High Low Brow
We’re carving out space in the airwaves for deep dives and thoughtful convos about our beloved pop culture that is often overlooked, laughed at, trashed, and brushed aside. Join us (and some of our internet pals!) for hot, juicy, maybe controversh opinions and a few rounds of games inspired by the stuff you watched when you were home sick with an anxiety-induced stomachache in your formative years.
High Low Brow
Abbott Elementary Love + Rewatching 90s Gems: The Crow & Striptease
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Join us on this episode of High Low Brow as we dive into our love for "Abbott Elementary," praising Quinta Brunson's masterful blend of humor and heart. We also share how we've been finding solace in cozy movie nights with 90s classics like "The Crow," delving into its dark allure and lasting impact. Switching gears, we dissect unforgettable scenes from "Striptease," comparing it to "Showgirls" and celebrating Demi Moore's iconic performance. Whether you're a fan of nostalgic 90s gems or modern TV hits, this episode is packed with insights and entertainment. Tune in now!
Welcome to High Low Brow. The show with high brow takes on low brow culture. I'm your one host, amanda Scriber.
Speaker 2And I had three cookies for breakfast as an act of trans joy. Nobody can scold me for it, because it's still june, river gilbert what kind of cookies were they. They were craig's cookies.
Speaker 1I know, but like what kind?
Speaker 2of craig's cookies. Amma, I don't think you understand. I am like basically cookie monster. It's less of like ooh, yes, I wonder what type of cookies these are. With the quality it's more of a just open mouth shove like cookie thing.
Speaker 1Yeah, exactly, yeah, I love that. I told you to order the cookies.
Speaker 2Well, yeah, I was like I made a huge mistake in not getting you to order cookies with our groceries. And you were like well, I know somebody's ordering craig's cookies. And I was like, oh, you're a genius.
Speaker 1Someone's the smartest person in this household I wouldn't go that far, but I do have good decisions you do have good decisions and I do have good ideas, and I do have, I do do good you do do good sometimes not all the time, but sometimes occasionally.
Speaker 2Um, I try, emma. What's gonna make you wrangle bird this week? What? Is making my brain go bird this week I can go first if you want. Yeah, pink pony papa, specifically pink pony papa. Yeah, he just makes me very happy and it's it's just really lovely to see old gay joy and that's what got me to really listen to chapel rone and yeah, you're so late to the chapel, I am so late.
Speaker 2I mean like I've heard the singles, but like I you gotta turn in your card listen, listen, listen hey, hey, hey hey I was too busy listening to brat on repeat I mean, I've been listening to brat and chapel. Well, so have I now and renee rap and wow, wow. Somebody sounds like she wants to start the gold star lesbian discourse. Wow, somebody sounds like she wants to start the gold star lesbian discourse. That's problematic, I know that's why I'm saying wow, it sounds like somebody is saying there's only one right way to be gay. What's making you bring over?
Speaker 1you're toxic. What is making my brain go brr? Honestly, it's hard. I don't know if there is anything.
Speaker 2I ask you every week I know, I'm just like I don't know. Life is hard, dude.
Speaker 1I'm just trying to survive out here on these streets. I will say, though yesterday I went to Pride, Toronto's drag ball, where they had like a million trillion drag performers and kind of piggybacking off of corpse speak piggybacking, piggybacking, circling, synergizing. I finally got to see don from season 60 of drag race perform live and they performed to chapel roan and they did pink pony club right they did, yeah, pony club because it's a religious experience yeah, and I was just like don really said gay rights yeah, no kidding and it made me so happy.
Speaker 1Also denim from kenneth's drag race season three performed to apple bottom jeans by nelly, which was also like incredible in the jean fit? Yes, in the jean fit which, like I feel like most people were not as excited as I was. I was like, oh my God, denim in, denim Talking about jeans yeah. Like this is incredible and amazing.
Speaker 2There's layers. That's synergy.
