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Episode 135: VS Morbius
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Yes. We finally watched Morbius.
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Transcript
Introduction and Zencastr Promotion
00:00:00
Speaker
This show is recorded using Zencaster. If you are a podcaster, or you want to be a podcaster, and you want to be able to record remotely, you can do so using Zencaster. They also have hosting options, and you can let them know that we sent you. Follow the link in our show notes, or in the episode description, and sign up for an account on Zencaster now to start recording your own podcast.
Movie Fighters Resumes After Hurricane
00:01:03
Speaker
Ring the bell hunger. This is Movie Fighters, the show where Chris Sims and I, Matt Wilson, we watch movies and we beat them up. Chris, we didn't do a show in October. We did not, Matt. And the reason for that was a hurricane that that hit the town where I live.
00:01:31
Speaker
We're still recovering from that hurricane. You, you can read all about it. And, uh, and please help the Asheville and Western North Carolina area with your donations and, uh, and volunteer time if you can.
Reluctant Viewing of Morbius
00:01:44
Speaker
But we have been saying for two years now that we were going to watch the Sony Pictures Studios film Morbius in October for Halloween.
00:02:02
Speaker
For some reason, we didn't watch it last year. um We would have had to pay money. But that was it? OK. Yes. Which we patently refuse to do. And that makes all the sense in the world. Then we were going to watch it this year and were prevented from making it a Halloween episode by the hurricane. And someone on our Tumblr said,
00:02:33
Speaker
You guys must have made some kind of monkey's paw wish to never watch Morbius. And we decided that we have to just rip the Band-Aid off and do this episode about this movie and get it done. Because we cannot wait until another October. No, it is it is incumbent upon us to Morb. In many ways, Matt, we're like the original Spartans.
00:03:03
Speaker
Uh-huh, uh-huh. What was the line? there's That line is in the movie. Yeah, they i they they say it a lot in the movie. And I was describing the plot of Morbius to my very patient wife as we had dinner. and she She was like, who are the children with an unnamed blood disease fighting?
00:03:33
Speaker
Like, who are the ops of these Spartan-like, terminally ill children? Yeah, because the the line is, we're like the original Spartans, the few against the many. Yeah. um Also, the the phrase, the original Spartans,
Jared Leto's Acting Critique
00:03:52
Speaker
like they have a different touring lineup now. Like, like they had to they had to get a new drummer. Yeah. Yeah.
00:04:00
Speaker
In case it's not obvious, we have seen this movie. We have seen this movie. I have seen this movie twice now. Because I saw this movie the first time on a flight to Italy. Now why if you're gonna watch a Jared Leto vehicle on the way to Italy?
00:04:23
Speaker
Why would you not watch his legitimately good, hilarious performance in House of Gucci? Now, I i don't think that movie was available at the time. When did House of Gucci come out? 2021. So, it's it was out, but I had not. i It wasn't available to watch.
00:04:48
Speaker
on that plane ride. I watched several movies on that plane ride, ah but the one I remember most watching is Morbius. This leads me into a question though, Chris, because the star of this movie is Jared Leto. The guy with the name on the poster is Jared Leto. ahha So you've seen House of Gucci? I have seen House of Gucci, which I would consider to be um his most legitimately good performance. Because that was a question I was coming into this episode with. Has Jared Leto ever been good in any of these? Don't misunderstand me, Matt. He's not good in it. Uh-huh. I guess what I mean is enjoyable performance. Okay. Well, everybody in House of Gucci, as I understand it, is like
00:05:42
Speaker
just balls out, let's do whatever the fuck. Devouring the scenery, yes. Like Adam Driver, Lady Gaga, all of them are just doing whatever. There's a scene where literally at least at least it's got to be at least three full minutes of screen time where Al Pacino and Jared Leto wander around a parking garage looking for their car.
00:06:19
Speaker
And it's kind of great. Okay, that that actually does sound like art. yeah that That sounds like a ah form of art. I do also want to point out that ah Jared Leto in this movie, does like he looks like Gallagher.
00:06:38
Speaker
i thought I always thought he looked like Jeffrey Tambor. like like They just couldn't get Jeffrey Tambor, so they made Jared Leto look like Jeffrey Tambor. Kind of, yeah. That's not unfair. Jared Leto's never been good. He's not good. and you Here's my theory about Jared Leto. okay I've never seen this show in my so-called life, but I know a lot of people like it and and think that he is good in it, right?
00:07:07
Speaker
It's like a teen heartthrob. He has ridden that wave of goodwill from my so-called life for 30 years. I did not even recall that he was in that. Yeah. The movie that people will probably bring up as, oh, you know what movie he is actually pretty good in? I just realized I forgot that he was in American Psycho.
00:07:39
Speaker
And in American Psycho, he plays Paul Allen, a totally moral a character totally devoid of morals. And he's part of that famous um card scene where Paul got a new card, and then they're comparing cards. okay And andd Christian Bale is flipping out about Paul's new card. that he's but He's pretty good in.
00:08:07
Speaker
but like I know he won an Oscar for Dallas Buyers Club, a movie that I was unable to watch because- He won an Oscar? He won an Oscar, yeah. For acting? For acting in Dallas Buyers Club, yes. Okay. i sound That sounds wack to me, dude, but yeah if okay. I couldn't watch ah Dallas Buyers Club because Matthew McConaughey looked too much like my dad in it. Okay. So, anyone who can tell me whether or not Jared Leto was actually good in the role he won an Oscar for, please, please say so. All I know is that his Joker was laughable.
00:08:57
Speaker
I mean, not laughable, though. In the worst possible way. And again, I had described the feeling of watching Jared Leto play the Joker as watching a child fail at a talent show. Yes. It's hard. It's a hard watch. And he ruined the movie Blade Runner 2049 for me. You know that meme of Oh, Brit is in this, the the meme from community.
00:09:27
Speaker
where the Dean is like at the play and he goes, oh, Britta's in this. That was my reaction to Jared Leto appearing in Blade Runner 2049. The rest of the cast of Morbius is better than this. yeah I will say Jared Leto does not look like he's having fun. Jared Leto does not seem like a person who has fun, which is weird because his job is pretending.
00:09:56
Speaker
And he's in a band, so that's two jobs where you're supposed to have fun. Yeah, he doesn't. I mean, maybe maybe he is. Maybe he's having a kick-ass time and and we we're the fools in this scenario. ah He doesn't seem to be having fun. Matt Smith seems like he's having a fucking blast. Matt Smith is enjoying this movie way more than anyone should be. Than anyone else ever did. Matt Smith certainly more than I did.
00:10:24
Speaker
Matt Smith plays the character Milo, which I'm going to get into him being named Milo a lot once we get into discussing that. That classic Morbius villain that everyone knows. You know what character he's playing, right? I do not know what character he's playing. He's playing Hunger, who
Film Direction and Character Analysis
00:10:47
Speaker
first appeared in Spider-Man number 76 from 1997, created by the one true voice of Spider-Man, Howard Mackie.
00:10:56
Speaker
We got, we got jokes on this show that are only funny to us, but we'll also never stop being funny to us.
00:11:04
Speaker
ah The Hunger is a rival vampire to Morbius in the comics whose name is Loxius or Lucius Crown, but who in every other discernible way is totally different from the character Matt Smith plays in this movie. But that is who he's playing. He's playing hunger. 100% definitely. That's the character he's playing. Yeah. um I mean, like, like, I feel like Matt Smith, Matt Smith must just like really enjoy playing vampires. What else did he play a vampire in? The Crown.
00:11:52
Speaker
He's Prince Charles in the crown, isn't he? He's Prince Philip. Prince Philip, yes, he's Prince Philip. His performance in this movie um actually reminds me a lot of One Night in Soho, which is a much better movie, where he gives a very similar performance.
00:12:13
Speaker
I recommend, or Last Night in Soho, sorry, similar title. um He plays a very similar character in Last Night in Soho. um Which is again a much better movie that I would definitely recommend over this movie ah directed by Edgar Wright The rest of the cast is also as I get better than this ah the lead the the the the female lead the lead actress is Adria Arjona and
00:12:43
Speaker
who this is the first movie I remember seeing her in. She plays, she plays Martine, but she would go on to be one of the leads on the Andor show where she is absolutely great.
00:12:59
Speaker
isn't And I think she's a really good actress. um Also on Wikipedia, it says, Arjona said the character, this is about Martin, the character was the smart one in the room and to took inspiration from politician and activist, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Interesting. You could really see the AOC in Martin in this movie, couldn't you? Sure. Sure. Sure.
00:13:29
Speaker
ah Jared Harris is in this movie. um Who I was trying to describe the movie to my wife and I said, Chernobyl's in it. Chernobyl's in it. Jared Harris also from Mad Men and many, many other good things um in a totally thankless role. Absolutely thankless. And then there are two f FBI agents in this movie played by Al Madrigal, who you may remember from The Daily Show.
