Resident Evil: The Umbrella Conspiracy - Part 4

Synopsis

In this episode, Phil and Kevin fall in love with a giant snake, and you should too. This episode covers chapters 12-14. Editors Note: While it is mentioned that Phil had just received his second COVID shot, this episode was actually recorded months ago. Not that that matters. Whatever, enjoy the pod.

Video Version

Automated Transcript

Phil 0:00
Are you telling me Are you telling me that after mentioning that this poor son of a bitch got killed and and it looks like it was poisoned from a snake bite? Are you telling me that at this point, a giant snake shows up.

Kevin Erhard 0:21
That’s what I’m telling you.

Phil 0:23
Book of the Year,

Kevin Erhard 0:24
you’re listening to pixel it because the only thing better than playing a video game is reading about one. On today’s episode, we delve further into the world of sD parys Resident Evil The Umbrella Conspiracy. As a content WARNING This episode will contain spoilers as well as discussion of gore and course language. And now on with the show. Hey there, everybody. Welcome back to pixel lit. I’m Kevin and with me as always is Phil. Hello. And Phil is feeling the effects of he just got his second COVID shot. So he’s he’s going to be a little little little fluey feeling tonight. He said,

Phil 1:01
I don’t I don’t feel so good. But I’m alive. Dammit. I’m alive. And nothing. No, you can’t kill me with a little needle. You can just make me feel vaguely miserable.

Now you and you’re not going to kill him with COVID either. So now you were on the more you’re planning on on sneaking it into his the cured meats that he consumes

Too late motherfuckers! You can’t kill me.

No. So we’re working. Continuing on with Resident Evil the umbrella Chronicles Chronicles sbrc. conspiracy. I think umbrella Chronicles was actually something else.

That would be pretty cool. Oh, yeah. Is that that? It’s a comic book, isn’t it?

Kevin Erhard 1:55
It’s either a comic book or one of those side games? I don’t know. I feel like there’s umbrella crop. Oh, no, there’s umbrella Academy. Is that what you’re thinking of?

Phil 2:05
Maybe that’s what I’m thinking of? Yeah.

And then we’re gonna just move, move along to chapter 12. of, of Resident Evil. We start with Jill, what is she doing in this chapter? It’s been so long since I read chapter 12.

She’s kind of she’s searching through the rooms, you know, like you do for more puzzle pieces.

I think if you find the ammo and whatnot, she found some shotgun shells. No red herbs. Nothing like that. But yeah, they don’t they don’t do a theory thing. You know what I was actually surprised I was I was I got to the end. And I was I was like, they didn’t actually ever reference the herbs. And I am moderately disappointed in that. So I’m moderately approving, you approve that? They didn’t. They didn’t try to force the herbs into it.

Right there. There were enough easter eggs. We didn’t have to we didn’t have to do anymore. It’s fine. That’s fine. But I do think it’s funny. I think this chapter almost immediately, basically, Jill points out in her own head and her internal monologue, if you will, that. by her estimation, she thinks there’s about two months worth of dust on everything in this sitting room that she’s in. And she figures out that that kind of coincides with when the attack started. So right basically, she’s like, okay, two months ago, these attacks started, no one’s been in this room for two months. Now. Here’s the thing. I am a guy. I do not dust. Right, I live in a new place with my fiance now. We moved in in it Right, right, right after New Year’s. So we’ve been here a handful of months, you know, definitely more than two and I haven’t dusted anything. And Brian maybe maybe it’s just Jill’s sense of you should definitely dust you sleazy scumbag. I’m looking around and I two months worth of dust doesn’t sound like much to me.

Yeah, that’s actually that’s a good point. I don’t know how if there is like, is that a like an imperial measurement like a breath of dust and bribed by by any any alerted person who could eyeball something and say that is clearly two months of dust. Hmm, there appears to be three and a half months worth of dust here let’s

coincide coincides with

Kevin Erhard 4:33
that one size with the girls were attack. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know why I drew the line at that. Like it’s like it’s like zombies. Sure. Finally, being able to eyeball two months worth worth of dust that’s pushing. It’s just a matter of your stars or not. It might sound far fetched, as Jill says then in that thought to herself, something that transformed them into flesh eating goals. That’s a bit for far fetched. And I think it’s funny that like, we have different characters at different levels of acceptance now. So like, Chris, Chris and Rebecca are like, yes, it’s zombies. It’s like zombies like the fucking movie. And then Jill is like no I don’t know if I believe it.

Phil 5:18
Jill zombie agnostic, you know, like, she’s, she’s to the side like, she’s the you know, Chris and Rebecca are like zombie Presbyterians and she’s like a zombie. I sleep in on Sundays.

Kevin Erhard 5:31
Yeah, yeah, she she, she goes to brunch.

Phil 5:35
Yeah, exactly. And that’s really the better thing to do anyway, so because then you can drink while you eat breakfast. It’s pretty good. Of course. Yeah. Now, I do think it was interesting. She She crushes one of the one of the zombies heads. And while she does this, she

