Mongo is Appalled
A podcast covering all novels of Dungeon Crawler Carl. Discussing outlandish ideas and ridiculous notions that no one should have to endure. For those of you that have read all the current books and are just waiting for the next one, this is your respite until the next book for Dungeon Crawler Carl comes along. WARNING: This podcast contains definite spoilers and preposterous ideas that may make your brain melt. Listen responsibly.
Mongo is Appalled
Metal and Soda
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With the new book released, Mike and Corbett take a bite out the incredibly important ideas, like talking about Rob Zombie and Soda Pop. Is it just the two of them in a dizzy spin over the new book or do they actually get anywhere. Who knows but it is fun to watch them run around the back yard and wear themselves out.
Mongo is a polled. Welcome to Mongo as a polled. We're back. We've read a new book, Mike. Mike, we've read a new book. We have?
SPEAKER_03I I listened to a new book. Does that count?
SPEAKER_01Okay, okay, okay. So you listen to it just because you're blind.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well. One excuse. Yeah, well, I'd hate to have seen the size of that book printed out in Braille. That would have been Yeah, volume three of A Parade of Horribles.
SPEAKER_01You know, there has to be a uh a Braille version of it somewhere, I would think.
SPEAKER_03Oh, I could yeah, there's a way of printing it out. The problem is it takes so much more paper and braille than it does in print because you can't like double side braille. So it's like one side and the braille makes it thicker, so it's you end up with volume and volumes on what is ostensibly a single book. So yikes. So forget screw that. I'm just gonna listen to it. Besides, Jeff Hayes. I mean, soundboot theater. Yeah, come on.
SPEAKER_01Jeff Hayes does a fantastic job. I'm on my one and a half ways through it, so I've gone through it once by myself and now I'm going through it with my wife, which she listens at a much slower pace than I do, I guess.
SPEAKER_03Well, no, I no, I understand. Uh Liz and I are the same way. I have to slow it down to a quote unquote normal speed for her to be able to enjoy it.
SPEAKER_01Oh no, no, I listen to it at normal speed. I just obsessively listen to it, so it's like, oh, 20 hours, no big deal. I'll just be awake for the next 20 hours.
SPEAKER_00Bam!
SPEAKER_01Done. Bam. And actually I'm a quarter way through reading it too, because I've been I've been going back through and reading them just because I really want to get the taste of it from the reading perspective. I know that sounds dumb because it's basically the same thing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, but it's a different experience because Soundbooth almost makes it an audio drama. Very true. Whereas the book is pretty much the straight book. But yeah, it it was interesting. Um I have questions.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, oh yeah. Well, for those who don't know, this this podcast isn't just two guys talking about random things. Okay, it is a little bit, but it's it's about a book called Dungeon Crawler or book series called Dungeon Crawler Carl, which if you have not read, listened to, or in some way had it smacked in your face, you should go check it out. It's a pretty good book. And if you haven't, we're appalled. We are. Uh I was gonna mention something. I I saw it in the Facebook post, and I'm really sorry to the guy who made the post. I do not I didn't catch the name. I swear to you, this is totally your bit, but it is a funny one. It is a funny one. The guy talked about how upset, how absolutely drawn out he was about this current book, obviously. For for really, really obvious reasons. It's an outrage. It's an outrage. His suspension of disbelief, he has pushed to the limits by uh yeah, an alien shows up, televises the apocalypse, and Carl's pet cat comes to life and can talk to him while writing a pet dinosaur, and he runs around in his underwear the whole time. Totally believable. But what is not believable is that Carl could have never ever heard the song Dragula by Rob Zombie. And more importantly, that he would call it technorock.
SPEAKER_00Wow. So yeah, that's the line. That is the line. That's the line.
SPEAKER_01How did you feel about Rob Zombie? Actually, I love that scene when they when they play when they uh have that song in the background, even though it's it's not playing, but I knew what song it was, and it's when um Gluteus Max, I think, is driving at that point.
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah, and he had taken all the those pills from just two. Well, if one's good, two must be better, right?
SPEAKER_01Two must be better. I can taste time.
SPEAKER_03I found it amusing. They didn't actually say the artist or the name of the song. He just said something about ditches digging ditches and witches.
SPEAKER_01Right, right.
SPEAKER_03So if you know, you know.
SPEAKER_01I wonder if he was trying to avoid like some kind of copyright thing. I didn't think about that.
SPEAKER_03It is, yeah. I think from authors, because there was some stuff in a manuscript I had where I was wanting to quote like a couple of lines from some songs, and apparently you have to get the rights to do that. And I'm like, ouch, that's curse you record labels. Or at least you used to, maybe not any well that would no, that's very realistic.
SPEAKER_01I mean, he puts plenty of references in the books.
SPEAKER_03Oh, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, tons of stuff. If there were if this were ever to get on television, haha.
SPEAKER_03That's madness.
SPEAKER_01I know, but if this were to ever wind up in some way visible, I have I'm curious to see how much would actually come through with all the references to like pop culture, just just real things that are current, which is kind of funny because now everything that's five it has to be everything five years ago, so it's becoming classic.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, uh it's sort of the problem Walking Dead had was it went on season after season after season. It's like, how do you have 2015 cars? The you know, society was destroyed in 2010. It's like, no, no, no, just don't worry about it.
SPEAKER_01Just trust me, car manufacturing will never stop, despite the apocalypse.
SPEAKER_03And and Kia is a supporter of the show now, so we have to show Kia's, you know, that the current model we gotta. So, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Anyway, sorry. Uh Dragula, it is a little unbelievable. I I would agree, it is a little unbelievable that he would not know the song.
SPEAKER_03Well, maybe like I was telling you off the show. Yeah. I was telling you off the show for it was released in '98, so if you presume Carl was thirty, what, five years ago?
SPEAKER_01I mean, he's he's in the first car released. He might be twenty-five.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I mean, he's got to at least be in his mid-20s.
SPEAKER_01Maybe we should do a show about how old he is. I don't know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, they never really say. You're just kind of supposed to infer it.
SPEAKER_01Because he was in the orphanage or the the boys' school or whatever it was. Oh, he was like, And then he went out for like a year. It sounds like he was out for a year and then just joined the the Coast Guard. Yeah. So he might even be in his early twenties. He feels like he's in his 30s.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's about to say But again, you know, there's age and there's maturity. So I've met 15, 16-year-olds that were rather more adult than a lot of 29-year-olds I've met.
SPEAKER_01Okay, I'm just looking it up because I was kind of curious. It was in The Matrix, apparently, the song.
SPEAKER_03Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01And it was in several video games, including Sled Storm, Twisted Metal 4, Gran Turismo 2, Jet Set Radio, which I don't even know what that is.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And in a Twisted Metal reboot in 2012, a Fortnite Festival, the Twisted Metal, the series, which I haven't really watched. I'm sorry, I'm a little out on that one. So yeah, he should know that song. I would expect. I couldn't.
SPEAKER_03Do you know the the reference for that song?
SPEAKER_01The reference?
SPEAKER_03The Dragula?
SPEAKER_01I kind of figured it was a play on the Dragula. It was a hot rod back in the 60s, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_03There was an episode of the Munsters where Grandpa Munster they got into a position where they had to drag race with some kids, and so he had brought his car out, which was this weird coffin mobile and stuff, and it was Dragula. Because Drag Race, so yeah. Well, and Rob Zombie redid the monsters, so he did, and I liked it, even though most people didn't seem to.
SPEAKER_01I thought it was okay. Yeah. I thought it was pretty it was a little weird because I was used to sort of the kid version. Yeah. Not that his was so like, oh, it's so bad, but he definitely crossed a few lines, like, I I don't know if a kid could watch this. Not in a bad way, but it was still cool though.
SPEAKER_03A friend of mine was like, it's too goofy, and I'm like, It's the monsters. What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_01Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03So then anyway, yeah, that was cool. I I've actually liked, and it's weird that that would be non-referenced, but they could have again spoilers, guys. Carl karaokeing take on me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, straight up.
SPEAKER_03Straight up, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Full lyrics and everything. So well, I presume getting those lyrics are kind of easy.
SPEAKER_03That would almost Well, yeah, it was an 80s song and they're from Scandinavia, so maybe it's easier to get stuff that way than in America. And I probably can't even blame Rob Zombie because it's probably the record label.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, most likely. And it's obviously been in a lot of stuff, and if they were using it in Twisted Metal recently, because I know that just came out a couple years ago, then more than likely they're like, Well, we're not giving it to you without you paying us. And he's like, Well, okay.
SPEAKER_03Which is ironic because if it was being played in like a TV show or something, you could fair use it as long as it's less than 30 seconds.
SPEAKER_01Well, but the thing is in a book you're writing it down. You're writing down the actual word.
SPEAKER_03But if you sang those same lyrics with and it was less than 30 seconds, it was okay. It just seems weird to me. But then l legal issues in America not making sense, no way.
SPEAKER_01That's true.
SPEAKER_03But anyway, yeah. Would Carl know about it? I I don't know that he would. There's plenty of songs that were released, you know, when I was f four or five, you know. I don't know.
SPEAKER_01Um I don't know. If it was a popular song that was used over and over again, you would probably know.
SPEAKER_03Well, it depends. Especially if a corp if a company, you know, used it in their commercials. That's a big way of knowing older songs. I mean, how many people songs but got a new life after playing on Stranger Things? You know, what was that Kate Bush song, Running Up That Hill, that basically charted again after it was played in Stranger Things?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I thought that was kind of funny. I mean, I it's an okay song, but I was never a big fan of it.
SPEAKER_03Uh and it actually got higher in the charts than it did back in the eighties. So yeah, you never know. It it depends on where it's played, I guess. Carl struck me as a bit of a metal head, but Oh, totally.
SPEAKER_01Well, I do know this. Matt Deniman goes to from coffee house to coffee house. Presume he's in Seattle or somewhere in that area. But he just goes from coffee house to coffee house every day and writes, like everybody there probably, and is just constantly blasting metal the whole time he's writing. That's probably why you're getting that vibe.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I was about to say, we all have our our writing. I I know lots of people who are writers that they have their playlists or whatever that they play that helps them get in the ride head space. So and as a metal head myself, you know, I salute Matt Dinnerman.
SPEAKER_01I don't know. I think it's always funny when you see somebody like at the gym just like yeah, yeah, yeah, and then you like they pull their headphones off and you can hear like the carpenters.
SPEAKER_03I've never had that happen. That's um that's uh yeah. Maybe it's a Wyoming thing.
SPEAKER_01Just begun. Yeah. Bob Dylan.
SPEAKER_02Who's your head?
SPEAKER_01Oh man. I need to hear some Otis Redding to really get ripped. I need the Oscar Meyer jingle songs. That's the way I really get it. Everybody has their their groove, though. You're right. Everybody does.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I mean, I think it's possible he wouldn't know it. Is it likely it could happen? I'm not sure how it would. I guess it would depend on what everyone else at the boat repair shop was listening to, because I imagine they have music playing while everybody does work. It's probably true.
SPEAKER_01I don't know. We live in a current age where people don't have just like the shop music blaring. You you just have your headphones.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and everybody listens to their own thing. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You know, usually you just put on the radio, whatever's on the radio is what you're listening to. It's a different, it's a different time, man. Yeah. Or old.
SPEAKER_03You know, Matt Deniman, if you're listening, and I'm sure you are. Like he has other things to do. Well, between metal songs, you know. One thing I liked about the guy who wrote Ready Player One, Klein, he did another book called Armada.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_03You read it? Yeah. Which basically it leans way more into video games and less into nerd culture in general. But you know, in the back of the book, he had his playlist that the main character listened to, the side A and side B of songs from his dad that he really rocked to. I'd like to see that for Carl. Does Carl have a mix of playlist that is just his thing? And that would be cool to see.