00:13:59
Speaker
And Tyrese Gibson, who is like, I feel like Tyrese took this role to do something different from his Fast and Furious character. Yeah, yeah. Because- Like in the way that in the way that his Fast and Furious character is entertaining. Yeah, that's what I mean. Absolutely. Yeah. yeah Because Roman, who he plays in Fast and Furious, is fun. yeah This guy is a stick in the mud. We're gonna get into this, but it is was it hilarious to you how much they try to make Al Madrigal look like Gary Oldman? Do they?
00:14:49
Speaker
Yeah, man! Like Commissioner Gordon? Like Commissioner Gordon? Well, he's cosplaying, dude. Buddy, so there's so much Dark Knight ripoff stuff happening in this movie. To a phenomenally hilarious extreme. And we will we will get to that. um There's also, ah spoiler alert,
00:15:13
Speaker
End of movie cameos from Michael Keaton, who is way better this movie, so much better than this movie. Oh yeah, oh yeah. Who also seems like he showed up for some filming and then instead of coming back to do any reshoots, got on a podcast microphone.
00:15:30
Speaker
to do his his the second bit. Yeah, there's no way that's him in that vulture outfit. No way at all. um And then apparently JK Simmons- They might have just hit him up on cameo. Could be. JK Simmons apparently filmed some stuff as J. Jonah Jameson that was just not used. Wild. If if that makes you understand anything about bad decisions that went into making this movie. This movie was directed by Daniel Espinoza, a Swedish filmmaker, who um has directed English language movies before this, but gun to my head, you cannot convince me that these movies are real. Okay. I think I've heard of Safe House with Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds.
00:16:20
Speaker
That's a movie I think I've heard of. That is a movie that sounds like it might exist, yeah. yeah There's a movie called Child 44 that has Gary Oldman and Tom Hardy in it that I have never heard of in my fucking life. yeah it's It's set in Stalinist Russia. I don't know anything about this movie. That dude must fucking love Christopher Nolan. And then there's a movie called Life with Jake Gyllenhaal.
00:16:50
Speaker
that I also just don't know anything about. Like, this guy's movies before Morbius got put in a hole, because I swear I have not heard of these movies that he made before Morbius. That's, I think, more or less all we need to say before we get into talking about the movie. the the You know the whole deal, like Morbius,
00:17:21
Speaker
famous flop of the internet hilariously got Sony to re-release it into theaters. um I do want to say before we get into it that this is the most blatant example I think we've had since maybe Billy Zane's The Phantom of how little studio executives give a fuck about what they're doing.
00:17:51
Speaker
but cow just ah about what audiences want for sure. Yeah, this is such a ones as good as another. And we had this conversation with ah when we talked about Madam Web, a movie that that we have friends that are fascinated by in a way that I don't understand, but I do support. I'm fascinated by Madam Web way more than I'm fascinated by this movie. I mean,
00:18:20
Speaker
Sure, if if that's if that's how you want to live. i like Madam Web definitely comes from that same source of who cares, right? like like Who cares if this is one's as good as another? Because this movie is coming out, this movie is made by people who think Morbius is as good as Spider-Man and is the same as Spider-Man.
00:18:50
Speaker
And if we can make a Spider-Man movie and it's popular, well then just put, just do them with Morbius and it'll be just as popular.
Morbius's Availability and Opening Scene
00:18:58
Speaker
And that's not how it works. What is amazing to me is that this movie came out in 2022, right? Uh-huh. And then Sony, a multinational corporation that is ostensibly a corporation intended to be a money making operation. Yeah. Then decided, yes, we're going to release Madam Web 2 in 2020. Not Madam Web 2, but we're going to release Madam Web in 2024. Then we're also going to release Craven. Yeah. Yeah, that's wild. Like, there has got to be a point where you go,
00:19:49
Speaker
Okay, this isn't working. Yeah, they just don't understand that they're the it's not that the characters are different. And I feel like there's one level where you can't blame them because Blade happened. And Blade famously a character that nobody cared about and honestly was not very good until that movie came out.
00:20:18
Speaker
But I also feel like if if you're gonna say like, well, they did it with Blade, maybe they thought they could do it with Morbius, then that would also imply that Jared Leto is as cool as Wesley Snipes. And he's not. yeah he Jared Leto, like this?
00:20:35
Speaker
cannot be a controversial statement. Well, also, yeah, also Blade is a movie about a cool guy who hunts vampires, right? Yeah. Morbius is about, well, we're going to talk about what Morbius is about. I mean, Morbius is about an asshole. Yes, we're going to talk about what Morbius is about. Morbius, believe it or not, is streaming on Disney Plus, along with all the other Sony Spider-Man universe movies.
00:21:05
Speaker
which seems wrong somehow. It's wild that you can go on there and watch it. It is on Disney Plus. So if you would like to watch along with us, ah then go to Disney Plus and watch Morbius. The best thing about it, and you will be happy to know this, is that it is less than two hours long. Yes. We've already seen it, but we're going to take a pause here and If you are so inclined, ah you can watch Morbius. Oh, actually, Madam Webb is not on Disney+, but Morbius is. So you can watch Morbius on Disney+, while we take a break. And then we're gonna come back and we're gonna talk about the movie in excruciating detail.
00:21:57
Speaker
So come back and and we will talk about it.
00:22:17
Speaker
All right, we are back and it is time to talk about 2022's Morbius. the The first thing that happens in this movie is an opening credit sequence that um I think promises more than this movie can deliver because it's like cool designs of an M and they're like pink and purple. They love that M. They love that M. They love that M. It's got like a big pink triangle at the beginning and you're like, hey, what's this movie going to be? and then It does not live up to any of those promises. Then after the credits, we get what should have been the cold open, ah which is adult Michael Morbius flying in a helicopter in Costa Rica to a cave full of bats. Morbius gets out of the helicopter and he's walking with like, you know, walker a walker or
00:23:15
Speaker
ah He's got crutches. They're crutches, but it's also like a Walker sort of thing he uses all the time um because he's got a blood disease that he's had since he was a child. What is the name of that disease, man? What is the name? I don't even remember what the name is. It's not mentioned. It's never said.
00:23:33
Speaker
He just never said. So so the the pilot of this helicopter sees him walking with his crutches and go, hey buddy, do you need a doctor? And Morbius goes, I am a doctor. Man. That's so badass.
00:23:58
Speaker
I know that that's the intent is to make Morbius seem like a ah cool, tough guy who doesn't take any shit, right? Uh-huh. But, like, there are different kinds of doctors. Yeah, no, uh, Mikey Morbz is kind of just an asshole. We talked when we saw Madam Web about how, like, what a choice it was to make Cassie Webb such a sort of prickly and antisocial character, right? Michael Morbius goes out of his way in the very first scene of this movie to be a huge fucking asshole. And I can't imagine anyone watching the scene and thinking anything different. Yeah, it's weird. It's a weird choice.
00:24:50
Speaker
It's a really weird choice, because, okay, he wants to, I guess, get the bats out of this cave so he can study them, right? Because he's looking for a cure for his disease. And he he's like, he's like set the trap at the mouth of the cave. So they set up a thing at the mouth of the cave. And The guys who took him there in the helicopter are like, okay, can we leave? Like, are you going to pay us? Can we leave? Cause we don't want to be around for when these bats, we don't want to get bitten by bats. Right. And Morbius is like, give me that knife on your belt. And, uh, and we have a deal and he hands him money and the guy hands him his, his knife and Mikey cuts his hand and holds his hand up to the mouth of the cave.
00:25:43
Speaker
with the blood coming out, which attracts all these bats, which is also, that's not how that works. No, no, it's really not. All these bats come flying out before these other guys can leave and their helicopter gets swarmed by bats. And like, what a jerk. Yeah.
00:26:10
Speaker
Also, how's he going to get home if they leave? Yeah, like the guy talking to him was like, I want to leave. Like that's his helicopter pilot, I believe. Yeah. Like, how is Michael Morvie supposed to get back without the helicopter? Well, don't worry about that, Matt, because the movie doesn't worry about that. There are so many scenes in this movie that, like, if you take a second to think about what happened between scenes,
00:26:41
Speaker
ah Another reason this director must love Christopher Nolan. because like Christopher Nolan is is guilty of that a lot of the time, of like not putting the connective tissue between the scenes. And if you think about what happened from one scene to the next, you're like, how did that how did they get there? Right? Yeah, but Nolan does that stuff with like Like, how did Batman get back to Gotham City? Well, like, he's Batman, so that's that's probably how. right um This is a guy without superpowers who is also, like, very ill. Right. there are but There are huge examples of this that I'll get to as we go as we go on. ah Way worse than anything Nolan is guilty of, for sure. Yeah, man.
00:27:27
Speaker
so Then we do a flashback to 30 years earlier where young Michael Morbius is growing, is is being treated at a hospital in Greece for this blood disease. And it seems like this hospital is mostly for kids with this same disease because a new patient comes into the hospital
00:28:00
Speaker
and And Nicholas, who is Jared Harris, is like overseeing the hospital.
