FH Mini 133 - Cinematic Cities

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Flop House Mini.

That's what we call our alternate week episodes, where we do something a little bit different than watching a bad movie and talking about it.

And that's right, today we're doing something a little different but related.

This is an episode of your favorite movie podcast that's all about locations, The Map House.

That's right, welcome to The Map House.

I'm your host, Elliot Kalen, and joining me are my regular special guests, Dan McCoy and Stuart Wellington.

They'll say hi in a minute, but first let's hit that theme song.

Map house in the middle of your ears, map house.

What you're listening to right here, map house, talking places in the films, map house, fire ceramics in a kiln, map house.

We love to talk movie locations, map house.

Films are the cheapest of vacations.

Still going, huh?

Map house.

Well, I could go longer.

House says to the cast that we do the things with the stuff.

And I didn't know anything.

I couldn't think of lyrics for the part in the song where he talks really fast.

Map House is brought to you, of course, by Hodor's Travel Guide, the only travel guide endorsed by the simple-minded stable boys of Winterfell and Randy McNasty, America's most trusted name in maps for perverts.

Now, Dan Stewart, thanks so much for joining us today on Map House.

How are you feeling today?

And where are you coming from?

I feel great now that I heard those two

jokes about travel guides.

i'm coming from my home uh brooklyn yeah since this is the map house what's the address here dan uh it's 123 fake street and anytown usa anytown brooklyn usa so map house is of course like i said the movie podcast about locations and today's episode of the map house is going to be all about cities as characters in movies now i feel like the last couple of movies that got on the flop house were really specific about their locations.

We watched Pool Man, in which Los Angeles felt like a character in the story.

And we watched Captain America, Brave New World, in which Washington, D.C.

actually had more personality than any of the human characters in the movie.

And so today, I wanted to talk about cities that feel like characters.

And there's a bunch of famous cities that are a lot of movies.

And I bet if I named them, you guys could tell me what kinds of characters they've been in the movies or how you think of them as a character in a story.

You guys want to start off doing that?

A little brain exercise?

Sure.

I think I understand.

Okay, sure.

So, like, for instance, New York.

What kind of character is New York in the movies?

You know, brash, bold.

It's where you go to succeed.

You know, it represents glamour and glitz and an urban life.

And an endless labyrinth of late-night delights and terrors.

Oh, very well put.

Very well put.

Now, perhaps you might say similar things, but I don't know.

What about Paris?

What kind of character is Paris in the movies?

You know, it's the city of lights.

It's the city of romance.

It's

It represents.

It's a little exotic.

Yeah, sophistication.

Someone call it a labyrinth of late-night delights.

Yeah, sure.

Depending on what they call it as well.

Sometimes the scene is full of sharks.

But Pharisee, it's mostly a romantic place.

You can already hear the accordion music and the crunching on long bread, right?

What about London, though?

When London's a character in the movies, what is London like?

It's foggy, it's rainy.

Jack the Ripper is probably

going around doing

something nasty.

Not something good.

He's not giving candy to children and helping elderly people across the street.

That's for sure.

That's true.

I mean, modern London is a little harder to

classify, I think.

But

you say high street shops.

That wasn't an up-to-date London idea.

The Jack the Ripper was a bit more of a Victorian vision of London.

Okay.

And what about Miami?

What's Miami like when it's a character in the movies?

Fast cars.

Yeah.

Full of drug dealers.

Butts wearing swimsuits.

Clubs.

Butts going to clubs.

What else are the butts doing in Miami these days?

Are they sitting in cars going to clubs?

What else are they doing?

Yeah, they're in cars with comedians getting coffee.

That's what you think of as Miami.

Okay, interesting.

I don't know.

It's just a thing.

And so, what about Tokyo?

When do you think of Tokyo as a character in the movies?

You say dress.

Word association.

Overwhelming.

Kind of high-tech, right?

Yeah.

Crowds.

Cops.

Danger from Yakuza.

And every now and then a giant monster.

Yeah.

Neon lights.

Neon lights, yeah.

And finally, Rio de Janeiro.

You shouldn't have used up butts for Miami.

More butts.

Extra butts.

Bigger butts.

Carnival filled with butts.

Talking birds.

And what's the butt situation with those talking birds?

They're interested but confused.

Okay.

So those are big cities.

Those are some of the biggest cities in the world and there are a lot of movies set there and it's a very clear idea.

Each one of those, you guys had a very clear idea of what the character of that city is like.

But I was thinking, there's a lot of smaller cities that don't get as much attention from the movies.

There are dozens, maybe hundreds, maybe thousands of movies about New York and Los Angeles.

There's only one movie about Columbus, Indiana.

It's called Columbus.

I highly recommend it.

It's a very good movie, but it doesn't give us a great idea of what the basalt character of Columbus is.

I mean, we know it has a lot of architectural landmarks because that's part of what the movie is about, but we don't have as much of a sense of it from the movies.

