Hi Barbie!

GT Radio - The Geek Therapy Podcast

#361: The crew discusses the Barbie movie!

Transcript

Marc Cuiriz 0:11
Hello everybody, and welcome to this Barbie tastic episode of GT radio. Where we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about

Josué Cardona 0:26
the barbies you care about

Marc Cuiriz 0:29
the Barbies you care about. I am one of the Barbies here tonight. Marc Cuiriz, and joined with me is Josué Barbie.

Josué Cardona 0:42
Yep, yep, that’s me.

Marc Cuiriz 0:44
Lara Barbie.

Lara Taylor 0:46
Hey.

Marc Cuiriz 0:48
And Link Barbie.

Link Keller 0:51
Hey,

Marc Cuiriz 0:53
how we doing Barbies.

Link Keller 0:55
Hi Barbie

Marc Cuiriz 1:01
how’s everybody?

Link Keller 1:01
Really? Nobody’s gonna say it back? Wow betrayed immediately. I think the patriarchy is in here you guys I’m worried

Lara Taylor 1:12
it might be

Josué Cardona 1:12
Who’s a Ken in here?

Lara Taylor 1:14
listen,

Marc Cuiriz 1:14
I’m actually an Allan

Lara Taylor 1:15
I am Kenough, okay?

Marc Cuiriz 1:23
we’re all kenough

Josué Cardona 1:25
what a movie what a movie.

Link Keller 1:26
What a movie. That’s cinemaaa

Marc Cuiriz 1:32
I yeah, I was not expecting to Well, I was kind of expecting to like go into it with like, walking away with like, things to think about right? Because of like everything I saw on social media because I was kind of late to seeing the movie. But I was still thoroughly surprised as to how much this movie actually made me like, Huh. This is this is something I didn’t, like, I didn’t think about it. In in the way that it was being presented in the movie. Like, patriarchy.

Josué Cardona 2:04
Please elaborate.

Marc Cuiriz 2:05
So obviously, like I understood, like a lot of the themes, I saw a lot of things on Tik Tok on Facebook and just social media in general of like, how Barbie was a really a movie that got you to like, think about things and sort of view things in a different way. And so I was like, okay, like, I get it. This movie is more catered towards adults kind of with the messages that it’s presenting things like that. And as I was sitting there watching it, and listening to kind of what was going on. I was like, Huh, that’s really interesting. I didn’t really think about it this way. And that, it almost seemed like every, I shouldn’t say almost it was in the sense, like everything was reversed in Barbie land, where Barbies ran everything. And the Kens were just like, essentially the eye candy. But we’re also like, dismissed. Like they weren’t really, they didn’t, no one really paid much attention to them. And then there’s Allan Ken’s best friend that was even more so ignored. And then they go into the real world. And then Ken sort of sort of starts learning about patriarchy, and then he’s talking to other dudes, and they’re like, No, the patriarchy still very much alive. We’re just really good at hiding it now. Like, we just have all these fancy words to kind of sprinkle things over and I’m like, Huh, that like that makes a lot of sense. Like, it’s stuff like I already knew, but to have it just kind of be outright and just kind of like spoken in that way. I was like, yeah, like, wow, that’s, that is that is nothing but hard facts that they are spitting right now.

Josué Cardona 3:56
And how Ken’s like, your whole patriarchy is awesome. Like, it really benefits us. We should, we should we should do more of that we should bring that home. We should just embrace it. It’s all about horses.

Lara Taylor 4:10
Ken is just a horse girl Ken really just wanted to be a horse girl and the patriarchy kind of ruined that. There are so many wonderful things about this movie, but we’re on the topic of the patriarchy piece. And what I think is what the movie does really well is it shows how toxic masculinity and patriarchy also doesn’t work for men either. And how it puts them in boxes. And literally puts Barbie in a box like but I thought they did that beautifully. Most of the people that I know, present company excluded are that have seen the movie are like queer people, trans people, women and so it’s nice to hear Are somebody thinking about things differently? It’s good.

Marc Cuiriz 5:06
Yeah, I was honestly thoroughly surprised to like the patriarchy isn’t about horses? you know what? Screw the patriarchy it’s not about horses. I’m not into it. Let’s let’s just get rid of it altogether

Josué Cardona 5:24
funniest thing was to me that they call that the ken called his place exactly what you call your house. Mojo Dojo Casa House. That was such a coincidence.

Marc Cuiriz 5:34
Listen, I told you that in confidence Okay. Now I gotta change the name.

Josué Cardona 5:39
Oh, sorry.

Lara Taylor 5:42
Listen, Ken is such a horse girl that he put on his Mojo Dojo Casa house, he has a saloon the saloon doors and it’s like, Ken saloon or something like that on the front?

Josué Cardona 6:00
I am interested in hearing from you, Lara, you said that some of your clients brought up the movie. Very curious, in what context

Lara Taylor 6:11
so. And it’s not just clients that have brought this up to me. But I’m friends who and these are mostly trans friends. Talking about it brought up feelings of a lost childhood, especially trans women. And this feeling these feelings of like, I wish I could have played with Barbies like this. And also feelings of like, damn, the patriarchy sucks. But I’ve known that for a really long time. And I’ve been on multiple sides of this and it sucks for everybody. But it’s led to some good conversations about well, you can you can still have these things if you want. I mean, if you feel like you’re past the Barbie stage, that’s fine. You can still play with your video games and your other things. But yeah, it’s been it’s been good to talk about toxic masculinity, patriarchy. Things that I have talked about with clients before. But through this lens, I think it may it brought things up to the forefront that just didn’t naturally come to them as often. So yeah. Plus, we talked a lot about how Ken is a horse girl, and that we are Kenough

Josué Cardona 7:45
do you really think he’s a horse girl. I’m just I just wasn’t sure if

Lara Taylor 7:47
yes, I really believe that. That’s that he wanted to be a horse girl. Yeah.

Josué Cardona 7:56
Um, the toy thing is really interesting to me, because I hadn’t thought about that. I’m, I play more with toys now than I ever have before. Also, I had a Ken doll. By the way, there’s a story I don’t know if I’m just sorry, my sister. It was her birthday. And someone came over. She didn’t know us very well. I believe this is my how I remember it. And so she had a pilot Ken and stewardess Barbie for for my sister. Once you realize that she had that my sister had a brother. She kind of split the present into and then gave me the Ken. and gave my sister the Barbie. When I was a kid, we like my action figures and my sister’s Barbies. It was kind of like in Toy Story, right where they were like, the toys are all mixed up

Link Keller 8:45
they play together.

Josué Cardona 8:47
Yeah. Yeah. Like Bruce Wayne used to ride in that pink Ferrari. Because it was cooler than whatever. Like, there wasn’t a Ferrari that you could buy for Bruce Wayne, and he needed one. You know

Lara Taylor 8:58
he did

Link Keller 8:58
plus, if you’re in the pink Corvette, then like the black suit really pops.