Scientific Motivations and Ethical Implications
00:28:07
Speaker
Yeah. And the the new patient is Morbius. The existing patient is... No, no, no. The new patient is Lucian. Morbius is the existing patient. Are you 100% sure? 100% sure because Morbius doesn't have an English accent and the new patient does. Okay.
00:28:27
Speaker
If you have that much faith in this movie, okay. I do. it's And here's okay. Here's how I know that the existing patient is Morbius because even as a kid, he's an asshole. Yeah. Because here's what here's what happens. The new patient comes in. Morbius is told that this kid's name is Lucien. Right? Morbius just starts calling him Milo. Because The last kid who was in the hospital in that bed, who died, was named Milo. It's pretty wild. This kid is like, my name's not Milo, it's Lucian. And Morbius keeps calling him Milo. Until everyone starts calling him Milo. Yeah? Including Jared Harris.
00:29:25
Speaker
That's how you get a cool nickname, man. Man, if the motivation for Matt Smith's character in this movie had been, actually, Michael, I fucking hate you, because my name is Lucian, and you and everyone I know has been calling me Milo for 30 years, which is not my name. That's the name of a kid who died. That's not my name. That's not my name.
00:29:54
Speaker
I swear to God, like, instead at the end of this movie, Matt Smith is like, you gave me my name. But like, he should be mad about that. Because what he's telling this kid is that, yeah oh, you're just gonna die too. So I'm just gonna call you what the I called the other kid. Yeah. That fucking sucks.
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah. No, he's not like, he's not a good guy. but he Like we never, like we never get, look, not everybody has to follow the formula, right? But we do not get any kind of save the cat moment from Morbius. Except for I guess he kind of is nice to that girl. Like the little girl. Yeah. I guess. Well, so
00:30:51
Speaker
jury's out on whether Morbius is actually supposed to be a hero, especially based on the end of the movie, but we'll get to that at the end of the movie. So, the kids, Lucian, who Morbius insists on calling Milo, like he lays down in his bed and immediately the machine that gives him blood transfusions, because one thing about this blood disease is they need like four transfusions a day.
00:31:21
Speaker
And, uh, I believe he says, uh, I need a transfusion three times a day, which would be every eight hours. That's important to remember. yeah Okay. i three times Three times a day, not four times. Three times a day. Yeah. So his machine that's doing his blood transfusion breaks and Morbius has to open it up and fixes it with like the spring in a ballpoint pen and makes it work again.
00:31:49
Speaker
And then he goes to Jared Harris's office and Jared Harris is like, Oh, Michael, you're really smart. You fixed that machine with a ballpoint pen. Let me send you to a school in New York. And he says, he specifically says, there's a school in New York for gifted children. And I'm like, is he talking about the X-Men?
00:32:14
Speaker
Cause like, There's schools for regular ass gifted children all over the place. Yeah, I'm sure there's one in Greece where they are. Oh, by the way, there's another thing in this about like there being a school across the street from the hospital, and the kids at this school are awful. Yeah, the kids at the school who bully and beat up the terminally ill children? but I guess that's who the ops are.
00:32:41
Speaker
I guess that's that's the Xerxes of the situation. Those are the ops, yeah. I'm just like, why would you say a school for gifted children in New York? You gotta be talking about the X-Men. I don't think so. I mean, because this is Sony and not Fox, right? Is he talking about fucking Brooklyn visions? Well, maybe, because there is at least one reference to Venom.
00:33:10
Speaker
ah very like you have to be looking for it reference to Venom later in the movie anyway Morbius goes to school in New York then we flash forward back 30 years where or 25 years where Morbius is winning the Nobel Prize because he's created he is invented artificial blood Are you sure that that's what he's getting that Nobel Prize for? What is it? Oh, is it what is he getting the Nobel Prize for? Again, I do not believe it is said. Well, I think it's the thing about him creating this artificial blood, which notably is blue rather than red. A visual distinction that will be important for the movie. It is mentioned later that he has created artificial blood, but I swear that is not mentioned
00:34:06
Speaker
Anywhere in in this so at the ceremony They're like building up to when he's gonna win the Nobel Prize Then we cut to a scene where Morbius is talking to Martine. He's back in New York He's talking to Martine and she's like I can't believe you refused the Nobel Prize and insulted the entire Nobel Committee and and Morbius says something like well, I couldn't accept to an award for a for an experiment that was a failure. Except that, like, it it is quite literally already in use in saving people's lives yeah if we are to take the movie at its word. At one point Tyreese tells Morbius that the artificial blood he invented saved his arm in combat. Yeah.
00:34:59
Speaker
when he was in the army, which is a dub. I watched Tyrese's lips. He didn't say arm. He said ass. You can't say ass. You can say ass. I think they wanted to make it so that he he was in danger of losing a specific body part that then got saved. I mean, the ass is a specific body part. That's true. it He could have been an ass amputee potentially.
00:35:29
Speaker
Um, but they changed it to arm. I don't know why. Anyway, another example of Michael Morbius being an asshole. He went all the way to Sweden. Or is it, where do they give the Nobel prizes? Because he is going to get an award from the king of Sweden. That's right. He goes all the way to Sweden and they do the ceremony and he, and there he's like, I don't want the award.
00:35:59
Speaker
What a jerk. Yeah, like, ah like on stage, like but he he basically leaves the Nobel Prize at the altar. Yeah. So why y'all? So he talks to Martin about this new experiment that he's doing. The reason he was getting the vampire bats in Costa Rica is that he wants to take their specific DNA and splice it with his own because vampire bats have, but in their saliva, they have stuff that keeps blood from coagulating ah so that they can digest it. And somehow that's going to help with his blood disease. Yeah. So so is the is the problem um here
00:36:50
Speaker
that his blood is coagulating too much? No idea. His blood's too thick? I guess the idea, yeah, is that the blood in his body is coagulating inside his body. And is too thick? he's His blood too thick. He got he got the thick blood. he got He got thick blood, but it's not so thick that he can't cut his hand and bleed and hold it up in a bunch of bat scum.
00:37:21
Speaker
Yeah, boy, they wanted they they want him to be Batman so bad. They want him to be Batman? They want this movie to be Batman Begins so fucking bad. It's honestly hilarious. They want him to be Batman. They want him to be Dracula Unconquered.
00:37:40
Speaker
They want him to be... Uh, no, no, no. They want him to be Dracula Untold. Dracula and told you rope Dracula and conquered. Correct.
00:37:52
Speaker
that that That's just at the forefront of my mind instead of the movie Dracula and told. That's right. as it As it should be. As it should be. um So anyway, he explains that he's trying to do this and he does an experiment on a mouse. And while when he tries the experiment on the mouse, the mouse falls over, appears to fall over dead.
00:38:16
Speaker
As that's happening, a little girl, this is the little girl that he helps, a little girl who also has this blood disease, like starts to crash so they have to go and help her and save her. And Morbius has to give her like a sedative. And there is like, the most likable Morbius ever is, is like earlier in the scene, he and the little girl are joking around.
00:38:44
Speaker
about about him refusing the Nobel Prize. Which is like, he's at least somewhat likable in that scene. But the little girl starts to crash and he has to like give her a sedative and settle her down. And as soon as that's done, the mouse is now back up and alive. And they're like, oh. So we find out that This kid, this English kid that Morbius named Milo, whose real name is Lucien, either comes from money or made a lot of money somehow. He's rich. He's super rich, ah which we know because he's also been getting blood transfusions three times a day for, I guess, like 40 years. Well, so is Morbius, but yeah. Yeah.
00:39:41
Speaker
And he lives in this you know fancy New York apartment and everything. And Morbius comes to him and asks him for help doing to doing an experiment on a boat in international waters, because it will be illegal to do this research on the the grounds of the United States.
00:40:06
Speaker
Yeah, which is also weird. Like they, like, he has this whole conversation with, I guess i guess it's AOC. Whatever. Well, Marti. Marti. Yeah. Who I, is his boss?
00:40:25
Speaker
i think i I don't know if their actual working relationship is never really established. It just kind of seems like their colleagues. Pretty hard to suss out. Or or that there's they're there' there um workers us their work associates in some way. I don't really know, but yeah. Yeah, so he's talking to her and she's like, he's like, yeah, I want to do this experiment. But he's talking about the bats and the the anticoagulant.
00:40:56
Speaker
Um, which is what rat poison is, by the way, in case you didn't know, rat poison is an anticoagulum, uh, coagulant. Uh, just, you know, thought that's not relevant. It's just a fun fact. so and So what you're saying is Morbius could have just eaten rat poison. Could have just eaten rat poison, yeah but he's like, yeah, like these, you know, I want to synthesize this thing that these bats do and that could cure this disease. And that's like,
00:41:23
Speaker
That feels to me a layman.
