The Happiest Pod on Earth

Ariel Landrum 0:11
Hello, everyone, welcome to the happiest pod on Earth. I’m Ariel.

Stefanie Bautista 0:14
And I’m Stef, and we’re Disney fans. But we’re really so much more than that. Ariel here is a licensed therapist who uses clients’ passions and fandoms to help them grow and heal from trauma and mental unwellness.

Ariel Landrum 0:24
And the lovely Stef is an educator who uses passions and fandoms to help her students grow and learn about themselves and the world around them.

Stefanie Bautista 0:32
And here at Happiest Pod. It’s a place where we dissect Disney mediums with a critical lens. Why do we do that? Because just like we are more than just fans, we expect more from the mediums we consume. And so today, what Disney the media or experience are we dissecting and sharing on this episode?

Ariel Landrum 0:49
I think this is one that you are highly familiar with as an educator.

Stefanie Bautista 0:53
Yep. Yes, it totally is. And I’m really, really excited to talk about this. And we are talking today about recess.

Ariel Landrum 1:03
Recess!

Stefanie Bautista 1:05
And I’m sure all of you are like listening to that theme song from Recess in your head, because I loved it so much. I wish we could have it here on the podcast, but we probably need to license that. And there’s the gardener in my house. Low and behold gardeners are not part of recess, but we’re going to be talking about Recess the show, and also recess as it plays into how it works in our kids lives, lives of kids who we know if you don’t have any, and also the impact that it has in our lives growing up.

Ariel Landrum 1:39
Absolutely. So recently, I got to respond to some research in an article that talked about the importance of recess for students and their mental wellness. And some of the things that they identified was that recess offers an opportunity to support just the healthy development of children. So that they became come well, whole humans and entire experience of themselves. And that the biggest factor was quality recess; factors such as a safe play environment, sufficient play equipment, and even supportive adult engagement, along with student autonomy and minimal disruptive conflict. Would you agree with some of these findings?

Stefanie Bautista 2:24
Absolutely. I think recess as it has evolved over time, I know that us playing recess in the early 90’s looked a lot different than how recess is conducted today while I’m working at a school. But I remember recess being the time that you are your whole self. In the classroom, you’re in front of an adult, there’s expectations, academic expectations, mannerisms, that you kind of get used to as you’re going into school. But when you’re on the yard, you are really who you are outside, just without your family. And this is where interactions with your peers, interactions with different ages of kids, interactions with other adults who aren’t your teacher, those connections and those opportunities only happen on the recess play yard. And that’s why I think A. I love the show Recess, because it was such a fun way to describe that, obviously in a way more fantastical setting. I did not have a king Bob at my recess yard. But the sixth graders were hecka scary.

Ariel Landrum 3:24
They were.

Stefanie Bautista 3:24
Like I did not want to interact with them at all. But absolutely, recess is so integral in, you know, a child’s development socially. And I think this past year, having not had recess really had an impact. But I know we’ll talk a little bit about that later. I know for my school in particular, we do more of a structured recess where we have TAs leading different games, only because we do have limited space on my campus. But at the same time we realize that kids loved structured play. Recess doesn’t have to be a free for all, maybe in kindergarten, as we saw that there, you know, little unruly human beings in the beginning, not really knowing how to socialize yet. But definitely, as you see in the older upper grades, third, fourth and fifth grades, they’re longing for that structure, and they want to use those structured structures to learn more about play and evolve the way they play.

Ariel Landrum 4:18
Absolutely, absolutely. And research that was published in the Journal of School Health, titled Recess Quality and Social and Behavioral Health in Elementary School Students. And the article that featured my comments was in VerywellMind.com, and the title of the article is Quality Recess Gives a Boost to Children’s Mental Health Study Says. I’ll be sure to link both in the show notes. I agreed with some of the findings in regards to and and again, I think this might be something that you can talk to you because I believe this is maybe similar to your educational environment. But something new that when I came out here had not experienced; in the show Recess, they have a fixed building. And they have a fixed play yard. And there are a lot of schools here that the buildings are not fixed they’re not permanent fixtures.

Stefanie Bautista 5:11
Yup.

Ariel Landrum 5:11
Play yard is just asphalt there aren’t there is an equipment, there isn’t toys, there’s maybe just a chain Link fence that separates them from just the street. And it that disparity and access to just play is really disruptive to just the the mental wellness of youth and causes disengagement from adults. Though they’re finding that I definitely agreed with was when the anyone supervising the yard actually wanted to play with the youth and was very attentive, versus, you know, now, maybe on their phone when they shouldn’t be or talking to the other adults and not really paying attention, that that attentiveness created positive memories for for youth in regards to engaging with adults. That play is something important; its the way that they communicate and that it was a thing that was encouraged.

Stefanie Bautista 6:01
Absolutely, I think that there’s two really important things that you touched upon. The first part is that growing up here in the San Fernando Valley, and also other parts in LA, you have really old schools, and then you have schools within schools. That’s something that’s common here. Because we do have things like charter schools, private schools, and depending on which school you attend, sometimes they have a play apparatus. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes, because they’re located on a school, there’s an apparatus there, but they can’t necessarily play with it. So you have to kind of be creative. And depending on the resources of your school, you can, you know, do structured play, like I mentioned before at my school, but other times I remember being probably in middle school where you don’t really see like a play apparatus, it was more so like you were participating participating in organized sport like soccer, or you know, basketball. And otherwise, you were just hanging out on the yard. And that’s where you see, like you mentioned ‘The Yard Ladies,’ which is like our favorite ‘Yard Lady’ on Recess being her grumpy self. And I remember that was so much more prevalent in public schools. We always called them the ‘LAUSD Yard Ladies,’ they were always frowning. They were super upset everything, they just wanted to, you know, share the gossip with their, you know, your their coworkers and they weren’t really paying attention. And when you went to them, ask them for help or something, they were just like, whatever, figure it out on your own. And that was definitely something that I experienced in public school, as opposed to now working for a charter school. And also knowing other kids, other friends of mine who went to private school, those yard ladies actually played with them on the yard, they were leading games, they were helping do arts and crafts on the side, they had those materials. And unfortunately, that’s just the reality of funding when it comes to public, private, and charter schools in the United States across you know, from coast to coast. But it really does affect the way that kids view play. And it’s no surprise that by the time High School rolls around, they don’t want to play outside anymore.

Ariel Landrum 8:06
Aboslutely.

Stefanie Bautista 8:07
Because they never really had those, like positive opportunities when they were younger.

Ariel Landrum 8:11
And you definitely talked about school funding, right? And one of the I think in the very first episode of the series, we see The Swinger; not not to be taken as a related to Austin Powers. The Swinger is a little girl dressed very much like Amelia Earhart…

Stefanie Bautista 8:29
Amelia Earhart yup.

Ariel Landrum 8:29
On a swing, who is wanting to soar to new heights, and getting essentially injured. And one of the characters says, “Oh, we’ll have to talk to her when she comes back to the school from the school nurse.” And I do know that a lot of American schools’, maybe the school nurse shows up two days, maybe there’s no one at all.

Stefanie Bautista 8:45
We don’t have one at all. And you know what, I was just watching that episode again. And now that I’ve been educated, I haven’t seen it since I was, you know, way younger. And I was like, “Wow, we would just give them an ice pack. But who knows where she flew to. She could have flown in a bush, she could have flown out a bunch of kids. She got a foam flat face on the asphalt. We don’t know that. But we could only give her an ice pack.” And, you know, that goes into the limitations of what you can do as a staff member. That’s a whole nother list of do’s and don’ts. What because we’re not medical professionals. We study education, not you know, minor, or at least, you know, a little bit more than first aid on the yard. But you know, like, I think the nature of play is getting hurt. And it’s just a part of it. But unfortunately, because of funding like we mentioned, kids experienced that in different levels. Could be in extremes also.

Ariel Landrum 9:44
I think the other thing in regarding to like funding in schools and disparity. Again, in that sort of first episode we see a discussion in regards to American school cafeteria food, which is not good.

Stefanie Bautista 9:59
Nope.

Ariel Landrum 10:00
And a joke about the good food being hidden and locked up and essentially for the adults. And sure, I can remember a couple of things that I enjoyed eating. But I mean, I’ve seen artwork of cafeteria food in schools around the world, right?

Stefanie Bautista 10:17
And it makes you feel so sad to be in America.

Ariel Landrum 10:19
So sad to the things that we feed our students. And these are disparities that are still happening today. Right?

Stefanie Bautista 10:26
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 10:26
And so the fact that there was kind of a nod to that in this show that was created in the 90’s…

Stefanie Bautista 10:31
In the 90’s, and you know what I think so our at our school for a little insight we, we don’t serve the same LAUSD food, even though we’re technically you know, under the LAUSD umbrella, so we’re not exactly serving like that coffee cake, and you know, those like weird calzones that tastes like rubber and feel like rubber. However, because I was so scarred from those things. The coffee cake was good, but the calzones I don’t know. Chalupas I guess I was trying to say. But it took me all the way up until this year to actually say, “You know what, I’m okay with eating a school lunch, because there’s extras I don’t want it to waste.” And that’s me thinking as an adult, however, “It’s not so bad.” But I think it’s because we have like a private vendor that we go to.

Ariel Landrum 11:17
Oh okay.

Stefanie Bautista 11:18
You know, that was it’s way different. Like it has vegetables it has, you know, like chicken nuggets that actually look like chicken. But I it took me you know, how many decades to be okay with even like thinking about touching that food. And consuming it just because we have, you know, these images especially perpetuated in media. Like shows like Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide on Nickelodeon, and, you know….

Ariel Landrum 11:43
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 11:43
Other school shows that it’s just basically slop. And it’s very reminiscent of the way prison cafeterias are. So many parallels there. And also…

Ariel Landrum 11:53
Yes

Stefanie Bautista 11:54
And mentioning that first episode, where essentially, TJ is kind of shamed for wanting to go inside ‘The Good Food Refrigerator,’ that like platform that they’re on totally looks like a jail type of platform.

Ariel Landrum 12:09
Yeah. Like this bars above in the cafeteria, where the adults can essentially literally look down at the youth. Yeah, definitely looked institutionalized.

Stefanie Bautista 12:22
Absolutely. Um, but yeah, I mean, like, the school lunches, and I must say, yes, there is always a fridge in the school that has the better food.

Ariel Landrum 12:31
This is true? Not urban legend.

Stefanie Bautista 12:33
But, but they’re brought by teachers, so you probably couldn’t eat it anyway. And even sometimes, the teachers don’t want to put their food in there ’cause they don’t want it touching other teachers food. And I’ve yes, I’ve had somebody eat my lunch and not tell me.

Ariel Landrum 12:43
Disrespect. Disrespect.

Stefanie Bautista 12:51
Super rude. But I anyway.

Ariel Landrum 12:55
So some of the other findings was that when children had quality recess, and so again, they used the factors of safe play, adult engagement, sufficient play equipment, student autonomy, and minimal disruptive conflict; when they had those criterias met, the students always returned to class with a better ability to have executive functioning, better emotional self control, and adaptive classroom abilities. Which all of these things were impacted if they didn’t have recess or if they did. And these things were vastly improved if they did have recess, and it was quality recess. And I think…

Stefanie Bautista 13:36
Absolutely.

Ariel Landrum 13:37
That when we go back to the show, we kind of see this, right?

Stefanie Bautista 13:41
Yeah, definitely. I think the kids first and foremost long for recess in the second part of that first episode, they change the clock so that the recess bell rings earlier than normal. And it’s a real thing, because you know what, wiggle brakes, just that outside, just getting up and moving. That is such an important thing to staying focused. I mean, even as adults, we need to get up at least once an hour, if you’re sitting at a desk, just so that you can get your mind right, like take a break from the screen. Even if you’re writing something you just got to take like that mental break, get your body moving, because your body isn’t going to, you know, the blood isn’t gonna go to your brain if your blood isn’t, you know, moving because you’re not using your limbs, you know?

Ariel Landrum 14:21
Yeah yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 14:21
And I, we incorporate so many wiggle breaks in the younger, in the younger grades for kids to get up and dance a little bit before they sit down and do some really tough math. All the way up until fifth grade. I mean, they’re not called wiggle breaks anymore, but we want to go just so that they don’t feel like little kids. If we want to go outside and you know, play a really quick game of, you know, foursquare or something. We’ll do that. Just because we know that if those kids get antsy in their seats, now you’re all of a sudden trying to play whack a mole. Like, as a teacher. You’re trying to keep one kid down and then you’re trying to keep another down and another kid down, and then you’re trying to keep another kid down. But if you just have them all do that mental break, take a walk, it helps so, so much. And you can essentially get more done out of the day and the week. And the kids feel like they have a well rounded experience not just being locked inside a classroom.

Ariel Landrum 15:18
Yeah, yeah. So getting into the show.

Stefanie Bautista 15:21
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 15:22
It is a 30 minute cartoon format is animated series, made in 1997, I believe. And it’s the format of 2 15 minute segments. So you’re actually watching two episodes in one. And if you go on Disney+, there’s actually more than just the original Recess.

Stefanie Bautista 15:45
Yes spin offs. And a like a movie.

Ariel Landrum 15:46
Yeah. Which I have no idea exists, right?

Stefanie Bautista 15:49
Yeah. Those were made like the early 2000’s, I believe. Right?

Ariel Landrum 15:54
So we’ve got Recess, Recess: School’s Out, Recess: All Grown Down, so this is them as kindergarteners, and Recess: Taking The Fifth grade. So that’s them growing up into the fifth grade.

Stefanie Bautista 16:07
Yeah, you know, what, and Recess to me was so like, I loved it so much, because it was very reminiscent of Rugrats. But they were just a different age, it was 2 15 minute segments, easily digestible. They had a problem, they were going to rally their friends to solve it, they solved the problem, and then we go on to the next day in their lives, or the next recess in their lives. And on top of that, as the show progressed, you see them getting older, but then they also toyed with “What happens if they were younger?” And Rugrats, we would, you know, they had a whole nother spin off of Rugrats All Growed Up where they grown up.

Ariel Landrum 16:40
Yeah. Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 16:41
And I love that show, too. It was so successful. And I feel like recess probably took a lot of cues from Rugrats, because it was such a groundbreaking animated feature that, you know, we could grow with these kids and look into Child Development really in a different way. And see things through the eyes of a child, because I think also watching these shows as adults, we then think about, “How did I see things as a child?” And I think so many of us resonate with that, because we see these images, and we see like, the playground essentially is not a big place. But when you were in fourth, third grade, it seemed so huge and vast, like to the point where you had two kids digging on the side trying to get to China.

Ariel Landrum 17:21
Yeah, yes.

Stefanie Bautista 17:22
You know, these these worlds within that playground.

Ariel Landrum 17:27
Yeah, that’s what made the playground so big. And even in the show, the playground is a character itself.

Stefanie Bautista 17:33
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 17:33
It has accepted laws and was lived through like a social hierarchy in regards to the the youth that were engaging with it, and had even its own moments of commentary. And when it comes to the actual core group core characters, and even with all the students, it was that anticipation for recess. I remember antas, like looking at the clock and counting it down for when this, like, I could just bolt out of here and go and just let myself loose on the playground. And when I think of my like moments at recess, I remember that having that autonomy, and I remember there being social rules and norms. And that, really, that my lived experience of socializing was on the playground, it wasn’t in the classroom.

Stefanie Bautista 18:26
No, not at all, especially when you were confined to your own desk. I mean, as you get into the upper grades, you don’t share a desk really anymore with other students. I mean, definitely now you would not share a desk.

Ariel Landrum 18:37
No definitely not now.

Stefanie Bautista 18:38
Not during the current COVID climate. But I mean, you didn’t have circle time anymore. You didn’t have rug time, as you know, an older student. So I mean, all the interactions you had were outside. And then you learned who hung out with who what type of kids hung out in a certain place. What type of kids hung out in the cafeteria? Where did eat? Did they even get school lunch? Did they bring their lunch from home? All of those social hierarchies and, you know, social challenges that kids need to navigate around, start at recess on the playground.

Ariel Landrum 19:08
So in talking about Recess, I know that you and I both watched it again to to get an idea. And I feel like for just to remind ourselves and I feel like for this show, it’s one of Disney’s most well rounded social commentaries.

Stefanie Bautista 19:23
Oh, yeah.

Ariel Landrum 19:24
I find that the the social dynamics that they sort of displayed on the playground and the the stereotypes really of different kids. I could think back in my mind to someone that was similar to that. So you mentioned The Diggers digging to China. They had Upside Down Girl. I remember plenty of kids that always hung upside down. They really liked that that kinesthetic feeling of like feeling the world being the other way. Right? If we’re thinking of even just like now with a Black Widow.

Stefanie Bautista 19:55
Oh, yeah.

Ariel Landrum 19:55
“Oh we’re both upside down.”

Stefanie Bautista 19:56
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 19:59
I’m thinking of King Bob totally made sense. He was he was someone of an older great.

Stefanie Bautista 20:05
He was a jock.

Ariel Landrum 20:06
He was a jock. There was the Ashley’s…

Stefanie Bautista 20:11
Oh my gosh…

Ariel Landrum 20:12
They were Valley girls, which you’re from The Valley. Does anybody talk that way?

Stefanie Bautista 20:18
You know, it’s funny because I feel like once the media started perpetuating how we, how they talk, I guess how I I don’t even know if I talk like this. I was hyper aware of how many times I say ‘like’ in a sentence at one point of my life. But like that, I there’s a word for it. It’s like that. The roadie like way of like elongating your syllables very much like how Kim Kardashian talks like, “Oh my god.” Like…

Ariel Landrum 20:48
Yeah very pulled.

Stefanie Bautista 20:50
Definitely know people who did talk like that, who totally bought into you know, “I’m like, Mandy Moore. I’m Britney Spears.” Or because it was the late 90’s you had these icons to look up to and The Valley, there were those girls who, probably richer than me, richer than most people about that hustle, you know, highest rung of the social hierarchy that only hung out together and probably didn’t talk like that. And the Ashley’s totally reminded me of another show, Daria, which had The Fashion Club also 4 girls who talked like they were from The Valley led by Daria’s sister and they were exactly like I was like “Oh the Ashley’s just grew up to be the fashion club. Cool. Cool. Cool.”

Ariel Landrum 21:36
Yeah. Yes. a clicker for wearing skirts. Right?

Stefanie Bautista 21:40
Yeah. Skirts.

Ariel Landrum 21:41
They were very, very Clueless.

Stefanie Bautista 21:42
Yes, very Clueless, very Clueless.

Ariel Landrum 21:46
And then, like, there were in the even in the first episode, we meet The Guru Kid, and I can distinctly remember in my mind, there was one kid that just seemed so like…

Stefanie Bautista 21:55
Zenned out.

Ariel Landrum 21:56
Yeah, like smarter. I was like, on another plane, and we will regularly seek out advice from this kid was a really good mediator. So…

Stefanie Bautista 22:04
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 22:05
But I have that I have that in my memory as like someone that to me, I like immediately when I heard guru kid because they they’re like, “We have a problem we need. We talk to Guru Kid,” it’s like, “Yeah, you do.”

Stefanie Bautista 22:18
Yeah. And it’s so funny how he literally gives the same advice to somebody who wants to make a great higher. And it was the same analogy, but like, so it wasn’t really The Guru Kid that was giving advice. It was just the interpretation of the person asking for advice ends up giving their own advice to themselves.

Ariel Landrum 22:33
Oh, very similar to how it happens in therapy, but thats a different podcasts

Stefanie Bautista 22:37
Interesting. We will definitely have to catch up on that one day. But yeah, I think those different characters that’s what I loved a lot about the show because like you said, you could identify other people but also you could identify yourself as one of the main characters because they were so diverse. And they were so different, but yet they all hung out together and all work together as a team. So Ariel, who did you identify with in the Recess crew?

Ariel Landrum 23:05
Okay, so in the recess crew, there are 1,2,3,4,5,6. There are 6, 6 people in the crew in the gang or posse, I don’t know whatever you want to call them. For the girls, there was Ashley and Gretchen. Ashley was more of a tomboy Gretchen is would be considered the smart kid I guess.

Stefanie Bautista 23:27
You mean Spinelli.

Ariel Landrum 23:28
Yeah, yeah. Ashely Spinelli. I apologize. Spoiler alert.

Stefanie Bautista 23:33
Spoiler alert.

Ariel Landrum 23:34
Her name is Ashley. But they call her Spinelli. My bad.

Stefanie Bautista 23:36
It was like, one of the best reveals I think of a show. I loved that. But anyway, go ahead.

Ariel Landrum 23:45
Yes, Spinelli tomboy. Gretchen smart kid. Then we have Mikey whose sort of like a big teddy bear. We have TJ who’s the leader. And I would say like, plan guy. I don’t know. Yep. We have Gus who’s coming along for the ride. Seems to just kind of absorbing everything. And it is it was the new kid. And then we have Vince who is the the sports guy or jock, right?

Stefanie Bautista 24:14
Yeah. Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 24:15
So I think for me, I really gravitated towards Gus.

Stefanie Bautista 24:21
Yeah, I knew you’d say that.

Ariel Landrum 24:24
And the reason why is we get introduced to guest because he’s a new kid, and he’s a military brat. And he says, like, I think he says, “I’ve been to like 12 schools in 6 years,” or something like that. And I remember the distinct difference of going to school off base and on base. And on base, it was a way more healing experience because we all knew we were the new kids. And we all knew that we were going to move. Like it was it was actually easier for me to make friends with kids on base because we we were always trying to develop ourselves and create a unit and we knew that the unit was going to get disrupted. When I went to school off base, it was really those clicks. It was really people who had known each other since diapers. And I was the new kid. I was othered. I, in the episode, they talk about a rule where you can’t talk to the new kid for 48 hours, a new kid doesn’t get a name. And I remember a lot of people having trouble remembering my name. And I was like, “But it’s a Disney Princess, like, how do you not know who Ariel is?” And that like being not having anybody to sit with not having anybody to talk to you. And remembering the few times where someone reached out and someone talked to me and someone tried to be a friend. I know, it took, I would say months before I actually had a friend group and some of my off base schools versus going to school on base. And I knew that experience of like, consistently being uprooted. The other thing was the the trope of his military dad, introducing him is like a cadet. And like if you go to their house, he’s got barbed wire and a Humvee like that, that stereotype that is exactly what the off base off base kids thought my life was like. And thought my dad was like, and if any of you, and I know Stef has met my dad, he is far from trope.

