511: Praise Band

So, what do this animal

and this animal

and this animal

have in common?

They all live on an organic valley farm.

Organic valley dairy comes from small organic family farms that protect the land and the plants and animals that live on it from toxic pesticides, which leads to a thriving ecosystem and delicious, nutritious milk and cheese.

Learn more at ov.coop and taste the difference.

Today, we're exploring deep in the North American wilderness among nature's wildest plants, animals, and

cows.

Uh, you're actually on an Organic Valley dairy farm where nutritious, delicious organic food gets its start.

But there's so much nature.

Exactly.

Organic Valley's small family farms protect the land and the plants and animals that call it home.

Extraordinary.

Sure is.

Organic Valley, protecting where your food comes from.

Learn more about their delicious dairy at ov.coop.

Then we cut over to Matt.

He's packing up for the move.

His mom and dad are seeing him off, desperate to get access to their fuck dungeon, I guess.

Yeah, wait, wait, when he's leaving, like a waterbed delivery gets delivered.

Yeah, exactly.

I wanted Matt to circle back for something that he forgot, and they're already costumed up and boiled up.

Couple from Craigslist is already there.

What's this full for keys, mom?

God-awful

movie.

Movie movies.

Welcome back to the Gamcast, where each week we sample another selection from Christian cinema without even being sentenced to do it.

I'm your host, Noah Illusions, and sitting 700 miles to my immediate left is my good friend Heath and and Wright.

Heath, welcome back.

We got god-awful music and movies at the same time.

Don't excited.

Yeah, all the mediums mushing together.

And sitting 900 miles to my northeast is my bad friend Eli Bosdick.

Eli, how are you this fine afternoon, sir?

I'm fantastic, Noah.

Let's do this thing.

And we're also excited to welcome in a guest masochist who's new to god-awful movies, but no stranger to awful movies.

Ryan Bailey is the host of the So Bad It's Good podcast, a daily podcast about the best and worst that entertainment has to offer.

Ryan, welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me.

And also, screw you guys.

This was awesome.

Yes.

Yeah, it sure was.

Did you not love this?

Yeah, it turns out I didn't love it unless I was just tired.

But I'm

this one didn't loop around.

Yeah, it didn't speak to me.

I feel like we need to do this simulation more than ever.

Yeah.

Truly, there are moments in this movie.

I'm going to talk about them when we get to the review.

There are so many moments in this movie where I'm like, this was written by aliens.

Right.

No human being wrote these words down or thinks this is how people interact.

This was filmed before the takeover of AI as well.

So that shocked me because this seems like an AI written movie.

Yeah, we can't even blame ChatGPT-1, right?

It almost has to be an alien.

Artificial stupidity, maybe they had that back in 2008.

I don't know.

So fill us all in.

Tell us, Heath, what will we be breaking down today?

We watched Praise Band, the movie called Praise Band.

It's the story of getting the youths on board with jesus using skibbity rock and roll dancing music it's that's pretty great

so sort of to the extent that it's the story of anything yeah yeah it's convincing a church to allow a guitar in the building it's the whole

church is a jewish instrument yes

and eli how bad was this movie well If you love catching up with your demented relatives, but you wish they had to rely on their B material, You will love this movie.

It's the, oh, grandma, that's someone on the other line.

I'm going to have to call you back of movies.

Yep.

Sure is.

Like half the movie is landline phone calls about mundane details.

So much.

And Ryan, we've already touched on this, but was this so bad that it was good?

It did, did this, did this, do the Pac-Man board loop around, or was this just bad?

No, this is so bad, it's bad.

I mean, there's an element, depending on how you watch movies, that I'm like, I was finding some good in it.

And I watched so much reality TV that this was refreshing in a sort of pseudo way, but it almost makes you feel like you've potentially died while watching it.

And this is some sort of penance or that you're in some kind of afterworld.

Yeah, honestly, if this movie is the Christian hell, it makes a ton of sense.

Yeah, that's right.

Yeah.

Because this movie is definitely the hell I deserve.

I kept waiting for things to like happen or some kind of like, and it just shows how messed up my mind is that I kept going like oh my god he's gonna cheat on that girl with that girl and then nothing happened no

ever happened there's no you kept thinking like oh well surely this is the love interest to someone no yes nothing yeah that piano lady i was like oh that's gonna ruin her marriage and it doesn't nothing happens in this movie i thought for sure that's what was gonna happen ne'er a conflict be introduced that it was not immediately resolved.

Oh, it's just amazing.

So is there anything you guys want to nominate this one for being the best at being the worst at?

Yeah, I'm going to go with best worst, naming a key for a song.

Oh, you are livid.

You are livid about this.

I was furious.

As the son of a music teacher, I was especially furious.

So there's like an audition moment for the church praise band.

And these two women come in and they're going to sing like some kind of hymn.

And they tell the piano player, they're like, give me a G flat.

And like, okay, technically, yeah, F sharp, G flat, but like it would be F sharp.

If there's, If you're going to have a song in a major key, which you are almost every,

it would be F sharp major.

So you don't have C flat in that, you would spell it F sharp.

So stupid.

Wow, this got really nerdy.

This got really,

you're talking really, like, this is, this is intended.

Was I supposed to know music knowledge?

Nope, no, don't worry.

Don't worry.

C flat major would be a crazy way to spell that.

So

that's like asking for a C flat.

C flat would be in that scale.

It's crazy.

Yep.

So, okay.

So, I was going to go with best worst tight shots.

So, there are several shots in this movie where clearly they got all their equipment in there and they're like, well, shit, there's not really room for the lights and the camera here.

So, we have these absurdly tight shots of rooms where there's never any reason for it.

Very claustrophobic feel.

I had some fun with those.

You feel really selfish to see a whole face by the end of this movie.

I'm going to go with best worst plot resolution.

This movie introduces so many plot points it doesn't resolve.

It may count as a prequel for lost.

I think it just automatically is a Cloverfield film.

My last seven notes were just what about blank?

It felt like, you know, how like when you watch a fucking like a Marvel movie or a prequel or something, there's a bunch of shit that they, like, it's fan service shit that they have to find a way to stick this character into it or whatever.

That's what this movie felt like.

Yes.

Right.

Was this not?

Wait, is this not a Marvel movie?

Oh,

I thought this was Iron Man.

I had no,

holy crap.

Yeah, we just answered a lot of questions.

Yeah.

It is better than the last couple of Marvel movies.

So this is all coming together.

It's about Tide.

So did you have a best worst for us, Ryan?

Yeah, mine is Tide.

My best worst is like Best Worst portrayal of homeless people.

It's a very interesting portrayal of the homeless man that gets his guitar stolen, but gets a Bible.

And then all of a sudden they give him an electric guitar and he starts wailing on it and he starts dressing like michael mcdonald in the 80s and then also best worst usage of like just shots that like will go on two beats longer than they need to in terms of like the scene is over but they won't cut the scene and they do that with the entrance as well like the beginning of scenes like you'll see a full walk to the phone to answer the phone instead of just starting with answering the phone it's like a picky little thing but i was like are they are they trying to get like 90 minutes to two hours in this They could cut this way down.

Yes.

How did he get to the phone?

Oh, okay.

He's walking.

Yeah, exactly.

I've seen him eat one bowl of cereal, but will he eat another bowl?

Oh, my God.

Did he eat the beginning?

Okay.

When he pours the cereal, he only pours like just a couple nuggets of cereal.

I mean, there were just little things like that that annoyed me.

Yeah.

The thing is, honestly, I think after fucking 510 of these movies, we're numb to a lot of that shit.

We're so used to the scenes starting too early and poor Christian actors having to do impromptu space work with them that, like, I don't even think I see that anymore.

So that's why it's so nice to have.

You're there to be the eyes of the people, Ryan.

The eyes of the people.

I'm with you on the cereal, though.

Like, this guy's eating 11 checks and then he's going to pour milk on it.

Get the fuck out of here.

That, I mean, by the way, he's suffering like Jesus did.

And that, it, it, um,

it really, I mean, it, it shook me in that this was like visual melatonin in a sense, where it,

I mean, I was just kind of shocked at how how deadened all of the performances were.

And, you know, they all seem like nice people.

I mean,

the whole thing was just very shocking to me.

I thought,

like, it's hard to determine.

I thought this was a sketch at first, and then I was like, oh, this is a real thing.

Yep.

Oh, yeah.

All right.

Well, nothing's going to happen in this movie.

So we might as well pad the runtime with some sketches and shit.

But we'll be back in a minute anyway with all the plot anticipation that is

praise band.

I would say it was fourth grade when I got chunky.

Well, like fifth for me.

I see.

Hey, hey, guys.

What are you doing?

Oh, hey, Noah, we're just unloading our childhood trauma onto Ryan.

They really are.

All right.

Why?

Look, Noah, we'd love to build a friendship with Ryan on a regular time scale, but we're short on time this summer, so we got to skip ahead.

They locked me in a closet with them to simulate college.

It's true.

We did.

Guys, if you want to save time this summer, why don't you just try HelloFresh?

What's

HelloFresh?

See, we wouldn't usually let you get a point but you're speeding ahead feel soon soon to me felt soon to me too thank you for saying it ridiculous sorry hello fresh makes it easy to fit quick home-cooked meals into your schedule every week by curating delicious recipes right to your door like panko crusted chimichuri barramundi or sun-dried tomato grilled cheese sandals as well as over a hundred seasonal snacks sides and treats I don't know, Noah.

What if I don't have time to cook?

Well, this summer, HelloFresh has made it even easier to enjoy delicious, healthy, and homemade quality meals with their new ready-made meals.

These heat and go HelloFresh meals are chef-crafted, flavorful dishes ready in just three minutes, so you can dig in and go do summer right.

Okay, that sounds great, but have you actually tried it?

Have you tried the Sando's?

I sure have tried the Sandos.

HelloFresh sent us a boxer shrine when they first became a sponsor.

I love how everything unpacks into the fridge in seconds, and I can have a fresh-cooked, delicious meal in less time than I'd spend on takeout or delivery.

That's why I, Noah Illusions, personally endorse HelloFresh.

All right, Noah, I'm sold.

Where do we sign up?

Make your summer enjoyable and delicious by signing up for HelloFresh at hellofresh.com/slash awful 10 FM and get 10 free meals with a free item for life.

That's hellofresh.com/slash awful 10 FM for 10 free meals and a free item in every box.

HelloFresh.com/slash awful 10 FM.

One per box with an active subscription.

Free meals are applied as a discount on the first box.

New subscribers only varies by plan.

All right, Noah.

Thanks.

So, so how did you guys simulate college in a closet?

Uh, mostly bong rips.

Yeah, a lot of bong rips.

A lot of those and sandos.

Where am I?

All right, everyone.

Welcome to the first ever Writer's Room meeting for Praise Bands.

Praise Band.

So I'm obviously super excited to tell the world our story.

Yeah.

So what is that story?

Yeah, we joined the church when you guys were already there.

All right.

So buckle in.

Oh, boy.

So Pastor James decided that a praise band might be good for the church, right?

Yeah, yeah.

And so he

hired me.

And then?

Well, and then I had auditions.

Okay.

And everybody who auditioned made the band, and then we had a praise band.

Oh, oh, you're done.

Is that.

Are you done?

Is that the whole story?

No.

Well, no.

There's.

I also had to move out of my parents' house.

You were still living with your parents?

I was only 24.

And also, a conflict here, my long-distance girlfriend was,

she was kind of not psyched about it, to say the least.

Oh, okay.

Did she break up with you?

Oh, no, no.

Okay, so you want to make that story into a movie?

Well, it's going to be a Christian movie.

Oh, that's fine.

Honestly, better than most movies.

Yeah, no.

Oh, Mark also fought with his wife.

Oh, yeah.

It definitely include that.

And we're back for the breakdown, and we're going to open up on one of history's least convincing rabble, rabble, rabbles,

right?

Because they don't have enough people really for a cacophony of voices unless all four of those people are talking to each other at once and loudly.

Yeah, it's just a bunch of old church guys doing the rabble, rabble, rabble.

They're yelling about some church thing that definitely ended with like, we got to force women to have babies somehow.

Let's get back on track.

Yeah.

So, but, and I love this so much too.

So, twice they do the whole, everybody's rabbling, and then Pastor James comes in to quiet them down, right?

He quiets them down, and they rabble again, and then he quiets them down again.

And on both occasions, there's one guy who just keeps going for too long, and he has like a full sentence to say afterwards.

I just said rabble slowly there.

That was weird.

I like that they're all so he walks in and he stands behind a podium, but they're all like, hey, you can't just like stand behind.

We're not doing an official thing.

That's just a, that's just an object now.

It's nothing.

He's like, I call official thing.

I'm doing the podium.

I'm giving a speech.

And they're like, all right.

Yeah.

Well, you know,

goddamn it.

Gravity toss up a podium.

But it starts off.

I mean, also, this scene actually sets up a precedent for the movie where every scene feels dead.

You know, like you're like, it just completely, even with the rabbiline, it's just the most unenergetic rabbiline that you've ever heard.

Yeah.

Well, you know, it doesn't help that everybody in the room is like 63 and actively changing a catheter as we're doing this scene or whatever.

But the impetus for all the rabbling is that the music minister has retired.

And apparently that has thrown this fucking church into a, like a crate, like when you step on an anthill or something, right?

They don't, they have no idea what to fucking do.

Yeah.

But like ultimately they're like, well, you should find a new music minister.

