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Speaker 1: Well, hello there and welcome to Pick Six Movies.

Speaker 1: Schools out, summer time is upon us and we are ready to hit the road.

Speaker 1: There's nothing more American than gassing up the car, cramming it full of people you vaguely resent and heading out into the wild gonders of vacation land.

Speaker 1: In here at Pick Six Movies, we are celebrating this poorly conceived family travel idea with a brand new season we call Holiday Road.

Speaker 1: Was all this talk of summers and seasons, you ask.

Speaker 1: Is this some sort of meteorological podcast?

Speaker 1: No, no, no.

Speaker 1: It's a movie podcast, kind of, where my old pal Chad Cooper and I, Bo Randstel, select six movies around a theme and present them to you, the listening public.

Speaker 1: This season is called Holiday Road and we have selected six movies about road trips.

Speaker 1: But before we put the pedal down on the discussion of the movie, we like to do a little bit of checking under the hood and give you a look at what makes these movies tick.

Speaker 1: So before we descend into further car related metaphors, let's drop this show in a drive and check out our first of six movies this season with a look at Vacation.

Speaker 1: No, not that one, the one with Ed Helms Yeah, he was the guy from the office.

Speaker 1: Also, there's lots of poop jokes and talk of genitals, so you know what's not to love, i guess.

Speaker 1: Eh, anyway, take it away, chad.

Speaker 2: Horatio Nelson Jackson was born in Ontario, canada, in 1872.

Speaker 2: His brother went on to become mayor of Burlington, vermont, and his other brother would later be the Lieutenant Governor of Vermont.

Speaker 2: Horatio Jackson, not wanting a life in politics, went to medical school and became a physician in Burlington, vermont.

Speaker 2: The now Dr Jackson married a woman named Bertha Wells who had a very wealthy father who worked in 19th century pharmaceuticals.

Speaker 2: Jackson and his wife had one daughter and they lived in Vermont where he pursued his other passion automobiles.

Speaker 2: At the time, people said that automobiles were a passing fad, many of them feeling that they were pure hullabaloo, funka, flu and not being able to understand why anyone would want one of these automawatsits over a faithful horse and buggy to get you where you needed to go.

Speaker 2: While visiting San Francisco's University Club in 1903, jackson got into it with probably some other rich asshole, and a wager was made.

Speaker 2: Jackson took a bet that he could drive a car from San Francisco to New York City in less than 90 days, all for a wager of $50.

Speaker 2: That's equivalent to about 1500 bucks in today's currency.

Speaker 2: Jackson at the time was 31 years old, he did not own a car, he had almost no experience in driving a car and you gotta remember there were no real maps to follow to get you where you needed to go on a journey like this.

Speaker 2: Also, there were very few paved roads and there were almost no gas stations along the way for refueling.

Speaker 2: His wife, bertha, hearing about his plan, said hey, i'm getting on the train and I'm heading back to New York City.

Speaker 2: Smart woman Jackson found a local mechanic named Sewell Corker to join him on this poorly thought out endeavor.

Speaker 2: Jackson purchased a slightly used two cylinder, 20 horsepower 1903 Witten touring car, which Jackson named the Vermont.

Speaker 2: It should be noted that the Vermont did not have a roof or a windshield.

Speaker 2: Jackson and Corker packed their coats, sleeping bags, blankets, canteens and ax, a telescope, spare car parts, cans for gasoline, a Kodak brand camera, a rifle, a shotgun and pistols for the trip.

Speaker 2: This is, after all, america.

Speaker 2: Their route would follow the Oregon Trail, as previous routes through the deserts of Nevada and Utah proved to be impossible by previous travelers.

Speaker 2: On May 23rd they began their journey.

Speaker 2: In 15 miles into the trip, the Vermont blew out a tire, so they stopped and they repaired it with the only spare tire they had, because it was the only spare tire that they could find in all of San Francisco that fit this particular car.

Speaker 2: On the very first night they realized that the Vermont's lanterns were too dim to light the way, so they had to stop in Sacramento the next day to replace them with a spotlight on the front of the Vermont.

Speaker 2: As they traveled, the rumble of the Vermont's engine and the rattle of the car itself prevented Jackson and Corker from hearing their cooking gear as it fell out the back of their vehicle.

Speaker 2: As they bounced along, at one point a woman gave them directions that ended up sending them 108 miles out of their way, just so her family could see a real, working automobile.

Speaker 2: The two had to use block and tackle pulley systems to lift the car across deep streams of water.

Speaker 2: Along the way, jackson lost his reading glasses, but luckily he had a backup pair, and then he lost those.

Speaker 2: At one point they had to pay $4 or $120 in today's cash to cross a man's property on an almost impassable road.

Speaker 2: Another tire blowout required them to wrap rope around the wheel to keep the car moving until they could reach a location where backup tires were sent, following a distressed telegram to people who could help them out.

Speaker 2: At one point the Vermont broke down and had to be towed into a town by a cowboy on a horse.

Speaker 2: They made the necessary repairs, only to discover a fuel leak caused them to lose all of their gasoline.

Speaker 2: So Jackson rented a bicycle, rode 25 miles to get fuel for the car and came back with 4 gallons of gas on a bike.

Speaker 2: When they reached Caldwell, idaho, jackson got a bulldog named Bud.

Speaker 2: Now there are some conflicting stories as to whether he purchased the dog for $15, about $450 in today's money, or if the dog was stolen.

Speaker 2: Either way, this story just gets better and better.

Speaker 2: As the now trio traveled through Alkalai, fletts, jackson and Corker realized that Bud the Bulldog wasn't doing too well with all of the dust, so they fitted him with a pair of driving goggles, which was adorable.

Speaker 2: They continued their journey, jackson, corker and Bud the Bulldog, and they kind of got a certain level of fame as celebrities, traveling from one town to the next, because newspaper reporters would come out and cover their arrival, because nothing else was going on in these hazy towns.

Speaker 2: As they traveled through Idaho, jackson's coat, which contained most of their cash, fell out of the car.

Speaker 2: They reached Cheyenne, wyoming, with no money, a busted up car and a bulldog in driving goggles.

Speaker 2: Jackson wired his wife, dear Bertha, stop, lost all my money.

Speaker 2: Stop, send more money.

Speaker 2: Stop.

Speaker 2: Bud the Bulldog looks adorable in his goggles.

Speaker 2: Stop your incredibly hard headed husband, horatio, stop.

Speaker 2: For three days they waited and they didn't have any food until they met a sheep herder who felt sorry for them and offered up a meal of roast lamb and boiled corn.

Speaker 2: They finally made it to Omaha, nebraska, on July 12th, which had more paved roads and made their travels much more expedient.

Speaker 2: Things were going pretty smooth until they reached Buffalo, new York, and, according to reports, the car hit a hidden obstacle.

Speaker 2: I have no idea what that means Now.

Speaker 2: Corker, bud the Goggle wearing Bulldog and Jackson were all tossed from the car after hitting this hidden obstacle.

Speaker 2: Nobody was really hurt, except for this hidden obstacle, whatever that was.

Speaker 2: They finally reached New York City on July 26th, 63 days after their trip began, and this was the first automobile to ever transit North America.

Speaker 2: The trip took over 800 gallons of gasoline, not including all the gas they spilled from the busted fuel leak, and it cost an estimated $8,000 to win a $50 bet.

Speaker 2: Jackson and his wife Bertha reunited in New York City and they decided that they were going to drive the Vermont back to their home in Burlington, and 15 miles away from their home the Vermont broke down again.

Speaker 2: So Jackson's two brothers showed up in their cars to help him out.

Speaker 2: They got the Vermont back up and running, and then both of his brothers' cars broke down.

Speaker 2: So Jackson towed his two brothers' cars to town using the mostly reliable Vermont.

Speaker 2: As the Vermont reached the garage of the Jackson's home, the story goes that the drive train snapped one of the few parts they didn't have to replace on their journey, thus punctuating the end to one of the earliest, most amazing American road trips in history, and it was an adventure that truly helped to inspire countless motion pictures.

Speaker 2: This season we're taking on six road trip movies, and there is maybe no movie framework that's more American than the road trip movies.

Speaker 2: America was founded by people fleeing oppression, seeking new opportunities and wondering what's over the horizon, whether on boats, horseback or in cars.

Speaker 2: The American spirit of exploration is exemplified in road trip movies.

Speaker 2: Whether you're looking for new opportunities or running away from people that are trying to get you, road trip movies are more of a storytelling framework than a film genre.

Speaker 2: That's because road trip movies come in all different flavors of storytelling comedy, drama, horror, science fiction, westerns.

Speaker 2: There are road trip movies associated with each of these.

Speaker 2: Now, there are really two types of road trip narratives.

Speaker 2: There's the quest and there is the outlaw chase.

Speaker 2: The quest is where characters weave in and out of situations, making discoveries and learning lessons along the way Planes, trains and automobiles little miss sunshine.

Speaker 2: The other version is the outlaw road trip movie, where your main characters are on the run.

Speaker 2: This is more like Smokey and the Bandit or Midnight Run.

Speaker 2: Road trip movies tackle two ideals in American culture individualism and populism.

Speaker 2: Americans don't want nobody telling them what they can and can't do, and when that happens, they hit the open road to go wherever it is.

Speaker 2: They need to go to do whatever they want to do and be whoever they want to be.

Speaker 2: One of the earliest road trip movies was Frank Kappers 1934 romantic comedy at Happen One Night, featuring Claudette Kellebair as a rich, spoiled socialite who marries a gold digger.

Speaker 2: Her dad wants the marriage annulled, so she hops on a greyhound bus where she meets Clark Gable, a reporter who's down on his luck.

Speaker 2: The two have a road trip adventure going from Florida on a greyhound bus to New York That sounds like a nightmare.

Speaker 2: These two go through all types of madcap adventures.

Speaker 2: They eventually fall in love and that movie is heralded as one of the greatest films of all time, being only one of three movies to win Best Picture, best Director, best Actor, best Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay.

Speaker 2: Do you know the other two movies to pull off the Oscar?

Speaker 2: Pintaveret, then over the cuckoo's nest and… S-Silence of the Lambs.

Speaker 2: That's right, good for you.

Speaker 2: The cast of the road trip movie can include pretty much anybody.

Speaker 2: Road trip movies can feature two men, like an easy rider, or two women Thelma and Louise.

Speaker 2: The characters can be gay, such as in Tu Wong Fu.

Speaker 2: Thanks for Everything, julie Newmar.

Speaker 2: They can feature one person, like Into the Wild.

Speaker 2: They can feature groups of people like Get on the Bus.

Speaker 2: They can be about people on drugs, fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Speaker 2: They can star people on drugs, like Tommy Boy.

Speaker 2: They can be musicals, like the Muppet movie.

Speaker 2: They can be musical starring people on drugs, like the Blues Brothers.

Speaker 2: You can take just about any genre of film with any cast of characters, with any narrative arc, and wrap it around the framework of the road trip movie and it kinda sorta can work, none of which is more famous than 1983's National Lampoon Vacation.

Speaker 2: Now, for those of you who are long time listeners of the Pick Six movies, both did a fantastic introduction to National Lampoon Vacation in our episode on Christmas Vacation back in season 2.

Speaker 2: Go listen to that if you need a refresher.

Speaker 2: This is my quick history of the National Lampoon Vacation franchise.

Speaker 2: The first movie is still okay, but knowing what we know now about Chevy Chase being the world's biggest asshole, it's kinda tough to watch him in just about anything.

Speaker 2: That film was directed by Harold Ramis, who a few years earlier directed Caddy Shack, a movie which he also wrote.

Speaker 2: Ramis also penned the screenplays for Animal House and Meatballs and Stripes, the latter of which he starred in with Bill Murray.

Speaker 2: In National Lampoon's Vacation, chevy Chase plays Griswold family patriarch Clark Griswold, a character who in this movie, leaves a dead aunt at a cousin's house probably a crime.

Speaker 2: He drags a dog to its death definitely a crime and almost cheats on his wife Ellen, as played by Beverly D'Angelo definitely a crime.

Speaker 2: Clark Griswold gives his teenage son a beer misdemeanor at best and the film touches on an incestuous relationship between what would become the Vacation franchise's go-to comic relief in the character of cousin Eddie, as played by Oscar-nominated actor and all-around batshit crazy person, randy Quaid.

Speaker 2: The sequel to that movie was National Lampoon's European Vacation, which was directed by Amy Heckerling, who previously directed the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and she went on to bring unto the world the Talking Baby movie Look Who's Talking, the sequel to that film, look Who's Talking 2, and she collected a paycheck by serving as the producer on the sequel to that movie Look Who's Talking Now.

Speaker 2: Heckerling then redeemed herself with the movie Clueless, then stepped back in a pile of cinematic shit serving as the producer on A Night at the Roxbury, a movie covered on this very podcast in Season 2, episode 6.

Speaker 2: National Lampoon's European Vacation also included Monty Python alumni Eric Idle in a small role where he plays a character who is repeatedly, albeit accidentally, physically abused by the Griswold family.

Speaker 2: Clark Griswold knocks over Stonehenge with his car.

Speaker 2: The teenage son, rusty, hooks up with a Parisian prostitute.

Speaker 2: Clark and his wife make a sex tape that gets stolen and the images from their sex tape end up being used to advertise porn.

Speaker 2: The family gets involved with some thieves or something, and at the end of the film the Griswolds return to the United States where their plane crashes into the Statue of Liberty.

Speaker 2: Thank God the Twin Towers were less cinematic options.

Speaker 2: Moving on, the third installment is National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, which everybody loves watching with their family during the holidays, until the scene where Clark fumbles his words while staring at the breast of a sexy lingerie saleswoman and then later fantasizes about this woman taking off her clothes, only to be interrupted by Cousin Eddie's daughter in the kitchen as Clark stands in his pajamas with a boner because he was fantasizing about having sex with the lingerie sales lady.

Speaker 2: The bits in this movie meander here and there until the movie finally ends with an FBI raid on their house.

Speaker 2: Merry Christmas everyone.

Speaker 2: As previously stated in our review of this movie from years ago, i believe that National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is overrated.

Speaker 2: Chevy Chase is an asshole in that movie, as he is in most movies, because by all accounts that I've read he is an asshole.

Speaker 2: There's a sequel to Christmas Vacation called National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation to Cousin Eddie's Island Adventure, which we reviewed in a bonus episode in season four of this very podcast.

Speaker 2: That movie was made for TV and it is terrible.

Speaker 2: Part four in this series is National Lampoon's Vegas Vacation.

Speaker 2: What can I say?

Speaker 2: When the family goes to Las Vegas they act like assholes.

Speaker 2: Cousin Eddie shows up because of his popularity.

Speaker 2: From Christmas Vacation, clark and his teenage son Rusty, discover they have gambling addictions.

Speaker 2: Audrey, the daughter, hangs out with her cousin from the first movie.

Speaker 2: I'm guessing she's the one who was sexually abused by her father.

Speaker 2: Ellen almost has sex with Wayne Newton.

Speaker 2: Clark loses all of the family's money because he's a shithead, and the movie ends on a happy note when an elderly man wins a game of Kino and then dies from his excitement of winning, and the Griswold family takes his winning ticket because they're all pieces of shit.

