Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Abar, The First Black Superman
140 Plays5 years ago
We round out this spotlight on black superhero movies by discussing the very first black superhero movie—the low-budget Abar, The First Black Superman. If you’ve never seen this movie, it will both be disappointing based on the poster and also surprising based on how intelligent it is in parts.
---
Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/superherocinephiles/message
Recommended
Transcript
Regret and Power Struggles at the Towers
00:00:20
Speaker
I must have been mad to have dreamt of that damn double phone. I'm curious to know why I didn't take the potion. Yes. My heart wouldn't have withstood its tremendous shock. I see. Now you have regrets.
00:00:52
Speaker
I must admit, however, that your performance at the towers was quite remarkable. Yes, I was aware of you and your brother being there. I wanted to destroy you. Yes, I know that too. Let me straighten your mind, put it at ease about that man in the alley. It was the police that killed him. You can take my word for it.
Divine Origins and Human Nature
00:01:19
Speaker
Doctor, you foolishly assumed it was me. How do you know? Lysakic powers. You see the potion released from my soul at ancient wisdom, which is presently to be used. What do you intend to do with your power? My powers are of a divine origin. Are you of a divine nature?
00:01:50
Speaker
I can assure you I am. And sadly, you're talking about committing suicide. And you're responsible. It isn't I. It's the man himself. He's self-facing self. Well, how does the power of your supply? I'm only a tool, doctor.
00:02:20
Speaker
A mirror, reflecting man unto himself. By control of the mind, I can hasten the retributive forces larger than his unconscious mind.
Power Misuse and Consequences
00:02:30
Speaker
I had suspicions it would work that way. I think that you can also control the elements in man's environment. Yes. In that way, I can accelerate the process of man facing his own evil and good as well.
00:02:49
Speaker
Well, I'm beginning to see what you mean. Well, now we must try something wrong. No, no. To further relieve you, doctor, if I misuse these powers, they can turn against me. Misuse? Well, how? Selfish gains. Personal power.
00:03:17
Speaker
Well, well, how would that affect you? A temporary loss of power in its devastating reactions. You send a nature. Anyway, I must leave. Oh, no, there's much to... I'll be back.
Introduction to Hosts and Pandemic Impact
00:03:37
Speaker
Your house about to be blown to smithereens.
00:03:45
Speaker
Welcome to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. I am half of your host, Perry Constantine. And I am the other half, Derek Ferguson from beautiful downtown Brooklyn. And I'm coming to you from beautiful Kagoshima, Japan. All right. Derek, how are you doing today?
00:04:01
Speaker
I'm doing pretty good considering that the city is in a frenzy behind the coronavirus. We're in the middle of the whole coronavirus thing, folks, for those of you who might not be in it. But here in New York, we have price gouging going on. People are selling bottles of hand sanitizer for $500. Jesus. And masks for $5 apiece and all kinds of craziness is going on.
00:04:30
Speaker
Hey, we shall survive. Yeah, it's the same thing here in Japan. Like people are going nuts over this thing. I've one of my jobs, they've moved all the classes for this month online. Schools have been shut. Well, here's the here's the this shows you like the amount of logic and thought that's gone into
Japan's COVID-19 Strategy and Olympics
00:04:50
Speaker
this, right? Because you've no doubt heard that the prime minister has ordered all schools in Japan to be shut down, right? Right.
00:04:58
Speaker
okay so here's the thing about that the school year in japan actually ends in like early mid-march okay so when he said we're shutting down all schools in march
00:05:14
Speaker
We had a big deal. Right, right. Also, also, here's the other thing. So even though the schools shut down in March, they still have things like entrance exams for the high school year coming up in April. They've got things like
00:05:29
Speaker
student activities club activities and And so they're still the schools are not really technically close also He doesn't actually have the authority to close the schools So it was just basically a request and it's up to those local districts decide if they're gonna close them or not
00:05:47
Speaker
And then, well, it gets even better, OK? Because now these kids who don't have anywhere to go because maybe their parents are working or everything, the solution to that has been we're going to give daycare centers stimulus money, and we're going to let them use the empty classrooms in the schools that we closed down.
00:06:15
Speaker
So basically, they shut down the schools, and now the students get to go to daycare in the schools that are shut down. So in other words, him closing down the schools is basically just a big PR stunt. Oh, it's totally a PR stunt, because he was so worried about how this is going to make him look on the world stage with the Olympics coming up and everything. And that's really what it's all about. It's just trying to save face so that he doesn't look bad before the Olympics.
00:06:45
Speaker
And actually, that's a big controversy that's going on here in New York now about them closing down the schools.
Pandemic Lifestyle Changes
00:06:52
Speaker
Because, of course, the parents are saying, well, wait a minute. I can't afford a babysitter. And I got to go to work. I can't stay home. I can't lose paid stay-at-home take care of my kids. So that's a big thing that's going on here now, too.
00:07:06
Speaker
yeah it's uh you know and some people you know they ask me they say oh how come you don't take it you know you don't seem to be taking it very seriously i said you gotta remember something i said i've been living with scares like this since i was a kid you know i'm you know it was the blind flu you know a few years ago uh what was the other thing that was supposed to kill all of us sorry sorry yeah that was the
00:07:29
Speaker
to kill us. The bird flu a few years back as well. The bird flu, we had the thing with the mosquitoes with the Zika virus. The Zika virus, yeah, Ebola. Yeah, that was supposed to kill all of us, you know. So, I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not minimizing it, but I'm just saying, you know, I've lived through too many of these things to start, you know,
00:07:49
Speaker
Hanging myself in the basement now Plus you mostly work from you pretty much only work from home anyway So you don't really have to worry about going out that much. So you're pretty much Self-contained right there. Yeah. Yeah, I mean I mean right now Patricia not well now that the weather is starting to get warmer will be going out more but usually during the wintertime We don't go out much at all unless we absolutely have to like for shopping and stuff like that you know, mostly I still and especially now that I
00:08:19
Speaker
You know, we've got, you know, Netflix and Hulu and Amazon Prime and stuff like that. We don't even have to go to movies that we don't want to. Right. Right. Yeah. So that's good. OK, so today we're I guess kind of rounding out because we're the next series that we're going to be doing is also kind of connected to Black History Month.
The First Black Superman: A-Bar
00:08:42
Speaker
But your pick for today was A-Bar, the first black Superman, which is also the first black superhero movie.
00:08:50
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I mean, this was brought to my attention. You know, somebody said, oh, you know what? Well, you ought to do this movie. And I didn't think of it, even though I have seen it. I saw it a couple of years ago on Turner classic movies. You know, they have their underground.
00:09:10
Speaker
Program of movies that they show it comes on here like Friday night Saturday morning like 2 a.m. And they show all kinds of weird out-of-the-way movies that you would never really see anyplace else and a bar the first black Superman was one of those movies and it was a movie that I had heard about but I'd never seen and You know now it's on YouTube folks. So after we finished after we finished with this episode you could go on YouTube and watch the whole complete movie and
00:09:40
Speaker
uh as i did yesterday in preparation for this or if you have turn of classic movies you can wait for it to come on there and you can see it in pristine hd yeah yeah and um this uh this movie's actually got kind of an interesting history behind it too so first off the title alone has been changed in different versions like when he um
00:10:03
Speaker
The brainchild of James Smalley, who was a black pimp from Louisiana, and Frank Packard, who was a white actor and screenwriter. This was really an example of the Gorilla filmmaking.
