♪ Entertain me, Entertain me right now ♪
- Hello everybody, welcome to the Pop Culture Junkie podcast.
I'm Shauna and I'm joined by...
- Olivia.
- And before we get started,
we need to shout out our newest fan on Patreon.
Thank you Camille for subscribing to Pop Culture Junkie.
We love you, we love all of the listeners,
but we actually love Camille the most.
So I want you to know that girl.
(laughs)
So if you want to shout out a sneak peek at our episodes
before anyone else,
then you too should head on over to the Patreon.com/popculturejunkie
podcast and subscribe.
Thank you again, Camille.
And this week we have a very special guest joining us.
Michael E. Cullen, the second is an award-winning filmmaker,
a podcaster who we love.
Founder of Cullen Park Productions.
Michael has directed films like The Horror Comedy,
Pi Day Die Day.
That sounds amazing.
The Christmas horror film Sheld,
and co-produced films like A Night of the Living Dead,
The Final Act, and New Blood Awakening.
Michael Co-host, the podcast, All Too Real To.
A look at the Wild and Wacky Realm of Pop Culture.
Welcome to the show, Michael.
- Thank you, thanks for having me.
- Yeah, absolutely.
That was quite the introduction
and I wanna know more about Pi Day Die Day immediately.
(laughing)
- Good thing is, is you can actually watch it right now
on Toobie.
- Ooh, it's on Tubi, that's amazing.
- Yeah, it's a, we shot it back in, like, mid-2010,
around there and it's a film that takes place
on Pi Day on March 14th, where small Ohio town
and a bunch of murder start happening
and it's up to the high school math teacher
and a couple of detectives to try to figure out,
you know, who the killer is and what's going on.
- That's amazing.
- Sadly recently, our star of the movie
who played the high school teacher passed away.
So yeah, he was only 50 years old and passed away,
I don't know where.
So one of my best friends, he was a really good guy,
Mark Klein, his name, so yeah,
but you can check that out on Toobie.
As an honor to Mark, I recommend doing it.
So yeah, it's a really,
Pi Day's in a couple days from when we're recording this,
so we're gonna have to watch it.
- It's a, you know, it's a real low budget,
so don't go in expecting anything spectacular.
- I love a good low budget fest, I love that.
- That's amazing.
I saw Christmas horror and I was immediately interested.
I made a stew and episode actually about Christmas horror,
so that really speaks to me on that note as well.
- Shelf, Shelf is the follow up.
We're trying to get that on Toobie soon,
but that is a movie about a little elf on a shelf dial sort of thing.
(laughing)
The horror comedy as well,
and it paralyzes a family little girl and mom and dad
and everything, and then there's a psychiatrist
and everything trying to figure out what's wrong.
And you know, I feel like most parents
who participate in the elf on a shelf, Christmas,
Jabaka would really love that Christmas movie.
- They probably feel like the elf terrorizes them anyway
'cause they have to wake up and remember to move it every day.
- Yeah, literally.
Some of the ones that you see on TikTok are like,
"We made a production.
"We had to clean the whole kitchen after this."
- Oh my god.
- They're quite crazy, so for any parents,
couldn't do it.
- Yeah, I think it's good.
It's good, I would never do that.
Yeah, my best friend, Lindsay LaForest,
wrote both of those movies too, so any of the humor,
I will give credit to her, so.
- That's awesome.
- Yeah.
- I love that.
So how did you get started in your passion
of making films?
I mean, what kind of sparked that interest in you?
Was it from a young age?
- Yeah, I mean, I've always loved movie and theater
and stuff of that nature since I was a little kid.
Probably, I mean, like, I'm in my 40s,
and when I was a kid, I would watch American movie classics,
which is now AMC.
And there were old movies on there,
and I'd watch those all the time.
Like, I remember one night watching Rubble Without A Cause,
and that kind of just like blew my mind,
and I was like, okay, I need to do that somehow.
I don't know what that is, but I need to do that,
'cause I was probably about nine years old when I saw it,
and I was like, yep, that's something I need to do.
And I had a little like, real cheap video camera as a kid,
and we made movies in my backyard and stuff
that, you know, I don't know where they are now,
but the first one was like a horror movie.
I'm not even into horror movies,
but we did a horror movie when I was a kid
called the Unknown Paperboy,
and I played the Paperboy,
and then my cousin played the Paperboy,
and both of us have completely different frames, body frames.
Just no continuity at all.
I love that.
That's amazing.
Very cool.
Yeah.
And so what was the first film that you professionally
directed or produced?
The side's obviously the Paperboy.
Hey, hey, hey.
