The pop culture divisions keeping us apart

Author Elisha Dacey
Says Conan to Douglas Quaid: “Get your square teeth outta here.” (Elisha Dacey/Illustration)

You’d think, after nearly 25 years together, there was nothing my partner could say to surprise me.

But this hypothesis was put to the test last night when my husband revealed his favourite movie of all time is Conan the Barbarian.

Have you ever physically felt the neurons in your brain stop firing from bewilderment? The only other time this has happened to me was when I discovered my husband is a Slytherin.

Once I rebooted, I asked “Conan? Like the ‘80s Conan the Barbarian?”

“With Arnold Schwarzenegger all muscle-y, yes.”

“How is it possible that my favourite movie of all time is Contact and yours is Conan the Barbarian?”

“It’s a great movie. Arnold makes a bunch of excellent faces!”

“How is that even relev- like the face where his lips turn into a square and all you see are teeth? He does that in every movie! True Lies! Total Recall!”

“You’ve never watched it! How can you say it’s bad when you’ve never watched it?”

“I don’t need to watch it to know it’s bad!”

From there, our faux bickering descended into other ways pop culture has divided us, like how I’m a Stark and he’s a Lannister, and how he may be Leonardo but I am none of the ninja turtles because I am April O’Neil, dammit, and how I still think he Imperio-cursed this Gryffindor into marrying him and that should be reasonable grounds for divorce.

After we stopped giggling in mock outrage, I eyed him smugly.

“Tomorrow is Fun Friday, I’m gonna write about this conversation for my column.”

“Yeah, sure,” he snickered. “You’d better let me read it first, ha ha.”

“Nah, you’ll have to sign up for the newsletter.”

I watched his neurons stop firing as he absorbed that I might not be kidding. “Wait. What?!”

After 25ish years, I can still surprise him.

Tell us this made you smarter | Contact us | Report error

  • Elisha Dacey is a seasoned journalist with more than two decades of experience in the field. She has worked in various newsrooms across Canada, ranging from small-town papers to major outlets like CBC Manitoba and Global News. Dacey began her journalism career in Manitoba and has held roles such as managing editor, senior producer and digital online journalist. Notably, she launched Metro Winnipeg, the city’s only free daily newspaper, which quickly became the second most-read paper in Winnipeg.

    Elisha Dacey is the Managing Editor for Future of Good.

    View all posts Managing Editor