kind of ruminates on the idea that zombies that the zombies are victims. Yes, this whole thing, which is it’s something that has never actually been posited, really in in Resident Evil like, nobody’s said that outright. So I actually kind of went off that she does, but it’s almost like this. In my head. I almost think of it as like, what’s the guy who directed Royal Tenenbaums? Oh, Wes Anderson. Yeah. It’s like a Wes Anderson moment of like, of just like a perfectly symmetrical shot of hers in the center of the frame, just like crushing zombie head under her boot. Wherever voiceover is, is, is debating the victimhood of zombies. Right, right. Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s exactly what it is, you know, and it’s, you gotta say, it’s interesting, because usually in zombie entertainment, that’s a weird word to say out loud. But in zombie entertainment. Generally, the connection people get to that idea comes from a personal one, like, right? Oh, no, my my best friends is zombie. My mom’s zombie. Oops, my kids zombie. And she’s able to get there in a super generalistic sort of way. So right, uh, you know, that I thought that was kind of interesting. Yeah, I hear that very often. Yeah, I had that I had that highlighted, as well as like, an interesting little little passage here. Yeah, I think I think Perry basically had to have her thinking thoughts like these because, you know, when it comes down to it with, if you’re making a novelization of Resident Evil game, you really need a lot of internal monologue, because a lot of it is just, it’s like Quiet, quiet, quiet. Run, run, run, run, run, run, boss. Yes. You know, and just, that’s, you know, and much like the game the chapters are kind of following a pattern here now, right. You know, we’re in a room we find we kill a zombie, we find a puzzle piece sometimes what happens before the other. And, and we have a lot of deep thought, or discussion, if a lot of rumination. Yeah. So what I really liked was the moment in which she solves a puzzle just by breaking the puzzle. And right, it was like a nice massage. This is a nice touch, because it’s like, okay, that’s how somebody would actually do it. You know, it’s like, at a certain point, they wouldn’t just sit there and try to play the games. They would like, be like, you know what, whatever. I’m just gonna break it.

Yeah, yeah, I would do I like puzzles. And even that moment, I’m like, being chased by zombies. How do I snap this thing and a half, right, the fastest, that’s gonna take less time. And it’ll make me feel better, you know?

Kevin Erhard 8:39
So she just so basically, Joe walks into a room, there’s a there’s a puzzle where she has to press a button. But it’s clear that if she presses the button, like, I don’t know, the room is gonna fill with gas or whatever. So instead of instead of basically solving the puzzle, she takes a gun, and she just cracks. She just cracks the glass case open.

Phil 9:01
Yeah, you know what, Jill all our time is valuable. I’m with your sister. That’s fine.

Kevin Erhard 9:07
And then she thinks to herself, she smiled back at it, please with her solution. Apparently, some of the houses tricks could be worked around, provided she ignored a few rules of fair play, which quite honestly, I mean, I would like that if Resident Evil occasionally, let me just ignore the rules. There were alternate options, you know, like, like, you could figure it out. I’m not saying that they have to make breaking it easy. But like, you know, give it give it some gameplay. That’d be fun. Because Who among us who have played Resident Evil haven’t wanted to just break a damn puzzle and half and go Alright, just give me the candy. Dammit. Given a candy. Exactly. And you know, it kind of reminds me of is an in this would possibly be too much work for developing a Resident Evil game but it reminds me of Indiana Jones and the fate of Atlantis.

Phil 9:58
Oh, good game.

Kevin Erhard 10:00
Good game, do you? And do you remember how there’s three different ways to play with in the game?

Phil 10:07
I only ever I don’t think I ever knew that until I was older.

Kevin Erhard 10:11
So there you can play it as puzzle solving. You could play it as indie is just kind of punching his way through or you can play through it using teamwork and basically you would you promote puzzles you would control two characters Indiana and I believe it was Sofia Hapgood was like the the femme towel for to Indy in that game. Yeah, it’s really fascinating. And it allows you those three different ways to attack a given situation. Now Resident Evil, it’s usually like, okay, there’s just that one way where it wants you to solve the puzzle. It would be interesting if there were more options, but it sort of like the book presents, but I digress. Now I’m thinking now I’m thinking of Indiana Jones question Lantus. It is a solid game. So we do a scene change. And now we’re with Rebecca and Chris, and they have found the mutilated body of Richard Akin. And it’s very sad. Very sad. We I can’t emphasize enough how sad you guys we knew Richard so well, I want to say it depending on who you found Richard with. You had a chance to like save him momentarily. Okay, in the original, I believe if you are Chris, and you had Rebecca as your partner, you could create an antidote to like, keep them alive a little bit longer. I might be I might be misremembering that but then in the remake, there actually was a way where you could save Richard and patch him up and he’s like, up and Adam, and he’s like, Okay, he’s another dude in the house now. until later, he he dies no matter what Richard is not. I was about to say like, Richard zombie, that amazing. He is not one of the survivors. So no, it’s a fixed point in time that he dies. It’s just how he dies.

Phil 12:03
He’s going he’s going one way or the other

is gonna Yeah, so but in the book, obviously, it’s basically he’s dead. You know, they, St. Perry was like, You know what? We don’t need we don’t need to spend any time with this guy. We got enough man. They find him the fact that the fact that he’s it’s sad is good enough for me. Yeah. And now this is an interesting one, though, because they found a lot of bodies of these the Bravo’s you know, they found a lot of bodies. This is the first one that Rebecca points out that he appears to have been poisoned, like a snake bite or something. Right? Because then somewhere a foreshadowing Angel gets its wings. Exactly. So the a foreshadowing Angel gets its wings, because the the wounds that he had would not have been enough to kill him.

Right, right. Exactly. Yeah, that wasn’t enough. And and then they do the most plausible thing, the most obvious thing. They split up, they split up, they they split up because you know,

Kevin Erhard 13:08
that’s what they’re trained for. Rebecca has a gun now. And she’s a star. Oh, well, in that case, it doesn’t matter that this is her first mission. By the way. I think it’s really fascinating how you kind of like reconcile Rebecca in this in this book and the original version of Resident Evil with the Rebecca from the remake, because eventually she’s like, there’s Resident Evil zero, there’s an entire game dedicated to her as a playable character. Oh, nice. I don’t know that enough. So Resident Evil zero is set right before the events of Resident Evil one. And it’s Rebecca having been separated from the beta team. Who has the betas. And thank God to want to be surrounded by a bunch of hkex fighting her way to the mansion in within the game universe. She’s a lot more experienced with dealing with zombies than even like Chris and Glr at this point, because she already had to deal with them once. She’s had her whole adventure. She had a whole her whole adventure already. nother tangent Richard Lee’s.

