WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.140 Okay, let's unpack this, because usually when 00:00:02.140 --> 00:00:04.099 we start one of these deep dives... We've got 00:00:04.099 --> 00:00:07.139 a massive stack of research. Exactly. We've got 00:00:07.139 --> 00:00:09.900 academic journals or, you know, breaking news 00:00:09.900 --> 00:00:13.000 articles, maybe a thick biography or two. Right. 00:00:13.199 --> 00:00:15.220 We like to really get into the weeds of a specific 00:00:15.220 --> 00:00:18.000 event. We do. We definitely like complexity here. 00:00:18.719 --> 00:00:22.239 But today, today we are doing something that, 00:00:22.260 --> 00:00:25.839 at first glance... looks deceptively simple. 00:00:25.980 --> 00:00:28.500 Very simple. We aren't looking at a book or a 00:00:28.500 --> 00:00:31.089 scientific study. We are looking at a map. but 00:00:31.089 --> 00:00:33.950 not a geographical map. Right, no, it's a cultural 00:00:33.950 --> 00:00:35.929 one. It's a bit of a treasure hunt today, honestly. 00:00:35.929 --> 00:00:39.049 It really is. We are staring at a single phrase, 00:00:39.090 --> 00:00:41.689 just three little monosyllabic words that, for 00:00:41.689 --> 00:00:45.170 some reason, absolutely refuse to die. Hell to 00:00:45.170 --> 00:00:47.750 pay. Hell to pay. And our source material for 00:00:47.750 --> 00:00:49.710 this entire discussion, the map we are using, 00:00:50.130 --> 00:00:53.590 is, wait for it, a Wikipedia disambiguation page. 00:00:53.729 --> 00:00:56.130 Which I know sounds incredibly dry to the listener. 00:00:56.149 --> 00:00:58.030 Yeah, it sounds like a joke. Because most people, 00:00:58.030 --> 00:01:00.630 when you land on a disambiguation page, It's 00:01:00.630 --> 00:01:02.939 a mistake. You typed something in wrong. You're 00:01:02.939 --> 00:01:05.299 annoyed, and you click past it in a fraction 00:01:05.299 --> 00:01:07.459 of a second. Exactly. It's usually just a traffic 00:01:07.459 --> 00:01:10.079 cop directing you to the actual article you wanted. 00:01:10.140 --> 00:01:12.439 Right. But if you actually stop, if you just 00:01:12.439 --> 00:01:15.319 pause and look at the specific list for Hell 00:01:15.319 --> 00:01:18.840 to Pay, it is fascinating. It really is. It's 00:01:18.840 --> 00:01:21.459 like a core sample of pop culture. It's this 00:01:21.459 --> 00:01:24.680 roadmap of how artists, writers, filmmakers, 00:01:24.920 --> 00:01:27.319 and even political commentators have interpreted 00:01:27.319 --> 00:01:29.799 this one specific threat over the last three 00:01:29.799 --> 00:01:32.400 decades. It creates a timeline. That is what 00:01:32.400 --> 00:01:34.459 jumped out at me immediately. We aren't just 00:01:34.459 --> 00:01:36.959 looking at a dictionary definition of a phrase. 00:01:37.079 --> 00:01:40.120 No! We are looking at a usage history. And it 00:01:40.120 --> 00:01:44.420 stretches from 1990... all the way to 2018. What's 00:01:44.420 --> 00:01:47.519 wild is the sheer variety of landscapes we are 00:01:47.519 --> 00:01:49.680 going to traverse today. You know, you'd think 00:01:49.680 --> 00:01:52.500 a phrase like hell to pay belongs in one specific 00:01:52.500 --> 00:01:55.040 box. Like a cheesy 80s action movie. Yeah, or 00:01:55.040 --> 00:01:56.859 maybe a heavy metal song. And to be fair, it 00:01:56.859 --> 00:01:59.159 is definitely in those places. Oh, it is heavily 00:01:59.159 --> 00:02:01.859 in those places. But we are also going to find 00:02:01.859 --> 00:02:04.459 it in political biographies and very serious 00:02:04.459 --> 00:02:08.439 World War II history in crime novels and animated 00:02:08.439 --> 00:02:12.060 superhero movies. It is literally Which raises 00:02:12.060 --> 00:02:14.300 the big question, really the mission for this 00:02:14.300 --> 00:02:17.280 deep dive. Why? Right. Why does this specific 00:02:17.280 --> 