00:10:20
Speaker
Oh, I'm blanking on the the name of the guy. You and Tom talked about him on your show, who did this kind of guerrilla filmmaking. It's like Black Caesar and a bunch of other. Oh, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Mine. I'm blanking on him, too. It'll come to me before then. Yeah. But he did a Black Caesar. He did a cute wing serpent. He did a whole bunch of exploitation movies. And the legend is is that what he did was that he drove around
00:10:50
Speaker
with a trunk full of screenplays that he kept in his car. And what happened was that, okay, he would take a meeting and he would bring a screenplay with him and he would show it to, you know, the producer or whoever. And if he didn't like that screenplay, he would say, hold on, hold on, wait a minute. And he'd run out to his car and get another screenplay. And he would keep doing this until he sold the screenplay.
00:11:14
Speaker
Yeah. So it was Larry Cohen. I looked him up. Larry Cohen. That's the guy. Yeah. But he would do this. Not only that, but when he was making his own movies, he gave he gave no shit like he did not bother with getting film permits or anything like that. Like they just so I think it was in Black Caesar when Fred Williamson is his shot and he's like walking through the street and everyone's looking at him all concerned. Those reactions are real. Those people were not extras.
00:11:41
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Those are actual people that are on the street. They're not extra. They just got out of the van or the car or whatever, and Larry said, okay, you're shot. You're stumbling through the street. You're trying to get help. Go. And they just filmed it. And people are looking at them, and you're looking at them, and yeah, their reactions are 100% authentic.
00:12:04
Speaker
James Smalley and Frank Packard, they did something similar when they did this movie because Packard never bothered to get any film permits when he was directing this, and it was shot in the Baldwin Hills and Watts neighborhoods of Los Angeles. They had no permits, and in fact, the guys who played the motorcycle gang in the movie, they're an actual motorcycle gang in real life.
Guerrilla Filmmaking Anecdotes
00:12:28
Speaker
They're an actual motorcycle gang, yeah.
00:12:31
Speaker
When white police officers were called in to shut down the shooting, the motorcycle gang surrounded them. And the white officers quite reasonably said, you know something? They're just filming a movie. Let's let them all say. Yeah, they didn't even bother getting out of their cars. They were just like, all right, we'll just stay here and wait. Yeah, and that's what they did. Yeah, they said, listen, they're just filming a movie. Who are they hurting? Really?
00:12:56
Speaker
But there was a lot of that type of filmmaking going on back during the 70s. You had a lot of film, because, yeah, exactly. They wouldn't get permits and everything like that. And, you know, they would just set up and shoot until somebody came along and say, okay, well, what are you doing? Oh, well, we're shooting a movie. Well, do you have a permit?
00:13:13
Speaker
Well, no, OK, well, you've got to break it down and, you know, never. And I say, OK, and they will even just go someplace else and set up and shoot. And, you know, I experienced this. I experienced this firsthand because when I was in when I was in college, you know, me and my friends, we would make some like, you know, films together. And when we one time we were in this this park in Arlington Heights neighborhood in in in Northwest Chicago suburbs and.
00:13:40
Speaker
We were in the park there, and we're shooting this scene, and this is the first time we had filmed anything in a really public place, because other stuff we had filmed in public, it had been mostly empty parks or that kind of thing, right? But this time, and this was a nighttime shoot, I think. It was at night, so there were lots of people around, and a cop came up to us, and he's like, what are you guys doing here? I'm like, we're just shooting a movie. Do you have a permit for that? I'm like, you need a permit? What the hell?
00:14:06
Speaker
And I'm like, no. I'm like, look, we're only going to be a few minutes and then we're almost done. It's for a student film project. You might be like, all right, fine. Just hurry it up. Yeah. Yeah. Usually if you don't get the cop and he said anything like that, yes or no, certainly because a few years back, um, there was a lot of that going on here in Brooklyn where, you know, people, you know, we're filming their own movies on the street or in the park and stuff like that. You don't see it so much now.
00:14:36
Speaker
but yeah like a few years back there was a lot of that going on and usually you know like I said the cops you know they would say okay well you know wrap it up and go and you know the people say thank you very much and they would you know leave so yeah I mean I I mean as I said it was going on a few years back when we had this explosion
00:14:58
Speaker
of people realizing that, hey, I can film a movie on my iPhone and edit it on my laptop and put it up on YouTube, which is what a lot of people did. It was a big thing. Yeah.
00:15:13
Speaker
So this movie was also filmed partly in a working whorehouse and and small he actually ran out of money before he finished the movie and So I think that that accounts for some stuff that doesn't quite seem to connect in this film when you're watching it And he had to sell the film to the owner of a film processing lab to settle his unpaid debts and when it was released it wasn't released until like two years later and
A-Bar's Release and Superhero Themes
00:15:39
Speaker
And it was the working title of it was Super Black, but then when it was released, it was released under the name ABAR, the first black Superman. And then later it came out on VHS and it was titled In Your Face. And it had it was original release was limited to what was known as the Chitlin Circuit of Southern Drive in theaters. Oh, yeah, the Chitlin Chitlin Circuit. Yeah, now now.
00:16:06
Speaker
Because when I saw it on YouTube and I believe that when I saw it or turn a classic movie, it's just a bar now. That's all it is. They got the first black Superman tag, which I think is a wise choice because saying the first black Superman, that's kind of a misleading, you know, addition to the title. Yeah, I think. Yeah, because he's really not a Superman in the sense that we would
00:16:36
Speaker
think he's a, and matter of fact, you know, something to be honest, this movie reminded me more of a Stephen King story than a superhero movie. Yeah. Yeah. And also, but, and that's only in the, like the last 30 minutes or so of the movie, like leading up to that, not even that, like I would say last 15. Really? Yeah, really. Yeah. You're right. Um, but like up until that,
00:16:59
Speaker
like it's kind of weird to call this a superhero movie because that last part that like last 15 minutes that's the only part of it that's a superhero movie. And then he's doing stuff that I associate more with like magic than any kind of real superpower because
00:17:17
Speaker
he runs up on a group of teenagers that are hanging out and they're on the street corner and everything like that and then he looks at them and he gives them that freaky look with his eyes and then the next scene they're walking out of college with college degrees in their hand
00:17:32
Speaker
Yeah. They didn't go to school. Apparently, he just magic them into being upright, respectable college students. Yeah, his powers are so undefined. He can just warp reality at a whim. And that one, the black priest, he leaves the church, and he gets into his car. And the next thing you know, it turns into a horse and buggy, which I'm just like, what? I don't get why you did that at all. Well.