Phil 14:18
Richard.

Richard, poor Richard Richard my I highlighted something where Chris, Chris thought Rebecca was turning out to be more useful than he could have possibly imagined. Hands. Let’s see your hands Chris. Well, what I’m thinking is like, God, what an arrogant motherfucker

is like, I know you’re a highly trained, you know, chemist and soldier and fighter and you know, blah, blah, blah. But you really have come in handy. Thank

Kevin Erhard 14:48
goodness. skanky goodness, you’re naughty. You’re not useless.

Phil 14:53
Right? Just imagine here’s a little condescending, pat on the head. Good job.

Kevin Erhard 14:58
Proud of you. So yeah, they split up and Chris goes into the little attic room and my favorite line of this whole thing is Oh shit. That’s a snake.

Phil 15:09
Wait, wait a minute, Kevin. Kevin, are you telling me Are you telling me that after mentioning that this poor son of a bitch got killed and and it looks like it was poison from a snake bite? Are you telling me that at this point? A giant snake shows up?

Kevin Erhard 15:35
That’s what I’m telling you. And

Phil 15:39
just, I don’t even need to know what other books came out in 1996. Was it? 9698 98 was the by the egg? All right, yeah. Okay, well, 98 I need to know even less than a book of the year. Book of the Year.

Kevin Erhard 15:54
So foreshadowing paid off immediately. I don’t even know if Chekov could have foreseen that efficient use of his so called gun.

Phil 16:08
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Like it was I was your I want to read a little bit. Because here’s the thing I again, I think that she does a really good job the author does a really good job with describing the monsters in the real grip limits and all that shit. So I like this part and a dark cylinder shot out of the opening lightning fast. It was as big around as a dinner plate and it hit the wall inches from his right leg wood crunching from the impact. And that’s where he says, holy shit. That’s a snake all capital letters. all capital letters. I like that. in real time. I have to wonder how long this this fight sequence took place? How long it took.

Kevin Erhard 16:47
Yeah, I like to I would say I imagine it in like, like d&d turns, where like each turn is considered six seconds. And I think there’s like maybe three turns between them or something like that three or four. Right? So so I’m gonna say this whole sequence actually plays out in 18 to 24 seconds real time pretty quick. Just using my quick just using my Dungeons and Dragons math.

Phil 17:16
He kills the shit out of that snake. And does it by the way just in time for jailbait galore to see him being a bad actually shows up at just the right time for him to be like, Yeah, well, you know, sometimes you just got to kill snakes. Now. Let’s just see what to do. He was he was mean to the snake. So uh, you know, only one of us going down.

I you’re 18 Yeah,

Kevin Erhard 17:42
you’re right. Yeah, you’re you’re good, right?

Phil 17:46
Yeah, it’s we’re cool. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard 17:48
Chris, you you, you will have Theriault

Phil 17:54
your wacky young man. He’s just he’s just boys being boys, man. That’s all

Kevin Erhard 18:01
you say that you say that? Actually. I literally my skin crawled.

Phil 18:07
That’s That’s what I’m here for that I believe is why you asked me to co host this. Yeah, yeah, I guess I’m able to make your skin crawl.

Kevin Erhard 18:15
They they kind of like you know, just admire the the dead snake for a while.

Phil 18:20
Yeah. Which I I’m such a geek, I’d be like, I would probably get killed by the reflex of a dead zombie or a giant snake because I’m such a geek. Like if I saw a dead zombie snake, I’d be like on my hands and knees like my face right next to it just going oh my god. You see this is never gonna see this again. And like one last little leap would happen to my son would be torn for my body.

Kevin Erhard 18:45
A death rattle and it just like Yeah,

Phil 18:48
yeah, and it would be in and in the movie, it would be played for comic effect. That’s how I would die. I wouldn’t even have a solemn fucking death. I would die because I was the idiot who got too close to the snake and my last words would be Nah, man. It’s fine. He’s not and that would be it.

Kevin Erhard 19:05
You know, and it’d be basically the moment in deep blue sea. Yeah, with with Sam Jackson.

Phil 19:15
That’s pretty much in its next ago and I think it’s important and I and you know what? I don’t have a problem with that. I’m a humble man. I’ve lived my life. I know what I bring to the table. I recognize that in the horror movie. I would die in a comical fashion. Possibly the only person to do it. And that’s okay, man. I can live with that. That’s alright.

Kevin Erhard 19:37
You’re totally fine with it.

Phil 19:39
Yeah, man like and come on. You know if you’re gonna everyone’s gonna kick the bucket. Who doesn’t want to you know die and get to the afterlife and be like yeah, dried snake. Pretty cool. Yeah, at this point, Chris and Rebecca find that the berry area returns and and he dances merrily Around the subject of where the heck Wesker is got off to, and they don’t seem as suspicious of him as jilda

Kevin Erhard 20:06
Yeah, they’re not they’re not that good at the at that really figuring people out.

Phil 20:10
No, Rebecca is a scientist and Chris is hanging out with Rebecca. So both of their minds are elsewhere. Clearly, clearly.

There’s so I just wanted to point something out. And, and it kind of like it’s like, it’s like Barry has a real close but no potato moment where he thinks he hadn’t seen a phone or radio anywhere in the house. If Wesker couldn’t get to that laboratory, how would he be able to contact the people at White umbrella and call off the killers now buried?