00:02:21.120 idiom have such incredible staying power? Why 00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:24.460 do we keep coming back to hell to pay to title 00:02:24.460 --> 00:02:27.379 our art? Yeah, why not, I don't know, big consequences 00:02:27.379 --> 00:02:30.539 or things are bad. Things are bad just doesn't 00:02:30.539 --> 00:02:33.120 quite have the same ring to it. It really doesn't. 00:02:33.360 --> 00:02:35.860 We need to look at the timeline and the genres 00:02:35.860 --> 00:02:39.360 today to understand the enduring appeal. Is it 00:02:39.360 --> 00:02:41.560 the drama? Is it just the rhythm of the words? 00:02:41.939 --> 00:02:44.360 Or is it this universal concept that we all just 00:02:44.360 --> 00:02:46.580 understand implicitly? I love that. The universal 00:02:46.580 --> 00:02:49.060 concept of, hey, you've really messed up now. 00:02:49.280 --> 00:02:51.360 Precisely. The stakes are always high when there's 00:02:51.360 --> 00:02:54.360 hell to pay and applied to debt and not a financial 00:02:54.360 --> 00:02:57.039 one, a moral one. OK, so let's open up the map. 00:02:57.099 --> 00:02:59.139 We have three main territories to cover today. 00:02:59.300 --> 00:03:02.169 Music, literature, and film. And I think we have 00:03:02.169 --> 00:03:04.750 to start with the loudest one. The place where 00:03:04.750 --> 00:03:07.629 this phrase seems to feel the most at home. We'll 00:03:07.629 --> 00:03:10.250 call this part one, the sound of retribution. 00:03:10.849 --> 00:03:13.710 Naturally. Because it's a phrase that screams 00:03:13.710 --> 00:03:15.870 to be shouted into a microphone. Oh, absolutely. 00:03:15.969 --> 00:03:18.150 Look at the phonetics of it. Hell, zoom your 00:03:18.150 --> 00:03:21.930 pay. It's percussive. It has a beat built right 00:03:21.930 --> 00:03:24.310 into the syllable. It really does. Looking at 00:03:24.310 --> 00:03:26.770 the album section of our source list, the earliest 00:03:26.770 --> 00:03:29.830 entry on the entire timeline, the pioneer of 00:03:29.830 --> 00:03:32.710 Hell 2 Pay, if you will, is the Jeff Healy Band. 00:03:32.810 --> 00:03:35.509 Right. They released an album titled Hell 2 Pay 00:03:35.509 --> 00:03:39.669 way back in 1990. 1990. That sets the scene perfectly. 00:03:39.990 --> 00:03:42.409 We are right at the turn of the decade. And for 00:03:42.409 --> 00:03:44.069 context, if you aren't familiar with Jeff Healy, 00:03:44.189 --> 00:03:47.669 this is blues rock. Yeah. It's gritty. It's soulful. 00:03:47.949 --> 00:03:51.069 It is not synthesized pop music. Right. When 00:03:51.069 --> 00:03:53.310 a blues musician says there is hell to pay, they 00:03:53.310 --> 00:03:54.909 usually aren't threatening to blow up a building 00:03:54.909 --> 00:03:56.810 or something. They're talking about personal 00:03:56.810 --> 00:04:00.110 demons. Heartbreak. The bottle. Bad decisions 00:04:00.110 --> 00:04:02.349 catching up with you. It's very internal. The 00:04:02.349 --> 00:04:04.509 hell is inside the room with you. The very personal 00:04:04.509 --> 00:04:06.949 kind of debt. So we start there in 1990. But 00:04:06.949 --> 00:04:09.349 then, if you look down the list, there is a massive 00:04:09.349 --> 00:04:12.409 gap. A huge gap. The next album with that exact 00:04:12.409 --> 00:04:15.710 title doesn't pop up until 2004 with the band 00:04:15.710 --> 00:04:20.069 Dawkin. Dawkin. Now that name... conjures up 00:04:20.069 --> 00:04:22.569 some very specific imagery. I'm thinking big 00:04:22.569 --> 00:04:25.250 hair. Big hair, power cords, leather jackets, 00:04:25.410 --> 00:04:28.329 the whole 80s metal scene. But here they are 00:04:28.329 --> 00:04:31.790 in 2004, releasing an album called Hell to Pay. 00:04:32.009 --> 00:04:35.389 That's a 14 -year gap. The Jeff Healy band and 00:04:35.389 --> 00:04:37.810 Dawkin are seemingly worlds apart musically, 00:04:37.910 --> 00:04:40.529 yet they both landed on this exact title. It 00:04:40.529 --> 00:04:42.670 shows that the phrase isn't tied to a single 00:04:42.670 --> 00:04:45.250 micro trend. Right. It didn't have a brief moment 00:04:45.250 --> 00:04:48.310 in 1990 and then just vanish. It lay dormant 00:04:48.310 --> 00:04:50.889 and then resurfaced, which suggests that the 00:04:50.889 --> 00:04:53.470 phrase itself has a classic quality. It feels 00:04:53.470 --> 00:04:56.790 vintage. Yeah. When Dawing uses it in 2004, they 00:04:56.790 --> 00:04:58.970 aren't trying to found futuristic. They're trying 00:04:58.970 --> 00:05:00.730 to capture an attitude. It's like putting on 00:05:00.730 --> 00:05:02.910 a vintage leather jacket. It immediately signals 00:05:02.910 --> 00:05:05.430 toughness. But here's where it gets really interesting. 00:05:05.709 --> 00:05:08.009 When we move from album titles to song titles, 00:05:08.850 --> 00:05:11.290 the list just explodes. And the names of the 00:05:11.290 --> 00:05:13.889 bands, I mean, you cannot make this up. The genre 00:05:13.889 --> 00:05:16.970 connection becomes undeniable here. You do not 00:05:16.970 --> 00:05:20.009 see, at least not on this list, a lot of bubblegum 00:05:20.009 --> 00:05:22.730 pop songs or smooth jazz tracks called Hell to 00:05:22.730 --> 00:05:24.589 Pay. No, definitely not. Let's run through the 00:05:24.589 --> 00:05:26.529 roster. We have a song called Hell to Pay by 00:05:26.529 --> 00:05:29.230 The Almighty that was on their album Soul Destruction 00:05:29.230 --> 00:05:32.449 in 1991. Soul Destruction. You really cannot 00:05:32.449 --> 00:05:34.329 get more literal with the theme than that. It's 00:05:34.329 --> 00:05:36.750 subtle, isn't it? It's very understated. Very. 00:05:37.430 --> 00:05:40.430 But then we jump forward to the 2010s, and this 00:05:40.430 --> 00:05:42.620 is where I notice a real pattern. We have the 00:05:42.620 --> 00:05:45.079 legendary Deep Purple releasing a track called 00:05:45.079 --> 00:05:48.079 Hell to Pay on their album Now What in 2013. 00:05:48.279 --> 00:05:50.420 A legacy band keeping the flame alive. Exactly. 00:05:50.720 --> 00:05:54.579 But then two years later, 2015, Five Finger Death 00:05:54.579 --> 00:05:56.839 Punch drops Hell to Pay on the album Got Your 00:05:56.839 --> 00:06:00.139 Six. OK. And then just one year later, 2016, 00:06:00.459 --> 00:06:03.160 Drowning Pool puts it on their album. And please, 00:06:03.160 --> 00:06:04.839 for the listener's sake, you have to tell them 00:06:04.839 --> 00:06:07.160 the name of that Drowning Pool album. It is important 00:06:07.160 --> 00:06:09.699 context. Oh, I was saving the best for last. 00:06:09.959 --> 00:06:13.529 The album is called Hello. That is H -E -L -L 00:06:13.529 --> 00:06:15.970 -E -L -U -Y -A. Incredible. It's a pun. A heavy 00:06:15.970 --> 00:06:18.509 metal pun. I love it so much. But seriously, 00:06:18.889 --> 00:06:22.829 looking at this list, the almighty deep purple 00:06:22.829 --> 00:06:26.550 five -finger death punch drowning pool. Yeah. 00:06:27.290 --> 00:06:29.790 There is a massive theme here. There was a definite 00:06:29.790 --> 00:06:32.029 pattern. If we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:06:32.089 --> 00:06:34.329 look at the clustering of dates. Right. You have 00:06:34.329 --> 00:06:36.509 the early 90s entries, and then you have this 00:06:36.509 --> 00:06:41.709 surge in the mid 2010s, 2013, 2015, 2016. It 00:06:41.709 --> 00:06:44.350 is like the rock and heavy metal community collectively 00:06:44.350 --> 00:06:46.470 rediscovered this phrase all at once. It's like 00:06:46.470 --> 00:06:48.490 they all got the same memo. Hey guys, hell to 00:06:48.490 --> 00:06:50.629 pay is back in stock. It speaks to the genre's 00:06:50.629 --> 00:06:53.029 values. Heavy metal and hard rock often deal 00:06:53.029 --> 00:06:55.829 with themes of judgment, retribution, and consequence. 