00:18:00
Speaker
Okay, he gets into a Cadillac. And back in the 70s, when I was growing up, pastors were kind of vilified for the fact that the churches that they preached in were falling apart. You would have pastors and
00:18:24
Speaker
Okay, as I'm saying this, I know some of your folks out there. You're not near his because you know exactly what I'm talking about. You would have a church that would have a building fun
00:18:32
Speaker
for 20 years supposedly to rebuild, you know, the church. The church would never get rebuilt, but every year the pastor would have a new car and his wife would have a new car and she'd have furs and diamonds and stuff like that. So I understand why that scene was in there because he's getting in this Cadillac and they bought changes it into a horse and buggy, which he considers to be more suitable for him to be driving instead of taking money from
00:19:00
Speaker
you know, the parishioners who really can't afford cars of their own, but they make sure that he's in the car, you know, so. Okay, that makes more sense then. It's like in that scene, remember, if you remember, there's a scene in the movie, Angel Heart, where there's a preacher in Harlem and he's telling his congregation that the other preacher down the street
00:19:23
Speaker
He has a Cadillac. He said, but if you really love me, you should put me in a Rolls
Cultural Commentary in A-Bar
00:19:28
Speaker
-Royce. Oh, right, right, right. Yeah. There's also that scene in A Time to Kill when the NAACP, they come to the black preacher and they tell him, well, you know, if you tell your congregation to chip in their money, we'd be willing to give you an administrative fee. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:19:50
Speaker
And there was a lot of that stuff that was going on back during the 70s, you know, so yeah. So that's why that scene is in there. Yeah. Yeah. OK. But but yeah, his powers are just so ill defined and it's just like he can basically do anything, can warp reality at a whim. And then when he talks to Kincaid at the end, right, the way he's like he's not talking like a bar anymore, he's much
00:20:17
Speaker
He's, it's almost like, okay, like when we were talking about Meteor Man, you talked about how that, your theory was that there was an actual entity living inside of him. I get that kind of feeling from Abar's speech at the end, the way he's talking. Yeah, yeah. And it's really funny about the, I'm glad you mentioned that because I watched this movie and they're speaking in English. Right. But it's like everybody in this movie is dubbed. Yeah, yeah.
00:20:47
Speaker
And I think that just has to do with the sound quality. Like I'm imagining like they didn't, because you know, most movies, they go back and they rerecord the audio in a studio.
00:20:58
Speaker
So, but they didn't really have, obviously they probably didn't do that. So all that, that all the sound is filmed on location while they're shooting the film. So I guess, yeah, they didn't have a chance to really like go back and plus like, you know, the mics they had were probably not the best quality to begin with. So I think that all is why that all that kind of has that weird effect on it.
00:21:24
Speaker
Yeah. Cause like I said, it's really weird. I watch that so weird. Yeah. They're speaking English and that's obviously their voices, you know, that's their actual voices, but they sound like they're dumb. It's really weird. But it, it adds to the weird trauma of this movie, which I should say I'm watching this movie and you know, you guys will hear me say a lot of times, yeah, it's a bad movie. It's a terrible movie. It's awful movie. But,
00:21:53
Speaker
watching it, I can see the sincerity of the actors in the movie. You know, it's not like, say for instance, let me see, what movie can I use? Okay. You take the trauma movies, right? Now I can't stand trauma movies. I hate the trauma movies. You know why? Because they're bad movies made by people
00:22:15
Speaker
who set out to intentionally make bad movies, and then it's like they're making fun of you for watching something that you know is bad. Right, right. If you understand what I'm trying to say. Yeah, I get what you're saying. Okay, this movie, A-Bar, I don't get that impression. These people have made a movie about something, and the movie does have a lot
00:22:37
Speaker
to go into. They go into racial integration, classism, they go into political corruption, which takes up most of the movie, actually. Well, one of the interesting things I thought is that, just like the different perspectives they have of the black community, because they have
00:22:59
Speaker
There are lots of different, uh, black perspectives in this and that, that kind of nuance, like, cause even now, like, you know, you turn on MSNBC and everyone's talking like we were in the midst of a primary election and everyone's saying, well, you know, Southern black voters voted for Biden. That means all black voters will vote for Biden because all black voters are a monolith. Yeah.
00:23:23
Speaker
Exactly. But this movie takes the time to show those different perspectives, and I thought that was a really interesting take on it. Well, here's the thing.
00:23:34
Speaker
You know, I actually would love to and see I shouldn't say this because every time I say shit like this, I get in trouble. I would actually like to take a crack at writing a novelization of this because you know what? The most interesting thing in the movie to me was the relationship between a bar and Dr. King K. Yeah, they've got a really they've got a really interesting dynamic. And you know what, despite how low budget this is and how
00:24:03
Speaker
you know just low-quality is and also when the there's a lot of up there's a lot of bad acting in this movie but jay walter smith who plays dr kincaid and also came up with the with the scenario behind the story uh... and toolbar mayo who plays uh... a bar and who's been in using extra a bunch of other movies they they both like you said they both have a lot of sincerity in their performances and there you can tell that they are really trying to to treat this seriously
00:24:32
Speaker
Yeah, exactly, which I respect and I appreciate. And there are two black men who have two completely different points of view and two ways of looking at how a black man should live in the world and the role of black people in society. But yet they find a common ground and they become friends in the course of this movie, you know, which is really
00:24:57
Speaker
As far as I'm concerned, you could have left off the whole superpower angle and had that relationship be the whole core of the movie. Mm hmm. Yeah. Because it really works for me, you know. I mean, by the end of the movie, Hokey as the ending was, I was convinced that you guys were friends.
Racism and Community Dynamics in A-Bar
00:25:14
Speaker
Yeah, same here. Like that. That is one thing that they really do is they they really sell you on that relationship between them. That's one of the there aren't a lot of strengths in this movie, but that is one of them.
00:25:26
Speaker
Oh, definitely. Do you want to give the folks the obligatory plot synopsis? OK, yeah. So for anyone who has not seen this movie, which is probably a large number of people. A lot of you.
00:25:44
Speaker
So the movie it takes place in in the 70s and you've got this black scientist who is named Dr. Kincaid and him and his family they've moved into this suburban neighborhood this predominantly white neighborhood in in California.
00:26:02
Speaker
And right from start, they get out of their car, which also I noticed this. The car that the family drives it in, it's the same car that the city officials arrive in later. Yeah.
00:26:16
Speaker
So it's like this town only has one car that everybody uses. Obviously a little bit of production. So they get out of the car and these two white women are the neighbors and one of those white women, we'll get into her later because they pull a ridiculous plot twist on the end with her. Oh, but she's hilarious though.
00:26:46
Speaker
And then she goes to introduce them. She's like, Oh, I wonder where the white family's at. And then she goes up to that and she says,
00:26:55
Speaker
No, the Kincaid family is so lucky to have you nice black people as they're servants Mrs. Kincaid has got this shitty look great on her face and she's watching this white woman making ass out of herself But she said oh and she lets her go on and on and on and on Oh, well, we want to invite the Kincaids and we wanted to do so We want to take them to our country club and we want to do me time her friend is sensitive
00:27:29
Speaker
And then when she says, you know, Mrs. Kincaid goes and introduces, no, I'm Mrs. Kincaid, these are my children. And like the white woman freaks out at her, she's like, no, you're not, no, you're not. She goes batshit and say, she says, stop lying, you're not the Kincaid, the Kincaid's a white.
00:27:49
Speaker
The husband's a doctor. She said, yeah, my husband is a doctor. He works at the hospital. He's got a government grant. And this chick just absolutely loses it. Oh my god. And then they protest to the city council. The council's having a meeting about it. They have one side. The funniest side is, go back to Africa, Dr. Koon came.
00:28:17
Speaker
And she calls the she calls the the son picking any and all sorts of shit. It's just ridiculous. Yeah. When he comes to get his freebie, he comes to get his frisbee that lands on the lawn accidentally. She's a young my lawyer, little pick in any way. Oh, my God. The only 1970 movies could get away with doing something like that. Oh, man. But he's like, you know, in all the wrong ways.