Speaker 2: This brings us to technically the fifth film in the series, but it's really the sixth, a movie that didn't have the decency to give it a new name, instead just calling it Vacation and removing the National Lampoon's at the start.

Speaker 2: It's kind of like they did with that third Ghostbusters reboot Which, by the way, for everybody who hated on the all-female Ghostbusters movie, you're a bunch of idiots.

Speaker 2: Ghostbusters 2 is a piece of garbage And that Ghostbusters Afterlife movie was just a nostalgic crank session.

Speaker 2: Was Paul Feig's Ghostbusters great?

Speaker 2: No, should it have been made?

Speaker 2: Probably not, but none of the Ghostbusters sequels should have ever been made.

Speaker 2: That Fimo Ghostbusters movie has more lives than any of the other Ghostbusters sequels.

Speaker 2: What are we talking about here?

Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, yeah, that Vacation sequel that didn't need to be made.

Speaker 2: Alright, back in 2015, it was announced that a reboot or sequel to the Vacation films was going to be made by New Line Cinema, which was now a subsidiary of Warner Bros, the company that had previously released all other Vacation movies.

Speaker 2: Executive producing this film would be Steve Mnuchin, the guy who would go on to be Secretary of the Treasury under Donald Trump.

Speaker 2: Remember this asshole?

Speaker 2: Mnuchin worked at Goldman Sachs for 17 years and he made a ton of dough, and then he launched Dune Entertainment producing films, where he went on to serve as executive producer for numerous movies, including, but not limited to, annabelle, american Sniper, jupiter Ascending, batman v Superman, dawn of Justice, suicide Squad and a bunch of those Lego movies.

Speaker 2: Steve Mnuchin has a face that just begs to be punched.

Speaker 2: David Dobkin was the producer of the film, having directed the Jackie Chan, owen Wilson sequel, shanghai Nights and Wedding Crashers.

Speaker 2: He also produced RIPD, a movie that we painfully discussed on this podcast at some point.

Speaker 2: Writing the screenplay and directing the movie duties were handed over to John Francis Daley and his partner, jonathan Goldstate.

Speaker 2: John Francis Daley started his career playing Sam in the TV series Freaks and Geeks.

Speaker 2: He was also Dr Lance Sweets in the series Bones, of which I have seen every single episode exactly zero times.

Speaker 2: Daley and Goldstate wrote the screenplays for Horrible Bosses and its sequel.

Speaker 2: They wrote The Incredible Burt Wonderstone before writing Vacation.

Speaker 2: They'd later go on to write the screenplay for Spider-Man Homecoming and Game Night, and most recently they wrote and directed Dungeons and Dragons, honor Among Thieves.

Speaker 2: Before this Vacation reboot sequel, it was decided that the movie would focus on the now grown-up son of the Griswold family, rusty, who has his own family, a wife and two sons.

Speaker 2: Rusty Griswold would be played by Ed Helms.

Speaker 2: Helms started his career on The Daily Show in the early 2000s, which led to him appearing as Andy Bernard on the NBC sitcom The Office.

Speaker 2: From there he went on to appear in The Hangover and The Hangover 2, and I'm guessing he was in The Hangover 3, which proved that he had the chops to maybe star in a movie of his own.

Speaker 2: To play Rusty Griswold's wife, debbie filmmakers cast Christina Applegate, who proved over the years to really be a comedic powerhouse, starting out her career in the Fox sitcom, married with Children and really holding her own in both Anchorman movies.

Speaker 2: Alongside Will Ferrell at all, she is a very funny actress.

Speaker 2: Other emerging comedy superstars were slated to appear in roles of varying sizes, including Charlie Day and Katelyn Olsen of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia fame.

Speaker 2: Leslie Mann, aka Mrs Judd Apatow, would play Audrey Griswold, rusty's sister, who is now married to Chris sure you can call me Thor Hemsworth And this couple was nominated for Best Kiss at the MTV Movie Awards.

Speaker 2: How is that still a thing?

Speaker 2: Alright, vacation was filmed in Georgia.

Speaker 2: For the most part, i think everything is filmed in Georgia these days.

Speaker 2: What's there to say about this movie?

Speaker 2: I mean, it's Vacation 5 or 6, depending upon how you're scoring at home.

Speaker 2: It was released in 2015 to align with the 32nd anniversary of the release of the first vacation movie.

Speaker 2: You can't miss a milestone anniversary like 32nd anniversary.

Speaker 2: I think the traditional gift for 32nd anniversary is hamster bedding or black licorice, i don't know.

Speaker 2: The movie came out and it was second behind Mission Impossible, rogue Nation, rightfully so.

Speaker 2: It currently has a 27% freshness rating on Rotten Tomatoes, ahead of Vegas Vacation at 15%, but behind European Vacation at 34%, but it's way behind Christmas Vacation at 70% freshness.

Speaker 2: Those people are high And the original has a 93% freshness rating.

Speaker 2: But that's because John Candy's in it and he automatically bumps up a Rotten Tomatoes score by at least 9% points.

Speaker 2: The movie comes out and comparisons were made to the Jason Sudeikis, jennifer Aniston movie We're the Millers, which many critics felt was a funnier road trip movie.

Speaker 2: Both films were raunchy, r-rated comedies that raced to the bottom to deliver crude, crazy and at times shocking humor, which is fine as long as it's funny.

Speaker 2: Vacation cost about $33 million to make.

Speaker 2: It pulled in around $100 million.

Speaker 2: Is that good, who knows?

Speaker 2: Now there are rumors that HBO or Max or whatever it's been rebranded to this week, that the unoriginal geniuses over there are considering making a series about the Griswolds.

Speaker 2: Now I speak for everyone everywhere.

Speaker 2: Please don't, just don't, don't de-age anybody for flashbacks.

Speaker 2: Don't give us a backstory to Clark Griswold's parents.

Speaker 2: Set it in the future or in space or the old West.

Speaker 2: Just stop Back away and leave this franchise alone, cause it's dead.

Speaker 2: I know it, you know it And, most importantly, mr Bo Randstahl knows it.

Speaker 2: So let's say we get the aforementioned Mr Bo Randstahl in here to discuss this movie in way too much detail.

Speaker 2: Say a little prayer, pour one out for our homie, the family truckster, toss a handful of dirt in the grave and say goodbye to a franchise that has overstated its welcome by at least two sequels.

Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, clarkson, ellens, let's hit the road one more time with 2015's Vacation And welcome to pick six movies.

Speaker 2: I'm Chad Cooper and I am joined by the Wally to my world.

Speaker 2: Mr Bo Randstahl.

Speaker 2: Bo, how are you doing today?

Speaker 2: You mean this podcast is closed?

Speaker 2: Who's up for it, mr Bo?

Speaker 1: Randstahl.

Speaker 1: See, that's a reference to the original vacation movie.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Yeah, which is really funny.

Speaker 2: Do you find the original vacation movie to be really funny?

Speaker 2: I?

Speaker 1: do.

Speaker 1: I think it's got a mean-spiritedness to it that I really appreciate the whole bit with the dog and you know, tossing the ant or whatever.

Speaker 1: Imaging Koka on the roof And the scene where Chevy Chase is talking to the cop about the dog and the cop saying he probably ran for a little while his little relics just couldn't keep up And Chevy Chase like barely containing his laughter at this situation.

Speaker 2: I find it hard to watch anything with Chevy Chase in it.

Speaker 2: In fact, you once proposed a season called Ford vs Chevy, where we were going to do three Chevy Chase movies and three Harrison Ford movies.

Speaker 2: We were really close to making this happen And I really kind of balked a bit at it because I was like I don't know that I want to watch three Chevy Chase movies in such a short timeframe.

Speaker 2: He's such a notorious asshole.

Speaker 2: Even going back and watching Fletch, It's like watching any movie these days with James Franco in it or Kevin Spacey.

Speaker 2: I just sort of filter it through like this isn't fake assholery, This is the real deal.

Speaker 2: You're just a dick and they're capturing it on film.

Speaker 1: Straight from the tap, dickheadedness Yeah.

Speaker 2: Had you ever seen this before?

Speaker 2: I had.

Speaker 2: I'd seen it once and I remembered nothing about this movie, beau, except the opening credits, because, as I've made it known on this podcast, i do not like opening credits.

Speaker 2: But the opening credits of this movie are like a PG-13 rated version of a children's pop-up book, where you lift that flap to find a little surprise And as Lindsey Buckingham's Holiday Road plays.

Speaker 2: That's synergy, beau.

Speaker 2: We tie it all together, lindsey Buckingham, by the way, what a career.

Speaker 2: Huh, fleetwood Mac and his solo artist And the fact that he was so unfairly treated regularly, on what up with that.

Speaker 2: It's a travesty.

Speaker 1: That's what I really know Lindsey Buckingham from most is the fact that he is, you know, a silent figure on a sketch on Saturday Night Live.

Speaker 2: That's Holiday Road plays.

Speaker 2: We get this series of images of people on vacation where you only see half the picture and then it reveals the hidden portion of the picture.

Speaker 2: to really give you the punchline of the photo, there are two women standing by a pool and then the picture pans out to reveal a guy in a Speedo with a raging boner.

Speaker 1: This movie does like its boners.

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 2: There's a kid on a farm next to a fence.

Speaker 2: We extend out the photo and there are two pigs having sex.

Speaker 2: There's a shot of people on a yellow raft going down some pretty violent rapids and we extend out the picture and you see another woman on the journey falling into the water.

Speaker 2: There's a dad on the beach and we see a kid pinching his nipple.

Speaker 2: We see just a shot of a guy vomiting violently on a roller coaster.

Speaker 1: We've all been there.

Speaker 2: All of this, I guess, is foreshadowing of what we're going to get in this movie.

Speaker 1: The best one is.

Speaker 1: You didn't mention it's.

Speaker 1: It might be the last one, in fact, but it's the woman sitting on the horse and the camera pans down So that you see that it's just taken an enormous horse piss with its big old horse cock.

Speaker 1: Yeah, there's something that always makes me laugh about a big horse dick.

Speaker 2: I found these opening credits to be entertaining because they weren't really there to be credits.

Speaker 2: It was just a little slideshow of funny nonsense And on first pass I didn't read any of the names because I don't care who made this movie and I pretty much know who's in it.

Speaker 2: But when I went through it a second time I paid a little more attention to the names.

Speaker 2: Whose name shows up, bo, but Chevy Chase and Beverly the Angelo, letting you know that they will be making an appearance in this vacation movie.

Speaker 2: Why wouldn't the filmmakers keep that a secret?

Speaker 2: Because when they show up, i guess kind of somewhere in Act 3, if this movie has a 3 act structure, it's a bit of a surprise, because when I saw that Chevy Chase was going to be in this, i just sat there dreading his big, smug pumpkin head popping into frame, probably grabbing a rake or a broom and bobbling it around in an effort to be funny.

Speaker 1: Maybe that's another good reason to have hidden the names in the credits.

Speaker 1: You don't want to put people on edge as they're watching the movie, because as soon as you see that you're on Chevy Chase, watch Yeah.

Speaker 1: And you're like, oh no, at some point I'm going to see an old man doing physical comedy and that's going to make me sad.

Speaker 2: You know whose name I get excited about when I see it pop up in the credits Clint Howard.

Speaker 1: Clint Howard, Paul Giamatti.

Speaker 2: When you don't know they're going to be in it, yeah.

Speaker 1: There's a kind of obscure not exactly a horror movie, kind of a sci-fi-ish movie called John Dies at the end, and Paul Giamatti is a secret actor in that movie.

Speaker 1: I think he produced the movie as well From jump.

Speaker 1: The movie opens with Paul Giamatti walking into a restaurant and sitting down and you're like well, all right then we got a little Giamatti.

Speaker 1: This is going to be all right.

Speaker 2: You know also, he's just a ray of sunshine in a movie, Bruce Campbell.

Speaker 2: As long as he's not starring in anything, when he just sort of waltzes into a film, it's like well, hello there.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with that.

Speaker 2: You know who I don't like showing up unexpectedly in a movie Kevin Bacon, like I like Kevin Bacon, but like when he was in that Guardians Christmas special and stuff.

Speaker 2: like he shows up and it's like forced camp.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: And I'm like he played a pedophile.

Speaker 2: Speaking of which, there's a whole lot of pedophilia in this movie, my goodness, or at least they talk about it a lot.

Speaker 2: So all right, let's get into this movie.

Speaker 2: We start off with a wide shot of an airplane from an airline called Econo Air And we hear Rusty Griswold say attention, passengers, this is your captain, rusty Griswold.

Speaker 2: I hope you've enjoyed your 18 minute flight from South Bend, indiana.

Speaker 2: We'll be touching down in Chicago very shortly.

Speaker 2: 18 minutes is meant to be a joke, right?

Speaker 2: Yes, and that drive on a good day takes about two hours.

Speaker 2: If you could go to a regional airport, hop on a plane and do that in under an hour, i'd do that Not have to do with the traffic outside of Chicago, plus all of the random gunfire that the media keeps telling me is going on there.

Speaker 2: You've got all of those parades with high school students commandeering them, sinking Donka Shane, and you've got Harrison Ford's hunting down one armed killers.

Speaker 2: There's all kinds of stuff happening in Chicago.

Speaker 1: So this movie is just a collection of gag strength together, which is what the original movie is as well.

Speaker 1: The downside of this is that it also tries to whip a little message in on you, which is something the original movie doesn't give a shit about.

Speaker 1: The original National Ampuns vacation doesn't want you to learn anything, and this movie kind of does.

Speaker 2: Well, I think you can't avoid that when you're making a movie that has a nostalgia as part of its DNA.

Speaker 2: I think that nostalgia inherently draws out some type of emotion, And so I've been told I'm not a very nostalgic person in general, as my wife constantly reminds me.

Speaker 2: Look at these pictures from long ago.

Speaker 2: Like who are those assholes?

Speaker 2: That's us.

Speaker 1: Oh, look at these assholes.

Speaker 2: My biggest problem with this movie we're going to get into this a lot is that none of the characters are likable, there's no one to root for And the movie constantly punches down, but in a weird way it punches down on itself.

Speaker 1: Yeah, the first gag of the movie, aside from the hey, it takes 18 minutes for this flight on a Kano Air Airlines Is.

Speaker 1: There's this old co-pilot that Rusty has and Rusty's like hey, i'm going to hit the lab And in the meantime I just wanted to say I'm really sorry about you being investigated for incompetence or whatever.

Speaker 1: And the old guy is like you know, rusty, i really appreciate you going to bed for me And as he gets up, the guy says hey, rusty, before you go, I just want to say I'm really appreciative of you going to bed for me.

Speaker 1: At which point Rusty gives a look like oh, this guy might be suffering from dementia.

Speaker 1: So he heads out of the cockpit and he sees this little kid with his family.

Speaker 1: The kid's like oh, look, there's the pilot.

Speaker 1: Rusty kind of saunters over like oh, i'm going to impress this kid because I'm the pilot.

Speaker 1: He's talking to the kid.

Speaker 1: And then there's some turbulence which forces Rusty to lunch for it and grab the tits of the wife.