00:06:56.410 --> 00:06:58.949 Take Five Finger Death Punch. Their album title, 00:06:59.170 --> 00:07:01.790 Got Your Six, is military slang for I've Got 00:07:01.790 --> 00:07:04.689 Your Back. Their aesthetic is very militaristic, 00:07:04.750 --> 00:07:07.189 very aggressive. So in their context, Hell to 00:07:07.189 --> 00:07:09.709 Pay isn't about a broken heart like it might 00:07:09.709 --> 00:07:12.069 be for Jeff Healy. No. It's a threat. It's external. 00:07:12.189 --> 00:07:13.990 You cross the line, and now there is Hell to 00:07:13.990 --> 00:07:17.699 Pay. Precisely. It shifts from consequences I 00:07:17.699 --> 00:07:20.060 have to suffer to consequences you're going to 00:07:20.060 --> 00:07:22.399 suffer because of me. It becomes weaponized. 00:07:22.680 --> 00:07:25.139 And the drowning pool title, Hallelujah, connects 00:07:25.139 --> 00:07:28.040 it right back to religion. Metal has always played 00:07:28.040 --> 00:07:31.079 with religious imagery. Heaven, hell, judgment. 00:07:31.680 --> 00:07:33.980 By mashing up hallelujah, which is a word of 00:07:33.980 --> 00:07:37.540 phrase, with hell, they are subverting the expectation. 00:07:37.800 --> 00:07:40.980 It is a celebration of the chaos. So in music, 00:07:41.199 --> 00:07:43.459 hell to pay is about attitude. It's about grit, 00:07:44.000 --> 00:07:46.160 aggression, and basically a musical fistfight. 00:07:46.439 --> 00:07:48.839 Absolutely. But moving on, we have to leave the 00:07:48.839 --> 00:07:50.920 mosh pit now. We are going to take those exact 00:07:50.920 --> 00:07:53.680 same three words, hell to pay, and walk into 00:07:53.680 --> 00:07:56.339 a library. A significant shift in tone. Huge 00:07:56.339 --> 00:07:58.879 shift. This is part two, the written word. We're 00:07:58.879 --> 00:08:01.199 moving from the noise of rock music to the quiet, 00:08:01.439 --> 00:08:03.779 terrifying intensity of books. And here, the 00:08:03.779 --> 00:08:06.459 phrase is used to signal gravity. In music, it's 00:08:06.459 --> 00:08:08.800 about posturing. In literature, at least judging 00:08:08.800 --> 00:08:11.199 by this list, it is about absolute seriousness. 00:08:11.420 --> 00:08:13.240 Let's start with the history. There is a book 00:08:13.240 --> 00:08:16.139 by Dennis Giangreco published in 2009. The title 00:08:16.139 --> 00:08:19.319 is just Heldepay. But context is everything here. 00:08:19.639 --> 00:08:23.220 Right. The source notes it is explicitly about 00:08:23.220 --> 00:08:26.300 World War II. Specifically, it's about the planned 00:08:26.300 --> 00:08:29.459 invasion of Japan, Operation Downfall. Think 00:08:29.459 --> 00:08:32.080 about that usage for a second. In a song by the 00:08:32.080 --> 00:08:34.779 Almighty, Heldepay might be about a street fight 00:08:34.779 --> 00:08:38.019 or a bad breakup. Yeah. In Dennis Giangreco's 00:08:38.019 --> 00:08:40.419 book, Applied to World War II, hell to pay isn't 00:08:40.419 --> 00:08:43.720 a lyric. It refers to the immense catastrophic 00:08:43.720 --> 00:08:47.000 cost of global conflict. The payment here isn't 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:50.139 money. It is human life. That is a very heavy 00:08:50.139 --> 00:08:52.820 pivot. It takes the idiom totally literally. 00:08:52.940 --> 00:08:55.500 There was a hellish price to be paid. Exactly. 00:08:55.840 --> 00:08:57.799 It strips away the bravado we saw in the music 00:08:57.799 --> 00:09:00.370 section and leaves only the tragedy. It's Jen 00:09:00.370 --> 00:09:02.909 Greco saying, if we had done this invasion, the 00:09:02.909 --> 00:09:04.929 cost would have been unimaginable. It's a very 00:09:04.929 --> 00:09:06.889 somber use of the phrase. And then just to keep 00:09:06.889 --> 00:09:09.110 us on our toes, the list pivots again. We go 00:09:09.110 --> 00:09:11.009 from military history to the political arena. 