Stefanie Bautista 26:20
No he’s more of like of The Guru kid.

Ariel Landrum 26:22
Definitely more like The Guru Kid. So yeah, I really resonated with with Gus and how much he just like he cried. So that to me was also important because we see a male figure crying, and being open about his emotions. And he cried, saying, “No one’s been so nice to me. Thank you guys.” And I remember that. So yeah, I’m wondering who you identify with?

Stefanie Bautista 26:46
Oh, my gosh, well, I love that Gus gave you a little bit of visibility in a cartoon. And I think that’s so important, especially for you know, all of our kiddos who are military brats, they are so special and you know, they go through just as much as their, you know, their parents do. And you guys do deserve that visibility, because it’s a real lived experience that a lot of people have. But for me, so I know straight out, I probably identified with Spinelli, Ashley Spinelli.

Ariel Landrum 27:14
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 27:14
Just because that’s how I look like when I was in elementary school, I was…

Ariel Landrum 27:18
No no no. Not just elementary school. I’ve seen that exact outfit on Stef with the combat boots…

Stefanie Bautista 27:24
Regularly.

Ariel Landrum 27:24
And the leather jacket and a dress and some sort of beanie and or hat, or coverage.

Stefanie Bautista 27:29
Literally throughout my life.

Ariel Landrum 27:31
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 27:31
Yes, I lived Spinelli’s outfit. I should have royalties for that. However, I actually identified a lot with each and every character because each and every character was a bit of me. So if we’re going down the list, I was Spinelli because I dressed like her. And sometimes I just didn’t care about stuff. And I was just like, “You know, whatever. I’m grumpy.” I was Gretchen a little bit because I really loved science. And I really loved figuring out things and that was one of my favorite subjects in school. I was a little bit of Mikey because I was like the mediator and also I was not the skinniest girl. I was very like, I guess athletic, you could say in my body type. So I didn’t really I didn’t wear like tank tops or anything like that during school just because I was so self conscious about my body, not being super super skinny as a girl. And leading into that I was a little bit of Vince because I really loved sports. I did dress like a tomboy.

Ariel Landrum 28:28
You do love sports.

Stefanie Bautista 28:30
I love sports so much. And then I think I identified the least with TJ just because he was just the troublemaker.

Ariel Landrum 28:37
Yeah scheming.

Stefanie Bautista 28:39
Without without Vince he was literally Zack Morris just causing just wrecking havoc on everything and…

Ariel Landrum 28:45
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 28:45
You know, Vince was like his, his his foil I guess you could say and…

Ariel Landrum 28:50
Moral compass like a Jiminy Cricket.

Stefanie Bautista 28:51
Moral compass, for sure for sure.

Ariel Landrum 28:53
Now, you could say that Vince is a essentially a stereotype and that he is a Black athlete. And that was a common stereotype especially in the 90’s. But then you miss a really some important part of regarding his depth of character. And that he was kind and calm. And then he had a lot of integrity and he was the reason that the group was grounded. So it makes sense that he was TJ’s is Jiminy Cricket. His conscience. I also want to just mark that one of my favorite episodes is where he is essentially teaching Spinelli what to do in regards to an upcoming beauty pageant. He spent all night watching some pageant videos and he learned how to sashay, how to walk and step. And I would say that was very forward representation of a Black male walking in heels and modeling with no embarrassment in regards to what he was doing. He just knew that this is a competition and this is how you win the competition. I’m going to dive in it headfirst and fully engage. Essentially, what could have been made fun of for walking around these heels, so shout outs Vince.

Stefanie Bautista 30:07
Gus I identified with not because I was a military brat I didn’t, you know, I was not introduced into being a military family till I was older. But I moved schools a lot in LA. So in elementary school, I think I attended 5 different elementary schools. So I was also the new kid, but in a different way. Like I was a local but also I wasn’t a local because I never had a peer group that I knew from diapers like you Ariel.

Ariel Landrum 30:34
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 30:34
And so I always had to find my way into these specific bs actual circles very much like Recess where it was just an amalgam of different people who were outcasts in their own I guess social ways coming together and just hanging out together. I remember my group of friends in late elementary just being you know, kids who back then guys, anime was not cool. You were lame for loving anime and, and cartoons, so I hung out with like five other kids, and none of us looked like we would ever be friends. But we all like the enemies. So we ended up hanging out together. But I think that was also the beauty of recess is that you… Just because you’re a jock, you didn’t have to hang out with just jocks. Just because you were a nerd didn’t have to hang out with just nerds. If you were, you know, Mikey, you didn’t just have to hang out with other kids who looked like you. You could be friends with different people. And it was okay. And you did great things together.

Ariel Landrum 31:30
And I think that you’re you’re also noting the difference between us following the narrative of like one character and sort of like our Disney media and a core group. Because you’re saying, like, “I identify with components of each and that’s okay.” And sometimes it’s one of the things that turns us off in regards to media is, “I just don’t like this main character. I could not be them. I can’t, I can’t find I can’t find relatability.” And in this case, you had options. And you could switch in episodes like, “I totally agree with Gretchen in this moment, or I totally agree with Mikey in this moment.” And that you that narrative change allows you to again, see more of a holistic kid, because there was definitely in this group, moments of infighting because of disagreements. And I think the really, again, beautiful thing about this group is that they were so diverse. What we did see was literally clicks on in the Recess playground. People only playing with people that were of similar interests. And this group accepted each other just because they were fun to hang out with. And then that was it. They didn’t have to have completely similar or same interests. And then they never seem to poke or make fun of each other for having differences. It was just we were automatically introduced to Gretchen being smart. And she was saying things that were smart, and no one questioned it. No one made fun of it. And no one tried to have her like, explain in a different way. If they said they were confused, she would and it was never seen as her talking down on them. And it was never seen as them telling her she was a dweeb, right?

Stefanie Bautista 33:07
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 33:07
It was like there was just like, “Oh, she just likes to be smart. And we like her. So let’s like learn a thing or two.”

Stefanie Bautista 33:12
Exactly, exactly. And, you know, like, seeing them as a group. It was it was so nice that I don’t know if you remember this, were they all in the same class? Were they all in Miss Grotke’s class?

Ariel Landrum 33:25
They were shout out to the best teacher.

Stefanie Bautista 33:28
Best teacher.

Ariel Landrum 33:29
More woke than I even I am today.

Stefanie Bautista 33:32
More woke in the 90’s, too. And I remember I think I had tried on a pair of like Harry Potter style glasses, and I had just cut my hair really short. And my husband was like, “You look like Miss Grotke.”

Ariel Landrum 33:43
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 33:45
And I was like, “Oh my gosh.” But then I was like, “That’s not like, that’s a compliment. She was the coolest teacher.” I wish. I wish that I had, you know, like a ‘woke teacher’ like that when I was growing up. Now I know teachers that are woke just like her, but I can’t be their students anymore. They’re my counterparts. But she was so compassionate and so loving. And I think with the chaos of the playground, it was such a nice way for them to come back and be grounded. Whenever they did come back in the class, even though they still wanted to be outside. They appreciated her and she always had their back.

Ariel Landrum 34:16
Yeah, and I remember having really good teachers, formative teachers and I remember teachers that did not like their job. Did not want to be there did not want to engage with kids like a like our Yard Ladies. And I feel like Miss Grotke was she was the maybe like the epitome of like what a teacher should be or how I imagined or hoped that they would be if I had kids that were being taught.

Yeah. Let’s I you know, it’s funny because when as we’re talking about adults in the school setting that you know, had their had their roles to play in our lives. Like you know, Miss Grotkewas the ideal teacher. What is the name of The Yard Lady? I literally just saw it like a couple minutes ago. What is her name Ariel?

Oh, her name is Miss Finster.

Stefanie Bautista 35:04
Miss Fist… Yeah, Miss Finster. Miss Finster was the grumpiest oldest lady that you could ever have on a yard. But for some reason, she was like built like a linebacker, and she could chase a kid down.

Ariel Landrum 35:15
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 35:17
there, lunch lady was just as miserable. Their principal was just as you know, they always paint the principal is so oblivious to what’s going on. And just always concerned about like, the administration of everything and not the actual happiness of the kids.

Ariel Landrum 35:33
Is that a trope? Or is that real from your knowledge as an educator.

Stefanie Bautista 35:37
Not in my school, however, more traditional schools that I have worked that there is definitely a gap between up and coming teachers who are my age who have just graduated, and also the tenured teachers who have been there when through you know, multiple generations of students.

Ariel Landrum 35:55
So bright eyed and bushy tailed or seen shit.

Stefanie Bautista 35:58
Seen some shit and you have the ones in the middle who have seen some shit but are still, you know, trying to bridge the gap between like the non technological and technological I think that’s the best way that I can describe it. And sometimes the principles just don’t follow that. Thankfully, for me, I have a boss that is way in tune with like a lot of things that are going on and she’s great. But I remembered student teaching on like other sites and the principal just kind of being aloof, or just being that figurehead and not much more else. And I want to know if you think this but I always thought that Randall Miss…

Ariel Landrum 36:38
Miss Finster.

Stefanie Bautista 36:38
Er, yeah, her her little pet. Miss Finster’s pet? Yeah, I always knew Randall. And I was like, “This kid always screwing up everything.” And the she treats him like a little dog because she gives him a treat like a puppy.

Ariel Landrum 36:53
Yeah she throw a cookie at him.

Stefanie Bautista 36:54
Yeah she throw a cookie at him. And I was like, oh, it was always just like, weaselly looking kid that just like, never really fit in anywhere. But I guess found safety and being next to an adult.

Yeah, I feel like the one of the things that this show does well is it gives you a way to simplify social challenges in regards to having characters identified in your mind on how to tackle these social challenges. So it’s like you think of Randall, he thrives at being used as a pawn to carry another person’s favor in order to maintain really social hierarchy, relevance, importance. He’s like a literally aligning himself with power. And if you look at that, you can look at it in a strength based way. And that is probably a kid who survives as a kid who can align himself with power.

Ariel Landrum 37:46
And if it means not having friends that are your age, and just align yourself with adults, then so be it.

I think like even in some of the other sort of character tropes, you can see like, are you struggling with someone who kind of, in your mind seems to match that of a sixth grader. They just want to maintain dominance, they just want to maintain control. And that’s their motivation. That’s the reason you’re having a social impasse with them is because somehow in this moment, they feel like you’ve removed control and you have asserted your own dominance, and they don’t know how to respond except to push back and be aggressive. And then even mentioning like The Swinger Girl, are you working with someone who has such daring desire and drive that they are doing so much, despite potential danger. That they don’t even see the risk or the potential harm that they’ve put themselves in? I feel like in watching the show, it gives you these snippets of the simple characterization that you can then use to tackle complex social engagements.

Stefanie Bautista 38:52
Yeah, definitely. And also the performativeness of Swinger Girl. Maybe she was doing it to be popular because you know what she maybe she just ended I want to know, the backstory of Swinger Girl now. Because you know, it’s wishing doing it for attention, like, did she not have anybody to go to and that’s why she was like, “You know what swinging is going to be my thing.” Just like Upside Down Girl, that’s going to be my thing. The 2 Diggers I’m pretty sure they’re brothers. Right? So they’re twins, I believe.

Ariel Landrum 39:19
I think they are. Someone correct us if we’re wrong, we haven’t actually like fully rewatched all of the episodes.

Stefanie Bautista 39:27
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 39:27
I was very young when I seented them. So my memory is but wasted.

Stefanie Bautista 39:32
Yes. Same here. But yeah, they I mean, they look exactly the same. They’re both digging and they argue like they’re siblings. So I’m assuming that they are siblings, and you know, maybe they just didn’t have anywhere else that they could fit into. So they were just like, “You know, we’re just gonna dig our way out of this.” And for some reason, no staff member decided, “Hey, there’s a hole in the ground. Next to a fence.

Ariel Landrum 39:55
This isn’t safe.

Stefanie Bautista 39:56
This is safe.

Ariel Landrum 39:58
Why do these kids have shovels in the first place?

Stefanie Bautista 40:00
Who gave them tools? Also, I mean, blathering safe. They have a hardhat. But, I mean, why are they in this hole? This is this is not okay, guys. Another one of my…

Very primitive ways of doing it. Not like an actual, like construction site with a sign that they made that says “China or Bust.” That was well thought out.

Ariel Landrum 40:21
Well thought out.

Again, it’s elementary, right? So I do remember in elementary school kids just randomly digging holes. Like that was that was like with objects with sticks, just like making digging sound effect

Stefanie Bautista 40:23
Very primiative ways of doing it. Not like an actual like construction site with a sign that they made that says, ‘China or Bust.’ That was well thought out. And without any notice, for whatever reason. But yeah, I mean, it’s so funny that you, you mentioned, just the ways that we perceive things now, as opposed to the way we perceive them before as kids. And I think that’s the fun part about looking back on shows like this, like Recess, especially one that kind of stands the test of time. And I think that there’s a there’s many things that we already said that, you know, hasn’t stand the test of time, because this is really how kids navigate their way socially in the world, right? But there are some things that don’t test, you know, stand the test of time, right? I think watching it, I was just like, “I don’t know about this.”

Ariel Landrum 41:13
So for me, that was the kindergarteners was that for you? So the kindergartners are, they’re described as being sort of wild and unpredictable, but they’re shown using really what’s called like an Indigenous Savage trope. So the this trope is in media, it’s used to show how Indigenous people are beneath Western white society by showing us that we need to fear them, that we need to fight them, and essentially convert them to our ways. And we see this by the kindergarteners having tribes having painted faces, having…

Stefanie Bautista 41:54
Feathers.

Ariel Landrum 41:55
Feathers…

Stefanie Bautista 41:56
Face paint.

Ariel Landrum 41:57
Face paint. Having rituals that involve tying kids up, and like saying they’re going to eat kids, like all of this is to portray that they’re primitive. And even Gretchen says in the first episode that these ‘primitive grades’ really saying like lower grades, and when when they go to visit, they say like, “We are from Big Kid land.” And “Here is shiny tinfoil we give you a few help us.” Like really just feeding into that trope. Now looking. I know, I know, seeing it as a kid when I was watching, I didn’t get that. I was not woke. I was not a woke ass kid. I was dead asleep. I did. I saw that as like, “Yeah, kindergarteners, like they don’t have… Their lawless. Like they just want to see the world burn.” But I didn’t see that they were portraying it using this trope. Now that I do see that, I know that that could easily be removed, and it would still be a good show. And I do know there’s an episode where TJ like goes and visits the kindergarteners and has a whole day there and enjoys a nap time. And so essentially realizes that they are not lawless, and they do have their own social norms and that they’re different. So maybe that was a little undoing of that.

Stefanie Bautista 43:08
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 43:08
But I would say that anybody who wants to pick this show up now that hasn’t seen it from childhood; that doesn’t have like maybe some nostalgia connection, those are going to be those, like points of disruption for you.

Stefanie Bautista 43:21
Yeah, I agree. Definitely the kindergarteners and working with kindergarteners, yes, there is an amount of lawlessness to them. They do like to bite each other. They do spit on each other. They are just learning and because they’re babies still like a lot, especially these ones coming from preschool. They’re coming from like daycare and they don’t have… They don’t know how to stand in a line. They don’t know how to hold their crayons correctly. They don’t know how to sit in a chair. So yes, there is a element of them not knowing but the way that they portrayed them as savages not knowing was you know, kind of probably the wrong direction. And like we said, it’s the 90’s it was a different time, we had different ways of perceiving other other norms, I guess you could say in other lands. However, I think now if you were to look at it, you would really have to look at it from a developmental standpoint, saying, you know, like, take away the, you know, feathers, we use feathers in arts and crafts, we use, you know, paint in arts and crafts, like kids are going to be messy. They literally look like that all the time. If you’re looking at it from an arts and crafts standpoint, and not an Indigenous people standpoint. You could always make that argument that you know, when TJ did go over there and was just like, “Oh my gosh, I love kindergarten like they got to take a nap. They get to do fun stuff like everyday seems like recess.” But also you know what, someone might bite you and like that’s okay, it’s normal.

Ariel Landrum 44:50
It’s normal.

Stefanie Bautista 44:51
It’s super normal. I think when I first was a teacher in kindergarten I literally thought of Recess. And I’m like, it’s scary, because you don’t know what these kids are gonna do. It is like being in a foreign country because you can’t really speak their language you, they don’t understand you. You have to learn the lingo of “Let’s all come together. Let’s clap, clap clap to pay attention.” Or, “If you can hear me match me. If you can hear me match me. Let’s shh.” And like you get this whole nother vocabulary and whole nother like way of talking to them. And sometimes when you don’t talk to an adult after being in kindergarten, for so long, you forget to form sentences. It is like being a foreigner in their land until you get used to being around them. So there are parallels to that. But I think as we are moving away from looking at Indigenous people, as people who are just never gonna get it, we can definitely form this in a way where it’s more true to child development, and not so much looking at foreigners in that way. Another thing that really, that I noticed watching it again, was the fact that a lot of the grades didn’t really interact with each other. The grade levels always stayed with their grade level. Like, if you’re in elementary school, now you have opportunities to talk to fifth graders, you have opportunities to talk to fourth graders as a first grader. And we actually encourage those connections, because then you can see where you want to be in the next couple years, like “Do you want to, you know, maybe you can identify with this person.” Like, or say, “You know, what, being a sixth grader is not so scary.” I think…

Ariel Landrum 46:34
Like do you guys assign like peer mentors or?

Stefanie Bautista 46:37
Yeah, we’re very much. And we also have a lot of fifth graders sometimes go into the younger classes, be a mystery reader, and say, “Oh, we’re going to actually hear from a fifth grader.” And they get to ask them questions like, “How does it feel to be in fifth grade?” Like, “How does it feel to be going into middle school soon.” Like, “Are you scared?” And you really get to establish those connections, and then now the younger kids have a wider, a wider vision of who they can be in the next couple years, as opposed to them just sticking with their grade. And because by the end of the year, you want them to grow.

Ariel Landrum 47:08
And removing some of that fear, right? Because there was definitely a lot of fear of the the older grades, because there was uncertainty, it seemed that they, they because they were bigger, they were stronger, they can bully you they can push you around. And that sounds more developmentally appropriate and that you are encouraging children to engage with diverse people. Including age as diversity.

Stefanie Bautista 47:33
Absolutely. And I think that’s the beauty of having different grades intermingle with each other is that you get those different levels of understanding that a teacher just can’t give them. They see each other as peers and not necessarily as enemies you don’t pit them against each other because I feel like that’s how it felt like being in elementary school. The the the scariness, the fear, it’s just it’s gone, essentially. And you don’t get those opportunities until you go to like a summer camp, or if you go to any extracurricular activities, so why not use the recess yard as one of those places?

Ariel Landrum 48:11
Absolutely. And I would say something else that was, again, just problematic, still very heteronormative. Again, it was the 90’s. There was a episode that involves kissing. First of all, TJ and Spinelli were like, forced to kiss each other out of peer pressure. And it was guise to science. And I think that sort of cohesion. And now I will say that, that on the playground, I remember levels of affection being performative. Like everybody gawking and watching.

Stefanie Bautista 48:46
So awkward.

Ariel Landrum 48:47
This case, it was we were accepting that they were doing this because because their peers are pressuring them. I think that that already is problematic. And then the reason that it all started was because a another youth was telling them that their future was girls were gonna like kissing boys and boys were gonna like kissing girls. So that just just that narrative, very heteronormative and then really wanting to explore if that was true, and what would happen, and “No, we’ll never kiss you.” I think that again, that’s another probably narrative that that doesn’t need to stay could be thrown out. I think talking about essentially kissing is a form of sex, sexual attraction, finding a way to show these elementary kids really uncovering that in a different, more safer way, I think would have been better social commentary.

Stefanie Bautista 49:40
Absolutely. And I think that knowledge just wasn’t there yet in that day. So I would love to see how people decide to portray that now if, you know they decide to do a remake or if they decide to do a show, similar to Recess. I think will be impactful to kids nowadays.

Ariel Landrum 49:57
Or even what these new episodes are like, right?

Stefanie Bautista 50:00
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 50:01
Because I think they were made in the 2000’s.

Stefanie Bautista 50:04
Mm hmm. Yeah. Maybe it’ll be interesting for us to revisit this topic again after you know, a Recess Part 2, or instead of just recess, it’s lunch recess now, which is always Recess Part 2. Because, you know, like, you know, we mentioned like we I was only watching the original Recess series. And like, when you look it up on Disney+, I did the same thing where I typed in Recess, and I’m like, “What are all these other things?”

Ariel Landrum 50:29
“What is this?”

Stefanie Bautista 50:29
“What is this? Feeling like an old lady here? What is all this new stuff these newfangled contraptions.” But I’m really interested to see if they did evolve from these tropes and stereotypes, because the knowledge of students and parents now are evolving so fast. And with recent events, were restructuring the way we look at play. The way we look at child development, the way we look at social interactions, not just with how we learned it in the past, but also how we’re teaching our kids how to do it. So yeah, maybe we’ll come back to this.

Ariel Landrum 51:04
I’m curious. What do you think recess is for adults?

Stefanie Bautista 51:09
Oh, recess for adults?

Ariel Landrum 51:12
Yeah. What do you think that looks like?

Stefanie Bautista 51:13
Happy Hour! You know, recess to me, as adults is like when you and I go, “Let’s get coffee.” That’s recess. Yes. Yeah, that’s like us just chillin, getting, you know, some snacks, nice cup of coffee sitting down, forgetting all of the things that we have to do for the day, just reserving that hour. And it doesn’t have to be 15 minutes, y’all. I don’t recess back then was just like 20 minutes of get out and get your body moving. But it can also be going to the gym. It can also be you know, having a picnic. It could also be engaging yourself in maybe some sports or with a league or something. I think that’s also considered recess. What do you think recess is?

Ariel Landrum 51:58
Well, I know if you’re thinking larger organizations and companies they’ve sort of embraced play, right? They, they have playing fields, I know lots of people who are on like a softball team at their job. And and take breaks for to practice or to prep for the next game. I think of when you’re talking about company and employee development, we have like here in the state of California mandated breaks, right?

Stefanie Bautista 52:26
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 52:27
You’re supposed to take every like your 2 15 minute breaks on your lunch. It and I feel like the the part that’s missing is the equipment and quality engagement. Like here’s a break for you. But I know that a lot of people will work. They’re not supposed to you into their lunch hour, they will check their email, they will respond to….