Josué Cardona 9:03
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Again, I’m pretty sure he had a Ferrari. And also like

Link Keller 9:09
she’s had a lot of cars

Lara Taylor 9:11
she’s had a lot of cars, a lot of cars. I have a trunk

Josué Cardona 9:15
literal dream house.

Lara Taylor 9:16
I have a trunk in the other room full of my old Barbie stuff. And like, I think there’s one of the I think the convertibles in there. And like an ice cream truck thing, which I love. And a bunch of weird Barbies are in there too. Along with my Power Ranger toys, and my Ninja Turtles and all of that.

Josué Cardona 9:40
I know brought this up before but I don’t have anything from any of the toys from my childhood. I don’t have barely anything from like the first 20 years of my life and kind of sucks and I’m overcompensating now. Hard, which is a problem. Yeah, the level Like meta commentary in this movie was impressive. The layers on layers on layers like the fact that the Barbies believe that they represent something that is so obviously good that they fixed the real world. Right. And I thought that that was

Lara Taylor 10:26
one of the one of the things that came up for me when I was watching the movie was the commentary about how Yeah, they fixed the world. Barbie is a good thing. And it’s also really messed up, it gives us this picture of what women are supposed to look like. And the standard that no one feels like they can live up to it. There’s a lot of commentary on that. And after the movie came out, there was an article talking about the Geena Davis project or Geena Davis Foundation [note: it’s actually Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media] and research on

Josué Cardona 11:00
if she can see it

Lara Taylor 11:00
if she can see it, she can be it and like how there was what was it? Like, there was a game design Barbie in a book. And it said that she had to have her friends Brian and Allan, or Brian and Steve or whatever, help her with the coding. She just did the design. And someone a game designer, she pushed back and was like, Listen Mattel this, this doesn’t work. And so they actually made a game design Barbie who sat down at a computer and coded her own stuff as as an action figure. So these are things that like, are both true at the same time.

Josué Cardona 11:42
Yeah. It’s like the welfare of like the welfare character, right? He’s like, literally, we’re empowering women. But you know, they can’t do this, or they can’t do that. But obviously, like, you know, we’re all about female empowerment here. I mean, there’s some funnier parts, right? I mean, more ridiculous parts, right? He’s like, Oh, we’ve had one or two female CEOs. Like we all have women in our lives. You know, but but as far as the toys are concerned, right, like he, he seems to believe it’s

Lara Taylor 11:50
that he’s doing good

Josué Cardona 12:13
doing. Yeah, yeah. But also that, like, realistically, there’s some things that she can’t code, obviously, but she can work in video games. She can’t code. Like, that’s weird. That’s crazy. But it’s true. Right? It was it was awesome to have like the America Ferrera character, and her perspective of the dolls and that her daughter representing that other view of like, Fuck Barbies.

Lara Taylor 12:40
literally called her a fascist.

Josué Cardona 12:43
Yep, yep. Oh, didn’t feel bad about it. So what is it

Link Keller 12:52
did you guys catch that the the four girls that were mean to Barbie. Their names are the names of the original line of Bratz dolls.

Lara Taylor 13:01
I did not get that is amazing.

Link Keller 13:04
isn’t that a fun little easter egg?

Josué Cardona 13:06
that is a fun little easter egg.

Marc Cuiriz 13:09
I saw the Tik Tok on that.

Josué Cardona 13:12
Oh, that’s good. So So what is what is your relationship with Barbies? Lara, let’s certainly you were talking about you have some in a box.

Lara Taylor 13:22
I have a whole bunch. I grew up. I had a bunch of Barbies. I used to play with them a lot. My friend my best friend Brian and I would play in the backyard with my Barbies and my Ninja Turtles and, and his GI Joes. I didn’t have too many GI Joes, but it was really funny having this really tall Barbie, and a ninja turtle that came up to like her hip and the GI Joes that came up to her knee.

Josué Cardona 13:44
yup

Lara Taylor 13:45
And we were Yeah, we would just like sit in the backyard and dig like pits for like moats around things and put like, and put like, like sticks and things in the yard to make forts and then we would put the Barbie Dream House next to it and then the car and the turtle and the like the Turtle Van. And everything was together. I don’t know like specifically what Barbies I had. Right? I probably had

Link Keller 14:12
okay, but I want to know which one was your favorite. And I want to know you I want to know your weird Barbie.

Lara Taylor 14:19
Um, so which one was my favorite? Like I said, I don’t know exactly how many like which Barbies I had. I had probably like a stereotypical Barbie and a

Link Keller 14:19
so just blonde barbie

Lara Taylor 14:22
blonde Barbie. I had a ken, which some of my friends were like, I don’t see that as ken and Ryan Gosling in the in the movie because my ken was brunette. And I’m like, mine was very blonde and had a collared shirt.

Link Keller 14:44
That was that was a choice when they first started doing screen tests.

Lara Taylor 14:48
Yeah.

Link Keller 14:49
Ryan Gosling had more of a like golden beachy wave look going for him and it’s just, he looked to what he just looked like Ryan Gosling and they were like, we really got to change Something so he reads as a Ken. it turns out, super platinum blonde was the move.

Lara Taylor 15:06
Yeah,

Josué Cardona 15:07
it’s a beach Ken

Lara Taylor 15:08
that’s a beach Ken whose only job is to be beach. His job. His job is beach. I know I had a Barbie that had the rollerblades that were in the movie and I love that Barbie. My weird

Josué Cardona 15:17
didn’t it like Spark? right like, like when you moved it forward didn’t do like, no, am I thinking of another doll?

Lara Taylor 15:32
They might have had some like that. Maybe, but I really want those. They make those rollerblades they’re selling them now I want those rollerblades now for myself. I and one of my favorite things to play with with the Barbies was the ice cream truck. Because it also came with like a little bowl that you could put your ice real ice cream in. It was really cool. And then also the chairs there were like little chairs you could set up that were like they looked almost like martini glasses, but they were supposed to be Sunday like dishes. But my weird Barbie. I think the weird Barbie weirdest Barbie I have was one that my friend my friend in high school started messing with after I did when I was a kid. So I had I cut her hair off. Not realizing that it wouldn’t grow back because hair grows back. And she’s got like a tramp stamp on the back in Sharpie. And some like tears drawn in black Sharpie down the side of her face. And

Josué Cardona 16:42
she was going through some stuff

Lara Taylor 16:42
she was going through some stuff she really was. Um, and I think currently because we just went through a bunch of boxes recently. I think she’s currently wearing Princess Jasmine’s outfit from one of the Disney. We also I also had like the Disney Barbies, like the the Princess Jasmine and the Prince and Ariel and Belle. But I wasn’t allowed to play with those. Because those were my mom’s. And those were on a display shelf

Link Keller 17:12
mmm the collectibles. Yes.

Lara Taylor 17:15
So yeah, those are those were, those are my favorites. I have yet to open the trunk in the other room, because it’s locked and I don’t have the key so we’re gonna figure that out. But it will be like a little time capsule of Barbie. So

Josué Cardona 17:34
I’m disappointed you didn’t bring Barbies, but I guess if you don’t the key

Lara Taylor 17:41
I don’t have the key. I don’t have the key

Josué Cardona 17:44
All right, so Link. What Uh, what about do you have a relationship with Barbies?