00:09:11.210 --> 00:09:12.850 And this entry definitely made a splash when 00:09:12.850 --> 00:09:15.549 it came out. This is the 2001 biography. Yes. 00:09:15.850 --> 00:09:18.529 Hell to Pay, the Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham 00:09:18.529 --> 00:09:21.710 Clinton by Barbara Olson. Now, completely putting 00:09:21.710 --> 00:09:24.090 aside the politics of the subject. We are not 00:09:24.090 --> 00:09:26.389 here to debate the content of the book or take 00:09:26.389 --> 00:09:29.129 any sides whatsoever. Look at the construction 00:09:29.129 --> 00:09:32.590 of that title, Hell to Pay, The Unfolding Story. 00:09:32.710 --> 00:09:34.750 It sounds like a thriller, doesn't it? It does. 00:09:35.230 --> 00:09:37.450 The use of the unfolding story in the subtitle 00:09:37.450 --> 00:09:39.789 suggests an ongoing narrative, something that 00:09:39.789 --> 00:09:42.190 isn't finished yet. But the main title, held 00:09:42.190 --> 00:09:45.870 to pay, promises dramatic consequences. It promises 00:09:45.870 --> 00:09:48.409 revelations. It's marketing shorthand. It is. 00:09:48.929 --> 00:09:51.490 In the world of political biographies, regardless 00:09:51.490 --> 00:09:54.009 of which side of the aisle you are on, you need 00:09:54.009 --> 00:09:56.710 a title that grabs the reader by the lapels. 00:09:56.769 --> 00:09:59.529 Right. It implies that there are secrets, scandals, 00:09:59.570 --> 00:10:02.169 or sins that are about to catch up with the subject. 00:10:02.570 --> 00:10:04.950 It's a promise to the listener. Read this, and 00:10:04.950 --> 00:10:06.870 you will see the reckoning. It's fascinating 00:10:06.870 --> 00:10:09.649 that both the World War II historian and the 00:10:09.649 --> 00:10:12.690 political biographer looked at their work, one 00:10:12.690 --> 00:10:14.730 about the biggest war in history, one about a 00:10:14.730 --> 00:10:16.730 polarizing political figure, and thought, you 00:10:16.730 --> 00:10:19.649 know what sums this up? Hell to pay. It speaks 00:10:19.649 --> 00:10:22.769 to the versatility of the phrase. It is a container 00:10:22.769 --> 00:10:24.570 that you can pour totally different kinds of 00:10:24.570 --> 00:10:27.590 drama into. Whether it's the drama of war or 00:10:27.590 --> 00:10:30.309 the drama of Washington, D .C., the label fits 00:10:30.309 --> 00:10:33.350 perfectly. Speaking of drama. The list has a 00:10:33.350 --> 00:10:35.570 couple more literary entries that fit that bill 00:10:35.570 --> 00:10:40.509 perfectly. We have a 2002 crime novel by George 00:10:40.509 --> 00:10:43.230 Pelikanos called Hell to Pay. Now, Pelikanos 00:10:43.230 --> 00:10:46.049 is a master of the crime genre. He worked on 00:10:46.049 --> 00:10:48.990 The Wire. His world is the gritty streets. Crime 00:10:48.990 --> 00:10:51.389 novels are a perfect fit for this phrase because 00:10:51.389 --> 00:10:55.149 the entire genre is built on debt. Debt, like 00:10:55.149 --> 00:10:57.929 literal money. Social debt. Someone steals, someone 00:10:57.929 --> 00:11:00.509 kills, someone breaks the rules. The social contract 00:11:00.509 --> 00:11:03.509 is broken. The detective or the avenger is the 00:11:03.509 --> 00:11:05.490 one who comes to collect on that debt. So in 00:11:05.490 --> 00:11:07.990 the crime novel, hell to pay is the climax. It's 00:11:07.990 --> 00:11:09.789 the moment the bad guy gets cornered in the alley. 