No, you should find a new minister.

Well, we should start a committee to find a new music minister.

And like they go through that like for a minute.

And finally, they land on that Pastor James should hire somebody.

And this character, we'll meet him later.

This is, this is Wayne Wilson.

He goes at the end, he's like, well, James can hire somebody.

What's the worst that could happen?

He starts a praise band

title card drop.

Yeah.

No, it's completely, I mean, it is completely ridiculous.

And also, I was so tired when I watched this at first.

And when they said Pastor James, for some reason, I heard it as Rick James, the 80s musician.

And I was like, oh my God, did they know about Rick James, the musician?

I was like, what a weird name.

And then I was like, oh, I just must have misheard that.

I like the movie You Hallucinated better than the one we watched.

Right.

Way better.

Every scene in this movie, I kept waiting for like a back to the future moment to happen of like, you know, that new sound you've been looking for?

Well, listen to this.

So, okay, so then we watched this kid wake up with his hair already done, which is nifty.

It's nice to be able to do that.

This is going to be, I guess, our main character.

This is Matt Young, and he's a 10, but he prays over his cornflakes, right?

This is the scene where he pours the 11 checks into him.

Yeah.

I mean, by the way, this, I mean, this was like the saddest way to wake up, I imagine.

Like, there's just, once again, no energy.

It's fully sad.

We see him like eating cereal.

We see him praying.

All of this stuff done with just the lowest of low energies.

Yeah.

We see him acting in this Christian movie.

Right, right.

Well, and the most upbeat of music, right?

So as, because like, you know, guy wakes up and sort of drags himself downstairs.

That's normal and fine in a film, except for the music.

It's like, oh, God is all glory and we're very happy in the morning or whatever.

Yeah.

Yeah, they're just, it really holds very long on like things like you said, like the cereal.

Like we see the full pouring the cereal in there.

We see the full everything and none of this could be cut way down.

And there was like when there's no action to it, but you have that soundtrack over it, you keep expecting for something to happen.

And it really, like, obviously he is living at his parents' house, and it's very much a parents' house kind of feel.

Yes.

100%.

Yeah.

The people who made this movie definitely finished editing this movie and were like, people say editing is hard, but that was great, guys.

We just took everything we shot and put them next to each other.

I mean, we pressed export.

It was so easy.

There were times where I just started watching the background.

I was just like, I was looking at like the cabinets and the refrigerator and things like that.

Trying to hallucinate another 80s music star.

No, that's what I was like, what I would do.

By the way, when you watch these movies, does it completely inspire you to make your own movie?

Because I was like, oh my God, if I saw this 20 years ago, I would be making Christian films.

Yeah, one of these days when we like when bankruptcy hits us, we're going to make the world's best Christian movie in a weekend.

So, okay.

So then we cut to this diner where we're going to meet Mary and Mark, right?

So Mary walks in.

She sees Mark and she's like, nope, not going to this diner, different diner for me.

But Mark grabs her and he's like, hey, you have to talk to me.

So this is like a separated married couple.

And Mark is a dangerous fucking stalker, but this movie doesn't know it.

And Mark looks like Guy Fieri got a makeover on a morning show.

He does.

And I hadn't done his frosted flakes in my entire fucking episode, my entire notes.

Yeah.

It's somebody that based their entire look on Ryan Reynolds from Band Wilder.

Okay.

With the frosted tips.

And like, this is, I mean, I hate to say this.

This guy seems like he's addicted to online porn.

Yeah, he sure is.

And he certainly goes around to high schools talking about it for the rest of his life.

Yeah, he does.

We need to introduce him to Blaine Bartell.

But I will say, without Mark's storyline, this movie probably wouldn't be worthy to be on our show, right?

It'd be boring.

It'd be bad.

We don't like it.

Jesus, blah, blah, blah.

But without the in-depth, dangerous toxicity of Mark being unwilling to listen to a woman who is very clear that she does not want him to contact her, this would not be a god-awful movie.

And Mark really pulls it through her.

She walks in and like spins around the moment she sees him.

Like he's a terrifying character.

She's in fear.

I mean, this is what I would imagine Nicole Brown Simpson was like towards the end.

But there are also things like they never, this movie never specifies anything.

They never get specific.

So when they do have like a specific line, like towards the end, this dude's talking to the homeless guy and he's like, hair dryers were thrown.

And I'm like, he just drops this line out of nowhere where you're like, oh, you were throwing shit at each other?

Yeah.

Like, so it's always, there's like this undercurrent of like, oh, you got violent at some point.

Right.

Either he got violent and threw a hair dryer or he deserved to get hit in the face with a hair dryer.

Either way, really.

Right.

Or she was scared enough that she had to throw a hairdryer.

Well, like, and we get that sense right away, right?

Because the first line is, she's like, Mark, stop calling me.

And Mark says, no.

That's the actual change.

Stop calling me, Mark.

And he says, no.

And I wrote my notes, wow, I hope this guy gets eaten by lizards at the end of this movie.

Yeah.

She's walking out.

Come back to Flavortown, babe.

Come on.

I thought God made you to obey me.

Right?

Is the plot of the movie, but we'll get there.

Okay.

So, but first we got it.

We cut to Pastor James and his wife, and his wife and him have such a like cold and formal relationship that me and Eli both wrote, his assistant just handed him some coffee.

Why would you introduce a married couple by them calling each other by their first name?

You could just have honey in there and it all makes sense.

Yes, uh-huh.

But yeah, but this is the first of my best worst, right?

The first ridiculously tight shot where like they obviously couldn't fit the camera and the lighting in the room with him.

Yeah.

But she sends him off to work.

And then we meet his real assistant.

this is betsy oh i hated betsy oh betsy so first of all troublemaker i yeah right and a gossip you just can't stop betsy from gossiping yeah i feel like the person who wrote this movie had a much older character in mind when she named her betsy and had like her best friend was mildred

I don't know, it just felt like really weird for Betsy to be 23.

But she's on the phone with Mildred talking about exposition.

And again, this is supposed to be: oh, Betsy's a harmless gossip.

So, what harmless gossip did they decide for Betsy to be gossiping about?

Why that someone's child has run away?

Well, she says, you know, Kayla's daughter ran away with that boy from the city.

If I ever have, if the Lord ever graces me with a child, my child won't do something like that.

Hey, movie, what race or religion?

It's not one of those non-binaries, is it?

Yeah, I'm not sure what from the city is code for, but it's code for something, yeah.

But then she gets another call for James.

It's Pastor Greg, who will serve no function in this movie.

Such a weird thing to add.

Oh, thick Paul McCartney.

Yeah, yeah, thick Paul McCarthy.

I have him as fat John Gardner.

Yep, yeah.

Okay, yeah, that's even closer.

Guys, by the way, they cut to this guy.

This is another weird thought.

I was like, is the head guy?

I thought he was playing dual roles.

I thought he was playing that because i thought oh this guy just slapped a wig on his head it's the same dude i was like this dude is playing dual roles

you thought he was tyler perrying yes i did actually i was like oh that's fun because he's like more upbeat that i was like oh he wants to show his range and it's like a totally different actor it is though

my range consists of me and me with longer hair that's what i thought oh all baptists look the same to us at a certain time yeah so yeah but now and also we should point out that betsy's listening in on this call yes why right like this is not needed for the movie to work in any way.

But he's like, yeah, you know, like, things are going rough for me, Greg.

My music minister retired, and we are a fucking overturned anthill about that.

And Greg's like, don't worry, I know a guy.

I know a young guy who's looking to get into music ministry.

Oh, is it Michael Tate?

I hope it's not Michael Tate.

I know he needs a job, but like, we're not doing that.

Oh, it's 2008.

He's still

doing it.

Well, no, he's not, but we don't know.

We're pretending he's still.

We know we know, but we don't know that.

He goes, is he trained?

And Greg goes, no.

And he goes, does he have any experience?

And Greg goes, no.

And he's like, are you just trying to get rid of this guy?

And he's like, oh, you know, I've got another phone call coming to you

on the other side, though.

It is Michael Tate.

Okay, bye.

He is not housebroken.

If the answer is still yes, why did you bother asking?

Right.

But also, this is another part of the movie where every time you think the movie is actually going to like turn into a movie, it like, because I was like, oh, they're talking about this guy.

And he's like, he's like into God, but he's from the wrong side of the tracks.

He's kind of like a rebel.

Like, I almost thought like that would be this great pivot of like, you've got to get this guy.

He's on the wrong side of the tracks, but he could come in and lead this band.

And it's just a dude that had poured like Chex Mix into his bowl.

Yeah.

And yeah, who is already Christian and wants this exact job?

Yeah.

No conflict at all.

Yeah.

Everyone will react like he is Kevin Bacon from Footloose in this movie, but he's the most milquetoast white boy that your great-grandmother would have approved of.

No, nobody should have a problem with this guy.

Like the big problem is guitars.

That's the big problem.

The instrument of the guitar.

The instrument of the devil.

Yeah, exactly.

He's supposed to do like you were talking about the back to the future thing.

Like your parents are going to love this and then be like, squinting and nail.

But it's like, Christ is God.

It is.

It's so sad.

It's really nice.

And I was like, what are the old hymns that you're used to if you have a problem with this?

Right.

What is more milquetoast than this?

Did actual milquetoast just sit there next to the microphone?

Shows up to the auditions.

Hello, my bad.

So then we cut to Pastor James meeting with another minister he's helping.

Why is it this one character, right?

The black minister and Greg.

And by the way, I'm sorry to call him the black minister.

This character never gets a name in the crowd.

No, I sure don't.

Oh, that's in the script.

This is like my black friend, the minister, for real.

That's like the character in the script.

No, literally, in the credits, they call him Park Minister.

And that's because somebody was like, dude, you can't call him Black Minister in the credits.

Okay, I see you've written here under his IMDb credit, Blinister.

I am not going to write that down.

I want you to know I'm not going to write it down.

So, but he's a black minister.

Don't worry, though, a white church is helping them.

I swear you, we have seen probably a hundred times now in our movies a white church helping a black church.

Never seen a black church, like a black minister helping out a white church in one of these films.

So, no, unless they're teaching that white head of that white church a valuable lesson about poor people, right?

Yeah, well, yeah, no, brother white.

Yeah, okay, there's that.

A real movie we reviewed, Ryan, called Brother White.

Think about that.

Think about what you were spared.

Well, also, the other thing that I was curious about about is like, when you watch this movie, I just wondered about the financials the whole time.

Like, you know, what did you pay the secretary?

What does the secretary get for working there?

And like, what kind of fellowship are you giving to this black minister besides like Bibles?

Like, I want to know what money we're bringing in.

I want to know what the ban budget was when later that happens.

Like, I got really interested in the financials.

Yeah.

Are you paying into the unemployment system?

Yeah, right.

Right.

Yeah.

Unfortunately, unlike other 501c3s, they don't have to disclose their finances.

So weird that they wouldn't have to do that when all the other charities do.

But yeah, but he's given this guy some Bibles and

some food.

He goes at one point, he's like, well, you can never have enough Bibles and food for the homeless.

Well, you can have enough Bibles

for them.

Also, the box is so small, right?

Like, how much food could you possibly, like assuming that they have the densest possible caloric fucking bars in that food, that's enough food for like nine people?

No, the box had to have just crusts crusts of bread because that's what it gives the homeless man like your own.

Oh my God.

He goes here.

He has a crust of bread.

Like how shameful.

It's not even protein bars.

Like it's literally a crust of bread in that box.

It's insane.

Yeah, well, we'll get there.

You know, they cut out the insides of Wonder Bread and fed it to the church.

And then they were like, all right, we got a bunch of these.

This is good.

How can we make the homeless feel more ashamed?

Yeah.

Give them duck food.

God.

Yeah, we'll get there.

We'll get there.

I don't want to spoil that.

Sorry, sorry to spoil.

No, you're good.

You're good.

So then we cut to Betsy.

She's on the phone with Mildred advancing the plot some more, right?

And then the Cornflakes hottie, the Chexmix guy, comes in earlier.

And

he's like, I gotta, I have a meeting with Pastor James.

And she looks at him, and she's such a bad actor.

And this is so miscast, and this is so poorly written that we can't really tell if she wants to fuck him or if she's scandalized by him.

Oh, she wants to fuck him.

Right.

No, that's clarified later.

But I think two things can be true at once.

You can be scandalized and want to fuck somebody.

In fact, that helps a lot of the time.

But I want to be clear, though.

In the movie's mind, it is that she is scandalized.

She is never going to be a romantic interest to this character in any way.

It's bizarre because, like, in any other fucking movie, when you meet the pretty young girl and the pretty young boy, they're going to be love interests, especially if she reacts like this.

But it's supposed to just be that she's scandalized.

Right, but she gets back on the phone after he walks away with her friend Mildred to gossip some more.

She's like, this guy had a guitar, a basement apartment of his own, own entrance, fucking sploosh, right?

Basically, roommates with his parents, if you think about it, right, Mildred?

See, I would rather they just followed this uh receptionist for the whole rest of the movie because I would love to know like her dream sequences at night when she's like trying not to think about Matt, but she keeps thinking about his ass.

Yeah, she does stare at it like she's gonna sculpt it later.

Gonna go to his basement and flood my basement, right?

Right,

right, Mildred.

Mildred, Mildred's gone.

Oh, she had a stroke again.

So, then we cut to the interview where Pastor James prompts Matt by basically saying, So, James, give us the bullet points of your character's backstory, right?