So

Kevin Erhard 20:48
close? Now, Barry, you haven’t seen a phone or radio? And you’re you’re you’re thinking well, how is he going to contact them to call them off? And I’m like, Barry, how did he contact them in the first place? Right tell those he gonna call. I wasn’t gonna call them to get them killed, dude.

Phil 21:10
Come on, man.

Kevin Erhard 21:11
And it’s like, oh, Barry. You’re so you’re so big and dumb.

Phil 21:17
Yeah, he’s known for his gun man. Like, but I and now this is my hunch. This is my my theory on why this and you can answer this. I can’t know for sure. But you can answer this. Barry’s a family man. And I’m not you however are you have you have a family? You got it. You got a kid? You know, and I have a theory that that burns a few brain cells out? At least in the perception department.

Kevin Erhard 21:45
Yeah, I know. I I’d say if having a kid were a ttrpg modifier, you know, it probably it probably knocks one off of your your perception? I’d say it would be like one per kid. Minus minus one minus one perception. Right? Yeah. Minus minus one wisdom per kid. And I would say it’s like, plus five passive perception when the kid is around because you become hyper vigilant to like, for the good. Yeah, but everything else just kind of, you’re just down a little bit.

Phil 22:19
Yeah. And and and I don’t mean to compare the two because I hate those people. But I did just get a kitten recently, that tiny little little bitty kitten. This is not the same. stop sending that email. But we got her because we have this other cat. He’s just he’s just over a year old. And he just has, he just he’s just lonely. He’s he’s he you know, we can’t play with him as often as he wants to be played with. He’s clearly just lonely. So we wanted to get them a friend. And they gotta get along like a house on fire. They immediately were just playing with each other and having such a good time. And the other day, me and my fiance were just hanging out. And I had a science moment where I just sat up in bed. Emily said, What? What’s wrong? And I was like, I can’t hear my children.

Because I was just so scared. I was like, I can’t hear them. What are they destroyed? What? What happens next? So, yeah, yeah, I think that’s the I don’t think people play with the the modifiers for having children. In ttrpg as much as they maybe should that where’s that source book? Yeah, yeah. On DMS Guild. I agree. It should be it should be a modifier.

Come on. Yeah. Like, you know, like, yeah, I think I think like, negative one. Wisdom. Yeah, for kid. But you gotta you gotta have a pretty low wisdom to have kids in the first place.

I am a panic.

Ah, God, he said,

I’m just too adorable. Too adorable for words. You’re so lucky to have me. I am so lucky

to have you. You’re You’re always right there with the same wisdom and my airtight advice. And oh, yeah, just just huh. Right there. So I was a nun’s fart. So yeah, they all meet up. Yeah, there’s a there’s just a nice little line or something that we’re working on got loose a virus and Rebecca adds one that can apparently infect mammals and reptiles, not just different species, different families. And then Barry thinks it’s certainly infected mine.

Oh, Harry, honey, honey,

Berry, you’re really thinking about yourself here.

Just I just like to I just like to imagine, like during this scene, like she says that and His internal monologue says, certainly affected mine. And he just gets this big cocky grin on his face and looks at everybody. And they’re just like, Why are you smiling like that? It’s like, Oh, I got nothing.

Kevin Erhard 25:10
I just I said some camera and the camera zoom zooms in to Barry’s face, and we hear the internal monologue. And then he starts smiling. And as we pull out, we see Barry’s hand. Barry’s hand is up reflexively for a high five. But nobody understands

Phil 25:26
why they have to give it to him. No one knows what’s happening. Chris gives it to him because it’s his duty. Yeah. Chris, he

Kevin Erhard 25:33
just he recognized that Chris can Chris. That’s his character flaw is he can never leave someone hanging on a high five. Oh, yeah. You cannot. There’s there’s another modifier. By the end of this, ladies, gentlemen, and the ladies and gentlemen. We’re just going to have a ttrpg that we’ve we’ve kind of crafted.

Phil 25:57
It’s just going to be, it’s just going to be about the most anxious, strange people. Like there’s no theme except for like all of these little ticks.

It’s like, Look, we’ll call it anxiety, the anxiety the game. Everybody gets the same stats, and then you throw modifiers

pretty much. Yeah, you got kids. There’s a modifier for that done. Easy peasy.

Kevin Erhard 26:22
So Chris has a brief moment of clarity for Barry. Chris just stared at him for a moment. And Barry could see the questions forming in his bright gaze. Questions that Barry wouldn’t be able to answer. Why split up at all? How about finding the missing captain? How can you be certain that the backdoor was an escape? And then crystal now he doesn’t want to split up and then Chris says,

Phil 26:45
Okay.

Cool.

Kevin Erhard 26:52
Cool. Cool. Barry’s really giving Chris more credit than Chris deserves.

Phil 26:57
Oh, Oh, absolutely. Chris is just there’s nothing behind those eyes. He’s just Chris his golden retriever boy material all the way. It’s just a sweetheart.

He’s got it. He’s

Kevin Erhard 27:10
Yeah, he’s got that song playing. I forget how it goes. Like doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo, doo. Doo doo doo did it? Did

Phil 27:20
you really did it take

to just undo or kill the zombies and zombies are coming forth. doot doot doot doot rate it for everything. And then Rebecca shows up and he’s like, I wonder if I should flex or something.

That’d be good. workout. I

Kevin Erhard 27:39
love our version of Chris.