Speaker 1: And then it happens again in his face, ends up in the kids lab, which is one of the pedophilia jokes.

Speaker 2: So a couple of things here.

Speaker 2: The father is played by Colin Hanks, child doppelganger of American treasure Tom Hanks.

Speaker 2: And in this scene you don't have Rusty Griswold's face land in the crotch of a five year old child.

Speaker 2: You haven't landed in the crotch of the mom or the dad.

Speaker 1: It's not funny, It's just inappropriate.

Speaker 1: And there are times where this movie gets it wrong.

Speaker 1: I don't think this is a funny premise for the joke.

Speaker 1: to begin with, whether it's the dad, the kid, the mom, like all of it feels very wrote and not very funny.

Speaker 1: By the time you get to the third bit of turbulence, he's just practically ripping the top off the woman.

Speaker 1: But again, this movie doesn't go all the way.

Speaker 1: It's not like he rips her top off and you see her tits, like it's an 80s boob comedy or something.

Speaker 1: It's just her like oh you know, like covering herself up.

Speaker 2: I want to pause for a moment.

Speaker 2: We're talking about this bit of physical comedy and it's helping to at least define the character of Rusty Griswold.

Speaker 2: Ed Helms plays Rusty Griswold, and I think Ed Helms is a bit of a one note comedic actor.

Speaker 2: He does a fine job playing this role, because Rusty Griswold in this movie is just a complete pushover.

Speaker 2: I mean, he's a bit of a dimwit and you never once root for him to overcome any obstacles at all in this movie.

Speaker 2: I think this scene would have played better.

Speaker 2: Instead of having him physically assault a woman and then put his face on a child's crotch.

Speaker 2: It should have been one of those scenes where you do word play, which they do a couple of times in this movie, and have the things that are coming out of his mouth be wholly inappropriate, but Rusty doesn't realize it.

Speaker 2: Clark Griswold did this a lot and you could tie those two together and you skirt pedophilia.

Speaker 1: There's some of that later, with him just kind of not understanding what a thing means.

Speaker 1: we'll get to.

Speaker 1: You could have done something similar here, for sure, but instead it's just this really unfunny premise.

Speaker 1: And then when he goes back to the cockpit because it you know, he's like, hey, what's going on up in the cockpit?

Speaker 1: And he goes in there and the old guy has taken the plane up to 60,000 feet, endangering them all.

Speaker 1: And when Rusty says, like what are you doing here, the guy says you know, rusty, i just wanted to say I really appreciate you going to bat for me And that's kind of the end of the whole gag.

Speaker 2: Also, why would Rusty leave the cockpit to take a piss for an 18 minute flight?

Speaker 1: Poor planning.

Speaker 1: One presents or he just has the shits.

Speaker 2: We saw him bounce around like a ping pong ball.

Speaker 2: Oh, if that was the case, he the shit should have come out of his pant leg.

Speaker 1: Now you're talking about a joke.

Speaker 1: That would make me laugh if the opening of this movie is him shitting himself.

Speaker 2: So we cut to outside the airport as feel right, as performed by Mark Rosen, featuring mystical plays And this other pilot who appears to be Rusty's nemesis bow.

Speaker 2: He exits with a flight attendant on each arm And this pilot is played by Ron Livingston, who is in office space and band of brothers and actor that we have been conditioned to like.

Speaker 2: But here that doesn't seem to be the case.

Speaker 2: Mark Rosen lets the two flight attendants get on the shuttle bus that's taking everyone to their cars And then he gets on.

Speaker 2: But then the driver says shuttles fool, take the next one.

Speaker 2: And Mark Rosen says see you later, It kind of air.

Speaker 2: And then the shuttle leaves and it says the next one's going to be here in 25 minutes, which doesn't seem that long.

Speaker 2: And then we don't hear from or see this character for the rest of the movie, until the last three minutes of the film.

Speaker 1: Yes, there is lip service paid to an actual arc for this character, but this is one of the big problems with this movie, of wanting its cake and eating it too, of like.

Speaker 1: If you want this to be a story about Rusty's character in his journey through the movie, then be that or be a series of gags.

Speaker 1: But trying to be both of those things, you become neither.

Speaker 2: Kept to Rusty driving into the driveway of his incredibly beautiful home.

Speaker 2: It's this McMansion in Suburbia.

Speaker 2: He seems to be doing all right.

Speaker 2: Rusty comes inside where we meet his wife, debbie, as played by Christina Applegate, who does a fine job in this movie.

Speaker 2: At first I was like she's the best thing in this movie, and then the character is just so terribly written that my opinion quickly changed.

Speaker 2: So Debbie is there with their oldest son, james, who looks to be around.

Speaker 2: What would you say?

Speaker 2: 17 years old.

Speaker 1: Yeah, 16, 17, for sure, Yeah.

Speaker 2: And so Debbie the mom and James.

Speaker 2: they are discussing how the younger brother, Kevin, is bullying his older brother, james, and Kevin is probably around 13 years old.

Speaker 2: And Rusty the dad.

Speaker 2: he comes in and he says well, hey, what's going on here?

Speaker 2: And James says look what Kevin did to my guitar.

Speaker 2: And we see that Kevin has scribbled in black permanent marker I have a vagina on this guitar.

Speaker 2: And Rusty says not again, That's right.

Speaker 2: So they call Kevin downstairs.

Speaker 2: Kevin sees what's up and he says God, you told mom and dad you have such a vagina.

Speaker 2: And see, this is funny because it's a younger person saying the word vagina as a parent bow.

Speaker 2: I'm not so pissed that this kid saying the word vagina as I am that he's ruined an expensive guitar.

Speaker 1: A couple of things about this thing.

Speaker 1: We're setting up the premise of the younger brother bullying the older brother.

Speaker 1: There's also this whole bit where Rusty's like, even if you're older brother, head of a vagina, that's fine.

Speaker 1: You know, people are born with vaginas all the time, and if your brother's gender fluid, then we support him and because we love him, it becomes this thing that feels like woefully out of touch where it's like I understand that you're trying to make some, i guess, comedy out of this, but I don't know that it feels all that funny and it just comes off being a little ignorant.

Speaker 1: To your point about Rusty not being a likable character, it just makes Rusty.

Speaker 1: It doesn't make him feel as if he is like an understanding and supportive parent.

Speaker 1: It makes him sound like he just doesn't understand anything.

Speaker 1: And stupid is not a great character quality.

Speaker 2: Rusty says so this is a teachable moment.

Speaker 2: And then Debbie the mom, she's like Kevin, just go to your room.

Speaker 2: And Kevin laughs and heads up to his room because he was just like yeah, that's where I was before you called me down here.

Speaker 2: I'm like okay, so I don't really like Rusty, i don't like Kevin.

Speaker 2: Mom, james, you're questionable right now.

Speaker 2: And then Rusty says give me that guitar, son, i'll fix it for you.

Speaker 2: And he takes the guitar with another permanent marker and he just scribbles over the word vagina and then he writes the word penis.

Speaker 2: So it now says I have a penis, but the word vagina is still legible.

Speaker 2: And Rusty says everybody get cleaned up.

Speaker 2: The Petersons are coming over for dinner.

Speaker 2: So we cut to the Petersons having dinner with them at their big dinner table.

Speaker 2: And James is talking to the oldest daughter of the Petersons and he's like Sheila, did you like school this year?

Speaker 2: And Kevin, the younger brother, bully, he's just staring at his iPad and he goes.

Speaker 1: Sheila, do you like?

Speaker 2: school this year.

Speaker 2: That's seriously what you sound like.

Speaker 1: Shut up.

Speaker 2: And I'm like if my kid ever acted like that at the dinner table, it drove me nuts as a parent.

Speaker 2: It wasn't as funny.

Speaker 2: Maybe I'm viewing this through the wrong lens.

Speaker 2: Did you find it funny?

Speaker 1: No, we'll get to when.

Speaker 1: I find his bullying funny, because I think we both have an instance of finding that abusing, but it's just hateful for the sake of being hateful.

Speaker 2: There's no reason for it.

Speaker 2: So the Petersons, the dad, dad Peterson, whatever is played by Keegan Michael Key from Key and Peel.

Speaker 1: The less talented one Yeah.

Speaker 2: I really don't care for him as an actor.

Speaker 2: I feel like in every role he's in, he's trying way too hard.

Speaker 2: There were certain roles that Robin Williams would do that it's like could you just like bring it down a couple of notches Right?

Speaker 1: Got you here, need you here.

Speaker 2: And so the dad of the Petersons, he's like my son here, you know what we did?

Speaker 2: We built a go cart, me and my buddy.

Speaker 2: come on, buddy, come on over, You know what's got an engine.

Speaker 2: and we drove it around, buddy, come over here.

Speaker 2: and he's like oh, come on.

Speaker 2: And then they start doing play boxing.

Speaker 2: and you know they're way too into each other.

Speaker 2: And then Rusty, feeling inferior to this man, tells James, his oldest son.

Speaker 2: He's like hey, buddy, come on, we should build a go cart.

Speaker 2: And then he starts to play punch his son, who appears to be frightened by his dad's activity which he should be, because he's never behaved this way before.

Speaker 2: And then this scene just sort of fizzles out and goes nowhere.

Speaker 2: I guess we're establishing here that Rusty and his son have this kind of a strange relationship, but it doesn't ever pay off, really No we cut over to Debbie and she's talking to Mrs Peterson, who just starts giving Debbie shit for not liking her Instagram posts from the Peterson family vacation in Paris.

Speaker 2: And then here we also introduced that Debbie is losing weight and that her wedding ring keeps falling off.

Speaker 1: That's just letting us know.

Speaker 1: Hey, here's a plot point that is going to come into play later in the movie Did you think she was going to have, like cancer or AIDS or something Like.

Speaker 2: If you're inexplicably losing so much weight that rings are falling off your fingers, especially knowing that Christina Applegate has had like health problems and so forth.

Speaker 1: It's like God.

Speaker 1: I hope she's okay.

Speaker 1: She's such a national treasure.

Speaker 2: It's like watching you see no evil here, no evil, and you're like Richard Pryor had MS badly Like.

Speaker 2: You can see it on the screen.

Speaker 1: It would be like if you cast Michael J Fox in a movie now and that was just all about him having trouble like getting to the fridge, like shakes the clown to like bad form.

Speaker 1: This is in poor taste, bad form, bobcat.

Speaker 1: And the other thing that you get here is the knowledge that the Peterson couple has just gone to Paris for a week.

Speaker 1: Yeah, She asks Debbie, christina Applegate, hey, are you going anywhere fun this year?

Speaker 1: And Debbie says Oh, we're going to the same cabin in Sheboyga, michigan, that we've been for 10 years.

Speaker 1: The kids call it Sheborin.

Speaker 2: You know who was really big in Sheboygan, michigan.

Speaker 2: Bow the Kenosha kickers, polka, polka, polka.

Speaker 2: Twin lakes, polka Yeah.

Speaker 1: Polka, polka.

Speaker 1: Yeah, no, are these?

Speaker 2: songs Played strange at automobiles.

Speaker 2: It is in the Mount Rushmore of road trip movie, without a doubt.

Speaker 1: What a much better movie.

Speaker 1: All right, like that is a movie that does a string of gags But also gets the heart right.

Speaker 1: What do you think the temperature is out here?

Speaker 1: I don't know one.

Speaker 1: It doesn't just do the emotional beat at the end, it has emotional beats all the way through it.

Speaker 2: That's what makes a road trip movie a good road trip movie, assuming is you're kind of following that spiritual journey framework of a road trip movie.

Speaker 2: I think that the Muppet move does that incredibly well for sure.

Speaker 1: Yet, like all the calls that Steve Martin has to his wife and I'll tell you another thing the whole like I want a fucking car For fucking wheels, like that scene is sort of the vacation scene when Clark loses his shit.

Speaker 1: In the original movies There's always that scene in plain strains and automobiles.

Speaker 1: It's a little more front-loaded.

Speaker 1: It happens earlier in the movie, but it gives you something about the character.

Speaker 1: Yeah, as opposed to it just feeling Necessary, necessary in the sense that, hey, this is what audience expect out of this kind of movie.

Speaker 1: It's one of the reasons that you know we've discussed this that we think that Christmas vacation is kind of a shit movie, because it's just a Symblage of.

Speaker 1: Here is what these movies ought to be, and none of it is particularly funny.

Speaker 2: I think that the original vacation does a good job of lampooning, if you will, those emotional moments with Rusty and Clark drinking the beer and the kid just shotgunning it and it's just gone.

Speaker 1: Well, yeah, and it has that great moment where he's like you know, i love you and your sister, audrey, dad, audrey, yeah, it's skewering a family film as opposed to trying to be a family film, and that's what this movie is trying to do and that's why it gets it wrong.

Speaker 1: Rusty, by the way, is passing behind Debbie as she's trash talking their vacation in the cabin for the past ten years.

Speaker 1: Debbie is saying like, well, we can't do anything fun because Rusty likes the cabin too much, right?

Speaker 2: so it's the moment of where Rusty is, like you know oh boy, i really ought to do something for my family and what if Rusty just went upstairs at this moment and hung himself in the guest bedroom And it turned into a sequel to that Casey Affleck movie?

Speaker 2: a ghost story.

Speaker 2: And just Ed Helms is trapped in the house for Generations, revisiting like his earlier decisions.

Speaker 2: Oh man trying to reconcile his own existence as a spiritual being.

Speaker 1: I would love that take that audience seeing Rusty see the heat death of the universe as a ghost.

Speaker 1: I would love to see, like Christina Applegate, just sit down in the kitchen and eat an entire pie.

Speaker 1: That would be so fucking good and it's only like an hour and 20 minutes.

Speaker 1: It's an hour 20 minutes long and it has an emotional resonance that has stuck with me for years.

Speaker 1: And this movie takes more time to do less.

Speaker 1: Shame on you, vacation.

Speaker 2: So our movie's hero is a disappointment at work.

Speaker 2: He's a disappointment to his friends and his wife and his children.

Speaker 2: Like he's just an all-around.

Speaker 2: We cut to Rusty and Debbie in bed and they're watching Hell's Kitchen, the TV show starring Gordon Ramsay, a man Whose personal brand is the most schizophrenic thing I've ever come across on TV, because on some shows He's just swearing at people who are cooking, and then other shows He's helping people fix up their restaurants, and some shows he's like hugging kids, teaching them that they can grow up to be chefs.

Speaker 2: Some shows he's like us globetrotting dime store Anthony Bourdain Just pick something and be that pick a lane, gordon Ramsay, you can't be the white Steve Harvey I mean look, there is only one, steve Harvey, and he is again a national treasure.

Speaker 1: So they're watching Hell's Kitchen and Rusty is looking at pictures on his iPad of their family photos from the cabin.

Speaker 1: And it's just variations of the same picture.

Speaker 1: The only difference is the look of disappointment and displeasure on Debbie's face, getting progressively less enthusiastic about being on this trip.

Speaker 1: Then he sees some old photos of the original vacation movie and he's like oh boy, that was a good movie.

Speaker 2: Maybe we should make that movie and their photos from each of the previous Incarnations, with the different actors in it.

Speaker 2: If you had not watched those movies and you're watching this, it's like who the hell are these people?