Character Interactions and Plot Weaknesses
00:41:28
Speaker
That feels a lot like normal ass science, right? And she's like, you can't do that. That's, that's you like, you can't do that, Michael. And he's like, but you know, like we've the the human body, like we adapt things from viruses, which is a wild thing to say, I think. And She's like, but that's evolution. That's different. And I'm like, hang on, hang on. I'm pretty sure that like, they do. Like, I'm pretty sure they use like, plant and animal enzymes in medical research on the reg. Like this doesn't, it, it doesn't seem like mad science. I guess it's because it involves splicing DNA.
00:42:20
Speaker
Rather than just like. But the splicing of DNA is literally like he puts some bat juice in a centrifuge and then drinks it. ida i like that I know. Look, I know I'm not, theres there's no percentage in critiquing the science of Morbius. I just, it doesn't feel like it's a weird thing to do.
00:42:44
Speaker
And they act like it's they act like he's tampering in God's domain. Yes. Or at the very least, like... If the, if the authorities find out that he's doing this kind of science, he's going to be in huge trouble, right? Yeah. And not, and not only that, but like Martin seems to think it is unethical and I can't figure out why. But when they go do the experiment on the boat, she's there. She is there. Yeah. She comes with him. But before that happens, there's a whole scene where Morbius is trying to convince Milo to fund this
00:43:20
Speaker
experiment on this boat in international waters. And he's also telling Milo that he's falling in love with Martine. And Martine is, er and Milo is like, well, you know, matters of love are way more complicated than anything in science. ah I've learned that from romantic comedies. It's just like so weird.
00:43:47
Speaker
Is this supposed to be the banter between old friends? Like, what is this? It is pretty accurate to how you and I talk. Yeah, I guess that's true. you know there's But Matt, I mean, we're like the original Spartans. That's true. There's one bit where Jared Leto is like, if you start quoting the notebook at me, I'm going to turn around and hobble that way.
00:44:09
Speaker
And it's like, it's supposed to be like endearing, like showing a friendship and it is just weird. Yeah. It's, it, it's real. It's real. No homo is what it comes off like that too. Yeah. But like, it makes me feel like Jared Leto doesn't know what a friendship is like. Like a real friendship is like, yeah he cannot play it. Like, like Matt Smith is kind of playing it. It's kind of playing it. Jared Leto. No.
00:44:39
Speaker
No. Anyway. That's a bummer. met like Matt Smith always, or not Matt Smith, Jared Leto always bums me out. Me too. like He's a real bummer of a dude to watch. he so There's so little humanity in anything he does. ah yes like And again, it's in a way that I feel that like I'm not unsympathetic to Jared Leto. it's It's not his fault he's been put into this position. Oh.
00:45:08
Speaker
A couple other details that I skipped over. Back in the flashback when he was a kid, he's playing singles chess.
00:45:18
Speaker
Well, he's playing chess with himself before the other kid arrives. Is that meant to be impressive? I guess. because got it <unk> It's actually sad. It's actually sad, right? It's actually sad. And it's actually not like, I mean, I could probably play chess with myself. I am very bad at chess.
00:45:37
Speaker
despite those hot new tracks that came out this summer about the Stafford Gambit and such. There's also a bit when he's talking to the little girl where she's like, why'd you have to be mean, where I swear to God Morbius in this movie says, I have issues. Like the fucking Deadpool shirt. Yeah.
00:46:05
Speaker
You that might be a joke about all the issues of comics Morbius has been in I guess so like and like He's got so many issues. Yeah from all the comics Morbius has been in ah Anyway, um they go and they they go on the boat and Martine is still hesitant about the experiment, but allows Morbius to try it. So Morbius drinks his bat juice and turns into a vampire. And also like, there's this- Yeah, that's it. You got it. There's this security guard guy that we only ever see in this scene, who's like weird and aggressive with Martine, but is really there to just like get wrecked by Morbius when he comes out of his little chamber.
00:46:55
Speaker
And there are other like mercenary guys on the boat that he kills. But before, before they get wrecked, one of them says about Morbius, what the hell is that thing? It's a fucking dude. It doesn't look like anything but a human being. He's still humanoid. He's just like,
00:47:23
Speaker
being really acrobatic and stuff. He just looks like Jared Leto. He just looks like Jared Leto. He's beating guys up. As long as we're dubbing stuff, they could go back in and have him be like, is that Jared Leto? Yeah. Also, we found out a little earlier about Morbius that his password for everything is the first seven digits of pi backwards.
00:47:49
Speaker
So he's not sort he's not smart at all. He's a fucking idiot. Matt, how can you say that when he he knows the number is in pi? That's how you know someone's smart. He knows seven numbers in pi and then he turned them backwards. Matt, that's I don't know why you're talking like that. That's how you know someone's smart if they know what pi is. That's true.
00:48:14
Speaker
Anyway, so he he um knocks out all those guys and drains them of all their blood. He doesn't kill Martine, he just leaves her um knocked out. She gets knocked out through in this and is left on the boat. He deletes, Morbius deletes all the closed camera, or the close closed circuit TV footage, um and then ditches the boat.
00:48:42
Speaker
And that's when we meet our police officer characters, Al Madrigal and Tyreese. They come investigate this boat after it's docked. And they see that all the the guys have been exsanguinated and they're like, what's going on here? Well, we've got one survivor. And they talked to Martine in the hospital and she's like, I don't remember very much from that night. And that's all they get out of her.
00:49:12
Speaker
they they do a thing where she's like, she's like, they're like, how are you feeling? And she's like, I'm feeling like I'm in the hospital eating crappy jello. Yeah, which is such a like, like, I feel like we kind of finally moved past people wanting to write like Joss Whedon.
00:49:37
Speaker
And now it just seems old. And yet, and yet, every once in a while. So can I get some clarity on something real quick? Please. Matt. Morbius did kill those guys, right? Oh, 100% he did. So Morbius did kill a bunch of people, like, for kind of no reason.
00:49:59
Speaker
And he is never brought to justice for that, right? Well, I guess, you know, he's got like the bloodlust madness after being transformed into a vampire. um And there's this whole thing of the movie after this where he's like trying not to drink real blood, right? Because so after this, we get a sequence where he's like in his lab and it's very much like the sequences where Bruce is in the Batcave and the Nolan Batman movies. It's exactly like those. Yes. Yeah. Where he's kind of like training and also like learning about his condition and what he can do and what he can't do. And he um is learning about how like he needs to feed on blood.
00:50:47
Speaker
but he's drinking the synthetic blood instead of the real stuff. So you can tell because it's blue instead of red. There's there's a whole thing where he like goes into the the freezer where the blood is and there's the red blood packs and he's like avoiding those and he's just taking the blue blood packs instead. And he's drinking those and he's like, if I drink the blue blood, if I drink the synthetic blood, um that sustains me for six hours.
00:51:14
Speaker
And um I know if I drank the real blood, it would it would sustain me for longer, but I'm gonna try the the synthetic stuff. But he drained so many dudes of their blood on that boat. It's not like there's like some moral line he he won't cross or hasn't crossed yet. He drank a ton of real blood within minutes of becoming a vampire.
00:51:38
Speaker
Now you said something there, Matt, that I want to make sure that I can hit. You said that he need the that the the fake blood will sustain him if he takes it every six hours. yeah And when the the disease that he had, he had to have a transfusion three times a day, hu which is every eight hours. right So this has made it worse.
00:52:09
Speaker
Yes, i I mean, even it has made it 33% worse. Well, I guess it's because it's the artificial blood, right? Ostensibly, if you drank the real blood, it would be eight or more.
00:52:28
Speaker
Surely to God they're using the the fake blood for all the transfusions? I don't know. That that is not established. Also, isn't this the plot of the television show True Blood? There is a whole thing in True Blood about synthetic blood that is true. Yeah, that's that's what True Blood is. Yeah, so I don't know. Maybe. it's but It seems kind of close, yeah.
00:52:53
Speaker
um pilot As time passes, the synthetic blood is less and less effective. So by later in the movie, it's only lasting him like four hours if he's drinking the synthetic blood. So he's made his condition markedly worse. Yeah. While he's doing all this like study on himself, learning what he can do, seeing that he's got muscles now, like so much Toby,
00:53:22
Speaker
ah It's exactly the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man. I got muscles now. I told AC I was like, yeah, they want it to be Spider-Man 2002 and also Batman Begins at the same time, but only the bad parts. Yeah. Yeah. and This scene is straight Spider-Man 2002, which I guess, to be fair, they kind of do this scene in every superhero movie.
00:53:50
Speaker
but But this is so Spider-Man 2002. They might as well have him like look through his glasses and it's his vision is now 2020, you know? um like My favorite part in this, this is ah the part where I texted you while I was watching it today, was when he's like, yes, I can use the sun, etc. and such.
00:54:14
Speaker
echolocation for those of you who don't know, which he's like narrating his notes to himself. So I don't know why he's being a dick in them, but then there's a zoom in on his superior, which is wild.