Stefanie Bautista 52:50
Me included. That’s so me.

Ariel Landrum 52:54
Yeah, yup. And so I feel like recess is that respite that we need. But we have to have some sort of equipment. I know. Definitely games, mobile, mobile phone games have become a way to create that, that respite and that release. I just I think that for that intentional break, just like when when you’re at school, like you had that intentional break, there needs to be intention to release to get out of your office, if you can…

Stefanie Bautista 53:24
Take a walk.

Ariel Landrum 53:26
Take a walk, walk your dog, if you’re working from home, you know, anything that you can do to remind yourself of your whole body. To remind yourself of the environment around you. I think that is what recess should be for adults. I definitely think that many of us have forgotten that we need recess that we need to play.

Stefanie Bautista 53:46
Or even translate recess into a vacation. I know sometimes we…

Ariel Landrum 53:50
Bing long recess…

Stefanie Bautista 53:52
A big long recess.

Ariel Landrum 53:53
Snow day.

Stefanie Bautista 53:55
I mean, whether it just be like a drive up the coast, if you live in California or drive, you know, to the park or National Park, if you’re near one or like just taking that day you actually use your weekend not to be productive. But to like we mentioned in self care, just do you is really important, because as you see, I mean, in other countries they have mandated vacations that you get paid for. An integral requirement. I know that you so…

Ariel Landrum 54:21
America do better.

Stefanie Bautista 54:23
We are sucky at that. The worst of. It is the worst. So I mean, as Americans, sometimes you have to equate having your recess as a vacation, and to intentionally be like, “You know what I’m going to unplug. I’m going to unwind. Don’t talk to me.” Put on that out of office message on your email, and really…

Ariel Landrum 54:42
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 54:43
It’s just it’s a little sad to say that we have to work so hard to create these little recesses for ourselves, but the frequently that you do that I feel like the more productive you’ll be. For myself, I totally look forward to planning all my vacations, whether it be like a drive away. I’m going to be driving pretty far in tomorrow. I’m going out to, yeah, I’m going on my reassess to a National Park just to get some air. So definitely those instances of play, of doing things that give you pleasure, are super important to maintain that quality of life and to maintain sanity.

Ariel Landrum 55:24
I’m curious for you, what have you noticed with students when they don’t get recess?

Stefanie Bautista 55:28
Oh, it’s the worst. It’s actually literally so hard to get A. kid focused if they don’t have recess. That’s why we never ever use no recess as a punishment at my school. Just because if you take away that play, you were actually adding work to yourself. You only don’t get a break, but the kid doesn’t get a break. And if you’re going to go through that 8 day, 8 hour day together, you’re kind of setting yourself up for failure. So definitely changing the way that you give consequences. Logical consequences is different. And I’ve seen back then, and other schools that I’ve worked at play being taken away, having them take a break from socializing, it isolates themselves so much more. And now they think you’re the enemy. And now they think that you are taking away their socialization, their play things that they love. And that really breaks that connection that you’re trying to make with your student, whether you’re the TA whether you’re the teacher, whether you’re the administrator, you’re not connecting with them in that way. You are severing the connection, essentially. So it’s something that I feel that all schools should be moving away from. Just because it’s it doesn’t do anyone good.

Ariel Landrum 56:44
Yeah, I think when I see it in adults, right, I get as a therapist, I’m seeing general mental unwellness. I’m seeing actual clinically diagnosed depression and anxiety. But I’m also seeing chronic stress. And people forget that the things that happen when we have chronic stress is we get irritable bowel syndrome, we get GERD, we get acid reflux, because it shuts down your digestive system. You’re not if you’re activating fight, flight or freeze, you’re not supposed to be digesting your food you’re supposed to be running away from like a tiger. In this case, you are feeling that sitting in your office, one on your break when you’re checking your email. Many of the things that I see are, you know thoughts of self harm, inability to engage with people, not wanting to socialize. Forgetting. Lots of memory loss, short term memory loss and inability recall, these are some of the things that we start to notice when we don’t give ourselves a break. And it starts off small we think we can sort of shake off these these sort of frustrations and I think once we we start to ignore them that much. We start to forget to you know, harken back to our previous episode, our self care. And recess is definitely part of lifestyle, it’s part of self care. Shout out to Simone Biles for her ability to recognize that she needed some self care that she needed to to ground herself literally.

Stefanie Bautista 58:17
Definitely. And for her because now that her form of play became her profession.

Ariel Landrum 58:23
Yeah…

Stefanie Bautista 58:24
I’m pretty sure as a young girl and hearing so many stories and learning about her story. Gymnastics is a way for kids to let loose and you know, just be in tune with your body and because she was so good at…

Ariel Landrum 58:35
Your whole body.

Stefanie Bautista 58:36
Your whole body and like push it to its limitations and like go above and beyond what you think is is possible for you know your sport. Now that this is her livelihood. And this is you know what the world sees her as her taking a break from it is actually normal come competitions are so stressful.

Ariel Landrum 58:56
So stressful.

Stefanie Bautista 58:57
I remember being in swim meets just like wanting to throw up in the pool, so that I could be disqualified. And you know, you never, ever really get used to that. And like I think as an athlete, her taking that time to ground herself and and still win two medals is still so impressive. She is still The GOAT. She is still amazing. She’s setting herself as like such a good role model for so many kids in sports, Kids of Color in sports, women in sports, there’s so much burden on her and you know what? Like I say to all these naysayers, you try doing all the things that they do. And do it in front of the whole world on a time difference. Being The GOAT and upholding that at her age.

Ariel Landrum 59:48
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 59:48
She’s a legend. She’s amazing. And I’m glad that you know, she did that for herself the ultimate form of self care and the ultimate recess for her brain.

Ariel Landrum 59:58
Yes. Yes. And harking back to recess and another Woman of Color who is The GOAT Miss Grotke.

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:07
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:08
I want to read some of these quotes to end us with?

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:11
Nice.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:12
“I look forward to reading your thoughts on how the male authors of the Constitution helped shape our gender based society.” snaps Okay. “The founding fathers didn’t think twice about excluding an entire gender from their rants. I mean, where were the founding mothers?”

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:29
Where were the founding mothers? I want to know this. She’s asking the questions.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:33
She really is asking the questions. snaps “So the noble Native Americans share their bountiful food supplies with the undeserving European savages.” snaps “And then our hero Beowulf, ripped Grendel’s arm off and beat him with it. A metaphor for man’s cruelty towards endangered species.” Thank you, thank you. snaps Woke. Woke. Woke.

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:55
Woke. Woke. Woke. Love Miss Grotke. She is The GOAT of for not only Third Street Elementary, but to all of us, you know, living as students and now adults. I strive to be like her as a teacher. And just you know, her calm presence. I love it.

Ariel Landrum 1:01:14
Yay.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:15
Yay. I really like I hope that you all like our talk on Recess. It is, if you are our age, and maybe you are, you know how much this little show really shaped our outlook on being at school, interacting with our peers, maybe even outside of school too. Let us know who your favorite recess character is either on Twitter @happiestpodGT, or on our Instagram when we post about this, to remind you that the episode is out very, very soon. Let us know who your favorite character, whether it be part of the crew or whether it be part of the staff or maybe even just the one off child that was you know, in the background. Because all those kids on the Recess field made Recess, whether or not the remain character. They were all important. And I loved this talk. I really enjoyed it.

Ariel Landrum 1:02:07
Me too. Me too. Thank you everybody for joining us and we will see you next time. Bye everybody.

Stefanie Bautista 1:02:12
Buh bye!

• Recess
• Spinelli
• Gretchen
• Mickey
• TJ
• Gus
• Vince
• The Swinger
• The Diggers
• Upside Down Girl
• 90’s Cartoons
• Mrs. Grotke

• Social-Emotional Learning
• Play
• Playground
• American school lunches
• Punishment
• Stereotypes
• Tropes
• School funding
• Developmental
• Excutive funcitoning
• Emotional self-control
• Student autonomy

Ariel Landrum 0:10
Hello, everybody, welcome to The Happiest Pod on Earth. I’m Ariel.

Stefanie Bautista 0:15
And I’m Stef. And we’re Disney fans. But we’re really so much more than that.

Ariel Landrum 0:19
Like I’m a licensed therapist, and I use my clients passions and fandoms to help them grow and heal from trauma and mental unwellness.

Stefanie Bautista 0:26
And I’m an educator who uses passions and fandoms to help my students grow and learn about themselves and the world around them.

Ariel Landrum 0:32
Happiest Pod is a place where we dissect Disney mediums with a critical lens. Why? Because just like we are more than just fans, we expect more from the mediums we consume.

Stefanie Bautista 0:42
And so today Ariel what Disney media or experience are we dissecting and sharing on this episode?

Ariel Landrum 0:49
So we’re gonna take it back a similar to what we’re dissecting we are going to dissect Wandavision

Stefanie Bautista 0:58
Wandavision lately got so many Emmy nominations, did you know that?

Ariel Landrum 1:04
Hey yes. Worth it.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06
Worth it. I don’t know exactly how many maybe we can get that number by the end of the episode. But I think it’s super awesome that these, The Academy or whoever is recognizing the work of Disney, not just Disney, but the work of comic book material, because I’ve always felt that comic books themselves as readable mediums have; their storytelling is so much more advanced than people take them for face value.

Ariel Landrum 1:36
Absolutely. Absolutely. And the appreciation that it’s becoming more than I think, I think we consider comic books and comic mediums very childlike or immature. There, there seems to be a stigma about the culture of people who consume comics and and even Disney media. Right?

Stefanie Bautista 2:02
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 2:03
So I think that now it’s, we’re gaining more recognition, it shows that it’s become very mainstream. It’s becoming a part of the general populace’s palette, but also that were given the way that Wandavision is created in regards to both honoring the comics and old sitcoms. It’s showing that that that projection and growth and evolution in regards to how we consume medium, but also the things that are still classic and timeless, and how that molding together is, I would say worthy of praise and are worthy of an award. But just something that we’ve known all along as as the audience; the consumers.

Stefanie Bautista 2:50
Yeah, absolutely. And I think in the time where I guess not a lot of people are so focused on getting those awards. I know, there’s so much controversy around like Emmys and the Oscars and the Grammys, I just think the recognition from a wider audience not just you know, our geeky audience and people who consume that media, it means a little bit and I think it just shows that the people running these shows are true professionals and the people who are producing the episodes and who are writing these scripts, they’re really taking the time to elevate the storytelling that we’re we’re used to seeing in our previous Marvel movies. So I do have the statistics, Wandavision earned 23 nominations, including outstanding limited series at the next Emmy Awards. They also get a nomination for “Agatha All Along,” the song…

Ariel Landrum 3:48
Heyyy!

Stefanie Bautista 3:48
For outstanding music and lyrics because you know that was an earworm for everybody who listened to it. It was like everwhere.

Ariel Landrum 3:55
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 3:57
And Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany have Outstanding Lead Actor and Actress nods as well. So I think everybody from I think also the, the cinematography maybe. There’s definitely directing, Outstanding Supporting lead actress in Kathryn Hahn as Agatha because she was crazy good in the show. Outstanding production design outstanding period and our character hairstyling which they fully deserve. I hope he wins. I do say here they have outstanding sound editing and sound mixing. Yes. That was the even got the the crackling of the old timey TV down. Yeah. And the visual effects. I’m talking about that were fantastic. They really got that old bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie style animation in the beginning of the episodes so perfect. But yeah, that just leads into what we’re going to talk about. And like we mentioned whenever we talk about a TV or movie. It’s full spoilers. So if you haven’t seen one division, pause and listen to any of our other podcasts or any other Geek Therapy podcasts and come back to us because we are going to be diving into the very nitty gritty details of wandavision and pulling all of our pop reference cultures and knowledge to make connections and how we can use that to further our practices.

Ariel Landrum 5:25
And if you have already seen one division after listening to this episode, I would encourage you to go to GT Radio and listen to their review on Wandavision and its notes to grief and loss.

Stefanie Bautista 5:38
Yes, yes. So where are we going to start with this Ariel? It’s a lot.

Ariel Landrum 5:43
So there are so many ways we could have taken really talking about and dissecting this medium and something that Stef and I have an affinity for is definitely retro vintage and and things that are stylistic. We, we like we like to have a nice aesthetic. Even with our straws like you know, no more, you can get your paper straw, but if you use a reusable straw, obviously way better. So for us, we were thinking very much artistic visual design, the sound of really much of the consumption of this medium, a little bit in the story arc of Wanda, but really more in its nods to other other shows other mediums and sitcoms, and very how it was so retro, but now it’s considered very avant garde. So I think umm starting off with obviously, the classic episode one, which if you remember watching it the first time was like “What is going on? Why is black and white? Why? This? I don’t I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. Is this where it’s gonna be at?”

Stefanie Bautista 7:00
Normally when we watch any sort of Marvel beginning, it’s like a flashback, there’s a child, things are happening. We’re going to follow this child and they’re gonna discover something or, you know, Peter Parker’s gonna get bit by spider. I know that didn’t happen that way. But that’s just what we’re expecting. So we’re expecting to follow a character and a journey, but it totally threw a wrench in our expectations where it started off exactly like how the not Dick Van Dyke we’re going way, way way further. We’re going like, I Love Lucy, black and white opening sitcom like animation…

Ariel Landrum 7:37
And they definitely did in the first episode.

Stefanie Bautista 7:39
Yeah…

Ariel Landrum 7:40
Some Dick Van Dyke Show. Yeah, tropes. Yeah, so definitely, but but even had, you know, some a little bit of Bewitched in there. Yeah. Especially in the the special effects.

Stefanie Bautista 7:52
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 7:53
And I was, we were used to fast pace.

Stefanie Bautista 7:58
Yeah. And we were used to like, not just, I don’t even know how to explain it. Like, I know, we mentioned Michael Bay, and like, the whole Transformers trope I like blows everything up. But we’re so used to action Marvel movies that were just like, okay, there’s gonna be some sort of Chase, or we’re gonna just like follows a movie, some crazy cinematography. And it completely grounded us and took us back to an era of TV viewing that we don’t see anymore. Where it is, you see credits first. You see an animation, you see something silly. And then you see a hard opening of a show where they open the door, and you see a set. And even in modern sitcoms, you don’t see that anymore. It’s it’s a totally different way of storytelling. So you find it’s more of a linear, I guess….

Ariel Landrum 8:50
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 8:51
Way of viewing it, especially because it’s, it’s an open set in clearly what looks like a stage, you know, homes that look like that. And yeah, it was, it was like what is happening. And I do want to mention, before we go on that not only are we lovers of retro style, and going to Dapper Day and everything, but Ariel here knows a lot more about art than I do, because she is an art therapist. And so she definitely engages in this medium and this visual medium so much more than I do. So it’s gonna be really fun to see your take on just visually consuming what they put on the screen in this very different way.

Ariel Landrum 9:32
Yeah, not so much in one division. But I never saw Knives Out when it came out. And I watched it on streaming with my roommate. And in the opening scene pne of the main characters is holding a mug that says, “My house my rules,” and I was like, “Oh, I wonder if this person’s like very controlling.” And I read it out loud. And I was like, I was like “That’s probably an important mug,” and the mug makes it in the end and has a very specific meaning in regards to |My house, my rules.” And it and he was like, “How do you just notice something like that?” But I’m like, “How do you not notice something like that?” Again? props, the props. I’m very into zooming in on props.

Stefanie Bautista 10:10
Yeah. And it’s great to to have that perspective. And this is one of those mediums or this is one of those shows that because everything was so retro, we didn’t use we weren’t used to finding Easter Eggs in small props like that. Back in the day.

Ariel Landrum 10:27
Yeah, like the commercials they had, right like, the very first like, it was it was a toaster commercial. I was like, “Oh, look, that’s Vision.” Like it’s like there’s it has a red dot says it says it says a Stark on there somewhere. And everyone’s like, “What are you talking about?” But if you freeze frame it like it’s a robot toaster, like made by Stark Industries and as a red dot in it’s head.

Stefanie Bautista 10:50
And we’re used to trying to find these Easter Eggs at this point, because we have seen so many different Marvel movies that inject these either just like playful props or playful visuals, but also some of them are foreshadowing. So they did a little bit of both in Wandavision and using those commercials, as vehicles to to show how scary the world she was, you know, weaving together was because in the later commercials, they were featuring the same people. And you know, those people were actually townspeople of Westview. And they were trapped. Because this was all just her orchestration, spoiler alert. Super spoiler alert. But yeah, we’re now seeing a 30 minute format write of a Marvel show. And we had feelings around that.

Ariel Landrum 11:46
Yes, so something we’re not used to, right? We I mean, not only before the pandemic, we were used to just seeing Marvel movies, and obviously, a movie format is a lot longer than a TV format. But additionally, because of the pandemic, we’ve been given more and more movies that are even longer because they can stream longer. And even with TV shows, we’re given the entire series. Like you can binge it all up front. But with these series, I mean, we didn’t see this until the Mandalorian. And now I think is going to be more common on Disney+ where it’s just like watching TV back in our day where you had to wait, you had to wait a week for the next episode. And it it’s not as easy to find those continuity errors what like now is with bingeing. And so it it force it, you mentioned being grounded, it forces us to have to really consider what we were consuming, it forces us to have to pause, and it gave a lot of opportunity to try and predict, right? Like “What who do we what do we think this Easter Egg means or what do we think is going to come in next?” And if you weren’t going on IMDb, then you were doing a lot of just your own guesswork and your own fact finding and weaving things together. And I think that builds excitement and anticipation that we don’t have to necessarily feel when we can consume an entire series in essentially a weekend.

Stefanie Bautista 13:16
Yeah, absolutely. And I think it keeps the the mysterious things that Marvel likes to keep under wraps, because you know, all of their cast all of their crew is tight lipped on anything that they’re doing. And I’m feeling that if I was a Marvel Disney executive, they were already doing that in the larger sense with their movies, they had to wait months on end for Avengers Age of Ultron Avengers Endgame so why not do that in a smaller scale format? And in not releasing everything all at once? They know the fans are going to wait for them. I’m gonna wait for them. And I’m gonna wait and maybe not all the time. But I know some of you will wait till midnight 12 pm or 12 am on the dot to, press play and see it over everybody else’s so that the next day when you’re at work or at school, or wherever you are, you can talk about oh my gosh, did you watch this? Like I watched that this morning and so many of our friends and in our group chat said “Oh my gosh, I just watched it,” it’s like freaking three in the morning.

Ariel Landrum 14:16
Like what you guys doing?

Stefanie Bautista 14:18
But that’s that’s the hype that they that they’re really good at, at projecting and, and coming up with because they know that we’re going to wait for it. So might as well keep keep people guessing, keep articles coming keep the buzz, like at the top of everybody’s feeds, because even when we were talking about Loki, we were guessing every single week what was going on because we didn’t know how it was going to end. So I think with Wandavision it being so far out of what we’re used to seeing. I think people were just either stumped; mad that they didn’t know what was going on…

Ariel Landrum 14:56
Straight up upset.

Stefanie Bautista 14:58
Totally like turned off to the series because it’s not what they were expecting. Definitely a lot of the action heads in our communities were just like, “What the is this? Like? I didn’t tune in to like see some old timey whatever blah blah.”

Ariel Landrum 15:15
Black and white what?

Stefanie Bautista 15:16
Yeah, if you weren’t invested in the storytelling of Wandavision, you probably were totally turned off by it and didn’t tune in again until the Malcolm in the Middle episode maybe where the cosplay happens.

Ariel Landrum 15:30
Yeah, I think that like you mentioned you know, some execs they took a risk with this they took a huge risks because you know, in watching Falcon and The Winter Soldier and in watching Loki those felt like, quote unquote, traditional Marvel media that we’ve been consuming. This was very unique and different. And I think you know, because of its uniqueness stands out in regards to to these other series. Give it to the girls.

Stefanie Bautista 16:05
Give it to the girls to make it stylistic, classic and also smart. I think Wandavision was very smart. You really had to think about what was going on and like, detach yourself because they didn’t detach themselves from the Wandavision world until Episode Two right where we see Monica.

Ariel Landrum 16:26
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. until until then we’re, we’re not really sure what’s going on. And I think that that eeriness, that confusion… I really liked it I liked not being able to to predict and guess what was going on it made it more exciting and I think is pretty much the ambivalence we feel about Wanda or the because it’s… Is she a good guy or she a bad guy? That is how she’s been introduced in the series very back and forth, and her journey in regards to that, that decision, we need to decide at some point whether this character is going to be villainous or not. And I think I think this series answered that and it answered it in the in very much the way that we felt her which was, we would see, we would see her against the Avengers. We’d see her with the Avengers, we’d see her split up with the Avengers like it, we’d see her alone it that that common theme is represented in all these episodes in regards to her story arc.

Stefanie Bautista 17:31
Yeah, absolutely. And I think what you mentioned about it being creepy. I think that’s a sentiment that you can feel for a lot of retro TV and a lot of retro movies. Because you see this world portrayed so perfectly, and so well thought out, everybody has hair is coifed clothes are totally iron, like all the way everyone’s dressed to the nines all the time. In our reality that’s just not true. We wake up out of bed not looking cute, no makeup on, like, “I woke up like this,” is like a real thing. You know, there’s something creepy about everything being so perfect like The Stepford Wives and that trope of being the perfect wife and being the perfect mother and being the perfect house, house woman caregiver to everybody. Having it all together just waiting for your husband to come home and have everything perfect than laid out there’s something creepy about that. And I think that was definitely translated in the way that Wanda wanted to make everything so perfect. So she can shield herself from the world around her and shield the sadness and the loss and the pain that she’s still actively going through. Because it was the only way that she could cope.

Ariel Landrum 18:49
And and very dreamlike, right like when we’re talking about using it as as a coping mechanism living sort of in a fantasy a full on fantasy that she was able to create with her powers. Those beginning episodes are dreamlike because everything is perfect. And then we find out that the mishaps that do happen they’re from Agatha not from her. So

Stefanie Bautista 19:09
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 19:10
Agatha had not noticed her powers and not inserted herself in Wanda’s world. I’m I would think that it would be even eerier than like looking back at old sitcoms because there probably would be no plot and there probably would be no quote unquote struggles. I don’t even know if we would have moved past you know, like the 1950s….

Stefanie Bautista 19:33
Oh probaly note.

Ariel Landrum 19:33
In her in her timeline, I think that she would have still been very curled hair coifed and even the costuming they had it forced her to sit up right. They they talked about in assembled if you watch that series on Disney Plus, the costumes definitely had a course that type feel to force everybody to sit up straight and just that very like 90 degrees. You’re sort of like her correct angle kind of gives you the sense that this world isn’t supposed to be off balance. And how is that possible? And then it isn’t until near the end of the episode, when we get very much they use the Twilight Zone effect of tilting the camera zooming and changing the music that we were like, no, yeah, this this world’s off.

Stefanie Bautista 20:22
Yeah. Let’s talk a little bit about what it takes to recreate something so accurate, right? In order for them to really capture the feel of these sitcoms in their respective areas. They had to do the same things that those exact shows did. And a couple of those things is that episode one was taped in front of a live studio audience. And that is something that is very rarely done nowadays, especially COVID, because you don’t have live studio audiences anymore. And you won’t have a laugh track, right? And can we explain a little bit about what a laugh track is, and like using that in, in TV shows? I think I can definitely speak to that, because I’ve seen a lot of old old old sitcoms, and the laugh track was used as a break for the script, basically.

Ariel Landrum 21:13
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 21:13
And they use that for the people who are acting to play off of and use that to kind of project and move their emotions forward. So they would pause, they would know when the audience was going to laugh because it was put in the script. And there was a little light in the audience that turned on that says “laugh” or “audience.” And then the audience was then laugh because they are part of the experience, and they are part of the taping. So in order to create that field, they did that in the first episode. And I would have loved to have been one of those people.

Ariel Landrum 21:48
Yes, I wish I’d known there was a call for that to be part of this live studio audience taping. I think even when you’re thinking of the the laugh tracks, the other thing is it’s training the audience to know what’s funny.

Stefanie Bautista 22:01
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 22:01
And the and for me in regards to thinking of the the Marvel Universe, like we’ve seen them shifting more and more towards jokes and humor. But it’s hard to tell when something’s supposed to be funny. Given that, you know, like, everybody has very different humor styles and kind of laugh at different things. That the again, these these beginning episodes are telling you, “You are only allowed to react this way. Or you’re only supposed to.” That again…

Stefanie Bautista 22:29
It’s so limiting.

Ariel Landrum 22:30
Yes. So limiting. It shows you not only how limiting those errors were in regards to just emotional depth and the ability to be expressive. It also, again, gets that eerie vibe of like, “Wait, why is this funny? Why is that funny? And why is everything funny?”

Stefanie Bautista 22:49
Yeah. And even when vision is like, I’m going to work doing the computer things…

Ariel Landrum 22:54
Oh hello kitty.

Stefanie Bautista 22:55
Hello kitty. When he’s typing and doing the computer thing, he’s not even 100% sure of what he is doing. So I mean, he and I think that that’s really interesting that we’re going through this world through Vision’s mind? Vision himself is kind of like the audience in where he’s not sure what’s going on. So the only person that we can relate to his Vision because he’s been dropped into this place. Without knowing what happened to him previously, or what is going to happen to him in the future. Everybody else seems to know what’s going on. Especially his um, his desk mate at work is just like, “Oh, you know, we’re doing these things and computing the stuff,| and he’s just like, Oh computers. What is what is this?” And you’re just like, “Wait, what the heck is going on?” Even he doesn’t know what’s like happening. And then he doesn’t know if it’s their anniversary, or if they’re celebrating something. And then when, like, that is scary in itself. Imagine waking up and not knowing what day it was what your agenda was for the day. We’re so used to planning things out digitally and in our minds and months, weeks in advance, that being present, which is a very common thing in retro TV and also just in the world of our past being present and just going through your day. And letting it unfold like that is something so foreign to us and scary.

Ariel Landrum 24:20
So foreign.

Stefanie Bautista 24:22
But yeah, I think seeing the world through Vision’s eyes really made at least me feel a little bit comfortable because it was starting to get really creepy and not exactly knowing what was real and what was not. And in a world where everything was so obviously fake. It was kind of like a mind trip to go on because the lobster that pure old and clearly fake. They could have made that really really

Ariel Landrum 24:46
Clearly fake. Yeah, I think that was the other thing is they decided to not only shoot in the frame that TVs were back in those days. So that so they had to they had to find very specific type camera framing and cameras to shoot at that format. They use special effects until it was an era where visual effects were created. So they match that era. And the special effects and props artists were, some of them had worked on Bewitched, so they were able to recreate, you know, those those recipe cards floating on a string. But looking at it from our perspective, we clearly know this, this is fake. Like “I can tell that this is not she’s not really using her magic.” So what exactly is going on that they are, you know, really stepping back in the way that they’re visually creating things? And it was because they were replicating that experience of sitcom. The, I mean, and even being acknowledging some of the, I guess, tropes of those sitcoms and like Agatha coming in and she was like, “You know what modern life nowadays wouldn’t have a full like dinner ready on hand?” That was an expectation back then that that women, very again, Stepford Wives that you have a specific role and your role is to feed the familym you roll is to keep this house clean, your role is to look cute. Somehow, make that lobster in your heels.

Stefanie Bautista 26:18
Yeah. And you know that Wanda is sort of a foreigner still. And we know that Wanda herself. Her character is a foreigner. She’s from a Sokovia, Eastern European made up nation. And you see that there’s an element of if you’re an immigrant, or migrant, or child of an immigrant, you know that these things are familiar, but still foreign. So the idea of having dinner on the table having like a spread and all of those fixings together for this dinner with the boss is still sort of a not so familiar concept. And she’s just like, “Wait, I need help with this. Because I don’t exactly know how I’m supposed to do this.” And you you then see, “Oh, my gosh, Wanda is still trying to figure out what this exactly looks like.” Because as real as it seems. And as like onpoint as we see it to be, there’s still something quite off about it. And as you were talking Ariel, I was thinking there was definitely some Disney Magic involved in this show.

Ariel Landrum 27:21
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 27:21
Because we know going to the parks and we know with very old, old, old Disney movies, animated and live action, there’s a certain style that comes with it. There’s a certain like Disney Magic that I don’t know, can’t really explain. But when you’re watching old movies like the old Parent Trap, and you’re watching old movies, like I think the one that they shot at Disneyland, I don’t know if the Disney movie, but they shot it at Disneyland. I forget the name. But I know a lot of you Disney fans know about it. It’s there’s just this feel to it. That is a little bit magical. And I think they really captured that in one division. Because they got it so right. But like a little too, right?

Ariel Landrum 28:04
Yeah, yeah, they did just they turned it all the way up. So that’s how you knew something was wrong. But it I mean, if I hadn’t known this was Wandavision, and someone had just shown me like some 1950 shows and then that I again, I would have assumed.

Stefanie Bautista 28:20
Wouldn’t have known.

Ariel Landrum 28:20
And even the rest of the areas; when we got to the 70s. And when we got to the 90’s. Like if you had shown me some sitcoms there and then this they matched. And they match not just in special effects not just in wardrobe, not just the set and propping but they matched in music. The two writers of all the songs they picked a specific melody to input in all every episodes’ theme song, but they only use instruments that were very common in those areas. And they only used a sort of songwriting and beats that you would expect in those areas. So it was a completely immersive experience.

Stefanie Bautista 29:01
You’re not hearing no trap beats 808 music in these early episodes and you totally see that and it became really evident to me during the Malcolm in the Middle Halloween spectacular episode because it felt super 90’s to me. The graphics that they were using in the beginning, the iconic like stretching of the background behind the the text title was so iconic of Malcolm in the Middle. Like the the fisheye lens where everybody’s just kind of getting in the camera. It was very early 90’s. Such a such a big step, I think from the previous episode, which was still kind of Brady Bunch inspired. I feel like it was like a…

Ariel Landrum 29:47
Definietly Full House and I’m trying to think… Umm.. Ah was it there’s one more? I’ve gone blank, but that happens. But yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 30:05
Are you thinking like of another?

Ariel Landrum 30:07
Oh, Good Times good times.

Stefanie Bautista 30:08
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 30:08
Yeah. Good. Yeah. It was very Good Times and Full House and a little bit of The Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Stefanie Bautista 30:15
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 30:16
But…

Stefanie Bautista 30:17
I think there was just over that period. And…

Ariel Landrum 30:19
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 30:19
I was surprised. I was really surprised because when we think of 90’s sitcoms, yes, of course, I do think Malcolm in the Middle, but that’s why I’m like 99 almost like borderline millenia area millenia era. Because I think a Full House, I think of Family Matters, I think of Step By Step. I think of all of the TGIF; Sister, Sister. Like…

Ariel Landrum 30:39
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 30:40
Those are the things that I remember, from 90’s sitcoms, and I’m wondering, and I don’t have the answer to this, why they decided to kind of skip that, like, stylistically.

Ariel Landrum 30:52
Yeah. I feel like maybe because it’s not as stylistic as like, like, iconic. Like we’re shifting from vintage to retro, right.

Stefanie Bautista 31:01
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 31:01
And now we’re, we’re, when it comes to sort of like 90’s, that has become at least some of the 90’s styles has become more present and modern now. It’s being sort of reclaimed. And not the the shirts over jeans. No, it’s like the crop tops. So like, the glowing part of the 90’s.

Stefanie Bautista 31:21
Seriously, I know.

Ariel Landrum 31:23
Y2K era.

Stefanie Bautista 31:25
We’re gonna we’re gonna digress a little bit because I know we’ve been having conversations of as women. I struggled in the 90’s to find any sort of, well, I mean, I was like, what, 11 right? So that kind of shows our age a little bit, but I was not feeling cute in the 90’s. I was so frumpy, like, I think I could barely afford going to Limited Too at the time. End like you would shop from a catalog remember Delia’s?

Ariel Landrum 31:52
Yes, yes.

Stefanie Bautista 31:52
Yeah, everything was like, but then everything then was harkening back to the 60s, because everything was like very flowery and tie dye and like block colorings.

Ariel Landrum 32:02
And they did have bell bottoms.

Stefanie Bautista 32:04
Yeah, bell bottoms. So it’s like, do I stick with my cargo baggy jeans, cargo baggy khakis with the super crop top that like I A. feel comfortable in and B. would probably get a dress code violation at school for. Or do I just stay looking like a tomboy, and I just stayed looking like a tomboy. Because that was just easier for me.

Ariel Landrum 32:26
Not only was it easier, but I for me, I was raised by a single dad and I had a brother. So at a certain point, we were all going to kind of dress the same.

Stefanie Bautista 32:36
And I mean, I come from… Excuse me, from a migrant household. So I didn’t really have the money to keep up with trends. And I thought about that, actually. Before we filmed this episode, I knew so many of these sitcoms, because I didn’t have cable. I don’t know if you didn’t grow up without cable. But I was…

Ariel Landrum 32:59
Oh there was no cable on the military base.

Stefanie Bautista 33:02
Really, they don’t pamper you for you know serving our country and laying your life on the line for the goodness of our borders?

Ariel Landrum 33:11
Nah fam. I had like six channels. Disney Channel was one of them thank goodness.

Stefanie Bautista 33:15
See and I didn’t even have Disney Channel, so I was living in 13 channels. For those of you in LA know, 2 a CBS, 4 was NBC. 5 was KTLA but then they always showed reruns, so if you were sick at home, you would watch things like The Mary Tyler Moore Show. The Brady Bunch. I loved and I think that’s why I have such an affinity for retro TV. And vintage TV is because I, that was the only thing that I watched. Being, you know, working class and not being able to afford cable not to like way way at like later on in life. I could only consume media that was limited in what they showed in the mornings and in the evenings. And I think tying back to the way Wanda was viewing American culture in another country and that is a… That’s a journey that a lot of immigrants and migrants and foreigners consume American media. Some is going on in my voice. But they only see what VHS shows them. They only see what their family in America sends to them. And they only see what is pirated and sold for pennies on the street. So many of my cousin’s in the Philippines only know American culture through the Brady Bunch and through I Love Lucy. I Love Lucy is so popular in other countries because of the way that it’s connected different people in different countries to what the American dream was.

Ariel Landrum 34:54
Yes. Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 34:54
And if your journey is to get out of your country and go to America, that is the ideal. You want to be in a nuclear household with a loving, you know, male and female relationship. And that is what’s portrayed. And that is what you you aim for. And anything outside of that is considered out of the norm. And so I think that’s really, I really like the episode where we see Wanda and her DVDs, and her holding onto her DVDs for dear life because that is what her hobby is. That is what her love is. And that is what she connects to. Because she’s so, so so wants to get out of her situation. And you see that is it’s not a good situation.

Ariel Landrum 35:38
Yeah, and in regards to like talking about that medium we consume like that, that was what she was consuming in regards to an ideal life. So of course, if she has the actual powers and ability to recreate that she’s going to recreate that. There was there were levels of safety. I think the the other thing in regards to just how her experience was growing up with with this, this imagery in these films, I was… I noticed that a good chunk of them had, you know what she was emulating really like male leads. And it wasn’t until she sort of created literally, her own episode that we then became the Scarlet Witch that we saw her actually claim her show, right? Like, like, actually claimed this world as her own. She was letting things even unfold for herself, despite the fact having the control. And I think that that very much shows her her shift of how control and chaos are a fine line. People think that they are binary in that they are worlds apart from each other. And their next door neighbors.

Stefanie Bautista 37:02
Yep, they’re so close. They could be sharing a wall.

Ariel Landrum 37:05
Sharing a wall. I, I always relate it to you when I’m talking to clients about like integration, like integrating different parts of ourselves. My dad has OCD. And he has OCD where he has to check things. And so you can say that’s very controlled, he has to you know, check the locks at least 20 times. That’s it’s a high number, right? And that’s very chaotic to have to go back and check something 20 times and not trust or what your what you saw what you touched what you felt. Your mind telling you, you know, essentially gaslighting you and saying like, “No, you need to check it again.” So that’s that, that fine line. And I feel like because she’s essentially she has chaos magic, like we’ve already identified it cah…, as actual chaos. It really shows how controlled she’s actually been this whole time.

Stefanie Bautista 37:59
Yeah. The whole time, in not in just what we see her in Westview. But also, when you’re looking back at that scene with like her parents, she only had a limited amount of DVDs that she could take and only a limited amount of choices that she had. And also she had to be told when and where to watch it. They had to you know, she wanted to wait for her family, obviously. But they were so limited in what they could see when they could watch it, that every single step was calculated for her. And you see that already in the beginning. And then when everything gets blown out of the water, and they’re left to just her and Pietro, she then becomes the decision maker. But she doesn’t quite know how to do that. So she somehow and we don’t see this part. But I know in the comic books, she finds herself in her brother in certain situations where she has to kind of attach herself to larger male figures in order to go on and survive in her life. And also in the comic booksm she’s seen as Magneto’s daughter. So that way is a little bit and very much different from the way that they decided to portray her in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but also it it draws parallels from there is a higher purpose and she is just kind of like a pawn in that. And that is how she is used in the original story. But you also see that when she’s introduced in the MCU, as somebody who’s just used to following directions.

Ariel Landrum 39:32
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 39:32
And really looking out for her younger brother, and that’s a very older sister, sort of sentiment that I can relate to. I’m an older sister, and I see a lot of that.

Ariel Landrum 39:46
And common even in twins. People forget that there’s still an older and a younger and they vehemently know it. And so for her like she and then to lose her younger sibling… So so the amount of grief and loss she can tell us experience right we’ve got we’ve lost parents we’ve lost an entire country so so no no actual home to sort of go back to. And you know now is essentially losing her life partner… It it’s it’s very much understandable why she would want to escape to these mediums and even going back into her childhood. There was war going on and Sokovia and that the people were having to try and like ignore what’s going on in their outside walls to keep themselves safe and essentially emotionally safe. Right? We we fully divulge or digest our mediums. We we fully immerse ourselves because that’s the only way that you can ignore sort of like these bombs going off. I know. For me, I lived in the safety of a military base. But, you know, depending on how close you are to the armory, like you, you heard those things all the time, you sort of started to get jaded and and not not be able to tell the difference between what was considered unsafe and what was considered safe. Or even like, when my dad retired in Kansas, you know, we had an alarm that went off at noon to tell us, it was our tornado watch alarm, and it’s just just the test it. But after a while he got so used to it that when there was actual tornado coming, it was hard to tell the difference. And when we should go underground, which anyone can tell you in Kansas, they still don’t go under the ground. Everybody wants to see it. But that’s neither here nor there. In talking in regards to just knowing what’s considered safe, detaching ourselves from the moment is, is a is a level of safety. It’s a coping skill that we that we need when when things are out of our control. And for Wanda, her grief was literally out of her control, there was there was no way that she was going to be able to summon up enough magic to even recreate Vision that that was Vision because he was very autonomous. And her Vision was not. It took them a while to get there.

Stefanie Bautista 42:06
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 42:09
But I think, yeah…

Stefanie Bautista 42:10
it took them a while to get there. But we, we still see him as vision, the amalgam of Tony Stark’s AI, you know, just him being frankly, a robot. And I mean, for me, I always wonder like, “Wow, like she found love in somebody who isn’t fully human.” Like it really takes a special person to find a life and a heart in, in something that we see as just a creation of technology. Right? So we already know that there’s something special there that something that we don’t see in quite understand, but we still see it as very beautiful. But Vision himself he as he’s discovering himself through this series, he’s stuck in the middle of “Am I supposed to act like a human? Or am I supposed to act like what I’m feeling, which is more of Vision, as you know, AI Vision fully, you know, realized.” But I do want to go a little bit backwards in what you were saying when you were in Kansas and living on a military base. I feel like being a teacher in pretty much downtown Los Angeles, like we’re downtown Los Angeles adjacent. We’re always hearing sirens, helicopters, we’re always going into lockdown. That is just like a normal thing for us. We’re we’re, you know, used to hearing people on the street kind of yelling. Transients. We’re used to seeing, you know, people who are displaced, just like not knowing where they are. We’re used to that sort of chaos in and around our schools. And so our kids are jaded to some extent into just focusing on school. Us as teachers, we put on media, we do all sorts of things in the classroom to distract ourselves from letting them know, Hey, we’re in a lockdown based police activity just right across the street, probably either a domestic dispute, somebody has like a gun. Those things are normal to us. And I think that is very relatable in the way that Wanda as a child decides to cover herself and shield herself from all the chaos around her. Because that’s what children are really good at doing; their imaginations are so large, and they’re so eager to find comfort in anything. Whether it be in storytime and closing the blinds and putting on a short film or closing the blinds, listening to storytime just like totally detaching yourself because you just want to feel safe.

Ariel Landrum 44:33
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 44:33
And in some ways, I feel like switching gears we did that during the pandemic.

Ariel Landrum 44:38
Yeah we did.

Stefanie Bautista 44:38
I remember during the protests and during civil unrest here in an I’m in the valley, so I was far away from where I work downtown, but Van Nuys was like one of the places that was really hit with the looting and a lot of protests and just people just like fed up and upset and just like going through all of the businesses and destroying them. So at one point, I was just hearing explosions, maybe like, every 30 minutes. I didn’t know what they were.

Ariel Landrum 45:09
Yeah. Yup.

Stefanie Bautista 45:09
And at that time, my son was about four months old. So I was trying to shield him as a parent as well, from hearing all of these sounds. He doesn’t know yet if they’re scary, or real, or whatever, but I didn’t want him to feel my fear. So we would distract ourselves. We would put on Disney+, we would watch things and try to just make sure that they felt safe in any way, shape, or form. So we I definitely can relate to what you were saying. But I know that we talked a lot about not just grief, but creating this world that is your safe space, right? Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 45:55
Yeah, I think in therapy, we ask clients to create comfort corners, either like in the real world or in their mind. Safety corners, safe spaces that you can go to in your mind’s eye when you are feeling anxious. And for for Wanda, she was able to do that with these sitcoms. And again, because I think sitcoms were a smart choice. They’re formulaic, they’re predictable.

Stefanie Bautista 46:21
They so comforting.

Ariel Landrum 46:22
They’re so comforting. And then even thinking about the way the comedy is, it’s very slapstick. Right, like if we think of Queen of Slapstick, I Love Lucy. Like we saw some of that in Wandavision in the the way that she was, you know, moving the ingredients around. Yeah, it was very Nick at Night.

Stefanie Bautista 46:43
Very Bewitched.

Ariel Landrum 46:44
Very Bewitched.

Stefanie Bautista 46:45
And I Dream of Jeannie so cute.

Ariel Landrum 46:48
It was a good respite. Because a lot of the humor is often very sarcastic, snarky, right?

Stefanie Bautista 46:57
Dry.

Ariel Landrum 46:57
We don’t get that…. Dry. We don’t get that until we get to like the 90’s. Yeah, the the Malcolm in the Middle sort of inspired episode. And we we start to see her, let her guard down there. And that’s why the humor changes. And I think that that’s also when we start to see her world unravel.

Stefanie Bautista 47:24
Yeah, in the classroom as well. We have a piece corner in every classroom for kids to just take a break because sometimes learning is really stressful. And you know, you you can feel some emotions that you just need to learn how to self regulate. And Wanda was the Queen of Self Regulation because she was creating all this magic to create her piece corner. But yeah, definitely the the humor and the comfort that we find in just the sitcom structure where we know it was every Friday, at 7 pm. We knew that there was gonna be one story that we followed, and that we are going to laugh and we’re going to find a little twist at the end. We’re going to end the episode resolving whatever problem that was presented in the beginning of the episode. And then we get to rest and then look forward to the next one. There wasn’t too much of an underlying like, larger story arc in many of these sitcoms. It was just very… Problem. Resolve. Happiness. Let’s have dinner. You know? Not Not until we see the interweaving of storylines in Modern Family, which they touch upon in the later episodes. And I have to shout out Elizabeth Olsen for her Claire Dunphy impression, I am such a huge Modern Family fan and the way she looks at the camera and does that like mom stare? Like, “Are you freaking kidding me?” I love that. That was like the best and I was just like, “She freaking nailed it.” Like, I love it. So we didn’t see those interlocking story lines until then. And there was there was no, there was no comfort there anymore, because now you have the kids who are grown. And they’re kind of thinking of their mom. And we’re not quite sure if they’re figments of her imagination yet at that point when they’re introduced, because the weird way that they aged, and that kind of creeped me out. Did it creep you out? It creeped me out.

Ariel Landrum 49:31
Which it also made me think of sitcoms when they were like replace younger kids and siblings and all of a sudden they’re just older but everybody else isn’t as older because they’re not like kids aging. That rapid aging thing is something we’ve seen usually doesn’t happen in that episode.

Stefanie Bautista 49:46
No. It happens over seasons.

Ariel Landrum 49:48
Next season, they’ve replaced this person with someone who’s like way older that somehow supposed to play younger. I think that also the like the knowingness that they knew that they were aging like I’m going to make a decision to be 10. Because I want a dog.

Stefanie Bautista 50:03
That self-awareness so weird. But speaking of kids, the way she gave birth, let me just say, if I could give birth that easily, I’d have a ton of kids at this. Because I was like, how are they going to show this and then I, as a mother, who had just given birth, was like, I’ve seen so many different ways that sitcoms portray this. Mainly, the one that sticks out to me is the one in The Office or a Pam is. She, her water breaks, and then she she gets, you know, sent to the hospital with Jim and it’s just like total chaos, because like, Michael’s tried to record it, but then when she’s in the delivery room, you hear her screaming, and you hear her just like in pain. And then Michael steps in and he’s just like, “Oh, God, that baby’s gonna have a lot of hair.” And that is the first time that that kind of grossness of of childbirth in a sitcom was, you know, portrayed to me. But back then we didn’t we never saw Lucy give birth to Little Ricky we never…

Ariel Landrum 51:04
Well so in The Mary Tyler Moore Show…

Stefanie Bautista 51:07
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 51:08
Georgette gives birth at Mary’s apartment. So yeah, that’s sort of what they were harking to.

Stefanie Bautista 51:13
I think so too…

Ariel Landrum 51:13
Because it is the 1970s.

Stefanie Bautista 51:15
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 51:16
And just as a as hilariously goofy as that.

Stefanie Bautista 51:20
Yes just as hilariously goofy, and anyone knows any woman any real like 21st century being knows that, childbirth is not like that. It is not cute. It’s very messy. And that’s all I gotta say about that. And to keep this prestene world it would not have happened.

Ariel Landrum 51:39
And the only mess they sorta had was her magic sort of like being in and out, right? But yeah, babies were came out clean.

Stefanie Bautista 51:48
Like fully grown almost like?

Ariel Landrum 51:50
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 51:51
They look like they had lived a couple weeks at least. Because we all know in creating a perfect sitcom, babies are not going to follow your stage directions. They’re not going to know their cues. So whenever we saw babies in sitcoms, they were fully grown.

Ariel Landrum 52:07
They are fully grown. Or they’re plastic.

Stefanie Bautista 52:10
Yes. Or they’re plastic. Oh my gosh, the plastic baby. It’s always fun to see and point out “Oh my god that baby’s fake!”

Ariel Landrum 52:15
“Fake baby!”

Stefanie Bautista 52:16
Fake baby. But we touch there’s so many things I think in one division to to tackle stylistically. Emotionally with Wanda’s female, female, I guess gaze, you can say in somebody as an outsider looking in. But at the same time creating her world she’s kind of laying out the tracks that she goes. And how I feel like many women do that in their everyday lives, especially as mothers and as wives and just caregivers, we’re kind of laying out the tracks as we go. Because if we don’t know what’s going to happen, chaos can ensue. I feel like every mother and wife has a little bit of or any head of household, that’s a woman really, you don’t have to be a wife or a mother to know that. If you’re keeping the house together, there’s little chaos magic that has to happen in order for it to make it to the next day.

Ariel Landrum 53:10
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 53:10
So I think there’s there’s a lot of things to be said about that, that we can, you know, tackle in a whole other episode. But I guess with every medium, maybe we can talk about what we loved and what we didn’t love, I guess because we really loved Wandavision.

Ariel Landrum 53:27
Yeah, I did. I really loved Wandavision in regards to the evolution of her hair.

Stefanie Bautista 53:37
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 53:39
So we know that it represents different areas of television, but it’s also very symbolic of her mental state throughout the series and that be wanting to control her identity and forcing a very specific presentation of self, and the unraveling of it. And literally the unraveling of her hair showing that. Because in the 1950s episode, again, we mentioned it was curled and coifed and had, you know, Stepford Wives vibes shorter pressed towards her head. And if I think of, you know, The Hex it was smaller at the time, it was still sort of being crafted. It was pressed close to her. There wasn’t other narrative being that we were aware of. But still, there wasn’t other narrative being brought in at least on Vision’s part, right? Eventually we see him sort of go off on his own. And then her hair continues to lengthen as her powers in The Hex grows.

Stefanie Bautista 54:35
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 54:36
And once sort of the town mirage comes undone her hair is shaggy, it’s loose, it’s messy, it’s uncapped.

Stefanie Bautista 54:45
It look like I’m done braids. Like when youdo your braids.

Ariel Landrum 54:49
Undone braids? Yes. Like I I need to let this out. I need to breathe. Yes, until it became a main once she was fully Scarlet Witch, it was red. It was. It was wavy, it was…

Stefanie Bautista 55:01
Big.

Ariel Landrum 55:01
Eluding fire was huge. It was a huge main. It was her chaos magic coming off of her. And a part of it was her embracing her full self. If we think of tight like coifed curls, you’re you’re not embracing really your full self, what you’re doing is you’re creating a presentation of self you want others to digest. In this case, it was like “To hell what you think,” right? ” Will literally sennd you there.”

Stefanie Bautista 55:28
“I’mma be me.”

Ariel Landrum 55:28
“I’mma be me.”

Stefanie Bautista 55:29
And it takes time to do hair like that. So you already know that there’s, oh my gosh, if anybody’s done pin curls, it takes for ever in a day to get them right.

Ariel Landrum 55:38
For-ev-ver.

Stefanie Bautista 55:38
And it takes practice, you got to do it every single day until you get them right. And I think that is something that it’s a very vintage personality trait of women back in the day to get themselves ready in order to be presentable for the males and for everybody else in the world that they’re going to go out and see when they go to the grocery store. So I mean, her being her full self just shows that you know what, “I don’t care what anybody else thinks I’m not living for anybody else. I’m living for me and what makes me happy.” Which she’s still trying to figure out.

Ariel Landrum 56:10
Yeah. Yeah, I I know that this is probably a moving towards her being a villain. So I’m wondering how her hair will change in that sense because there’s no way it’s going to stay even with with this because this embracing yourself that’s her embracing her power and and that it may actually also be just naturally an innate to her, not just given to her by the mind stone, but I also think that as she starts to become more villainous, it’ll probably become like those tendrils like we saw in Agatha, right? Like, these sort of like, has has its own arms and legs even. Could reach out and grab you. The other thing I really liked, obviously, I loved the music choices. And in the in the 90’s episode for the what was like the Malcolm in the Middle, the singer of that theme song is Kathleen Hanna from Bikini Kill. From the Riot Grrl music era. For those who don’t know, the Riot Grrl music era happened in 1990’s, and it was an underground feminist punk movement. In this subculture had music that was for feminism and politics. And at the concerts, what Riot Grrl bands like Bikini Kill would do is they would tell the women, “Come to the front. Men you go to the back. We’re going to make space a safe space for women, they’re going to be able to mosh they’re going to be able to be themselves and you’re going to cheer them on, you’re not going to make noise at them, you’re going to make noise for them, you’re going to lift them up.” And it was interesting because in this episode, we see her at the end like really assert herself in regards to Pietro her her fake Pietro.

Stefanie Bautista 57:55
Her fake Pietro. Which we could talk so much more about fake Pietro and… I was like “That’s not Aaron Taylor Rogers.”

Ariel Landrum 58:03
“The goofy uncle err.” Yeah. I think that that was that was really reminiscent of her saying like, “I am not just a mom. I am not just the wife.” This is an even in her costuming. right this is this is symbolizing that, “I am going to be the Scarlet Witch.”

Stefanie Bautista 58:19
Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I totally got that right girl vibes. I grew up in music discovery, listening to Sleater-Kinney and Le Tigre and like thinking, “Oh, I can totally be a tomboy still, but I could be a girl while doing that. And, and it’s okay to be a girl and be a badass.” And that was totally something in the 90s that a lot of girls went through where they were just kind of tired of being pop princess. And the dichotomy of seeing Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera at the time, but also knowing that there were these girls who could rock out and be punk rock badass. Totally his maybe it shows a dichotomy of what Wanda wanted to be and who she was before. I feel like every girl has a bit of a transformation when they grow up. When they go through those formative years. I know I had many stylistic choices that were very, very different and still are changing to this day. But I think that that was really fun to see. And also really touching to see that she was going through these real life emotions, even though she is somebody that has a lot of power to control her own universe. She’s still going through these things. And that really made her way, way more human and way more relatable, especially to women.

Ariel Landrum 59:38
Yeah, so I would say that those were some of the things that I really loved. And then certainly the episode where the beds get combined for like a foreshadowing of them having kids.

Stefanie Bautista 59:48
Babies yeah.

Ariel Landrum 59:49
I thought that was that was very clever and again that moving of the eras because we did only see couples sleep in separate beds. And then apparently, Mary Kay and Johnny was the first show to feature a couple in a bed together and be pregnant.

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:04
I never saw that.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:06
I’ve never seen it either. But there you go. There’s some history for ya’ll to put in your trivia night. Yeah, I think the thing that bothered me, which I don’t know if it quite bothers anybody else the same is that Scarlet Witch is, is that character is inspired off of the Romani people. But it does not really show the honoring of them. In fact, Romani people are presented as being chaotic, as being emotional, as being uncontrolled. And even in her having her classic Scarlet Witch costume in the Halloween episode, even though she is saying that this is, you know, Sokovia fortune teller, they didn’t have to sort of insert that sort of type of language. She could have just said that she was a made up comic book character. But the more that they kept hinting towards her Romani pass, or or at least what is inspired by the Romani people, the more it was the stereotype of, of these individuals and not so much their their actual heritage.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:15
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:01:16
And so I wished that we hadn’t gotten that close to it, I felt like we could have pushed the narrative slightly different in in regards to her past, especially because she’s already not Magneto’s kid.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:27
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:01:28
And now, I would say that was the only thing that bothered me because even her sort of exploding and her grief, Romani people have experienced a lot of grief because they, they’ve been removed from their lands, they, they have had a lot of harm and trauma to their people. But that’s being made fun of as, like, “You just don’t know how to control yourself, you just don’t know how to be controlled.” So that’s where the history of the like the chaos magic comes from inspiration wise. And I feel like if we kept it in with the mind stone, and I feel like if we had not inserted that line about a fortune teller, I think I would have liked that liked it even more, it would have been a full nine. It’s like an 8.7 for me.

Stefanie Bautista 1:02:11
Yeah, I totally, I totally understand that. And like they portray them as such outlandish, kind of almost comical type of people, but it really is part of their culture and something to, you know, be respected and honored. So I totally see that. For myself. I love Wandavision. I love the mystery of it. I love the unknowingness and kind of like, “How are they going to? How are they going to immerse me in classic television, but also make it creepy and mysterious, like the Twilight Zone.” And I love the Twilight Zone. I actually probably watch more retro TV than I would like to just because I was so used to it. And it’s comforting to me. So I I really liked the way that just the the style choices and the way that they were so they were so true to the era. They like took things from the Brady Bunch like you saw staircases that look like the one in the Brady Bunch house. You saw, like you said, I mean like the the set for the first episode was almost exactly like I Love Lucy set where the kitchen was on the right, the dining room and the dining room and the living room are in the middle. And then they had their bed somewhere else. I think that that was really smart of them to present it in that way that was familiar, but also foreign. And I think whenever they played with that all throughout the series was really fun to kind of just like go back and forth. Because I like watching something but also having a hidden agenda of like, like, “How is the production thinking about this every single time?” And that’s why watching Assembled really, really helped because I saw like what they were thinking of and I was like, “If I were to recreate a whole scene,” kind of like how sometimes we do theater in the classroom, like “how would I wow can I make this real?” Like what do I tell like my students, the actors, what mindset do they have to be to make this feel tangible and make this feel like how it’s supposed to? I love the breaks the commercial breaks as creepy as they were. I love that they brought back Randall Park as Jimmy Woo because I love Jimmy Woo in Ant Man and The Wasp. I think he’s hilarious. I love Randall Park. He himself was on a sitcom Fresh Off the Boat, which was based off of Eddie Wong’s life who is a chef and entrepreneur and that sitcom was so important to me because it was the first time since I think Margaret Cho’s sitcom where you saw an Asian family going through their life in America. So I really love Fresh Off the Boat. So I’m pretty sure that Randall Park was really excited to be part of Wandavision being that he was also in a sitcom himself. even talking about a Darcy who is from the Thor movies. She…What is her anem?

Ariel Landrum 1:05:06
The ultimate Sass Queen.

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:07
The ultimate Sass Queen.

Ariel Landrum 1:05:08
Kat Dennings.

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:09
Kat Dennings is also in a sitcom Two Broke Girls on CBS.

Ariel Landrum 1:05:14
And..

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:14
She.. Yeah, and she’s also

Ariel Landrum 1:05:16
The dolls one?

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:18
Yes. Dollface.

Ariel Landrum 1:05:20
Yes. Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:20
It was yeah fun show on Hulu and has a fantastic set of girls that are just so weird. Quirky. And is part of everybody’s girl group I guess girl group of friends of anyway watch Dollface it’s hilarious.

Ariel Landrum 1:05:36
It’s hilarious. Particularly the brunch episode.

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:41
That whole series is just so funny. So she brings a little bit of her snarkiness and sassiness from Two Broke Girls and Dollface into the MCU as Darcy and she did Darcy before she did those sitcoms. And and being in Thor and seeing the comedic style in Thor change from the first Thor to Ragnarok. I think she brought a little bit of that too. So that was really cool to see because it’s familiar. Seeing those two characters pulled from a Marvel Universe into now Wanda’s world and introducing Monica Rambeau who is from the Captain Marvel movies, who is played by Teyonah Paris who is beautiful by the way. She…

Ariel Landrum 1:06:25
Grog. Gorgeous.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:26
A gorgeous human being. Everything looked fantastic on her. And…

Ariel Landrum 1:06:31
Yes, it was it didn’t matter what outfit home girl was wearing grog.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:35
I mean, everybody looked amazing. But she so gorgeous Teyonah Paris, shout out to you. Did an amazing job becoming Photon. Who will we will probably see in the later movies. But yeah, there’s just like, overall the feel the vibe, the the tone of Wandavision and the unknowing and mystery of it I loved. What I would have liked to see was more episodes because I feel like they were so honed into the Bewitched and the I Love Lucy and the I Dream of Jeannie eras, that they didn’t give that due diligence to other eras. And I think it could have maybe she could have used those 80’s 90’s sitcoms to interact with the townspeople more.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:25
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:25
And I would have liked to see what their perspective was because as they were sort of becoming self realized that they were in a world that wasn’t theirs. And they were you know, trapped essentially, I think those instances would have really made it difficult for Wanda to want to continue, because she was juggling, “Do I do this for my family? Do I save these people because they also have families that they are missing. And you know, I’m changing their world in order to make my world better.” I think that would have given a lot more depth to her dilemma. And not just throwing Agatha in there right away. But also I wanted to see more Agatha and Wanda interactions.

Ariel Landrum 1:08:05
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:08:05
It was so electric seeing them on screen. And Kathryn Hahn, who has been in so many different sitcoms, the first time I saw her was on Parks and Recreation as the no nonsense lawyer that is funily on enough representing Bobby Newport who is Paul Rudd, who is Ant Man. So all of these all of these fun connections that I was making, in my mind, being an avid consumer of pop culture.

Ariel Landrum 1:08:31
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:08:32
Seeing her step into Agatha and being really scary and just like controlling and that that ultimate portrayal of a witch who is just out there to just destroy. She played that really well. And I think that witch versus witch. “Who is good who is bad are they both bad? Are they both just gonna destroy this earth?” I wanted to see more depth in that so more episodes would have been greatly appreciated. I hear that they’re not doing as season 2 is that correct?

Ariel Landrum 1:09:01
That’s what I hear as well. Hopefully that’s just a rumor and that there or or that it’s gonna be titled something different right? Like Falcon and Winter Soldier who is no longer the Falcon is Cap.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:14
Captain America.

Ariel Landrum 1:09:15
Uhh I don’t know.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:16
Scarlet Witch Vision?

Ariel Landrum 1:09:18
Scarlet Vision.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:21
Hey, you know what? That could be a play on her seeing red, and that symbolism of her’s. She’s just now we see her in her remote village somewhere is it probably there’s the Sokovia I don’t know where it is…

Ariel Landrum 1:09:33
Some kind of Eastern Europe area yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:35
She’s in the Himalaya somewhere. She has red eyes. She’s controlling her projecting of herself in front of the house and she’s trying to get her babies back. So you can see that she is fully seeing scarlet because she is just laser focused on getting her family back. So Disney if you’re listening… Marvel if you’re listening… We have an idea for you, which is probably an idea that you probably thought of already.

Ariel Landrum 1:10:04
Yes. Probably an idea. We will we will only take 2%.

Yes we will only take 2%. Hey, but that’s a big chunk though. I’ll take it. take what I can get.

Stefanie Bautista 1:10:16
But yeah, is there anything else you want to say about one division? Oh, I didn’t get my rating, right?

Ariel Landrum 1:10:21
Yeah, what’s your rating?

Stefanie Bautista 1:10:23
Man. I think just this is my favorite. Did I did I say Loki was my favorites. I love Loki so much. But Wandavision. It just speaks to my vintage retro heart and all of the things that I love about pop culture growing up. So if I gave Loki… Did I give it an 8.5?

Ariel Landrum 1:10:47
I think you were in the middle between Rachel and I.

Stefanie Bautista 1:10:51
Yeah, I was in the middle. I put it at an 8.5 to maybe even an 8.6. Just because the styles were just so true in the beginning, and they really got the costume down. And it really pissed a lot of people off, which I loved. I love that I got the the Neck Beards shaking. It’s always fun to see that and it’s always fun to see the fandom shock because if the fandom shock, then you know you did a good job, because you really. You are really onto something, and it’s usually a hit with Marvel. Sometimes it’s a miss, but we haven’t seen a mess since I think the Incredible Hulk?

Ariel Landrum 1:11:37
What? There was no Incredible Hulk movie that doesn’t exist.

Stefanie Bautista 1:11:40
Edward Norton that wasn’t Oh, that was Fight Club. That’s right. It was all it was all a figment of his imagination.

Ariel Landrum 1:11:46
Yes, yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:11:47
That’s right. That was part of Fight Club. Yeah, it was really good to see that.

Ariel Landrum 1:11:54
I think for me, the only thing is, again, in regards to the music, and I really loved the scene where they had “elped Me Rhonda playing to then all of a sudden Help Me Wanda.

Stefanie Bautista 1:12:06
Yeah. So good.

Ariel Landrum 1:12:07
I think that was a good sort of like narrative shift.

Stefanie Bautista 1:12:12
So good. Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:12:14
But yeah, I think that I don’t know if we’ll get something similar to this again. In regards to any of the the Marvel movies or shows. I think we’re gonna get very traditional back to the Marvel Marvel formula. And so I I’m okay with that. I’m okay with this being it’s it’s you it’s unique thing, I think that there’s no way to recreate this and have it just be as magical.

Stefanie Bautista 1:12:43
The timing was so right, we were coming out of the pandemic, sort of, right, we weren’t out of it, we’re kind of back in it. But everybody was still at home. We were still consuming media, mainly through our television screens and our computer screens. And I think the timing was just right to reintroduce the Marvel Cinematic Universe in this way, because we haven’t seen anything since everything shut down. So, it was a perfect way to launch Disney+ Marvel media.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:12
Yeah, yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:14
Because they saw how successful like you said the Mandalorian was. And because they knew it was successful for Star Wars, they’re like, “Hey, we have a whole new phase to introduce. And it’s gonna take a lot of details.” So now knowing that they’re using this in tandem with the movies, it really kind of conditioned us to consume this sort of media in this grand world of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And get ready to dive in and analyze alongside each other with movies and TV.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:49
So Stef, the Happiest Pod on Earth universe. What will be up on our docket next? What do we have coming up?

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:58
What do we have on our docket next? I know that we are done with Well, we’re not done with talking about all the shows. Right? We still have to talk about Falcon and Winter Soldier which I loved so many things about.

Ariel Landrum 1:14:11
Yeah

Stefanie Bautista 1:14:12
I love Sam. I love Sam and I love Bucky and they’re they’re like, they’re like the boyband that exists in my Marvel heart.

Ariel Landrum 1:14:26
The bromance.

Stefanie Bautista 1:14:27
The bromance, and you guys will come to see how much I love buddy cop comedies.

Ariel Landrum 1:14:33
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:14:34
I have so many favorites, but I’ll talk about that later. So we are going to be talking about Falcon and Winter Soldier pretty soon. But I know that we’re gonna have some special guests, right?

Ariel Landrum 1:14:44
Yeah. So yeah, yeah, we’re gonna have a guest tell us their experience on webslinger. We we have a friend who got in.

Stefanie Bautista 1:14:53
He did it.

Ariel Landrum 1:14:53
He did it. I also know that we’re going to talk about AIA combining our music passion with our passion Disney karaoke.

Stefanie Bautista 1:15:04
Yes. Disney karaoke which is the thing, guys. So don’t don’t believe the memes.

Ariel Landrum 1:15:09
Don’t believe the memes. It’s real. It’s real.

Stefanie Bautista 1:15:10
Yeah, we’re gonna talk about karaoke. And the ways that we use karaoke to connect and the ways that we’re going to use karaoke and music, especially Disney music, to, to relate to other people, other fans and the way that the uniqueness of Disney music connects us and our kids too. Yep, so a lot of things to look forward to. I will be going to the parks hopefully soon.

Ariel Landrum 1:15:38
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:15:39
So you’ll see that in an episode. Hopefully, I have a good experience. Fingers crossed.

Ariel Landrum 1:15:44
Fingers crossed.

Stefanie Bautista 1:15:44
Because I want to have at least experience that you had Ariel because you had a really good experience.

Ariel Landrum 1:15:50
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:15:51
Yeah, okay. But once again, thank you for listening to the Happiest Pod on Earth. Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter at happiest, @happiestpodGT, and on Instagram @hoppiestpodGT, where we will be updating you on all things happening in the Disney Marvel Star Wars universe.

Ariel Landrum 1:16:11
Absolutely. Bye, everybody.

Stefanie Bautista 1:16:13
Bye.

• Wandavision
• Wanda Maximoff
• Vision
• Pietro Maximoff
• Monica Rambeau
• I Love Lucy
• I Dream of Jeannie
• The Mary Tyler Moore Show
• Malcolm in the Middle
• Bikini Kill
• Riot Grrl

• Style
• Identity
• Grief
• Trauma
• Safety
• Safety corner
• Presentation
• Caregiver
• Chaos
• Control

Stefanie Bautista 0:11
Hello, everybody, welcome to the Happiest Pod On Earth. I’m Stefanie.

Ariel Landrum 0:15
And I’m Ariel. And we’re Disney fans. But we’re really so much more than that.

Stefanie Bautista 0:19
Yep. I’m an educator who uses passions and fandoms to help my students grow and learn about themselves and the world around them.

Ariel Landrum 0:25
And as for myself, I’m a licensed therapist who uses clients passions and fandoms to help them grow and heal from trauma and obtain mental wellness.

Stefanie Bautista 0:33
Happiest Pod is a place where we dissect Disney mediums with a critical lens. Why do we do this? Because just like you we are more than just fans, we expect more from the mediums that we consume every day.

Ariel Landrum 0:43
So Stef… What Disney medium or experience are we dissecting today?

Stefanie Bautista 0:51
Today we are talking about Black Widow.

Ariel Landrum 0:54
What!?

Stefanie Bautista 0:54
The movie that we have been waiting for for so so long.

I feel like…

Ariel Landrum 1:00
So long.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01
Not only because the pandemic made it longer, I feel like we’ve been waiting for this for what is it more than a decade now? Marvel celebrated its 10 year when again? Like a year ago?

Ariel Landrum 1:12
Yeah…

Two years ago?

At least that that long.

Stefanie Bautista 1:16
Yeah. I mean, when they took that picture, Scarlett Johansson had brown hair.

Ariel Landrum 1:22
Yes. Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 1:23
She had long brown hair. So definitely not Endgame. She didn’t have the short blonde bob right?

Ariel Landrum 1:31
No.

Stefanie Bautista 1:31
She had. I mean, she changes her hair all the time. But I don’t remember seeing that after or before I saw the 10 year anniversary. But Black Widow back to the movies, Marvel really stated that this was their big return to the movies. And how did you feel about that?

Ariel Landrum 1:50
Yeah, I was actually really excited. I genuinely miss our theater experiences. Well, in the before times…

Stefanie Bautista 2:00
Yeah. Yes.

Ariel Landrum 2:01
We used to get those midnight showings, we would we would stay up late, we would stay all the way to the end credits to make sure we got every scene that they put in there and every Easter Egg and I often I would rent an entire row. And so it was it was a gang of us. Like we had we had the squad 20, 30 seats.

Stefanie Bautista 2:21
Deep.

Ariel Landrum 2:22
It was great.

Stefanie Bautista 2:23
We would hang out beforehand, have dinner and drinks. Pregame. Kind of like we were tailgating for a game or you know, pre gaming before a concert, we treated it exactly like that. So I’m sure many of you guys did the same thing. Preparing for all of these movie releases these Marvel releases that were so important to us. Are so important to us.

Ariel Landrum 2:43
Yeah, yeah. So it’s so it was, it was nice to sort of have that back, but not really. And since since I lost I last saw this movie versus like what’s happening now. The LA has mask orders again.

Stefanie Bautista 2:59
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 3:00
And wearing them inside. We were that delta variant is no joke.

Stefanie Bautista 3:05
Yep. It’s no joke.

Ariel Landrum 3:05
So this was a pause in the pandemic that I got to embrace.

Stefanie Bautista 3:10
It was a hard pause. A positive that was gonna be a longer pause. But you know, we we had a little too much hope for that. But I know both Ariel and I saw Black the Black Widow in theaters, but we sought separately due to our schedules and everything else that’s going on in our lives. So we would like to share with you guys are 2 very different experiences, apparently, of going back to the movies, because, I mean, this was not my first movie back in the theaters. Although this is my first large movie back without there being many restrictions. Was it the same for you, Ariel?

Ariel Landrum 3:48
So this is my This was my first movie back during the pandemic. I did go see the Trolls movie? I hadn’t even seen the first one. But it was playing at an outdoor movie theater. So I saw it in my car.

Stefanie Bautista 4:02
Oh, right. Yeah, yes.

Ariel Landrum 4:03
Um, other than that, I had not stepped foot in a movie theater the entire shutdown.

Stefanie Bautista 4:09
Yeah, I went to see a drive-thru movie too. I saw. I’m forgetting the name of it. It’s the one with Shia Labeouf and he’s like a cholo?

Ariel Landrum 4:18
Oh, yeah. I don’t remember the name of that.

Stefanie Bautista 4:21
No, it’s not the negotiator. It’s something like that.

Ariel Landrum 4:26
Help us Dr. Google.

Stefanie Bautista 4:27
Yeah, help us doctor… And I saw it at Mission Tiki just like you did.

Ariel Landrum 4:31
Yeah MIssion Tiki.

Stefanie Bautista 4:31
You went to Mission Tiki. Yeah, pretty far away. And it was technically the first ever movie my son went to as like a 6 month old. Which is really funny. It was not very memorable. Shia Labeouf was cool. And I’m glad that he had a lot of dedication to this movie, but it was it was not it y’all. Definitely not my first movie back. My first movie back was Demon Slayer. And for all you anime fans out there, that was a fantastic movie to see in theaters especially for it being an empty theater at the time. But Black Widow was definitely my first big Marvel movie release full capacity theater. Back to the movies and yeah, I saw it at Burbank 16 which is a very popular place in LA to watch movies. It’s a huge cineplex. Very central to a lot of people who live in LA Valley area, and plenty of parking and we would normally see our Avengers movies all of our Iron Man’s, Captain America’s, Batman vs. Superman, all of our real big comic book theaters. If we couldn’t dish out the money to go see it at Arclight and the Cinerama, we would go to Burbank because a little bit more affordable and it was part of the AMC A List that many of us were a part of.

Ariel Landrum 5:45
And they had Dolby so…

Stefanie Bautista 5:47
They have Dolby

Ariel Landrum 5:47
You’re not missing out too much.

Stefanie Bautista 5:48
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 5:49
And and now everywhere you choose seats, so…

Stefanie Bautista 5:53
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 5:53
That was that was we… We used to go see it at the AMC that was the one in Winnetka maybe?

Stefanie Bautista 5:59
Oh my gosh, yes. Ariel would drag us all the way over there way out yonder in the deep Valley.

Ariel Landrum 6:05
Because of the prizes and the fact that I could get tickets.

Stefanie Bautista 6:08
Yes, but we could have done the same thing at Burbank, which we started to do. So

Ariel Landrum 6:12
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 6:13
We we live in we learn. And more people showed up because you started choosing Burbank, which is great. So yeah, Burbank normally is a solid theater, because it accommodates so many people and it’s usually always busy. They’re pretty on top of things. However, that was not my experience this time. This is not a theater review by any means necessary. But you know, for it not being my first experience back, but it was for many other people. I mean, there was just things that were kind of amiss. The great thing about Burbank is you don’t have to pay for parking. And I think that’s why a lot of people choose it. So parking wasn’t so bad. I watched on a Sunday night. And it was a 7:50 showing so not super late not super early, pretty prime time to watch a movie.

Ariel Landrum 7:01
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 7:02
We were able to purchase our tickets early. So we were able to reserve. I was in the Dolby Theatre, which was great. Been in that theater so many times. But my friend decided to get us our popcorn and drinks before we got there because I was running a tad bit late. And so I’m getting these texts from my friend and he’s like “Ah Stef, they ran out of Coke on all the machines and every single machine be routed with Coca Cola.” And they also did not have Ginger Ale, which is like my second choice. And so he had to get Diet Coke and I am not a fan of Diet Coke. It has that taste that I’m just like bleh afterwards. I don’t know what it is I do they sweetened with Stevia or something?

Ariel Landrum 7:48
No I that Coke Zero isn’t it doesn’t have sugar right is a thing? I don’t know.

Stefanie Bautista 7:52
Coke Zero doesn’t have sugar. But anyway, it has this taste and I’m sure you diet drinkers. I’m sorry. If you like diet, I’m just not a fan. So I knew I was gonna go in having to drink that. And it was like a large. The popcorn was like it wasn’t popped.

Ariel Landrum 8:09
What?

Stefanie Bautista 8:09
We sat down and it was a huge bucket of popcorn. And we usually do that to share. Me and my husband normally do. And my friend got his own bucket of popcorn and the minute we sat down, he leans over and he’s like, “This is the worst popcorn I’ve ever had in my life.”

Ariel Landrum 8:26
So I mean, was it was it mushy? Or was it not all popped? Or was it cold?

Stefanie Bautista 8:31
They were tiny, uncooked kernels, like crumbs. And so the top layer because I had the fresh batch because my friend had been eating has already. The top layer was like maybe an inch of freshly popped popcorn. And then under that was all the not popped popcorn.

Ariel Landrum 8:49
No.

Stefanie Bautista 8:49
Like maybe I would say six inches down. So here we are, like trying to like not choke.

Ariel Landrum 8:59
Hm hmm.

Stefanie Bautista 9:00
Eating the popcorn. And you know, I was like, all right, well, this is gonna be more work than I thought. And so we’re trying to get through the bottom of popcorn. But I think that was one of the things I was looking forward to the most about being back into theaters; theater popped popcorn. I love the smell of freshly popped buttered popcorn. It’s like my last treat that I like to eat before I leave the parks. Like I mentioned in our last episode.

Ariel Landrum 9:24
Yup. Hm hmm.

Stefanie Bautista 9:25
And I don’t know like I really love popcorn. So this is kind of disappointing.

Ariel Landrum 9:30
Oh, man. Okay, so one of the things that we talked about in a previous episode in regards to my experience going back to the parks, like we really highlighted expectations.

Stefanie Bautista 9:42
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 9:43
How they can sometimes be a detriment to happiness. So it sounds like you were you were expecting what you considered even a traditional movie going experience not not even very, like you know, like you weren’t asking for the extra.

Stefanie Bautista 9:57
Nope. I just wanted my drink and my popcorn. Literally it I knew I knew the theater was going to be fine. I had a plan already to just eat my popcorn and drink as fast as I could, so that I can put my mask back on knowing that there was full capacity. So that’s really my plan going into the movie theater. And it kind of got jacked, because I was trying to navigate this popcorn situation, and in the dark. You’re not really trying to look inside of your popcorn bucket and trying to find things that won’t kill you. So I mean, at that point, I was like, “You know what, I’m just gonna use my my sense of touch, to find the ones that were popped, and enjoy the movie away.”

Ariel Landrum 10:41
Way to evolve and adapt.

Stefanie Bautista 10:43
Yeah, way to evolve and adapt. Just like, you know, how we do. The pandemic taught me a lot y’all. So I mean, it could have been worse. There could have been no popcorn, we could have been, you know, I couldn’t have I, I maybe could have had a friend who couldn’t get me popped, you know, so many other things. That you know, we we think about walking in and you know, there are certain privileges that I’ve had going into here, but it was just a little disappointing.

Ariel Landrum 11:08
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 11:08
The beginning of the movie, and it didn’t really set the tone for the movie just because the movie in in in itself, and we will talk about this in a little bit. It just pulls you from like, minute 1. So, you know, aside from that… It was okay theatre experience.

Ariel Landrum 11:28
Okay.

Stefanie Bautista 11:28
I will try it again maybe not on a weekend. I’m you know, at that point in my life where I don’t have to see a midnight showing. I don’t have to watch things on the weekend, even though it’s very convenient for me. I will be A-Okay with watching on a Monday night so.

Ariel Landrum 11:45
Well I think part of it is like we have gotten older so maybe that’s not something that we need. You you definitely have family, a little one that you have to go home to and accommodate. But I also think like with the evolution of media, it’s a lot easier to avoid spoilers now. Umm even that term, I think in the beginning of my Marvel watching career wasn’t really even a thing. And it was like “How do I how do I read a movie review without somebody telling me like who the bad guy was and how they got destroyed?”

Stefanie Bautista 12:16
I mean, like a wise person once said, “Ain’t nobody got time for that.” So…

“No buddy go time.”

“Ain’t nobody got time for that.” But I know you had a very different experience.

Ariel Landrum 12:26
Yes, yes, I did a very different experience. Um, so this was the first time that I went back to the theaters and like you said, I also wore my mask unless I was going to be eating popcorn or drinking Coke. Again with weird ticket buying situations, my partner and I tried to buy tickets to the El Capitan Theatre. The El Capitan Theatre used to be a playhouse theatre; is built in 1926. And it was actually balt, bought by Walt Disney Studios in 1989. And they did like a two year restoration with Pacific theatres. And so gorgeous. It has a Wurlitzer Organ, it has a street level walk up Box Office, and it’s actually marked as LA Historic Cultural Monument.

Stefanie Bautista 13:16
Yeah, it’s definitely a very touristy area to watch a movie.

Ariel Landrum 13:22
Right on Hollywood and Highland.

Stefanie Bautista 13:25
Right front of the Dolby theater, where they host the Oscars.

Ariel Landrum 13:28
Walk of Fame. Stars.

Stefanie Bautista 13:30
All of that. So Ariel, you really went for the Hollywood experience for this one?

Ariel Landrum 13:35
Yeah. So I told my partner I’d never been to the El Capitan Theatre. Never.

Stefanie Bautista 13:40
“Dun dun dunn!” Can’t believe that.

Ariel Landrum 13:42
And there’s like a list of LA things that all ‘LA-ers’ do and then there’s a list of LA things that all tourists do, right?

Stefanie Bautista 13:50
Angelenos.

Ariel Landrum 13:51
Now ‘LA-ers.’

Stefanie Bautista 13:53
No one ever calls us that.

Ariel Landrum 13:55
Does that, does that count as one?

Stefanie Bautista 13:57
No, I’ll let that slide just because you’re a transplant.

Ariel Landrum 14:01
Thank you. But I and so one of those things is going to the El Capitan Theatre. I had never gone because I didn’t have a partner that wanted to go that far. Which…

Stefanie Bautista 14:14
It’s not that far.

Ariel Landrum 14:15
It’s not that far but in LA traffic, it’s like far enough, right?

Stefanie Bautista 14:18
I work farther guys. Much farther.

Ariel Landrum 14:23
But so he said, “Okay, well, then, you know, we’re gonna go back to the movies. We’re gonna go see Black Widow. Let’s see it at this theater.”

Stefanie Bautista 14:29
Love it. Yes.

Ariel Landrum 14:30
So we tried to buy tickets online. And they they make it so that you have to reserve there, there can’t be a seat on either side of you that’s filled as part of spacing.

Stefanie Bautista 14:41
Okay.

Ariel Landrum 14:42
For social distancing, and the system would not let us do it. Like it would not let even if we had like three seats on either side, like it was not letting us buy it. So then we called the Box Office, and they were telling us to just use the app. And then we’re like, “We tried the app. We tried the websites, it’s not working.” And then they finally let us buy tickets. And we were supposed to go in the at like 3:30, where it was supposed to be a matinee. And we ended up going at 10:30. We had to switch the tickets twice to 2 different times

Stefanie Bautista 15:16
Oh my gosh.

Ariel Landrum 15:18
Because my partner’s job and a shoot came up

Stefanie Bautista 15:22
Oh okay.

Ariel Landrum 15:22
And all that nonsense. This will be a common theme and a lot of these episodes where I will have plans that change because my partner’s job schedule is not consistent as he works in the industry. So there you go.

Stefanie Bautista 15:34
And like you said, area we are learning to adapt and, and learn about our expectations and our realities.

Ariel Landrum 15:43
Pivotting.

Stefanie Bautista 15:44
Pivotting. It’s just part of our it’s part of our MO now.

Ariel Landrum 15:47
Yes, yes. So um, my first time so if anybody has not been there. Totally worth it to go.

Stefanie Bautista 15:56
Yup.

Ariel Landrum 15:58
The there’s an intro show before your previews before your movie. So the the intro show was just just some lights and music but it’s Disney Magic lights and music. So there’s a stage in front and the music turns on. And there’s sparkly lights that are glowing all over throughout the theater. And the stage has a curtain and the curtain lifts. And then there’s a beautiful scenery of animals with a peacock in the middle. That’s just glittering and sparkly. And then that turns out to be a curtain and it lifts. And there’s a crystal beaded curtain that’s just sparkling with a cityscape behind it. And it turns out that beaded curtain and the cityscape are also a currtain and they lift. And then there’s a tensile shimmery curtain that gives you like a cool holographic effect. And that’s a curtain and it’s the final curtain. So that that was that made my freaking night. I did not expect it. I know that in one of our episodes, we talked about a Disney short that involves jobs. And I did get to see the guy who plays a Wurlitzer. I didn’t see him in person here, but I saw it on that.. In in that show. So I just thought that was the only performance and if he wasn’t on stage, then I wouldn’t get anything. But it was the lovely theater. No no lifting of the curtain.

Stefanie Bautista 17:26
Yeah, he’s not always there. And I think I’ve seen quite a good amount of movies there at the El Capitan. I probably only have seen him once or twice over the years. And I don’t even know if that’s the same guy who is on One Day at Disney. It might even be like a long time ago, because the first movie I ever remember watching there was Mulan in like, ’94.

Ariel Landrum 17:47
Okay.

Stefanie Bautista 17:47
So who knows who was playing at that time?

Ariel Landrum 17:51
So not the remake? Not the live action one.

Stefanie Bautista 17:53
No, no, no, no, no, this was this was Ming-na Wen. Mulan, like not live action, animated.

Ariel Landrum 18:01
Yeah. So um, I think something that I think probably was at your theater because and so I know it was mine. And I think is a very Los Angeles thing, because we are so close to the film industry was they had a lot of the props and costumes that were actually in the film. And for us it was in 2, like, opera boxes?

Stefanie Bautista 18:23
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 18:23
And then throughout the theater. Were there any for you?

Stefanie Bautista 18:26
Yes, it wasn’t for Black Widow. But they did have the costumes from Jungle Cruise at Burbank. I know, when you watch movies at the Arclight, either in Hollywood well, as they’re preparing to open it up, whoever’s taking it over. Any Arclights will have a bunch of costumes from many different movies. And it is a very LA thing, just because you know what to do with all of these beautiful costumes after they’re done doing their job? I mean, they’re just gonna sit in storage in all of these places in the Valley that store them. So what they do is that they do put them on display for long periods of time at theaters all throughout the Valley. So I hope they continue to do that.

Ariel Landrum 19:06
Yeah. And and then it’s something else that I and this is where I don’t know if… So, so again, I was I’m a military brat, and I moved around a lot. A lot of the theaters I went to where the free theaters on the military base. They are by far not snazzy or glamorous.

Stefanie Bautista 19:23
No.

Ariel Landrum 19:24
But they they never had trailers. It was just you saw the movie at the time that you were going to go so. And then and then my dad retired in Kansas. And that’s not really a big film industry area. There was I even remember there only being one theater and one in the city that I went to. So this is something that you’ll have, you’ll have to Tweet us if it’s changed in the Midwest. But I know one of the things that I loved when I started going into theaters out here in LA was was my swag. Had no idea that gave out swag and so at this theater, I got a tin popcorn bucket. It was tin and it has the El Capitan on it. My my drink cup, I could get a topper that also just stands on its own so I can put it on top of the drink or I can. It’s a figurine. So I got Taskmaster.

Stefanie Bautista 20:14
Nice.

Ariel Landrum 20:16
And I also got a poster at the end.

Stefanie Bautista 20:18
Yeah, I know that, from all the, you know, experiences that I’ve had at the El Capitan, because you’re paying slightly higher price for your movies, you are always going to get some sort of souvenir; a pin, a popcorn bucket, a little poster, what have you. It’s just all part of the experience of going to the El Capitan. I can’t say the same for a lot of AMCs, Pacific Theaters around LA. Sometimes they do, but they normally have that as a disclaimer before you buy your tickets.

Ariel Landrum 20:45
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 20:45
So if you do want to get some swag, there are plenty of opportunities to get that swag, you just kind of have to read the guidelines on the specific showing that you’re going to. But yeah, I think that is like an LA thing that we do have those opportunities. I don’t even know in, in New York or other major cities if they do this sort of thing. Maybe now with the rise of, you know, the popularity of Comic-Con and you know, comic book movies, especially, you know, incorporating Disney movies into this sort of category. Swag is a really big part of the experience of going to see a movie.

Ariel Landrum 21:21
It’s definitely part of the culture. Like you expect swag when you go to the cons.

Stefanie Bautista 21:25
Absolutely. So I think they’re really starting to incorporate that with the movies. But I know, for the El Capitan specifically, it is something that is included, as well as sometimes I don’t know, Ariel, did you get to go to the basement of El Capitan?

Ariel Landrum 21:37
No, we didn’t go to the basement.

Stefanie Bautista 21:39
Okay.

Ariel Landrum 21:39
And again, we saw the movie at 10:30 at night, and it was showing and when we got our popcorn, they gave us our refill right away because they’re like, “After, after this we gone.”

Stefanie Bautista 21:49
Yup. It’s closing time.

Ariel Landrum 21:52
But I’m, I’m curious for you. I know that some of our friends, when they went to AMC, they were able to get a comic book.

Stefanie Bautista 21:58
Yes. I think that was for some showings. It wasn’t part of my showing, unfortunately. But I think it was a part of the IMAX showings. I only went to a Dolby showing. So I know IMAX also does a promo because you know, they, they want people to spend that extra money. And I know that there’s an IMAX at City Walk next to Universal Studios. However, you do have to pay for parking there. And that’s why, although it is fun, and I suggest going for like a really special movie that you want to see. It is going to cost you a pretty penny, knowing that movies are not cheap nowadays. But yeah, I asked if you went to the basement because I remember watching Finding Dory there and a lot of other Pixar Disney movies, and they always have a really special exhibit downstairs. For Finding Dory they had an aquarium. And they had yeah, like they had Dory. And you know, all of they had an octopus for Hank. And they had like the different characters. And I know they’d done it for Frozen as well. They had like a whole behind the scenes of how they made Frozen downstairs. I don’t know because of COVID if they’re trying to limit the amount of people that are in an enclosed space, but I know pre-COVID they always utilize that basement for some really special thing. And then they would actually have people exit out from that bottom entry. So that..

Ariel Landrum 23:18
Nope. went out to the main lobby.

Stefanie Bautista 23:20
Got it. Got it. Yeah, so I’m sure things have changed since the pandemic and I’m sure that they’ll adapt moving forward, but I’m glad to see that they’re using at least the opera boxes.

Ariel Landrum 23:30
Yes, they’re using the opera boxes, we got to go upstairs and there was a Jungle Cruise like backdrop but no actual items. And so again, because the tickets got changed 3 times so did our seats. And it was because it was so late at night. Even though it was a Saturday, we had the entire right side of the theater to ourselves. Like talking about social distancing. I don’t I’m a I’m a bad aim, but I don’t think I could have thrown popcorn at the next person. ‘Cause they were so far away.

Stefanie Bautista 24:07
I’m sure you wouldn’t want to throw it because your popcorn is probably really good.

Ariel Landrum 24:10
Oh my popcorn is amazing. So fulfilling.

Stefanie Bautista 24:12
Their popcorn is always amazing. That’s I was thinking about I was like “Oh man Ariel probably really good popcorn. She’s at the El Capitan.”

Ariel Landrum 24:19
However, we did have a Mickey pretzel; again owned by Disney. So there was a Mickey pretzel and it was just okay. It was not Disney park good. I could tell a difference and so I don’t know if that’s common for that, that theater or if it is…

Stefanie Bautista 24:34
They use that hard LA water. I’m sorry. There’s nothing we can do to mask that I’m sorry.

Ariel Landrum 24:42
And then the other really crazy thing about the experience was they raffled off 3 gifts and it was like a bag full of Black Widow swag. I did not win, or I would have said that. But er ahh. Yeah I’m mad that I didn’t win because there was only like, what 5 other people? It was like, there was nobody there. And there was 3 in my aile, and there was 2 of us, I thought our chances were, were high, but they were not. But it was just really cool. They they, they did the raffle. And they actually handed the items to the guests, the guests and a half to get up. And again, owned by Disney. So their cast members, and the they they started the intro with, “Ladies and gentlemen,” and I don’t know if you guys have been following some of the Disney news. But a lot of the parks have changed the intro to their firework show to, “Welcome all dreamers,” to be more inclusive of individuals who are nonbinary. And so we were wondering if that’s going to change there too. I’m just gonna take note and keep an eye on that.

Stefanie Bautista 25:50
Yeah, I’ll definitely take a look at that too. Because now, I want to make up for this theater experience of mine. And the next movie, I’m gonna watch it, I’m gonna dish up the extra books to get me my fresh popcorn. But I’m glad that you had such a fantastic first time at the El Capitan. That’s really great to hear, especially, you know, coming from an Angeleno, myself, I always want people to have the best experiences when they go to touristy places like this. I know it’s always a hit or miss when you go to Hollywood, because it’s just, it’s a wild place out there, also, but the El Capitan does have that Disney magic. So they will go the extra mile to make sure you and your little ones have a really good time. Because, you know, we’re always bringing kids to the El Capitan because they’re always showing Disney movies. So so many things can go wrong with watching a movie with kids. So I’m glad that you had that fantastic experience.

Ariel Landrum 26:46
I’m not glad that you didn’t.

Stefanie Bautista 26:48
No. It’s all right. I mean, it be like that sometimes.

Ariel Landrum 26:53
It be like that sometimes.

Stefanie Bautista 26:54
It be like that sometimes. But let’s dive in to the movie itself.

Ariel Landrum 27:00
Okay, um… You go first.

Stefanie Bautista 27:04
Yeah, again, this is not a review podcast…

Ariel Landrum 27:07
But there will be spoilers there. Will you want a spoiler free pod review in a podcast We do have a friend named Billy he’s not part of the GT Network. But he is The Movie Grater. That says podcast, he grades movies, and none of them have spoilers.

Stefanie Bautista 27:23
Yes, none of them are spoilers. They have really great conversations about different perspectives on the movies. And you’ll laugh a lot. Because Billy is a very, very fun person and a good friend of ours. So check his podcast out if you want spoiler-less review or commentary. So if you haven’t seen Black Widow, put a pause on this. Listen to any of our other episodes. And we will see you back after you watch Black Widow. Go see it ’cause we liked it.

Ariel Landrum 27:54
We liked it a lot.

Stefanie Bautista 27:57
Yes. Um, I don’t know, Ariel. Maybe we can just kind of riff off of each other of this one? Just because I know that we can take this movie in a lot of different angles. Now, Black Widow was supposed to be released. And not this year.

Ariel Landrum 28:12
Oh, no.

Stefanie Bautista 28:13
Not last year. But way before we really went forward with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, right?

Ariel Landrum 28:21
Yeah, believe 2019 or 2020? Yeah, that was. Okay. So other experience in talking about Comic-Con earlier, Stef and I went to Comic-Con in 2019. And she was able to attend the Marvel Hall H, ah, and she got some swag. And she gifted it to me because she’s the most loveliest friend ever. And it was a Black Widow ballcap um, it has her silhouette. And it says Marvel 2020 on the back.

Stefanie Bautista 28:55
Yes, Marvel 2020 because it was the big reveal of all the things that were happening in 2020. They hype this up. I was in tears. Everybody in Hall H was just like losing their minds. You can see Scarlett Johansen comes out and then you see Florence Pugh come out and then you see Hopper I’m forgetting his name David Harbour come out.

Ariel Landrum 29:17
Yes. Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 29:18
And then you just see all these you see Simu Liu. I mean, it was just like, all of the YouTube videos that you see of Comic-Con.

Ariel Landrum 29:26
Hm hmm.

Stefanie Bautista 29:26
It was just it was major. And as they all were like, introducing the movie they put on these hats facing facing the stage and not facing the audience and they turned around to reveal Black Widow’s silhouette and her, her monogram, and it was it blew everybody’s mind and then as they turned around all of the all of the Hall H workers started giving hats out. And we again hats. Oh my gosh.

Ariel Landrum 29:56
And you get a hat and you get a hat!

Stefanie Bautista 29:59
I think correct me if I’m wrong, Ariel the popularity of the Marvel panel at Hall H has gotten so large that they don’t give away too much swag recently. Right?

Ariel Landrum 30:11
Yeah, they’ve Yeah, they’ve cut the variety of swag. So the final Game of Thrones panel Hall H, I got to see it and that that was a bag full of swag.

Stefanie Bautista 30:25
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 30:25
There was a poster. There was a pen.

Stefanie Bautista 30:27
There was a tote bag.

Ariel Landrum 30:28
There was a water bottle there was I think of a…

Stefanie Bautista 30:31
A shirt.

Ariel Landrum 30:32
A shirt. Yes, yeah, sure.

Stefanie Bautista 30:33
I still wear that shirt.

Ariel Landrum 30:36
And the the Marvel ones have slowly started not giving as many things I think not just because of the popularity, but also because they are not wanting to reveal anything. Everything. Is Marvel’s all locked down tight lipped. I mean, unless you’re Spider-Man.

Stefanie Bautista 30:53
Yep. Yeah. So we’ve been waiting for this movie for a really long time. And so I if we’re talking again, about expectations, and what we as women wanted to see out of Black Widow, I feel like over the years, it has changed for me, how about you?

Ariel Landrum 31:12
I, I think it definitely has changed. I if you look at her evolution, she certainly changed. I am looking at an image right now at me and I will I will link in the show notes of the evolution of her wardrobe. And this is what caught me when I when I was watching this movie. And and now even more so as I’m looking at the evolution of her wardrobe. So like black latex Iron Man 2 Black Widow. Very low cleavage. I think at some, I learned that apparently they they do a lot of special effects even on the clothes when things bend a certain way. So so certainly the special effects on this clothes like there’s just tightness. So just really hyper-sexualized, and going into the outfit she’s wearing here, the zippers hire so there isn’t as much cleavage and there’s actual padding. Like you see it on our elbows and her knees and on her shoulders. And even on her gloves. She looks like a fighter to me. And her hair isn’t like in these ring like curls. And she is wearing a vast amount of makeup. She actually looks. Now we know everybody’s wearing makeup on set even the men. But her makeup is toned down it is more natural, and even her hair is sort of more free flowing. Like she has some braids in a few different areas. But they aren’t tight knit they aren’t curly. She doesn’t look like she’s meant to be sexually digested. It looks like she’s meant to, you know, whoop some ass. Yeah, exactly. And I know that that’s always a point of contingency when it comes to looking at female fighters and female characters in action movies. As a woman, you’re always thinking to yourself, “How in the heck are you fighting with just the latex suit on, hair all up in your face? Makeup, you know, full, full face makeup all the way done? How are you not realistically sweating and uncomfortable in that? And not everybody is Catwoman because Catwoman is, you know, otherworldly. She has you know, cat like reflexes. Not everybody’s Michelle Pfeiffer

Different franchise has different magic. Quote unquote.

Stefanie Bautista 33:28
Yes. Different franchise. And, you know, I always thought about that whenever I played Mortal Kombat. Whenever I played Street Fighter. I mean, clearly, these are video games. They’re not supposed to represent real life. However, you got to have a little bit of realism when it comes to it. And especially if you’re doing a movie like Black Widow, which is more of you know, she doesn’t necessarily have superpowers per se. She’s not a mutant. She’s hasn’t been injected with any sort of super serum.

Ariel Landrum 33:57
Isn’t a sorcerer

Stefanie Bautista 33:58
Isn’t a sorcerer. So she has no abilities, aside from the fact that she’s highly trained and skilled in what she does. So, I mean, I think realistically, she looks a lot more suited to the work that she’s doing.

Ariel Landrum 34:13
Yeah, and, and even in talking about her being highly trained, like we’ve known that throughout all of these movies, but I feel like this is the first time where I was able to really appreciate her training, even when she was fighting Taskmaster. Like, like in the comics, and even in this iteration, Taskmaster, Taskmaster learns your moves and mimics you, essentially mirrors you. You’re you’re like fighting yourself. And she kind of picked that up right away and was able to adapt her fighting style instead of going to like her common go-tos. That’s just difficult. That’s that’s not an easy thing to do. As as a therapist, I work with a variety of people and I have a large caseload of people who are MMA fighters. And we talk about how it can be easy to default to a fighting style, but that makes you more predictable to your partner, or I mean the person that you’re attempting to fight. Your opponent. And in this case, Black Widow is always learning and always growing. We do see her sort of couple of her same signature moves. But she in this movie has shown even more wider variety in her stance and her fighting style. So I, I think, like, again, she’s not she. So so when we meet her an Iron Man 2, she’s a spy who attempts to infiltrate Tony Stark’s operation, but she’s a femme fatale. She uses her sexuality to get men to drop their guard and trust her. Now, we’re a decade a little over a decade later, and she is no longer a spy, she actually gets to be her full self. I think that’s, that’s a very different approach. Like we we actually accept her as a hero, and not sort of like having ulterior motives. And she she isn’t a sexual object, and she doesn’t use her sexuality as a weapon. And then even Scarlett Johansson has said in many interviews that she no longer comfortable playing with this character as someone who’s objectified.

Stefanie Bautista 36:14
Yeah, absolutely. Um, I think the first time when I saw her in Iron Man, she was like a Bond girl to me. She could have been somebody that I knew was working for somebody else, not somebody who was working out of their own volition, but somebody with an ulterior motive that was working for the man behind the chair. And ultimately, that is who trained her however, like you said, the evolution of her character started to become more and more independent over the films.

Ariel Landrum 36:45
More autonomy.

Stefanie Bautista 36:46
Yeah, more autonomy. Exactly. Every time we saw her in all the other various movies, she was attached to Hawkeye. They were working as a team more of like a duo where, I don’t know and I can’t really say that I saw one leading the other, but I kind of knew that one worked in tandem with the other and they always talked about, you know, their, their previous jobs. And you know, how…

Ariel Landrum 37:10
‘Buda-pesh.’

Stefanie Bautista 37:11
Budapest. Buda-Budape-sht. And that was such a wild thing in the movie, but anyway. But yeah, she was always working with Hawkeye. And they were always paired up together. So I was just like, “Okay, well, we haven’t really seen Hawkeye by himself. But we also haven’t seen Black Widow by herself. And then when everybody split their separate ways during Civil War, she was now Cap’s right-hand woman.

Ariel Landrum 37:32
Yup.

Stefanie Bautista 37:32
And so we didn’t really see her as her full hero self she was more of, you know, Cap’s confidant, which was great, because, you know, he was so nice to her and, you know, always respectful to her, but still, she kind of took a backseat. Definitely the second tier of the Avengers.

Ariel Landrum 37:50
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 37:50
So it was really nice to see her, you know, act on her own volition and also find about find out more about herself because us as an audience, we want to find out more about her and where she’s coming from.

Ariel Landrum 38:06
And in and that she has, she has leadership qualities. She took a leadership stance in this movie, and when we remember her RIP in End Game, she out after the 5 year Blip, she was the one running the Avengers. She was the one giving people orders. She was the one who really tried to keep it all together. And that seems even more believable now after seeing this film.

Stefanie Bautista 38:31
Yeah. And not just motherly, where we’re expecting her as the woman to be like, “Okay, everybody, let’s get it together.” Like “We got to save the world,” kind of thing, where it teetered on that I don’t think it was fully realized. And this movie definitely shows that her empathy as herself as Natasha was shown more above anything that we’re expecting out of her as a female superhero.

Ariel Landrum 38:56
Absolutely, absolutely. So I think like really highlighting those those big changes in differences. I mean, I I’m trying to imagine how I would feel if this was how I was introduced to Black Widow versus the previous versions. I remember trying to buy those those costumes and outfits and, and I’m a I’m a well-endowed woman, I have rather large breasts, so I could fill that part of the costume if I wanted to. However, I wasn’t always comfortable. That that costume is not easy to wear a Comic-Con. It apparently, it gives permission for people to to grope you. And as someone who cosplays fairly regularly, it’s one of those things of, “How do I like make sure to set that boundary?” And why I tend to, quote unquote, have a ‘Comic-Con guard’ with me so that people won’t,. This costume I could see being respected. I can see people seeing me as the fighter of Black Widow and not so much as this hot thing I can take a picture with. Like a like really much like, “I’m taking a picture of Black Widow like this is the character and the hero that I love.”

Stefanie Bautista 40:10
And on top of that you’re carrying weapons on your back. You are carrying weapons on your back. So I really hope that if they are looking at your backside, they’re looking at your weapons and how you will use them on them. But absolutely, I think the the playing field for cosplay has gotten larger, especially with having her sister having Iron Maiden there. I mean, even having a Red Guardian, Red Gaurdian right?

Ariel Landrum 40:42
Yes. Right.

Stefanie Bautista 40:43
His portrayal of kind of this fallen male icon, especially Soviet icon where us as Americans, we view you know, Cold War era 1980s Soviet Russia as this big, you know, iron curtain. Everybody’s you know, stoic, of course, like with the Tocky films like you think of I know, Drago and you know, you have this, like very macho sense of all men, all Russian men. But then you meet Alexi. And he is definitely fallen from grace since he was kind of pushed aside after his undercover mission in Ohio with the girls and you see him struggling to fit into his his suit. And I thought that that was a really great moment for men. Really.

Ariel Landrum 41:31
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 41:32
Dad bods everywhere. And I think that David Harbour played that role just so nicely, because he’s so loveable.

Ariel Landrum 41:40
And that scene of him trying to fit in that suit is that scene of me trying to fit into the Black Widow costume. It ain’t happening in the same way that I think is.

Stefanie Bautista 41:50
Yeah, I mean, for me, I I’m not as well endowed as Ariel. However, I don’t have the typical Asian slender body. I am much more Moana and Nani than Raya.

Ariel Landrum 42:03
Thicc.

Stefanie Bautista 42:04
So you know, I can’t really find a one size fits all costume. I have the make er actually adopt many male costumes to my suiting and I normally go that route just because it’s a little easier and more comfortable for me to attend cons that way. So I think, yeah, it was it was really great to see the differences in body types and the realism of getting into a suit that is meant for fighting and meant to you know, get hurt in. Because there was a lot of getting hurt In this movie and I

Ariel Landrum 42:38
Oh, the hits look hard. The you know those…

Stefanie Bautista 42:41
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 42:41
Who the stunt actors I applaud to them because it looked..

Stefanie Bautista 42:45
They deserve an award.

Ariel Landrum 42:47
I was cringing all the times that any of the characters got, you know, hit up because it It didn’t look just like a big explosion or that Star Wars kick that never quite hit.

Stefanie Bautista 43:01
Yeah, it wasn’t. it wasn’t Michael Bay blowing up everything. Like Natasha was getting thrown off a building. Yelena was like, you know, falling and rolling all over the place. All of the Widows that were doing their stunts. They were so fantastic. It reminded me a lot of Justice League and seeing all the Amazons on Themyscira, but harder. Way harder because they were falling. They’re getting stabbed. They were you know, she’s you Yelena stabs herself in the leg to get out her little transmitter. And it looked real.

Ariel Landrum 43:34
Looked so real. So real. She barely flinched too.

Stefanie Bautista 43:38
Barly flinched. And you could hear it squelching. Like, you could hear the bones like I don’t know I mean, I heard an Dolby, obviously so I heard everything. But I liked how they didn’t go soft on the women. And because they were doing such big scenes and also car chases that involved women.

Ariel Landrum 43:56
The best car chase scene I have ever seen and I have seen except for the the new one, which I haven’t seen yet I’ve seen every Fast and Furious. And you know, they start to get the same where we’re trying to get away and we’re coming up with some stuff. I have never seen what Yelena did in regards to the car chase scene and I was thoroughly impressed with the ingenuity and literally, like Black Widow was saying like “I’m trying to get away and escape.” Like she acknowledged that that was her plan.

Stefanie Bautista 44:31
I love the banter, too. That was that same I think just the overall banter between sisters is something that we don’t see. And the only other way that we’ve seen it is Frozen.

Ariel Landrum 44:41
Well I guess Lilo and Stitch?

Stefanie Bautista 44:43
Lilo and Stitch, which is more of a motherly approach because you know Nani is her caretaker. But yeah, I think between sisters who are working and sisters who haven’t seen each other for a really long time. I don’t have a sister myself, but I do have cousins who have sisters and I know, and I see the struggle between you know, I’m just we’re trying to one up each other I guess you could say. And if you’re a trained assassin trying to one up an Avenger who is your sister figure. I mean, hilarity ensues. And I think that was a really great move to insert humor into there. I died in a half when Yelena was trying to be like, “How do you how do you do that pose when you go down, and you.” Wow.

Ariel Landrum 45:29
“Such a poser.”

Stefanie Bautista 45:30
“You’re such a poser.” And I didn’t know that she was going to use that word poser, but I love that she did use that word poser, because she is just essentially taking down this Avenger who we have seen do so many great things for the universe. Work alongside Captain America, Iron Man. You know, calm down the Hulk. And now you’re reducing her to a poser there just because she looks at the camera.

Ariel Landrum 45:53
And really humbling her right when it comes to siblings. So not just sisters, your siblings can humble you in a way that nobody else can.

Stefanie Bautista 46:01
Like nobody else can. Nobody.

Ariel Landrum 46:04
‘Cause you are an older sister.

Stefanie Bautista 46:06
Yeah, I am an older sister. And my younger brother can humble me in ways that, you know, I do humble him too, because he is my younger brother. But I mean, there’s just this dynamic when when you’re an older sibling, you always try to keep it together. And I felt that with especially Natasha because she’s trying to keep it together for her family. She’s trying to just get the job done. By any means necessary, because this is just what she does. And she’s just gonna go at it however she can. And you know, even even in her laser focus of a job doing this. You get your Yelena who is the youngest. She is you know, blonde, and she’s more sprightly I guess you would say?

Ariel Landrum 46:47
Yeah. Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 46:48
She has a spark. She has this fire in her. And she she’s got a mouth on her too. It’s just awesome.

Ariel Landrum 46:55
She feels like the new generation of Avengers. Like like a completely different take with different experiences that is is even just it’s just fresh and and really wonderful. I fell in love with her honestly.

Stefanie Bautista 47:10
Oh the best.

Ariel Landrum 47:11
Just amazing. Actress of Florence. Is it ‘pew’ or ‘few’?

Stefanie Bautista 47:17
I think it’s ‘pew’. But correct me if I’m wrong. I haven’t really this is what I’ve heard on interviews, but I might be wrong. Uhh I think she’s British.

Ariel Landrum 47:25
Yeah, I feel like I’ve heard ‘pew’ of the most.

Stefanie Bautista 47:27
Yeah, I know she’s British. So if if that helps, I’m not familiar, but she is a fantastic actress. If you look up her IMDb, she has done it all y’all. And now she is the future Black Widow as we are going to see in the future. So I think they picked the fantastic person to play her and…

Ariel Landrum 47:48
And I think that when we’re talking about banter, the funniest scene, which I didn’t think I would ever see in a Disney movie, I never thought I would hear the words. ‘hysterectomy’. I never thought I would hear the words ‘fallopian tubes.’

Stefanie Bautista 48:04
Yes. They went there.

Ariel Landrum 48:07
The word ‘uterus’ and and the great thing about that she adlibbed that scene.

Stefanie Bautista 48:12
I love that.

Ariel Landrum 48:13
She ad loved it. It was just hilarious. Again, I felt very seen. Because again, if we’re talking about girls, young girls who have been taken from their families or or taken off of the streets, this is this is a real life issue issue when it comes to trafficking and sex trafficking. Women and girls statistically are the majority who are trafficked. And those are things that do happen to them so that they can still be considered a marketable object. You know, “If you don’t get pregnant, it’s easier for me to market you and that.. can be see have it put it plainly on on a in a Disney movie, though, was a joke. Like it made the characters more real, because I’m sure that there’s been fandom questions in regards to how come Black Widow doesn’t have any kids? And it’s like, well, this is why this is part of the horrors of of her of her trauma and her past experiences before an Avenger.

Stefanie Bautista 49:10
Yeah, and as a clap back to, “Is it your time of the month?” Which is every woman’s just who loves to hear that? Absolutely no one. No one loves to hear that.

Ariel Landrum 49:22
Every every woman and every person with a uterus.

Stefanie Bautista 49:25
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 49:25
Just like really?

Stefanie Bautista 49:26
Yeah. And as a clap back to that I applaud that whole entire scene, because you know what, it’s not just a matter of us being on our time of the month, and nor does it have to do with any of your concern if you’re asking. So maybe you should walk that all the way back and he walked it all the way back. So…

Ariel Landrum 49:46
All the way.

Stefanie Bautista 49:48
All the way and it was liberating without burning a bra and it was liberating without using any of those, “this is a feminist movie trope,” which you know, has been played out over the last couple of years. So…

Ariel Landrum 49:59
Yeah, yeah, again, a different way of looking at feminism and older way. And I think this, this is very much how this current generation and I think our generation is, is accepting the openness around feminism, which is that these aren’t things we’re going to be afraid to talk about. But we’re not. I mean, we’re bringing them up in a moment. It is, it’s a shutdown to you, but it isn’t a weapon. It’s the truth.

Stefanie Bautista 50:22
Yeah, and I really want to highlight the fact that you mentioned Yelena being more of the new generation representative of the Avengers. I think that really worked well parallel to Rachel Weisz’ character as the Iron Maiden, because she lived her entire life being cycled through the Red Room 4 times, as she said, and she is the classic example of conditioning. And she is an example of having been used as an object as a woman under under the spell of.. Why am I forgetting his name right now?

Ariel Landrum 50:55
Oh, Dreykov?

Stefanie Bautista 50:56
Dreykov. Yes, Dreykov. I didn’t want to come Alexi that’s not him. Yeah, under Dreykov rule. And I think by her breaking away from that, to open doors to the younger generation is just, I think symbolic of Marvel’s way of opening that door from female superheroes that we’ve seen in the past and female superheroes like Black Widow, who this story is about and how she was portrayed in the past and how we are going to introduce her and every other female character after her now. Because although that, you know, it might not have been the best way to portray female superheroes. It still exists in the past, and we’re going to acknowledge it, but we’re going to take that and learn from it.

Ariel Landrum 51:39
Yeah, we’re not we’re not going to hide from it and we’re not going to minimize it. So it’s going to be presented as as factual and truthful, but it’s not going to be presented as the always in will be.

Stefanie Bautista 51:50
Yeah, and in fact, we need that perspective to move forward. Which is exactly how we needed Iron Maiden to help you know, kind of orchestrate that one explosion that ended up taking the entire island down?

Ariel Landrum 52:07
Floating Red Room.

Stefanie Bautista 52:09
Yeah, I don’t know what…

Ariel Landrum 52:11
Flying ship thing that somehow Iron Man miss every time I… Okay.

Stefanie Bautista 52:17
Okay, so now that we’ve talked a lot about what we loved, I’m sure there’s things that we could have improved on, right?

Ariel Landrum 52:26
Okay, this is my first and biggest gripe that I as soon as I found out after that’s Stef had finished finished watching the movie. I texted, did you notice that thing? Okay, I think you guys can hear my cat. I apologize.

Stefanie Bautista 52:43
Hello.

Ariel Landrum 52:43
She says, “Hi, feed me for the fourth time,” and I won’t because you’re on a diet. But anyways, as soon as I found out she’d watched it. I texted her immediately. And I was like, “Did you find the mistake? The continuity mistake in the beginning when they were in Cuba?” And she was like, “What are you talking about?” And now I am a huge Disney fan. But I will also say that I am a My Little Pony fan. Yes. I love my ponies.

Stefanie Bautista 53:18
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 53:19
And so when they land in Cuba, Yelena is holding a stuffed animal. And this stuffed animal gets passed around at least 4 times. So I got lots of views of this stuffed animal. And it is a My Little Pony. And it is an Alicorn Twilight Sparkle. So that’s the name of the character. However, Twilight Sparkle did not become an alicorn until February 16, 2013.

Stefanie Bautista 53:47
Oh, no. Way after.

Ariel Landrum 53:49
An this animal was was featured in time where it’s supposed to be 1995. So I don’t know. If Loki and Wanda had done some kind of multiverse thing and somehow Twilight Sparkle was put in this 1995 because that’s what got messed up in this universe. I’m thinking not but I was upset for the rest of the movie about this. I was… I don’t know what prop person done messed up that. And I and I had I went online I had to confirm that I was not I was not crazy. And I found all kinds of Reddit threads from other My Little Pony and Brony fans.

Stefanie Bautista 54:24
Yup.

Ariel Landrum 54:25
Yes. Yes, this was the Twilight Sparkle that did not exist in 1995.

Stefanie Bautista 54:31
Yes, I am not a big My Little Pony fan. I do love My Little Pony. However, I’m not that big of a fan. I, so now that you said that, what if there was a Nexus event that had to do with Sylvie? ‘Cause we know how old she is. And. No. I know there’s nothing nothing, somebody messed up.

Ariel Landrum 54:50
Somebody messed up.

Stefanie Bautista 54:51
in that in the opening credits. Me and in my attempt to connect the multiversus of all the fandoms that I love. I was like, okay, so David Harbour is in this movie. I’m a huge Stranger Things fan. And I’m like, “Are they in Indiana? Why are they always in Indiana? Oh, no, they’re in Ohio, which is next to Indiana. Why do they always have to pick? Is that Hopper’s house? Is that?” And I was just trying to find all of these Stranger Things Easter Eggs for whatever reason.

Ariel Landrum 55:19
Evemnthe name ‘Alexi?’

Stefanie Bautista 55:20
Even the name ‘Alexi’. I’m like, “Oh my gosh, Alexi, just like Alexi. Poor Alexi.” And so, you know, if you’ve watched Stranger Things, every 80s reference, I think, because Stranger Things has done it so so so well, I always think of Stranger Things whenever I see something 80s now because I think they kind of hit the benchmark of what it is to portray the 80s in, you know, the 2020s. So I don’t know why my brain went to that. But I was trying to connect those things, which is probably why I did not notice that My Little Pony stuffed animal. And, you know, I think everybody goes through that when they sit down to watch a movie. Especially when it’s in a multiverse like the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We are so trained to find Easter Eggs now. And

Ariel Landrum 56:04
Yes.

Stefanie Bautista 56:04
I talk about this all the time with my students, especially when Endgame came out. I remember, and my coworkers can attest to this. I remember watching Endgame, midnight showing, and I had to work the next day because it was Thursday. And of course, you know, Friday, we still have school. So I came into the classroom and the first thing I said to my students was, things just be dropping everywhere today. It’s okay, this is real life, guys. I walk into a classroom and I said, “If you guys don’t behave today, I will spoil Endgame for you. And I am not joking.”

Ariel Landrum 56:39
Ohhhh. So you put down there, hammer. You put down’s Thor’s hammer.

“Your Have a Good Friday. Today, you are going to get your play time you’re gonna get your free time. But if somebody slips up, I am spoiling Endgame for you.” And we had the most fantastic day in my class. So and they always love talking about Easter Eggs. And we always try to one up each other like , “Oh Miss Stefanie, did you remember this? Or do you know if you saw that?” So I think we all go through that as Marvel fans and Disney fans now. We always try to find the Pizza Planet Truck. But I think…

Yeah, that really shows you how much like when we’re talking about dissecting medium like that gives you such a good critical lens and also being observant, right? Like that’s probably I know, for my clients, and I’m assuming for your students, like being more observant of the moment is a critical skill to obtain.

Stefanie Bautista 57:27
And it’s a really, it’s pretty high level skill when you’re thinking about it because you’re accessing memories that you’ve had from previous experiences in previous movies, and you’re making those connections. And I love it when you know, kids make those connections and what stands out for certain students and what doesn’t stand out for certain students. For you, for example, the My Little Pony thing totally stood out for you.

Ariel Landrum 57:47
Instant rapid processing. Executive functioning boom, there it is.

Stefanie Bautista 57:53
For me, it was the time period and I love time period, everything I love how Marvel and really any sort of medium decides to portray any sort of time travel, any sort of retro imagery, because I feel like as technology is evolving, we’re getting so much better at it. And our understanding of prior eras has gotten so much more clear. So I mean, I think that was good, but we’re talking about things that you know, we could have fixed, right.

Ariel Landrum 58:19
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 58:20
So I think for myself really quickly, Taskmaster could have been done a little bit better.

Ariel Landrum 58:28
Okay.

Stefanie Bautista 58:28
I think it was kind of Oh, I know it was kind of like a guise for who the real villain was. And we all know that. The real villain of course is the red the Red Room and I’m gonna keep forgetting and Dreykov.

Ariel Landrum 58:44
Forst time I’m saying things right.

Stefanie Bautista 58:45
Yeah. I think it’s because they don’t want to mess up the pronunciation. Dreykov.

Ariel Landrum 58:49
Yeah. Ohh.

Stefanie Bautista 58:52
Dreykov. So I know he’s, you know, kind of a Wizard of Oz thing again, where he is the man behind the curtain. He’s the person who we really need to take down. However, with the original Taskmaster, I knew that it had more of like a skull face. This one had more of a Daft Punk robot looking face.

Ariel Landrum 59:10
Yeah, yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 59:11
It was like, “Are we gonna see him behind the DJ booth?” Like it looked really Daft Punk. And Deadmau5 to me. And the hood didn’t quite make so much sense because she was already wearing like a skin tight, like, cap.

Ariel Landrum 59:27
Yeah, it was just kind of some extra.

Stefanie Bautista 59:31
Yeah. And I don’t know like, it was fun to see the different fighting styles like clearly claws came out Black Panther. Shield came out Captain America. It didn’t get large like the Hulk? That didn’t happen. But I think even even when you’re tying who that character was and their relationship to Natasha, it wasn’t fully fleshed out and I know that wasn’t the goal of the movie. And that was kind of like part of the journey for her. But I think that was a little bit wasted.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:05
Well, they, they, I mean, if you if you remember Black Widow was always talking about wanting to, she’s got read on her ledger and she’s wanting to wipe it clean. Like, that’s just some of the common quotes that that she has. And this was one of those reds. And unfortunately, it didn’t it didn’t quite meet expectations. Now, I really liked that they did change the gender and they connected it in the story. This wasn’t just a random person who teamed up with Dreykov like that seems to be a common thing like weird superhero team ups that don’t make sense or supervillain team ups.

Stefanie Bautista 1:00:39
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:00:40
But it didn’t seem like this was something that she regretted as much as she probably should have. And it was too easy of a of a forgiving, I think, because it was so instant. All that I don’t remember that Taskmasters daughter’s name is Valentina?

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:04
No, no Valentina is

Ariel Landrum 1:01:05
No that’s who came out at the end. But a task, it was really that Taskmaster asked, “Is he gone?” She she wanted to get away from from her abuser. So that totally made sense. How, however, given the amount of trauma, given friggin jumping out of falling ship, and then and then being unprogrammed, I just I feel like it would have made more sense if if she was just disoriented and it wasn’t really quite speaking or or engaging and wasn’t there. I don’t I know that I would want Black Widow to have redemption. But I don’t think in this case that she should have had it. Not that easily.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:48
Exactly. Umm her name is Antonia.

Ariel Landrum 1:01:51
Gah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:51
Yes.

Ariel Landrum 1:01:53
We were close.

Stefanie Bautista 1:01:54
We were not very close. But yeah, I think with her especially being one of the actors who’s truly of Russian descent, she is, you know, Olga Kurylenko, who is she’s an action actress. And she’s been in other films. It was it was kind of a miss to see her not highlighted in that way. But also, I’m sure it was hard to do that because Taskmaster already has such a reputation in the Marvel Universe in the comic books. So I know they were trying to just pull in characters probably where they could. I could be wrong. I don’t know. But yeah, I think it could have been fleshed out a little bit more. However, I know, we were teetering on what a 2 and a half hour movie at this point.

Ariel Landrum 1:02:42
Were you surprised that she was Taskmaster? Or did you figure it out?

Stefanie Bautista 1:02:47
Um, I knew Taskmaster was gonna appear at some point. Like you said, spoilers are kind of unavoidable at this point in time, so I knew I knew that character was gonna come out and the only way it could have been her. So and like, there was major foreshadowing when Yelena was talking to her and said, “Did you I did you recover the body?” And when she said, “Well, there was nobody to recover.” It was kind of like “Well, clearly she is MIA. So she’s gonna pop up somewhere.”

Ariel Landrum 1:03:14
Yeah, I I knew instantly that that moment one of 2 things and that I leaned towards it was gonna be Taskmaster or that she took over the Widows. I thought that was that could have been a take or twist. But at once I actually saw a Taskmaster fight. I was like, “Okay, yeah, this this has to be Dreykov’s daughter.” If we’re talking about him dabbling in bioengineering him dabbling in you know, conditioning mind control. Yeah, I don’t see him having any qualms doing that to his daughter. So it was it was somewhat predictable. But I thought I was going to appreciate the predictability. I didn’t as much in this case.

Stefanie Bautista 1:04:01
Yeah. Fun random fact, the woman who played Taskmaster, Olga Kurylenko, was a Bond girl. Or she was in a James Bond movie. So she was in Quantum of Solace. And that is the last time I saw her. And she, yeah, was a Bond girl named Camille Montez, for all your Bond fans out there. So yeah, I think that is just one of the things that I, you know, kind of had an issue with. But other than that, I think the linear progression of Natasha finding her roots using that to kind of wipe her ledger clean and in the process, liberate the Widows, was fulfilled pretty straightforwardly. Um, yeah. And I think the end just because of when it was released, you really had to reach back. I’ve heard from a lot of my friends who have watched it who do follow the Marvel Cinematic Universe, maybe not as closely as you and I do. Or if you know our listeners do, they just said “I wish maybe I could have been prepared in watching some of the prior movies again, just to kind of freshen up.” like watch civil war again to see you know, “Why is she on the run? You know, why is you know she living out in a trailer with her version of M or Q in the Bond movies, who supplies her with all of her necessities to live. Which I like that character. I like…

Ariel Landrum 1:05:32
Mason is the character and the actor. His name is OT Fagbenly and he is also British, and he went to the same elementary school as Florence Pugh but just like 10 years earlier

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:45
That’s wild. He reminds me of Craig David.

Ariel Landrum 1:05:49
UK be small.

Stefanie Bautista 1:05:51
Oh, yeah. I kept looking. I was like, “That can’t be Craig David. He’s not an actor. He sings. He sings ‘7 Days.’

Ariel Landrum 1:05:59
I guess he plays Luke in The Handmaid’s Tale, but I’ve never saw that show.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:01
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:06:02
The Handmaid’s Tale.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:03
That’s one of the ones I’ve yet to see. I know it’s on my list of things on Hulu that I have to watch. And I don’t watch Hulu very often anymore.

Ariel Landrum 1:06:11
So some of the other sort of small nitpicky things, because I think we’ve gotten to the point where, at least I have, I can be nitpicky in regards to Marvel movies.

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:21
Yeah.

Ariel Landrum 1:06:22
Okay, so the the scene where you Yelena is calling Natasha poser. They’re doing that a convenience store. They they didn’t confirm what are the convenience store person spoke English or not. Understood what they were doing or saying. They’re talking about people they’ve killed. And now she’s on the ground like whipping her head back forth. Wipe her hair back and forth. And that and he had no reaction. That extra if his his line or direction was do nothing, say nothing. They could have put a mannequin in there. And I wouldn’t have known because literally no, no response to…

Stefanie Bautista 1:06:55
None.

Ariel Landrum 1:06:56
This woman on the ground whipping her hair back and forth. Umm.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:00
And just taking things from the shelf. I don’t know if they have any intention of paying for them.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:06
But I didn’t see them stealing them in their outfits. So..

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:09
No. Also just them hanging out in that gas stations front or in clearly it’s a family owned gas station. Yeah. And they’re in like the boonies of this country. Are they in Budapest? Their in um…

Ariel Landrum 1:07:23
I don’t remember.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:23
I don’t remember, but very in like a very remote town and in remote towns everybody tends to know each other.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:30
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:30
Quite well.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:31
Yeah.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:31
Look at these 2 Russian slash white women talking.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:36
Yeah just sitting here talking to each other.

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:37
Super cas’

Ariel Landrum 1:07:38
Enjoying some beers with no like, no other party, no chaperone like just, you know, I, it was odd, right?

Stefanie Bautista 1:07:47
Yeah a little odd.

Ariel Landrum 1:07:47
Like there would be there would be a response. Like, I don’t think the kids would be out playing. Yeah, if these strangers in this random town are chilling. Yeah. And then the other thing was at the very end, the not not the end credit, but the very end Black Widow, rolls up in a motorcycle, and then jumps out, and then kicks Mason, and he wakes up. And I’m like, “He didn’t wake up from the sound of the motorcycle? But he wakes up because she nudges him.” I don’t buy this, I get that this trope is that he sleeps because he’s worked on a bunch of time zones, but but they should have done that better. She should have been driving a Prius and like rolled up on him sneakily.

Stefanie Bautista 1:08:25
Also why wasn’t his sleeping in the quinjet?

Ariel Landrum 1:08:28
I’ve no idea.

Stefanie Bautista 1:08:29
Isn’t it comfortable in there. And I mean, we’ve seen the inside of that thing. It’s pretty state of the art.

Ariel Landrum 1:08:34
And how did she not notice it? Like why was it “Oh, thanks for this jet.

Stefanie Bautista 1:08:39
“This gigantic quinjet that all the Avengers are gonna fly in one day. To save the quantum universe.” Yeah, you know, those? Yeah, I think we can nitpick on those things. And I, I’m right there with you on that. So I think in the grand scheme of things, I mean, even and I this is probably the last thing I’m going to, like contribute to this part of the conversation, but the whole subway part of them just like going in. Have you guys been in a subway station? Anything goes down. I’ve been in many subway stations in many different countries, and the smallest thing goes down. Everybody turns and no one is just watching to see what goes on. You will see them scatter like roaches.

Ariel Landrum 1:09:27
Scatter. And there’s a shutdown, like it reported to them the metro authority.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:35
Yeah. Especially in Europe, because it’s such a small enclosed space like. Do not tell me.

Ariel Landrum 1:09:40
And there have been plenty of, you know, in reality, terrorist attacks that have happened in those areas. So the response time is instant.

Stefanie Bautista 1:09:47
Yeah, I even think that was a better response time in the Italian Job way back in the day with Mark Wahlberg. And Charlize Theron because I love that movie. It’s one of my favorites. And when they shut down Hollywood and Highland right across the street from where you watch Black Widow, shit goes down it goes.

Ariel Landrum 1:10:04
It goes down.

Stefanie Bautista 1:10:05
So yeah, that’s the last thing I’m gonna say about that. But oh, I enjoyed it.

Ariel Landrum 1:10:11
I think like a couple of things before we end. I think The Cap would disapprove of the language. I counted I counted. So a bitch was said in English once. Shit was said in Russian once. And in English three times. Bullshit was said twice in English and ass was said three times in English. So watch your language. Language. Watch your mouth. Cap would disapprove. And I think really the only other thing that I would want to touch on is I there was some foreshadowing in the beginning with the fireflies, right in regards to like bioluminescence, and that sort of like illuminating darkness. And if we think a Dreykov off, he’s operating in the shadows. He’s hiding. I think. And then when we talk about the serum, it used light, right? Like it seemed a sparkle. Very much similar to the fireflies. I thought that was really lovely. But I feel like in the writing to the completion, something was missed in like connecting that.

Stefanie Bautista 1:11:10
Yes, yeah, it didn’t come into full fruition. And yeah, I they spent so much time on that scene with Rachel Weisz explaining it to her that I thought it was going to come up again, maybe even in the scene where Yelena visits her grave afterwards. I would have liked it to be at night maybe where they would revisit that. And then we could see, you know, fireflies, but again, it did not happen. It was more symbolic, I guess.

Ariel Landrum 1:11:11
Yeah, definitely foreshadowing for the, the the way the story is supposed to go, which is like illuminating this, this person operating in the dark and in the shadows, but I, I think it should, it seemed more like it was going to be talking about their sisterly connection. And I agree with you. Like if we saw the fireflies in regards to like at her grave that would have felt like very healing as part of just grief and loss. We do tend to look for the ones that we’ve lost in the symbols around us. So I think there was a hidden amiss there.

Stefanie Bautista 1:12:13
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I definitely agree. And I think that, you know, minus those little snafus, I think Marvel did a pretty good job considering that this is a release, not just in theaters, but also Disney+ as premiere access. Again, as a big theatrical release, it’s pretty hard. But I know that they’ve done quite well. Making I’m not sure hundreds of millions at this point 5, 7 or whatever.

Ariel Landrum 1:12:44
Yeah, yeah, domestically and internationally, this is broken, broken the records. And I think I think what we expected and even broken records in regards to premiere access and new subscriptions. Totally worth it overdue for this character.

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:01
Definietly.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:03
And really just makes me sad that we aren’t going to see her again. I’m hoping maybe flashbacks? Or like a variant?

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:10
Who knows like it like we’ve said before, the multiverse will probably surprise us in ways that we can’t even figure out yet.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:18
Can’t even figure out.

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:19
Yep.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:21
Well, if you want to hear more about Black Widow, go ahead and check out GT Radio’s episode where they talk about more of the family dynamics.

Yeah, definitely.

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:31
I know that there’s much to explore with that with the dynamic of what is considered a family and what they define as a family and what Natasha, all of those people go through because of their experience as this undercover family. And yeah, it’s a must listen to.

Ariel Landrum 1:13:51
Yeah. So thank you, everybody for listening to Happiest Pod On Earth. I’m Ariel.

Stefanie Bautista 1:13:58
And I’m Stefanie.

Ariel Landrum 1:14:00
And we are Disney fans. But we’re so much more let us know how much more you are than just the Disney fan by tweeting us @happiestpodgt or dming us on our Instagram @happiestpodgt.

Stefanie Bautista 1:14:12
Yep. And let us know how you like the movie and maybe some of the things that you noticed or had gripes with also. We would love to hear there is no judgment here. Okay, bye. See you next time.

• Black Widow
• Captain America
• Thor
• Iron Man
• Iron Madien
• Loki
• Sylvie
• Red Gaurdian
• Yelena
• Stranger Things
• My Little Pony

• Trauma
• Objectification
• Human trafficking
• Sex trafficking
• Childhood trauma
• 80s themes
• Anatomy
• Continuity error
• Leadership skills
• MMA fighting
• Cosplay
• Costumes
• Body image
• Body types