And he's got, this is where we first learned that this character has the, or that this actor has the acting chops of fucking saran rap.

Oh, my God.

You know, when people send you a video and they're like, guys, AI video is so real these days.

And then you show you something that looks like a PS1 cutscene?

That's that's how the acting in this movie is yeah it's not wait it's not just one person the whole cast is the same like if there's not one person that's like wow that person's really good no no no but there is one person who's like wow that guy's really bad and that is mad

so sure is so and then but like and then he's like well maybe you could sing us a song and we're like oh i bet they hired this guy because he he had musical talent not because he had act no no no he's not he's barely even trying to lip sync this shit i'm like wow you're you're singing without moving your Adams apple.

That's tricky, man.

Imagine somebody live singing and then they cut to like, obviously, a pre-recorded song.

And then you have to wait till the end of the movie to find out that Chad Pollard is the voice of Matt Young.

It's not even.

So they hired a separate guy to do the singing parts for this dude.

So they didn't hire this dude because he had a beautiful singing voice.

Nope.

They sure didn't.

They hired him for the acting job.

No, they hired him for that panty melting smile.

Yes, thank you.

Yeah.

I also just have to point out how long this song is, right?

Because they keep shot reverse shotting and you watch the pastor run out of like,

I am enjoying this song faces two lines in.

He plays an entire song for the guy.

I would have smashed through the window like

two verses in.

Yeah, but his song is terrible, but the pastor loves it.

So then we cut, they're leaving the office and Matt is hired.

Betsy, who was for some reason like sitting under her desk, apparently like flicking her bean down there.

I don't know what was going on there.

But Betsy like pops out from under her desk like shocked that this guitarist has been hired now.

I will say though, like the fact that, you know, the head guy at the beginning, he already knew they were like worried about a praise band and immediately he goes to a praise band.

Yeah.

He doesn't try anybody else out.

There's not like, you know, I'm going to try the old way and then it's like, this is not working.

We should try the praise band.

He immediately goes to praise ban.

Again, this movie is made so incompetently because, yes, what this movie demands, and keep it, like, keep in mind, this movie sells itself as a comedy, right?

That's what the marketing says.

It compares itself to the monkeys for some fucking reason.

What?

Yeah, yeah.

That's what the market is.

He's like, imagine the monkeys, but with praise band.

There's no comedy anywhere in this movie.

But what they absolutely should have done is had like a montage of bad music directors, right?

Yes.

That's what this movie calls for.

But they're too bad at filmmaking to think of that.

And there would have been no contrast with their movie.

Well, right, yeah.

But in their heads, is this like a riotous laugh out loud comedy?

Like, is that like the people making this and the people this is for?

Is this hysterical to them?

Maybe.

I feel like there were a lot of high fives in the writers.

It's entirely black.

We got it.

They do not know what humor is.

I can say that for sure after 510 movies.

So, okay, so, but then, so Betsy calls Mildred, right?

And she's like, you're not going to believe the hot guss I just got.

He hired a guitarist.

And just then, James catches her and hangs up the phone on her.

Yeah.

Right.

It's a dick move.

And then he's like, hey, don't tell anybody about this yet.

I want to surprise everybody with it on Wednesday.

And she's like, well, aren't you already aware?

Like, didn't they already tell you that they would be upset, all of the other church leaders and stuff, if you did this?

And he's like, yes.

Now,

we don't know why this would be controversial, right?

Like the movie, and the movie will never explain.

We're supposed to just understand intuitively that guitars in a church is supposed to be a big fucking deal, right?

Well, I think it's because of that first scene, right?

Where it's like they laugh about praise bands.

So that's what I took this as.

Also, when he hung up the phone, I got scared that we were like headed towards a dateline episode because I thought she was going to get killed.

Yeah.

Like of like, you better not say anything.

And she's like, I will be saying something, you know, and then like she disappears.

Yeah.

Like, it's aggressive.

It was a weird fight.

It was a fucked up move.

Yeah.

But she's she's like, you're gonna have a guitar.

What is he gonna bring a fucking, what, a drummer?

And he's like, yeah, there will be a drummer.

And she's like, drums.

And she runs away from the drums.

She flees.

She flees from the words drums, everybody.

Yes.

Oh, and then she goes, you know, Wayne Wilson isn't going to like, that's Wayne, not Wade.

He's not going to fight Deadpool in this movie.

Disappointing.

Wayne Wilson won't like it.

And she goes, you know, he's already got a grudge against you.

I'm like, well, that's the laziest possible way to introduce a plot point, isn't it?

Yeah.

So the idea from the pastor is like, yeah, we're going to pull in all the youths and tell them how Jesus gets us.

He gets us like in that thing.

Yeah.

And I was just so depressed.

It's almost the exact same conversation at the DNC right now.

Just

80-year-old dudes trying to get the youths with like vertical videos.

Is that a thing?

What do you do?

A praise Rayan?

Yeah.

So, okay.

So then James goes to see Wayne, the old guy that doesn't like him, no praise bands.

He goes to see him to tell him about it.

We have another one of these ridiculously tight shots.

And this one is actually spectacular because the camera accidentally shows that James is already in the room as they play the sound effect for him knocking on the door and as Wayne tells him to come in.

So

they fuck this one up just gloriously.

Movie making.

Yeah, right, right.

No, they won't know.

But we watch him like kind of skate around.

He doesn't exactly tell Wayne that he's hired a guitar player, just that he's hired the music minister.

Gotcha.

And Wayne goes, oh, you know, I can't wait for us to all get together and vote on this hire on Wednesday.

And James is like, nope, no democracy.

You told me I could hire a guy.

And Wayne's like, oh, well, you know, there's a lot of perfectly reasonable reasons why you wouldn't want us to have a vote on this.

I'm sure it'll be fine.

Of course, as soon as James leaves, though, Mildred calls and tells him about the praise band, and she is fucking scandalized by it.

Yeah, for those of you counting, by the way, at home, that is the fourth scene in a row that has been about the exact same subject matter.

Yep.

Well, and then after it gets off the phone, Wayne fucking monologues to an empty room about his motivation.

Also, I love that Wayne sounds like one of those old gold mining prospectors of like, oh, back in my day, we didn't have this type of music.

Are you bringing old synthesizers and guitars?

Percussive instruments and globalization.

I can't have any of this, my truth.

I remember when I was in college and I whacked off to the beat of a drum and I knew it was devil.

It was the devil.

We're going to be dancing.

So, okay, so now we're going to cut to.

We'll keep telling him about J-O-I.

I don't understand.

All right.

Heath don't project onto the movie.

So then, okay.

Yeah, don't project onto the movie.

So then we cut to this.

Okay, I feel like this movie, like a more interesting movie about this gospel group, was trying to break through this boring-ass movie, right?

Yes.

Yeah.

So we're going to meet this girl group.

She, they're meeting with somebody from a record label that doesn't want to bring them on.

He's like, I think you're really good, but you're too urban.

Can I say urban and not get sued?

Well, I think she was, they were meeting with Bad Boy Records, right?

Okay.

Yeah.

Exactly.

It sure appears like they're being cast from a couch here.

So I guess that

fucking tracks.

So he gets up and leaves.

I assume his.

It's his office.

If it's not his office, the seating arrangement is insane.

Very strange.

Yeah.

But he leaves and they turn to each other and they say, well, we've tried being famous singers three whole times.

So I think we gave it our all.

We're done now.

To your point, I really thought, I was like, is this like the Destiny's Child story?

Like, I thought, I thought the movie was going to then focus primarily on them.

And that was going to even like make Wade like even go like lose it even more.

And then it doesn't do that at all.

I was like, you have a, you have a plot device that you do not use at all.

And they give up on their dream and that's pretty much the end of their internal struggle.

Yes.

That could have been a movie.

They keep walking up to the edge of a plot device and then being like, nah, no, nah.

It's going to scare grandma.

It's, you know what it's like?

It's, do you remember how when all the famous actors retired from the Marvel movies, they had to pretend that like, we cared about Bucky all along.

That's how I feel about this girl group is they were like, shit, an hour and 21 minutes.

Guys, if we could make it past an hour and 30, Amazon Prime will give us seven more dollars.

Right.

Let's find these scenes.

Well, that's, I almost thought they were setting up like this cinematic universe where I was like, well, maybe they're in another film that's just about that.

Like a spin-off?

Yes.

Yeah.

It had that feeling of this is a prequel to a larger movie where they had to shove these characters into it.

Well, are you guys sure it is not a prequel to a bit?

Believe me, I looked for more movies.

So, okay, so then we have James.

He's got an idea.

So, he calls Matt the young hot guitarist.

You wait, wait, wait, wait.

You say young hot, but he answers, hey, it's Matt.

Hey,

what's going on, guys?

He's hot when he does it.

He's brooding.

Yeah,

it would be great if not just his singing voice is dubbed, but his speaking voice.

And it's actually like, he's actually like, what's going on?

I'm on those Twelzen

songs um i saw my big acting roles and they said i could speak

we gotta hire chad who actually lives in spotlight chad yeah

so yeah but but so the the pastor's like hey matt why don't you come to the prayer meeting tonight um to introduce yourself to the church and he's like okay but like the prayer meeting's at seven i live three hours away i if i leave now i can't make it

right

and i'm like okay so what you're asking pastor james is for this guy to do a six-hour round-trip drive at the last minute to convince people to hire him for a job that you already hired him for.

Yeah.

This is a dick movie.

A lot of this movie is about what a bad employer James is.

Well, that's what I'm saying.

I wanted to know about the financials.

Are you going to give him gas money?

And like, you, you know, you guys explaining this to the audience, they don't get it.

Like, you would think there would be some sort of change in the vocal tone of like, oh my God, I live three hours away.

It's going to be a lot.

It's like, I live three hours away.

I think I can make it.

Oh, that would be great.

Like, it would never be like, oh, my God, I didn't realize you lived that far.

Are you sure?

Like, I hope you're okay, but that would mean a lot.

There's just monotone delivery.

Yeah.

And if we mention something in one scene, it's going to happen in the next, right?

So, so we've cut immediately to the prayer meeting.

And James says, you know, well, we hired a new minister.

And I got to tell you, he's the most amazing musician I've ever met.

I'm like, you heard him play three fucking chords, man.

And listen.

And we heard you hear him not be that.

Yeah.

Three chords and the truth.

Well, right, yeah.

Yeah.

One is he's never met a multi-instrumentalist, apparently.

But Wayne, who already knows that it's a guitarist that he hires, starts trying to like coax that out of him.

He's like, oh, what instrument does this guy play?

I hear he does the fiddle.

Is that what you're doing?

So which

type of music is he going to play for us now?

He plays the piano.

Does he play a piano?

And he goes, well, no, he plays the guitar.

And everybody's like, rabble, rabble, rabble.

Okay.

Guys,

admittedly, I never attended church.

Are you allowed to do one-man insurrections during a church meeting?

That appears to be what Wayne is doing.

Christianity is a pretty unitary executive theory type place.

No, you are allowed to do one-man insurrections at church.

I've been.

Oh, are you?

Okay.

Oh, good.

I don't think that's information that you should have given Eli.

So, all right.

I got one kitty corner to me.

I'm going to make some changes this evening.

So, Wayne goes, Wade, aren't you trying to start some kind of praise and worship, man?

And yes, he is, right?

Wayne doesn't want no changes to his damn traditions.

Yeah.

And this is how sloppy the stakes of this movie are.

Wayne is so outraged that he goes, Well, I call for a vote about whether or not you can hire that guy you hired, and also

whether you're funding it too.

He calls for a full vote.

Is that like a cascading ballot?

I like that he has to explain to everybody what yay and nay are going to mean on that because he kind of had two things built in.

And he's like, just is it not?

Is he's fucking fired, I think, right?

Oh, come on again.

Godfar nations, it's yay or nay.

Don't you not want James to be hired?

But just then.

Right, Matt pulls up in the parking lot, ready to shift the narrative with those icy blue eyes of his, right?

So he pulls up.

Inside, they're counting the votes.

Everybody's ready to fire James for hiring a guitar.

It's like three people, three yays and 56 nays, right?

I love that it was all yeses and no's, though.

Everybody was like, I didn't understand the yay and nay thing, even though he explained

yes and no.

Also, in the background of this scene, there's like a little kid that won't sit still and he's like running in the pews.

And I think he's like, they thought he was out of the camera frame and he's just kind of like running haphazardly.

So then, okay, they were counting up the votes when Matt walks in, and James is like, like, nope, nope, you have to let Matt do a song before you finish counting the votes, right?

And so Matt, he's like, Matt, do a song.

Matt pulls a guitar out of his ass, right?

Like he did not have a guitar when he walked in there.

And the way they filmed that shot, it's coming from his ass region.

Like a PS1 character.

Yep.

Yep.

Yep.

And so he starts singing and he's got that natural echo cathedral effect to his voice, which is very haunting.

And this is supposed to be the squint in an air moment, like the rock and roll, like,

and then it's an acoustic guitar.

And he's just like, C major Christ is gone.

It's so sad.

Well, that's what I, I started like getting like another like dream sequence in my head where like Matt kicked the door open and it was like smoke and doves and like Prince.

Yeah.

And, you know, like, I thought it was going to be something like that.

And then it was just like, oh, you're playing acoustic guitar.

This is a, this is music you play to an old person to die to, right?

Like you're pulling out chords and undoing IVs and Matt's like, oh Lord.

And you're like, nice.

Yeah.