00:28:44
Speaker
Oh, but as I'm watching this movie, I'm just like, oh, my God, this is it's it's such a sharp contrast from how serious it treats other issues and how it. Yeah. Like the dynamic it portrays between Kincaid and a bar. And then you've just got this almost cartoonish level of over the top racism.
00:29:09
Speaker
Well, yeah, she's like something out of Mel Brooks, you know, the neighbor, you know, in her, cause she's so racist. Like the old lady who comes into the, it says up yours. Yeah, right. Okay. Exactly. This is her descendant. Yeah.
00:29:24
Speaker
Right, to see when he walks up to her, you know, Cleveland Little, and he says, oh, it's a beautiful morning. Isn't it, man? She's like, oh, yours, nigger. This is her great granddaughter in A-Bar. Oh, exactly. Yeah, absolutely. Oh, man. And in the meantime, while the protestant is going on with the neighborhood people trying to get Dr. Ken Cady and his family to leave, A-Bar and his group of black militants, they hear about it on the radio, and they run to the rescue. Yeah.
00:29:53
Speaker
And they show up, and they kind of like scare the white people away, basically. Oh, yeah. Oh, they were like, oh my god, more black people. They don't. Oh my god, there's more black people. See, I told you, you left a couple of them in the neighborhood, and they bring more.
00:30:11
Speaker
their motorcycles and everything with their chains and they plant the black liberation flag. I love that part. Like they're cleaning this ground for black. But what I love is they only have it there for that scene and as they leave, they take it with them. We don't want the white people taking down our flag. We can only afford one flag for this movie, so we got to take it with us.
00:30:41
Speaker
car.
00:30:46
Speaker
But anyway, so Abar goes to the house and he introduces himself to Dr. Kincaid. Who says to him, well, you know, I appreciate you hanging around and helping us out and bye, bye, bye. Could you hang around and do this? And Abar says to him, I got a better suggestion. Why don't you move back there together with the rest of the brave people? Right. And Dr. Kincaid said, well, I can't do that. Oh, I just got here. So Abar agrees, OK, well, you know what? I'll hang around.
00:31:15
Speaker
and i hope you and your family and that's how they become friends you know cuz he you know he hangs out with the kids you know he will basically kink a tiresome is kind of a bodyguard more or less yeah more or less yeah. And so yeah there's a there's a lot of great moments with like with a bar and the kids like when he's reading them the tone the bedtime story of dead i dick.
00:31:38
Speaker
Deadwood Dick. Deadwood Dick, yes, sorry. The Black Cowboy who fought for preserving himself. And they do, they reenact kind of the story with the Kincaid family playing the parts of the settlers and Abar playing the part of Deadwood Dick.
00:31:59
Speaker
Right. The son has a dream. Right. He falls asleep and he has a dream and he dreams this whole scenario where they're out in the West and these white men come to run them off their land and the father's trying to defend them but he's not very good at it which says a lot about how the son subconsciously thinks about his father.
00:32:17
Speaker
And yeah, as you said, A-bar, as Dick, he comes and he guns down all the white men and, you know, and he leaves and, you know, and the kid wakes up and he's excited. He tells his father this story, you know, anything like that. And Dr. Ken Kay don't look too happy to be in the role, in the role of interfectual homesteader, but hey. And then,
00:32:45
Speaker
The racism gets out of control, and they try to set a bomb at the house, which A-bar finds their truders, they get rid of the bomb. But then there's another altercation, and Kincaid's son ends up getting shot. No, he just run over by a car. Oh, I'm sorry. Yes, run over by a car. The shooting stuff comes with you. Oh, yeah, because the guy is setting the bomb. Right. And Kincaid Jr.
00:33:13
Speaker
I forget his first name. I think it's Tommy or something like
Family Tensions and Social Pressures
00:33:16
Speaker
that. We'll call him Tommy. It is actually Tommy, yeah. Okay, and he finds this guy trying to set the bomb, and he's playing dead with Dick, and he's got that little toy six-shooter, and he's hanging away at him, and the white guy gets up and runs.
00:33:33
Speaker
and he jumps in his car, and the guy's legitimately trying to get away. I'm going to give him that. He's trying to get away. But Tommy jumps in front of the car, still with the toy gun shooting, and the guy can't get out, because the kid did jump right in front of the car. I want to be fair to him. The guy was just trying to get away, and he runs over the kid, and the kid is dead.
00:33:58
Speaker
So throughout the movie up until this point, Kincaid and his wife have been having this argument over whether they should stay or go with his wife. She says, let's just leave. Let's get out of this neighborhood. Let them have the neighborhood. Screw it. Our family's more important. While Kincaid, he refuses to give in. And that comes to a head after the son dies because at that point, she's just like, that's it. I'm taking our daughter and I'm leaving because I'm not going to stay here anymore.
00:34:27
Speaker
which, mind you, in the context of this low-budget, cheesy, you know, exploitation movie, this is a conversation that many Black married couples honestly had to have. Oh, absolutely. Even during that period, especially in that period of our history, when we were supposed to be overcoming and getting ahead, and we were still getting burned out of our houses, and we still had people
00:34:51
Speaker
that we're making off like in this movie. They go to King K and they say, well, you know what? You paid $200,000 for that. We're going to give you $300,000. That's how bad we want you out. Now, some people might think that's ridiculous and that's over the top, but that's actually realistic.
00:35:07
Speaker
It reminded me a lot of Raisin in the Sun. Raisin in the Sun, right. The Neighborhood Association or whatever of this home they've just bought, they come and they say, we're willing to offer you what you paid for the house and then some, so you don't move in.
00:35:24
Speaker
Yeah, I think they were going to pay them like another $10,000 over that, if they just wouldn't move in. And people look at that kind of stuff now, and they say, oh, well, that's ridiculous. No, that shit actually happened. It went off. And again, OK, in talking about this movie, I go back and I advise people to watch it. I recommend it, not for the superhero stuff that happens in the last 15 minutes, which really doesn't have anything to do with me.
00:35:50
Speaker
which is the meat potatoes of this movie, which is the relationship between these two men who were both black men, but they come from totally different worlds and the struggles of this family to, you know, have this house in the neighborhood where people don't want them. Yeah. You know.
00:36:08
Speaker
To me, that's what the real story of this movie is. Yeah, absolutely. And also, another thing that I thought was a neat little touch is how they talked, they touched on political corruption. And in this case, it was not only white politicians, but also black politicians who were just like, you know, I don't give a damn about the ghetto. We live, we live nicely over here.
00:36:31
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Yeah. There's there's what I think he's an alderman or something like that. He comes. He flat out says that at one part of the movie. He says, I don't care about the people in the ghetto. He said, listen, I'm living good. And that's and he said, that's all I care about. Which to me, I say, you know something, this movie gets props props for me for stating that so flatly. And we see the same black
00:36:55
Speaker
God, this Alderman or whatever he is, but he's corrupt and he goes to Kincaid and he tries to talk him into moving and he even goes to A-Bar and he tries to tell him what you need to tell your friend that he should move out there and, you know, and if you don't, well, you know, they're gonna cut all these programs and you won't be able to do these, you won't be able to do this for the kids, you won't be able to do this for the senior citizens. I said, wow, this cat is really sleazy. Yeah, yeah. And that's...