Oh, and probably, like when I got into college,
I started doing things, and I probably,
I mean, I made some like real short little films and stuff,
and I made short films,
I mean, most of them are short films in college,
and probably the first one was a weird movie
called The Book of Life,
where it was about a guy missing in the woods,
and his friends go off to look for him,
and he, it was like real surreal and weird,
and kind of, I was told it was David lynching in,
but I didn't even know what that meant at the time,
'cause I hadn't seen a lynch movie.
Thank you, I guess.
Yeah.
And then, yeah, it was like, he goes into the woods
and finds a book that supposedly has the meaning of life in it,
and then, and it's all this time in there,
and yeah, it was, it was bad, but yeah, it was.
I'm sure it was amazing.
That's awesome.
[LAUGHTER]
I love that.
So it's interesting.
You said you're not a big horror fan,
but we've made a few horror films.
I kind of brought you into that.
I mean, I like horror.
It's not that I don't like it.
It's just not my favorite genre.
I don't even know if I really have a favorite genre,
but it's, I think I like more of like, you know,
what I want to go into now, because I just
wrote a screenplay that's kind of a coming of age film
that takes place in the '90s, and with some teenagers,
I don't want to get away too much else.
But that's kind of more of my like, when I watch movies,
that, or like I really like, you know,
movies based on true stories and stuff.
So that too.
But I don't know.
It's just horror kind of just fell into my lap,
because around in Toledo, where I lived,
I lived, I don't live in Toledo anymore,
but where I lived, there was the film community.
Everybody was making horror movie.
So it was just easy to like get on a crew to that,
and then eventually we filmed a movie at my best friend's
house, and she had never written anything.
And she's just like, I could write a movie,
and I'm like, I'll go for it.
And then so we made the two that I directed.
So yeah.
It's a real Matthew McConaughey moving into more films, right?
Everybody starts in horror.
So--
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
We talked about that too on one of our episodes
was how many famous actors and producers have
gotten their start in horror movies.
And how it's like, horror doesn't usually
get the respect that it deserves sometimes,
because there's some masterpieces out there.
I like a lot of horror movies, but like I said,
it's not my favorite genre, but it's
they're easy to make to a lot of time.
They're fun.
It's not anything in horror is ever taken too seriously,
so it's kind of easy.
People will forgive mistakes in horror more
than they would in like a drama.
So you are also the host of a podcast called All Too Real Two.
Tell us a little bit about that.
What do you guys talk about in the show?
It's kind of just like a catch all pop culture show,
probably similar to yours.
But we talked-- we started out--
it's a sequel to another podcast.
That's why the two--
I was wondering what the two was there.
OK.
We used to have a podcast called All Too Real,
where we watched movies based on true stories.
But we got bored with that.
So we created a sequel podcast to do on the side.
And then we just stopped doing the original podcast.
Just stuck with the name.
We kind of started out originally doing movies
that were like directive video sequels, like Honey
We Shrunk ourselves or--
Oh my god.
I remember that movie.
Like, "2/3/2, Jingle All the Way, 2, both starring."
We can't get any of the original cast on there.
We have an ongoing hatred towards Larry the Cable Guy
on our podcast because--
Oh my god.
It's movies.
Yeah.
But-- or Dan Whitney was--
who's Daniel Whitney is his real name.
But my co-host is named Matthew Haas.
He goes by Sesame and Carter on our podcast, though,
because he just is him.
And Don--
Yeah.
We need nicknames, Olivia.
I know.
We're just out here being boring.
We're going to live in our names.
Sesame and Carter.
Our early episodes were--
He went by his real name, and then eventually he just decided,
hey, I'm going to change my name.
And I'm like, OK, you go.
I'd go for it.
And Carter, isn't that like the old disk
we used to get as kids?
Like the--
That's what you're talking about?
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
That might have been before your time, Olivia.
It was like an encyclopedia, and you could get it
like a DVD or a disk and put it in your computer.
And that's how you research stuff.
It was like, whoa.
But not online.
Yeah.
You had to buy the disk.
And you couldn't edit it.
It was kind of like an encyclopedia books that are encyclopedia,
but it was a disk.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
That's amazing.
Shana could tell by the glazed-over look in my--
Yeah, you were like, yeah, no idea that it is.
The head was nodding.
It's not.
You can't tell on a podcast, but there was nodding.
That's when the age gap comes out just a little bit.
Just a little bit.
So you mentioned making a movie about kids in the '90s.
And you also mentioned during your 40s,
that's kind of when you grew up watching pop culture.
What were some of the stuff that you grew up watching
and that you were into?
Well, I mean, if we go into when I was in high school
and stuff, it was like Kevin Smith movies and things
of that nature that got me--
I'm friends with a lot of people that are in his universe now,
just randomly.
I interviewed a couple of people from his films.
Yeah, it's interesting.
That kind of indie films is what kind of got me going back then.
But I mean, there was also when I was really young,
I was like Star Wars and stuff like that.