And I started thinking, there's so many small cities that don't get movie attention, but if they did, what would, and some of the movies I've been shot in, what's the character that they should have?

So I took a look at the U.S.

News and World Report list of the 250 best places to live in the United States.

And I thought, let's take a look at them and use our movie brains to figure out what kind of character these cities would be in a movie to give Hollywood a head start.

Now, we're going to go through all 250, so I hope you guys are ready.

No, I'm just kidding.

We'll go through about nine of them.

But I thought, let's start with the number one city on the list.

Are you guys ready to use your movie imaginations, your knowledge of movies, and your creativity to figure out what is the character of this city?

And I'll give you some, I can give you some facts about the city, but I mostly want us to just say, what's the feel?

What does this feel like?

Okay.

Yeah.

So number one on the list, of course, is Johns Creek, Georgia.

Population 78,937.

According to U.S.

Mules and World Report, this is the best place to live in the United States.

Some things I can tell you about it, it has a humid subtropical climate.

It has the metro Atlanta area's only fully professional symphony orchestra, the Johns Creek Symphony Orchestra.

There's the annual food festival, the Taste of Johns Creek.

There's six golf courses.

According to Wikipedia, this is a quote from Wikipedia.

It is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the state and nation.

representing many countries and cultures from around the world.

So Johns Creek, Georgia, population less than 80,000, one of of the most culturally diverse cities in America and perhaps the world.

They've had a fire department since 2008.

And there are movies that have been shot there that include Parental Guidance, starring Billy Crystal, and Strip Club Massacre, I assume not starring Billy Crystal.

So, guys, I'm glad you hedged your batch on that.

I haven't seen it, so I don't know for sure, but I'm going to guess.

I'm just adding that one to my watch list on Letterboxd.

Yeah, so Johns Creek, Georgia,

what kind of character would the city be in a movie?

I would say it feels like it would be like a gentrified, like up-and-coming

suburbs with

a modest but bustling

downtown area.

Okay, so how does that represent in a movie?

What kind of story would you tell?

How would the city play into that story?

Maybe there's like, see, originally you said humid.

Yeah, humid subtropical climate.

Yeah.

My mind went to like a thriller some sort of like, oh, yeah, like a, well, yeah, maybe a noir, a sweaty noir.

I was thinking like a southern gothic, which could have like an overlap, but then everything you said made it sound very cosmopolitan.

So maybe

Food Festival, it's one of the most diverse cities in America, according to Wikipedia.

Yeah.

Maybe the way to do it is have one of those the CD underbelly

sorts of things.

Yeah.

It wasn't shot there, but I keep imagining, what was that movie with Ben Affleck where he was breeding snails and he killed Tracy Letz?

Deep Water.

Deep Water, was that it?

Yeah, yeah.

Is it that kind of thing?

Sexy snails.

Sexy snails.

Sexy snails, yeah.

So, okay, so Johns Creek, you're imagining, is kind of like, it's, it's like, almost like a blue velvet type place where there's like a seedy criminal underbelly underneath.

Maybe it's involved with the taste of Johns Creek annual food festival.

I don't know.

But, okay,

either that or like you have, you have two rivals at the food festival that are like a mix of like a keeping up with the Joneses, but also like an element of trying to defeat their rival at the food festival.

Or it could be, you know, like a little Italy situation where it's

a romance set against the backdrop of the food festival.

I forgot about that movie that we did on the podcast about the competing Canadian pizza places, right?

Yep.

So, okay, so John Creek, Georgia, you can go eat Hollywood.

You can go one of two ways with it.

It's either like an up-and-coming gentrifying suburb that has a seedy criminal underbelly, or it's a place where love can come even between the children of competing food merchants at the food festival.

Let's slip a little bit farther down the list for our next city.

You guys did a great job.

Let's go to number four on the list.

This is Fishers, Indiana, population 103,711.

Now, Stuart, you're an Indiana boy.

Are you familiar with this town?

I'm a Hoosier.

Now, where is this?

Is this an Indianapolis suburb?

It is a suburb of Indianapolis.

It has a humid continental climate.

This is a humid but continental climate.

It's a continental climate.

It's a suburb of Indianapolis.

Is this on

Where is this?

I don't know.

It was a town until 2015 when it officially transitioned to be a city.

Previously, in 1998, voters had defeated a referendum to become a city.

So

there's a little bit of a controversial history about whether it's a town or a city.

That's called Fishers, Indiana.

Home ownership rate, 81.9%.

And you may know this already, Stuart.

It's home of the Indy Fuel minor league hockey team and the Hoosier State Instigators basketball team.

So, guys.

Yeah, so this is on the north side of Indianapolis.

It's just east of Carmel, which is

another very affluent suburb.

I think you mean Caramel.

Nope, they removed the A.

Oh, okay.

Don't need it.

Strange to think they can afford it.