Link Keller 17:48
I do. As a person who was raised as a girl, I received many Barbies as gifts. I only recall like actually picking out like one or two myself. Most of them were gifts or whatever. But I was more of a Beanie Baby kid than a Barbie kid. But I do I

Josué Cardona 18:16
that movie also came out just now.

Link Keller 18:17
Oh, no, I don’t think I can handle that. Um, but, ya know, I had Barbies. And I had Barbie clothes and some accessories. I had the veterinarian Barbie, because when I was very young, that’s what I would tell everybody I wanted to be when I grew up. My grandmother, before I went to live with her, owned a hair salon, and did hair for her profession. And when she was in the height of that career, she would do hair for, like runway shows. So she’d be like flying out to Germany to do runway shows and stuff like that. And so one of the times that she did that she brought me back a special German Barbie, which was the prized Barbie for quite a while. Right up until I put her hair in a ponytail, high ponytail and chopped it off.

Lara Taylor 19:17
That’s kind of what I did.

Link Keller 19:17
And then I had I had that immediate realization of like, that’s not how you cut hair. I know better. I’ve seen my grandmother cut hair, you don’t put it all into a ponytail on the top of their head and then chop it off. It makes a very ugly haircut and it does not grow back and so I hid fancy German Barbie way back underneath my bed. Because I didn’t want to get in trouble for ruining my expensive fancy German Barbie which honestly probably was not that fancy or expensive. It was probably just literally a Barbie from Germany. But I hid it for a while and then when I finally got found out and I was like oh this is that I’m gonna get I’m gonna get in big trouble. Well, my grandmother thought it was just adorable that I was trying to cut her hair like Oh, you were trying to be a hairstyle is Oh, that’s so sweet. And I’m like, WOO got away with it? My crimes. but yeah, I had and I can’t remember exactly how she was related to me. I think she was my Grand Aunt. So my my maternal mom’s sister I think that’s how we were related. Anyways, a relative when I would go to North Carolina in the summers as a child, she made these gorgeous Barbie houses rooms furniture out of there’s probably a name for it. I don’t know what it’s called, but that you use like plastic grids. And then you do cross stitch over it with yarn. And then you can tie the pieces together and so she made like, she made me a house and a bed and a couch out of the you know, the plastic and yarn. And I thought that that was so cool. But at some points they got hand me down to somebody else without my knowledge and so they are hopefully still together in some loving home being played with but most likely they got thrown away at some point. But yeah,

Josué Cardona 19:23
They’re weird Barbies now

Link Keller 20:33
Weird Barbies. Yeah, don’t I don’t have any of my Barbies anymore. I didn’t keep any of those. I kept. I kept my American doll. And I kept my favorites of the many many Beanie Babies I had. But yeah, Barbie Barbie wasn’t as big of a thing for me. And I think part of that was the way that I liked to play with Barbies is just dressing them up and not so much of the imagination play. And I was not I did not come from a wealthy enough family to support the amount of clothes that I would have wanted for my Barbie. But yeah, I I still deeply resonated with the Barbie movie and I think it’s less to do with Barbie itself and more to do with Barbies story and her discovery of the way that patriarchy works and is harming her. And I think that’s, Many non binary people like me felt a very similar way towards that realization and then the sort of off characters of Allan and weird Barbie as being representative of the queer experience. And so I really resonated with that stuff. I love weird Barbie so much so so so much. I do. Kate McKinnon did an interview where she said when when she was talking with Greta Gerwig about being weird Barbie she said hey, you know if we’re going to do this right weird Barbie has to be naked, which in my experience is true weird Barbies. You’re not going to put the clothes on the weird Barbie. So I’m a little disappointed. Weird Barbie wasn’t naked.

Lara Taylor 23:38
they wanted to keep that PG 13 rating

Josué Cardona 23:42
I can’t believe her arms were where her arms are supposed to be and her legs where legs are supposed to be and yeah

Link Keller 23:47
Ooooh That’s my Okay, that’s my other weird Barbie that I didn’t mutilate but I did watch excitedly No, my, my slightly older boy cousin came over to hang out and we were playing and I showed him that I had just gotten one of the I don’t remember if it was McDonald’s or Burger King, but they were doing a Barbie line of gymnast Barbie and like her Her body was bendy.

Lara Taylor 24:15
Probably Probably McDonald’s. They usually do Barbie

Link Keller 24:18
probably McDonald’s but that is it was you know not full Barbie sizes like little Barbie size and the body was like soft plastic. Basically, he removed all her limbs in and burned off her hair and I kept her, in those pieces, for a While ummm

Josué Cardona 24:42
were you upset when he did that?

Link Keller 24:43
No, I was I was rapt. I was like I had never even occurred to me that we could do this. I’m sort of looking at my other Barbie is like, hmm, but then I was like, Oh wait, I don’t want to get in trouble because I got scottfree for the German Barbie. I don’t want to this one I can blame on Charlie. It’s not my fault. Oh, but yeah, I did. I did keep that tragic gymnast Barbie as you put her in a little box and cover her with a little napkin and now she’s sick Barbie and Dr. Barbie is coming to treat her

Lara Taylor 25:17
huh Mattel put out a weird Barbie that they’re selling after the movie.

Link Keller 25:28
[Link makes pained noises]

Lara Taylor 25:28
And it’s not weird it’s not weird enough her hair looks so normal and someone I know said that she looks like an eccentric art teacher. That’s about it. Yeah.

Link Keller 25:42
Art teacher Barbie,

Lara Taylor 25:42
but that that we also we also we also like Googled weird Barbie like just for images afterward because we were looking at what the weird Barbie that we’re selling looks like. And the next image was a Barbie shoved into a coor’s can.

Link Keller 26:03
Oh the one that’s flying around?

Lara Taylor 26:04
I think so. Yeah,

Link Keller 26:05
yeah, no tik tok has been showing me real choice weird Barbie videos. My favorite. Well okay, my two favorites. One is Barbies head and then a weird three pronged stick to her two legs so it’s just head and legs.

Lara Taylor 26:24
I feel like Toy Story did weird Barbie better.

Link Keller 26:27
Yes. Yes. absolutely

Marc Cuiriz 26:29
one hundred percent

Link Keller 26:30
But the other really good one. I may have sent it to you guys but a woman when she was a child, her house burned down. And so her uncle went back in and looked around in the wreckage and pulled out a Barbie that had been like underneath something plastic and the plastic melted down over the Barbie and he like cut whatever. It was like a desk that it was on top of any like cut the piece of desk out so she’s got this like what’s it what? I’m trying to make a star wars han solo

Josué Cardona 27:05
Han solo?