A lot of sci-fi.
I was really into sci-fi as a kid.
So I was basically under the nobody's eye too.
So sci-fi.
[LAUGHTER]
Well, that is the perfect segue then,
because we are going to talk about a sci-fi show that was made
definitely before I was born.
1983's V, V, the original series.
Is that what we call it?
Or V, the mini series?
V, the mini series.
Because then there's the final battle
and then the TV series after that.
That's right.
So let's take a quick break and get into some sci-fi, 80s,
nerd dumb.
Welcome back.
So as we mentioned, Michael is joining us today
to talk about V. In 1983, NBC Television,
mini series about an invasion of seemingly friendly aliens
here on Earth.
The two-part mini series was the second most popular program
the week it was released and was followed by a sequel like Michael
mentioned called V, the final battle, which
came out a year later in 1984.
So now that I watched V, the mini series, really
want to watch the final battle.
I loved it.
I did too.
I hadn't seen it in decades.
Yeah, so you watched it all the way through before.
This was your second viewing then?
Yeah, probably.
I mean, I think-- so OK, with my age-- and I'm 47.
So when it came out, I was probably about five or six.
Yes, that you were a kid.
Theygly remembered my parents watching it
and freaking out when you could see the aliens being revealed
and--
Yes.
Yeah, I know.
--and nightmares for the longest time after that.
Yeah.
They're creepy.
They're creepy as hell.
It is really interesting to see how that piece of media
really kind of comes into popular day today.
When I was watching it, I was like, oh, is this where
lizard people started?
Like, amongst-- the lizard people are among us.
Like, that kind of seed and kernel within conspiracy theories.
Like, did it originate here?
Was that an original idea within the show?
That's something in the Los Angeles sewer system.
I don't remember it there.
I feel like I learned the backstory of that at one point.
I don't remember what it was.
The reason-- there is a conspiracy theory that
is really popular by a British former sportscaster.
And soccer player named David Ike about people usually
hire up in society like the queen or the president's.
Those are people wearing fake faces and stuff like that.
Yes.
But I guess the conspiracy theory actually
dates back to about the 1700s originally.
So yeah, but I don't know the whole history of it
that I was reading a little bit on it the other day.
So yeah.
I still feel like it's a thing.
I remember even when Hillary Clinton
was running for president, people look,
you see her being a lizard person.
She's so stupid.
Yeah, there was--
see, you're thinking Hillary Clinton.
I was like, there was this Justin Bieber-like-faked video
of him turning into a lizard person in the 2010s.
So yeah.
So everyone-- everyone's a lizard person.
Everyone's a lizard person.
I can't help her.
Anybody except for Donald Trump or something.
But yeah.
Oh yeah, no.
He's perfect.
He could never possibly be a lizard person.
He could never lizard.
Never lizard.
No.
So people who have-- I had never heard of V before.
We decided we were going to watch the show and discuss it.
So for other people like me, who might not have heard of it
before, it begins when a massive alien spacecraft of peers
over multiple cities worldwide.
The aliens called visitors--
or that's what people kind of colloquially start calling them--
look human, but wear sunglasses and speak with kind of a weird
inner vocal effect in their throats.
They are led by their supreme commander, Diana,
who is hot as hell.
Oh my god.
Yeah.
Beautiful.
What a fox.
Even eating that guinea pig, I was like, I'm
like, I'd let you eat me.
You can eat my guinea pig any day, Diana.
Listen.
Sorry, Michael.
Oh, no, you're little.
This is us.
So the visitors claim to come in peace, seeking chemicals
and minerals to save their dying planet.
And initially, everybody's like, oh my god, the visitor is
yay, and there's action figures made.
And slowly but surely, they start to take over the government
and take over the media, brainwash people.
The visitors are not our friends.
You guys?
No.
Yeah.
No.
Well, and I think it's important to kind of say,
like how they got us to believe them, just knowing what we
know today about the way that we embrace new cultures is they
come in and say, like, if you give us resources,
we will cure you of all of your problems, all of your resource
issues, help you heal the earth, help you cure diseases.
And so they really kind of promise, like, hey, we have all the
answers.
And we'll give them to you if you just give us some of your resources
from your factories.
I mean, they make it seem like it's going to be a peaceful kind
of quid pro quo situation.
But I think it's just-- it speaks obviously in allegory
for just the rise of fascism, right?
And they even have the grandfather who
was a survivor of the Holocaust, who
can see his dumb ass grandson--
God, that grandson's the worst character.
I hate it, though.
Oh, I don't even remember his stupid name, but he was the dumb--
The dumb jock.
Daniel, I think it was.
Yeah.
Daniel, what a dumb jock name.
I'm just kidding.
If your name is Daniel, we love you.
Love you, Daniel.
Join Patreon, Daniel.