00:37:24
Speaker
You know, it's fitting that we were watching this after Mike Bloomberg dropped out of the race, because you saw a lot of him trying to do that, like, trying to basically buy off black politicians to endorse him to cover up the fact that, you know, he's a racist piece of shit. And you know something? If anything depresses me about watching movies like this, in that this is the same bullshit that goes on in this movie, A-Bar, and a lot of other black movies that were made
00:37:54
Speaker
during the same period, the same shit that happened that we're still dealing with it now. Yeah, I was thinking the exact same thing. I was thinking like, you know what, if you took this screenplay and you filmed it today and you made it in the modern day setting, you would not have to change a word.
00:38:14
Speaker
No, really. No, no, no. There's a lot you wouldn't have to change. You wouldn't have to change any of the dialogue between Abar and the doctor, between the doctor and his wife, even the doctor and his brother. Because even the doctor's brother tries to get him to move out. Yeah, yeah. Because he's like some kind of successful businessman. They never say exactly what he is, but he says his brother says, listen, they told me if I didn't talk to you and get you to move, they'd see to it that I don't get no more contracts.
00:38:43
Speaker
Right. I said, you know, you know, for an exploitation movie, this takes some nice surprising turn turns into some serious realms of thought into, you know, what was going on then. And as we've said so sadly, it's still going on now. Well, I mean, we've and this has influence on modern day depictions because, you know, the main character, a bar. Right.
00:39:09
Speaker
Yeah. What's the name of the main character? What's the last name of the main character in the Watchmen TV show? Oh, A-Bar. A-Bar. Yeah. A-Bar. Yeah. And he becomes a black Superman. He becomes a black Superman. Exactly. Yeah. So these connections are, there's that whole connection in there. And I didn't realize it until I watched this. And you know, I'd heard about this movie, but it wasn't until after I watched it that I really made the connection. I'm like, oh, now I see what they were doing there.
00:39:38
Speaker
Yeah, and also
A-Bar's Powers and Identity Exploration
00:39:40
Speaker
Dr. Manhattan, his powers are kind of magical also because he can warp reality to suit himself. He just thinks of something and it happens. Right, and he's also got that kind of like
00:39:53
Speaker
It's so weird because this is before even the Watchmen comic book came out, but Dr. Manhattan's mannerisms and the way he talks and everything, it's very similar to how A-Bar acts after he gets his powers. You know, now that you mention it, you know, because then he's got that kind of detached...
00:40:12
Speaker
Latitude, almost. He even dresses different. For the first time, we see him wearing a suit. Yeah, exactly. And most notably, it's a blue suit. Mm-hmm. Good point. Yeah, I didn't even realize that. Yeah. Yeah, it's a blue suit. And the guy that plays a bar anyway, Tobor Mayo, he's kind of freaky looking anyway, because this cat has absolutely no hair. Yeah, I realized that too. I didn't notice it until they did those close ups on his eyes. And I'm like, holy crap, the guy's got no eyebrows.
00:40:42
Speaker
He doesn't even have eyebrows, yeah. So all through the movie, he has this vaguely alien kind of look because, yeah, I mean.
00:40:51
Speaker
It's not even that he's bald. It looks like he never had any files, period. Yeah. I wonder if he's got because there's there's that medical condition where people can't grow hair. I wonder if he's got that's what he's got. Yeah. Yeah. Because like I said, it doesn't even look like he even shaved for the role. It looks like he never had any hair. Right. Yeah. I can watch the movie. He's wearing a blue suit. He's wearing this bright blue suit. And now the two, you know, putting the whole Dr. Manhattan thing together.
00:41:22
Speaker
I'm starting to wonder if, oh wow, that's wow. Well, I'm 100% positive that Alan Moore has never seen this movie, has never even heard of this movie. So I don't think he had any sort of influence on Alan Moore when he was creating Dr. Manhattan. But I think it did have a big influence on Damon Lindelof when he was putting together the Watchmen TV show.
00:41:47
Speaker
Right. Exactly. See, that's what I'm thinking, too. Yeah. I'm thinking, you know, Linda Hoffman, he's probably seen it. Yeah. Alan Moore, I don't, there's no reason why I would think that he said, but Linda Hoffman, yeah, given
00:41:58
Speaker
what you're saying to me now and i'm thinking more of it and it didn't hit me because when he was wearing this i said why is he wearing that bright he's wearing this bright blue suit like you know it's almost neon i said oh wait a minute dr may have this blue and i think i think linda i think what happened is lindelof looked at all these different connections right he saw you know he looked at all these different things he probably researched the history of black superheroes and he found this movie right which pretty much the only way you're going to stumble upon this movie is if you're looking for it
00:42:27
Speaker
Yeah, this isn't exactly a movie that's going to pop up as soon as you go on Amazon Prime, you know how it pops up movies I recommend for you. Yeah, this is a movie that you have. The only way you're going to find it is if you're looking for it. Right, right. So he probably found this movie, he watched it and then he took the name A-Bar from that, the whole
00:42:47
Speaker
the whole thing about, and he probably noticed like, wow, this guy is really similar to Dr. Manhattan. I'm going to use that. And just like he connected in the whole thing with Bass Reeves and Hooded Justice and Link that. So I think he's just kind of working all these things together. And it's amazing because even though it wasn't created to be that way, it all fits together really well.
00:43:07
Speaker
Yeah, because like you said, we even get the connection between A-Bar and Western Hero did with Dick. Exactly, that stood out to me too. Wow, that is, you know what, I just learned something.
00:43:25
Speaker
I co-host this thing, and I learn more than that. Wow, that's really, no, but all kidding aside, that really is something to think about. Yeah, and I think that just says something about how Lindelof really knows his shit when he puts the effort in. There have been a lot of times where he hasn't really put the effort in, but thankfully on Watchmen he did, and he proved that he can actually do this stuff really well.
00:43:54
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, when you when you put it because didn't he do what was on the show? He did lost the hero, right? Oh, I don't know if he did heroes, but he did lost, I believe. Lost. OK, yeah, lost. And he dropped the ball with lost. Right. You know, he dropped the ball. But you know what? Maybe that was I'm willing to give him the benefit of that with like studio interference and all this other kind of stuff. And of course, once you're dealing with other creative people, other things get thrown into the mix.
00:44:22
Speaker
But that season of Watchmen was his baby all the way through. And maybe that's what he should just stick to, just doing these limited kind of series where he's got full creative control from start to finish. And it's not that long. He can wrap up a whole story in one season, like a few episodes. Right. Right. OK, so back to this movie.
00:44:46
Speaker
I saw this movie about a week ago, so my memory is a little bit fuzzy on some of the plot details, but after King Kade's son dies, A-bar gets into an altercation with the police, I believe. This is after, so King Kade has told A-bar about his formula.
00:45:12
Speaker
Right. They have, they have like a discussion in his basement laboratory and he explains to him, you know, his whole elixir that he's been working on and everything like that. And of course, a bar saying to him, you know, well, you know,
00:45:29
Speaker
You can't keep this to yourself. You know, the typical speech that everybody gives a mad scientist, right? You know, starting with Dr. Frankenstein, when he's just come up with something that's going to change the world. You can't keep this to yourself. It's too big. Yeah. And King Kate is telling, well, well. And of course, King Kate gives him the usual speech mad scientists do. Well, man is not ready for this yet. You know, I said, what'd you create it for? Well, just see if I could.