Speaker 2: the kids are all played by different actors.

Speaker 1: We assume you did the required reading before you showed up to watch this thing and also They leave out all the stuff from the cousin Eddie only movie, that movie stretch, although it does involve a monkey flying a plane or something.

Speaker 2: We cut to the next day and Rusty walks in with his wife and two children eating breakfast And he says hey, everyone, i have exciting news.

Speaker 2: And Kevin shouts out James has AIDS.

Speaker 2: Oh that Kevin says the most outrageous things.

Speaker 2: Who knows what's gonna come out of his mouth next?

Speaker 2: Oh God.

Speaker 2: Rusty says the four of us are gonna take a little trip and his wife shouts out Paris and Rusty, the perpetual Screw up in this movie.

Speaker 2: He just dismisses this.

Speaker 2: The whole film She's been talking about how she wants to go to Paris.

Speaker 2: You know he's like nope, we're gonna drive to Wally world.

Speaker 2: This family's in a rut and we need to shake things up.

Speaker 2: Plus, the boys can learn to get along with each other by being locked in a car together.

Speaker 2: And Kevin screams out This is bullshit right here, and I'm like that kid needs to be chunked through a window right He would be in some kind of inpatient treatment program.

Speaker 1: His oppositional defiance disorder.

Speaker 1: That kid is bound for alternative school at the very least.

Speaker 1: And James is saying like well, i don't want to do this because I don't want to go some corporate theme park, i want to see the real America like Jack Kerouac or the Mary pranksters.

Speaker 2: This is the one of two jokes in this movie that made me laugh out loud when he says he wants to see America like Jack Kerouac or the Mary pranksters.

Speaker 2: Kevin the younger brother, sitting beside him at the breakfast table.

Speaker 2: He gives his brother this combination smackdown It's a punch to the arm, then, with the same arm, a slap to his face.

Speaker 2: Same hand points his finger in his brother's face and says don't say weird shit, the delivery is Perfect.

Speaker 1: I agreed.

Speaker 1: This is a good joke.

Speaker 1: Debbie is like I don't know if this doesn't sound like a great idea.

Speaker 1: And then the movie to your point earlier Begins to doubt its own existence here gets a little meta.

Speaker 1: Yeah, where rusty is basically saying no, no, no, this will be a good vacation.

Speaker 2: She says you just want to redo the trip from your childhood.

Speaker 2: Won't that be a letdown?

Speaker 2: and rusty says oh, we're not redoing anything.

Speaker 2: This will be completely different.

Speaker 2: The original vacation had a boy and a girl.

Speaker 2: This vacation has two boys And I'm sure there'll be other differences.

Speaker 2: And then James says I've never heard of the original vacation.

Speaker 2: And rusty says doesn't matter, the new vacation will stand on its own.

Speaker 2: Come on, honey, we'll fly out and we'll drive back.

Speaker 2: And you're like oh, this will be in the trailer, which it was.

Speaker 1: So he then has to coax them out to see this car, which is the tartan prancer, which he describes as the Honda of Albania, and I have to admit, some of the gags with the car I think are funny, because there's something I like about the absurdity of it.

Speaker 1: It looks kind of like a Volkswagen thing.

Speaker 1: It's got external mirrors that face each other.

Speaker 1: So like the design of this I find to be a good Production design gag where there are courts coming out of everything.

Speaker 1: It's got two gas tanks for no good reason and The key fob has like 37 buttons on it.

Speaker 2: There's one with a muffin and a rabbit, and a rocket.

Speaker 1: Yeah, and Debbie says is that a swastika?

Speaker 1: and he's like, yeah, we're not gonna touch that one to ruin the gag that I like about This car.

Speaker 1: Rusty goes to open the driver's side door and puts his arm in.

Speaker 1: He's like, go on, honey.

Speaker 1: I slam the door on my arm.

Speaker 1: And she's like, no, i'm not gonna do that.

Speaker 1: He's like, no, don't worry about, there's a sensor in place to keep it from closing when my arms here Which she does.

Speaker 1: And it slams the door on his arm and he's like, oh, i guess I didn't have the sensor turned on.

Speaker 1: Hang on, let me turn it on, try it again.

Speaker 1: She's like I'm not gonna try that again because it didn't work.

Speaker 1: He's like, no, no, no, i've got it turned on, try it again.

Speaker 1: And so she does it again and it just slams his arm in the door a second time.

Speaker 2: Rusty Griswold is nothing like Clark Griswold in this movie, because Clark Griswold was this well-meaning Headstrong idiot who just slowly descends into madness until, as you mentioned earlier, he just explodes, almost killing his whole family in the process.

Speaker 2: He's a lot like Jack Torrance in The Shining when you think about it, and This movie Rusty, is such a pushover, and the only growth of his character is that he finds out that his wife wants a divorce.

Speaker 2: He never bonds with either of his children.

Speaker 2: I don't even think he talks to Kevin, other than telling him to stop saying you know swears.

Speaker 1: Nobody in this movie ever gives Kevin any attention, other than the brother which speaking of.

Speaker 1: There is another kind of gag About James the older brother, where, as they're packing up the tartan prancer, he has this stack of notebooks and he says oh look, i'm taking my dream journals and my wish diary and all kinds of crazy shit like that which is never called back to.

Speaker 2: And it's not that funny a joke to begin with, so I don't know yeah, i'll bet all this is gonna take on a totally different light if James, it turns out, is gay.

Speaker 2: All this bullying and mocking him for Being sensitive and writing his feelings down Whoops then it the whole movie just becomes a hate crime right.

Speaker 2: Remember in the TV show, the Cosby show, starring that rapist.

Speaker 2: Later it turned out that Theo Huckstable was dyslexic, and so all of those jokes about Theo being stupid and bad at school It's like, oh, those weren't funny, he just couldn't read because he was dyslexic.

Speaker 1: He needed educational support, not the cruel mocking of his rapist father.

Speaker 2: Yeah, do you watch that Kamal bell documentary?

Speaker 2: We got to talk about Bill Cosby.

Speaker 1: I did not you should.

Speaker 2: It's good That dude was a monster, is a monster.

Speaker 1: I have no doubt like that's why I don't need to see it.

Speaker 1: It's like that Finding Neverland documentary where it's like, oh, all the tea is spilled in this documentary.

Speaker 1: I'm like the tea is spilled, i get it.

Speaker 1: The only documentaries I want to see are about big feet and UFOs hosted by Mojo Nixon.

Speaker 1: Oh man, are you kidding?

Speaker 1: How is that?

Speaker 2: show not happen?

Speaker 2: How is Mojo Nixon not hosted in search of?

Speaker 2: also, i want to point out when Rusty comes in and says, hey guys, we're going on a family vacation, they're like what.

Speaker 2: And he says, here's the tartan prancer, they're like what.

Speaker 2: And he says, and guess what?

Speaker 2: we're leaving right now.

Speaker 2: That's never gonna happen, right?

Speaker 2: you're not just gonna show up and be like, hey, everybody, let's pile in a car and drive 2,500 miles right now, unless Johnny law is is on the trail.

Speaker 2: We got to get out of town now.

Speaker 2: Remember those guys I owe all that money to.

Speaker 2: They are coming to kill us.

Speaker 2: Great, grab your go bags and we are going to go.

Speaker 2: They just hop in the car and then they set their GPS and it's real wonky, because they're going from Chicago to, let's call it like, los Angeles or Southern California.

Speaker 2: They go by way of Memphis, which adds 500 more miles onto their trip.

Speaker 2: And this movie fails so miserably by setting up why they would be taking this road trip.

Speaker 2: They're just taking it to take it.

Speaker 2: This movie should have addressed the issue that the family isn't spending time together.

Speaker 2: So Rusty says when I was a kid, we took this road trip and it really helped us to bond.

Speaker 2: We could all be together and then say things like oh and honey, you know how our oldest son, james, wants to go to college.

Speaker 2: We could go by your old alma mater and you could show him the school and we could stop by and visit my sister in Texas And we could see the Grand Canyon.

Speaker 2: You give reason to go to these locations.

Speaker 2: The movie doesn't do any of that.

Speaker 2: They just hop in the car in Chicago and in the same day drive all the way to Memphis, tennessee, in a day.

Speaker 2: It's so frustrating that if you just did basic, simple things to stitch this story together, rather than worry about what vomit, semen, pedophile, jerk off, murder gag can we put in the movie, find ways to connect all of these dots and your movie feels more coherent if you give it also That sort of advanced planning as an audience member, when they get to Texas, for example, you can say like, oh good, this movie is almost over these are the four set pieces We're gonna have in our film and so when one of the kids asks what the big deal is about going to Wally world in the first place, rusty tells them there's this new scary roller coaster called the velociraptor, which is the biggest roller coaster in the world, and we're gonna go to that so his motive for this trip is so they can go ride A roller coaster that's right.

Speaker 2: I mean, does anyone in this movie even like roller coasters?

Speaker 2: because in the original vacation the purpose of them going to Wally world, which was a proxy for Disneyland, was that it was like this great American destination hell.

Speaker 2: In that movie There's a stand-in for Walt Disney named Roy Wally Looks like Walt Disney and then when they get there the punchline of course is that the park is closed.

Speaker 2: The whole family in that film is Excited about going to Wally world.

Speaker 2: Here No one is excited about going to ride this roller coaster.

Speaker 1: Nobody cares bow until they walk through the gates of this place.

Speaker 2: Nobody gives a shit and even then they're like oh yeah, this is, this is something.

Speaker 2: I'm out of the car, i'm stretching my legs, so they're on the road and this menacing 18 wheeler with a teddy bear strapped to the front of it, so we'll recognize it later comes up behind them and Rusty says Hey, let's, let's talk to the truckers.

Speaker 2: And he hits a button in a CB radio, pops out of the dashboard and Rusty gets on and Speak some trucker lingo to ask if there are cops ahead.

Speaker 2: And they say they're clean and green.

Speaker 2: And Rusty is totally confused by their response because it's impossible to like this character.

Speaker 2: Kevin The youngest says hey, dad, let me try.

Speaker 2: And he grabs the microphone and he says hey, my friend Jesse says all truckers are rapist.

Speaker 2: Are you a rapist over?

Speaker 2: and then Rusty takes the CB radio controller back and he's like oh good, buddy, sorry, you know how it is when little boys mouths get going.

Speaker 2: I'm not.

Speaker 2: I mean, i'm not suggesting you're a pedophile.

Speaker 2: That's the second blatant pedophile joke in this movie and there are more to come right as he's saying this, the 18-wheeler Pulls beside the car but we don't even know that this was the truck They were talking to or that this truck was listening to them on This channel.

Speaker 2: that's not how CB radios work right.

Speaker 1: And then Kevin asks Hey, what is a pedophile?

Speaker 1: and Rusty starts to explain this and then Debbie is like no, do not go down this road with this child That already has emotional and social problems.

Speaker 1: Yeah, at a diner later the kids decide that they got to go piss and Debbie mentions that, like she has all these streams of Traveling overseas to Paris, paris.

Speaker 2: Have you paid attention over the last 15 years of our marriage, idiot?

Speaker 1: Rusty is like hey, look, a connoir has been real good to us.

Speaker 1: I know it's not the international carrier that would let us go all these different places, but this trip is my dream, because I get to be with all of you.

Speaker 1: And then Kevin comes back and says hey dad, there was this weird hole in my soul.

Speaker 1: And Rusty says well, what you found yourself there, kevin, is what's called a glory hole, at which point Debbie shuts it down again, which you think is gonna be running gagged through the movie.

Speaker 1: But then it's only those two things, right it also.

Speaker 2: The dad knows what a glory hole is, but later He doesn't know what a rim job is it's very selective.

Speaker 2: Yes, his visits to urban dictionary only got up to the letter g.

Speaker 2: He hasn't made his way down to the ours yet.

Speaker 1: He's got the one a day calendar.

Speaker 1: He's just up to glory hole and gang bang which only gets to rusty trombone.

Speaker 2: I don't like this at all.

Speaker 1: He's just a couple of days away from glass bottom boat.

Speaker 2: I think he's really gonna enjoy that one Yeah as they leave the diner, the movie pans over and we see the teddy bear strapped to the grill of the 18 wheeler a Storyline that goes nowhere in this movie at all.

Speaker 2: You think it's gonna go somewhere like sea bass and dumb and dumber, but don't get your hopes up.

Speaker 2: It kind of shows up for a moment.

Speaker 2: I also think that the movie probably should have done a better job of having her play with her Wedding ring here and like it slips off her finger and she's kind of like futzing with it, so that when it turns out that she lost it in this diner We have been witness to that, maybe, anyway.

Speaker 2: So they're on the road, day one.

Speaker 2: A jeep with top down pulls up beside them, a mom and a dad in the front seat and there is a Brunette teenage girl in the back and her hair is just flapping in the wind.

Speaker 2: Now, bo, have you ever been in a jeep with the top down on the interstate?

Speaker 2: because it's the closest you will get to Jumping out of an airplane while remaining on earth.

Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2: It's horrible.

Speaker 2: This girl's hair will be so fraught with knots when they stop.

Speaker 2: The only way she's gonna be able to deal with it is to shave her scalp.

Speaker 1: Which would be a good look for her through the rest of the movie, and it would be a good opportunity for this movie to make some cancer jokes, which it seems like it's on the verge of doing it all time.

Speaker 2: Maybe some timely Britney Spears mental breakdown jokes.

Speaker 2: Give her an umbrella and have her just like bash cars in a parking lot.

Speaker 1: It's something that really mocks those who are in need of help and struggling through life.

Speaker 1: That's where this movie lives.

Speaker 1: Yeah, this movie is like a seventh grader, like the whole movie is just one big seventh grader.

Speaker 1: Yes, it has no morality.

Speaker 1: It's just an asshole.

Speaker 2: Using profanity, talking about things it doesn't fully understand.

Speaker 2: Yeah as this jeep is rolling down the road, some are breezed by seals and croff plays.

Speaker 2: James looks out and sees the girl and they're kind of like waving at each other, until Kevin whips out a plastic bag that I guess he just carries in his pocket at all times and violently throws it over his older brother's head, attempting to kill him.

Speaker 2: Debbie the mom She's the front seat reading a copy of the help and Russ is driving.

Speaker 1: These two are oblivious As one child is trying to kill another child in the backseat by the time James gets free of the plastic bag That Kevin has over his head, the Jeep is gone.

Speaker 1: And then Kevin produces a second bag to kill his brother again which is a thing that comes back at the end of the movie.

Speaker 1: At least, rusty ends up pulling off so that Debbie and the kids can visit where she went to college, which, as you said, is Memphis State.

Speaker 1: Again, this is where Debbie is not a likable character, but I like the fact that Christina Applegate is kind of mean in this movie, strangely, where, as they're pulling off, rusty says something like hey, maybe one of you will go to Memphis State like your mom.

Speaker 1: And James says how I've got my sights set on something a little more Ivy League.

Speaker 1: And under her breath, debbie says little fucker.

Speaker 1: And he says what did you say, mom?

Speaker 1: and she says I love you.

Speaker 1: That's what I said.

Speaker 1: I was saying I love you.

Speaker 2: None of these characters are likable up until this point.