00:54:34
Speaker
While all this, while he's learning all of this, an employee of the lab, is drained of her blood. Well, no, this doesn't happen at the lab. It happens at the hospital. There's ah there's a nurse who gets drained of her blood. And we don't see in the movie who does this. We're supposed to think it was Michael, um but we don't see who does this. There's also a scene where ah Michael and Milo meet and Milo sees that Michael is like,
00:55:12
Speaker
walking around fine. Now he's got muscles. Like his skin isn't all pale anymore. And he's like, Oh, you got, you did the cure. Great. You're going to cure me. And Michael's like, no, I can't. It's a curse. It's a curse. Michael or Milo. Uh, uh, I have to drink blood and Milo's like, so I die, but you get to live.
00:55:38
Speaker
and It'll turn you into some kind of living vampire. I wish he would have said that. He doesn't. Yeah. So anyway, this, this nurse at the hospital gets drained of blood and that leads to a confrontation between the two cops and Morbius and the two cops are like, Hey, you don't look like you do on TV. You look a lot better than you do on TV. And Morbius is like, I have good days and bad days. It eventually just leads to like, yeah, you're getting arrested.
00:56:09
Speaker
Uh, because like it's more than obvious that Michael is like lying and being shady about their questions. Uh, so, uh, he gets arrested and, and very quickly put in prison in like orange jumpsuit. I guess. yes but But all of that happens within four and a half hours. Yeah, yeah. Like, I guess he's just in jail awaiting trial. But he's in the full fucking DOC orange jumpsuit. Yeah. Writing notes about how the the fake blood is less effective. Oh, and he had like a big um bag of fake blood, which they notice.
00:57:05
Speaker
And so there's like an interrogation scene where the cops are like saying like his fake blood is in evidence. They can't bring it to him. And he's, he's like growling and snarling at them. Cause he's like, I'm hungry. And you pointed out that there's i was so mad about this. I was so angry. Cause there's this bit, right? Where they're interrogating the two cops are interrogating him.
00:57:35
Speaker
And he goes, uh, Hey, uh, you should give me some of that, uh, some of that fake blood stuff that I had. And they're like, we're not going to give that to you. You fucking weirdo. Fair. And then he goes, well, I'm starting to get hungry and I don't think you would like me very much if I was hungry.
00:58:00
Speaker
what he says and What he says is, you you even made it closer to the Hulk line than what it is. What he says is, you don't want to see me when I'm hungry. Yes, that's it. That's it. And I'm like, you got all the way up to the line. You got you you walked right up to it and then to Like didn't do it like you got right up to you wouldn't like me when I'm hungry and Then you didn't do it Yeah, what's wrong with you? So okay, so what would you do? Why would you write that? Here's what's wild it goes from this scene where
00:58:51
Speaker
Morbius is talking about how like he's getting really hungry if he doesn't eat soon he's gonna like run out of energy and and Like his disease is gonna come back and stuff and he's snarling at these cops and everything and Then we just smash cut to him back in his cell fine Yep Nothing he didn't get put in the whole for saying he's gonna attack these cops, there were no consequences of him not eating. He's just back in his cell normal.
00:59:32
Speaker
yeah Thanks to editing. Like, what? Yeah, man. ah knock There's a knock on his cell door and he is told, ah your lawyer's here to see you.
00:59:48
Speaker
And this is Milo who has come to visit him. Who's like, Hey, you're going to get out of this. It's going to be fine. I got, I got you. You're, you're going to be fine. I brought you a little gift and he leaves a blood pack on the bed for, uh, for Morbius. There's no way a guard wouldn't have immediately noticed that. I had that same thought and I was trying to give this movie at the smallest amount of benefit of the doubt that I could give it, yeah which is that I think it is implied, this movie implies and does not state a lot of stuff. ah But I think it's implied that he's bribing the guard to get in there. And that's why he is able to give him
01:00:42
Speaker
a a pack of blood. Do I have any reason to believe that? No. Yeah. But I think that's what's happening. So here's another thing. The pack of blood that Milo leaves on the bed is red. The movie has been training us throughout
01:01:10
Speaker
to think that Morbius only wants to drink the synthetic blood, which is blue. Uh-huh. Here's my question. Are we supposed to think that Milo brought real blood for Morbius to drink? Or is this a mistake? And is the blood pack the prop the wrong color?
01:01:36
Speaker
No, I think it's on purpose because Morbius does look at it and go like, brrrr! Right, because I think that's when he figures out that that Matt Smith is is doing vampire shit. Then he drinks it, right? Right, then he drinks it because he's got to get out and do some vampire shit at Matt Smith. But then later in the movie... Uh-huh.
01:02:01
Speaker
when Morbius finally drinks Martin's blood, spoiler, Matt Smith treats that as though Morbius has, like, crossed a red line, right? He goes,
01:02:17
Speaker
youbs ah you've ready You finally drank the red. That's what he says. Well, yes, but I think that is supposed to be that he drank it from a person. Okay. Which again, Morbius has already done to many people. To a lot of people.
01:02:38
Speaker
it's we well We've talked a lot about movies where like everything kind of feels like a first draft. Yeah. And this movie kind of feels like like not even that, like like they went, this is like when you don't wanna, your teacher is gonna make you write a first draft. And so you just write the paper and then you kind of like go in and make it a little worse and turn that in and be like, oh, this is my first draft, wink, wink. Did you do ever do that? I've done that. I'm sure I did, yeah. Yeah, like that's a very much like in school,
01:03:16
Speaker
It's like, yeah, you have to write a first draft, a second draft, and then turn it in your final. And it's like, well, I don't want to do that, because I'm going to write it right the first time. Probably very revealing about me and my approach to my own
Critique of Sequel Setup and Tropes
01:03:27
Speaker
writing. But yeah, I feel like that's what this movie feels like, is that this is the version where they went back in and made it make less sense. Okay, so you're right that it seems like Morbius is having some revelation about my about Milo, right? so He drinks the blood that in the blood pack, and then he smashes through the window of his prison cell and escapes.
01:03:56
Speaker
And while he's doing that, Milo is out walking along the street buying a Daily Bugle about morbius with ah with a headline about Morbius being arrested for murder.
01:04:12
Speaker
and He attacks, like, the newsstand guy. Because here's the reveal that he's, like, also a vampire. Yeah, because the newsstand guy's like... Michael Morby is like, that guy's a fucking freako.
01:04:26
Speaker
and And... Massimo's like, are you judging him by how he looks? What about me? I probably look frail, but I can kill you! And then he does. And then he does.
01:04:41
Speaker
and ah And so Morbius like breaks out of prison and goes and finds Matt Smith and starts fighting him. Here's my question about all that. ah When did Matt Smith become a vampire? That's a great question. When did it fucking happen? We don't know how he became a billionaire and we don't know how he became a vampire. I thought I, look, I was, um I was getting a lot of vampire survivors in while this movie was playing.
01:05:12
Speaker
um And you know what what it was, was I set it to endless and I was using Queen Sigma ah and just just setting it so that I could just make money. um But I did forget to charge the Steam Deck, so it did kind of flop in the middle of that. So I just assumed that I missed the part where Matt Smith went in and got the serum and became a vampire.
01:05:38
Speaker
there's There's a couple of scenes where he goes to the lab, where I guess you could say that he got the cure, but it has to happen sometime between when he gets mad at Morbius for using the cure on himself, but then saying he can't use it on on Milo, on him. And when the nurse dies at the hospital, because we will later find out that it was Milo who killed that nurse.
01:06:07
Speaker
not Morbius. Uh-huh. I've seen this movie twice, and I still don't fucking know how Milo, when Milo became a vampire. Yeah, man. I'm i'm glad. I feel better about that now.
01:06:31
Speaker
i i I don't know. ah I'm seeing things that explain that he stole it at some point and administered it to himself, but not nowhere when. So I don't know, man. I mean, you know, we always talk about how we always talk about Graham Morrison, right? And how like Grant, Grant skips over all the parts that are boring and how we we like it when that happens. Mm hmm.
01:07:03
Speaker
And did maybe this is just, uh, this movie is like, yeah, like, yeah, obviously he, he did this. Come on. But like, that seems like an important thing to show. It does seem like an important thing, and but least I do like that this movie is like, come on, you've seen a superhero movie before. Obviously the superhero has to fight a villain who is exactly just like the superhero. You've seen every movie since Iron Man that uses this exact same formula.
01:07:33
Speaker
Yeah. I would love it if someone would make a superhero movie where the superhero fought someone who wasn't just like the superhero, but bad. Maybe it'll happen one day. Maybe it'll happen one day. Maybe, yeah. Like maybe... That's... People like that, right? Like they have to. Or else they wouldn't keep doing it. Fighting an evil version of yourself? Yeah, but like as kind of the only thing you ever see. I mean, it is an...
01:08:02
Speaker
easy story for a superhero's first story. Like, because you know you get the superhero's deal. I think the reason that is such a formula that has gone to so much since Iron Man is because it means that you have to do less work on the villain. If you understand the hero, then you understand the villain because the villain is just an evil version of the hero.