It legitimately scared me that anybody would have a problem with this music.

Yeah, right, right.

Well, I don't know because the chorus of this song was just, I come, I come, I come.

So there's that.

I do love how often they say come in Christianity.

Do they say it senses them for the like, shh, and you put a pillow over it.

Yeah, right.

So, but everybody, now they hear him sing, now everybody wants to change their vote now that they see how fuckable he is, right?

Wayne tries to nurse Ratchet.

The voter's like, no, the vote already ended.

It doesn't count.

But then somebody says, all right, well, we want a new vote to hire James back then.

There's also a weird moment where they're like, okay, but you have to wait.

Like, James, you guys have to wait outside while we have the vote.

But there's a window in the door.

Yeah.

You're like watching the vote take place.

The whole while, Matt's BPM never goes above 56.

Like, he doesn't even look like he's been on the road for three hours and he's just like, very cool.

They are voting now.

I hope they've enjoyed this.

Yep.

Zuckerbergian.

James goes, you did it, Matt.

You convinced him to hire hire us and matt goes no i didn't do anything god did it and i'm just like oh i just thought you just didn't do anything because you're so melancholy are you the lorax do you speak for the trees

so okay so so matt's leaving and flavor town back for the long car ride home yeah right right yeah right he comes in for six goddamn minutes and now he's got to drive three hours back I'm going to call it, he's like shaved guy Fury.

I'm going to call him Shavertown for now.

Okay, I haven't missed Flavor Town in my notes.

Fantastic.

He's going to be Shavertown.

That's good.

I'm legitimately, I'm shocked that they didn't do a driving sequence where it's just him driving and nothing else.

For three hours.

Yeah, that we didn't just see.

No facial reactions.

And you know, this guy is raw dogging the drive.

He's not listening to anything.

He's just alone with his thoughts.

No, that would have been $14 more from Amazon.

This movie's an accidental boyhood.

Right.

Yeah.

But yeah, Mark is there to do what he will do for the rest of the film, which is that no matter what else someone else is saying, he will bring up his not divorce and then deny it.

So here's the conversation.

And gentlemen, I want you to intercede if I am exaggerating a moat.

Hi, I'm Mark.

You did a great job today.

Thanks so much.

I play the bass.

Great.

Don't worry about my divorce.

It's not permanent.

That was the exact order of the sentences Mark chose to say.

Almost exactly.

If the third sentence you said to me was, don't worry about my divorce, it's not permanent.

I would assume you are on your way to kill your now legal wife.

The next sentence was going to be, I kind of play the bass, I dabble a little bit, and then the murder.

Yeah, right, exactly.

What you've heard about me potentially is not true if you have heard something about me.

Anyways, I lay down fat bass licks.

Yeah.

Well, he goes, he goes, I play the bass.

And I'm like, dude, we can see the frosted tips in the divorce.

We know.

Yeah, we know you play the bass.

I also at one point expected the bass to have like, that's what caused the divorce.

of, like, she hates the bass.

Right.

Well, also, I expected at some fucking point that he would have to sing or serenade her in some fucking way, that the band would play.

Nope, none of this.

Oh, God, they're so bad at filmmaking.

Oh, God.

If he had done a bass serenade to try to win her back,

it was just like, okay, this is all I learned from church band: C, C, C, C.

Yeah, right.

Touch it.

Right.

Outside her window.

That's Seinfeld.

Fuck.

That's the only other thing I know.

So, okay, so then we cut to have Matt having more cereal.

I know you were worried we'd only get to see that one time, but no, we get a second Matt having cereal scene.

This is where we meet his parents.

He's like, Dad, I don't know if I should take this job.

It's a long ways away.

And the dad goes, well, if it's what you think you should do, you should do it.

That's an exact quote.

That's the great fatherly advice this movie has.

You gave it more energy than this father did.

Like, oh, I did this thing.

Way more.

Well, you've got to do what you've got to do.

And he has like this beard that takes up three-fourths of his face and it doesn't connect at the sideburn.

Did you notice that?

Yep.

Well, I actually found, I hate to push back, gentlemen, but I found this to be a really realistic depiction of every person over the age of 30 who lives with their parents I've ever seen.

Where they're like, what do you think, mom and dad?

And they're like, I think you should fucking leave, ma'am.

Yes, right.

That's what I think.

In my head, they were like, that basement is turning into a fuck dungeon so goddamn.

Immediately, they're putting in a St.

Lucian's cross as they're measuring out his stuff taking rope out of boxes he's just like all right so I guess I'm

yeah by the way every time he goes back to visit his parents there needs to be a new thing changed like why is there a tarp on the floor yeah right

saint andrew's cross everybody it's not a st.

Lucian said you have to call before you show up now

Eli's worried that they're going to get entirely the wrong cross he's like what this is I'm not going to fit on this I don't know why my brain said st.

Lucian

so okay so but he's like well you know i'll have to move three hours away and i don't know how patty is going to take this and we're like who the is patty

right that will be in my notes several more times yeah right but then he gets a conveniently timed phone call from james james is like hey can you drive out to do some paperwork and go over logistics and i'm like It's a six-hour round trip, you fucking asshole.

You couldn't have him do the paperwork last night?

Okay, but literally, literally six hours is better than explaining DocuSign to this pastor and trying to get that done.

But what year was this made, too?

Because I was like, How deep into the internet are we at this point?

It was 2008, so DocuSign existed.

Oh my god, I thought this was like 98 or something.

I did too.

I felt like a 90s.

I don't know.

Yeah, I had 92 in my head until I don't remember why, but yeah.

The amount of landline work, it's just

big time.

Yeah, so okay, so then we meet Ginny.

She is Wayne's granddaughter, and she plays the piano.

She wants to be in the band too.

And this scene plays like she doesn't actually play piano.

She just wants to fuck Matt, right?

Because she comes in to see James and she's like, I play piano.

What's Matt's phone number?

Oh, this is where my, like, I feel so bad.

Like, my, I didn't even think about it, like, but I was like, my dirty head was like, oh, they're going to hook up.

Like, yes.

You know, Matt and this girl, the piano player that's married is going, they're going to hook up.

Like, I fully thought that.

Absolutely.

I think you were just desperate for a plot.

I don't really think you blame yourself.

I'll even go less dirty.

I thought they were going going to fall in love within the confines of the band.

Sure.

Sure.

Yeah.

Cause the pastor is like, okay, but what about Paul?

Your husband, Paul.

And she's like, oh, right.

She's like, yeah, he could, I don't know, he can do the fucking sound.

He can watch and do the sound.

He can sit on the edge of the bed of the praise band.

He's a cuck.

So, okay.

Jerry Falwell, right?

Come on.

So then we get.

One of maybe the greatest scene in the history of Christian.

This is such a great fucking scene.

So we cut back to the the black pastor.

He's out ministering to the unhoused out in a park, right?

We meet John the homeless guy, homeless John.

John has a remarkably well-maintained guitar, right?

And he's talking to the pastor about how like, you know, people usually overlook him and don't take the time to get to know him.

And he's actually a pretty good guy.

And the pastor's like, you know, usually I take all my stale bread out and I feed it to the ducks out in this park.

But today I think I'm going to give you that stale bread.

Okay,

podcast listener.

I need to clarify.

No illusions is not joking.

I'm not, though.

That is not an exaggeration.

Exactly.

Loose bread.

But it doesn't, it also doesn't.

It looks weirder than stale crusty bread.

Like it looks even, I don't even know what it looks so weird.

It's part of a hot dog bun, I think.

Yeah.

It might be part of a hot dog bun.

He hands John

one piece of loose bread and he takes back the other piece that he was holding.

He keeps that.

He does not get the,

he's not full crust worthy.

And did you notice the homeless man, he has a guitar like on his lap, and he's acting like there's a strap around his neck and there's no strap.

Yeah.

You guys told me you'd have strap money.

This is bullshit.

Yeah, he gives him half a piece of fucking moldy bread and he's like, I think you need some food.

And I'm like, I think he needs more than bread.

I mean, even if we assume the bread is fresh, I think he needs needs more than bread.

Still a problem.

And what makes him homeless is that he has a big beard.

Yes.

Yeah.

Like that, just to clarify, because he's not like, they don't put dirt all over him.

They just have a very, like a bushy beard, but still, I think a well-kept beard.

No, you're not supposed to assume he's homeless.

Yeah.

Beard equals homeless.

They also went with a little bit of a pirate look for some reason.

Not clear.

Sure.

But then also, like, so he gives him the moldy bread and then he starts lecturing this on the housed gentleman about how he should really take time to appreciate all the things he has, like the chirping of the birds and the running water that you probably have to bathe in.

So, and he goes, hey, you know, do I need to do anything to repay you for this moldy bread crust?

And he goes, well, there's one thing you could do.

Yikes.

Right?

And he goes,

read the Bible.

And he says, and he's like, oh, that's, you can have your fucking bread back, man.

Oh, I wish it was sucked in duck.

That's really

but also does he make the ducks read the bible that he feeds like he's interested possibly yes holding this guy to a higher standard that's unfair also the i will say like also the the town whatever town this is

i mean it does not look like there's any unhoused people so you know the the park they're even in is very nice it's like he's very out he seems like the one unhoused person in whatever town this is yes yes right exactly yeah they got just the one felt like this black pastor is gonna have to leave the park before sunset.

Oh, God.

He goes,

I have to be here at the park because they won't allow me around schools anymore.

Oh, yeah, exactly.

All right.

Well, surely that unhoused guy will get a home and that African-American pastor will factor into the movie in some way.

And while you're still comfortable in that delusion, we're going to take a quick break, but we'll be back in a minute with all the dangling plot threads that are praise banned.

Okay, what about a soul stone?

Does he have one of those?

I don't know if he has a soul stone.

Wow, so you just did like no homework on this.

Well, do you want to help or not?

I'm helping.

I'm just saying.

Hey, guys.

Who is this?

Oh, hey, Ryan.

This is the wool dasher Mizzel.

Hi.

Yeah, he's kind of a deep cut.

Oh.

I'm on three shows.

How am I a deep cut?

And anyway, it turns out that Heath signed away his soul to a demon that worked for a cell phone company.

So he and the HiFae court are trying to help us out.

I said I'd ask.

Yeah.

Ass.

Guys, guys, if you're tired of getting burned by high cell phone bills, you should try Mint Mobile.

Oh, yeah, I've heard of them.

What's Mint Mobile?

Really?

Well, really?

What?

I'm here.

I'm here.

Your wireless bill should be the last thing holding you back.

That's why I made the switch to Mint Mobile.

With plans starting at 15 bucks a month, Mint Mobile gives you premium wireless service on the nation's largest 5G network.

It's got the coverage and speed you're used to, but for way less money.

So while your friends are sweating over data overages and surprise charges, you'll be chilling, literally and financially.

That sounds great.

It is.

Use your own phone phone with any mint mobile plan and bring your phone number along with all your existing contacts i don't know noah have you actually tried it i sure have i became a mint mobile customer when they became a sponsor i love that i get the same great coverage i'm used to for a fraction of the cost all right you know what i'm sold where do i sign up this year skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank get your summer savings and shop premium wireless plans at mintmobile.com slash gam that's mintmobile.com slash gam

upfront payment of forty five dollars for three month five gigabyte plan required equivalent to fifteen $15 a month.

A new customer offer for first three months only, then full price panel options available.

Taxes and fees extra.

See me at Mobile for details.

All right, guys.

Thanks.

Oh, oh, do you have a firstborn you could trade?

I mean, I have a stepkid.

So, no, then.

Family is found.

Oh, relax, Tumblr.

Jesus Christ, dude.

Matt, thanks so much for coming in.

No problem, Pastor.

Yeah, so we're really excited at the prospect of a music ministry in our church.

I'm excited as well.

Okay, so why don't you tell me about yourself?

Even better, how about I play you a song?

Jesus, Jesus, how I love you,

Jesus.

You are my Lord and Savior.

I love you, Jesus.

All right, well, that was Jesus,

Jesus.

Okay.

I love you when I was all alone.

You were there, Jesus.

When you're in my arms, you're there in the place I know where.

After this one, so Jesus, I love Jesus.

Call me to crave.

Making this up as you go.

Jesus, Jesus,

Jesus.

All right, that was

lovely.

Thank you.

So do I have the job?

Well,

I think we're going to.

Maybe another tune will change your mind.

You know what?

You got the job.

Actually, you got it is what I was going to say.

Nice.

Let's celebrate with a song.

Motherfucker.

And we're back for more of this shit.

We're going to rejoin the action with James telling Matt that he's found himself a piano player for the band, right?

And he goes, oh, did you like listen to her play piano to make sure she was any good?

And he's like, no, I didn't at all.

I just hired her.

He's like, oh, well, if she's no good, we'll be able to get rid of her, right?

And he's like, no, she's the granddaughter of Wayne, the guy that hates me and wants to fire you.

So, no.

And if you're thinking, oh, wow, that sets up a great conflict for later in the movie.

No, it doesn't.

She's just actually going to be fine.

No, no, there's no ulterior motives.

You would think that would be a plot line.

Yep.

And he goes, oh, her husband can be your sound man.

And I'm like, oh, really?

Like, you don't have to get his permission for that at all?

No.

This is another one of their plot fanes, right?

This idea that Paul, the sound man, won't be up to the job.

They allude to that like three times and then it never pays off.

Yeah.

Speaking of which, he goes, oh, you know, for the band, we'll need to buy a bunch of new equipment.