00:45:57
Speaker
You go back to Jurassic Park, you know, you were so busy trying to figure out if you could do it, you never stopped to ask yourself, should you do it? Exactly, yeah, yeah. That old meme, you know, science can teach you how to recreate a dinosaur. The humanities teaches you why that might not be the best idea. Well, okay, here you go. So, Abar takes this homegrown funky cold Medina.
00:46:26
Speaker
But before we get to that like when he's showing demonstrating the the serum to a bar on the rabbit and I just love this cuz it shows how low budget is and he takes the gun right and They cut to a gun firing a close-up of a gun firing That's obviously a completely different gun being fired in a completely different location Well, they only had the one rabbit
00:46:51
Speaker
And they only had that one shot of the gun, because they just keep reusing it over and over again. Because they only had one bullet. And so they had to keep using that same shot over and over again. They said, hey, bullets cost money. Yeah. And then, so yeah, so then he takes the, well, because what happens is this other guy gets shot. Now, I didn't, at first, when I was watching this, I thought the guy who got shot was actually Kincaid.
00:47:19
Speaker
So, you know what? So did I. Okay, so I'm so stupid. You're right. I had to rewind it back because I could have sworn one of the cops said, you shot the doctor. Yeah, I thought I heard that too. And then it turns out. Right. Because the guy's trying to climb over the fence and the cop shoots him in the back, mind you. Bam. Yeah. That's what you do. You just shot the doctor.
00:47:41
Speaker
he said he had a gun and then they go up on him and of course he doesn't have a gun and the guy and the cop says you know what are we going to do and the cop who shot this poor guy who to this day I still don't know who this guy was yeah just some push love that happened to be the wrong place at the wrong time which also again
00:48:01
Speaker
is another parallel to things that happened today to black men who all the time are getting shot because they're in the wrong place at the wrong time. Absolutely. And the cop who shot him goes to his car, gets a throwaway gun and puts it in the dead guy's hand.
A-Bar's Confrontation and Ethical Dilemmas
00:48:16
Speaker
Yeah. You know, and he puts it there, you know, and everybody shows up. He said, hey, I had a gun. You know, what do you want me to do? Yeah. Oh.
00:48:27
Speaker
So then A-bar goes back and he takes the serum. And this is when he gets his super powers. And this is when it just gets kind of...
00:48:42
Speaker
It seems like they're leading on a path of there's going to be some sort of confrontation between Kincaid and Abar that never really quite happens. Like they have that conversation, but it doesn't, I didn't really get the sense that much was resolved in that conversation. And I think this might have something to do with the fact that they ran out of money before they finished it. Yeah. Well, you know what? Actually, I'm kind of glad.
00:49:08
Speaker
that we didn't get that kind of traditional scene where they confront each other. Yeah. Because to me, that would have spoiled everything that's happened
00:49:17
Speaker
up to that point with their relationship. Because like I said, I enjoy the relationship that goes between these two characters so much. It would have left a bad taste in my mouth or say like Kincaid confronted. And especially it wouldn't have said much to me about the intelligence of Kincaid because he knows exactly now what ABAR has become. So it wouldn't make no sense for him to try to confront him. Yeah. And you know, yeah, it wouldn't make any sense. And if anything,
00:49:43
Speaker
I have to admit, Ken Kane has not shown himself to be a stupid man in this movie. The only mistake that he made is not taking this, or at least sending his family away. If he could, you know what, if he felt he had to make a last stand in that house, he should have sent his family away. Yeah, I agree. You know, go live with my brother, me and Ava. You know, we'll stay here and, you know, we'll do the Alamo thing, you know, but you guys don't have to be here.
00:50:08
Speaker
That's the only mistake he makes in this movie. Otherwise, he presents himself as being a very calm, rational, thinking man, which I kind of admire. Now, instead, what A-Bar does, he goes back, and as we said earlier, he does all of these different things.
00:50:30
Speaker
There's a mugger that snatches a purse from a woman. He makes the mugger take the purse back. I was watching that scene because it's in such a weird way because A-bar, you see the close-ups on A-bar's eyes and you see the guy, it looks like he's running at superhuman speed then.
00:50:48
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And then he starts, he drops the purse, and then he's like picking it back up, and he's like running backwards, and then he brings the purse back to the woman, and then he just collapses. And then he collapses. There's the winos. There's like four or five winos that are fighting over a bottle of wine, and he gives them that look. And all of a sudden, they're all drinking milk. Yeah, yeah.
00:51:15
Speaker
He goes to and then he goes to the the black politician that we talked about earlier and go there They're eating dinner and this is when he says like, you know I don't care about the ghetto or anything like that and then he turns it into He turns their spaghetti or whatever into into worms Yeah and then
00:51:36
Speaker
For the finale, he goes back to the white neighborhood where Dr. Kincaid lives at in the white people that have been tormenting them and basically throws the plague, the seven plagues of Egypt. Oh, yeah. He goes full on wrath of God in this. Like he unleashes he unleashes rats in one house. He unleashes locusts in another, you know, puts it turned, adds snakes into him and everything. But then it's yeah.
00:52:01
Speaker
And it's all happening to every house in that neighborhood except that really over the top white woman at the beginning. Right. And now this is where
00:52:14
Speaker
It throws in a curve ball that really comes out of nowhere and feels so ridiculous when the woman, she goes up to the Kincaid family as they come back to the neighborhood and she says, I'm so sorry about your son. I'm so sorry about what I said to you, what I did. And you think, okay, well, you know, it's a little bit of a forced reconciliation, but at least she's, you know, they're trying to show that it's possible to change.
00:52:40
Speaker
But then she takes it and she's like, the reason I did all that is because I'm black and I've been passing as white. Yeah. Yeah. That's why she threw it. That's why she threw it. She said she found out she has, uh, I think what she was trying to say, cause she said she had the sickle cell. Yeah. Yeah. And that's when she found out that she was black. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I get what you mean. You know what I get what you mean, but
00:53:06
Speaker
To me, that kind of put her whole over-the-top reaction in some kind of context now. Yeah. I said, oh, OK. Well, she lived her whole life as white. Now she just found out she's black. That's why she freaked out. You know, that's why she was freaking out like that, you know, all Looney Tunes and everything like that. I get what you're saying, though. I understand because, like you said, it's like a ham-handed kind of, right, reconciliation.
00:53:32
Speaker
Yeah. Especially because there is no way that actress is in any way black. No. No. I can understand. There are black people who are light skinned enough and they can pass, right? Or mixed race or something like that. But she is definitely not one of them.
00:53:51
Speaker
Well, okay, but but wait a minute. Okay. Let's uh, let's look at a very famous actress who uh, you know at the end of her career after she had finished and everything like that and she retired And uh, you know, she admitted that she was black Oh, who's this Carol Channing? Really? I didn't know that
00:54:12
Speaker
you look it up Carol Channing she you know at the end of her career you know she admitted she said yeah she said uh you know she was African-American and she does have but she like you look closely she does have like she's very light skin but she does have
00:54:29
Speaker
you know, features, right? Or features you can kind of tell a little bit if you know that going in. Well, let me tell you something. When I was a kid and, you know, and I would be watching like Ed Sullivan or Sonny Chair or something, you know, because it was all variety shows, you know, back then. And Carol Channing was on all of them. And I distinctly remember my mother and father speculating as who in her family
Racial Identity and Historical Figures
00:54:52
Speaker
was black. And I looked at her and I said, you know, I saw this black white woman on there and I said,
00:54:59
Speaker
But wait a minute, but dad, mom, she's white. No, no, she ain't white. She's black. There's somebody black in the family. And I never could figure out how they knew. And all my father would tell me, he said, well, when you get older and you get some more experience up under your belt, you'll be able to tell. And he was right. Now I can look at somebody and I can tell, yeah, OK, well, I can see where he was. Look at, what's his name? Tom Jones.