Speaker 1That's synergy, baby, and that's on synergy, oh my God so that made my brain go burn. Yeah, that's fair, but also I think I messaged you this. I also posted this on the internet. My friend Sam, shout out to Sam, don't know if you will hear this, but she gave me these VIP passes for Pride. So I was like I have no idea what these will entail. I went yesterday to the event and not only I was able to sit in a nice little section, lovely, amazing.
Speaker 2You texted me and you were like you actually might've enjoyed this, cause I'm sitting with food but it is loud, and I was like that's two out of three. Yeah, I was like I had.
Speaker 1I think I was like that's two out of three. Yeah, I was like I had. I think I was like every event needs to be like this.
Speaker 2I need to be able to sit with chicken kebabs and and I'm gonna go out on a limb and say, hey, maybe that should just be the standard. Maybe everybody should just be able to sit down if they want to or need to, and there should be food, because every event should have food, because everyone's sleep and eating schedule is so fucked up oh, 100 like, even if it was just like a cheese plate and some like little cookies I, I disagree.
Speaker 1I think it has to be past like hors d'oeuvres, because sure all I know is that, like I was, like, wow, I get to sit here and I get to drink a bubbly while eating some chicken kabobs and watching drag. Like is this?
Speaker 2I am so You're the gay 1%.
Speaker 1Yeah, I am the privileged gay 1%.
Speaker 2Yeah, this is your gold star moment. Have it.
Speaker 1Listen, I just want to go.
Speaker 2I want to go out in public, but it's hard and, oh my god, I feel you because like we were gonna go to the trance march and I was like emma, I have a headache and I sprained both my ankles and I think I'm having a lot of anxiety about this and you're like that's cool I mean I wanted to go, yeah, emma, I wanted to go, yeah, yeah, yeah. Emma, I wanted to go too.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2It was just one of those. Being perceived in public in 2024 is hard.
Speaker 1It sure is.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean, what did we do that night rather than?
Speaker 2go to. I feel like I slept. No oh we watched the Crow. Yeah, we watched the Crow. I was, it was like yes, you did sleep at some point, but we did watch a movie I was like we went on this website that was like, reckon, what movie should I watch? And it's trash. But it told us to watch, uh, tom mcblonde and I was like, oh, that looks interesting. But then the crow popped up on prime and we were like, do you want to watch the crow?
Speaker 1yeah because neither of us has seen it in like the past two decades yes, and I was like I remembered this being good when I was younger, but also I'm 40 now, so like I wonder if it holds up, because you know how you watch some films when you were younger yeah and you're just like you watch it again and you're like, oh, yeah, donnie darko fight club, yeah, no, no, I remember, I remember being a teenager, yeah, so we. We decided let's watch this let's watch this.
Speaker 2Let's watch the crow so what were your thoughts on the?
Speaker 1crow it was so edgy like I knew it was edgy when I was younger and like I knew all this before we watched yeah, right, I mean the cover. The poster of the film is very edgelord, like there's no delusions of failure.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 1However, the writing and some of the like, it was it wasn't bad, like the film wasn't bad, but I was just like, oh, I don't remember this being as choppy.
Speaker 2It was a product of its time. Yeah, I, because it came out in 94. Yes, the comic came out in 89.
Speaker 1Yeah, I remember the next morning you told me that you stayed up and read the comic.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, because I was like we had so many questions about the lore Like wait, so the crow is invincible, except when they shoot the crow, but the crow is still alive, but he's not invincible anymore. Is it just that he had to get revenge and that was it. So I was like, well, maybe they go into more detail in the comic and no they go into less detail in the comic.
Speaker 1Yeah, it was like wait, why is he now like I'm gonna die? I was like I thought he was invincible. No, what is happening?
Speaker 2yeah, so I'm sure. So I only read the original, like because the author of the comic uh wrote it to kind of come to terms and process his girlfriend being killed in a drunk driving accident yeah, so I guess like there are parallels between the comic book author and eric draven yeah, and somebody dealing with loss and loss and of a partner yeah, yeah the other thing I think I kept asking as we were watching was like the, the crime boss, or top dollar, top dollar yeah I was like is he a vampire?