And Matt's like, yeah, fine.

Just tell me how much I can spend.

He's like, well, you'll have to talk to the treasurer.

He's like, who's the treasurer?

He's like, Wayne, the guy that hates you.

Again, we'll never touch that plot thread again.

But I got so excited they started talking about budget.

I was like, what is the budget debate?

But we never go back.

Yeah, it's just a tease.

So then we get the scene where Ginny comes in to tell Paul, Paul, tell Wayne that she's in the praise band.

He finishes that scene monologuing to himself again.

Then we check in on Mark and his stalking victim slash ex-wife.

Oh, yeah.

We get another uncomfortable scene with them where she's like, you know, I'm ready to move on.

And he's like, well, well, I'm not.

And I'm like, well, you don't get a say in that, though.

Actually, no, I'm sorry.

It's even worse than that.

The actual exchange is, I'm ready to move on.

No, you're not.

Yep.

No, you are not.

Hold on, babe.

Hold on.

Doom, doom, doom, doom, doom.

By the way, the waiter did a lot of heavy lifting in this scene, and it always annoys me.

Like they put in the order, like we have to have the order as part of it.

And they're like, I'd like a water and i'd like a soda there's no specificity even soda is not specific in this film i was furious about that i've been a bartender for many years so many people i'll have a beer oh you'll have a beer we only have the one perfect i'll get drinking for you yeah

but she's like you know so i i filed for a divorce our court date is neck in next february i'm like what a weirdly distant date for a divorce

really tight schedule in the courts these days i guess it's louisiana i guess That makes sense.

Yeah.

But she's like, you know, I still want to be friends.

And I'm like, I wouldn't advise it with this obsessive prick.

Right.

He says, but you still love me.

And then she slides the divorce papers over like it's a counter offer to you still love me,

which I fucking love.

I wish he had brought up.

He's like, hey, but I am playing the bass in a band now.

You'd think that would be relevant, right?

He just slides the bass back across the table.

don't try to fold it so then we check in very quickly with the sisters the gospel band sisters that i thought until that moment had just wandered into the wrong movie and then found their way out

we get them rocking a church in nashville but unfortunately they're like you know yeah we're we're um we are quitting the music business altogether though despite the standing ovation we just got in this church this is the end of our dream yeah they seem by the way that church seemed huge like the church we're talking about like sparsely attended, it seems like, but that church was like, why would you leave that church?

Right.

Yeah.

They're obviously doing, they get a standing ovation at this church of 80,000 fucking people.

And they're like, yeah, no, nothing, no money in this music business for us, I guess.

So then we get Mark.

He's coming to see Pastor James, Mark being the Shaver Town, Flavor Town.

He comes to see Pastor James about the divorce.

It feels like Mark is also ignoring the scene with the black sisters in it that we just experienced.

He's like, hey, so as you know, the last scene was where I talked to my wife about her wanting a divorce.

He's like, no, no, there was actually a whole other scene.

No, that's not what the movie will be about for the rest of it.

Yeah, right.

But James is like, hey, Pastor, what should I do about my wife?

And he's like, well, you know, God has a plan, and I don't think God's plan involves divorce.

And I'm like, oh, this is a really dangerous thing for you to tell this guy.

Yeah.

Like, seriously, like, this advice gets people killed.

But also, I don't, I mean, like, you know, if God exists, whatever, like, I don't think God gives a rip about our divorces.

You wouldn't think.

You'd think he'd have bigger shit going on.

Yeah.

Like, obviously, there's a lot of stuff.

You'd think God would be a big fan of this particular divorce.

Hey, look, man, honestly, you're just saving me from sending this guy to hell for murder later or something.

Yeah.

So, but they pray on it.

And then Matt goes to see Greg, who you've already forgotten about, right?

He was the pastor that called, that recommended Matt in the first place.

Yeah, I thought James, Pastor James was playing, this was the dual role that I thought Pastor James was playing.

Yeah, you thought it was Eddie Murphy.

Yeah, right, right.

Norbit.

So

he says, like, hey, man, I, you know, I, I want to take this job, but I'm not sure because it, it, it involves a big move for me, which is hilarious because it's three hours from home, right?

It's three hours away.

And Greg says, I shit you not.

not it's kind of like hey remember when moses was leading those people out of egypt and i'm like it's not like that at all man he goes a lot of those people didn't want to go and i'm like they were slaves in the story i think they wanted to go Well, what I loved about this scene is that we see the reaction that I've always wanted to see because he tells him to pray about it.

And Matt's like, oh, I have prayed about it because I'm a boring Christian.

That's my only quality.

And you watch the pastor be like, well, then fucking pray pray about it more.

Pray about it as a nonsense sentence.

You're not supposed to respond with, I have prayed about it right.

Right.

Yeah.

That's like if someone said yes to good luck.

What are you fucking doing?

I thought they were, I was like, are we about to hear more about the Moses story?

We're like, you didn't know it, but Moses had an electric guitar.

It was bizarre to me that this guy never rocked out.

The long-haired pastor never showed up to let my people go squinting in there.

Turns it into a snake.

Yeah.

So then we see Matt rocking out again.

He's playing guitar.

And then they haven't put together a band yet, but he does have accompaniment for this song that he's rocking out.

Yeah.

Okay.

I laughed so long here.

He made fucking Flavor Town play a tiny little bongo drum.

He's multi-talented.

He goes from the bass to the bongo like that.

Yeah, right.

How is he doing?

Yeah.

Yeah, right.

So we watch this guy fake bongo drum while another guy fake guitars and lip syncs.

It's just amazing.

But this is also, this is a place where there could actually be conflict where they're like doing this and it's not working for the audience, you know?

But it seems like everybody's fine with it already.

Right.

Yeah, exactly.

Right.

A competent movie would have most of the crowd being uncomfortable and not really liking this new direction, but this movie is too stupid for that.

But I will say, though, the song ends and literally nobody applauds.

Well, it's the Lord's house.

house, you only applaud for the Lord, yeah, right, right.

Like, yeah, I don't think that they were trying to send the message that people didn't like it because we saw audience shots of people getting into the music before that.

I think they're just such incompetent filmmakers that they didn't bother to include applause there.

Yeah, when Christian people clap for stuff, they should really be like, clap, clap, clap.

Oh, this is for the God.

Glory to God.

This is for you.

You don't get this, though.

This is clapping.

We're clapping around you to God.

Yeah.

So, okay, so now we cut to those tryouts, right?

Ginny is, we get Ginny singing a boring ass Jesus song while playing the piano.

There is so much fucking music in this movie.

But we get this scene.

And then the movie takes, I think, its only actual stab at comedy.

Yeah.

Right?

Because, like, during the tryouts, like, two old ladies come in.

Oh, yeah.

Right.

And they're like, we want to be backup singers, but they're not very good at singing.

They're singing the old stuff.

Like, oh.

Yeah.

What they do is they go, holy, holy, holy.

But that's it.

Like ghosts.

Like you opened a haunted chest from a pirate's cave.

And of course, these are the people who ask for a G-flat for their song and send Heath into an apoplectic rage.

If you're the music director or the piano player and they're like, give me holy, holy, holy and G-flat.

Get the fuck out.

Absolutely not.

But it is funny to think that they do have any standards at all.

Like they're like, this doesn't work for us.

I only know it in F-flat.

Get the fuck out of here, Jesus.

So, but yeah, no, that's the bit.

They're not very good at music.

So, okay.

So then we get Matt picking Patty, who I guess is his girlfriend up from the airplane that Indiana Jones had to escape from in the raft.

Yeah, it's like not like a private plane, but it's not like, but it's like a old-timey private plane.

Yeah, it's like a crop plane or something.

Yeah.

Yeah.

This really ruined my fantasy that Patty was going to be an old senior pug that he just didn't want to be away from when it turned out to be a woman.

But the way they greet each other, I absolutely assumed this was his sister until much later in the film.

Yes.

Well, nobody has sexual chemistry with anybody in this film.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Nobody has human chemistry with anybody in this film.

Right.

Except for I feel like the pastor wants to fuck Matt and doesn't know what to do with that feeling.

But other than that, yeah.

So yeah,

he greets her with a big hug.

And I thought thought when he did the big hug, I thought, oh, okay, so this is one of those things where we're going to like try to fool everybody into thinking he's got a girlfriend the whole time so that you think that there's a conflict why he can't get with Ginny or Betsy or whatever, but it turns out to be his sister.

But no, because in the very next scene, or in the very next line of dialogue, he makes it clear that Ginny is supposed to be his girlfriend.

And that we still have not told Patty at all about the move.

Yes, right, right.

He's like, hey, I got a job.

And she's like, well, that's great.

And he's like, yeah, it's not like it's far away or anything.

Moving on.

Because again, that's the only conflict the movie's got, right?

Is that he hasn't told Patty about his move yet.

So they have to slow roll that.

But this is the thing about Christians that I sometimes don't understand.

It's like you have basic tenets of faith and you would think that they would face everything head on.

And then we have this kind of mild subplot about him hiding this from Jenny, you know, like purposely hiding.

Right.

And he's supposed to be a good Christian.

Yes.

So, okay, so then we get a quick scene where Matt's packing and he's talking to his parents about how he should, you know, break the news to Patty.

But don't worry if you miss this scene.

It will happen again.

We'll get the whole fucking scene again.

But first, we've got to cut to, like, they set up in that scene that he's going to take Patty out to dinner and he'll tell her about it then, right?

So, of course, the next scene has to be dinner, right?

Him taking her out to dinner.

Yeah.

And this scene is mostly noteworthy because of fucking community theater Ed as the waiter.

Oh, yeah.

Okay.

So community theater Ed as the waiter is great because he's going to be able to do it.

Oh, this is the soda water thing.

Yeah, I did that with the other scene.

I'm sorry, guys.

He comes in way too hot with the volume here.

They're like, So, what did you want to talk about?

Hello, I am the waiter.

Like, it's hard for me.

Hi, dude, you're screaming.

This honestly, he was so close to hello today when he came in here that I felt like this whole movie was like a prank that you had set up with like an 18-year run time or whatever.

Now, I will say that this scene also contains one of the most insane moments moments we have ever seen captured in Christian cinema, right?

So he says, hey, I got a job as far away.

She goes, oh my gosh, I don't want to do a far away relationship.

And then she leaves.

And then she comes back and says, shit, you drove me.

And so they then keep having the scene and never refer to her having exited the scene in the movie for the rest of the conversation.

Why would they do that?

Pretend they would keep talking.

If she had been like,

if I'm Patty, I'm like reading a magazine actively with it held up in front of me.

Like a big newspaper, if I can find it.

Yes.

It could not be more strange or off-putting if she had been like, one second, I have to go take a shit.

And then we just watched him sit there at the table fucking playing the snake on his phone for four minutes.

It could not be.

The screen waiter comes over and they talk for a while.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And also, like, so they, they, they try to do the bit where, like, he's trying to tell her this complicated thing, which is, again, that he's moving three hours away.

The stakes are so low.

It's fucking hilarious.

But he's trying to tell her.

But the waiter keeps interrupting, except they're so incompetent that they one beat that joke.

So he just

interrupts one time, and then they go on with the conversation.

I'm like, that doesn't count, man.

You didn't even do the bit.

Anyway, so he says, I got to move like three hours away.

We'll see each other less often.

And she's like, I don't understand.

What?

All the good jobs are in the megalopolis of fuck mud, Louisiana, three minutes away.

Go where the work is.

But even specifically, like, we don't know how long they've dated.

We don't know any, like, we don't know if they were talking about marriage.

We don't know anything.

And it does not seem like they like each other at all or attracted.

I mean, you wouldn't know.

It's like automatons.

Yeah.

Yeah, right.

They didn't, like, she was away on a trip without him and they didn't kiss when she got back.

So yeah,

they don't seem all all of that into each other.

He also, he says at this point, you know, this is what God wants me to do.

And I'm like, that is such a dick move to pull in an argument with an like, I don't, you know, I'm not Christian, but I bet that's a like, as Christian, I think that's a dick.

But are you allowed to blame God on everything?

Like, hey, take it, take it up with God.

I don't want to do this.

You think I want to go three hours away, but God wants me to.

Yeah.

Everybody needs to do the like bring, bring.

Oh, no, God's calling me now.

Yeah, actually, he told me that he didn't want you to go at all.

Yeah.

But we, and then we have that amazing scene where she, the bit where she walks away and then comes back.

And then we have to check back in on Homeless John long enough for somebody to steal his guitar.

Yeah.

So he's at rock bottom.

Yeah, he's lost his guitar.

And they always now they just have him laying on grass, but like near stairs for some reason.

Yes.

Yeah.

Also, he's got a coat that's sitting next to him while he's laying there.

Because, of course, he has to have the Bible in something, right?

So he's got the coat laying next to him and he's got like newspapers as blankets.

Why wouldn't you use the coat?

But anyway, so yeah.

So they steal his guitar.

He's at rock bottom.

The only possession he has left is his Bible.

I wonder how his story will work out.

But then we cut over to Matt.

He's packing up for the move.

His mom and dad are seeing him off, desperate to get access to their fuck dungeon, I guess.

Yeah, wait, wait, when he's leaving, like a waterbed delivery gets delivered.

Yeah, exactly.

I wanted Matt to circle back for something that he forgot, and they're already costumed up and scaled up.