Speaker 2: I thought that Christina Applegate would be the saving grace, because I do think she is a very funny comedic actress.

Speaker 2: As I mentioned in the intro, she's great in the two Anchorman movies.

Speaker 2: I think she really honed her skills as a comedian on Married with children and she had another sitcom she started called Jesse.

Speaker 2: So I think she's very funny.

Speaker 2: One of the things from the original Vacation that I always like was that Beverly DeAngelo's character was always in Clark's corner.

Speaker 2: You know she always had his back almost to a fault at times, but could really, you know, when things got really out of control She could ground him and bring him back to earth.

Speaker 2: And I thought in this movie the Debbie character would be the same one.

Speaker 2: And this is the exact moment where the wheels on that bus just flew off in all directions And I was like, oh, she's just as unlikable as everyone because, again, this movie is seventh grader And it's like, hey, you know, it's funny.

Speaker 1: Angry Koreans, yeah.

Speaker 1: And so the navigator, as they're trying to figure out how to get to Memphis State University, changes the navigator voice to Korean, which is a really angry sounding voice because, you know, koreans always sound angry or whatever.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that'll be a running gag through the movie because we need another group to punch down on yeah.

Speaker 1: And then they get to the campus and they're walking across campus And they see that there's this wild party happening at Debbie's old sorority house.

Speaker 2: It's a Hollywood depiction of college life.

Speaker 2: There are keg stands, there's people smoking weed out of bongs.

Speaker 2: You see two women making out.

Speaker 2: No men making out with men.

Speaker 2: Not in my America, not in my vacation movie.

Speaker 2: I'm talking to you.

Speaker 2: target Bud Light.

Speaker 1: Well, alright.

Speaker 1: So when they show up to this Hollywood sorority party, there is what.

Speaker 1: What's going on is this thing called the tripod chug run, which is this big Obstacle course.

Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like this dumbed-down mini version of a wipeout set like a Japanese game show style Obstacle, course you got a bounce across stuff and little things try to punch you, knock you off And you got a blah, blah blah when they ask like what is this for one of the sorority girls?

Speaker 1: It's a charity for ass burgers and it's spelled ass burgers.

Speaker 1: Not ASP be or right because, again, seventh grader, we got to make fun of people with mental illness as well.

Speaker 1: Right, it turns out this is something that Debbie invented, and when she was back in college She was known as Debbie do anything and they happen to have on hand.

Speaker 1: Mm-hmm a photo album of her being drunk and smoking and all kinds of bad behavior cashed out on the toilet Giving the middle finger to the camera.

Speaker 2: And then the sorority girls start peppering Debbie with questions Like did you climb the clock tower naked?

Speaker 2: Did you show your tits to anyone who asked?

Speaker 2: and then the last one is I heard you stuck your finger in the Dean's dick.

Speaker 2: What in his dick?

Speaker 2: right, i don't even okay anyway.

Speaker 2: So push comes to shove and debbie claims she holds the record for completing the chug run, which is where you have to drink a pitcher of beer and then run across this obstacle course, and she says she did it in 16 seconds.

Speaker 2: And then one of the sorority girls calls debbie old, which is the equivalent of calling Marty McFly a chicken.

Speaker 2: So debbie decide she's gonna do the chug run because quote, these fucking bitches are disrespecting me and that ain't what I'm saying, right, yeah?

Speaker 2: so she comes up, she chugs the beer and then immediately a little bit of spew comes up and then James walks over and he sees his mom on this obstacle course and then she immediately just kind of face plants and there's some good physical comedy here to see this mom just sort of spectacularly fail.

Speaker 2: But again, this movie punches down and it's punching down on itself.

Speaker 2: I would have recommended that considering having her complete the chug run and then, when she gets done, vomits.

Speaker 1: Right, give debbie the opportunity to be at least a little bit of a hero.

Speaker 2: You let your kids see the mom in a new light.

Speaker 1: She chugged this beer, she did this crazy thing and then she vomited on these bitches giving the opportunity to let these characters, as you said, see each see each other in a different light, where they start to see each other as people and start to connect.

Speaker 1: That is the movie where the emotional beats make some sense the Simpsons do it yeah, you're right where you find your Peers, family, siblings, co workers.

Speaker 2: You find respect and admiration in their flaws and quirkiness and, in this case, if she's a violently acrobatic athletic alcoholic, good for you.

Speaker 2: I now respect my mom even more, said Chad when he was 12 years old.

Speaker 1: And so later in the car.

Speaker 1: After all this is done, debbie is looking rough.

Speaker 2: James officer some water and she just slaps it back at him and screams out what are you doing?

Speaker 1: right.

Speaker 1: It makes her seem like such an asshole like it.

Speaker 1: I understand why you're going for that gag, but you've already shown like this character got your responsibly drunk in front of her children, kind of failed at what she was trying to do, right, vomited all over the place, like this.

Speaker 1: That scene ends with her laying on the ground and still vomiting.

Speaker 1: Yeah, and now you just have her Mean mean to her children once again.

Speaker 1: What is it you want me to think about this character?

Speaker 2: and the answer seems to be you want me to kind of hate her yeah, debbie hates her kids more than bill Murray hated his twins and rush more boy.

Speaker 2: He hated those kids right slot the shit out of him in the back seat of the car.

Speaker 2: So rusty turns the radio on and the song kiss from a rose begins to play by artist seal.

Speaker 2: And rusty wants the whole family to sing with him and boat.

Speaker 2: Nobody knows the lyrics to that song, including seal.

Speaker 2: That's not a sing along.

Speaker 1: I like that song a lot and when it comes on I will try to sing to it.

Speaker 1: But as many times as I've heard that song, i still screw up the lyrics all the time because it's just not lyrically memorable.

Speaker 1: Now the thing that's memorable is the baby.

Speaker 1: Like that part of it I get every time and you know, i've got the voice of an angel it's the soul version of end of the world as we know it by REM like I love.

Speaker 2: And he's like The world as we know it.

Speaker 1: yeah, yeah nobody else in the car scenes, everybody's.

Speaker 2: You know so long as they hate each other right.

Speaker 1: Debbie feels like shit.

Speaker 1: The kids are hating each other and the parents.

Speaker 1: Kevin's planning his next murder attempt on his brother rusty is just in his State of denial where he's saying everything's fine.

Speaker 1: He is setting himself up to be the family annihilator, right like as soon as Debbie hands over those divorce papers.

Speaker 1: He's going to lose a shit and kill all of them and then himself, and then burn down the house right.

Speaker 1: So this 18 wheeler comes up behind him and it haunts and rusty, swerves lanes at which hits another car as they're trying to get away from it.

Speaker 1: Debbie hits a button that looks like a rabbit and then the rear bumper falls off Yeah, she's like, why would that even do that?

Speaker 1: and they hit another button and the driver seat just slowly spins around with rusty in it that's a pretty good gag.

Speaker 2: I mean it's funny and I think Ed Helms that may be his funniest comedic performance, where he's just freaking out and kind of screaming as the seat does a slow 360 as they barrel down the interstate and in a weird way I thought that the tartan prancer would be a bigger character in the movie, like take on its own personality.

Speaker 2: I really thought that the car would become a character.

Speaker 2: I just thought that the car would become slightly sentient, but it never really does.

Speaker 2: I mean it has a few little physical gags here and there, but I really thought it would become kind of a member of the family, but it doesn't.

Speaker 2: Another way I would have fixed this movie.

Speaker 2: I would have had rusty not be a pilot, because that doesn't matter.

Speaker 2: I would have had him working for a car company and that he had to drive the car from Chicago to Los Angeles and he uses that as the excuse to go there like yes, to deliver the car, and Wally Worlds along the way.

Speaker 2: So it's like you have to deliver the car and as they do it, there's a lot of people that are like testing it out as a prototype.

Speaker 1: Oh, that's a really good idea.

Speaker 1: You could have it be sort of that prototype smart car, so that it actually has a voice and talks to them and he worked on the project.

Speaker 2: When you know, and when it arrives, it's just you know this burnt husk of a car and you think, oh, he's going to get fired.

Speaker 2: But they're like no, no, no, this is exactly what we needed.

Speaker 2: We needed to go through all of these horrible conditions.

Speaker 2: Rusty, you did a great job.

Speaker 2: Like you survived this road trip.

Speaker 2: Nobody should have to be in a car with their family for five days, and we proved that.

Speaker 1: You know it can be done, or something and you can like hang a promotion on it or something like that and right a number of ways to make this all better, just by making the car more of a thing.

Speaker 1: And the car gags, like I said, i think those are funny.

Speaker 1: They're just not connected to the rest of the movie no rusty says hey, family, i've got an idea.

Speaker 2: I'm gonna pull the emergency break and do a 180 because a Vin Diesel can do it.

Speaker 2: I can do it.

Speaker 2: And Debbie says you're not nearly as good as Vin Diesel and I'm like she hates everyone in this car, including her son yourself.

Speaker 2: I mean, maybe it's still the hangover talking I guess rusty does that thing he just said, and when he does it the car flips on its side and it rolls over like a good eight times.

Speaker 2: Everybody in this automobile would be dead bow, and the car would be inoperable.

Speaker 2: It's not gonna work again.

Speaker 2: But the 18 Wheeler comes barrelling down at them and then it jackknifes and skids to a halt, barely missing them.

Speaker 2: Then rusty just speeds off and the family gets away, only to be startled back to reality by the Korean voice shouting at them on their GPS.

Speaker 2: And then they finally stop and the family gets away at a motel.

Speaker 2: Everything we have just described happened in one day.

Speaker 1: Apparently so, so they end up getting this pair of rooms at this questionable motor lodge and definitely not a hotel.

Speaker 2: And James says hey, dad, there's a hot tub down there, can I go take a soak?

Speaker 2: And Rusty says, yeah, but if anybody tries to shove you in their van you give them a good scratch, like I showed you.

Speaker 2: And I was like in the real world.

Speaker 2: if a child ever asks a parent if they can go get in the hot tub, the answer is always no.

Speaker 2: You remember Robert Schimmel had that joke about how he wouldn't get in a public hot tub unless he was wearing a condom and had a cork in his butt.

Speaker 1: And that's kind of the especially had a place like this right Like this is a shitty looking joint to begin with, And now you want to go to the hot tub here And they put Kevin and James in the same room together.

Speaker 2: That's going to end with Kevin dismembering his brother and melting his body in the bathtub with acid.

Speaker 1: Hey James, you want to help me hurt these animals Also, I think I wet the bed.

Speaker 1: I'm going to go start some fires later too.

Speaker 2: Debbie and Rusty.

Speaker 2: they're in their motel room And Rusty says hey, hun, how come you never told me about Debbie do anything as part of your past?

Speaker 2: And she just blows it off like it's no big deal And he's like no, no, i'd like to know more about your past.

Speaker 2: And she's like all right, what do you want to know?

Speaker 2: And Rusty says how many guys did you sleep with before me?

Speaker 2: And I'm like how is this question not come up in their 15 plus years of marriage?

Speaker 2: Like it's shocking, if not an exact number, at least a ballpark.

Speaker 2: she thinks for a while.

Speaker 2: she says, okay, i'll tell you.

Speaker 2: she goes around and she starts to like a three ish numbers on her lips And she says around 30.

Speaker 2: And Rusty freaks out because he says he had only slept with three people.

Speaker 2: I thought that Debbie do anything would say 300.

Speaker 2: For me, 30 felt low.

Speaker 1: For Debbie do anything.

Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll do anything, do anyone.

Speaker 1: I guess it's fairly high, i mean for a national average kind of perspective.

Speaker 2: Well, according, to the CDC.

Speaker 2: When you look at men and women having sex with partners of the opposite sex, age 25 to 49, the average number of sexual partners is 7.2.

Speaker 2: The point two comes from for the pant stuff.

Speaker 1: I'm really glad we had those numbers on hand.

Speaker 2: Well, that's our crack staff man.

Speaker 2: They do all this research.

Speaker 2: I don't do anything, I just show up here and read these notes doing good work this season.

Speaker 1: Really, the yeomans were hey, don't tell them there's a writer strike.

Speaker 1: I think you have to be paying them for the strike to be a thing.

Speaker 1: And let's face it, they're not killed, they're not even scabs.

Speaker 2: It's not illegal that we pay them in.

Speaker 2: Pick six bucks right.

Speaker 1: No, no, no.

Speaker 1: I mean we put on the bills that it's not legal tender except in the storage unit.

Speaker 2: They can go to the storage unit down at you store a lot And then they trade their pick.

Speaker 2: six bucks for whatever is in the storage unit that month.

Speaker 1: Right, i like to think that we're setting up as sort of those old gold mining camps, right.

Speaker 1: Yeah, it's fun, the grocery store that we have in the storage unit, i mean it's, yes, it's mostly pop tarts and flavor aid packets, but you can live off that for a while.

Speaker 2: Vitamin C in there somewhere, I'm sure.

Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, i mean the strawberry pop tarts.

Speaker 1: That's practically a food group, that's fruit.

Speaker 2: That's what we learned from bird box.

Speaker 2: It's what strawberries taste like kids.

Speaker 1: This is strawberry, you cretin.

Speaker 1: Um, here's a s'more in pop tart form that tastes nothing like a s'more.

Speaker 2: That's the biggest lie that pop tart is ever told.

Speaker 2: Remember the first time you ate a pop tart s'more Like, oh, i can see how all this comes together And it's just like the s'mores pop tart is the most chemical tasting thing outside of actually eating a rubber tire.

Speaker 2: It doesn't contain any of the three ingredients of a s'more There's no graham cracker, there's no marshmallow and there's no chocolate.

Speaker 2: We know Right.

Speaker 2: That's why there's a question mark at the end of the word s'mores.

Speaker 1: They ought to just put like a surrealist painting on the front of that box.

Speaker 1: So it's like we're not really trying to capture the taste of s'mores, but sort of the feeling that eating a s'more creates.

Speaker 2: Kellogg's interpretation of a s'more.

Speaker 1: Right, right, it's like the Van Gogh-esque.

Speaker 1: It is the starry night of s'mores, where it is by no means exact, but evocative of s'mores.

Speaker 2: Do me a favor, put a canvas on the ground.

Speaker 2: I'm going to give you my Jackson Pollock interpretation of your product.

Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, oh yeah.

Speaker 1: So a s'more pop tart will run right through you.

Speaker 1: That is that, like doctors prescribe those before you have surgery.

Speaker 1: Um, rusty reveals it.

Speaker 1: Like you said, he's only got three lovers in his life and he says you're just so cool and I'm a loser.

Speaker 2: And she doesn't really argue with him.

Speaker 1: I mean, you're not not a loser.

Speaker 1: Debbie says like look, just over time we've gotten a little less free with our bodies and maybe we just need to mix it up every now and again and not just light a Yankee candle and do lights off.

Speaker 1: Socks on kind of sex.

Speaker 2: I will say I did find it funny that her back is to him when she sang all this and she mentions lighting the Yankee candle as part of their routine And there's a cut to Rusty lighting this blue Yankee candle and he quickly blows it out and puts it away.

Speaker 2: It was a nice visual throwaway joke.

Speaker 2: I want to give credit where credit's due.