If I were driving from Indianapolis, aka Nap Town, to my hometown, Fort Wayne, Indiana, I would drive through Fisher's

Interstate 69.

So

I feel like a real connection.

So we've heard of flyover country.

This is drive-through city.

Yep.

You think you've ever taken that?

You think you've driven through Fisher's?

I'm sure I've driven through it.

No question.

So let's use that personal experience, this authentic personal experience.

Fisher's Indiana, what kind of character is it in a movie?

Hmm, seems boring.

Yeah,

I'm not a Hoosier, but

I'm from one state over,

Illinois,

small town living in Illinois.

Again, it's just not a small town.

There's 103,000 people.

It's a city that's a suburb of a bigger city.

I'm guessing there are multiple very good malls.

But

probably we'll be hearing about a city later that has a couple of malls, but this, I don't know for sure.

Well, you know what?

Let me bring up some more information about this.

I spent a lot of time, though, in the bustling Midwestern metropolis of Peoria, Illinois.

I was going to say that

the immediate thing that suggests to me is like a suburbia style like bored disaffected youth hanging out in uh okay parking lots sort of thing which was a lot of my youth

all right so i think that's true i think and you know a little bit of the haves and the have nots the you know the rich kids and the townies versus the rich kids um does it help to tell you that the uh that the the highest uh employer in the in the area court in 2020 top employer was hamilton southeastern schools i guess the school district is the big employer.

Number 10, U.S.

Foods employees in 2020 employed 320 people.

There's also the Geist Reservoir where you can fish and water ski.

So is that where like the children are?

You can water ski?

Apparently.

I mean, if the boat's fast enough, yeah.

If I don't know how to water ski, will I learn just by doing it there?

Unfortunately, no, I don't think so.

But unless maybe that's maybe it's a children's movie about

a magical water skiing lake.

I don't know.

I think you've seen Cocoon.

Cocoon's where Wilford Brimley learns to fucking water ski from alien pods, right?

The alien pods are pulling him along the water, yeah.

And he's got two on his feet as the skis.

You wouldn't believe how young I actually am in this movie.

I'm younger than Tom Cruise is in the Mission Impossible movie, some of them.

So fish is in the enemy.

Fish is known stunts, too.

That's true.

So we're saying it's kind of a boring place that teens want to escape in the movie.

But there might also be an alien movie.

Dona Michi.

Donamici was significantly older than wilford brimley he was very old i mean he had been a movie star in the 40s so yeah so let's see donamici how old wasn't he made to cocoon so uh donic and his first name's don or is that a title

you're right

it's possible that that was his mafia name yeah or or just as a spanish landowner no his name is dominic felix amici uh so he was born in 1908 so we need to cocoon he was only 77 you know and how old was wilford brimley wilford brimley at the time in 1985.

Let's see, Wilfred Brimley was 51 years old.

Guys, I hate to say it, but that's a pretty problematic age gap, right?

Yeah.

But in the love scenes, you wouldn't worry about it.

I mean, that's the thing.

That was when Wilfred Brimley was like, he was getting a lot of controversy for appearing with men as the love interest who are much older than him.

Because Wilfred Brimley had a, you know, he did light a thing for older men.

That's fine.

Donomici, of course,

a lot of great movies.

Anyway, we should do a Donamici mini sometime.

He He was in a lot of great stuff.

Anyway, so Fisher's Indiana, I think we've covered that pretty well.

We know that it has to do with Cocoon and Water Street.

It's named after Fisher Stevens.

Yeah, right.

Yeah, well, it's Fisher's, right?

It doesn't have an apostrophe in the name, but I have to assume that it was originally Fisher's, Indiana, like the Indiana that belonged to Fisher Stevens.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's move.

We'll do two more before we take a quick break.

Let's go to, oh, now we're going down North Carolina way to number five on the list.

This is Carrie, North Carolina, population 174,961.

Just shy shy of 175,000.

You'll get there, Carrie.

If you want to hear some about it, it's got a humid subtropical climate.

It's home to the world's largest.

Some of these fucking humid places.

Some more humid stuff's coming up.

It's home to the world's largest privately held software company.

In 2021, it was named the safest mid-sized place to live in the United States.

And the Cary drainage basin, it includes three creeks, the Crab Tree, the Swift, and the Walnut.

There's a Kellogg's factory there.

It also, there's a nonprofit that promotes the use of cotton in the area.

And it also has the Sri Venkateswari Temple, which serves the Hindus of the Research Triangle section of North Carolina.

It's home to the North Carolina Courage women's soccer team, and they have shot a number of movies there, including parts of Iron Man 3 and also a movie called Top Spin about people competing to be on the Olympic ping pong team.

So, guys, Kerry North Carolina, what kind of movie character is it from what we've heard?