00:11:09.909 --> 00:11:12.210 Or the moment the good guy realizes the cost 00:11:12.210 --> 00:11:14.889 of doing the right thing. In noir, nobody gets 00:11:14.889 --> 00:11:16.590 away clean. Everyone pays a little bit of hell. 00:11:16.830 --> 00:11:19.860 We also have a play listed by Amy Fried. Theater, 00:11:20.019 --> 00:11:22.320 so we've got music, history, politics, crime 00:11:22.320 --> 00:11:25.379 novels, and the stage. The ubiquity is kind of 00:11:25.379 --> 00:11:27.919 staggering. It suggests that retribution is a 00:11:27.919 --> 00:11:30.340 universal theme. It doesn't matter if you are 00:11:30.340 --> 00:11:33.000 writing a biography or a guitar solo. The idea 00:11:33.000 --> 00:11:35.919 that actions have consequences is the engine 00:11:35.919 --> 00:11:38.679 of almost all storytelling. It really is. The 00:11:38.679 --> 00:11:40.980 ultimate stuff is about to go down label. Precisely. 00:11:41.200 --> 00:11:42.779 Okay, we've heard the albums. We've read the 00:11:42.779 --> 00:11:46.059 books. Now we need to watch the movie. This brings 00:11:46.059 --> 00:11:50.000 us to part three on the screen. The visual interpretation. 00:11:50.299 --> 00:11:52.179 The list for films is interesting because it 00:11:52.179 --> 00:11:55.360 feels a bit polarized. On one side you have these 00:11:55.360 --> 00:11:57.860 directorial works that frankly I hadn't heard 00:11:57.860 --> 00:12:00.299 of before seeing this list. These seem to be 00:12:00.299 --> 00:12:02.860 smaller independent productions. Right. We have 00:12:02.860 --> 00:12:05.960 a 2005 film credited to Roberto Gomez Martin 00:12:05.960 --> 00:12:10.159 and a 2011 film by Jay Jennings. both titled 00:12:10.159 --> 00:12:12.659 Hell to Pay. I'll be honest, these aren't films 00:12:12.659 --> 00:12:15.120 that broke box office records. But think about 00:12:15.120 --> 00:12:17.480 the market for these kinds of films, maybe direct 00:12:17.480 --> 00:12:20.299 -to -video or indie action. Why choose that title? 00:12:20.440 --> 00:12:22.120 It's the same reason as the political book, right? 00:12:22.120 --> 00:12:25.279 Pure marketing. Exactly. If you were scrolling 00:12:25.279 --> 00:12:27.539 through a list of movies to rent or walking through 00:12:27.539 --> 00:12:30.100 a video store back in the day and you see a title 00:12:30.100 --> 00:12:33.360 like Hell to Pay, you know exactly what you are 00:12:33.360 --> 00:12:36.460 getting. Yeah. It promises a gunfight. It promises 00:12:36.460 --> 00:12:38.879 revenge. It's an incredibly efficient title. 00:12:39.000 --> 00:12:41.759 It's a low -budget promise of high -budget excitement. 00:12:42.120 --> 00:12:45.000 It keeps the timeline moving, too. 2005, 2011. 00:12:45.700 --> 00:12:47.639 The phrase never really goes away. It's just 00:12:47.639 --> 00:12:49.600 always there in the background waiting for a 00:12:49.600 --> 00:12:51.379 director to pick it up. But then, then we get 00:12:51.379 --> 00:12:53.559 to the heavyweight. The most recent entry on 00:12:53.559 --> 00:12:56.200 the entire list provided by R -Source. And this 00:12:56.200 --> 00:12:58.539 brings us to the modern era of blockbusters. 00:12:58.659 --> 00:13:01.980 The era of the franchise. 2018. Suicide Squad. 00:13:02.250 --> 00:13:04.649 Hell to pay. And this is an animated film, correct? 00:13:04.690 --> 00:13:07.529 Yes, an animated film set in the DC universe. 00:13:07.710 --> 00:13:10.230 This brings the timeline full circle in a really 00:13:10.230 --> 00:13:12.870 fascinating way. Think about it. We started with 00:13:12.870 --> 00:13:17.269 the Jeff Healy band in 1990. Blues rock, gritty, 00:13:17.610 --> 00:13:20.669 human, grounded in reality. We end on this list 00:13:20.669 --> 00:13:23.669 anyway in 2018 with comic book characters. From 00:13:23.669 --> 00:13:26.450 a Canadian blues rocker to Deadshot and Harley 00:13:26.450 --> 00:13:29.450 Quinn. Exactly. The phrase has entered the realm 00:13:29.450 --> 00:13:32.440 of superheroes and villains. And if you think 00:13:32.440 --> 00:13:35.759 about the Suicide Squad concept, bad guys doing 00:13:35.759 --> 00:13:40.360 good things under threat of death, hell to pay, 00:13:40.840 --> 00:13:42.659 fits perfectly. For those who don't know, the 00:13:42.659 --> 00:13:45.039 Suicide Squad is basically a team of villains 00:13:45.039 --> 00:13:47.860 who have actual bombs implanted in their necks 00:13:47.860 --> 00:13:50.279 by the government. They go on literal suicide 00:13:50.279 --> 00:13:52.279 missions. So the stakes are literal. If they 00:13:52.279 --> 00:13:54.470 disobey, they die. They're living on borrowed 00:13:54.470 --> 00:13:56.649 time. And because it's a superhero movie, the 00:13:56.649 --> 00:13:58.889 hell might be literal, too. They fight magic 00:13:58.889 --> 00:14:02.090 users, demons, portals to other dimensions. That's 00:14:02.090 --> 00:14:04.149 a great point. In the crime novel, hell is prison. 00:14:04.389 --> 00:14:06.470 In the DC movie, hell is an actual dimension 00:14:06.470 --> 00:14:08.629 of suffering. It reflects how pop culture has 00:14:08.629 --> 00:14:11.549 shifted. How so? Well, in the 90s, rock and gritty 00:14:11.549 --> 00:14:14.690 crime dramas were king. In the late 2010s, superhero 00:14:14.690 --> 00:14:17.230 culture eat everything. The phrase revived. It 00:14:17.230 --> 00:14:19.169 just migrated into the dominant genre of the 00:14:19.169 --> 00:14:21.450 time. It adapted. It's a survivor. It is. And 00:14:21.450 --> 00:14:24.500 notice the date again, 2018. That is right after 00:14:24.500 --> 00:14:27.120 that surge of metal songs we saw in 2015 and 00:14:27.120 --> 00:14:30.080 2016. It feels like the mid to late 2010s was 00:14:30.080 --> 00:14:32.620 a peak era for Hell to Pay. Maybe the world was 00:14:32.620 --> 00:14:35.100 just feeling a little vindictive then, or anxious. 00:14:35.720 --> 00:14:39.659 Perhaps. Art reflects the times. When everyone 00:14:39.659 --> 00:14:43.100 is singing about or filming Hell to Pay, it usually 00:14:43.100 --> 00:14:44.980 means there's a sense that the bill is coming 00:14:44.980 --> 00:14:48.529 due. A sense of collective anxiety. That is a 00:14:48.529 --> 00:14:50.909 sobering thought, but it's amazing how durable 00:14:50.909 --> 00:14:53.049 the phrase is. It sounded cool on a cassette 00:14:53.049 --> 00:14:56.070 tape in 1990, and it sounds cool on a streaming 00:14:56.070 --> 00:14:59.110 service in 2018. It's because it's punchy. It's 00:14:59.110 --> 00:15:01.470 efficient. You don't need a long sentence to 00:15:01.470 --> 00:15:03.490 explain that there are consequences. You just 00:15:03.490 --> 00:15:05.809 say hell to pay, and the audience knows exactly 00:15:05.809 --> 00:15:08.429 what the stakes are. So we've looked at the evidence. 00:15:08.610 --> 00:15:10.889 We've seen Hell to Pay used by Deep Purple and 00:15:10.889 --> 00:15:12.929 Drowning Pool. We've seen it on the cover of 00:15:12.929 --> 00:15:15.289 books about Hillary Clinton and World War Two. 00:15:15.509 --> 00:15:18.389 We've seen it attached to indie films and animated 00:15:18.389 --> 00:15:20.909 super villain movies. It has been quite a journey 00:15:20.909 --> 00:15:23.450 for three little words. So what does this all 00:15:23.450 --> 00:15:26.210 mean? If you had to sum up the Hell to Pay phenomenon 00:15:26.210 --> 00:15:29.110 across all these sources, what is the ultimate 00:15:29.110 --> 00:15:31.529 takeaway? I think the takeaway is that Hell to 00:15:31.529 --> 00:15:34.509 Pay is a linguistic chameleon. It adapts to its 00:15:34.509 --> 00:15:37.850 environment perfectly. Think about the color 00:15:37.850 --> 00:15:41.850 of the phrase. In a mosh pit, it's red. It's 00:15:41.850 --> 00:15:44.610 anger and aggression. In a history book, it's 00:15:44.610 --> 00:15:48.669 gray. It's the ash of war and tragedy. In a political 00:15:48.669 --> 00:15:51.629 bio, it's yellow. It's scandal in journalism. 