Speaker 1: So she's going for a shower and Rusty says, well, you want to do it in the shower, debbie.

Speaker 1: And she's like, really All right, let's check this out.

Speaker 1: They go to the bathroom and they open the shower curtain and it's just this filthy bathroom with like mushrooms coming out of the drain.

Speaker 2: Yeah, the tub is like black stain, and then on the wall there appears to be the remnants of someone's brains where they committed suicide.

Speaker 2: Right It's a crime scene, and then rather than call the front desk or local authorities to investigate, rusty just reaches into a drawer or something and pulls out some steel wool to start cleaning it himself, and Debbie's like that's not steel wool, it's pupa, pupa pubic hair.

Speaker 1: Like it's a Scooby-Doo episode.

Speaker 1: Zoinks.

Speaker 1: One of the gags is like it's not one person's pubic hair, it's a bunch of people's pubic hair, and we cut away from this gag to James, with his feet in this hot tub playing guitar.

Speaker 2: His.

Speaker 2: I have a penis, vagina guitar.

Speaker 1: Right And the girl from the Jeep shows up and surprises them by saying oh, you're pretty good, and the girl's name is Edina.

Speaker 2: You say so.

Speaker 1: So they decide that they're going to take a soak in this ill-advised hot tub.

Speaker 2: Hot tubs are always ill-advised unless you own it and you put the chemicals in it.

Speaker 1: Otherwise it's full of ass and crotch rot and sex remnants, And they're about to take this soak and then Rusty shows up and starts asking his son, james, like hey, they're young men, we're strangers and all, but I was wondering if you have a girlfriend now.

Speaker 1: And he's like no, oh well, that's a shame.

Speaker 1: You seem like a really handsome young man.

Speaker 1: Whoa, why don't you take off your shirt there and let me get a look at what we're dealing with there?

Speaker 2: And the girl doesn't know this is his father.

Speaker 2: She's just thinking it is a pedophile.

Speaker 1: Right, and she whispers to him should I call the cops?

Speaker 1: And finally she just takes off because she realizes like I don't want to be part of this investigation.

Speaker 1: Sure, Rusty sits down and is like, oh, sorry about that, son, looks like she got away from you.

Speaker 1: And he says you know my dad, when I was about your age we shared a beer and had a talk just like this, you know, just like in that earlier movie.

Speaker 1: He's about to give him this birds and the bees talk And James is like look, i know dad, you know, you know everything.

Speaker 1: And James says well, I guess there's one thing I have question about.

Speaker 1: Oh, what's a rim job?

Speaker 1: Rusty is confused by this Again, knows what a glory hole, is Not sure about a rim job And his answer is well, i guess it's when you kiss someone with your mouth closed because it looks like a rim.

Speaker 2: That's not what it is, though is it Beau?

Speaker 1: No, not for my experience.

Speaker 2: For any listeners who don't know what a rim job is, it's where you look another person's asshole.

Speaker 1: That's right.

Speaker 1: It's when two consenting adults who love each other very much and have done all the usual stuff decide like you know, let's get into some ass play.

Speaker 2: And they like each other's ass.

Speaker 1: Yeah, As they're having this rim job talk.

Speaker 1: it concludes with Rusty saying well, James, I hope you're not too old to give your old dad a rim job.

Speaker 1: And this happens as another guy is approaching the hot tub, because apparently this is a popular spot at this motor lodge.

Speaker 2: He turns on his heels and leaves.

Speaker 2: But I'm surprised that this movie didn't lean into that and have the guy go a little pie-eyed and be like mm rim jobs and then climb into the hot tub with him.

Speaker 1: You're right, Or we'll get to the truck driver stuff later.

Speaker 1: but that is also an open-ended pedophile question.

Speaker 1: This movie really does love pedophilia.

Speaker 2: There's a lot of pedophilia in this movie.

Speaker 2: A shocking amount of pedophilia.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: All right, we're on to day two and the family's in the car and everyone's asleep, except for Rusty who is driving.

Speaker 2: And here we get a repeat of the Christie Brinkley scene from the original vacation, where a sexy woman in a red convertible pulls up beside Rusty and they kind of make eyes at one another.

Speaker 2: It really doesn't go anywhere.

Speaker 2: And then she drifts into oncoming traffic and she gets crushed by an 18-wheeler head on.

Speaker 2: Rusty looks in the rearview mirror, but because the tartan prancer has mirrors placed in such bizarre ways, one mirror is looking back at him, so he's kind of looking at himself in the rearview mirror and it blocks the horrific accident that's behind him.

Speaker 2: Should be noted that the woman in the Ferrari is Hannah Jeter, wife of Derek Jeter.

Speaker 1: Yeah, Derek Jeter, obviously a famous painter.

Speaker 2: If you say so, that's the notes here that I have to say that.

Speaker 2: Oh, hold on, he is involved in sports.

Speaker 1: Oh, Oh yeah, Yeah, he plays for my favorite sport club.

Speaker 2: And hold on, hold on.

Speaker 2: They're telling me in the booth his father, michael Jeter.

Speaker 1: Oh, interesting.

Speaker 2: Star of the Fisher.

Speaker 1: King and Evening.

Speaker 2: Shade, I appreciate that.

Speaker 2: Imagine Michael Jeter being Derek Jeter's dad Those Christmases.

Speaker 2: What that would be like.

Speaker 1: Everything's coming up movies, Our videos.

Speaker 1: that's what it was from Fisher King.

Speaker 1: Now I'm just thinking of Jeff Bridges with Michael Jeter in his arms from that movie.

Speaker 1: Did you know when you went crazy?

Speaker 1: did it happen all at once or did it happen slowly?

Speaker 1: So anyway, we're on our way to Texas, where we are visiting Audrey.

Speaker 2: The only reason you know we're on our way to Texas to visit Audrey is because, bro, you've seen this movie Right.

Speaker 2: The audience doesn't know that that's where we're going, and they don't even know what an Audrey is, let alone who an Audrey is.

Speaker 1: Yes, and also they're not really talking about Audrey.

Speaker 1: Everything in the conversation is about her husband, stone, who is a local weatherman, who has ambitions and apparently some interest in going national.

Speaker 1: This is the joke that I like in the movie the most.

Speaker 1: Take it, which is James saying oh hey, when we get to you, audrey, do you think I can ride Stone's horse?

Speaker 1: And Rusty says well, sure, son.

Speaker 1: And Kevin says, hey, can I shoot Stone's gun?

Speaker 1: And Debbie says absolutely not.

Speaker 1: And then Kevin leans to James and whispers too bad, i would have shot you right off that fucking horse.

Speaker 1: It's a good joke.

Speaker 1: It's a good joke.

Speaker 1: Rusty says it's surprising that Audrey went for Stone because he's so politically conservative.

Speaker 1: Debbie says well, just because he has different beliefs, it doesn't mean that he's not still good looking.

Speaker 1: I mean a good person.

Speaker 1: Yeah, establishing that Stone is this god of a man.

Speaker 2: And kind of shitting on her husband at the same time, of course, who she hates.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 1: But then they see a sign for hot springs In Arkansas.

Speaker 1: Rusty says you know, we've always wanted to do this.

Speaker 1: Let's take a little side trip and go to these hot springs, because there's probably a comedy gag in there.

Speaker 2: Oh, boy is there Bo.

Speaker 1: So when they get there, there's this huge line of cars lined up to get to these hot springs, yes, and they see this local with a rat on his shoulder passing by and Rusty calls over to him.

Speaker 2: And he's some hillbilly.

Speaker 2: He just looks like a cleatest, the slack-jawed yokel-tie.

Speaker 1: Very much.

Speaker 1: So Rusty says hey, is there a shortcut around here anywhere, my good man?

Speaker 1: And the guy says, oh yeah, you can take a dirt road up and follow that little shortcut up to some hot springs.

Speaker 1: Then Rusty says I appreciate that, by the way, what's your pet rat's name?

Speaker 1: And then the guy just loses his shit and freaks out.

Speaker 1: The one throwaway line I think is pretty funny is him saying I don't know him, as if the rat is a people.

Speaker 2: One thing about a movie like this, especially when you come in and I don't know that they make fun of stones, political leanings which are positioned to be more conservative than liberal.

Speaker 2: But whenever movies like this where people from the city go into the country and they're kind of making fun of people from the country, i think that you're in a place where you may be alienating a large portion of your audience because you're making fun of rednecks or just people that live in rural areas.

Speaker 2: I think where this movie works better is where, again, that's punching down.

Speaker 2: You can have a situation where the city-fied folk come into the country and because of their own either hubris or arrogance or whatever it is that they bring from a more metropolitan area is completely inaccurate and they kind of are their own downfall And here they don't do that.

Speaker 2: In fact, the way that it's played out is that the country folk are not only stupid and weirdos, they're also thieves and liars.

Speaker 2: Like everyone in this movie is just awful.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 2: They go to the hide springs and, to make a long story short, they get into the water and it turns out that it's raw sewage and they just smear shit all over themselves.

Speaker 2: They find random syringes and Kevin throws one at James.

Speaker 2: Wait, Kevin James, Kevin James.

Speaker 1: Oh, oh you, And so they jump out.

Speaker 1: Once they realize this is shit, they run out of the hot, spring back to their car because they hear the car alarm going off, and when they get there they find that their car has been broken into.

Speaker 2: Everything is gone.

Speaker 1: Not everything, because there's the copy of the help that Debbie is reading, and also a spray painted Dick and balls has been left on the side of this tartan prancer.

Speaker 2: Yeah, it also feels like, especially when we get to the next gag.

Speaker 2: When they show up at Stone and Aubrey's house, i felt like that the spray painted cock and balls shouldn't have been on the side of the car but should have been on the back of the car.

Speaker 2: So they didn't see it until they get there And then it's revealed.

Speaker 2: But when you see it here it's like OK, although I can name at least three people from our youth that would have broken into a car and then gone back to get spray paint to put a cock and balls on a car Right.

Speaker 1: It is this movie's equivalent of the BHP, which we have addressed previously on this show.

Speaker 2: They get in their car and they drive to Aubrey and Stone's house, which is this ranch style mansion.

Speaker 2: This is where we get the joke I was alluding to just a moment ago, where everybody gets out and then, rusty and Debbie, they see the big spray painted Dick and balls on their car And they're like, oh, we need to get this off because that's so embarrassing.

Speaker 2: So they spit on their hands and he's like you work the balls, i'll work the shaft.

Speaker 2: And then his sister and Stone come out to see them jerking off this spray painted car.

Speaker 1: Right.

Speaker 2: It's as funny as I'm describing it.

Speaker 2: But surprise, in this movie, when they walk out, we see that the always talked about Stone is played by Chris Hemsworth, who is having a very good time playing this rich, handsome Texas weatherman.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I wish they gave him a little more to do.

Speaker 1: And also there's a running gag of him constantly referencing faucets for no reason.

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: That I don't think is very funny.

Speaker 2: But the movie even references it.

Speaker 2: It's like what's with all the faucets?

Speaker 2: And you're like, yeah, that's what we were thinking.

Speaker 2: You don't need to say what's going through our head.

Speaker 2: I will say that I think Chris Hemsworth has good comedic timing.

Speaker 2: They certainly tapped into that in those latter Marvel movies.

Speaker 2: Oh yeah, as Thor, he was one of the funniest parts of Paul Feig's Ghostbusters.

Speaker 1: Absolutely.

Speaker 2: Every moment that he's on screen in that except for maybe some of the dancing, which is silly, he is hysterical.

Speaker 2: There are not very many people that are this good looking, that are also this funny.

Speaker 2: I think Channing Tatum is able to pull that off.

Speaker 2: Jenny McCarthy is one who I think is genuinely funny.

Speaker 2: I think Charlize Theron is a beautiful person that is also capable of being very funny in films and television.

Speaker 1: Absolutely.

Speaker 2: But for the most part beautiful people haven't had to suffer enough to figure out what it takes to have a personality.

Speaker 1: Speaking of that Ghostbusters movie, there is that bit where I think it's the job interview, which is probably the funniest scene in that movie is where they're interviewing him for the job where he's wearing the glasses and at one point reaches through them because there are no lenses to scratch his eye.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great bit of subtle comedy And he just pulls it off so well.

Speaker 1: Yeah, he's super funny And the problem is that this movie doesn't give him anything to do.

Speaker 2: The scene in the bedroom is the closest thing yet.

Speaker 2: We'll get to in just a moment, but we're getting out of there.

Speaker 2: So they show up and they smell like shit.

Speaker 2: So they're like come on in and we've got some clothes we were going to give to the church and we'll get you all dressed up.

Speaker 2: So the whole family gets dressed up and they're wearing like country Western gear And Debbie is wearing a dress that used to belong to.

Speaker 1: Aubrey, because the joke is that Stone, aka Chris Hemsworth, is saying hey, hold your.

Speaker 1: You remember the first time you wore that dress.

Speaker 1: And then they just start to get horny for each other and make out in front of Rusty and Debbie.

Speaker 1: Finally, audrey breaks it off as like hey, y'all want to go see Stone's man cave, which they do, and this is a gag that I don't even understand.

Speaker 1: It's just them going to his den where there's a picture of him and Charlton Heston.

Speaker 1: Stone talks about how he and Chuck Heston, as he calls them, cried over the state of the country and makes another false joke, like even a false of drips, every now and again.

Speaker 1: Then it cuts outside.

Speaker 1: That's the whole gag.

Speaker 2: They go outside and they're all eating dinner and it's barbecue.

Speaker 2: And over this meal there's a line where Aubrey says that Stone did a weather report And because of his early warning he was able to save 2000 people's lives, and that's how many people died at Pearl Harbor.

Speaker 2: So basically, stone prevented Pearl Harbor And I thought that was funny illogic.

Speaker 1: Yes, One of the kids, James, says you're a hero.

Speaker 1: Stone says well, you know, actually the hero was sitting right beside you.

Speaker 1: And James looks to the empty chair to his right And Stone's like no, no, The other way, you're father there, because every time Rusty here doesn't crash a plane, it's like he's saving lives too.

Speaker 1: Also, he nailed down this hot little piece of ass named.

Speaker 2: Debbie And he keeps hitting on Debbie.

Speaker 2: At one point Stone gets up and feeds beef ribs to a cow, which again, at that point we've had no reason to not like Stone, other than him kind of hitting on Debbie.

Speaker 2: But just like, well, maybe he's just this horny, rich weatherman Texan.

Speaker 2: But the moment he starts feeding cows to cows, you're like this is getting bizarre.

Speaker 2: And this is where I was thinking, oh, is this going to turn into a rich version of cousin Eddie, that he's going to be bat shit crazy, but he just has money.

Speaker 2: But that's not what happens.

Speaker 2: Stone then decides to let the boys come out and herd cattle in the morning and Rusty agrees to come help him.

Speaker 2: And then Aubrey says to her brother I don't know why you wanted to go back to Wally World after dad flipped out on that trip.

Speaker 2: And during this time Stone leans over and wipes barbecue sauce off Debbie's face in this seductive way And she just like, closes her eyes and puddles the ground beneath her.

Speaker 2: And then Aubrey says something incredibly perplexing.

Speaker 2: She says maybe we can take baby Cooper on a vacation next year, not to Wally World, but maybe to Paris.