Well, as soon as you say it's like voted the safest place, it makes me think of like rebel ridge or something

where the uh the local police department's uh skewing the numbers okay so this is or like uh or like uh or like uh uh what the world's end or whatever where uh aliens have come in and they're taking over yeah i mean i mean i could see aliens coming in to take over that software company or perhaps the the locus of the cotton lobbying that carry north carolina is uh dan what do you think what is that what comes to your mind either corrupt cops or aliens or is there anything else that feels more carry

Man, was Alien Nation aliens and corrupt cops?

I don't think they were corrupt cops.

But they're drinking rotten milk.

Is that what corrupt cops are?

These cops are as rotten as the milk they drink to get drunk because they're aliens.

And it's spoiled milk.

I know.

Oh, spoiled milk.

Write in and complain.

Yeah.

You know, I.

You know who has a hard time on the Alien Nation planet?

Barbers.

Dan, you're saying?

No, I was just going to say that I totally zoned out on the description of

this city because

my brain was going to medical anxiety as it often does in spare moments.

Are you doing okay, Dan?

Do we need to let this mean you should be about?

Yeah.

Okay, so humid subtropical climate.

Yep, this is

Fishers, Indiana.

No, no, we're doing Carrie, North Carolina at this point.

Carrie, North Carolina.

Named after Harry Carey.

Named after Harry.

Carrie Mulligan.

Yeah, both.

It was named after both of them.

And Jim Carrey.

Yeah.

spelled.

The most famous Carrie.

Carrie Fischer.

Most famous.

Grant, I would say.

Grant, right?

It is spelled like Carrie Grant's name.

So maybe Carrie Grant's in the movie or maybe A.I.

Russell.

There's no Carrie Russell.

It's spelled and pronounced differently.

Anyway, so Carrie, North Carolina, I feel like this is a wash.

I feel like we didn't get it.

We didn't get this one.

Let's move on to if only North Carolina could get another bite at this apple.

Oh, and it does, because number seven on the list is Apex, North Carolina.

That name is too cool.

Yeah, too cool.

It's population 65,091.

What's its climate like?

You guessed it, humid.

It's located pretty close to Cary, North Carolina, so maybe this double for both.

Apex's city motto is the peak of good living.

It's got a historic train depot from the 19th century.

In 2015, it was named the number one place to live by Money magazine.

I guess they didn't care that in 2006, there was a chemical explosion at a waste processing facility that caused 16,000 people to evacuate.

Luckily, no one was seriously hurt.

Guess what?

There's some famous residents of Apex, North Carolina.

Do you want to hear about some of them?

Yeah, yeah.

Notable residents include Susan Higginbotham, the historical fiction author.

There's also Justin Jettica, known as the human Ken doll for the numerous plastic surgeries that he's had in his life.

The lack of penis.

I assume.

And of course,

and of course, Jason Alexander, the race car driver.

not from Seinfeld, spells it differently.

Jason Alexander from Seinfeld is of course from New Jersey.

Are they twin brothers?

No, they're not twin brothers.

So Apex, North Carolina, from what you know, what kind of movie is Apex North Carolina the character in?

What does it feel like in this?

What kind of character is this city in this movie?

It's all based on the waste plant explosion.

Like, you got to have a toxic or something.

No, oh, that's the direction you're going with it.

I was like, oh, is this going to be like a, you know, a...

China syndrome or like an Aaron Brock, like a kind of a, you know, drama about,

you know, a company doing wrong and people uncovering it.

And what's the city like?

What makes it apex that this is happening in?

You know, what's what's the, how does the city, how is it personified, you know?

That everybody's

everybody's super competitive, that they're all perfect versions of human beings on the apex.

Okay.

So only the best, only the best, most perfect people can live there.

And so when the chemical explosion happens, it's like, oh, no, our best people are threatened by this.

The city that has such high standards, suddenly what happens when it falls below those standards?

Yeah, maybe that's what's the insidious thing that's going on is that

there's some sort of engineering out of like the

lower persons and that leads to this insidious company.

You know, something goes wrong with them.

And like a Toxie has to show up and beat up all these beautiful people.

Oh, wow.

Okay.

So it's the ugliest among us is fighting the most beautiful among us.

Which one's the hero?

Toxy is, right?

Yeah.

Of course he is.

So do you you guys have any other ideas based on that for Carrie, North Carolina?

We didn't really come up with much for Carrie.

Uh,

I mean, are you trying to put a slate together, Elliot, of films?

Uh, you know, there's uh, the North Carolina Film Board has hired me to really get some movies going in in the research triangle area of, oh, no, that's uh, that's uh, yeah, the research triangle area of North Carolina.

So, I got a pitch for you: it's a slice-of-life comedy starring Carrie Elwez, Carrie Mulligan, Carrie Russell, and Jim Carrey.

Okay.

And they are all hanging out in Carrie, North Carolina.

And what's it called?

Carrie.

Carry-On.

It's called Carry-On, Carry-Torrell.

It's Carry-On 2, where

the sequel to the airport movie.

Oh, you're going it that way.

I was saying it was one of the British,

the old British Carry-On comedies, those ones.