Phil 27:41
He is the kind of guy that you want to marry your sister. for so many reasons. Like all the good ones and all the wrong ones too. Yeah, you just like oh, we are gonna tease the hell out of this guy. He is going to be and I know because my sister married a golden retriever. He is the coolest guy. He’s a sweetheart. I’ve never seen him frown. He is the sweetest guy. And and me and my brother love teasing him and he just takes it in the most gentle, good natured way. It stops being fun after a while but man is it good for a minute. It’s pretty good.

Kevin Erhard 28:18
Yeah, they find Barry notices that now three of the things are in the thing. Three of the whatever’s whatever, you’re doing the who’s it’s Yeah, the crests and are are in this. So we got 75% of the crests action happening. And then Wesker basically shows up. And this is so basically Barry Chris and Rebecca they split up again because of course they do.

Phil 28:46
Right? Because you gotta

Kevin Erhard 28:48
because westcoast entries and now Wesker shows up. And he says to Barry, why don’t you finish the puzzle, Mr. Burton?

Phil 29:01
slick enough. It’s a name that said infrequently enough that you’re like, What the hell’s he talking to see? Oh, Barry, Barry, Barry Barry. Barry Burton.

Kevin Erhard 29:12
So they, they they he puts the final piece in Wesker can get in and basically Wesker as any good villain does, he moves the goalposts because now even though we’re not off the hook, you’re not off the hook my friend. Even though now when you did the thing Wesker asks you to do he is now saying there’s more for us to do and that I my heart just goes out for Barry. I mean, oh yeah. poor poor buddy.

Phil 29:43
Wesker is basically just that, that like, trainer at the gym. I’m a fat guy. So I’m gonna reference the gym like once and that’s it. But he it’s like that trainer at the gym who’s like, Alright, give me give me one more setup. One more, dude. One more and you’re like okay, one more. One more. And he’s like alright, just two more steps after that one like fuck

you. Like you told me

at that point I’d be like kill my family. I don’t even Fuck you man.

subways calling some

Yes. subway on that one. subway. What’s your Subway sandwich?

sweet onion chicken teriyaki with green peppers and spinach. Man I popped that one out pretty good.

Kevin Erhard 30:28
You know? It feels Yeah, no, I’m not gonna lie. You said that. You said that a little too fast for comfort. If you just

Phil 30:38
out awful fast

Kevin Erhard 30:40
it just fell right off the tongue it it. Did you have a sweet onion chicken teriyaki with with was peppers and spinach? Yeah. Did you have one today? No.

Phil 30:49
No, but I would I want one.

I think that was what it was. I think my body is telling me like hey, fatty. It’s been a few months since we had subway. Let’s go get some of those white chocolate macadamia nut

cookies you like so much and what what what’s the chip that they normally have? It’s

all I don’t get I don’t get chips. I get I get I get cookies. Ah, because I’m still five years old deep down inside. And cookies make me epic. on a level that sunchips never could.

Kevin Erhard 31:20
Oh son chips. Those are what what? Yeah, son chips.

Phil 31:23
I kind of put them front and center there don’t they? Like they got the other stuff. But those ones they sell they really want they’re

Kevin Erhard 31:29
really trying to move the Sun Chips.

Phil 31:32
Yeah, yeah, I gotta move some chips out to get them out. They’ve been they’ve been there for years don’t touch the Sun Chips. There’s two months of dust on the Sun Chips exactly

two months. And this is this is a stars metric measurement of the two months worse on the sun. Some chips push this is like every day the manager goes to the employees. Alright, everybody, let’s have a good day push the Sun Chips they’re about to turn. And but that’s every day they’re about to turn every day. The moment a sonship is made it immediately is ready. It’s in the process of going stale. Right right because that’s because that’s one of the features of sunchips that they are pretty stale. That’s that’s what you like Jeff and I like after I’ve had a jog is a bag full of stale chips. really keeps me motivated on chips that just they don’t it tastes almost like something and you’re not you’re not sure what it is they’re going for. The the the tea of chips. Yeah, just like a vague sense of flavor. Yeah, but not much else. Chapter 13 starts out with a fucking letter written by Edgar Allan Poe I mean Jesus Martin crack horn Good lord.

Oh boy. I

mean your you got your diet and you got zombies at the door and you’re sitting there writing God My dad is Alma

now my last Lenore

it’s just very late. Despite what I thought there is no never Moore’s in in the in the letter but yeah, so like there’s like it does read like a letter home from a civil war. So it’s a letter. It’s a letter from the front. It right it’s you know, this is written by a Virginian. Right. fighting for freedom against tyranny.

tyranny

Kevin Erhard 33:30
that old presa Abraham Lincoln

Phil 33:35
lunches consist of heart attack and sunchips please know that I’m thinking of you daily for crack on and he even has even has a civil war named Martin crack crack horn

corporal of the of verge the the second Virginia regiment of the the armory of, of Northern Virginia. Martin crack horn was killed in action at the Battle of the wilderness. He is survived by his half acre of tobacco. He has donated every he leaves everything to the tobacco plants. Right.

God, yeah. So they are Joel reads a letter from this scientist. She takes the

Kevin Erhard 34:24
time to read this this letter. I mean, here’s the thing. I understand because it’s like, and we also got the itchy tasty journal entries. The second the second time the letter thing happens though. I’m like, you’re really just kind of hanging out and reading shit, aren’t you?