Speaker 1is he just a bad guy? Why are they eating an eyeball? Why, are they drinking blood or is it wine, like what is happening?
Speaker 2I have questions yeah, so top dollar and his uh movie, only sister girlfriends who had the worst case of brow blindness.
Speaker 1Yeah, like and here's the other thing too is that Top Dollar of that time. He looked like a vampire Because he had that sort of like True Blood.
Speaker 2Well, I was going to say Interview with a Vampire. Oh, okay, I was going to say he reminded me of somebody on the council in True Blood.
Speaker 1Or Dracula.
Speaker 2Not like a Gary Oldman, bram Stoker's Dracula, cause he had the, the buns, he had the space buns.
Speaker 1Yeah, but he had that weird like forehead kind of thing he did have like that, like poofy golf bang moment. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I I'm not mad that we watched it, no me neither I hated that the skater girl was pushing Mongo. Yeah, you screamed at Mongo.
Speaker 2I was just like why did they make this poor girl learn how to skateboard wrong? Maybe pushing Mongo in 94 was like super cool. Maybe I'm so wrong.
Speaker 1You'll have to look it up. Yeah, maybe it was.
Speaker 2Yeah, I don't know if it held up, but I mean they're remaking it. I think they have remade it, I think it has been. It is out as of like earlier this month. Oh, I'm wrong, it is coming out in August.
Speaker 1Oh, so that's still pretty soon.
Speaker 2It's soon adjacent.
Speaker 1Yeah, so like we're early to the crow band.
Speaker 2Yeah, hopping re, soon it's soon adjacent.
Speaker 1Yeah, so like we're early to the crow band, yeah, hopping, re-hopping on the crow bandwagon so I need to.
Speaker 2There was the original trade paperback for the crow uh, and then it got passed along to like three different comp like it started at I don't remember which one it started at but then went to kitchen sink, then it went to id, but then I went to Kitchen Sink, then I went to IDW, then I went to Image. Okay, so there are, like probably in the ballpark of a hundred issues of the Crow that I haven't read, so maybe we get answers as to what are his crow powers. Maybe Because he disappears sometimes.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2And also in the film you can see out of his eye like the crow's eyes. Yeah, I liked when I googled what are the crow's superpowers.
Speaker 1The top one was empathy. Yeah, I remember and I'm like, wait, he just like he cares a lot about me.
Speaker 2Well, that's what I thought, but then I looked into it more and it was no, he can see, think like you know, I'm an empath, not I'm empathetic like the psychic empathy, not, not. I just care a lot, man. That's why I'm so sad about my girlfriend.
Speaker 1I have so many feelings. I have a lot of feelings. Yeah, I'm a crow, oh, I'm a crow. I guess we'll have to revisit this when the new Crow comes out.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1To see.
Speaker 2The Crow 2, the Reckoning.
Speaker 1We also not on the same day, but I think it was the week before we watched.
Speaker 2Striptease yeah, we watched Striptease. Which came 96, 98?.
Speaker 1Yeah, I think 96. 96, with Demi Moore.
Speaker 2And Burt Reynolds. Yeah yeah, as the terrifying congressman.
Speaker 1Yeah, and ving roms yeah, who was the security guard for the strip club? Yeah demi moore worked out.
Speaker 2Yeah, the, oh god, what was it? The something?
Speaker 1beaver, eager, beaver, eager, beaver yeah, and it was interesting because we again we were kind of like what movie do we want to watch? What kind of vibe do we want? What do, what do we think?
Speaker 2we're like it's pride month, we should watch striptease well, there was a category on crave that was uh, erotic 90s or 90s erotic and we're like well, we've seen showgirls, so what else do we watch? And we watched Striptease.
Speaker 1Yeah, and I think also part of our decision making here was that we watched Showgirls. We obviously need to watch Striptease to see how these two sort of Stack up yeah. Against one another.
Speaker 2Did you have a preference between the two?
Speaker 1Oh, you know what Okay.
Speaker 2Controversial or brave between the two oh, you know what?
Speaker 1okay, controversial to brave. I think striptease was better written.