It's Carry-On Carrie.

Well, maybe it's a mix of both.

It's a comedy version of Carry-On the Thriller set in Carry, North Carolina with all these Carries on it.

Oh, Carrion.

Maybe there's some Carrion involved.

Yeah, probably.

Or the Spider-Man villain carrying.

Well, guys, I think we figured it out for those cities.

Let's take a short break.

I'll let your brains have a rest while I say a word about our sponsor today.

Unless, Dan, do you want to do the sponsor spot today?

No, no, please.

Oh, I saw you get your phone and I thought you were getting it to read the sponsor, but you're just checking your emails.

No, I'm getting,

excuse me, I'm getting it to promote Flop TV season three later on.

Okay, that sounds good.

That sounds good.

All right.

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Hey,

I want to say a few words about Flop TV Season 3, which is a thing that's going to be coming up.

It's going to be happening every first Saturday of the month from September through February.

That's six episodes and our usual time slot of 9 p.m.

Eastern, 6 Pacific.

And if I have my release schedule right,

this should be releasing this mini on July 26th, which is when we're going to be putting

the

tickets on sale tickets will be live to buy

on July 26th yeah you go to flop you go to sorry theflophouse dot simpletics dot com that's ticks t i x and you can get tickets there either uh seven dollars for an individual show if there's just one if you just if you're just if there's just one special movie that you

just want to dip your toes in the water of flop tv or if you want to watch the whole season you can get a seven and i don't know why you wouldn't come on for thirty five dollars that's a uh that's a discount that's uh like one episode free basically if you buy the season pass it's like you're stealing one episode of flock tv from us and you're gonna feel so good about that like you got one over on the flop boys yeah fine because you hate us take them down a peg oh we think we're so cool yeah uh we're doing uh the theme this uh year is flopsterpiece theater we're uh going back in time decade by decade picking one um

i wouldn't say representative flop necessarily although some of them are kind of representative of the times that they were made in uh just like one significant flop of that decade uh it's gonna it's gonna be the adventures of pluto nash for the 2000s jack frost with michael keaton for the 90s for the 80s xanadu the 70s zardaz the 60s dr doolittle the uh musical with rex harrison that sort of uh destroyed the big hollywood musical for a while and for the 50s a biggie Plan 9 from Outer Space, directed by Ed Wood.

Yes, the same Ed Wood of the film of the same name.

I mean, he wasn't actually in it, but it was about him.

It's about him, yeah.

And it's a great, I just re-watched it recently.

It's a great movie.

Yeah, so again,

Plan 9 is a terrible movie.

Again, that's theflophouse.simpledicks.com.

If you want to join us this season for Flop TV season three.

Hey, I'm Alan McLeod, the host of Walking About, and I'm here with Adam.

Hello.

You know, as a member of the month, you're the member of the month.

You'll be getting a $25 gift card to the Maximum Fund store.

Holy moly.

Oh, yeah.

I can't wait.

Thank you so much for supporting this show and the network.

Happy to do it.

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I just said, you know, these people give me so much entertainment and joy and fun in my life.

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Well, so nice to meet you, Adam.

Thank you very much, everybody.

Keep up the good work.

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It's midnight here on Host to Coast, and we've got Sarah from Michigan on line one.

Hi, I'm calling in for some help.

I used to love reading, but between grad school, having kids, and the general state of the world, I can't seem to pick up a book and stick with it anymore.

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Reading glasses every Thursday on maximum fun.

Right now, we're coming back to this episode of the Map House.

We just got a couple more cities that we're going to look at real quick to see what we can do for them.

So let's go to number 10 on that list of best places to live in the United States.

And this is Troy, Michigan.

Population 87,452.

Guys, let me tell you a little bit about Troy, Michigan that might help.

It's the 13th largest municipality in Michigan.

It's home to both the Somerset Collection Mall and the Oakland Mall, as well as

Troy Historic Village, a historic village.

It used to have a newspaper called the Troy Eccentric, but I don't think it's published anymore.

You know who went to high school there?

Sutton Foster and Stephen Ewan.

So some big stars went to high school there.

And movies shot in Troy include It Follows.

You don't know Jack starring Al Pacino as Jack Kvorkian, because as I've said before, the Biggest shame you can have in America is to be portrayed by Al Pacino in a movie, whereas the greatest honor is to be portrayed by Tom Hanks in a movie, uh, and also Whip It, the roller derby movie, and part of Dinner with Leatherface, a documentary about Gunnar Hansen, who was shot in Troy, Michigan.

So, guys, Troy, Michigan, it's already Hollywood.

Yeah, they call it the Hollywood of Michigan.

So, guys, what is the character of Troy, Michigan, and what movie would really make the most of Troy, Michigan?

Movies have been set there, shot there, but what's the movie that really presents the character of Troy, Michigan?

Now, would Troy, Michigan be described as urban,

suburban, or rural?

Almost 88,000 people live there.