Link Keller 27:05
yeah,

Josué Cardona 27:07
carbonite

Link Keller 27:07
Carbonite. Thank you, I’m like adamantium is not the right one. Carbonite. So it’s like Barbie Carbonite is very funny. I was like, that’s a perfect weird Barbie actually. Um, but yeah, I am loving seeing people share their their Barbie stuff and talk about, you know, what the movie made them feel and how they felt, you know, connected and seen and loved. And I think that’s beautiful.

Lara Taylor 27:36
I think there was a lot of crying during America Ferrera’s characters, like, rant

Josué Cardona 27:42
monologue.

Link Keller 27:44
Yeah, I got teary eyed during that.

Lara Taylor 27:46
Yeah,

Josué Cardona 27:47
yeah, my sister hasn’t seen the movie but she told me she’s she’s seen the monologue.

Lara Taylor 27:52
It is the truth. Every word

Josué Cardona 27:56
Yeah

Lara Taylor 28:00
One thing I love that came out of the whole thing was red carpet questions. Someone asked America Ferrera what would what would you bring back from Barbie land if you could and she said all woman Supreme Court

Josué Cardona 28:19
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, at least those

Link Keller 28:25
I really, really love this movie. I do. Like there. There are some valid criticisms we sort of touched on. They focused on like, patriarchy and Barbie story of discovering the patriarchy and what that feels like and I think they succeeded very well on that but they did absolutely like sweep away the commercialism and consumerism aspects is like you get a one off joke and like we’re not going to dive too deep in that which I don’t love but I understand however my my one like legitimate annoyance criticism is I really did not like either of the the Mount Rushmore joke and the smallpox blanket. I don’t know if it was supposed to be a joke, joke has got quote air quotation marks on it, but I thought that was really important taste. I wish that they had just cut that completely.

Josué Cardona 29:24
What’s the smallpox thing I don’t remember

Link Keller 29:27
when the Barbies come back and discover the Kens have taken over and the they say that the other Barbies didn’t have any protection from the patriarchy. And then they analogize that to like the natives when the British came with the smallpox blankets. And it’s like, that’s really not the same vibe

Lara Taylor 29:58
No

Link Keller 29:58
at all and it feels was real weird and gross in like surrounded by all of these other really, you know interesting ways of engaging with intense topics in it’s just that throwaway line and then the Mount Rushmore is like that’s also not cool for indigenous people but I did love the music.

Lara Taylor 30:25
The soundtrack was on fire soundtrack.

Josué Cardona 30:28
Okay, well okay, okay on the thing on the music. Yes, this the the matchbox 20 song. Okay, afterwards I was like, I remember the song like what does that even mean? Like I was looking at I’ll look up the lyrics on genius and because the lyrics go, I want to push you around. Right? I was reminded as I want to push you away. But obviously the song is I want to push you around and that felt aggressive

Link Keller 30:55
are you getting a hint of sexual violence here?

Josué Cardona 31:03
A little bit? yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Link Keller 31:07
Truly the perfect song, though, for that scene of really nailing that like this is so uncomfortable and the playing guitar at a woman. I don’t know if any of you guys have experienced that. But that is not a rare experience. Yeah, I the Billy Eilish song. Yeah, that one that one is still floating around in my noggin. And then I’ve watched the video that they made to go with it a couple of times. I think that one’s really cool. People who haven’t seen it, Billy Eilish has a bunch of like, Barbie sized clothes, but it’s close from like Billy Eilish’s his music career and so from like music videos and stuff. I just think it’s a really cool detail. Especially within the context of this movie being you know, dolls and real women and the crossover and all that stuff.

Lara Taylor 32:07
Yeah, yeah. Indigo Girls closer to fine. The second I heard the first layer is like, lyrics to that singing every time it came up in the movie every single time. I know all the words to that song. And the Lizzo music in the beginning. So good. So good. I want someone to just sing about what I do every day, all day.

Marc Cuiriz 32:40
Yeah. And just kind of cutting it and be like, Hey, you good every time you like pick a stumble? Exactly.

Lara Taylor 32:47
Exactly. Like someone’s just watching. No, I don’t want that.

Marc Cuiriz 32:51
Are you Sure. is it what you really want?

Lara Taylor 32:57
No. But yeah, it was great. The soundtrack was so good. Yeah.

Marc Cuiriz 33:05
You know, one of the comments that I had made after walking out of the movie, was I was like, they could not have casted a better person to play Allan. And Michael Cera. I was like, he’s like, I was like, this is like the embodiment of an Allan honestly. And, and then my wife and I, like she was talking to some of her friends that had also seen the movie, and they called me and Allan and I was like, you know, I don’t know how to think about like, how I should how I should take that and like, I they’re like, no, no, it’s like, because Allan was like an ally. He was there. He supported all the stuff. Like he was all for it and everything. And I was like, okay, I can see that. But also, it’s it’s Allan. Allan, like, no one remembers Allan, I’m like, y’know. This is like a backhanded comment, like compliment right now.

Josué Cardona 34:05
That wasn’t a compliment.

Link Keller 34:07
no, it was a compliment. I love Allan.

Josué Cardona 34:10
So Alan is meant to be like, great. I mean, the joke is that he’s invisible. Right? Nobody knows who he is. Nobody remembers him. I don’t even remember. Any of the Kens acknowledging him.

Link Keller 34:22
Not really.

Josué Cardona 34:23
and He’s supossedly. Yeah, right.

Marc Cuiriz 34:28
best friend, but they didn’t acknowledge him at all.

Josué Cardona 34:30
Yeah. Just as a side note, right. I think I think Michael Cera. Like, is typecast as that. Right? Right. Yeah. Except in I, but I still remember him and Scott Pilgrim. Were like, he’s not like a great character. But like, he’s,

Link Keller 34:52
no he’s pretty bad. Scott Pilgrim is not a Cool Guy,

Josué Cardona 34:56
I know, but he kick ass, you know, and you’re that you’re still like that. That’s a quote that I liked the movie and he’s got, you know, like, he’s,

Link Keller 35:05
I will give you that Scott Pilgrim is more Ken than Allan.

Josué Cardona 35:08
Yes, yes. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

Link Keller 35:12
No, I like hearing like trans masc people talk about Allan and as sort of representative of the trans masc experience where it’s like, so, so much of your identity is around conforming to and fitting in to Ken’s clothes. But then, you know, when it comes down to it, recognizing that you have more solidarity with the women specifically, but people who are oppressed under patriarchy is like i He’s like, I gotta get out of here. And so I really like that and then you know, with weird Barbie sort of representing like the queer women experience where you have all these similar experiences, but you are still held on like the outside the edges of womanhood and I think that the the gender the gender stuff is really yummy. Which is so I think it’s so interesting because there’s like very little like sexuality represented within this movie. But gender comes up a lot. I think that is really cool.

