(01:13:36):
the Matreon plug. You can go to patreon dot com
slash bactel Cast and sign up for our Matren which
is too bonus episodes every single month, plus our backlog
of all of our existing Matron episode, so nearly fifty
bonus episodes. If you burn through the main feed, there's more.
This month we did into the spider Verse, and we

(01:13:57):
are also even upcoming matre an episode about who frame
Rat a Rabbit? Yes, because it was my birthday month
selection and that's what I picked. We did cartoons. I'm
going to do a quick pluggy if you're an international
listener living in just like Paddington. Yes, it listens to
the podcast and all residents of the UK are cordially invited.

(01:14:21):
I'll be at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival all of August
doing my show Boss Whome Is Girl, So if you're
around there, perhaps there'll be some Bite tal cashas as well.
We don't know. Oh yeah, we're working on it. That's
a tease. I'm gonna go to Paddington Station while I'm there.
I'm just gonna roll around on the ground. So I'm
just gonna soak it up here, and then someone's going

(01:14:41):
to show up and be like, we've got to adopt
this Adora woman. I'm like, please look after this woman,
and then someone will take me home. So yeah, look
out for all of that. And thanks for listening everyone.
Thank you for indulging me and letting me do this
Paddington episode. It was a gift. I had such a

(01:15:01):
great time and I love these movies so much. Okay, bye,