I'm guessing it's more suburban than anything else.

Oh, yeah.

You're like, urban, suburban, or ultra-urban?

Yeah, yeah.

It's a fucking Shadowrun arcology.

Yeah, yeah.

It's all mega blocks.

It's Megacity One.

Yeah, yeah.

Maybe I'm just being influenced by

the wide variety of films shot there, but there's something about it that's saying

quirky and eclectic to me.

Make it into like sort of a northern exposure, Sicily, Alaska style

town where something weird's always happening.

And I was thinking a classic suburban slasher movie.

I think you could do a little bit of both.

I don't think I've seen a slasher in a city like that where it's like kind of a weird, quirky city.

I mean, with a newspaper called The Eccentric, I feel like that

brings in, it's a weird, quirky town, and there's a slasher on the loose.

You know, if a slasher was loose in Sicily, Alaska, or,

or, you know uh austin texas or something like that or you know portland oregon you know one of these one of these town cities that considers itself a weird city they tried to get rid of the slasher in austin but i was like keep austin weird guys we want that guy out there murdering people the leather face is basically right yeah austin slasher yeah like this is part of the austin character we've got to historic make this a historically preserved landmark slasher uh so okay troy mission has seemed like some kind of like bat monster too right because austin's known for their bats guys we're not talking about austin i feel like austin texas has its movies and has its characters.

We don't need to give Austin any help, okay?

Oh, yeah, I got a text from Richard Link later.

He says, stay out of Austin.

Stay in Troy.

It's mine.

Okay, so Troy, Michigan, it is a quirky little town with a slasher running around in it.

I like that for it.

Okay, let's go to number 11 on this list.

It's Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.

Population 116,677.

So I think this is the biggest of the cities we're going to be talking about.

It has a

cool name.

Yeah, it's a cool name.

It has a humid subtropical climate.

Off with his humid shit.

I mean, every place is humid these days.

Yeah, apparently.

Everyone wants to be humid.

It's the

largest suburb of Tulsa.

They've got a FedEx ground office.

They've got a Bass Pro shop.

They've got the Rima Bible Training Center.

Yeah, it's not a Bass amateur shop.

No, amateurs need not apply.

Professionals only.

It's like,

I've pretended to, you know, enough.

I've worked hard to be a bass.

I think I've got what it takes to make real money off of being a bass.

I was a smallmouth bass before, but now I think I'm a largemouth.

Yeah, I know all the words of that song that I have to sing when you push the button.

That's the yellow.

Chase me to the river.

You know who went to high school there?

Another Broadway legend, Christian Chenoweth, went to high school in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.

And movies shot in Broken Arrow include Tex with Matt Dylan, but neither of the two movies called Broken Arrow were shot or set in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.

First off, that's a slap in the face to Broken Arrow.

Yeah.

so guys, Broken Arrow, what's its character?

What's the movie?

Yeah.

Well, it sounds like a big-ass city, right?

It's pretty big.

Yeah, it's a pretty big ass city as opposed to a big ass city, which is

like really sure.

Yeah, in Miami, yeah, of course.

It's a big bass city, too.

They've got that bass groat shop.

Oh, Christ.

It is a big bass city.

Maybe there's something in there.

I know that a fish ate Pittsburgh once.

Yeah, sure.

Different Different city once.

Just once.

Pittsburgh has all these great things before, but a

fish eats your city once.

Something that's all they want to make of it.

Yeah, yeah.

This is broken arrow, Oklahoma, you said?

Yes, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.

I see a modern, I'm seeing like a modern Western

in an urban environment,

but you know, with the kind of Oklahoma Western feel.

And what is that Oklahoma Western feel?

You know, like tumbleweeds and shit.

So just any Western.

Yes.

So you're saying the city still has this is a modern city of almost 120,000 people and there's still tumbleweeds rolling through it.

Yeah.

I'm saying that the it has the elements of a like a drifter coming into town and uh city uh into this big city and uh relatively you know relatively simple lines of good and evil drawn.

However, there is there's you know more to it and uh i don't know so it's another city that has an underbelly similar to

similar to the first city we talked about uh johns creek georgia so

broken arrow oklahoma also has an underbelly to it dan do you think i'm trying to think about you know what i know about oklahoma i've been there and i remember when i was a child i was there and my impression was that it was very flat and this is as a man who

uh came from illinois the central

so uh that's saying something i know that my dad is from oklahoma he's an Okee.

Okay, is he from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma?

No, he's from closer to where Killers of the Flower Moon actually happened.

Was he one of the killers of the Flower Moon?

No, he was not.

He was a child.

It was after that happened.

Children can be killers.

Damn, we've all seen The Bad Seed and Problem Child.

It's true.

But I guess I would say that I guess it should be like a fictionalized biopic about my dad.

Yeah, yeah.

Second city he didn't live in.

Okay, I like it.

That sounds good.

Yeah, sure.

Dad's of the flower moon.