01:08:30
Speaker
Yeah, and I mean, like, like a lot of superheroes have that. Sure. Yeah. You know, I'm not, I'm not going to sit here and pretend like, uh, like, you know, Iron Man doesn't fight a bunch of dudes in armor or whatever. And Dr. Strange doesn't fight a bunch of bad wizards. And the Captain America doesn't fight Nazis. Well, Nazi, Nazi Captain's America. Right. Yeah. But man, they, it's the only thing that they do.
01:09:00
Speaker
like so Like, that's one of the reasons Spider-Man Homecoming was so great. Peter Parker fights a guy who's like the opposite of him. Well, but everybody knew Spider-Man, right? Like, you didn't need Spider-Man to be explained to you so you could spend more time on the bad guy. ah like i i think It's what always happens in first superhero movies. If they get to a sequel with that same superhero, then it can be a different kind of villain. Well, they didn't do that in Spider-Man 2002.
01:09:29
Speaker
Which this movie desperately wants to be. But that was before Iron Man created that formula. I guess so. Iron Man is the the progenitor of that formula. I mean, when you think about it, Spider-Man 3 kind of created that formula.
01:09:46
Speaker
Spider-Man 3 had like four villains in it. Alright, continue with Morbius. Hey folks, Morbius is really fucking boring. Yeah. There, there are long stretches of just like, maybe that's why, maybe that's why a bunch of stuff is never explained. Cause like, no one's going to notice it's, they're going to be bored. Yeah. the The whole thing is like, Oh, let's not show Milo making himself a vampire, even in a flashback. Cause people aren't going to really be paying attention and they'll be like, Oh, that must've happened when I wasn't watching. That must've happened while I was looking at my phone. Uh, but anyway,
01:10:26
Speaker
Anyway,
01:10:29
Speaker
Milo chases Morbius. They fight for a while. They end up in a subway station. And like Milo is like approaching Morbius. They're on a subway platform as a train is approaching. And then there's this thing that happens.
01:10:47
Speaker
where Morbius starts like seeing the air move around him. he This is ah earlier in the film, this is how his echolocation powers, his daredevil powers, yeah are presented. So that's what he's doing. He's really seeing the heart of the cards. He's seeing the air move around him and he like, this is how he flies. He can jump and ride the airwaves.
01:11:16
Speaker
and fly on them. And he does this in front of the A train, like he drafts in front of the A train, and that train does not stop. It keeps going even though there's a guy in front of it. Yeah, maybe the guy maybe the guy driving the subway was like, is that Jared Leto?
01:11:40
Speaker
So that's how he gets away from Milo here. Hey, I'm not going to stop this train until you give me my $15 back from seeing, uh, Suicide Squad. Yeah. And theater. Yeah. i I, that's, I would also say that. So a few things happen after this one, the cops see some, uh, security camera footage of Milo's rampage.
01:12:08
Speaker
and see that that's not Morbius. And they're like, oh, this must be a copycat killer.
01:12:18
Speaker
This must be a second vampire. Also, Morbius, who is a fugitive on the run who is broken out of prison. There are Daily Bugle headlines that now say, Morbius wanted for murder even though the last day's paper said he had been arrested for murder. Like, Martinis and he are sitting in a diner just talking.
01:12:44
Speaker
He broke out of jail yesterday. meant Hey, New York City, baby. New York City. Nowhere else. here Here's where the movie does my favorite thing in a story in which someone is some kind of vampire, ah which is that Morbius like sticks his hand in the sunlight and goes, not that kind of vampire.
01:13:07
Speaker
And it's like, okay, asshole. Yeah, he's a living vampire. Yeah, he's he's a living vampire. but this This movie should have had the Comics Code seal of approval in the corner at all times. That's true. He should have had suction cups on his hands. Plasma!
01:13:28
Speaker
While they're in the diner, some guys come in and try to give the cashier $100 bills that are counterfeit $100 bills. Which leads to a wild and out of nowhere little subplot where Michael Morbius stops a counterfeiting ring. Finally, someone's standing up. Like, it is such a short, otherwise and
01:13:58
Speaker
and
01:14:01
Speaker
unassociated bit of movie where he just takes a little bit of time to stop a counterfeiting ring.
01:14:11
Speaker
Buddy, I don't know what to tell you. I mean, that's how that's that's how you know he's a good guy now. Yeah. Because you got to go stop a crime. So then ah Milo Nicholas the the head of the hospital in Greece from the start of the movie, Nicholas goes to see Milo. That's ah that's that's Chernobyl. Yeah, that's Chernobyl. And he's like, Milo, I saw you on the news. I saw the the footage of you on the news. What's going on with you? And ah Milo, who is like,
01:14:49
Speaker
Again, Matt Smith having the time of his life dancing around shirtless in his apartment. um It's like, yeah, that's right, I'm a vampire. And you you can't come in my house and tell me what to do. i I'm gonna stab you in the stomach. And he rakes Jared Harris across the stomach.
01:15:16
Speaker
Matt Smith, who apparently, in our recounting of this, is playing, uh, fucking Noel Gallagher as... and as Hunger. And then Jared Harris, who is dying, calls Morbius on the phone and says, you have to come help me. Milo, he's he's attacked me and... and he's He's off the deep end. He's off the deep end. And so Morbius goes to him. And another thing that is very unclear is whether this was Jared Harris calling Morbius sincerely or whether he was set up to do this by Milo. I really don't know.
01:16:10
Speaker
But either way, Jared Harris dies when Morbius gets there. And then immediately more Morbius uses his super hearing to hear Martine being threatened by Milo.
01:16:26
Speaker
Cause bats use echolocation. Cause bats use echolocation. So he flies back to go save Martine. She is already like, bleeding out, so he has to bite her to save her. And that's when Milo's like, oh, you finally drank the red, even though he's drunk a lot of human blood already. Kill a lot of guys. Then also also, they're literally on like a lit floor.
01:16:56
Speaker
on the roof. Yeah, I don't know what this is supposed to be. I don't either. But it leads to you it literally like, they're on like a D and&D map. that yeah It's like the dance floor from the dance floor from Saturday Night Fever. it's Yes. And but it's half red and half blue.
01:17:15
Speaker
And so it's, I, but it never changes. Like, I think you would think it would change to kind of reflect what was happening. But it's really just like she's on the blue side and he's on the red side, I guess. Everything in this movie is like almost finished. It's like, yeah, yeah, we'll go back and fix that later. So then Morbius and Milo fight.
01:17:38
Speaker
and they're like falling off the side of a building. And just like in fucking Madam Web, there are falling neon letters. Yeah, man. Somebody at Sony Pictures cannot get enough of fucking neon advertising letters. I mean, look, to be entirely fair, they do look pretty cool. Like that but they're not cool in context, but they do look pretty cool like on their own.
01:18:08
Speaker
then they fall through a hole in the road and have a big fight underground. That eventually leads to, oh, okay, so earlier in the movie, I forgot to even mention this, earlier in the movie, Morbius made an antibody that that kills vampires. Weird that he would do that when he's the only one who exists.
01:18:34
Speaker
Well, he knew about he knew about Milo by that point. And he made two, and Martine is like, okay, that one's for Milo, what's the other one for? And Morbius is like, I did this, I created this. And once the synthetic blood stops being effective, i'll have to I'll have to start drinking human blood, and then I'm gonna be a menace and a terror, and so I'll have to use it on myself too.
01:19:00
Speaker
which He says he's going to do and then never comes up again. Does not, does not do it. Yeah. Like there's no moment of him realizing that he can be a vampire for good or whatever. He just doesn't use it. But he uses the one he had for Milo on Milo and Milo's like, you can't kill me. I'm your brother. I'm your brother. You gave me my name.
01:19:28
Speaker
Which again, he should be mad about that. Also, they're doing they're they're doing that thing where like they've clearly put Matt Smith in some makeup, but they're like augmenting it with CG. yeah oh Like in Doctor Strange 2, which I really liked. Yeah, yeah yeah oh much better movie. Yeah. um But like they do a really bad job of it, so it is like Matt Smith is just running around with like the fucking PS2 Buffy the Vampire Slayer game on his face. It does look like that. And God, Matt Smith is trying so hard here, and it's just like even he can't save this. I don't even feel bad about Matt Smith trying hard because he's also clearly just like having a laugh.
01:20:19
Speaker
And so he dies. And then we see Martine, like her eyes open and they're red. And so she's alive in a vampire now. And then Morbius is just flying around with his bats. Like he comes flying out of the hole in the road and like flies over New York city. He's got the bats all around him. Like in Batman Begins. Like in Batman Begins. Then There are two mid-credit scenes, one where the Vulture, Adrian Toomes, just shows up in a in a jail cell in this universe because we see the like crack in the sky.