His grandfather has to watch his grandson join this fascist
movement.
And like, he's basically seeing history repeat itself
from Naziism that he survived and that heroingly
tells his wife die.
I got a little misty when he was talking about his wife dying
in the Holocaust.
And I mean, it's basically--
he was part of the visitor youth, which
is the Hitler youth.
He's exactly.
So yeah.
And even their symbol looks quite a bit like a swastika.
And the uniforms are very like Utah.
It's Harry, and I guess is the word.
And it's very much symbolic.
I mean, in Grandpa Clark's at the minute he sees them.
He's like, nah.
That was reading though.
I was reading something, Robert England, who
was better known as Freddie Krueger.
He was the visitors in this, and he was Willie.
And he said that he was at a convention.
And somebody came up to him, and they
had that symbol tattooed on their chest.
Oh, no.
And he had to try to explain to them.
He's just like, yeah, you might not
want to do that.
Yeah, that's not what you think it is.
It reminds me of when people were getting the death mark
or whatever from Harry Potter.
And I'm like, it's kind of like a Nazi symbol.
Yeah, like a magical Nazi.
Maybe you don't stop me that.
Oh, man.
I did like Robert England as Willie.
And Willie was definitely like--
you got a soft spot for him.
So it was kind of nice to see that some of the visitors
were trying to break away from the, you know,
authority or the government and stuff
that they didn't agree with.
Like the one visitor who was helping our main character,
Mike, throughout the movie.
For the mini series, I guess.
Yeah.
It was really interesting to see how they kind of--
like, I was just analyzing like the 1980s character tropes
within the humans as well.
And I think that one of the things they really had
was like the career woman.
It was just like so self-serving.
And like, is only looking to move herself forward
versus like the angelical, like mom, who just wants
to save everyone.
I thought that juxtaposition.
Whereas now, like, if they adapted it
and I know they did it in the 2000s,
like, would that be such a, you know,
clear, like self-serving business woman trope,
like the with the reporter?
Yeah, it's like the--
I think the adaptation in 2011, the like spokesperson
for the aliens is a man.
Oh, interesting.
So yeah, I think Scott Wolf plays like a reporter in it
from what I remember reading.
I only watched it once or something when it was on.
I would didn't really get into it.
So yeah.
I don't even remember it being on.
But I definitely want to continue at the '80s series.
I'm like, I got to see what happens next.
I do-- I think that's interesting, Olivia.
Like, there are some intense stereotypes in this movie,
right?
There's intense racial stereotypes.
And I think it's just a product of its time being in 1983.
But it was still so progressive for its time
and what it was speaking to.
I was like, I'll give it some grace
for some of these more like moment.
Yeah.
The two African-American brothers were the ones kind of,
like, jive talking, I guess.
And then the other one's kind of smart doctor.
Like, it can't be those two, I guess.
No, it has to be one or the other.
And then like the Hispanic Gardener guy
with his cowboy hat on the whole time.
Yeah.
But I think what they're speaking to
and what they're getting at in the series
is so progressive for the '80s and something
that needed to be heard.
So I was like, all right.
Sadly, really, really holds up.
And a lot of the things that are going on now,
where you've got like these people
that were just disappeared on there.
And then recently we had
McMood, Colliel, a protester from Columbia
who just was disappeared.
And eventually, but you know, things like that
are just happening with our government.
So I meant to mention all the concentration camps,
but that's what they are.
Yeah.
No, 100%.
I think it's sad how much
it stands up today.
And like I remember Mark was on,
or I'm sorry, Mike.
The actor's name is Marcus Characters Mike.
Mike was on the ship at one point and was like,
how did you guys even let somebody
that terrible get into power in the first place?
And he, the visitor was like,
I don't know, people didn't realize it at first
or he made a lot of great promises
or he had a big personality and was charismatic.
And I was like, no, that's weird.
Sounds a little familiar.
But no, yeah, the people going missing
is definitely a little on the nose right now.
And it's really scary.
I mean, I know for me,
I'm very outspoken about progressive issues.
Oh, same.
Us too.
I knew we'd like you, Mike.
Okay.
I'm just really worried.
I'm like, okay, should I say any of this stuff
I'm lying anymore or not?
Because who knows?
But yeah, I'm gonna still do it regardless.
If they want to put me in a camp, go ahead.
I mean, and it just, it's like the letter in the movie
that I keep calling it a movie,
but it felt like you know, just two movies,
the way we watched it.
The letter that Grandpa wrote and was like,
you guys need to stand up and fight.
This is what's right.
When his granddaughter was like,
I don't know, I don't, this seems dangerous.
We were already kidnapped.
We got away barely with our lives.
And it was like, no, I mean,
it's like that famous quote and I'm gonna butcher it,
but it's like, first they came for the communists
and I didn't stand up 'cause I'm not a communist
and then they came for the Catholics
and I didn't stand up 'cause I'm not a Catholic.