A couple from Craigslist is already there

what's that what's this full for keys mom

is that Pikachu

it's at this point a metaphor about this movie struck me right so you know when someone tells you a story but they started a little too early so for a minute you cannot fathom what the fuck they're talking about right yeah you're like how'd you get that tattoo and they're like so i went to college in minnesota and you want to be like stop right right you have four sentences that's what this movie is.

This movie is, oh, shit.

I guess you didn't need to know about high school.

Yeah.

The film.

And also, I have to fucking point this one out.

So as Matt is leaving to move away from his home for the first time to start his new life beyond his parents' grasp, you know, being pushed out the nest, his mom gives him a hug and his dad gives him a firm fucking handshake.

Yes.

I was like, wait, you can't hug your dad?

I'm like God.

Apparently, they can't hug their fucking dad.

Yeah, it explains a lot about them that they're not allowed to hug their dads.

But then we get like Frosted Flakes helping him move into his new apartment.

Yeah, it's going to be good times with these guys.

Oh, yeah.

We have to meet his landlord, who is Carl the Pugapegicorn.

Oh, my God.

That was amazing.

So another deep cut on the show, Ryan.

I apologize.

I would hope so.

I was like, I did not see that in the credits.

Yeah.

So as he's moving in, damn it if they don't hear a drummer downstairs.

And they they need a drummer.

But it's a loud.

Also, it's loud.

And the guy's like, oh, don't worry about that.

And they're like, we're cool with it.

That sounds great.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Who doesn't want a drummer living downstairs from them in their apartment?

Right.

But again, like this movie has so little awareness of comedy that it's not even, it doesn't even take the time to have some fun with that before he goes down and knocks on the door.

And he's like, hey, do you want to join my band?

And the guy's like, yes, I do.

The guy whose name, by the way,

whose name is Luke.

Matt and Mark and Luke.

And the announced guy is John.

You got to watch this movie a couple of times to get the pickup on the deep cuts.

It would be great if we had the Trump guy.

We found out his name was Jesus at the end.

Yes.

So they're like, hey, do you want to join our band?

Oh, sorry.

First, we have to establish that he's a science teacher.

Yeah, that comes back in handy later.

You're going to want to remember that.

Oh, yeah.

But he air quotes science when he says, I'm a science teacher.

You know, science.

And everybody's like, huh?

Yeah.

He's like, do you want to play in our band?

And he's like, yes.

And they're like, it's a church band.

And he's like, less, yes, now.

I'll think about it.

He's not sure because of the science.

This is how REM started, I think.

So, all right.

So, meanwhile, in that more interesting alternative movie that keeps sneaking in, the sisters are back home in Louisiana with dad, and he tells them about this very cool praise band in town.

Yeah.

And he's like, you should sing with them.

And they're like, I don't know.

It's just act two still.

No, and we won't.

Not for the whole fucking movie.

Nope, not until the very end.

So, okay, so then we cut to practice for the praise band.

Luke does show up.

He's not so sure about it, but he'll show up long enough to practice exactly one song with them and then leave.

But he also is like, uh, an electric drum kit.

Yeah.

Uh-huh.

Yeah.

They have like rolling V drums.

That means they bought that already a while ago.

They do have a budget.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Wayne, Wayne apparently was pretty generous.

What kind of old-timey proper gospel music has V drums in it is what I want to know.

Yeah.

Great question.

Yeah.

But so then he gets everybody together.

He's like, all right, let's play something.

And they're like, should we agree on a song or at least a key?

And he's like, no.

Three, two, one, go.

And they're going to play something two, three, four, and they all know that they're just the music.

Lord, we come to praise you, and they're on it.

Yeah.

Yes.

And G-flat.

Yeah.

So they sing another song about how God is really good at being God.

Yep.

By the way, there's no songs where God is like not great.

No, there isn't.

Yeah.

Who are you comparing him to?

It's so boring and long, and they have to show us stuff during it because it's a movie.

And they're like, i don't know we'll show flavor tin he's still got his wedding ring on while he's playing the bass over over and over the same thing uh oh no we'll show paul the sound guy he'll do the one-year dj thing yep show him for a second yeah because paul the sound guy jenny's husband was like i don't really know how to do sound for this but there seems to be no issues at all no no again it's one of those feigned plot devices where we always like oh wow i've never done a band like this before i don't know that i can oh nope nope i've got it i've got it's just the other knobs on this big board that I'm staring at.

They actually show him move one fader for a second.

Yeah, he's a fan.

And then do the one ear DJ thing, but the headphones are both facing in, so he's just got him smashed against his ear.

So, okay.

So then they get done with the song.

James loves it.

Pastor James thinks they sound great.

And he's like, hey, Mark, could you lead us in prayer?

And so Mark does a prayer.

Luke, the whole time, because Luke is a science teacher, is just like, fucking whatever.

He's trying not to laugh out loud at the silliness of their prayer.

But even that is not as extreme as it should be.

Right.

Yeah.

He's like, he's like, yeah, okay, yeah.

You know, I don't agree with your religion, but I guess I'll help sell it.

What

hold still while you do it?

Yeah.

And then after that, they go, so are you in the band?

And he says, yes, I'll play for you guys, but I'm not comfortable playing for a church, which is an insane sentence because they are playing in a church.

Like, there's no outside gigs available.

To be fair, we don't know the music scene in this undetermined town.

Like there might be a burgeoning music scene that we don't know about.

Oh, that's fair.

There you go.

That's a true point.

Why did he put science in air quotes if he's kind of an atheist?

Right, because I think it's like a Scientology town, like Clearwater, Florida, where everybody feels this way.

Okay, all right.

Got to fit in.

So, yeah.

And of course, this stupid fucking movie, Pastor James, as he's walking away, he goes, hey, wait a minute.

You guys are named Luke, Mark, and Matthew.

That's three of the four gospels, in case anyone didn't notice that.

Don't look into the camera, James.

We've almost collected all the infinity stones.

Yes.

So, okay, so that night, Wayne and his wife were getting ready for bed.

Wayne didn't chirp out this here praise band, but his wife is kind of liking it now.

Completely separate rooms that they brush their teeth in, by the way.

Obviously, you don't want to see the dirty gum work of your wife.

And this is the first time that a character will voice the objection to the praise band.

And it's just insane.

Yeah.

Right.

It's like, I want music with a piano and a choir.

And she's like, they do have a piano.

And he's like, no,

it's plugged into an amplifier.

It doesn't count.

Cushion is gay or something.

I don't know.

Right.

So look at, because, because he's grumbling about it, I wrote my notes at this point.

Oh, please tell me he was in a boy band in his youth and has never gotten over his disillusionment.

But no, it's just, he goes, I want to hear people sing like my granny sang.

Yeah.

Well, that was the thing.

And I was like, are we going to explore that relationship with his grandma at some point?

Because I was like, there's something there, obviously, with his grandma.

And then that never really gets explored.

No, no, no.

We didn't.

Yeah.

And then, so fucking, the wife turns on.

She's like, well, I think it's good.

And she turns off the lights.

And then nine seconds of darkness later, he turns the lights back on and continues complaining.

And by the way, in those nine seconds, they already already had sex missionary style.

And this is after.

Yeah, exactly.

Oh, that's what was going on.

Okay, yeah.

Yeah.

So, but yeah, he wants the same music forever and ever.

And his wife goes, well, you know, all music is God's music.

Oh, yeah.

God.

Women.

All right.

Well, clearly, that's all the conflict we've got for this one.

So we're going to take a break there.

But first, let me give Act Three one of the most uphill hard sells I've ever had to conjure.

Will Kroger have the coffee creamer James likes when he stops by on his way home?

Will Ginny be able to find parking convenient to the festival?

Can Mark combine his Dunkin' Donuts coupon with the in-store special?

Find out the answers to questions with even lower stakes than these when we return for the I guess that's about the runtime conclusion of Praise Band.

Rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble.

You can combine those, but you have to make a scene scene first yeah

this is an ad by better help okay so this guy i found on google his profile says you can be gay for now oh that feels worse way worse hey guys you ready to finish the podcast yeah sorry ryan we were trying to find an lgbtq affirming therapist oh yeah oof that can be really tough depending on your location Exactly.

Everyone should get the mental health care that affirms their sexuality and gender, but it can be really hard to find.

Well, I mean, have you guys tried BetterHelp?

What's BetterHelp?

Seriously?

Don't you have like a message to deliver?

Noah said I could stay for love.

Fine, fine.

With over 35,000 therapists, BetterHelp is the world's largest online therapy platform, having served over 5 million people globally.

Well, that sounds great.

Yeah, it's convenient too.

You can join a session with a therapist at the click of a button, helping you fit therapy into your busy life.

Plus, you can switch therapists at any time.

So no awkward therapist breakups?

No awkward therapist breakups.

As the largest online online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise.

Talk it out with BetterHelp.

Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com/slash awful.

That's better, H-E-L-P.com/slash awful.

Okay, thanks, Ryan.

Can I have this honey smoked turkey?

My name is literally on the container.

You guys have a really weird show.

Yeah, no, we do.

Don't take off the tape,

Mark.

What we shared was very special, but I want a divorce.

No, you don't.

No, you don't, babe.

Look, I know this is hard for.

Sorry, what?

No, you do not want a divorce.

We are married, and you forgive me.

Okay, Mark, you literally can't tell me what I feel.

Yes, I can.

What you feel is love.

Love for me.

You love me.

Mark, I understand that this is.

No, no, you don't marry.

You like me.

Mark, you forgive me.

Mark.

Love me forever now.

Hey, folks, you get a chance to look at the menus?

Yeah, I'll have the Fettitrini Alfredo.

Ooh, I'm afraid we're out of that.

No, you're not.

Sorry, did you say?

Bring Fettettini Alfredo.

You have it.

Yes, you do.

Sorry, he does this.

I see that.

No, I don't.

And we're back for still more of this shit, and we're going to rejoin the action on,

maybe my second, but this is the next best scene in the history of Christian movies after the moldy duck bread scene.

As you'll recall, Luke the Drummer is a science teacher.

Science teacher.

Science.

So

we're going to join him at science class talking about that science so-called of the Big Bang.

It's such nonsense.

He's like, as usual, I'm ending science class by saying the Big Bang theory is real and God is dead.

End of science class.

Yeah.

So they set up an interesting discussion here.

Oh, that's where a spirited and inquisitive young youngster who was not written for by a crazy adult says, but teacher, what about this new theory of intelligent design I have heard so much about?

What about the widespread belief of it?

And I'm like, it's wrong.

It's demonstrably incorrect.

He gives the big, long sigh and he's like, well, you know, that one's not grounded in science.

And one girl goes, well, actually, it is scientifically grounded.

Thank you.

Many scientists are investigating the theory.

I'm like, that's many scientists investigating.

That's not.

This guy's Jewish.

Get him.

And what's amazing is she's doing the Invisible Watchmaker apologetic.

But what's wonderful about the Invisible Watchmaker apologetic is that it has been reduced to a nonsense sentence, right?

It was never a good apologetic, right?

Because the best version is the universe is too complicated.

How can this all be an accident, right?

But what that is instead turned into in modern Christian parlance is, if I saw watch,

I would not believe that just happened.

Yeah.

Well, right, because it's code at this point, right?

Because they're like, you, you get it, you know, right?

Because it's for their audience.

Yeah.

And also, I just want to point out that the people who write this, they know how knowledge works so little that they don't even see the inherent issue in the fact that these students are telling their credentialed science teacher what is and isn't science well science yes

and by the way this is they they shoehorn this in and this is literally the only actual semi-argument of the whole movie yes like this is like this is finally there's like some sort of pushback and it's weird it's against the science teacher yeah

they might as well just be like what about the watch thing right am i right she gets it.

And then cut.

That's it.

It's just for audience.

Basically, that's what happens.

Yeah.

Yeah.

When she says, if you found a watch on the ground, my eyes rolled so far back in my head, I had to watch the rest of the movie out of my ass.

So if I don't know what happened on a couple of these scenes, that's why Tunnel Vision.

And if you find a watch on the ground, give it to the homeless guy in the park.

Exactly.

Give you the watch.

He could pawn it, maybe.

So your loving God-designed watches and homelessness?

Is that what you're saying?

Cut, God.

I'm God Forsako.

God has forsaken me.

So, yeah, so, okay.

And then we get a quick scene where Matt is opening his mail and someone has sent him a very long list of hymns that he should play and unfolds for so long.

Wah, wop.

And then, okay, so then we check in on Homeless John, right?

The black pastor.

John is his name.

In case you hadn't noticed.

Yeah.

Ding.

So the pastor's there and he goes like, so, hey, what's your backstory?

And he goes, well, you know, I left home at 14.

I have had abusive parents.

And, and, and the minister says, to that, I shit you not.

He goes, so you really don't mind living on the streets?

What?

He didn't say that.

I mean, look, this is a nation of bootstraps.

And I assume if you wanted a house, you would have one.

So you're just like an outdoorsy guy?

Yeah,

because he says, you know, he says, well, you know, if I had it all to do over again, I'd have made the same choices.

And he's like, Oh, so you like the situation that you're in?

He's like, No, man, he likes it better than having like being abused by his parents.

I got a crust of a bootstrap.

Is this helpful?

Well, half.

You can have half of the crust.

Well, that's why I thought they were setting up a cinematic universe because I was like, we're going to see a prequel of Homeless John's Life at some point because there's stories.

I was like, Is this going to be a TV series of Homeless John?

And then he talked about being, he's like, you know, homeless shelters, you know, the way they look at you, don't you?

Yeah.