Speaker 2: And she's like and when we get back I can get a part-time job And Stone shuts down the idea of her getting a job.

Speaker 2: But I was like whoa, whoa, whoa, who is baby?

Speaker 2: Cooper, right, are you pregnant?

Speaker 2: Are you planning on having a baby?

Speaker 2: Is this your dog?

Speaker 2: I don't know what's going on.

Speaker 1: Also this running joke, cause it comes up a couple of times where Stone is refusing to allow Audrey to work, even though it's clear that she wants to, because it gave her a sense of purpose Once more.

Speaker 1: like am I supposed to just hate this character and think that he's really closed-minded?

Speaker 1: And is that what conservatism means to the writers of this movie Is that he feeds cows to other cows, sits around crying with Charlton Heston and won't let his wife have the autonomy to work?

Speaker 2: And if it doesn't matter in your movie, don't mention it Right, it doesn't flesh out the characters or their relationship or progress, the plot.

Speaker 1: Get rid of it.

Speaker 1: We go to the bedroom later where Debbie and Rusty are staying.

Speaker 1: Debbie is saying you know, i'm really happy for Audrey.

Speaker 2: It seems like she's got a good life here And she's kind of drunk and she wants to have sex with Rusty And Rusty says no, no, no, you're all horned up just because you've been around, stone.

Speaker 2: And I was like, look, i don't care where you got your appetite, as long as you come home to eat.

Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's a bit of foreshadowing here, where Rusty complains about the genes that Stone lent him, where he says these are all stretched out in the crotch, and Christina Applegate has a funny delivery of why would they?

Speaker 1: oh shit, as she kind of puts two and two together.

Speaker 2: She has real moments of comedic spark in this film.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 1: And then Rusty at this point notices that her wedding ring is missing.

Speaker 1: Debbie is like I don't know where it is.

Speaker 1: I did not take it off on purpose, i would never do that.

Speaker 1: And this is where Stone comes in to check on him.

Speaker 1: And it's just Chris Hemsworth in boxer briefs, with an enormous fake cock strapped to his like, held in place by these boxer briefs.

Speaker 2: It looks like he has a police issue flashlight strapped to his leg.

Speaker 2: I mean, it's a horse cock in his pants.

Speaker 1: Yes, And it's like he keeps lifting his leg to put his foot on a chair or something nearby to really show it off and comes close to Rusty And Debbie's eyes are just locked on this thing.

Speaker 2: My eyes were locked on it the whole time.

Speaker 2: Of course, i just want to say Chris Hemsworth, the smile that he is fighting back off of his face during this scene is pretty awesome.

Speaker 2: The pause that he has at the door just before he leaves I think that was the actor's choice He stops and turns around.

Speaker 2: He's so proud of his huge dick as he should be.

Speaker 1: Sure, I mean look, if I had that thing, I would not be working a regular job, I would have made my bones in pornography.

Speaker 2: I would be a weather man, no.

Speaker 1: And then Rusty, to show once again that he's an idiot, says can you believe he came in here just to show off his six pack?

Speaker 2: Muah, muah, muah.

Speaker 1: Then we cut to the next morning where Stone and Rusty are on four wheelers, heard in cows, heard in the cows back into the barn.

Speaker 1: Rusty says, hey, there are, there are gonna be helmets.

Speaker 1: And Stone says, yeah, i keep them with the tampons, right.

Speaker 1: So they split up to wrangle some cows that have gone rogue on this small farm.

Speaker 1: As Rusty is kind of gunning the four wheeler around, he looks over and there's his family waving to him from the lawn And he's waving to them, not watching where he's going, and then looks forward again, just in time for him to realize that he is about to collide with a cow, which he does, and it explodes like it's a water balloon filled with pig intestines.

Speaker 2: We cut to Stone, hosing blood and guts off Rusty with a hose, as the family looks on, and here we see that Aubrey's holding a baby.

Speaker 2: I'm guessing that's baby Cooper.

Speaker 1: I guess Then they just leave.

Speaker 1: That's the end of the joke.

Speaker 1: He gets hosed down and then the family takes off and the follow up gag is that the big dick on their car has been covered up with tape and paper, and that's it.

Speaker 2: Yeah, as they drive away, the family starts making bad cow pun jokes Rusty says one, then Debbie says one, then James says one, and then Kevin just calls his brother a piece of shit.

Speaker 1: Yeah, You don't you don't get it.

Speaker 1: You kind of ruined it, yeah.

Speaker 1: And then we also see the 18 wheeler with the teddy bear on the front of it.

Speaker 2: To remind us that's still a thing in our movie for some reason.

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 2: Then we stop at the Wampum Motel.

Speaker 1: Uh-huh.

Speaker 2: Where they all sleep in a teepee.

Speaker 2: And Rust wakes up and he's like hey, debbie, you know, we're real close to the four corners where four states all touch.

Speaker 2: Let's go there and have sex in four states.

Speaker 2: And she's like all right, so that's what they do.

Speaker 2: They go to the four corners to have sex.

Speaker 2: Then James wakes up to find his parents gone, so he leaves.

Speaker 2: He goes outside and the cute girl from the Jeep earlier she's there in the middle of the night.

Speaker 2: I guess that's what she does at night Just go sit out in the courtyard at these motels.

Speaker 2: And then James explains that the pedophile from the night before was his dad and that he's not a pedophile, just a dimwit.

Speaker 2: And then this scene starts to have a moment.

Speaker 2: But it ends with James asking if he can give this girl a rim job because he thinks that's a gentle kiss.

Speaker 2: And then Kevin just comes out of this wigwam thing that they're sleeping in and just starts chunking rocks at his brother.

Speaker 2: And then the cute girl says hey, you should go kick his ass.

Speaker 2: And then here James stands up to his little brother and kind of beats him up in the strangest way possible because he's bigger than him.

Speaker 2: Is this a turning point for James, kind of, but not really.

Speaker 1: It's really strange because it doesn't totally inform the rest of the movie other than I guess Kevin isn't mean to him anymore.

Speaker 1: It sort of ends with James giving Anita this quick kiss and heading inside Anita rightfully saying that's a weird fucking family.

Speaker 2: Cut to Russ and Debbie at Four Corners and they sneak in under the dark at night And as they're approaching the location to have sex, it turns out there's a whole bunch of other weirdos there waiting to have sex And then the camera quick edits to these people in various states of dress And it's like flipping through the pages of a National Geographic from 1958, leg, ankle, stomach, bare breast that you really don't wanna see in the nude jiggling out.

Speaker 2: It's like the kind of people that go to nude beaches.

Speaker 2: It's nothing you wanna see.

Speaker 1: Right, then the cops show up Chad.

Speaker 2: And it's the beat, it's the cops.

Speaker 1: The only people left are Rusty and Debbie.

Speaker 1: The gag here is that cops show up from all four states to converge on this and they're claiming jurisdiction on arresting Rusty and Debbie.

Speaker 2: It escalates, they start arguing and yelling at each other and they're all comedians of some notes There's like Nick Kroll and Tim Heddecker right, caitlin Olsen from Always Sunny and Michael Peña He's the fourth And they make racist jokes or jokes about the state that they're in, and they just argue to the point to where Debbie and Rusty just leave.

Speaker 1: Right, and the cops end up forcing each other onto the ground with their guns pushed in front of them in this mutual standoff.

Speaker 2: That's something else that's strange about this movie.

Speaker 2: A lot of the gags come from other characters, but not the main characters of our movie, like James and Kevin never really get involved in shenanigans, and that wasn't the case in the other vacation movies.

Speaker 1: So they're crossing the Grand Canyon on their way to Wally World the next day.

Speaker 1: James friends Adina on Facebook.

Speaker 1: As soon as he friends this girl on Facebook, he immediately changes his status to in a relationship, which is creepy.

Speaker 2: Again giving us more reason to not like this character but it doesn't ever really come to anything Like.

Speaker 1: isn't Adina kind of out of the movie at this point?

Speaker 2: At the very end, when we get the postcards of the characters from our movie, there is a shot of James and Adina kissing an on a back porch And then you see that Rusty is behind them, like giving them the don't get her pregnant look, or something.

Speaker 1: But in the movie itself, no, she's not in the movie which seems crazy to me, because you leave it at yes, she helped him.

Speaker 2: What she said.

Speaker 2: don't take that shit from your brother, Right.

Speaker 1: And that's it.

Speaker 1: Like the relationship between the two of them feels like it just stops there, because it does, but we have another gag to get to.

Speaker 2: Here's the thing about all the gags in this movie.

Speaker 2: You could edit any one of them out or all of them out.

Speaker 2: Well, if you edit them all out, you don't have a movie.

Speaker 1: Now you're talking.

Speaker 2: Them having sex at four corners.

Speaker 2: You could edit that out.

Speaker 2: Does it matter?

Speaker 2: The scene we're about to talk about with whitewater rafting?

Speaker 2: that doesn't matter.

Speaker 2: Like none of this, as opposed to if you look at a better movie like Plain Strings and Automobiles.

Speaker 2: If you edit it out, any of the moments where they had comedic mishaps, you miss key plot points.

Speaker 2: You miss character development.

Speaker 2: There are integral things into the comedic set pieces of that film.

Speaker 2: Here, not at all.

Speaker 1: The gag here is that they're going on a whitewater rafting trip down the Colorado River And the guide is Charlie Dase speaking of it.

Speaker 1: It's always sunny.

Speaker 1: Here's another cast member from that, and he's funny in this.

Speaker 1: He's capturing something.

Speaker 1: I think that is generally true.

Speaker 1: If you've ever worked in any kind of corporate training or gone with tour guides and that kind of thing, you'll run into this kind of person who is full of little quips, like I'm really looking forward to taking it out.

Speaker 1: I mean, this is my first time, but I think we're going to be okay.

Speaker 1: I'm just kidding.

Speaker 1: I've been doing this for about three and a half years now And look, as we're going down these rapids, we're probably only going to lose one or two of you.

Speaker 1: I'm just kidding.

Speaker 1: We're all going to be fine and have a good time.

Speaker 1: You know, it's that I'm just kidding, and over emphasizing the danger and so forth.

Speaker 2: Before they go out, charlie Dase character gets a call and it's from his fiance and she has broken up with him and he is emotionally devastated and they all head off down the river And instead of going down the gentle rapids, since Charlie Day is now in a state of suicidal depression, he sends them down the dangerous path of rapids escalating, with the family getting bounced around and thrown all over the place.

Speaker 2: In this scene I don't have a notice to what song is playing, but it's like you know, all by myself, or only the lonely, or some shit like that, and the look on Charlie Day's face is of just sheer.

Speaker 2: Like what is it?

Speaker 2: It's just serenity.

Speaker 2: Yes, that he knows this is the moment of his death and it is by his own doing.

Speaker 2: He looks so happy.

Speaker 2: It made me just appreciate how funny Charlie Day is in everything.

Speaker 2: Long story short, the whole family gets bounced out.

Speaker 2: He stays in the boat and goes over a waterfall where he ping-pongs down, presumably to his death, but not really.

Speaker 2: The incredible say he survived possibly.

Speaker 1: It later finds a bear in a sequel to the movie The Edge.

Speaker 1: Oh, that would be fun.

Speaker 1: I know Charlie Day v Bear in the wilderness Now you're talking.

Speaker 1: He should have been in Cocaine Bear.

Speaker 1: now that I think about it, the one thing I will say for Cocaine Bear as a film is the bear in that movie loves cocaine.

Speaker 2: Well, that's cocaine Bo.

Speaker 1: I know, but the movie does not shy away from the fact that this bear loves cocaine.

Speaker 1: It's quite funny.

Speaker 2: So we come back to the family, they're in the car and Kevin says, hey, can we just go home?

Speaker 2: James says I don't even care about Wally World.

Speaker 2: Debbie screams out we almost died.

Speaker 2: And then seals Kiss From a Rose comes on the radio and Rusty tries to get everybody to sing along again, which what makes you think that's going to happen.

Speaker 2: And then the car runs out of gas in the desert.

Speaker 2: Russ, in a state of desperation, starts tapping buttons and he hits the top hat button and all the windows explode.

Speaker 2: Then he finally hits the muffin button and the car starts up again.

Speaker 2: But then it drives away and he hits the muffin button again and the car explodes, leaving our family in the desert to die.

Speaker 1: Right, And this is where we get the end quotes National Limpoon's Vacation rant.

Speaker 2: But it sucks Like Clark Griswold lost his shit when everything fell apart, and that's one thing I will give credit to Chevy Chase for doing.

Speaker 2: He was good at having freak out moments.

Speaker 2: He's no Gene Wilder when it comes to freaking out, because nobody freaks out better than Gene Wilder.

Speaker 2: Here.

Speaker 2: Ed Helms performance is so tamped down and also it's mean spirited.

Speaker 2: He starts calling out his family for being a bunch of assholes And at the end he essentially is like fuck all of you, i'm leaving.

Speaker 1: It's all about how they're disappointed in him.

Speaker 1: And the one thing he says that I think could have been the core of a good moment is him saying you know, i've gotten jobs from all kinds of international carriers as a pilot, but I turned them all down because I wanted to be at home more with you and the kids.

Speaker 1: But that is kind of buried under like, oh, he said the F word for the first time in this movie or whatever, yeah.

Speaker 1: But when he starts to storm off, then we see coming down the road the 18 wheeler with the teddy bear latched to the front of it.

Speaker 1: This 18 wheeler is chasing rusty and he finally stops, and then so does the 18 wheeler, and then out comes Darryl from the Walking Dead.

Speaker 2: Yep.

Speaker 2: And he says you wife left this back in the truck stop in Missouri.

Speaker 2: I thought you might want it back.

Speaker 2: And he hands her her wedding ring.

Speaker 1: That's what he's been trying to do this whole time.

Speaker 1: Yeah, he says well, it looks like y'all stuck out here.

Speaker 1: Russi says, yeah, i guess we are.

Speaker 1: You think you could give us a ride?

Speaker 1: And he says, well, where are you headed?

Speaker 1: And they say San Francisco.

Speaker 1: He's like yep, hop on in A stripped down version of holiday road plays And they arrive at a bed and breakfast run by Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo.

Speaker 1: But as they're getting out of the truck, one of them asks so what is the teddy bear on the front of your truck of all about?

Speaker 1: And he says, oh, it just puts the kids at ease.

Speaker 1: And they say, oh, you have children.

Speaker 1: And he says, no, it's left at that, The implication, of course, being that he is luring and stealing children for his own nefarious purposes.

Speaker 2: There's more pedophilia in this movie than sleepers, natural born killers, the woodsman, mystic River and that remake of Nightmare on Elm Street combined.

Speaker 1: It's shocking And I don't know why the makers of this movie think pedophilia is funny.

Speaker 2: It's not.

Speaker 2: I mean clearly.

Speaker 2: Yeah, i guess you know here's what it is.

Speaker 2: It's not that pedophilia is funny.

Speaker 2: This is playing in the sandbox of shock humor.

Speaker 1: Right.

Speaker 2: That it's trying to do things that are just so what that?

Speaker 2: as we've talked about on this podcast, so much of humor comes from surprise, and shock is a form of surprise, but in this case it's like like, just stop it.