And then they came for me
and there was no one left to stand up for me, right?
So.
- It's funny too.
Like even with that, they censored that poem
when it first came out.
It was originally, they said socialists
instead of communists.
- Interesting.
- 'Cause they didn't want to put any emphasis
on communism until they needed to.
Like basically they already were setting up
the whole idea for the Red Scar,
which is another thing that's very similar
to what's happening here.
So yeah. - Yeah.
- Yeah.
- That's so interesting.
So have you watched the rest of the mini series?
Did you want, or the final battle?
- I probably did.
I just don't remember it.
So yeah. - Yeah.
I'd be very interested to see how they wrap it all up
and if they continue with like the political allegory
and if it's, you know, how did they save it?
Maybe we could take some notes.
(laughing)
How did they stop fascism?
- I was doing some research on like what it happened.
Like Kenneth Johnson who created,
he wrote the mini series and created it.
He was, he had creative differences with them
for the final battle. - Yeah.
- And were taken off the project.
They basically rewrote a lot of the stuff.
They still had to give him credit,
but he decided to change his name to Lilian Weezer
for some reason.
- Interesting, fan name.
He went on to create the series afterwards though, right?
- He still gets creative credit,
but he had nothing to do with it.
- Interesting.
Did he come back for the 2009 one?
- He gets creative credit,
but he had nothing to do with it.
- Nothing with that one either.
- He's like, he's in his 80s now
and he's still trying to do a movie remake of the original.
- He's said it was, it was a good idea.
I'm gonna keep it going.
- It was a good idea, but come on bro.
- Come on.
- I know there were some comic books as well,
but I didn't go a chance to pick it.
- So what I understand, the TV series
just was real lower budget.
And it was turned into kind of like a,
like they said dynasty with aliens.
Like it was like,
like a nighttime soap opera, but with an alien.
- Oh god.
I definitely got that.
Like between the love interests
and the main guy in it,
where he's just like this Casanova,
who's like he was making everyone fall in love with him.
And yeah, I think that one of the most interesting things
about this show and how prophetic it was
was them really just straight going for the scientists.
And of course we, we all lived through 2020.
We've seen it continue into other things,
but it was really, it wasn't necessarily people
that could physically overthrow them
or physically fight them,
but mentally would ask questions.
And it really just kind of like spoke to this target demographic
that people would go after,
which are people who are making educated questioning
and things like that.
- Yeah, anybody willing to stand up and like fight back
and actually question the things that they see
around them for sure.
- And it's like right now,
we're they're trying to dismantle
at the Department of Education.
And we've stuck up a thing where everybody just,
you know, somehow thinks that Dr. Fauci was an evil person.
- Am I right?
- I had a, I mean, it's just yesterday at my work,
we have like a meeting every night
and there's this older guy, he's like in his 70s.
And he started saying some outlandish COVID conspiracies.
I'm like, dude, it's 2025.
- Yeah, man, get a new conspiracy, come on.
- Maybe don't though, 'cause I don't want to see
what they come up with next.
(laughing)
- This guy has all these alt right conspiracy
of the party. - He's a gate bullshit.
Yeah.
- But he was, he scared me because I corrected him
and he was yelling at me.
Like I literally felt like a little kid all of a sudden.
I was just like,
- I hate that feeling.
I hate that. - He got that crazy eyes going.
- My boss had to like calm him down
because he was just going off like crazy.
You know, that's the type of thing
where people get so baked into their conspiracies.
- They're confronted with the truth
and don't know how to handle it, right?
And it's like, and then we get,
it's very rare as an adult that you get yelled at like that.
Right?
So that's why you're like, oh God,
you start to feel like a kid again.
But then you have to be like, wait a minute, I'm right.
Wait a minute.
(laughing)
- I was like, this guy's the dumbass.
- And he's like yelling at me and I'm like,
my parents never even yelled at me like this.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- It's like when the truth is right in front of you.
It reminds me of that movie, don't look up.
That came out two years ago and God,
that was for the most fucking frustrating movie
I've seen in so long because the truth is literally
just right there if you raise your head and look at it.
But that was such a conversation of just,
you know, the MAGA movement too,
that it's just like it's right there guys.
Come on.
- Yeah, you can, I mean, my father who is in his late 70's,
he's very much a Trump supporter and he,
I will tell him something and he, I'll show him facts
and he's like, are you sure that wasn't like AI or something?
And I'm like, you don't even understand how AI works.
(laughing)
- But then when they see something that is AI,
like a picture of Jesus surrounded by like ducks
and scarlet joeants and they're like,
oh, hashtag blessed.
Amen.
- Comment amen for blessings.
- Yes.
- Okay.