Phil 34:42
A little less excited at that point. It becomes kind of like the Did you ever play South Park Stick of Truth? No. It’s actually I have my problems with South Park, but it’s actually a very funny game. And they really do lampoon video games. Well. One of the things is that you’re on an alien spaceship at certain point you find tape recorders all over the place, and you can listen to them. And it’s basically making fun of Bioshock because I think Bioshock was the one that was really well known for that at the time right? And just like the person becomes increasingly incredulous at how much time he has to record all of his thoughts while everything’s going to hell, right. So yeah, by the time you get to a second letter you’re like, Okay, listen, this

Kevin Erhard 35:28
is just one he had stationery to write on in the room that he would be dying and there were stationery

Phil 35:35
and God yet otherwise you’d have to write his final letter to his girlfriend of the backup or receipt or something you

Kevin Erhard 35:42
know? It’s like It’s like the the final letter Martin crack horns final Will and Testament is written on stationery that says dumb things I got to do today.

Phil 35:51
Right? Yeah.

Yeah.

Monday’s Am I right my dearest it’s Garfield stationery.

Yeah, I was gonna say Dilbert. But yeah

it’s like at the

bottom at the top it’s Garfield is like eating a tray of lasagna at the bottom it’s it’s like odd like just bounding happily across the bottom of the bag. And he shoots himself in the head and I don’t like Monday starts playing over the speakers. Jill notices that it’s warmer in the house because there’s somebody somebody left the door open

Yeah, she she sinks is a shift

that is a total parenting move by the way is being like being like Did somebody leave a window open in like oh that’s funny across the house to be like the air is wrong. Somebody left the window open. That is that where your your dad thermostat powers comm that is where the dad thermostat powers come from? I knew it. I knew dad’s had a heads up display there Terminator is a heads it heads up display of what the current temperature temperature situation in the house. I knew it. I always suspect dew point. Gets gets down to dew point. dewpoint. Yeah. Eagle scores, stuff like that. Yeah. So basically, Jill realizes the doors open and she starts looking. She is she goes, she goes outside.

And she finds herself in this courtyard. Yeah. It’s got like a 20 foot drop and a waterfall. And she swears she sees some figure ducking behind the waterfall and and finds she finds an elevator shaft that she can make her way down. She’s basically she’s going after the figure because she figures that that couldn’t have been a stars member or anything like that.

Kevin Erhard 37:49
And she would be wrong.

Phil 37:52
Yep, and not

Kevin Erhard 37:54
for the first or last time for the first or last time. So she does a little squiggle thing down where she I guess she puts her back the way it’s described as she like puts her back against the shaft at one end of the shaft and kind of like yeah, which is down with her feet. Shimizu. shimmying her way down. Sure. So Jill is in one area of the mansion like the after mansion like level which are these tunnels they’re going to give Chris and Rebecca a whole different area to in the game you end up in both no matter what but I think it’s an actually a nice touch that they’re like Alright, we’re gonna do this split it up Jill gets this area Chris gets this area

Phil 38:36
when you’re playing both characters in the game at that point you’re very much looking to you’re gamifying the whole thing and so you’re not the second time around you’re not until a story quite as much as you’re trying to see what stuff you missed and with the book i agree i think this was a good call.

Kevin Erhard 38:52
Exactly even though I think overall this this book should have been a Choose Your Own Adventure novel. I’ve still I still wish that was a thing bris they had been waiting they had been given very the full 15 minutes and then they they go back and they see that the doors open somehow missing jail. I guess Joe is came in seven minutes earlier. I don’t know

Phil 39:11
I feel like that’s that’s the thing that’s happened a couple of times it’s like yeah, someone’s like five to 10 minutes ahead of someone else some Yeah.

Kevin Erhard 39:18
Yeah, you just gotta assume that there’s some time lag even though for the most part. The book is written as if everything is is mostly like real time as you’re reading it. Right. Right there we get a little backstory for Chris we flashback to Chris’s first mission and he gets back when he was jailbait Magoo when he Yes, exactly. And he had his first Captain a tough as nails short, extremely short woman named Kaler which it is it is way to like Kaler that is a that is a now name 1998 or 1980s. For Kaler. That’s

Phil 39:59
Yeah, that’s That’s it. You can just see your hipster friend naming their newborn Kayla. Yeah.

So he gets the best piece single piece. best piece of advice he’s ever received. Son, she said, no matter what happens when the shooting starts. Try not to wet your pants. I guess that’s good advice. That’s good advice for a lot of time. I mean, I pretty general advice. I don’t know how that’s the best advice.

Oh, yeah, for God’s sakes, I don’t, there’s not really a great opportunity to wet your pants. Unless that’s like your kink or something. Which no judgement do your thing. But I don’t think there are a lot of opportunities where it’s like, just go man, this is the time if there’s any lag. So yeah, if you’re in the lake, and you want to pee on a fish.

Kevin Erhard 40:44
That’s gonna be that’s gonna be what starts the episode. I know.

Phil 40:50
Well, I know what I know what I’m doing tomorrow. At this point. As soon as I’m off work, I’m going to subway and I’m going to go pee on a

Kevin Erhard 40:58
Mac, I’m going to make one as as straight line to the other as I pause that sweet onion, chicken teriyaki and transition right into Yeah, I’ll probably be eating it while I pee right into fish pee. They find they find some dead dogs, we get a lot of weird, we get a lot of description as to what is happening. Like how they’re kind of traveling about and I kind of got lost in my mind’s eye as to where they are at this point. Because we’re like, and I know that there are multiple paths. Like I remember from the game, obviously, there’s multiple paths that they can go right. But in the descriptions here, I’m like, I got lost mentally because I’m like, how are they just not where Joe went? Right didn’t seem like there was that many opportunities to deviate.