Really highlights where he went wrong, you know.

Yeah, father's the flower moon.

We're killers of the father moon.

Yeah, where did your dad go wrong, Dan?

You know, like many men of his generation, you know, he probably could have done with like some therapy, you know, just like emotional training.

But he was

a good guy.

He seems overall like a good guy.

I mean, your parents have always struck me as good people.

So I don't know why you're making him the monsters who killed the flower moon, you know.

You asked.

They're great.

I asked what you answered, Dan.

It takes two to ask a question, one to ask and one to answer.

Yeah.

How did uh, yeah, but then if they're such good people, how did you guys end up like this?

Okay, okay.

Moving on to the next city in the list, let's go to number 13.

That's Ellicott City, Maryland.

Population 77, 336.

Yes, I picked this one because it sounds like my name.

It's spelled with two L's and two T's the proper way.

Now, what kind of climate do you want to guess Ellicott City has?

It's fucking humid.

You bet it's humid.

It's humid subtropical climate.

There's sporadic snowfall in the winter, but usually relatively light.

It's a suburb of Baltimore.

It's called the heart and soul of Maryland because it's right in the center there, I think.

It once housed a fairy tale-themed amusement park called the Enchanted Forest.

It's since closed.

It's also home to the oldest surviving railroad station in America.

This is where the famous race took place in 1830 between the steam engine Tom Thumb and a horse, where technically the steam engine lost because it broke down, but it showed people that steam power will be a thing to reckon with in the railroad industry.

The armies passed through here several times during the Civil War, but I don't think they ever fought here.

Notable residents, according to Wikipedia, include Divine and Edward Snowden.

And there have been some movie shot

tippies in a pod.

Span of humanity.

What do they talk about?

Yeah, I assume they were roommates at some point.

Yeah.

But

movies shot in Elicot City include The Goddess, Crybaby, and The Blair Witch Project part of it.

So

what's so I feel like we're already backing into a movie where it's Divine and Edward Snowden

together in some way.

But

what is the character of Ellicott City?

I'm thinking of the character of Ellicott is sort of like a fast-talking, know-it-all,

kind of a pain in the ass sometimes.

Interesting.

Interesting.

I wonder what this is basically.

It's a family man,

sort of.

Always too busy for things,

very stressed out.

Yeah.

You know, losing his hair.

I think

this is where my friend lives.

I think my friend lives in Frederick, Maryland, Maryland, which I think is a suburb of Ellicott.

And this is where I drove down to play Warhammer with him, and my fucking car broke down, and I got stuck there for a couple extra days.

Do you know the character firsthand?

I know the character firsthand.

I've learned where cars break down.

I will say, I was not able to get my car fixed on a Sunday because all the

mechanics were closed.

So there's something terrifying about that.

Yes, it's a religious place, maybe a little cultist

potentially.

Yeah, it's the town that dreaded Sundays.

Sundays.

So, so, Stuart, so let's build off.

So, it's the kind of town where your car might break down, but you might get stuck there for a little bit.

Now, is it and then is it scary or you get caught in a kind of paranoid thriller of Edward Snowden conspiratorial stuff?

Or is it that you get stuck there and you learn something new about your life from Divine and the other

earthly allowed people to do that?

I learned something about my life.

I also was like, I didn't bring enough clothes to stay here a couple extra days and I can wash my underwear in the sink.

So, you learn to bring more more clothes.

I had to like walk around.

It was really hard to find.

There's really few, like the hotel I was in was near shopping, like a shopping center, but there's very few menswear stores, which was frustrating.

Okay, so Ellicott, so the city that might have been Ellicott that you got

that you got stuck in, hard to get men's clothes there.

It would explain, I mean, it's an interesting origin for Divine's personal style.

It's hard to buy men's clothes there.

Okay, guys, so I think we haven't really figured out Ellicott completely.

But Dan, I like the way you were, something about the way you were describing it made it sound really cool, really cool and sexy.

I don't know why.

It really appealed to me.

This fast-talking, annoying, workaholic city.

I think this is an example of

my first-hand experience is actually a detriment because it limits my imagination.

Yeah, that's a good point.

Sometimes it's better to be not bound by that experience.

Yeah.

I don't like the way Dan smiles when he says fantasy.

I don't either.

So there's one city.

I like how George R.

Martin smiles when he says fantasy.

Well, Dan is the author of several best-selling novels that will never be finished, sure.

So

they're not going to be finished.

I mean, get George on the job.

He doesn't seem that intent on doing it.

But I've done so much.

I've read all these books and he's not going to finish them.

I mean, maybe he will.

Maybe he'll, maybe he'll hire somebody else to finish them someday.

It's okay.

Maybe you, Stuart.

That would be amazing.

There would all of a sudden be some really cool characters introduced that look a lot like me.

Yeah.

And I would be, and all the babes would be like, he's the best.

And all the dudes are like, he's scary and tough and cool.