Josué Cardona 36:18
Yeah, yeah. The the Barbie world is so exaggerated, right? Both at the beginning when it when it’s Barbie land, then when it’s Kendom, right, it’s to its to complete extremes. And it’s so I don’t know, I kept thinking. From my perspective, it’s like, they just showed the things that most embarrassed me about other men. Like, like, right, like coming coming from right coming from from from a male perspective. It’s like, Ah, okay, so I saw I saw the movie at the Alamo. And there’s an Alamo right by which also, like, the alamo’s great, right? So like, at the beginning, they had all these old videos and all this stuff is fantastic. Always go to an Alamo if you can. But this Alamo theater is by Wrigley Field where the Cubs play. And I didn’t know that there was a game at the same time as the movie. So when I left the movie, everybody had was leaving the game. And I walk out and the theater is on a third floor and I look out onto the street and there’s people walking around. And there’s a bar right in front. And there’s a guy in shorts with his shirt off and like a backwards hat and glasses on. I was like, it’s like this guy came out of the movie. It was like he was just one of these douchebag Kens that just came out and

Link Keller 37:42
he was ready to do beach.

Josué Cardona 37:44
He was just doing beach. He that’s all he was doing. At the bar. It was so it was so funny. It’s almost like they hired somebody, like there were Barbies everywhere. And someone’s like we need some Kens in here too. And they they pay this guy but I on on the gender stuff and I mean it can be it can be also, it’s just interesting that so Barbies are the whole world revolves around them right Barbie land. And then Ken feels invisible. And then when he gets the chance to do it, to do like to flip the table, he completely fits the table like exactly the same. He treats them just like they treated him.

Link Keller 38:32
No. And I’m gonna push back against that claim.

Josué Cardona 38:34
Okay, okay, push back, push back do it do it do it

Link Keller 38:37
in the beginning Barbie lands. And this is true within the production of Barbie; Ken is an accessory.

Josué Cardona 38:44
Yes, yes, yes.

Link Keller 38:46
So he does not have the fullness of personhood that Barbie is given. Right. And so the Barbies do not mistreat the Kens, they don’t give them a ton of attention. And they don’t center them in any way. They’re mostly just ignored. Kens go do their own thing. When they flip it, the Kens put the Barbies in positions of servitude.

Josué Cardona 39:13
Yes,

Link Keller 39:13
and dress them specific ways.

Josué Cardona 39:16
This is a good point. I can’t argue with that

Link Keller 39:17
So so that switch is not is not a one for one. It is very much informed by the patriarchal world that Ken saw where women serve and dress the way that men tell them to. So I do i

Josué Cardona 39:36
Well, that’s good. That’s good. That’s a good clarification it Well, I

Link Keller 39:39
think it’s extra important to point out for us, but I do also think that I hope that lots of audience members did catch that because it would be so easy to just be like well yeah, Barbies did it first and then the Kens just copied them but that that violence and enforcing servitude and all of those aspects that is more correlated to our real life world. And less so the fantastical version of Barbie where the Barbies all have these amazing jobs and do whatever they want, and they Kens hang out and do beach. Not saying that there aren’t women who do beach in the real world. That obviously also exists, but you know, it, it is very much like I and I think that that’s been some of the pushback from people is like, in the way that it resolves the like solution to Ken’s patriarchy is to give him attention. And to tell him like, Oh, you are important, and you do matter. And I’m sorry, I didn’t make you feel that way before, which some people are pushing back against because it’s like, that sort of feels like oh, well, the reason like in the real world we have patriarchy is because we don’t we don’t tell men that we appreciate them enough. And it’s like, Oh, I hope that that is not the takeaway. Yeah.

Josué Cardona 41:12
Like, they’re not like intentionally, right. It’s like, they just activated they turned on patriarchy, and immediately the Barbies became subservient. Right. It’s not like it, just like in the opposite way. The kens were just accessories. But once they acted, because I guess it was just Barbie land. Right. It wasn’t it wasn’t representing Yeah, thing, in particular, and once patriarchy came in, they defaulted into. And

Link Keller 41:39
I think that that that is such a good opening conversation of the way that we socialized little boys within the patriarchy. And the ways is like, it’s most men who will absolutely utilize the patriarchy to their own benefit. Or like, rationalizing it in that way. They’re doing like that is what was taught to me when I saw and so I’m, they’re doing what they see.

Josué Cardona 42:05
So are the women’s, the women’s. Yeah,

Link Keller 42:09
yes. And so having that I, you know, it could have gone harder. But I think within the context of the Barbie movie, I think that that was a good way of showcasing both like the way that patriarchy gets passed between men isn’t necessarily this nefarious, like, secret cult of like, we’re now initiating you into the woman haters club is like, no, it’s like, no, you see a guy do a thing and you’re like, that worked for him. I’m gonna try it. And then it’s like, ooh, all society keeps supporting that pattern.

Lara Taylor 42:37
I think that leans into the if she can see it, she can be it kind of thing, right? Or she can like, the kens didn’t see patriarchy. And then they this ken saw patriarchy and was like, that’s what I’m gonna do I want that. Um,

Link Keller 42:53
well and I think it’s also really important that like Ken explicitly says he’s like, once I realized it wasn’t about horses, I lost interest. And I think that that is also like, reflective of a lot of real men’s experiences where they’re like, I thought like the patriarchy meant I was I was personally going to get a bunch of power and it doesn’t really shake out that way. And they’re like, Yeah, honestly, it kind of sucks. I don’t like this anymore. I thought I was gonna get more horses

Marc Cuiriz 43:22
you know, when when I think about like the the when you guys brought up the idea of like the switch between like how it is in the beginning of the movie with Barbie land, and then it switches to Kendom part of me was like, viewed Kendom is like the patriarchy like at its core. So like, you know, like when when Ken’s like talking to all the men in the real world? They’re like, No, no, it’s still around. Like we’re still very much like, this is how we want to do things. We’re just sneakier about it. And so I feel like with Ken he’s like, how about let’s just not make it sneaky? And just like it really just through like the blood through the patriarchy in your face it like it like shoved it down. Your gall. It was like here, you want patriarchy. This is what it will look like. Like this is essentially what it looks like. It’s like most exaggerated form but also in its purest form. I think I

Link Keller 44:12
do I do like the the joke of once Ken has become indoctrinated by the patriarchy, he goes to get jobs and he goes to all these jobs where he’s completely unqualified, and it’s just like, Yeah, I can get this job easy.

Lara Taylor 44:28
that’s not how it works dude.

Link Keller 44:30
That’s so funny. That’s sometimes is how it works. oh man Yeah,

Marc Cuiriz 44:37
yeah.

Josué Cardona 44:37
Cuz you need experience. And he’s like, do I though?

Link Keller 44:40
Do I though??