Speaker 2I had more fun watching striptease yeah because I knew what they were doing. The whole way through I was like oh, so this is, this has like a coherent beginning, middle and end yeah, like it was an actual film, but showgirls is camp high camp which I oh, it was great, like great I love.
Speaker 1Yeah, I'm just like this is ridiculous and makes zero sense. 10 out of 10.
Speaker 210 out of 10 we have to talk about bururt Reynolds' character.
Speaker 1Oh my, okay, so as soon as Burt Reynolds' governor character.
Speaker 2Yeah, congressman David Dillbeck.
Speaker 1Okay, so soon as this congressman was introduced, which is in like the first five minutes.
Speaker 2Yeah, he assaults somebody with a champagne bottle. Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1As soon as I saw him I was like wait, is this the same actor who plays Baby Billy in the Righteous Gemstones?
Speaker 2The entire way through, we were like this is Baby Billy.
Speaker 1I am and like maybe someone else can chime in on this, but I feel like Baby Billy in the Righteous Gemstones was sort of like character profiled off of this Inspired by David Dillbeck. Yeah, because, like literally, they are one in the same Unreal.
Speaker 2The best, slash, worst scene in the movie, I think, was where he gets his like aid to steal her lint from the laundromat yes covers himself in vaseline and wears cowboy boots and is like alluded to be jerking off yeah, yeah and then goes down to the like young republican convention or whatever it is young christian, yeah, and is shaking hands with everybody and they're all wiping it off because he's still covered in Vaseline, because he's still like greasy and gross.
Speaker 1Which, honestly, I bet you there's so like that is, that is so many Republicans. A hundred percent, like you cannot convince me otherwise.
Speaker 2Oh, my god, yeah.
Speaker 1I mean, there's a reason that like trans porn is most searched in places with trans bands yeah, of course we cannot talk about striptease and not talk about demi more going topless oh, and we were like I think both of us were just like oh, she looks really good. Because I think I, if I remember correctly, when Demi Moore filmed Striptease, it was super controversial that she was going topless. But not only that. I think she was like in her 40s when she filmed.
Speaker 2Striptease, and she was one year off of doing GI Jane. So, she was probably already had the rule or was getting ready to that yes, so yeah, bang and body, yeah her like wow, yeah, wow wow, you want to see to be more like she's not fully nude.
Speaker 1You don don't get the bottom bits.
Speaker 2No, no, no.
Speaker 1You get the top bits, but if you want to see her body in the profile, damn yeah.
Speaker 2I also love that we got the T-1000 as Demi Moore's husband, robert Patrick. Yes, the T-1000. Just the T-1000. From Terminator.
Speaker 1Yeah, and he was using their kid to sort of like steal from hospital.
Speaker 2Yeah, which I was like this doesn't make any sense, because she was allegedly secretary for the fbi, so she would have had to have been vetted and they would have been like no, your husband is sketchy, not good yeah, this is well.
Speaker 1It's related to the film, but unrelated to the film. So right before we put the movie, on on. I forget what streaming service we were using, but it said something like dune, more or like oh what did they call?
Speaker 2it was demi more and dema more, or something like that.
Speaker 1Yeah dema more and we were like, wait, who's dema more? And you were convinced that it had to be someone else and I was like I think they made a typo and we ended up finding out that the daughter in the film is actually played by Rumor Willis.
Speaker 2Who is Demi's daughter?
Speaker 1Yeah, and Bruce.
Speaker 2Willis' daughter. I've just found out.
Speaker 1Yeah, she has a potato head. But it was funny because as soon as I saw the kid I was like I'm pretty sure that's Rumor Willis.
Speaker 2Yeah, Did she change her name? Did it used to be no?
Speaker 1it was always Rumor, rumor willis. I don't know like I don't know why. I think they just made an error that's so funny yeah, I think they just made an error on the streaming service.
Speaker 2But get your shit together, crave let's talk about mental health belt.
Speaker 1No, let's talk about your fuck up of striptease's cast list but yes, I I think that, like if we're comparing striptease and what is it? Showgirls, showgirls together like striptease. Clearly had writers in the room that knew how to write a movie.