And I was like, what is that?

I don't know that.

Yeah.

Lucky me, I guess.

But yeah, there's also this kind of like they allude to this several times that the unhoused guy is like, hey, you know, most of the time Christians just look down at me and they don't like take the time to help me.

But once in a while, they give me their duck bread.

And that's how I know I found a good one.

That's how I know you're a true Scotsman.

Yeah.

Yeah.

By the way, he's

probably saved like three-fourths of that bread.

He's like, something for later.

He's like, I see you still have that Bible.

Have you read that?

And he's like, I'm like, man, he just told you that this guitar was stolen and that he has absolutely nothing.

And he told you about his body.

He's saying you have free time now that you don't have a guitar anymore.

So he's like, by the way, the pastor probably stole that guitar.

So, yeah.

You can fashion the outside of that Bible into a bootstrap.

It's kind of got like a leathery feel to it.

There you go.

Yeah.

So, okay.

So then we get this quick, we get what is supposed to be a montage of the praise band, you know, making the church more and more popular.

And that ultimately resolves on this festival that the church is having at the park, right?

This is where we're going to meet the worst mustache in the history of mustaches.

God.

It's boring Coachella.

Oh, my God.

Terrifying.

Yeah.

This man did a sex crime so, like, just out of the frame, nevertheless.

That did this.

Well, that was that.

I think he's, isn't that like a full wig?

Because it has that little shock of gray at the front of the wig.

Oh, yeah.

So that was an intentional modified mullet on as a wig.

Okay.

He went mullet.

He decided to go mullet and he worked hard to get there.

Yeah.

So, but he's explaining to everybody, he opens the scene by telling everybody it's open mic day.

And I'm like, wow, we could sure make a regret that decision, couldn't we?

So, but he goes, it's open mic day.

There are balloons over there and clowns over there and lemonade.

It's all off camera.

Trust us.

It's there, though.

It's over there.

Trust us.

And then he says thank you and there's no applause.

There's like another hilarious lack of applause.

But this is, of course, all setting up the time that the sisters that we've seen so much of can finally get up and like to the open mic and sing a cappella and they're like wow you could be our backup singers exactly that's what this entire scene existed for Yeah, for this all-white band to turn to the women of color and go, you know what you would be great at?

Right.

The help.

Yes, right, right.

All four of you are better singers than any of the singers we have in our band of course but you know

you know and by the way i think this this this lady band is like an actual christian band for in real life oh is it well they were really talented like they were good they were good because i think they were like credited as like a band name oh like serenity yeah yeah yeah serenity yeah And they make them back up vocals with one.

They don't even get four mics.

They get one mic.

No, I have to share a mic.

It's a Bechdel fail, but but also adding lack of talent and racism to

the sexism of it.

Right, right.

Yeah.

So, no, of course, we should point out the other reason for this festival shot is that they promised everybody who's going to be in their movie pizza.

Yeah.

And so they might as well get a shot of everybody having that delicious dominoes pizza

to use in the film.

I just have to talk about this one scene because honestly, the montage of them eating pizza while a homeless guy sleeps on an open-air

brick wall.

It would be great if they had a pile of pizza crust to give him later.

Right.

We have no pizza, but we saved you the crust.

Or he wanders over for a piece and they slap his hand and hand him out a Bible.

Yeah, exactly.

A duck steals his slice.

You took my bread, motherfucker.

Yeah, exactly.

And the reason, of course, that they're having a festival at the park is so that homeless John can see him and say, hey, can I play one of them their guitars?

And of course, he's a, well, like, in the writer's mind he's an amazing singer in reality he's a pretty good he's he's fine okay so i have to talk about this because this is how he he just sings a christian song boo whatever i have to talk about how funny this setup is though he goes you know a while ago he's like at the open mic he's a while ago i had a preacher who gave me a book and here's the song i wrote and then he plays the most tropey fanservicey Christian music garbage song like the idea that anyone would read the bible and then be like the blood of the

crown of like crown of thorns or something like that yeah the blood runs down his face it's a it was a pretty graphic fucking song about the if someone told me they had read the bible and wrote this song i would check them into a hospital yeah what a one in a million shot that this guy actually can play the guitar and sing well yeah because because he goes

the just the random person that matt meets at the park goes hey can i can i touch your guitar and he's like only if you play at the open mic and sing to everybody.

I'm like, wow, that probably doesn't work out 99 times out of 11.

Everybody, I just wanted to jerk off onto this guy's guitar, but he says I have to play it.

So

didn't say I could play.

See, that guitar has a hole in it that I can put my jocks in.

So, yeah.

And also, this song is so fucking long that when he started doing the last verse, I laughed out loud.

I thought the song was over.

And he's like, nope, I'm still going.

I'm like, God damn it, man.

So, but after the song is over, Matt says, Wow, hey, you know, we're one gospel short and your name is John.

Would you like to be in our band now?

And he's like, Well, I'd like a home

more.

Does it pay being in your band?

He's like, No, no, it doesn't.

We will only exploit you.

And he's like, Well, surely.

It's more of an internship.

You could play for exposure.

Yeah.

Well, right, right.

Well, like, I've actually got a problem with that.

No, no, that's not what we meant.

And this is another thing where I had a dream sequence where it's like they started playing, and then all of a sudden you see like the montage of them getting bigger and bigger.

And on the cover of like Christian Rolling Stone, you know, like I just thought they were going to be

homeless the whole time.

Yeah.

Well, but okay, but this is where, again, any competent movie would have James say, well, you know, we have an old apartment back out in the back of the church where, you know, the church custodian used to say, the position doesn't pay much, but it would help you get back on your feet.

But they don't because the movie is so incompetent that, for all we know, John remains homeless throughout the entire goddamn movie.

Well, you will notice when he does play at the church, he is in like a sports jacket and he's like changed his look.

He's got a ponytail, he's got a ponytail now, yeah.

But for all we know, they just make him do that at the front,

so yeah.

So, but now he's in the band and the sisters are their background singers and Paul is just rocking that as the sound man, right?

And okay.

One moment during this number, the movie tries to do like, oh, the big pause in the music and then drop the beat.

And the movie missed the beat that they were dropping in their movie that they could edit if they wanted to.

Yes.

Do the big pause.

It doesn't come back in in terms of the visual action.

It's the best.

Oh.

So, okay.

So then the next morning, Matt gets a phone call.

Well, first of all, the fucking screen blacks out so long we had time to record an episode of D ⁇ D Minus, right?

It was

the screen went black so long that all of us were like, did I hit pause?

Or what happened to the movie?

But no, but then it finally comes back.

Matt is getting a phone call.

Wayne.

Had a heart attack.

Yeah, but you didn't notice with the sound cue, it was like, beep, beep.

It was like like a heartbeating.

Oh,

that was in the black.

That was in the black.

There was a heartbeating.

Oh, it was artistic.

It was setting artistry.

It was a setting heart attack.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

I thought that was the V-drums.

So, okay, yeah, no, I just, I missed the movie's artsy turn there.

Yeah.

So, but Wayne has had a heart attack and James is so far away that he can't get to the hospital right away.

So he asks if Matt can go wait with the family.

Dude, they always ask Matt to go anywhere, like drive three hours, go to the hospital, whatever you need.

Right, but Matt, who like

significantly, Wayne hates, hates him.

Well, Wayne had a heart attack because of this band crap.

Yes, yes, exactly.

This band almost killed him.

And now they're asking Wayne to go to him to go to the fucking Wayne's family.

Heard a bunch of V drums.

He started masturbating furiously in a stroke.

This would be like if the first person No Illusions saw when he woke up from his heart attack was Don Ford, Voice of Fantasy and Adventure.

We were just like, we were worried about you, buddy.

Don, I would love to

have been here by your side the whole time.

We had him take Lucinda's car.

No,

he said he had a stroke.

Go ahead.

So, okay.

Masturbating.

So, oh, but then the pastor says, he says, while he's on the phone with me, he says, oh, by the way, Mark forgot his cell phone at the festival.

I have that in case that's plot relevant later.

Dude, that part was like amazing because you know that's going to come back in later.

But also, I just kept thinking, like, that's why I was like, oh, is this 98?

Like, the people have no addiction to their cell phones in this movie.

So, like, Mark, he doesn't have his cell phone and Mark is not actively looking for his cell phone at all.

Yeah.

Right.

And also, by the way, nobody has had a cell phone for this whole fucking movie.

Everybody's been talking on a phone on the wall that lives in its own room this entire fucking movie up to this point.

So they didn't even need to set this shit up.

So, okay.

So now we cut to the hospital room, the waiting room rather, bathed in shitty Christian music.

Ginny shows up to ask Ma Ma how Paw Paw is doing.

And by the way, the wife does not seem concerned at all.

No.

No, she's like, finally going to clear out some space in the basement.

I'm going to get a water bed.

Okay, but...

We've all met this lady, right?

The guy who everyone hates and his wife is just fucking humming in the emergency room.

Oh, I'm sure.

Oh, you mean everyone paying attention to me and I don't have to talk to him anymore.

Oh, what a bad week I'm having.

Bright, right?

Yeah.

I would like to hear 30 years worth of stories that he told me to shut up while I was telling.

Why do you have four different types of pillow with you right now?

Don't worry about it.

But also when he said I have Mark's cell phone, and I just kept thinking, why is it Mark concerned he doesn't have his cell phone?

Mark strikes me as a guy that might have multiple phones for his like dirty work.

Interesting.

Yeah, he's got his porn phone separate.

So yeah, that's his church phone.

Yeah, right.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Okay, so we cut to Luke.

He's driving Matt to the hospital.

And we have the conversation where Luke is like, you know, I'm really scared to die because I'm an atheist with the science and everything.

And thus death scares me.

And, and, and of course, Matt's like, oh, I don't, I'm not, you know, I live forever in paradise, so it doesn't really bother me at all.

Which, by the way, thank God the science teacher was driving.

Because if Matt was driving and he was talking about not being afraid to die,

they're going to be so scared.

He'd be like, yeah, we're going to a great place.

It's so weird that you have your seatbelt on then.

Yeah, actually, Matt.

Well, what I love is, again, in a usual Christian, in a finer quality Christian film, right, this is where the Luke character would go, wow, that's really comforting.

Oh, man, I've never thought of it that way.

But he just turns back to the road and the scene ends.

Yes.

You know, the way you and I would react.

Yes.

See, that's why there's got to be a sequel to this movie because I know this science teacher is eventually going to come come around to God.

We just don't see it.

We don't see it.

Ryan is genuinely able to fund his self-produced sequel to this movie in every commercial.

I'm going to reach out to these people and see if I can remake all of this.

Yeah, there you go.

There you go.

Do you have $11 and a camcorder with your grandpa's porn on it?

Because that's what it's going to take.

The first thing we need to do is just recut the whole thing with Rick James playing Pastor James.

Yeah, I'm saying that.

First and foremost.

So, okay.

So, but then we cut to Pastor James.

And he's with his wife.

He goes, hey, honey, can you make a thermos for me?

And she's like, oh, you can't make that yourself, you lazy fuck.

And she goes, do you want to pray first?

And he goes, oh, yeah, you know, there is literally anything useful that I could be doing, but I should probably do that first.

I like that they have a giant Tupperware of animal crackers out

on the counter.

Like all the time, like it's out like beer nuts at a bar.

Like they're having those a lot.

Like an M ⁇ M's dish, yes.

Fuck yeah.

Podcast listener, this is the words I have exactly written in my notes.

Don't expect any jokes from Heath for this scene.

He will be distracted by the large Tupperware container of animal crackers.

Never let it be known that I don't know my cohort.

Stop interrupting.

The animal crackers look like really, really good ones.

The Barnum and Bailey?

Yeah,

I feel like they got a whole bunch of small

Barnum and Bailey.

Unfrosted, but they opened up all those packages and put them into the Tupperware.

So they stay fresh.

So yeah, so

he does this prayer, and the prayer is amazing, Rick, because he goes, you know, me and Wayne have had our differences, but

yet somehow I don't want him to to die, right?

The movie acts like this is a very impressive and selfless thing that James is doing, using his magic healing powers on a guy he doesn't particularly care for, even when he's on vacation.

Yeah, he prays for Wayne the way my wife admits she's married to me, right?

He's just like,

what's gonna say?

Here we are.

Yeah, he calls me.

Health insurance is expensive.

He calls Betsy and he's like, you know, hey, everybody pray for Wayne.

He had a heart attack.

And she's like, aren't you on vacation?

And he's like, can you believe it?

I'm even now still featuring.

So then, okay, so then we check in on John and the now cell phoneless Mark at a restaurant together.

Which, by the way, how did how without a phone, how did he know?

Like, and the homeless man doesn't have a phone, obviously.

But then like, how did they know to go to this restaurant together?

So I think what we're supposed to believe is that the band is like always meets here and on this morning or whatever.

Cause later they'll be like, oh, wait, Matt's late, you know, or and have to find him.

So yeah.

But this is the greatest example of Mark repeatedly trying to steer the conversation back to his impending divorce.

Oh, right.

Because John is talking about his problems, which are, you know, hefty enough problems that they've, they've left him like sleeping in a, in a fucking park.

Right.

But Mark just keeps trying to hijack the conversation by going like, oh, yeah, it's like my wife, you know, when she kicked me out, I had to sleep on a friend's couch for two nights.

That's homeless.

We're tied.

So let's talk about my thing instead.

He just keeps interrupting him with wife comparisons.