Marc Cuiriz 44:43
and the guy is like, no, but like, we have to, like, say these things because it’s just, you know, it’s to cover our bases and make sure that like, people aren’t just thinking it’s like a patriarchal thing, even though in reality, they’re like, no, like, we would probably give you this job if we wanted to. It’s just that we have to, like go through these things because we have to make it seem like the patriarchy isn’t around as prevalent as it used to be. And so, I don’t know, I just felt like that was like an interesting thing of like, it’s like, here you go, you want patriarchy. Here it is. And then just kind of like, having to experience like, the huge like, like the complete like I don’t wanna say 180 Because it’s not a 180 it’s more like a 270

Josué Cardona 45:34
Barbie land is like a like an amplifier or something like that right? It’s like introduce patriarchy and boom that’s what you got. You could do a sequel where you introduced some other system

Marc Cuiriz 45:45
oligarchy I don’t know I don’t know. I

Josué Cardona 45:49
don’t know you get you get you get install some other system right and it would just go to its extreme which is which is like that’s what Barbie land in a way is if you take you know if you take that concept to its extreme as well that any any any new ideas that you introduced to it would be could potentially take over? If the if the Barbies. Why did the Barbie do we know? We don’t get to see? Actually clarify this for me. How does Barbie land turn into kendom? Like how do all the Barbies just suddenly get brainwashed?

Marc Cuiriz 46:32
I think the way they interpreted like how they how they explained it was that the barrier between Barbie land and the real world was it was disintegrating basically. So because of that the influences of Barbie land and the influences of the real world they were entered in like a they were intermingling with each other. So if he brings over a real world concept, it’s now manifesting itself in this in this way, so if he comes in and proclaims this, and it’s like a because of that influence like that. It’s almost like a magic thing, I think, where it’s like, oh, we’re bringing because like once he made the Mi casa, dojo, whatever

Josué Cardona 47:17
mojo dojo casa house.

Marc Cuiriz 47:18
There you go. Then all of a sudden, they’re like, Yo, these mojo Dojo Casa houses are flying off the shelves

Josué Cardona 47:24
got it

Marc Cuiriz 47:24
because they were really influenced. Yeah, the real world influenced Barbie land to create kendom and then Kendom by that because of that influenced the real world by creating its own line of things.

Josué Cardona 47:41
Okay, okay.

Lara Taylor 47:43
Yeah, so it was like a magic thing, the same way that like, the deprogramming was literally her going off on this like, monologue and this rant and all of a sudden they snap out of it.

Josué Cardona 47:57
Okay okay I’m only somewhat satisfied

Link Keller 48:04
Well, I mean what the what you’re talking about is like what they tried to explain with that that line about the smallpox that that was what they were trying to cover that sort of plot hole

Josué Cardona 48:16
got it Yeah, yeah

Lara Taylor 48:17
yeah, yeah.

Josué Cardona 48:19
they had no resistance

Lara Taylor 48:20
like they’ve been brainwashed and infected

Link Keller 48:24
like it better that it feeds back in like you’re saying Marc I think they should have leaned harder on that but the idea of that the Barbies in Barbie land are Barbies who are being played with by little girls in the real world

Lara Taylor 48:38
and so if the if people want these mojo Dojo casa houses

Link Keller 48:41
if people buy you know it’s the the hot new ticket and 100 little girls all just got the Mojo Dojo Casa house as their birthday gift

Lara Taylor 48:50
then they’re gonna they’re gonna they’re gonna play with their kens, right?

Link Keller 48:53
Yeah, it’s a new toy so you play with it because it’s new. I think that would have been

Josué Cardona 48:58
Oh, this makes sense

Link Keller 48:59
better way to rationalize that change but

Marc Cuiriz 49:03
I kind of like to think of it as like there’s a boy out there playing with a Ken doll and just assigned to you know what? Any, like, kicks his little sister out and just takes all her Barbie. Yeah. And creates Kendom and he’s like, this is my mojo dojo casa house.

Link Keller 49:18
That would like they could have just done a jump cut to that and it would have been the perfect explanation. Yeah, I did. I did really love the detail of like, the reason that Barbie was like, pretty apathetic and uninterested in Ken is because the America Ferrera’s Gloria Gloria’s Gloria didn’t have a Ken and so her Barbie never played with Ken. I think that that’s such a perfect detail. I do love, off of that. I do love that there are both lesbian readings of Barbie and asexual readings of Barbie with her uninterested in Ken disinteresting ken I think that that’s really cool interesting stuff. I love the idea of of asexual Barbie. I don’t know why that that really does something for me. I’m like Hell yeah, I love that

Lara Taylor 50:11
because Barbie is a toy that gets sexualized a lot.

Link Keller 50:16
a lot. Its just like, I don’t have genitals!

Lara Taylor 50:19
no genitals

Link Keller 50:20
I have all the genitals. that line made me laugh really loud. I do I think that also feeds back into the, the pre and post patriarchy moment in Barbie lands of having Barbie is the Barbies have girls night, right? And they spend time with each other. And Barbie excludes Ken and that’s part of why he’s so hurt is that he gets excluded in this way. But why don’t the kens have boys night?

Marc Cuiriz 50:58
They do?

Josué Cardona 51:00
Well, no

Link Keller 51:00
and then when it flips, right? When it’s the kendom and they’re in charge, they still don’t have boys nights. And I think that that is such an interesting discussion about the way that masculinity treats friendships between boys. And that Barbie was feeling fulfilled with her community of other Barbies. She got what she needed from that. But Ken was not getting that from the other Kens. And so he lashed out and tried to change it and they still weren’t showing up for each other in that way and the Barbies defeated them by foisting that aggression towards each other. And I love the idea of like the the solidarity between the Barbies and Allan is what the Kens were missing. They didn’t have that solidarity with each other they didn’t have that shared emotional connection the same way that Barbies do the same way that women often do. I think that’s yummy! yummy discussion stuff!

Lara Taylor 52:02
Yeah, the closest they got to a boys night was when they were all singing the matchbox 20 songs or to their to their Barbies.

Josué Cardona 52:12
But they needed the Barbies there.

Link Keller 52:13
Yeah, like they don’t play at each other

Lara Taylor 52:16
that’s why I said, it’s the closest they get and it’s not

Link Keller 52:18
the closest they got. Yeah.

Josué Cardona 52:21
So there’s that there’s a part where someone says like, where’s like, Barbie has a dream house? Where does Where’s Ken’s house? That’s like, oh, no, does Ken even have a house?

Lara Taylor 52:32
It’s interesting because Nina and I watch a lot of HGTV and they did the Barbie Dream House competition where they had everyone come in. It was really cool. They each got a room and then there was a randomizer for the decade of Barbie that they were doing. And they kept making this big deal that one of the rooms in the house was for the first time Ken was getting a Ken’s den in the Barbie Dream House. It was a cool concept. Um, but yeah, Ken doesn’t have a house. Ken has a den

Josué Cardona 53:08
a he’s the accessory.

Link Keller 53:09
that’s so funny. I don’t ever want to hear the phrase man cave ever again. It should always be Ken’s den. That’s perfect

Lara Taylor 53:19
actually I think after the movie.

Josué Cardona 53:21
oh, Ken’s Saloon?

Lara Taylor 53:24
Maybe after the movie came out, they should like recut the show to make it the Mojo Dojo Casa house in that room is Ken’s den for the first time he gets his own room in Barbie’s house.

Josué Cardona 53:42
It’s yeah, I mean, what else like he, he very explicitly was like, Can I stay over? Like, can we be boyfriend and girlfriend? Right? Like just straight up and she’s like, like Link said, like, she doesn’t need that shit. She’s good.