Speaker 1: Right Again.

Speaker 1: it's that seventh grader thing of sitting in the back of the class and hurling out pedophilia jokes because that is the replacement for actual humor is to shock someone.

Speaker 2: Maybe it was because the MPAA board made them cut out all the incest jokes, like they really packed it with those, knowing that they'd have to pare it down.

Speaker 2: They're like, damn, we got to keep all the pedophile stuff.

Speaker 1: Yeah, it's the like horror movies used to do that where you have a couple of gags so extreme that you know the MPAA is going to ask you to cut them.

Speaker 1: that way you can leave in all the other stuff.

Speaker 1: All right.

Speaker 1: So at this bed and breakfast, immediately somebody is coming out saying don't stay here.

Speaker 1: The people who own this place are crazy.

Speaker 1: They go inside with Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo.

Speaker 1: It's pretty much immediately a dinner scene.

Speaker 2: Yeah, cause I don't think Chevy Chase, in his contract, was required to stand up for very long.

Speaker 2: He looks like he just woke up from a nap in this movie and he acts like he's still taking one in this movie.

Speaker 2: He's also not aged.

Speaker 2: Well, No, I mean, I get that we all get older and we all age.

Speaker 2: He looks crazy in the eyes not to compare an older person to a younger person.

Speaker 2: If you look at him during his peak and I can't believe I'm going to say this like during, like memoirs of an invisible man, Fletch, you know that era he looked like a matinee idol.

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 2: In this he's got one eye that's pointing a different direction and he looks like he's reading off cue cards.

Speaker 2: He's phoning this shit in.

Speaker 2: He just his shirt is untucked and un-pressed, his hair isn't combed And I don't think any of this is by design.

Speaker 1: Right, this is just how he showed up on set.

Speaker 2: Right, he was just like.

Speaker 2: I'll do my own wardrobe man makeup and hair.

Speaker 1: When they tried to comb his hair.

Speaker 1: He's like get the fuck off me.

Speaker 1: Yes, so they have this dinner scene and James talks about how his guitar got stolen and there's a very sad bit.

Speaker 1: This is in the realm of watching Harrison Ford run.

Speaker 1: Chevy Chase says, oh, i've got a guitar you can have, and does this physical comedy stick that he sort of known for, where he fumbles this guitar out and ends up like behind the cabinet that he pulls it out of and everything and gives it to James.

Speaker 1: And there was some wordplay where it's like Oh, this is from Bob Dylan, but not that Bob Dylan spelled D I L L O N, but he got it from Jimi Hendrix.

Speaker 1: And James says Oh, the Jimi Hendrix, and he says No, and that's kind of it, and that's really the whole scene.

Speaker 2: They also ask how Audrey's doing And then they say well, you know, their marriage is a sham.

Speaker 2: They sleep around on each other.

Speaker 2: I wish they had a more solid marriage, like you and Rusty.

Speaker 2: First off, of course, they're having sex with other people, or at least Stone is.

Speaker 2: you don't have a dick the size of a baby's leg and keep that at home.

Speaker 2: You farm that out.

Speaker 2: That was understood when they got married.

Speaker 2: But also why on earth would your parents know that I mean because they're proud of it, because Audrey and Stone record this and put it on the internet.

Speaker 1: You know, me and Stone are swingers as in to swing.

Speaker 2: Yes, we have sex with other people.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know if baby Cooper's even mine, we don't care, i just wanted to have a baby.

Speaker 1: It just seems weird.

Speaker 2: They know that we feed cows to cows.

Speaker 1: So anyway, upstairs, rusty discovers that Debbie has been reading not the help, which is what the dust jacket is, but called Gray Sports Almanac Right.

Speaker 1: A book called is our marriage dying?

Speaker 1: And Debbie shows up behind him and sees that he's got this book And Rusty says you know, is that what you think, debbie?

Speaker 1: Is our marriage really dying?

Speaker 1: And she says yes, yes it is.

Speaker 1: This is where the movie tries to have that emotional beat.

Speaker 1: It's totally unearned where she says you know, rusty, you never stop trying with us.

Speaker 1: And I think I kind of did.

Speaker 2: It's her fault.

Speaker 1: That's what the movie is kind of saying.

Speaker 1: And then she says you sacrifice so much for us by not taking those other jobs.

Speaker 1: And he says I didn't sacrifice anything, debbie.

Speaker 1: I have everything I ever wanted.

Speaker 1: And then she tosses the book and the trash and he puts the wedding ring back on her finger And then they fuck.

Speaker 1: Presumably we have now healed the wound of this marriage.

Speaker 2: Rusty goes to see his dad, Clark, who's cleaning one of the bedrooms in this bed and breakfast.

Speaker 2: With attempts at humor, Rusty says Hey dad, will you take us to the airport?

Speaker 2: We're not going to go to Wally World.

Speaker 2: You know what they say?

Speaker 2: It's not the destination, It's the journey.

Speaker 2: But the journey stuck.

Speaker 2: And then Clark Griswold says Yeah, the journey sucks, But that's what makes the destination all the better.

Speaker 2: When you get there, You got to take your family to Wally World.

Speaker 2: Never let that go.

Speaker 2: I didn't.

Speaker 2: And then Clark opens up the door to the adjacent bathroom where there's a guy in there taking a shit.

Speaker 2: That stay at their B and B and Clark just sprays this guy for a good 15 seconds with Lysol disinfectant.

Speaker 1: That's right.

Speaker 2: Rusty says we don't have a way to get to Wally World, we don't even have a car Right.

Speaker 2: And that's where Clark says Well, i got something for you.

Speaker 1: And so he takes him outside and he hits a remote to open up a garage which reveals this little Nissan sedan.

Speaker 2: And he says Oh, no, not that one.

Speaker 1: And then he hits another remote And that opens up the door to reveal the family truckster from the original movie.

Speaker 2: Is the reason that we see the Nissan sedan first, because filmmakers assume that everyone in the theater knew that he was going to have the family truckster there for him.

Speaker 2: Is that a head fake?

Speaker 2: Because if you weren't aware of what the family truckster is this lime, green and brown wood paneled station wagon that's iconic from the vacation films that's not really a very funny joke.

Speaker 1: I mean I don't disagree with you, Yeah.

Speaker 2: I'm expecting something surprised.

Speaker 2: You give me something different to me.

Speaker 2: This would have made more sense if he's like, hey, i've got something I want to give you, and he was like I think this might get you where you want to go, and you kind of have this not hallelujah moment but this moment of like.

Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we're tying the original to this one and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah and let it be a nice moment.

Speaker 2: It just it feels like an unnecessary joke.

Speaker 2: that isn't funny.

Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1: And also the joke is Russie saying, well, can we just take the Nissan instead?

Speaker 1: And Clark saying No, anyway, so they get on the road holiday road place.

Speaker 1: Yet again.

Speaker 1: Because we paid for the song, we're going to use the fucking song.

Speaker 2: I love holiday road.

Speaker 2: I think it's a catchy song.

Speaker 1: Yeah, but this is like the fifth time in the third version.

Speaker 2: Okay come on As they drive.

Speaker 2: James says Hey, wait, i thought we were going to the airport and we were going home.

Speaker 2: And Russie says kids, when your dad makes a promise, he keeps it.

Speaker 2: And Kevin says this sucks.

Speaker 2: And everybody in the car looks miserable And their faces are just saying we just want to go home, just like the faces of the people in the audience watching this film.

Speaker 2: No one wants to go to Wally war, right?

Speaker 2: That's not what happened in the original film.

Speaker 2: Everyone, by this point of the movie, where you were at the point of exhaustion, it was like you know what?

Speaker 2: we've come this far, we've got to get to our final destination.

Speaker 2: And when they get there, it's this triumphant, albeit catastrophic finale.

Speaker 2: Although that movie ends on a positive note, this movie ends with a kick in the dick and a smack on the head.

Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, and there needed to be more buy-in from the other characters to show that they'd grown like.

Speaker 1: Debbie needs to be supporting Rusty.

Speaker 1: The kids need to be, you know, finding some peace with each other.

Speaker 1: I mean, like you know what?

Speaker 1: you're right, dad.

Speaker 1: We, despite all the shit we've been through, we're going to make this happen.

Speaker 1: You know just something, yes, and instead you have to wait till we get to Wally world, not just get to Wally world, get inside, and then somebody I think it's Kevin says Oh, this is dope as fuck And it's like, ah, okay, I guess that's the point where we make this emotional term that nobody really cares about.

Speaker 2: And then the gag is Hey, we're going to go to the velociraptor And they play the chariot's, a fire theme music, which is from the original when they were running to the park, but here, instead of rushing to the park, they get in line for the ride and there's a four hour way.

Speaker 1: Right, and then you just see this kind of parade of dissolves as it goes from four hours to three hours, then two hours, then one hour, and then that changes back to two hours again And finally they get to the head of the line that they're about to get on the roller coaster.

Speaker 1: And then, from nowhere, ron Livingston shows back up in this movie with some sort of platinum pass bullshit.

Speaker 2: Yeah, the asshole pilot from the beginning of the movie that no one remembers.

Speaker 2: He's there with his family and he's like, sorry, we paid for this fourth time riding it.

Speaker 2: And then the worker tells the Griswold family sorry folks, this is the last ride of the night, the park's closing, which that's not how this shit works at all in theme parks.

Speaker 1: Right, but for movie purposes.

Speaker 1: They have waited in line all this time just to have Ron Livingston and his family.

Speaker 1: It's like take their seat and Ron Livingston recognizes Russi's like Hey, a connoir, how about you and your family go fuck yourselves.

Speaker 2: And then both for no reason at all.

Speaker 2: The Griswold family and this other family that they've never met before.

Speaker 2: Have this bare knuckle, donnie Brook, fight, yeah, and beat the shit out of these people.

Speaker 2: This is some real World Star hip hop action.

Speaker 2: It's in slow motion.

Speaker 2: At one point, kevin, who clearly just carries a plastic bag in his pocket at all times, wraps this thing around the head of the asshole dad pilot in an effort to kill him.

Speaker 2: Yeah, he's got to get his murder list out at least once a day, bo, or else he starts hurting himself.

Speaker 1: I like the fact that there is that callback.

Speaker 1: This is just the dirty fighting that he does as a rule.

Speaker 1: They finally kick the shit out of this family.

Speaker 1: who submit?

Speaker 1: you know, you win, you win And then off they scurry and nobody gets arrested, Bo, because it's a couple of white family.

Speaker 1: Not only does no one get arrested, they don't run the ride until the fight is settled.

Speaker 1: Sure, and so the Griswolds.

Speaker 1: They climb onto the roller coaster at the very front and is it climbs up the track like that first hill that, like chunka, chunka, chunka, they start singing Kiss from a Rose.

Speaker 2: James kicks it off doing a acapella version and everybody joins in.

Speaker 1: Yes.

Speaker 2: It's really goofy and forced.

Speaker 2: But you know what It's?

Speaker 2: a moment It's like oh okay, i kind of see what you're doing movie.

Speaker 2: But because this movie can't let anybody ever have fun ever.

Speaker 2: Once the roller coaster starts going, it immediately comes to a grinding halt upside down on one of the loops which Bo.

Speaker 2: This is not how roller coasters work.

Speaker 1: Right, there is such a thing as inertia and centrifugal force.

Speaker 2: Unless it's magic or voodoo or the earth stops spinning or some shit.

Speaker 2: It breaks the realm of reality.

Speaker 2: Like what are you?

Speaker 2: It's just so fucking dumb.

Speaker 1: It's terrible.

Speaker 1: Then, finally, the I mean this is kind of the end of the movie is night falls.

Speaker 1: They are finally pulled off this thing which we don't see.

Speaker 1: It just sort of happens where they're taken off the ride, where people are being led away with blankets over their shoulders and there are EMTs there.

Speaker 1: Then they go to the airport.

Speaker 1: This is where Rusty is just like Hey, you shitty kids, you're going to go.

Speaker 1: stay with the Petersons, Remember them from the beginning of the movie The what?

Speaker 1: Yeah, the Petersons, you know.

Speaker 1: Then Rusty says he's going to take Debbie to Paris and we cut like it's such an abrupt thing of we're in the airport, he's telling the kids that they can fuck off, and then they're on a plane in jump seats next to the bathrooms, where Rusty has pulled some strings so that they can take this flight to Paris.

Speaker 2: They're in these jump seats or something that every time somebody opens up the toilet door it bangs against their legs Again.

Speaker 2: they can't win for losing.

Speaker 1: Right.

Speaker 1: And then the movie ends with Debbie saying So how long is this flight?

Speaker 1: And Rusty says Oh, about 12 hours, sonny.

Speaker 1: And she says Yeah perfect.

Speaker 1: And then that's it.

Speaker 2: You hear like a toilet flush, edith, oh gee.

Speaker 1: Right, and that's it.

Speaker 1: And then you know, there's a credits roll and we see pictures of our characters from throughout the film, showing a little bit of follow up, but nothing.

Speaker 2: I mean, there was nothing in that that stuck out as far as like, oh, this totally resolves this character or anything, it's just it's in fact, it reminds you of things that they mentioned earlier that don't matter, like there's a shot of Rusty and James racing a go cart against the Petersons and theirs is falling apart, and other.

Speaker 2: Like we mentioned the thing where James and the girl from the Jeep are kissing and the dad's there.

Speaker 2: The only one that's worth mentioning is the very last one, where you see half a picture of stone and Aubrey and the camera pans down.

Speaker 2: You see that he's wearing shorts and like the top third of his cock is sticking out from under his shorts.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that's pretty good.

Speaker 2: It's up there with Saddam Hussein waggling his dick in the South Park.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean just a surprise cock.

Speaker 2: At any time He's short, whether it's this or any movie with Kevin Bacon.

Speaker 1: This is a much better surprise cock than Chevy J showing up in your movie.

Speaker 2: But that's it.

Speaker 2: What do we have coming up for episode two of this road trip extravaganza?

Speaker 1: We are really raising the stakes.

Speaker 1: Let's hear it.

Speaker 1: Not only is it a road trip featuring one of our favorites, nicholas Cage, wild at heart, no, not that one.

Speaker 1: The much worse road trip movie starring Nicholas Cage, a movie called Drive Angry, which involves Nicholas Cage escaping from hell to save his granddaughter while being pursued by hell's accountant, as played by Billy Ficks himself William Fichter.

Speaker 2: Never heard of this movie, never seen this movie.

Speaker 2: I'm assuming that it is of the highest quality.

Speaker 1: No, Chad.

Speaker 1: it is a middling action film at best, but it stars two actors who are absolutely chewing the scenery at every step of the way, And I think we're going to have a lot of fun with it.

Speaker 2: All right, i will look forward to it.

Speaker 2: So come back and see us in two weeks time.

Speaker 2: Like great review.

Speaker 2: You can email us at picksixmovies at gmail.com.

Speaker 2: Bo.

Speaker 2: Any final thoughts that you have on vacation six, the vacationing.

Speaker 1: I'm just trying to decide if I need to call DCS on this movie for all the ----- talk.

Speaker 2: Don't make weird shit.

Speaker 2: We'll see you two weeks time, everybody.