00:55:23
Speaker
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. Tom Jones did the DNA thing and found out that he had black people. Matter of fact, if you look at Tom Jones now, he looks like a black man. Yeah. Yeah, his modern appearance looks much more like one. Yeah. So yeah, I see what you're saying, that there's no way that this woman could. I mean, I understand budget constraints and everything, but couldn't you at least try and find someone who looks a little bit more the part?
00:55:53
Speaker
Yeah, if you were going to go that route, you know, yeah, couldn't you get somebody with at least, you know, frizzy hair or something like that. So we could look at them and say, yeah, OK, I can see it. Yeah. Yeah. Otherwise, this feels like what was that that white woman a few years ago, but Rachel Dolezal? Oh, yeah. Yeah, it feels like that kind of situation.
00:56:14
Speaker
Yeah, but hey, but listen, listen, I give Rachel credit. She committed to that. Oh, yeah. You know, oh, wait a minute. There was nothing in it for her to pretend she was black all these years. It wasn't like she was making a fortune here. You know, she would listen. Homegirl was committed to the role. That's what I got.
00:56:39
Speaker
But yeah, but yeah, they could have got somebody a little bit. Like you said, it's like they're trying to wrap up a whole lot of things in that last 15 minutes of that movie. And this is just another one. And I think that has something to do with that might have something to do with the fact that they ran out of money during production.
00:57:04
Speaker
Like, maybe they had planned to shoot some extra scenes that had kind of set this up a little bit better. Plus, when he mentioned the doctor told me that you had sickle cell anemia, that stuck out to me. And I think that's who that other guy was, the guy that the cop shot.
00:57:22
Speaker
Oh, OK. I think I'm not positive. But yeah, I'm not positive either. Like I said, I was because, you know, as we were saying earlier, I'm with you. I thought it was Dr. Kincaid that got shot. Yeah. And and that and it made a narrative sense for me because I thought, oh, well, this is why a bar is going to take the serum now and he's going to go get revenge. Right. Because the street gang. OK, they got back to the biker gang that Dr. King was looking for a bar and he has a gun.
00:57:53
Speaker
because they all jump on their motorcycles and they're running around the ghetto. They're trying to find Dr. Kincaid. So when this guy got shot and the cop said, oh, you shot the doctor. I said, oh, man, they killed Dr. Kincaid. That's messed up. Yeah. And then there's the confrontation between the cops and the biker gang. And, you know, and A-Bars just sit in there.
00:58:19
Speaker
And he's just like, and the one white cop, he's like, screw this, man. I'm going home to my wife, make love, not war. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because A-Boy puts the whammy on him. Yeah. And I mean, like, the biker gang is getting ready to go down. They got their guns out, and they say, man, we going down. We taking these pigs with us. And A-Boy, like you say, we just sitting there. And they yelling at A-Boy, you know, get down, get down, get down. And apparently, he puts the Jedi mind trick on these cops, because they all start fighting each other. Yeah, yeah.
00:58:50
Speaker
Though I did like that one guy who just said, I'm going home to make love to my wife, reminded me of that scene at the end of Clue. Yeah, he just throws his gun down and says, man, screw this shit. What are you doing? Nah, man, I'm going home to make love to my wife. And that was the same cop who also objected to planting the gun on the guy that the other cop shot. Oh, man.
00:59:16
Speaker
And then one guy throws a racial slur at one of the black cops or something like that. He calls him a spirit chucker or something like that. And they start fighting. And the biker gang is just saying, well, what's going on? Because now cops, you know what, it's like six cops, they're all fighting each other now. They're in the dirt wrestling around. And A-Bar is gone. Of course, they turn around and look for A-Bar. And he's, you know, boom. You know, magic himself away.
00:59:41
Speaker
And then at the end, you know, it's just the Kincaid family with A-bar just kind of like walking down the street holding hands. And that's just kind of how the movie ends. So it's like, I wonder...
00:59:56
Speaker
They didn't run out of movie if they would have had anything else tacked on to the end there or something to hint at what a bar would be doing next because we don't really get the sense of Where is he gonna go from here? Like is he just gonna keep this stuff limited to this neighborhood? Is he gonna go take it nationwide worldwide? What like that's that's kind of the question that's left hanging in the air
01:00:17
Speaker
Yeah. A-Bar suffered from the same malady that a lot of movies of the 70s suffered from in that there's really no resolution to the plot. The movie just ends. Yeah.
01:00:36
Speaker
Like you said, we really don't get a feeling of what he's going to do with these abilities now, because the KK family, along with the white woman, mind you, who I guess they're trying to say that, you know, now she's going to join the family to make up for the son that was killed or something like that, but she's walking with them.
A-Bar's Themes and Remake Potential
01:00:51
Speaker
And they're walking down the street, and then, yeah, ABAR stops, and they stop, and he turns around, and he waves, and he just walks up down the street, and that's our last shot. We see of him.
01:01:00
Speaker
He turns the corner and he walks down the street by himself and then it's a freeze frame and it's the end credits. And you were left with this sense, well wait a minute, what happened next? What happened now? What's he gonna do? Is he gonna go to Las Vegas and start a magic act? Is he gonna walk the land like Cain and have adventures? What's he gonna do? And yeah.
01:01:30
Speaker
And I'm not really sure where to go next on this one. It's such a weird movie because it is oftentimes very complex and there are some very big ideas it's playing with, but then there are other times when it's completely ridiculous and over the top.
01:01:50
Speaker
See, A-Bar is the perfect example of something that I've always said for years. If I ran a studio and if I had billions of dollars and writers and stuff like that, I would not remake successful movies. I wouldn't. I would take a movie like this, like A-Bar, and I would remake this.
01:02:12
Speaker
Because there are elements in here. Like you said, there's some complex elements that are in this movie that if they had had a bigger budget, probably more time to rehearse. Some better actors, although I would not exchange that white woman for anything. But if they had some other actors, this would have been a much better movie. Yeah.
01:02:42
Speaker
And again, I have to say, I don't consider it, I consider it a bad movie in terms of what it is as far as
01:02:52
Speaker
I don't know. You know what? I don't even want to call it bad because as I said earlier, there's a sincerity in this movie. These people, you know, weren't winking at the camera and they weren't trying to, you know, do a spoof or anything like that. I distinctly get the feeling that they made a movie. They actually wanted to make it. We're proud to make it. And they wanted to say something with this movie. Oh, absolutely. And I think that was the intention going into it is that this was
01:03:20
Speaker
Like it ended up on the black exploitation circuit and everything like that. But this was intended kind of as a response to black exploitation movies to say like, look, we can make more serious films than what we've been doing. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
01:03:35
Speaker
Exactly. And yeah, yes, it does have its moments of goofiness. I'm not going to lie, but it does have, like, as we were saying earlier, the core of the movie to me is the relationship between A-Bar and Dr. Kincaid, and the relationship Dr. Kincaid has, because he sits down, he has serious conversations where he cusses out the alderman, but he does it in a very nice, polite way that I loved.