Marc Cuiriz 54:01
She’s just living her best life.

Josué Cardona 54:03
Yeah,

Marc Cuiriz 54:03
perfect life.

Josué Cardona 54:05
It’s weird. I don’t know exactly. It’s hard to empathize with the character of Ken. When he’s set up as the accessory as like he’s he’s

Link Keller 54:20
UH HUH!!

Josué Cardona 54:21
right right

Link Keller 54:22
Keep going!! follow the thought

Josué Cardona 54:24
no, You go you go. Yeah, yeah

Link Keller 54:25
no, you follow the thought.

Lara Taylor 54:26
you keep following the thought

Marc Cuiriz 54:28
You got this.

Josué Cardona 54:31
I got nothing. I got nothing I’m done.

Link Keller 54:33
It’s hard to empathize with characters that are incredibly flat and exist solely to support the main character.

Josué Cardona 54:43
Yes.

Link Keller 54:44
Now if we follow that doo doo doo doo little dotted line back to cinema and moviemaking as a whole which Greta Gerwig loves to do. That is a reflection of the way 100 years of movie have treated women characters. And the idea of there’s a woman like what do you why you like mad? There’s a woman character in the movie is like you made her so flat, and so only existing to support this one character like how am I supposed to empathize or connect with that? It’s like, Oh, oop.

Josué Cardona 55:22
Yep. That’s it.

Marc Cuiriz 55:24
It’s like they’re like, well, they’re in the movie. Like they have their they have screen time and stuff. It’s like, Yeah, but there’s also no personality there. They’re literally just a part of the background almost

Link Keller 55:36
an accessory.

Marc Cuiriz 55:37
Well, the interesting thing is that this this Ken, his job is Beach, right? He that he doesn’t really have anything to do. But also, this Barbie is like the stereotypical Barbie the standard Barbie, she has no job she does. She does nothing. And she has more personality than he does.

Link Keller 55:57
Yup.

Josué Cardona 55:59
Yeah. I mean, she has character development.

Lara Taylor 56:02
Well, but also her her purpose is

Link Keller 56:05
So does Ken.

Lara Taylor 56:06
Yeah.

Josué Cardona 56:08
Does he though? That’s where I was

Link Keller 56:10
He’s not given the same level of character growth and everything. But he does, you know, he has his big song like that is very much a character growth moment for him both like, within the context of the movie, and also, within context of movies, that you have a big song number when a character is going through growth moment. But I do like legitimately think it is impressive to get that level of flatness in, especially in the early Ken. Because Ryan Gosling is so compelling as an actor, like when he’s on screen, like people are like, what’s, what’s Ryan Gosling doing? So, I do think that he did a fantastic job in this role. But I yeah, I totally, it’s very intentional that the way Ken is treated is very reflective of the way that so many female characters got treated in movies, you know, especially in the 60s and 70s. But like, the whole time Yeah.

Josué Cardona 57:11
Then then none of that makes sense. Right? Because Because at the end, I was like, I I feel like you want me to care about this character, but I can’t. Because he has been so intentionally, I mean, aggressively flat. Right? Not even just like invisibly flat but just like aggressively flat. So, okay, mission accomplished. Well done.

Link Keller 57:35
It’s good stuff. It’s good stuff. There’s lots of really cool movie easter eggs. I mean, the 2001 Space Odyssey opening was glorious

Josué Cardona 57:47
that was amazing. That was amazing

Link Keller 57:49
but yeah, there’s lots of there’s lots of little movie easter eggs in there that I think are really fun. I gotta say though, I think my favorite moment is when Barbie has flat feet and she goes and talks to weird Barbie as the like the soothsayer The wise man to help you begin your quest. And she holds out the heel or the Birkenstock. and Barbies like heels! weird Barbies like there’s it’s not actually choice like you have you have to pick this one. I love that just from like a storytelling joke, right? Yeah, yeah, it’s like you can’t you can’t you have you have to choose to continue the story. what were some of your guys’s favorite parts favorite joke? one liners?

Marc Cuiriz 58:48
that’s a good question. I was not prepared to answer this.

Link Keller 58:53
Okay, I’ll give another one when

Josué Cardona 58:56
cheater

Link Keller 58:56
when Barbie goes back to the dojo Casa house and, and she agrees to what Ken is asking and he goes back inside the behind the saloon door and he just goes SUBLIME!! I teared up a little at that from laughter It was so funny. Truly the like the perfect delivery but then off screen is like so funny to me

Marc Cuiriz 59:34
I think really just anything with Simu Liu in it. Like his his iteration of Ken was just

Link Keller 59:43
really funny

Marc Cuiriz 59:43
just. Yeah, it was so funny. And just like just the cockiness that radiated from it like you could totally tell like, he gave it his all. Like he was 100% in this

Lara Taylor 59:56
I loved to hate him I love

Link Keller 59:58
He’s got big Kenergy.

Marc Cuiriz 1:00:00
Yeah, yeah, he’s got that big kenergy and it was perfect and I loved it. I loved it so much

Link Keller 1:00:07
yeah, the um the I’ll beach you off. How are you going to beach? off one guy or two guys? We can’t even beach off one guy? that was a good one that was a good joke. It was a really good joke. Side Story I went and saw this in movie theaters. It’s my first time going back to the movie theater Since COVID started very exciting. I went saw Barbie and then I went and saw across the spider verse which was fantastic, but great double feature but that joke specifically the beach off and then in spider verse has the stop talking about your holes. You’re making everybody uncomfortable. Like those. Those two jokes are like, so perfect that they just go together. They’re beautiful. It made me laugh so hard. Fantastic.

Josué Cardona 1:00:57
Oh yeah, I think I think my favorite stuff is like the the mojo dojo Casa house and stuff, right? It’s like, Hey, man, you get to name stuff for the first time. What would you name them? It’s like, uuuhh, I think this would be really cool. I went to the kendom the those things I thought were

Link Keller 1:01:22
really funny.

Josué Cardona 1:01:23
Yeah, yeah,

Lara Taylor 1:01:24
I think some of my favorite parts of the movie were seeing the different Barbies and Kens that were like, historical kind of left out.

Link Keller 1:01:32
yeah!

Lara Taylor 1:01:33
I was mad that they did not have more Skipper. But I am so glad that they included cockring Ken in the movie.

Lara Taylor 1:01:44
midge?

Link Keller 1:01:46
I mean, we could we could have avoided Midge.

Lara Taylor 1:01:49
Yeah, yeah,

Josué Cardona 1:01:51
they spent a lot of time on midge

Link Keller 1:01:55
I embarrassed my friend by hooting and hollering when they showed wheelchair Barbie because I thought that that was really cool.

Lara Taylor 1:02:02
that was cool

Link Keller 1:02:02
And then they also had prosthetic arm Barbie and I got really excited about I didn’t hoot and holler for that one cuz she was in the background. But wheelchair Barbie got like a front and center moment. I was like, WOOO, he’s like, Shut up. You’re embarrassing me.