Phil 41:49
Right? It didn’t seem that way. Anyhow, I I don’t know. It was I think I’ve made it clear that I’ve kind of lost track of where everyone is and I’m just kind of like just on trusting the author at this point. Yeah, I’m just like I’m here man. Let’s just do this. So

snakes Yeah, snakes fall from the sky. Which which you know what? I thought we were done with snakes. Nice twist. We aren’t that what a twist. What a twist. Yeah, we’re gonna we’re gonna have we’re gonna have but we’re gonna have it’s a quantity over quality thing instead of one gigantic snake we got a just up just just a butt ton of regular old, regular old girls and army cheney. We don’t even we don’t even get a good description as to the snakes themselves. I mean, they could just be garter snakes.

Yeah, they they Yeah, they don’t i don’t i don’t think we get like any rattles or anything like that. They’re just snakes and that’s gonna have to do

they’re more they’re gonna have to do it’s kind of like it’s like spiders. You know? They never they never specify what kind of spider you’re dealing with in a scary movie or book or something like that. Generally speaking, so right, but they but they know you’re gonna like spiders. They know you don’t like nobody likes spiders. Oh, it’s gonna have to tell you like spiders. I know you’d like spiders. I do. I really actually really do like spy think about Phil is he loves he loves the creepy crawlies. I love invertebrates they are my friends. The within a week of my now fiance and I dating, it was we’d been together for maybe a week at this point, we were sitting out on the front porch. And this great lit big fuzzy moth flew up to the light and I just hopped out of my chair and ran right up to it so I can get a closer look at it. I think it was like a tulip silkmoth or something like that. And it was a nice big one and I finally convinced it to land on my hand and my girlfriend found out that I’m basically the grossest Disney Princess in the world that So yeah, I like them. I like creepy crawlies there i like i said i but uh but I will say this. I’m a horror guy. So I am not above using these little guys that I love so much to scare the shit out of out of other people. I’m not one of those people are like no, they’re fine. They’re such that they get such a bad rap like you hear that a lot with people who like sharks nowadays like they’re like sharks or jaws is responsible for killing so many sharks and that is true and I sympathize. But I have not that way with bugs. I’m like oh yeah, man, though. Yeah, they’re scary as hell aren’t they and that cool? Isn’t it cool that they’re terrifying and terrible right? They’ll kill you. They will eat don’t you enjoy that cold sweat in that name? Isn’t that goose bumps on the back your neck it’s it’s amazing. Wonder what it’s like to be in one of those cocoons man pretty pretty probably sucks probably sucks right? Getting spun up by getting all spun up by a spiderweb into a Charlotte over there. I Charlotte over there. Probably probably sucks and this is where you would insert the GIF from community of the of the prints. trouble saying I hope this doesn’t awaken anything in me

pretty much

oh no I hope but a sexy spider does a cover lug it’s spin its web all the way around my hands

they get into they get into another building they hear Brad chicken heart yes yes finally made his return a circling around

it presumably while stopping the hell out of snakes by the way like they’re just they don’t say it but I could I felt like that was a given like they’re running

yeah i mean you know Chris just hate snakes at this point so oh yeah they these two both have serious her phobia going on like there’s no way around that is that the word? I think so isn’t isn’t her apology or whatever it is that’s like the stuffing of snakes or maybe it’s reptiles I don’t know Don’t you know what guys if you know don’t don’t bother letting me know because I just I’m much prefer not knowing her over exposed to the internet as it is her pet a phobia is a fear of reptiles. Her pet a phobia. Okay, okay, reptiles. Okay, fine. Well, you know, that makes sense. You know, if you got attacked by a giant snake, and then a waterfall of little snakes fell on you. I don’t think you’d be very welcoming of a lizard Now. Now. I don’t think anything in the in the genus. The family either would the family would would would be on your Christmas list. Your Chris your Christmas card list.

Not that year anyway.

So we’re in chapter 14 now and Jill Yes. Feel is? She’s in some tunnels. Yeah, she’s trying to get to this door on the opposite side of the tunnel. So yeah, within the first on the first page of chapter 14. She’s frustrated. She’s like, dripping wet, you know, and cold. It’s damp. It’s wet. And she and she’s that and she thinks to herself great secret passage. To use it. You have to catch pneumonia. And I immediately thought there’s some indie role playing game out there that that will do that as a guarantee. Like to get to the next stage. Yeah, you literally have to catch the flu somehow. Yeah, like that kind of moon logic. Shit. I know. That’s out that that is amazing. I like it.

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Kevin Erhard 47:25
I play that game. She’s investigating the these tunnels. She sees a small six small iron plate sent to a stone a six sided hole about the size of a quarter. Jill and Jill never actually gets the thing. Yeah, shouldn’t Shouldn’t it it has nothing to do with her. It has nothing to do with Ernie. I think I think Barry Wesker uses it or something and Barry one of

Phil 47:47
the two Yeah, I

Kevin Erhard 47:48
think maybe what’s good happens really briefly and in passing, but there is a whole separate thing where you have to find this thing. Right in the game right? She continues to walk through the path it’s it’s an awkward path. It’s it’s dark, she can hear the sound of the waterfall and then she runs into Barry.

Phil 48:09
Barry Barry returns very return and and he’s super paranoid that he can hear voices at this point. Anything you know, he’s he thinks he heard some little voices or something and and that just kind of deepens her feeling that something fishy is going on here. Yeah, she eventually after 19 more times are running into him being being fishy.