Speaker 2I'm gonna say something controversial and get brave. I think Strip Tease was showgirls for straight people yes like I was thinking that I'm like, oh yeah, okay, I get it, I get it. This was the male gaze and the other one was for the male gaze.
Speaker 1Oh, I see what you did there. We also wanted to talk watching Abbott Elementary. It was a show that I had started watching on Disney Plus here in Canada. I think we talked about this in the last episode, but we really miss being able to have, you know, a show that's a quick 30. Everything is so long, content's so long 22 minutes is wonderful, yeah and we were. We were aching for a show that was quick, and I hadn't. I had only gotten through, I think maybe two episodes, three episodes, yeah like two or three episodes.
Speaker 1So I was like I'm willing to restart this so that we could do it together.
Speaker 2And yeah, we got through it very so quick, yeah, and we were waiting forever for season three to come out.
Speaker 1Yeah, because season three got released in the us and then they took forever to launch it in canada. Because they hate us because they hate us yeah, like hello, we want things at the same time, please. If you're not familiar with Abbott Elementary, abbott Elementary is written by Quinta Brunson. Yes, and she's a hilarious comedian good writer.
Speaker 2I think it was written. Was it created by her as well? Yeah, yeah, like she plays the main character, janine. Yes, just such a great cast.
Speaker 1Do you want to explain what the premise of yeah, it's?
Speaker 2a uh, primarily black school in philadelphia and it's about the struggles that these teachers face and it's like very child focused, like it's. It's never like oh, these fucking kids. It's always like in service to the children.
Speaker 1And that's a really refreshing take them to a charter school or wanting to provide certain programs for their students but not being able to because the funding is not there. You know, trying to deal with different family dynamics and sort of what that teacher and parent relationship looks like, kind of what their own relationships look like, it's just uh, it's funny but also very heartwarming yeah, it says a lot of stuff, but it doesn't say stuff at the expense of writing or at the expense of humor.
Speaker 1Mr johnson, the uh custodian is the best character it's so funny because, to your point, like, he is one of the best characters apparently and I read this online, so if it's incorrect, please do not drag me on the internet but apparently he was only supposed to be in one episode as like a throwaway character and then he just nailed. He nailed that characterization so well and people really responded to him that they decided to write him in yeah, it's like, uh, jesse from breaking bad.
Speaker 2he was supposed to be killed off in the first episode, yep, so yeah, no, he's wonderful, they really flesh him out in this season, like he's always kind of like what is? Your deal what is good. And then they like sort of shed light on like, oh, he's done literally every job on the face of the planet.
Speaker 1Yeah, ava is hilarious. Ava's wonderful who's the principal of the school. She's sort of this you want to hate her, but also.
Speaker 2This this season really also flushed her out like, yeah, she got her job over gregory, who was like the guy who went to school for to be a principal yeah uh, because she had dirt on somebody at the school board or the superintendent, yeah so she blackmailed him into getting it and she's very clearly doesn't want to be there.
Speaker 2She doesn't really understand what it means to be a teacher. She just is always on her phone and in this season she's like I went to harvard to attend some classes on how to be a better principal and like she goes from like deliberately dragging people down and you see like her grow into like somewhat competent leader yeah, and sort of the, the other teachers at church.
Speaker 1Sometimes she, she goes a little too far with being like now we have rules now we have have this. And they're like no, we want the old Ava back.
Speaker 2Yeah, I realized, because during one of the episodes I was like I've seen this before. Why have I seen this before? I've seen this before? Because I watched a YouTube video essay on the third season of it and they showed that clip, Got it.
Speaker 1I was like I feel like you probably saw it on tiktok or something no there's no way that you could have but they did.
Speaker 2They did a really clever thing, because usually it's shot in real time well, not real time, but like it's released in real time with like what the actual school year would look like. Yeah, but because of the writer's strike they started this episode with a quick flashback about why they've been not filming for the past five months, and it's because the camera crew was documenting the. The whole series got their camera equipment stolen yeah which was quite clever unreal.
Speaker 2What was his name from the other two? Hell yeah manny, manny, but who's the actor? Oh, what's? Josh sagara. I'm probably pulling a page out of your book and not pronouncing his name properly but you tried, I, I did try it was hard to see him as anyone else than.
Speaker 1Helya, Helya. Well, I think as soon as I noticed him first. I was like, oh my God, it's the guy from the other two.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1And you were like who, and I was like Helya.
Speaker 2And then it took me a second. I was like, oh my God it is yeah.
Speaker 1So sometimes when you develop such fond memories of a specific character in a show, that's how people get typecast. Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 2But no, he did a really good job.
Speaker 1He did a great job.
Speaker 2He still played a little bit of that.
Speaker 1Yes.
Speaker 2But he was more caring and more on top of things. Yeah.
Speaker 1I also really like that we saw Janine and Gregory them sort of also flesh out their relationship, what that looked like.
Speaker 2I hate, will they want these in tv shows? It just, I'm just like I don't fucking care, like either do it or don't you ah, do it, or don't you cowards? So they they did like, uh, will they, won't they? For the first not in the first season, really, because gregory was still trying to get his like feet underneath them but the second season big time, yeah, and then in this season they decided that they wouldn't yeah and I was like thank god, I'm glad.
Speaker 2And then at the end of it they decided that they would and I was like it's better not happen any further in season four.
Speaker 1You guys better just be together.
Speaker 2Be together or don't.
Speaker 1Well, guess we'll have to wait and see. I will say and I don't want to spoil this for anybody but I totally understand why Janine didn't stay at the district. Her heart is with teaching but I was also like I feel like she could have done so much good.
Speaker 2Yeah, and like I feel, as somebody who had something similar with, like I need to be a barista that mentality does hold you back.
Speaker 1Yeah, irl, yeah, but like you know, be a barista, that mentality does hold you back.
Speaker 2Yeah, irl, yeah, but like you know, I I can appreciate, appreciate it. She's a young teacher yeah like I think in the show she's supposed to be like two years out of, or three, two or three years out of, teaching school yeah, and I I.
Speaker 1What I felt, too, is like it would have been so interesting to see that sort of like if she went and worked there.
Speaker 2It could have opened up a whole other universe of like characters and storylines and very spin-off, yeah, and I'm sure they could go that route and like the next season. If somebody's like we really like, if. If they did that for like a miss shementi, yeah, who is one of my favorite characters how good they're all so good yeah, I mean, the characters are very well done ensemble cast like it's.
The Crow and Reality TV Recommendations
Speaker 1It's great yeah I I believe, if I'm not mistaken, that the show has won so many awards.
Speaker 2Oh, it would not surprise me. It's just, it's lovely. Please go watch it. I recommended it to my mom and it's won four Emmys.
Speaker 1Yes, I mean.
Speaker 2Nominated for 174 other awards.
Speaker 1Yeah, because, of course.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Yeah, it's like a nice light watch, especially when you know the world is of course. Yeah, yeah, it's like a nice light watch, especially when you know the world is on fire. Yeah, we all need something like that. Yeah, that.
Speaker 2I think that's it, that's it, unless we want to talk about the crow more.
Speaker 1What else could we say?
Speaker 2We could talk about why his powers don't make sense and they're not consistent no, I think we should just tell the people where they can find us you can find us ranting about the crow on threads tiktok and instagram at high low brow pod. That's h-i-g-h-l-o-w brow pod. You can also find us at the website, at the website.
Speaker 1At the website. That's also highlowbrowpodcom. That's highlowbrowpodcom.
Speaker 2Next week we might talk about reality television, because we're starting to watch Perfect Match.
Speaker 1Yes, we also. What else is there that we're watching there's? We need to get back on the Love Island train. Oh, it's so intimidating, I know, but like.
Speaker 2Love Island is the one piece of reality television.
Speaker 1It's so, but like I've heard, it's so dramatic and I'm just like yeah, I saw Ariana's like I want to host this forever.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, oh, ok, we're going gonna go be gay.