Lara Taylor 1:02:18
One thing that I honestly haven’t seen a lot of talk about it other than a couple articles with some horrible comments is that one of the actresses that played Barbie is one of the Barbies is trans. And that

Link Keller 1:02:28
Doctor Barbie!

Lara Taylor 1:02:32
Yeah, Dr. Barbie is trans. Which was really cool.

Link Keller 1:02:36
I love seeing Dr. Barbie

Lara Taylor 1:02:39
this movie was great. So many good things.

Link Keller 1:02:42
Gorgeous, gorgeous costume design set design. Fantastic. So it’s like so much of this movie was practical effects, which I think makes it like supreme, sublime!

Josué Cardona 1:02:57
sublime!!

Link Keller 1:03:00
Yeah, just just a visual treat. Specifically the scenes where they’re going from Barbie land into the real world and they’re on all of the different types of automobile which one very funny joke but all of that was like almost all of that was practical effects. So they like set up the layered scenes in the back

Lara Taylor 1:03:21
and had them running.

Link Keller 1:03:23
Yeah, parallax effect is what that’s called, but I it looks so good. And then the payoff joke of the the tandem bike and then the three person bike and like eleven in person bike for the Mattel people, that was that was a good good joke pay off. I really enjoyed that.

Josué Cardona 1:03:46
There was there was one thing at the end that I’ll just I’ll just end with this that what after like during the credits, they were showing different Barbies, so we’re kind of weird. And then they showed a totally yo yo Barbie. And, and she’s black. And it says like I really yo yo Yeah, I was like, Are they are they continuing to call out like how messed up some of the things were like all the way up until the end was Mattel okay with this? Like there were so many things I was like does Mattel know that we’re that they’re getting called out in the movie?

Link Keller 1:04:21
I think I think Mattel was in on it. And that’s why they really didn’t push on the consumerism aspects.

Lara Taylor 1:04:30
Yeah,

Link Keller 1:04:30
very much at all.

Josué Cardona 1:04:31
that was the deal

Link Keller 1:04:31
It’s like you can’t you can dunk on us, but like we’re not we’re not going to talk about the consumerism side.

Josué Cardona 1:04:38
We’re here to sell dolls.

Lara Taylor 1:04:40
Sell some weird Barbies.

Josué Cardona 1:04:43
here to sell weird Barbie. I just checked and apparently they are not selling a mojo Dojo casa house,

Lara Taylor 1:04:49
probably haven’t made it yet.

Marc Cuiriz 1:04:52
it’ll probably be here by christmas.

Link Keller 1:04:53
Probably they were like, we are going to make it and then they were like, oh, no, just like Allan and Midge, Nobody is going to buy this

Lara Taylor 1:05:03
I think I know some people that would buy it

Marc Cuiriz 1:05:07
Josué would buy it

Josué Cardona 1:05:08
I would not buy it.

Lara Taylor 1:05:09
they could have made it at Comic Con exclusive people would have bought it

Link Keller 1:05:12
get a mojo dojo house

Josué Cardona 1:05:14
hasn’t been a comic con exclusive

Link Keller 1:05:16
just put your your Gundams in there

Josué Cardona 1:05:19
yeah. all right any closing thoughts?

Link Keller 1:05:24
My my final closing thought is the same one that they ended on in the movie it was it comedy perfection to end with the last thing that Barbie does is sets up a gynecology appointment.

Josué Cardona 1:05:37
agreed

Link Keller 1:05:37
I thought that was so fucking funny.

Josué Cardona 1:05:39
That’s exactly what I said. I was like that was the perfect joke to end on it was perfect. Yeah. Also the Duolingo joke. I thought it was hilarious too, that was great

Lara Taylor 1:05:54
Nina Nina laughed at me because I did my Hebrew lesson before the movie started. Yeah,

Link Keller 1:06:04
it’s you. You’re that husband? How does that feel?

Lara Taylor 1:06:07
MmHMM

Josué Cardona 1:06:11
Any other closing thoughts? No?

Marc Cuiriz 1:06:16
I like the ruminating death Barbie idea.

Josué Cardona 1:06:19
Yeah, yeah,

Lara Taylor 1:06:20
that’s That’s some real there’s some real stuff right there.

Link Keller 1:06:26
I look forward to the memento mori Barbie coming soon. 2024 comes with coffin. and urn

Marc Cuiriz 1:06:40
and existential dread.

Link Keller 1:06:41
The question is Is Barbies coffin Pink?

Josué Cardona 1:06:45
Yes,

Lara Taylor 1:06:46
yes, of course it is.

Marc Cuiriz 1:06:47
Yeah.

Link Keller 1:06:48
Okay, Unanimous.

Josué Cardona 1:06:50
Yep. All right, Marc, take us home.

Marc Cuiriz 1:06:54
Oh, no. No, uh put on the spot. Thank you, everybody so much for tuning in to this week’s episode of GT radio. For all you if you guys want to be included into the conversation, links to all the stuff is in the show notes. And all the community spaces are there as well. You can join in have wonderful conversations about all sorts of other topics as well. Remember to geek out and do good. And we’ll be back next week

Link Keller 1:07:31
MMbye Barbie!

Josué Cardona 1:07:34
Bye Barbie!

Lara Taylor 1:07:35
Bye Barbie!

Marc Cuiriz 1:07:35
Bye Barbie!

Josué Cardona 1:07:37
Geek Therapy is a 501 C three nonprofit organization dedicated to making the world a better place through geek culture. To learn more about our mission and become a supporter, visit geek therapy.org

Transcribed by https://otter.ai and Link Keller

Characters / Media

• Barbie / Barbie (2023)
• Ken / Barbie (2023)
• Allan / Barbie (2023)
• Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010)
• Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)

Themes / Topics

Conversation Topics:

* Patriarchy
* Change
* Consequences
* Cultural representation
* Death
* Difficult emotions
* Family
* Finding Oneself/Identity Development
* LGBT Issues
* Moral dilemma
* Power struggle
* Standing up for others
* Strong female role models
* Standing up for oneself
* Taking responsibility for one’s actions
* Working with others

Relatable Experience:

* Clarity/Understanding
* Coming of age/Getting older
* Death
* Depression
* Disability
* Fear/Anxiety
* Loss (other than death)
* New Life Event (New Rules)

Questions? Comments? Discuss this episode on the GT Forum.

—

Links / Social Media

Check out the GT Network: network.geektherapy.com

GT Forum: forum.geektherapy.org

GT Discord: geektherapy.com/discord

GT Facebook Group: facebook.com/groups/geektherapy

Find us at www.GeekTherapy.org | @GeekTherapy | Lara: @GeekTherapist | Link: @CHICKENDINOSAUR | Josué: @JosueACardona

Ask us anything through the Question Queue and we’ll answer on the show: geektherapy.org/qq

Join the Conversation!

What did you think of the Barbie movie? Did you have a Weird Barbie?

The post Hi Barbie! appeared first on Geek Therapy.