Kevin Erhard 48:31
She’s gonna address it. She is going to figure it out. But first, they finally run into another basically the last extant member of the stars Bravo team and Rico. Rico murrini. What a name What a name as something about a name. That is a good that is a good good name. It is a full name. I wish Enrico had more than like three pages of existence in the book do with that

Phil 48:59
kind of you can tell he’s strapping like it’s just it’s just a butch dude’s name. I’m in Rico marine. Ice dude. Nice. Can you teach me how to get a girl

Kevin Erhard 49:11
so the find Enrico he is Yeah, he’s hurt. He’s already hurt. But he’s, he’s he’s fine ish. He’s just like, not in good shape. They’re talking about they’re going back and forth. And he mentions that umbrella do all long that talks about how Enrico got in he clearly he came in the back way. Like he he just he just says the most obvious thing is like he didn’t solve all the puzzles. He he Yeah, just just showed. Okay, cool. You know what, fine, he he climbed a fence and everybody else is like, Oh shit, climbing fences, climbed a fence if only they taught us that in Star training. When in doubt, climb a fence. So Enrico climbs a fence and he is well ahead of everybody. He’s He’s in the tunnels at the end of the game Jesus Christ and Rico way to show everybody’s speed running speed running it. And Enrico is doing the 80% fence skip speed run of resume he’s doing it to raise charity for toys for dogs. and end up next on Games Done Quick, quick. world record holder and Rico murrini Oh, and Rico, Enrico rip, buddy. So Enrico was already in bad shape. He The last thing he says to Jill before he gets unceremoniously offed? Well yeah, it was. There’s a trader in the stars. And then he gets shot. There’s a setup. He gets shot twice in the chest and he is dead. And thus ends thus his watch has ended. rip my favorite character in Rico murrini

Phil 50:55
you know i is speaking of that reference. I actually no joke. I imagined that actor he was in Game of Thrones Season Narcos. The I think he’s a Hispanic gentleman. I imagined him as Enrico There you go. Good looking cat.

Kevin Erhard 51:14
There you go.

Phil 51:15
That’s Oh, are

you talking about? He’s the one who got his head squashed like a tomato. Oh, yeah. You’re talking about the Mandalorian

Yeah. Oh.

I actually have that. You know what, they’re gonna take my geek card away. I have not watched the man to learn. Yeah, he’s it’s good. I like it. But yeah, that is Pedro, Pascal.

Pedro. Pascal. Thank you. Okay. Yeah, I imagined him and so you can imagine my disappointment when he gets executed like a paragraph in so

he would marry chases after whoever did the shooting. Of course Barry knows who did the shooting. But

of course at

source he does Barry runs off chasing after the shooter. Jill has a few moments to to herself where she thinks so who did this who is Trent talking about? And who did Enrico See? feeling lost alone, Gil held his cooling hand and waited for Barry to come back. Which is maybe the most sensible thing anyone’s done in this book so far. Like it’s like, you know what, I’m just gonna wait, we’re gonna wait right here. And theoretically, he’ll be back. He knows that I’m here. We probably be better to have him there. Exactly. Rebecca mean. Meanwhile, over in this other well back at the ranch and, and this other building, Rebecca is going through an old trunk filled with stacks of papers,

they they they find our latest puzzle piece, they find it find a key leather tag had had the word alias burned onto one side, the number 345 written on the back in smudged ballpoint pen. So clearly, we’ve got a combination of some kind of worst combination ever probably take about 10 minutes to crack that one just by going 001002 and eventually you get 345 Exactly.

So they figure out the password. It’s three, four or five unbreakable on credit is an unbreakable password. And they start finding out something about something called plant 42 and that they are in point 42. So they kind of make it they kind of make the connection point 42 and plant 42 are in that same place. And they are going to have to deal with the plant

and I love this by the way because at no point they read these notes finding out about the plant and at no point are the notes subtle. They basically just straight up are like yeah, this is a man eating plants. So that’s what’s next. Just so yeah, that’s what you’re gonna have to deal with

coming up.

Right, right. And I won’t lie I was like girl, I mean,

Kevin Erhard 53:58
sounds Frankie foreshadowing has just been leaving notes all over the place.

Phil 54:02
Pretty much.

Subtle scene change back to Mr. Wesker. Who does his his usual thing? twirling his mustache? Yeah,

yeah, he confronts Barry. Charles’s mustache, moves the goalposts threatens his family again. And then goes here’s a basement map

like the log you have received basement map up right

up pops up

on the screen. So So Barry is is upset about him killing and Rico,

which is justified I think

Wesker basically treats Barry like a dog at one point he thinks Good boy, going back to the golden retriever discussion. We’re having it Chris is a golden retriever to Barry and Barry’s golden retriever to Wesker. That’s pretty much right.

Right.

Kevin Erhard 54:50
Yeah. I think that stands up. Yeah, I think that’s pretty much how they’re aligned. I think that makes sense. We come in for landing berries back in Thrall West. Even though Wesker killed and Rico, and we get a lot of foreshadowing with the about the 120 ones, the hunters, yes, yes, he muses on these these killing machines. Now, if I recall correctly in the game that hunters would have actually had been seen already that might have been the remake. I’m not sure though, but yes, they do. They do talk about the he does talk about the hunters quite a bit. And he’s actually mentioned them in previous chapters as well. But he’s, yeah, he’s brought up he’s really been building up these hunters. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So they got a they got a, they really got to do a number here. And with that, we reach chapter 15. And we are in the we’re in the we’re coming in for a landing with this book.

Phil 55:49
And yeah, we’re

Kevin Erhard 55:50
definitely in the homestretch. We’re in the endgame now, as S.T.A.R.S. As Dr. Strange would say, certainly, he would definitely say he definitely would say that and somebody he definitely somebody in the theaters at this point pointing at the screen saying that’s the name of the movie. Right. So that’ll that’ll do it for this episode. Come join us for the next episode of pixel lit where we finally put to rest. The Resident Evil book one. The Umbrella Conspiracy, conspiracy, right.

Phil 56:26
The umbrella cookbook,

Kevin Erhard 56:27
nailed it.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai