Suicide Squad’s Starro is too gross to watch while eating

Based on the box office receipts, most of you who saw Suicide Squad this month did so at home, on HBO Max. But for those of us who braved the outdoors and went to see James Gunn’s DC superhero extravaganza probably had a heated internal discussion about whether or not to eat during one of the grossest movies of 2021.

Most of those disgusting scenes involved King Shark, a CGI monster creation that has developed a taste for human flesh. There’s also thousands of filthy rats, a giant starfish that squirts babies from its armpits, human beings ripped in half, and a head that’s used like a wad of bubble gum. Hard to have an appetite after some of those scenes. Fortunately for us, we found two people who have no problem eating under any circumstances.

This week’s episode of Galaxy Brains features a conversation with comedians and fast food experts Nick Wiger and Mike Mitchell of the Doughboys podcast. We discuss Suicide Squad’s grossest moments, plus do a deep dive into the culinary offerings at your local multiplex.

As usual, this conversation has been edited and condensed to be less weird.

Dave: How do you justify eating during a movie this disgusting?

Mitch: Great question. It makes me hungrier.

Dave: You get hungrier when you see a guy’s head explode or a talking shark ripping someone in half.

Mitch: I just need...

Dave: To have a hoagie.

Mitch: There is like a very gratuitous moment and it’s where the shark does eat a human head.

Dave: He’s chewing that thing for like 20 minutes.

Mitch: Yeah. He’s like gnawing on a head. That’s about as gross as it gets. But I’ve sadly never been bothered by seeing gross stuff. It’s never really bothered me too much. Yeah. I think part of the I think just being a disgusting person makes it easier, like if you just already are inherently disgusting, like that allows me to eat something disgusting while I’m watching something disgusting and there’s no contradiction.

Dave: So it kind of relaxes you to see a shark gnawing on a head like a Charleston Chew candy.

Mitch: With the eyes still twitching. Yes. That’s the thing that really puts it over the top.

Nick: Yeah. He’s like looking up. He’s like realizing what happened. It is. Yeah, it’s a lot. Right. The DMT hasn’t hit yet.

Dave: When you went to the theater, what did you guys eat?

Nick: I got nachos. People get so mad because I don’t like popcorn. And a big part of that for me is I don’t like being greasy and like sitting on my own. As disgusting as I am, I don’t like being greasy in a movie theater, having greasy hands and a greasy face. And the other thing is like, I hate having anything stuck in my teeth. I know that’s pretty universal, but with me in particular, I can’t focus on anything else. So if I’m trying to watch a movie, you know, for 120 minutes and I’ve got a kernel stuck between a couple of my molars, I can’t. I’m like I’m completely out of it. So popcorn is usually no for me.

Dave: I often think that nacho cheese at baseball games or movie theaters is akin to butter, that it’s more like someone’s drizzled butter on chips than the tangy sharpness of real cheese. You don’t feel that’s a problem?

Mitch: No, I definitely is like you dip a chip into some margarine, but I’m OK with that. It’s a little hint of cheese. It’s kind of got that savory cheesy character to it. Here’s what I’ll say about the AMC movie theater nachos in particular. So first off, they are giving you the Tostitos Rounds Minis. So those all fit very cleanly into the dipping cup. You don’t ever have an issue where like, oh my my chip is breaking because this triangle is a little too big to get in here or, you know, getting a partial dip. That’s pretty unsatisfying for the surface area of the chip. You’re getting a great proper dip with every single chip with the Tostitos Rounds. And then also they give you two dipping sauce cups when you really only need one for that quantity of chips, which I love. Give me more. Give me too much sauce. Like if I’m having chips and guacamole, I want too much guac. I don’t want to run out of guac and have surplus chips. And that’s exactly what they did with the movie nachos.

Dave: Have you ever thought about pouring the cup onto the chips and then whatever remainder you have left, you dip?

Mitch: Yeah, the cereal milk approach. The issue there is more just messiness, like I mentioned earlier, especially in the context of a movie theater. I don’t want it to be gooey or sticky in there. That’s a problem. That’s a problem.

Dave: Keep it clean.

Mitch: I was going to say this to Nick. I would rather have more dip to cover all the chips. But there is something very satisfying with you finishing the dip with your last chip. That’s perfection. That’s the dream.

Nick: Yeah, that’s what should happen.