01:21:03
Speaker
that was from Spider-Man No Way Home? Yeah, due to the events of Spider-Man No Way Home. And Adrian Toomes, who was kind of just like a dude, I mean, I guess he was a scientist. He built a fucking jet pack, I guess. But he's like, like later on, we see him, he's like, I'm pretty sure Spider-Man did this. It's like, dog, did you see Spider-Man No Way Home? Yeah, you i get you must have seen the movie. ah But like,
01:21:29
Speaker
He shows up in this universe and he gets released from jail because he's just a guy who showed up in an empty cell. You know? Which honestly is kind of like really harrowing. Like Adrian Toomes had a wife and a daughter in that other universe that are like, he's now been quantum leaped into a different universe. Like that's really sad. Yeah. Uh,
01:21:59
Speaker
And also, how like how is he on the grid here? He doesn't have a Social Security card here. Anyway, ah he later, in his full vulture costume, which he put together, um goes and meets Morbius. And he's like, hey, let's have a Sinister Six.
01:22:20
Speaker
and And the last line of the movie, yeah which is so like this sums it up better than anything any critic of this movie could have written. oh but Matt, do ah do Vulture's line and I'll do Morbius's line. ah Hey, ah I thought we should meet because I think you and me, we could do a lot of good and we could have a team to take down Spider-Man. Intriguing.
01:22:50
Speaker
End of movie. End of movie. Smash cut. Literal. Intriguing. Smash cut. To credits. Hey, the Dark Universe is here. Let the games begin. Let the games begin. Charles Dan's at least put a little mustard on it. Intriguing. Alright Chris, what are the high points of Morbius, if any?
01:23:18
Speaker
that i I honest to God I'm not like being snarky there aren't any cuz like nothing Like the the movie is largely boring. yeah So it's there's not like anything to really enjoy about it. The only thing I i will say is that Jared Leto is better as Michael Morbius than I expected. And he's certainly better as Michael Morbius than he is as the Joker. But that's kind of it. like he's He's better in this role than he is as the Joker. I would not say his performance is a high point. i No, no, no, no. I'm reaching.
01:23:57
Speaker
I do think the rest of the cast is way better than it needs to be. I mean, they're all good actors, but like if, if people in this movie aren't phoning it in, if if you're going to sit there and tell me, uh, Jared Harris is really giving it as all d to me Jared Harris is not. I mean, Jared Harris is good cause he's Jared Harris, right? Yeah. I think Matt Smith is putting way more investment and energy into this movie.
01:24:28
Speaker
that even he probably thought he should. Matt Smith is having a good time and seems to be having a good time. And that's kind of the most positive thing I could say about it. Yeah. But like it's not like he's it's not like he's in this movie delivering a titanic acting performance. No, no, no. But here's here's why I say Matt Smith is better than you could ever expect. Imagine having read the script for this movie.
01:24:58
Speaker
and being on set for this movie and still delivering the performance that Matt Smith delivers. That's fair. That's fair. I will say on the set, like, I mean, would this, this is kind of verging into low points. Uh, but I do think I was watching this movie and thinking about Jared Leto, like insisting that he hobble to the bathroom on crutches. And so like every time he had to pee, like, like,
01:25:25
Speaker
Um, filming would stop for 45 minutes, uh, because he's a method actor, which means he hasn't heard of acting. Um, you just, you can just pretend and then you can stop pretending. It's wild. Uh, but I was thinking about that in the scene where like the blood starts to wear off and he's like, you can see like, Oh, the old, the old infirmities are coming back. And it's basically just like Jared little, kind of like doing the stanky leg.
01:25:53
Speaker
That's what it is. Matt, you know what I'm talking about. I do. And I was watching him and like, that's why he made everybody stand around for 45 minutes. Yep. So that he could do that. Yep. Which is kind of the the feeling that I always get watching a Jared Leto performance is like, wow, he he's clearly trying very hard. And that is what we got. The only other high point I could give this movie is the incredible
01:26:26
Speaker
incredible internet dunking campaign that happened. I think the internet dunking campaign on Morbius might have been the last good thing to happen on Twitter. It's weird. That's not actually part of this movie. It is associated with the movie. that's Matt, your high point did not appear in the film. And my high point is that Jared Leto wasn't as bad as he is in another film.
01:26:53
Speaker
That's pretty scrap at the bottom of the barrel here. Low points. i I want to say this one because we haven't mentioned it before now. The first time I watched this movie, I watched it on an aeroplane. And for whatever reason, I did not pick up on this. This time watching it, it was one of the key things I noticed. It's so funny. Which is that the score is such an absolute obvious ripoff of the Dark Knight score that it is, you cannot deny it or miss it. It's so funny. It's like, it is the it is the Jim Johnston to Hans Zimmer. Like, it is, it's it's Jimmy Hart writing ah Smells Like Teen Spirit, but for Hans Zimmer's, ah
01:27:52
Speaker
Batman Begins for Dark Knight soundtrack. yeah It's so funny. the the The guy who did the music for this is named John Eckstrand. John's Jimmer. John Eckstrand. He has done the music for every other of this director's movies.
01:28:11
Speaker
And I can only imagine that, yeah, like, Daniel Espinoza is doing a Christopher Nolan imitation anytime he can. And he hired John X Strand to do a Hans Zimmer imitation. Because it is so, so close. I want to see the version of Morbius that would have come out if ah they had ever seen another movie.
01:28:37
Speaker
It's a great question. It's a great question. I want to see the one that comes out where they're really into Dune actually. And so we get like a sound alike for that score. That's that's the only like entertaining low point I can think of all the other low points are that it's boring. It makes no sense. They didn't show when the villain became a vampire. They it's it is it's a rare kind of boring where it's boring, but it also has a lack of detail. Yeah.
01:29:07
Speaker
Like it's boring, but also what kind of disease does Michael Morbius have? I don't know, blood problem. Like it's boring, but like how did that guy become a vampire? I don't know. did He stole vampire juice from Michael Morbius's centrifuge. Don't worry about it. It happened off screen. Yeah. Hey, did Michael Morbius get the Nobel prize that he didn't actually accept from the King of Sweden for the synthetic blood that he invented? That's apparently really good.
01:29:37
Speaker
I guess. that okay this is a this is I think this is a a great example. like What would be the dramatic part of the scene of of refusing the Nobel Prize? I would say that would be announcing that you cannot accept the Nobel Prize. Which they don't show. Which they don't show. No, he just leaves.
01:30:00
Speaker
Like the dramatic thing would be like, uh, not being an asshole about it, but then being like, I can't accept this. It's my, you know, my work is incomplete because I have Rolex syndrome. That's the disease that catching Picard has. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, it's not hard to make up a fake disease the the rigorous syndrome. That's what Alfred has in, uh, is that the one about with Picard's heart where he has to get like the replacement heart?
01:30:29
Speaker
No, that's because he got ah stabbed by the Nausicaans while playing Domjot. That's right, yes. No, Verolik syndrome is why ah the Picard and Picard season two and three is actually a robot body. He's a data. I have not seen that but a part of Picard, so I didn't know that. Interesting. Yeah, the end of Picard season one, Picard becomes a data.
01:30:52
Speaker
Interesting. Yeah. I wish Picard was good. like Man. It would be so great if it was good. If only. Okay, here's a low point of this movie. We want to talk about ah Picard instead. Yeah, like it because this movie is boring. Because like, ultimately, kind of nothing happens in it. And it's just like, it it feels like every other movie because they are consciously following following the beats of every other superhero movie. Yeah. And that's just boring.
01:31:26
Speaker
All right, Chris, final thoughts for Morbius. Before we get too deep into it, I want to mention this movie's one connection to another Sony Spider-Man universe movie, Venom. Because on the boat, when the cops show up to investigate all these dead bodies on the boat that have been drained of their blood, Al Madrigal says,
01:31:52
Speaker
The last time we saw something like this was when that thing happened in San Francisco. That is the entirety of the connection to Venom. ah Until, or any other movie, until ah Michael Keaton shows up at the end of this. Except for being just like all those movies. Yeah, right, right, right. And even Venom fought a bad Venom.
Sony's Villain Movie Strategy
01:32:17
Speaker
Even Venom fought a bad Venom.
01:32:20
Speaker
like twice. Venom has now fought a bad Venom three times. Who's he fighting the new Venom? Well, I mean, Knoll appears in the movie, but he's not the actual villain of the movie. Knoll from Klyntar? Knoll from Klyntar, yeah. I guess it's not- I think people say that movie was bad and that made me want to see it even more. Yeah.
01:32:46
Speaker
um I guess the villain in Venom 3 is not actually a bad Venom. There are other Venoms in it or other symbiotes in it, but they're not the villains of the movie. um There is a Xenophage in that movie. right I haven't seen it, but I know what happens in it. Yeah, Morbius is just as good as Venom. Let's do a Morbius movie. Let's do a Madam Web movie.
01:33:16
Speaker
Let's do a Craven movie. Let's do a Craven solo movie. Now, to be clear, you're not saying that. You're saying that as though a studio executive. Yeah, that's my impression of some guy at Sony who just thinks it's all the same. Yeah. It's just movies, right? Here's the thing. Here's the thing for me, Chris.