SPEAKER_01Well, it would be good to or or just get the Matt Denniman playlist. It'd be like Barack Obama's reading list. Except the Matt Denniman playlist.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I mean, if you're not going to do a Carl one, yeah, I'd like to know I'd like to know what songs inspire him. That would be cool. Obviously, Take On Me is one of the things.
SPEAKER_01Well, I doubt it. I think he really focused a lot on the 80s for this particular book.
SPEAKER_03You mean in it is Liz and I burst out laughing as we were getting ready to go to bed and listening to the book. And Donut said that. This is all old people music. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's all pop 80s stuff, too. That's the funny part.
SPEAKER_03I mean, she's not wrong, but ow.
SPEAKER_01A little bit. Little bit. No, she's right though. Well, another thing that was really prominent, at least to me, in the in the book was soda pop. Soda pop. Soda pop. Prepotente finally found his soda dealer.
SPEAKER_03And now his mother isn't around to limit his intake.
SPEAKER_01Obviously not.
SPEAKER_03He does not have a problem.
SPEAKER_01I need 10 of each. Really? Ten? Oh, you're right.
SPEAKER_0320. Well, we know when you have an unlimited inventory and can hotkey.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Instead of potions, he can hotkey his sodas.
SPEAKER_01Well, it is kind of cool they put that in there. I I thought it was funny when he was slurping down the grape soda while he beat the crap out of the warmage.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Or his very, very disturbing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Or his insistence on big red. Hey, I I'm sure it's national now, but growing up, that was a Texas exclusive.
SPEAKER_01You don't I I live way up north and it's not up here. Yeah. There's just no big red. There's Dr. Pepper, so there's that.
SPEAKER_03There's that at least, but though when we were kids, Dr.
SPEAKER_01Pepper and Big Red were separate brands. They weren't both under the Dr.
SPEAKER_03Pepper company.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Big Red was the same company that did RC.
SPEAKER_01Mm-hmm. Which is I can get R C, but I cannot get Big Red. That's weird. You can only know the joys of Big Red when you live in the South.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Because it's like what, 90% sugar?
SPEAKER_01Actually, they never mention Big Red in this last one. I was wondering. Now that I'm now that you mentioned the thing about it.
SPEAKER_03I thought it one time he got a big red. I could be wrong. I've only read that. I bet I remembered.
SPEAKER_01He was drinking the grape soda, which I thought was funny. Yeah. But he's always been a big fan of Big Red, Sasparilla, and Diet Seven Up, which is his mother's favorite.
SPEAKER_03Which yeah, that's like super, super sugary, except for that last one.
SPEAKER_01Uh-huh. Well, that's Diet 7 Up, which is, you know, dumb. But what are you gonna do? Well, I I should point out, I looked this up because I was kind of curious. How many sodas should a human consume per day? And of course, the the basic allotment is you should have you would be okay with one. It still has sugars, it's not great for you, but it's a treat, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, psychological stuff. But one 12-ounce can of soda would be perfectly fine for any human. Then, of course, I looked it up and on Reddit, feel free to look this one up. There is a video of a goat slamming bottles of Coke. I'm presuming it's in Africa or um everybody is of color in the background, so I don't know and I don't know what they're saying. But the video is quite funny of a of a goat. They put down bottles of half-finished Coca-Cola, put its mouth over the top part of the bottle, and then just lift it up and suck down all the rest of it. And they'd go through like four or five bottles of that really quick. Just because that's kind of funny to watch. What you need is a goat with an excellent sugar rush. Yeah, that's but I did look it up, and for a goat, specifically for a goat, under veterinarian uh there's a bunch of googling, but it's fun to know. Yeah for a goat, uh soda, too much soda specifically, can cause severe digestive distress, floating, and dangerous diarrhea, which is always what you want to go do.