(laughing)
- Jesus is just hanging out with an Avenger.
Yeah, they're basically.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- Oh, hashtag blessings.
I got that viral video a couple years ago where she's like,
mom, mom, they found Jesus, he came back and the mom's like,
she'll be the video.
I want to see you.
- Show it to me right now.
- Yeah.
- She starts a weepie.
- Oh my God.
- Sometimes I regret the day we,
we taught parents how to access Facebook and Instagram.
- How to internet.
- Yeah, how to internet.
Like, would we have been better off
would this have ever happened?
That's like that butterfly effect of,
if we just didn't give them the information,
like would this have ever happened?
But, you know.
- It was like a year ago that my dad found out
that there was more to the internet than Facebook.
- Oh gosh.
I can actually look at facts on here.
- I can.
- He's like, he just thought that the internet was Facebook
and I'm just like, that's adorable.
- You sweet, sweet summer child.
(laughing)
- Good man.
It can be used for good, it can be used for evil.
It's like, yeah, honestly, anything
because there's been so many ways
that I've organized over Facebook
for progressive movements and causes
and for abortion rights over the summer
and then it can be used to spread some fascism
and some visitors style propaganda.
- Yeah, and this movie, let's what's said,
this mini series or movie or what I'm gonna call it,
it's a very poignant,
I actually think people should watch it.
- I totally agree.
- But it's available, I mean, it's on Plex
or something that's where I found it.
- Plexi, me too, yeah.
- Something's like a film.
- You've been in prime video, I think.
- Oh, Plex and Prime, okay.
- Like, I think I'm a prime, you have to pay for it.
- Oh.
- Pretty sure, but yeah, so yeah.
- Plex, pluck it up.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- Yeah.
- Well, I definitely recommend it to anybody who,
I don't know, anybody who's a fan of sci-fi
or who just, I mean, anything that you've listened to
I say and you go, okay, yeah, that sounds like something
that I would be interested in wanna support too.
Check out V, 1983.
Watch a lady swallow a guinea pig hole.
- It's hot.
- It's what's metal.
(laughing)
- That's it, just watch that.
- Honestly, like Diana just, oh, so beautiful.
- Take that part.
- So beautiful, but so beautiful.
- So evil and so beautiful.
- Yes.
- Sometimes I go hand in hand, you know?
- Yes.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
(dramatic music)
- So besides old 1983 mini series,
what else have you been into lately, you guys?
What are you watching, reading, listening to?
- Yeah, so on the note of anti-science,
I actually have been watching this new Netflix TV show.
It's called Apple cider vinegar.
It's also based on this documentary
or this woman named Belle Gibson, who in the 2010s,
she came to popularity over being an influencer
on Instagram who had a malignant brain tumor
and cured herself via juice.
- Jesus.
(laughing)
- And so she built this huge brand.
- Olivia put cured herself in quotes, by the way,
for anyone just listening.
- Yes.
- Heavy finger parts.
- She used to use herself.
- Yes, yes.
And so it's, she really blew up.
She had an app called The Whole Pantry
and really was one of these like original wellness,
health gurus who built a brand around it
and then created like a productized service.
She was very, very well known.
She was an Australian influencer.
And ultimately it came out that she lied
about having cancer, the entire time.
- I shocked.
- Right, exactly.
And so the documentary kind of tells the story
of how she did it, how like she was found out
and all this stuff.
And then Apple cider vinegar is based on that
and that Netflix made it.
And it's a dramatized version of that story.
I'm only a few episodes in so far,
but it's really, really good.
I like the way that they do it.
They kind of break the fourth wall
and have each of the characters talk to the camera
and kind of be like a, you know,
sly bag style, I would say.
And it's really, really good.
And so I would definitely pop that.
And then Netflix is just putting out
some crazy documentaries right now.
- Yeah.
- Did you watch the Gabby Patsito one?
- Yes, I do.
- I knew you'd would, I knew you would.
That was good.
But they actually just came out with this documentary
called Chaos, a Manson murder story.
I think this one is called Manson Murners.
And it's based on this book called Chaos by Tom O'Neill.
And the book itself alleges that Charles Manson
was a part of the MK Ultra Study
and that he was actually used by the CIA
to and taught these tactics.
And that's ultimately how he gained divine control.
I read the book, like four years ago.
The book is amazing, Chaos by Tom O'Neill.
And the documentary is based on that book.
It's super interesting.
It goes into how Charles Manson was connected
to Jolly West, or Dr. Jolly West,
who's really big in the MK Ultra side.
And very, very interesting.
If you don't wanna read a, you know,
a 24 or 12 hour book, then you can watch the documentary.
And it can be--
- Michael Olivia reads like 45 books a month.
It's insane.
(laughing)
- Hey, I'm on 18 books this year so far.
- Sure.
- I've been an avid reader, but--
- Far more than me too.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- I think, I mean, I find Manson is interesting too.
It's like, I know he has connections to Scientology too.
So-- - Yes.
- So yeah, it's really interesting.
- There's an author, I think, I don't know if it's in Blue Sky,
but there's an author who wrote Blue Sky.
I can't remember his name right now,
but he makes a big argument that he wasn't a part of MK Ultra.
He was actually a part of Scientology.
- Which I've never heard that conspiracy before.
I don't know if that's what you wanna call it,
but that's interesting.
- Which is so scary to think, like,
oh, we just have this air quote, religion
that is so similar to a CIA Mind Control program.
- Right, that's so many rich and famous people follow.
- Yes, exactly.
So I would definitely pop those.
It was really, really interesting to see a manipulation
and then ultimately, you know, denying of science
for both of those.
So, oh, God.
You watched all this, like, deep shit.
Mind's not gonna be--
(laughing)
Well, now that we got the smart junkie out of the way,
I watched the first two episodes of Daredevil Born again
on Disney Plus.
I am a huge Marvel fan girl.
Like, I will consume any and all of the MCU
and be an apologist for most of it.
But for those who don't know, Daredevil Born again is,
there was a devil series on Netflix.
It's gosh, 10 years ago, that was amazing.
And after the invention of Disney Plus,
those Netflix shows for a minute kind of seemed
like they weren't gonna be canon.
And now they are.
And we've seen Matt Murdock, a K.A. Daredevil,
make his way back into the MCU.
And so finally, this is his revival slash continuation
of his story that we left off
when the Daredevil show stopped on Netflix.
The first two episodes, I will not spoil it
for anybody who hasn't watched yet.
Start with a bang, they go, just hit the ground running.
It's insane.
- Would you think about the beginning
that I'm not gonna spoil either?
That had--
- I was devastated, but I called it.
I told my husband before we even started it.
I was like, I feel like blank, any blank, blank,
skin of blank.
And he's like, why do you think that?
I just got like a feeling.
(laughs)
What did you think about it?
- I knew it was gonna happen.
I had a feeling and then I was disappointed though
at the same time.
I was like, okay, but yeah, it's Marvel.
They'll do what they do.
- They will do what they do.
There is also a comic book storyline
where that is--
- Part of the first.
(laughs)
- Part of the first.
- Yeah, like how do I say this without spoiling it?
So maybe they'll go that way.
- Hopefully they do.
I mean, who knows?
- Yeah, I hope so.
- I'm not supposed to happen in season two with that,
but so yeah.
(laughs)
- Oh God, I love that we both know exactly
what we're talking about, but try to so hard not to spoil it.
- I have anything, but yeah.
(laughs)
- Yeah, I was actually gonna,
I was gonna actually mention that
as something I've watched recently,
but also more on the line of faking cancer.
I watched Scamanda.
- What's that?
- Documentary on Hulu.
I think it was on ABC or something,
but I had listened to the podcast years ago when it came out.
It's about this woman who was like a internet blogger.
I think it was before like Vity.
- There were influence services.
- Yeah, influence her.
And she faked having cancer for years
and got all this money out of people.
They would pay for trips to her to go to Broadway
and see Hamilton and whatnot.
- Oh my God.
- For that.
Yeah, and she just faked this whole thing for years and years
and got a lot of money out of people at her church
and different things.
It was interesting that that was interesting.
And then I also watched another documentary.
It was about this, oh my God, about this woman who's in jail now.
I can't remember the name of the documentary,
but it was about this woman who was another,
she was a mom influencer online with a family blogging.
- Oh, Ruby Frankie.
- Ruby Frankie, that's it.
I was blanking the name.
Yeah, I watched the documentary about her and oh my God.
- Does she fake cancer too?
- No, she abuses her children.
- Oh God.
- So horrible.
- Yeah, we watch all of these.
These all sound fascinating and terrible
and I wanna watch them all.
(laughing)
- God, that's horrible.
I have to watch it again.
- I watched that.
Well, I think of this documentary from back in the day
that I, back in the day, was probably like 10 years ago.
Called The Woman Who Wasn't There.
- Oh yeah, yeah.
- Yes, oh my God, I love you.
If you haven't watched this one,
she has this whole fake ass story
that she was in one of the towers of September 11
with a plane hit.
And she gets tons of money, tons of sympathy
and runs a charity for survivors of September 11th.
And as the title suggests, she was not there.
- Yes, yeah, I have seen that.
Crazy.
For people are, you know.
- I love stories about scammers and people that fake things,
even though I think it's horrible that they do this,
but it's really intriguing.
Yeah.
- I think it's like, how do you get to that point?
Like I am someone who is obsessed with colds.
And I just find it so interesting, like manipulation.