01:33:36
Speaker
Cause you brought up the dark universe, right? You brought up- Yeah, which is another example of someone going like, boy, these Marvel movies are really popular. What do we got? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which, by the way, all of those characters are public domain. Anyone could do that. But I guess Universal has like a sort of- Well, Universal has like them those specific versions of those characters, which were not the characters that showed up in those movies. Right, yeah.
01:34:07
Speaker
Hilarious here's the thing about these movies in particular and what this movie is setting up by the end What they want to do is make a sinister six That eventually will fight spider-man, right? Mm-hmm But at some point After Morbius fails And after Craven is definitely going to fail
01:34:39
Speaker
Just make a movie where Spider-Man fights the Sinister Six. Yeah. Just make a movie where Spider-Man fights the Sinister Six. Like, cause he was thinking, Morbius ain't in the fucking Sinister Six. Neither is Venom. Well, I don't, maybe they're going to put Venom in the Sinister Six. Maybe they're not, but I think the idea was that it was going to be Vulture, Craven, Morbius, which is wild because what, if he's going to be in the Sinister Six, why does he break up a counterfeiting ring?
01:35:11
Speaker
Like, but look, I was very excited at the end of Spider-Man Homecoming ah when it was like, oh shit, he's gonna make the Sinister Six. Cause I figured the Sinister Six would then fight Spider-Man and it wouldn't be like seven years later that we still didn't have it.
01:35:33
Speaker
But like, also, Vulture is not the guy who does that, which is another thing of like, yeah, someone's as good as another. Like, like say what you will about Walter Elias Disney's Marvel Comics Entertainment Incorporated films. But like, if they were doing this, Doc Ock would have made the Sinister Six.
01:36:01
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I guess they would have made a Doc Ock solo movie. But Doc Ock had already been in a movie, and they wanted to do movies about characters that they hadn't done movies about yet, right? Yeah, but like, again, like, you can't just you can't just swap shit out. And like, this is this is my point. This is my point.
01:36:24
Speaker
like Absolutely. Definitely. Somebody at Sony was like, well, nobody knew who Iron Man was. Nobody knew who, or nobody cared about Thor or nobody cared about Captain America. And then they made movies about all of them. And then eventually they made an Avengers movie that was huge. So why don't we do that with our characters that they're all going to be the sinister six and then they're going to fight Spider-Man. And then that movie is going to be like our Avengers, right?
01:36:52
Speaker
But the thing is, people do care about seeing a Captain America movie. People do care about seeing an Iron Man movie. Well, well, nobody cared about Iron Man. But people care, look, people went and saw that movie in 2008. They did, but it was very surprising that that happened. It was surprising that that happened. That movie was good. That movie was good. And Robert Downey Jr.'s Charismatic and also Iron Man is a cool character that you can understand, right? Yes. That's not true of Morbius. Yeah. That's not true of Craven. I think Craven has a better shot. Well, that movie's gonna suck shit. No, I know it is. But like, I would, I would have, I would say if I had to, if Bobby Bad Ideas came to me,
01:37:49
Speaker
and and and asked what they should do. They were like, hey, we're gonna make one of these movies. It's gonna be Morbius, Madam Web, or Craven. I'd be like, Craven?
01:38:06
Speaker
Like, because at least Craven, like, does stuff? He hunts men? But, okay, but like, Here's another element of this why this especially doesn't work. Because it's the same reason the Dark Universe didn't work. What did Dracula Untold try to do? It tried to make Dracula a movie monster who's eventually going to team up with other movie monsters into the protagonist.
01:38:41
Speaker
Yes, enter and and we all we all got, ah they tried to make us sympathize with him, and then also gave him a bunch of new superpowers, because cause Dracula didn't have enough superpowers. Right. Dracula! This movie and the Craven movie do that same thing, where it's like, they have to have a bad guy to fight.
01:39:09
Speaker
So they have a bad guy to fight in this movie and they're the protagonists, but it's on the path, it's to set them on the path to eventually be the antagonist of the team up movie. Which is nonsense. No, it's complete nonsense.
01:39:27
Speaker
um my My question for you Matt is this, um ah <unk> who's Craven fighting? Do we know? Is Craven fighting anybody? I think his dad. His dad, who's also Craven.
01:39:39
Speaker
His dad who's also Craven, yeah. he's His dad who's Russell Crowe. So is the movie Alexei Cravenov versus Sergei Cravenov? No. Aaron Taylor Johnson is Sergei. Russell Crowe is Nikolai.
01:39:54
Speaker
Okay. All right. Are you going to bury anybody and eat a room full of spiders? I don't know, but Chameleon is also in the movie.
01:40:06
Speaker
That's wild. That's hilarious. They're like, yeah, we're going to put chameleon in it. so i don't know I don't know who's the actual antagonist of the movie. If I had to guess, I bet the antagonist is Russell Crowe. Well, yeah, because he has to fight a guy who's exactly like him. He has to fight another guy who's another craven hunter. Yeah.
01:40:30
Speaker
yeah you can't that's the It is the lack of respect for the source material and for, like, the audience that gets me about these. It's like, yeah, we can make a Madam Web movie. It's like, look, I don't think Madam Web's a great character. I don't like Madam Web. But like, she's definitely not a character that can that can hold down her own film, let alone her own film franchise. And like, we know that because Madam Web's been around for 40 fucking years.
01:41:05
Speaker
And we also know that about Morbius. Morbius couldn't get over in the 90s. Well, it's ah it's such a huge thing now where it's like, you can't just make a movie about a character you want to make a movie about. You have to make a first movie that then leads up to the movie people actually want to see. Because you could have just made a Spider-Woman movie.
01:41:35
Speaker
Right? Yeah. Yeah. Because that's who you're setting up in Madam Web. Yeah, at the end of Madam Web, when the movie starts. When the movie starts. So just make that fucking movie. Yeah. And if that's popular enough, then make a prequel. Or don't. Or don't. Yeah, it's, it's, I i cannot shake the, the the feeling of just incredible disrespect to the audience and incredible disrespect to the the franchise, which you do not usually see in conjunction, I don't think. That is true. Yeah, Morbius is just like Spider-Man. And I feel like it like anyone, everyone knows that's not true.
01:42:31
Speaker
except whoever is in charge of making a Morbius movie. I don't i don't know that the thinking is Morbius is just like Spider-Man, but it is there is thinking of Morbius is connected to Spider-Man, people know that he's eventually going to run into Spider-Man, so they'll watch a dozen movies of breadcrumbs until the movie they actually want to see.
01:42:57
Speaker
Yeah, they won't though. They won't though. People don't have the patience for that anymore. It worked one time. And that's because those movies were about characters people wanted to see. Well, yeah, like that's the difference between. That's the difference between like what happened with the Marvel Cinematic Universe and what's happening with this is like.
01:43:18
Speaker
The big thing in Iron Man is like Nick Fury shows up and goes, hey, we're going to do the Avengers. Not Nick Fury shows up and goes, hey, we're going to do Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. Yeah. Yeah. you know you didn't like And you didn't even know about the nick fury you didn't even know about the Nick Fury part until the end of the movie. Yeah. Right? You were just enjoying Iron Man before that.
01:43:46
Speaker
I just can't get past the hubris of making a movie about Morbius. It's unbelievable. Cause we all knew it was gonna flop.
Podcast Conclusion and Future Plans
01:43:57
Speaker
And we knew from announcement that it was like, we knew before they made it, it was gonna flop. Only the people who were funding and making the movie didn't know that.
01:44:10
Speaker
Unbelievable. Hey, thanks for listening everybody. We finally watched Morbius. Can you believe it? Um, we'll be back. It was bad. It was real bad. I, we made final thoughts. It was bad. Yeah. We may be back in December with a Christmas movie. We will let you know. I, I don't know if that's, if we're going to do that or not yet. I almost feel like we are contractually obligated to watch that one with, with the rock as Santa's bodyguard. Oh no. Like I don't want to, but I kind of feel like red, what he's got to.
01:44:47
Speaker
Oh, God. That's still going to be in theaters, so I don't know. Matt, fly up to Minnesota. We'll go to the theater. We'll have a nice time.
01:45:00
Speaker
If you want to email us, you can do that at our email address, which is moviefighterscast at gmail dot.com. If you want to support this show and the other shows that we do, ah which includes Next Situation and War Rocket Ajax and all the associated War Rocket Ajax podcasts, um you can go to patreon dot.com slash War Rocket Ajax and ah and kick in a little money there. and we would That would be very helpful for you to do that.
01:45:24
Speaker
If you want to find me and my stuff, you can go to MattDWilson.net to find links to all the stuff that I do. Chris, where can people find you? Everybody can find me by going to the-isb dot.com. That is my website. It's got links to the things I do. Hey, thanks for listening, everybody. ah Thanks for sticking with us ah during the hurricane and all the other stuff that's been going on. um We're happy to be back and and doing these shows for you. And yeah, we'll do one in December. It may not be red one, because it will still be in theaters, but maybe December 2025. We'll dive into red one. Don't make these promises. That's how we wound up watching more Beals. Great point. Bye, everybody. Bye.