And I'd be like, hell, you'd love to marry.

And what's the title of this concluding Game of Thrones volume that you're going to, or Song of Ice and Fire volume that you're going to write?

Yeah.

Fire of Stews.

Okay.

A pot of stews.

Let's call it that.

So this last one city we're going to talk about, this is number 31 on this list.

Again, there's 250 cities on this list.

We couldn't cover them all.

Maybe we'll, you know what?

Next year, maybe we'll set some incredibly high

pledge goal.

And if we reach it, we'll talk about all 250 cities on this list.

But it would have to be that we'd have to get like 30,000 new and new and upgrading subscribers or 50,000.

And then we'll just live stream us going through all of them going crazy.

Exactly.

So question.

So this is city number 31, West Des Moines, Iowa.

Not to be confused with Des Moines, Iowa.

This is population

or East Des Moines.

That's true, or north or south.

Population 71,794.

Climate, you guessed it, humid continental.

In 1915, a major auto race was held here, and a couple people were killed accidentally during the race.

Until 1937, though, it was called Valley Junction.

But voters changed the name to West Des Moines because they thought it sounded more prestigious and glamorous.

West Des Moines.

They want all the glamour of Des Moines, Iowa.

So Microsoft has a number of data centers there, including one of the locations where ChatGPT was trained.

So it is evil.

And I don't know what movies were shot there because when I tried to research it, I kept getting movies that were shot in regular Des Moines and not West Des Moines.

Again, it's a different place than Des Moines.

So guys, what is the character of West Des Moines and what kind of story are we telling about it to bring out that character?

Evil AI.

You already touched it.

Okay.

What were you going to say?

I mean, the fact that you couldn't find anything for West Des Moines because of Des Moines, I was always thinking, you know, like overshadowed, feeling like unappreciated sort of thing.

Yeah, the kind of thing that would lead them to create an evil AI.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Take their revenge.

So West Des Moines is always living in the shadow of regular Des Moines.

It's the little brother of the two.

Yeah.

And so it's a place full of resentment, seething with resentment.

If you live in West Des Moines, please write in and let me know if the city seethes with resentment.

Yeah.

It's taking part in evil.

It's like

I went to school with this kid who was from Youngstown, Ohio, and he would always talk about how Youngstown, Ohio was like really dangerous and tough and it had a really big murder rate.

It did.

And he was like, when he was a kid, he was like, the murder rate was so high, they called it Little Chicago until Youngstown's murder rate exceeded Chicago's, and they started calling Chicago Big Youngstown.

I'm like, I do not think they've advertised

that.

Nobody has ever called it that.

I mean, in Youngstown, I guess.

You go to Big Youngstown.

So, guys, I think we figured out a lot of these cities.

Again, to repeat what we decided,

Johns Creek, Georgia, number one greatest place to live in the U.S., according to U.S.

News and World Report.

That is going to be a CD underbelly.

That's a really good for me, sorry.

Or romantic comedy.

Fisher's Indiana, number four on the list.

We didn't really, what did we come up with for Fisher's?

Fisher Stevens hangs out there.

Yeah, I guess so.

Ghost fishing.

Slice of life.

I think that was Slice of Life Teens trying to escape.

Yeah.

Then there's number five and number seven, Carrie, North Carolina, and Apex, North Carolina.

Carrie is full of Carries.

And Apex was the place where Toxie is fighting off the people made too beautiful.

Then Troy, Michigan, we talked about it.

It's a quirky little town, little city that's also got a slasher.

Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, which is kind of a modern-day western with

moral boundaries being crossed.

And professional bass and tumbleweeds and professional bass.

Ellicott City, Maryland is basically me, but a city.

And Devine is there, hard to buy man's clothes.

And West Des Moines, Iowa is, of course, resentful about the shadow cast by Big Des Moines.

So if you live in any of these, yeah, if you live in any of the cities, tell us how good we did.

Did we accurately describe your city?

Is that the kind of movie you want to see about the place you live?

I would love to hear about it.

Just write to Elliot Kalen, care of Dan McCoy, real address TBD.

Dan, just include your real address later on.

We'll do.

And we will be happy to find out how right or wrong we were.

That is, of course, this episode of The Map House, a subsidiary podcast of The Flop House.

Hollywood, there you have it.

You got a whole slew of new city characters to start setting movies in.

Courtesy of me, Elliot Kalen, and my cohorts, Dan McCoy and Stuart Wellington.

I'd like to, of course, thank Alex Smith, our producer.

He goes under the name Howell Doughty when he's recording music and magic online.

The music is magical, and the magic is musical.

He doesn't actually do magic, but he's a really talented musician.

We are a podcast of the Max Fun Network.

Please try the other Max Fun shows if you like silliness and information about cities maybe you never thought about before.

Until next time, this has been the Map House.

Join us next week for the regular Flop House.

Goodbye, and good locating to you.

Bye.

Actually,

I should have said place be with you.

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