And it's also like, how do you get manipulated like that?
And then also what type of person can manipulate
in that way?
I think it's just so interesting.
And I think scammers really follow into that,
but on like a one-to-one basis as well.
- Everything that you just said brought us right back to V.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- Right back to V.
Who scams?
Who has the power to manipulate people like that over time?
- And that is the visitors.
- Yeah.
- I also recently listened to a podcast.
It's called The Opportunist,
which they have different seasons,
but in this one was about Tim Ballard,
the Operation Underground Railroad guy who, yeah.
- Yeah, it's a--
(laughing)
- The guy trying to fight petafiles who,
and you know.
- The movie sound different.
- It's actually harassing people.
- Yeah.
- Oh my gosh.
I am not familiar with this.
- Interesting.
- If you wanna go down the craziest rabbit hole.
So Mormon Stories podcast does a whole series
about Tim Ballard and who he's connected to
within the Mormon church.
And then he's like two or three degrees separated
from Laurie Valow and Chad Daybell,
as well as Jody Hildebrand,
who's the therapist for Ruby Frankie.
- Like you get, you see the spider graph of Mormon,
Mormon like influencers,
and ultimately like Doomsday individuals.
And yeah, it's crazy.
Mormon Stories has some really good ones.
I'll have to check out The Opportunist,
but yeah, he's a crazy person.
- Yeah, my ex-Fiancé was raised Mormon
and she used to tell me all these crazy stories
about just growing up Mormon and, yeah,
- Yeah.
- It's wild.
- It's sadly like abused by some people in church
and different things like that, yeah.
So yeah, just.
- My dad's, for my mom's side of the family,
was raised Mormon.
- So it's my dad's family.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Like at all us.
- Yeah.
- Could have been Mormons.
- Oh, yeah.
(laughing)
- So if you wanna watch some really messed up documentaries,
this is the episode video.
- This is the Andeer Devil, Andeer Devil.
- Andeer Devil.
- I would say Palette Cleanser,
but I don't think those first two episodes
are Palette Cleanser for anything.
Here's a great Palette Cleanser to close out the episode though.
Lady Gaga just dropped LG7.
It is a new album called Mayhem.
♪ And it is a banger ♪
It's full of bangers.
It's like Synth Pop 80s dance.
I mean, I can't wait to go to the gay clubs and just dance.
- She was great on FNL recently
when she hosted musical guest, so.
- Oh, yeah.
- I still haven't gotten to watch it.
I've just been so busy the last couple days.
I need me and my husband to just sit down
and just watch it.
- Are you even a little monster?
- I know.
And I've been trying to avoid spoilers
so that anytime I see it come up on Instagram,
I scroll fast because I'm like,
"We have to watch it together."
(laughing)
So you like Lady Gaga?
I'm like,
- A little bit.
- Yeah.
- I've had,
you know, I'm not like a Lady Gaga fanatical monster.
- Yeah, a little monster.
No, I've just, you know, I like her,
but I don't like love her.
- I feel that.
So I am a huge fan.
Olivia feels that way about Taylor Swift.
And she's kind of,
she's converted me.
- You might see her in the background, honestly.
- Yeah.
- I'm a stand of Taylor Swift.
Shauna's a stand of Lady Gaga.
And we've slowly made each other kind of meet in the middle.
- This is true.
- This is her friendship.
And we both very much stand Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
So, how can you not?
- Original Girl Crush.
- And that's speaking of my, my, my ex-fiancé.
I'm so mad that she stole my angel
and Buffy the Vampire Slayer DVDs when we broke up.
- No.
- That's the worst, man.
- No.
- Yeah.
- Go get those back.
When me and my roommate in college,
hi, Jessica, love you.
We, we bought them together.
And then when we eventually, you know, met men and moved out.
- Yeah.
- I took like, she took seasons one through three.
And I took like four, five, six.
It makes no sense.
We just split down the middle like parent trap style.
(laughing)
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- Well, I think it is about time for us to wrap up.
So, thank you again so much, Michael.
It was so nice to chat with you.
- No problem.
Thank you for having me.
- Yeah.
We need to do this again sometime.
So, before we let you go, let everybody know
where they can find your work on social media,
how to connect with you, all that good stuff.
And where they can find the podcast.
- The podcast can be found at all2real2.com.
It's A-L-L, the number two, R-E-E-L-T-O-O.
I know it's difficult, but (laughing)
all of our links are on there.
You can also go to cullenpark.com,
which is the name of my film production company.
There's links there.
All the links to the social media and our Patreon
and our T-Public and all that stuff is on those websites.
So yeah.
- Beautiful.
Yeah, follow Pop Culture Junkie on Patreon
and follow All2realToo on Patreon as well.
Spread that podcast, love, guys.
As always, you can find the Pop Culture Junkie podcast,
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