SPEAKER_03I don't know if you remember, but the Fialco brothers are friends of mine and they come to the con every year. And Jared, the younger one, is a gastroenterologist. He says he frequently gets hit by people at the con going, How much soda is too much? How much diet soda is too much, and so on and so forth. And it's like, You're a doctor, you know these things, right? Yeah, well, I normally get paid for this advice, just saying. And they're worried about sodas, they're like slamming back fists of whiskey, and I I just find humorous, but anyway.
SPEAKER_01No, it's it's right in well, I used to work for Coke. I was a delivery driver for Coke, and you get essentially unlimited sodas all the time. And within three months of working for them, I had to go to a doctor because I had an ulcer. Oh, wow. Because I was literally going through like a case of soda every day, which by the way, is not good.
SPEAKER_03I used to work uh convenience stores in the early 90s, and you get free soda there too, albeit it's off the tap.
SPEAKER_01Straight off the tap, you just put your mouth right on and push the button.
SPEAKER_03But because yeah, I'm here, I'm there for eight hours and I get free soda. I started that was when I first got onto diet soda, because I knew if I just drank sugary soda, I was gonna gain 30 pounds or something. It's like, no, no, I gotta force myself to like diet drinks. So I'd have like three quarters regular soda and a quarter of diet, and then as a week went by, I'd then make it half and half, and then two thirds, one third, and then eventually I was drinking just diet Pepsi because yeah, probably more than I should have anyway, but at least it was diet. And diet can't be bad for you, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you can drink as much as you want, yeah, forever.
SPEAKER_03It can never possibly cause you any trouble.
SPEAKER_01That does remind me. I I worked at a uh coffee shop for a little while, and of course you mess up when you first start because you don't like know the routine of how everything works. And anytime I'd have a messed up drink, they're like, well, just save it or throw it away, or you can drink it all you want. Like, okay, cool. So, like, oh, a couple more shots of espresso, wham, another espresso, wham, another espresso, wham. About seven or eight coffees in. You're starting kind of shaky. You feel the floor vibrating and stuff.
SPEAKER_03It's uh Corbett is a next Nescafe ninja.
SPEAKER_01Just saying there's probably some regulation you might want to have on there. Listen to your mother. No more than five. No more than five.
SPEAKER_03But nobody is limiting prepotente, so it didn't really play into Parade of Horribles as to any negative effects. I'm hoping the next book will see some negative effects.
SPEAKER_01Maybe not the ones you just described earlier, but well, I'm just kind of surprised they never like nobody else drank any of the sodas. Well, except for uh Louis got a milkshake. Yeah. Because he wanted the boost and Carl got a boost from something. What was it? It was a plus two to con. I can't remember what it was now. He drank something, but it wasn't a soda.
SPEAKER_03It wasn't a soda. Okay.
SPEAKER_01I wonder what it was. Trying to remember now.
SPEAKER_03We'll just have to read it again.
SPEAKER_01Oh no.
SPEAKER_03There's a lot packed in a parade of horribles, though, so not remembering is is not unusual.
SPEAKER_01I was not as frustrated with Parade of Horribles as much as I was with Bedlam Bride. And Bedlam Bride was a good book, don't get me wrong. But it has a lot of rules about card games that I didn't really want to know. But you have to know to know what's going on in the game. So Right. It and the Iron Tangle book, the third. Third book.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Just fourth level.
SPEAKER_03Right. Kinda kind of throw. I still enjoyed both of them, don't get me wrong. They had some really good scenes, but yeah, on average, they were my less fond. I liked this one more than those, but I I still say five and seven are my favorites.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, those are penultimate type books. They're also kind of in that, well, five is very much in the predator versus alien feel, sort of fighting alone in the jungle. Yeah. And seven is kind of the World War II book. Yeah. Which makes sense why you would like it. Because you're old. The most as an old man, you have to like World War II.
SPEAKER_03Ever since I got my musket at Valley Forge, I've really paid attention to wars.
SPEAKER_01Well, Mike, as you know, we all have our limitations.
SPEAKER_03And they will not break us, but Big Red Light.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for sounding wing racist than I intended.