It's like a comedy sketch.

It is.

Well, yeah, you say the homeless man's like, what?

People always judge me.

He's like, well, my wife filed for divorce.

What room do I have to judge?

And then the homeless guy is like, most people look at my face and don't get past that.

And then he's like, I got to tell you, sometimes hair dryers were thrown.

Yes.

Yes.

That's the those are the exact lines back to back.

Like that's the, yeah.

Again, it's like a comedy routine, except the the movie doesn't know that it's a comedy routine, right?

The movie is unaware that Mark is being an asshole here,

which is fucking hilarious.

Okay.

It's incredible.

Yeah.

So, okay, so now we cut to the waiting room.

Ginny and Paul are praying together.

Remember Paul, that very important character?

And this is where

the missing cell phone thing pays off, right?

So Pastor James has the cell phone and it starts ringing.

So he answers it.

And it's the ex-wife, right?

She's like, is this Mark's phone?

And he's like, yes.

Oh, Mark is on his way to the hospital.

And then her phone dies.

Yeah.

Right.

Leaving her to believe that Mark is in the hospital.

Super weird.

Okay.

So just to be clear, God's plan, and that's what they're setting up here.

They're saying God's plan was to drop a cell phone call strategically to make Mary, his ex, sad that he, Flavor Town, might be dying, but then he won't be, but she's still going to be like, okay, I love you, though.

I mean, that's what they're going for.

Intelligent design.

It's intelligent design.

So, it's that's very scientifically grounded, as I understand it, uh, theory.

So, he that's even worse than that, as far as I can tell, God gave Wayne a heart attack so that Pastor James would be in the hospital when married.

Call, you got to crack some eggs.

No, you don't.

You're omnipotent.

You can just keep them all intact and also conjure an omelet, you piece of shit.

So, Mark gets to the hospital, gets his cell phone.

He's like, hey, your wife just called.

And he's like, oh, I'll just call her right back and ruin this bit.

But no, he gets the voicemail.

Her phone's dead.

So then Luke has to confess that he actually doesn't believe in all this Christian nonsense, which is hilarious because they've had no reason to believe that he does to this point, right?

Like everything he said has indicated that he doesn't believe in their religion.

Right, but he's just like staring sadly out the window being like, crisis of faith, crisis.

Yes, yeah.

And they're like, hey, hey, Luke, you were mumbling crisis of faith.

You okay?

Well, there's a moment, and we see this a lot in Christian movies, right?

Where he's like, you know, I used to think he had to be stupid to believe in Christianity, but I was wrong.

In order to join your form of Christianity, I don't have to leave my intellect at the door.

That's his actual fucking line.

I don't have to leave my intellect at the door.

And first of all, I'm just sorry, but like.

We've seen nothing to back that up in this film, by the way.

No, his fucking students argued with him about fucking Big Bang.

Other than that, we've had no arguments in favor of their religion.

And also, like, I'm sorry, but you can be our religion without being an idiot is such a low-ball claim.

The fact that they fail on it is a separate issue altogether.

Right.

But it's such a low-ball claim to begin with.

Yeah.

Holy shit.

And he's like, yeah, I'm a man of science, but this church, you know, it's backed by science, so I love it.

Very next thing he says.

Also, based on science, I decided to play with your shitty church band on a spiritual hunch, and I think it's intelligent design.

Yes, something was telling me to play with your band.

Was it the fact that you played drums and didn't have a band?

I mean, like, you know, there are instruments where you're like, you know, like, if you're a guitarist, maybe you don't want to play with a band.

But if you're a drummer, you need a fucking band.

So true.

So, and then the nurse comes out.

The nurse is like, it turns out Wayne's going to be okay.

And I'm like, that's a hell of a prognosis for a guy who just had a heart attack.

And by the way, they have a shot at

Wayne's talk.

Like, hey, are you doing?

Like, he's fine.

He's like,

how's everybody doing?

And he's foghorn, leg hoarding his way through the fucking hospital at this point.

Yeah.

Yeah, don't worry.

Nothing has happened in the film.

And then, so Wayne's wife goes back to see him, and then she comes out and she turns to Matt, the fucking praise band leader, and she goes, he wants to see you.

Hey, you're a named character, right?

I'm not.

You got to talk to him.

You're the main fucking character.

His granddaughter is right there.

Grandma walks right past Ginny and goes, He actually wants to talk to you, the guitar player that he hates first.

And Wayne's like, I need you to drive three hours to grab me something, Matt.

Send Genny in on your way out.

Oh, shit.

But he's like, you know, I'm sorry for the way I treated you.

And we're like, we've never seen these two people interact in the movie.

Yeah.

How did he treat him?

Did the writer mean to have scenes where Wayne was mean to Matt and then forget?

It would make sense for James to have this conversation with Wayne.

Sure.

Yeah.

Right, right.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But no, he's like, I'm sorry I treated you bad.

I'm sorry, I thought you were such a piece of shit.

He's like, well, I didn't know you thought I was a piece of shit until you just said that.

Well, right, but I'm sorry about it.

He explains that he was afraid of those liberal

different chord progressions.

Or sorry, no, the same chord progressions,

different instruments.

If anything, simpler.

Yes, right.

But with drums.

But he's learned something here today.

It's all God's music anywho.

Right?

Yeah.

So then we've got to resolve this butt line.

Mary rushes in to see Mark, right?

She's like, is Mark here at this hospital?

And the nurse is like, no, nobody, nobody checked in by that name.

And then...

She sees him in the waiting room and throws her arms around him and having considered what life would really be like without him decides she doesn't want to get divorced anymore.

So stupid.

And by the way, I'm sure she's familiar with the layout of a hospital being married to the stupidest.

Yeah.

Fake a medical emergency and your wife will take you back.

This movie.

I want her to be like, all right, well, you're okay.

Gonna take off.

Sign those papers.

Right.

Yes.

Yeah.

I was kind of hoping to get to watch the light leave your eyes.

I didn't want you to die before I got.

Right.

But again, consider all of the better.

So what I thought they were setting up with when he had the phone was that, you know, she would call and she's like, I want to talk to that asshole husband.

Oh, well, this is his pastor.

And she would go, his pastor.

He's like, oh, yeah, he's been really active at the church for the last couple.

He's playing with the church band.

And she's like, oh, he's really turning his life around.

Like, I thought that's where they were going.

Yeah.

And it was even lazy.

So much dumber than that.

So much dumber.

I wanted her to run in with her new girlfriend.

That was fantastic.

I wanted you to meet her before you died.

I wanted this to be the last last thing that happened.

But yeah, and then fucking Wayne starts narrating the credits like he's been spinning this whole yarn the whole time.

It's the best.

It's like, oh, hello.

We have a narrator now.

It's me, the end.

Seriously?

Remember me, the asshole?

I am redeemed as a character now.

We have no idea how to get out of this movie except for me to say goodbye.

And then, yeah, right.

And then I have in my notes at this point, like 14 different questions, right?

Like, why did we give the backup singers a story?

Yeah.

Right.

Why was that story their dreams were crushed and they moved back into dad's basement?

Whatever happened to Patty?

Why was Pastor Greg in the movie?

Why was the black pastor in the movie?

Why weren't those guys the same guy?

Why weren't those guys Pastor James?

Why would the credits have a fucking photograph of church member four?

I have so many questions.

Well, I think they were investors in the movie.

That was my theory.

Oh, wow.

We do a photo montage.

Yeah, this is our twin peaks, everybody.

Watch the spin-off podcast coming in.

We're just going to get on with Ryan once a day until we've really hammered out the questions we have.

And of course, the twist ending to the whole movie, right, is that the very end of the picture credits where they credit the guy who did the singing that Matt is lip-syncing for.

And we all went, that wasn't really him singing.

That was my favorite part when they did it.

Which they did the same thing with Zach Efron on high school musical, which is so funny is that Zach Efron did not sing and they had some other guy, this guy, Drew Seely.

Oh, I did.

And that was a big thing.

And they couldn't, like, at first, they didn't want that information to get out there.

And yeah, I get it.

I have now lost respect for Zach Efron.

That's right.

I lost respect.

I lost respect for the entire high school musical franchise.

There wasn't a lot of room and I lost it.

Right?

Same.

Same.

All right.

Well, damn it.

Now, so, Ryan, everything was going great.

And then now you're ending us on that depressing ass note right there.

But, but, but despite that, thank you so much for hanging out with us today.

It's been a blast to watch a movie with you.

Thank you guys.

This was a wild experience.

I didn't know what to expect, but you guys are awesome.

All right.

Well, I'm glad you had fun.

And of course, if our listeners wanted to hear more from you, where should they go?

It's just, yeah, it's called So Bad It's Good with Ryan Bailey.

We're on like five days a week.

It's like a lot of pop culture and reality TV.

So I'll break down reality shows like you guys break down these amazing Christian films.

And yeah, it's just pretty silly, but we have a lot of pop culture stories and things like that.

So you can just search it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify or go to our YouTube channel or any of that stuff.

But yeah, this has been a blast.

Nice.

All right.

And of course, we'll have all of that linked on the show notes as well.

It's a fantastic show.

Golden Bachelor.

Yeah, Golden Bachelor.

I love Golden Bachelor.

I love Golden Bachelor.

I just got into that.

Nice.

I love it way more than the actual Bachelor franchise.

Me too.

Interesting.

All right.

Well, and if you want to know why, well, you're going to have to check the show notes and find more about Ryan's show.

And well, that's going to do it for our review of Praise Band.

That's not going to do it for the episode just yet because we still need to make this same mistake again.

So Eli, tell us what's on deck.

While vacationing separately in small town, USA, Elwood and Nora, two of Santa's elves, receive an urgent transmission, initiating a series of events that will change their lives and the world forever.

We'll be watching Summertime Christmas.

Okay, that's just fucking weird.

So with that to look forward to, we're going to bring episode 511 to a merciful close.

Once again, a huge thanks to Ryan from the So Bad It's Good podcast for all his help, and perhaps even huger thanks to all the Patreon donors that helped make this show go.

If you'd like to count yourself among their ranks, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com/slash godawful and thereby earn early access to an ad-free version of every episode.

You can also help a ton by leaving us a five-star review and by sharing the show on all your various social media platforms.

And if you enjoyed enjoyed this show, be sure to check out our sibling shows: The Scathing Adias, Citation Needed, DD Minus, and The Skeptic Add available wherever podcasts live.

If you have questions, comments, or cinematic suggestions, you can email GodawMovies at gmail.com.

Tim Robertson takes care of our social media.

Our theme song was written and performed by Ryan Slotnick with Movie Drafts on Mars.

All the other music was written and performed by our audio engineer, Morgan Clark, who was used with permission.

Thanks again for giving us a chunk here, Life this week for Heath Enright and Eli Bosnick.

I'm Noelucia's promise to work hard to earn another chunk next week.

Until then, we'll leave you with the American Graffiti Clothes.

Breakfast Club clothes.

Nope.

Can't just change them.

I can't.

I can't change them.

You can't.

I can't.

Then you have to admit you're the boss.

Flavor Town Mark went on to fake a heart attack every time he was shitty.

Oh, no.

Then he got caught faking a heart attack, and he faked a heart attack, and Mary divorced him.

Mary's a listener now to the Seashie and

John still sleeps in that park, as far as we know.

Wayne Wilson did die the next day.

Those black sisters just quit music i guess yeah dreams were crushed

ending us and ending us on a downer again damn it

grilled cheese sandos as well as as well as over one

yeah it was good right sandos come on

sandos

it's in the maker

i know i know i know

I must read this.

I made it through.

As well as over 100 seasonals.

All right.

Now, just keep in mind, Sando can't be a running joke.

Oh, no, wait.

We get Sandos in the first ad.

That's right, yeah.

So we got Sandos all throughout.

I'll have to put for patrons who get the ad-free version, I'll have to say, hey, guys, there was a Sandos joke in this ad.

Sandos ad.

Chime in.

All right, interstitial two.

This content is can-credentialed, which means you can report instances of harassment, abuse, or other harm at their hotline at 617-249-4255 or on their website at creatoraccountability network.org.

The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle in the Thunderstorm LLC, Copyright 2025, all rights reserved.

Start your journey toward the perfect engagement ring with Yadav, family owned and operated since 1983.

We'll pair you with a dedicated expert for a personalized one-on-one experience.

You'll explore our curated selection of diamonds and gemstones while learning key characteristics to help you make a confident, informed decision.

Choose from our signature styles or opt for a fully custom design crafted around you.

Visit yadivejewelry.com and book your appointment today at our new Union Square showroom and mention podcast for an exclusive discount.

Hey parents, have you been thinking about homeschooling?

Choosing the right curriculum can feel overwhelming, but it doesn't have to.

At the Good and the Beautiful, we offer complete, high-quality homeschool courses.

And the best part, our K through 8 math and language arts programs are completely free to download.

Homeschooling can transform your family, allowing more flexibility, deeper learning, and quality time together.

Start your journey today for free at goodandbeautiful.com.

Hard Rock Hotel and Casino Sacramento at Fire Mountain brings you our biggest bingo event ever.

Saturday, August 30th, it's Hard Rock's $100,000 Bingo Royale 2.

20 bingo games paying up to $20,000.

Doors open at 9 a.m.

Games begin at 1 p.m.

Buy-ins available now.

Early bird pricing available through August 20th.

Earn 10 free packs when you buy your pre-sale entries in person now through August 18th.

Or buy online at HardRockHotelSacramento.com.