00:15:52.070 --> 00:15:54.669 In a crime novel, it's noir black. But the shape 00:15:54.669 --> 00:15:57.029 is always the same. The shape is always the same. 00:15:57.149 --> 00:15:59.649 It is a universally understood shorthand for 00:15:59.649 --> 00:16:02.789 things are about to get bad. But the flavor of 00:16:02.789 --> 00:16:05.360 bad changes entirely depending on where you use 00:16:05.360 --> 00:16:07.320 it. That is such a great point. It's a warning 00:16:07.320 --> 00:16:10.360 sign that works in any context. It's the find 00:16:10.360 --> 00:16:12.580 out part of mess around and find out. That is 00:16:12.580 --> 00:16:14.860 a very modern way to put it. But yes, absolutely. 00:16:15.159 --> 00:16:18.120 It is the pivot point in a story where the action 00:16:18.120 --> 00:16:20.100 has to happen. You cannot have a story called 00:16:20.100 --> 00:16:22.200 everything is fine and we paid the bill on time. 00:16:22.580 --> 00:16:24.440 No, nobody would read that. That sounds like 00:16:24.440 --> 00:16:27.200 a very boring Tuesday. We crave the drama of 00:16:27.200 --> 00:16:29.399 the debt. We want to see the hell being paid. 00:16:29.559 --> 00:16:31.480 This raises an interesting question for you, 00:16:31.480 --> 00:16:33.659 the listener, though. Oh, here we go. I see that 00:16:33.659 --> 00:16:35.879 look in your eye. If we look at the pattern artists 00:16:35.879 --> 00:16:38.159 and writers using this title to define a moment 00:16:38.159 --> 00:16:41.779 of high drama or consequence, I want to ask you 00:16:41.779 --> 00:16:45.539 this. If you were to write a biography or record 00:16:45.539 --> 00:16:47.980 an album about your own life and you had to title 00:16:47.980 --> 00:16:51.559 it Hell to Pay. Oh, wow. Which specific year 00:16:51.559 --> 00:16:54.379 or event in your life would it be about? And 00:16:54.379 --> 00:16:56.720 more importantly, what genre would it be? That 00:16:56.720 --> 00:16:59.259 it's a provocative fun. Because we all have that 00:16:59.259 --> 00:17:02.960 chapter. We do. Would it be your rebellious teenage 00:17:02.960 --> 00:17:05.200 years? That would be the punk rock album version 00:17:05.200 --> 00:17:07.420 held to pay the high school years? Or would it 00:17:07.420 --> 00:17:10.119 be a chaotic job you had? That's the memoir version. 00:17:10.119 --> 00:17:13.400 Yeah. Held to pay my year as an intern. Or maybe 00:17:13.400 --> 00:17:15.700 a really bad vacation, the Comedy of Errors version. 00:17:15.799 --> 00:17:17.680 The time the plumbing burst and you try to fix 00:17:17.680 --> 00:17:20.339 it yourself. That is a literal bill to pay. Exactly. 00:17:20.420 --> 00:17:23.539 I think mine might be my college years, specifically 00:17:23.539 --> 00:17:25.640 finals week. Definitely a soul destruction vibe 00:17:25.640 --> 00:17:28.549 there for a bit. I think for me it was my That 00:17:28.549 --> 00:17:32.170 was a psychological thriller, Hell to Pay, the 00:17:32.170 --> 00:17:34.789 academic edition. See, it works for everything. 00:17:35.049 --> 00:17:37.650 It works for superheroes, politicians, and stressed 00:17:37.650 --> 00:17:40.789 out students alike. Just hopefully for the listener, 00:17:41.230 --> 00:17:43.130 that chapter is a short one. And hopefully it's 00:17:43.130 --> 00:17:45.589 firmly in the past tense. Amen to that. That 00:17:45.589 --> 00:17:47.289 is something for you to mull over while you're 00:17:47.289 --> 00:17:49.990 stuck in traffic or doing the dishes today. Which 00:17:49.990 --> 00:17:52.509 chapter of your life is the Hell to Pay chapter? 00:17:52.670 --> 00:17:54.559 And if you don't have one yet? Brace yourself. 00:17:54.599 --> 00:17:56.819 Don't jinx them. Thank you for joining us on 00:17:56.819 --> 00:18:01.480 this deep dive into, well, into a Wikipedia disambiguation 00:18:01.480 --> 00:18:04.180 page. Who knew it could be this much fun? There 00:18:04.180 --> 00:18:06.299 is a story everywhere. If you look close enough, 00:18:06.480 --> 00:18:08.440 you just have to follow the map. Absolutely. 00:18:09.099 --> 00:18:11.119 Thanks for listening and we'll catch you on the 00:18:11.119 --> 00:18:11.880 next deep dive.