01:04:03
Speaker
Well, you know his wife and his wife here says no, you know something said you're starting to act a little bit like a bar now You're starting to get that's a whoa. I said, you know, that's kind of cool how The two men they have certain qualities that start rubbing off on each other. Yeah, and in fact, that's something that that just that just struck me now because in if you took some of the dialogue between Kincaid and a bar and you
01:04:30
Speaker
had it read by Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen, some of that dialogue could easily fit for Xavier and Magneto. Ooh. You know something? You're right.
01:04:43
Speaker
I mean, especially that line when she says you're starting to act like A-bar, you're starting to sound like A-bar, right? Because that's something that happened to Xavier in the comics. When Magneto died, right, and there was no longer that counterbalance, Xavier's perspective started shifting. And he started becoming a little bit more like Magneto. Yeah. Yeah.
01:05:05
Speaker
and that's what and like I said I can't go into that enough and I can't recommend that enough because they don't go the normal route that you would have
01:05:15
Speaker
in a movie of this sort where these two guys would be enemies and everything like that, they actually kind of respect and like each other right from the start. Yeah. You know, A-Bars says something to him at one time when Dr. King K comes to a rally that A-Bars haven't and he's given a speech and then he starts ragging on King K and saying, oh, here he comes. And
01:05:36
Speaker
You know, and he done left us and he's living in this big
Public Perception and Leadership in A-Bar
01:05:40
Speaker
house. He's done moved on up everything like that Just standing like kind of smiling, you know, he's not offended anything like that And then he asked a bar to come take a ride with him and they said yes And then get in the car and they go and they're talking like, you know Like Fritz and can't can't kind of realizes that he had to say that you know, and it doesn't bother it's Really? I can't
01:06:01
Speaker
I recommend this movie highly enough just for the relationship between these two very different black men who who end up, you know, having this friendship. You know, they're working together and there's no animosity.
01:06:16
Speaker
for the life choice that the other one is made. Yeah, there's also, there's also, sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, no, I haven't talked enough. Well, there's also that the emphasis they both place on how much respect they had for Martin Luther King, which I thought was also an interesting touch because there's not really any mention of the Black Panthers or Malcolm X or anything like that. And it seems like ABAR is more from that ideology.
01:06:48
Speaker
Well, not really, because I remember there's a point where King Kate is asking them, you know, when ABAR says, you know, that's when they first media comes to this house and he says, OK, well, we're going to protect you and we're going to make sure your family is safe from, you know, the crackers. And, you know, King Kate says, well, how are you going to do that with violence and everything like that? And ABAR says, don't worry about it. We have always we know how to protect ourselves.
01:07:16
Speaker
So it's not like he advocates violence. But that was even that, like, like I'm talking when I say Malcolm X, I'm talking like later Malcolm X after he left the nation of Islam. But also the Black Panthers were also very much about self-defense. True. But what I'm saying is that we don't see the street gang use any we don't really see them with guns until that final confrontation that they have with the and even then they don't shoot the police. Yeah.
01:07:44
Speaker
You know, Abar, you know, like I said, he does the Jedi, you know, mind trick on him and everything like that. But yeah, you're absolutely right because they play snippets of speeches Martin Luther King made throughout the movie. Yeah.
01:07:58
Speaker
But you don't hear you don't hear anything about Malcolm X or the Black Panther or any other Black leaders of that period. It's just, you know, Martin Luther King. Wow. Yeah. Now, I wonder if that was intentional because, you know, this was made in the it was released in 1977, but it was actually completed in 1975. And I wonder if it has to do with the time period, because really, when you think about it, it's only within like the past
01:08:27
Speaker
20, 30 years that white people have started to look at Malcolm X and the Black Panthers and starting to say, well, wait, they weren't as bad as everybody made them out to be.
01:08:39
Speaker
So I wonder if whereas, you know Martin Luther King even like yeah, he was considered a radical at the time But there was there was a shift in perspective after he died that you didn't really see with Malcolm X or after with the Black Panthers when when they when Malcolm X died or when the Black Panthers, you know died out and I wonder if Because I don't know if they'd be I don't know. I'm wondering if maybe they were worried about
01:09:07
Speaker
any potential backlash they would have had from that if they would be seen as like glorifying that kind of stuff. But I'm not sure if that, but also seeing like all the issues they touch on here. I don't know. I'm kind of rambling now. It doesn't seem like they would, that would be a concern to theirs. Right. Exactly. Exactly. And I understand where you're going, going with that train of thought. And I'm going to jump on that train with you because yeah, with all of the other themes that they explore in this movie,
01:09:35
Speaker
that were controversial at that time, why would they, you know, step back on mentioning the Panthers or Malcolm X after they took this step here and, you know, and they have said, OK, well, we're going to talk about this and we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk about the other, you know, while with the year. Yeah. No, I mean, you know, listen, that's an excellent point. It is. Yeah.
01:10:01
Speaker
something to think about. Well, you know something? I got to go back and watch this now because you don't give me a whole lot of other stuff now. You're thinking, you're serious? You gave me a whole lot of other stuff to think about this movie now. So now I got to watch it in a whole new context now. Yeah. See, I mean, this is a
01:10:18
Speaker
it's it's also not at all what you'd expect from the the title or the time period or or just the the cover art because like you've seen the the poster image of this right yeah yeah i mean it's it's look it looks like a standard black exploitation movie right like it's got the it's got the a-bars on there with um i just had the image here and i just lost it
01:10:44
Speaker
I hear you go. So, yeah, it's you know, it's got a bar standing there. He's dressed in kind of like this like African style design shirt. He's wearing these aviator sunglasses.
01:10:53
Speaker
Yeah, and there's like the fire in the background. There's a snake wrapped around. There's a guy holding the gun. There's a guy in a motorcycle. The tagline is what it was, what it is, what it ought to be. And plus, the title on VHS was in your face. That poster is nothing like the movie. No, not at all.
01:11:18
Speaker
There's one scene where Ava wears a dashiki that resembles the one that's in the thing. But it's a nighttime scene where he's sitting on the couch, he's having a conversation with Ken Cade and Ken Cade's brother. Yeah, and that's it. That's what I've never seen wear the dashiki, yeah. So the movie seems like from the poster, it's a movie that you're not gonna, you're gonna be
01:11:41
Speaker
like you're gonna be disappointed that it's not what the poster looks like but at the same time you're gonna be surprised that some of the other stuff it is yeah yeah
A-Bar's Relevance and Recommendations
01:11:50
Speaker
you know what I definitely think that a lot of people if they watch this movie and I do recommend that you see it mind you trust me folks I would not be
01:12:01
Speaker
going through all of this. I wouldn't be going through all of this just to wrap it up by saying, now I don't watch this movie. No, I do recommend that you sit down and watch it. No, it is not high art. No, we are not talking about a $200 million MCU CGI blockbuster here. But there is a lot in this movie to like and appreciate if you take it for what it is and approach it.
01:12:26
Speaker
in the time frame that it was made and accepted for that. It's also kind of admirable because this, again, we talked about other movies that came out in the old days and early superhero movies. This came out before Superman.
01:12:47
Speaker
Yeah. And they took a serious approach to this kind of idea. And yeah, it gets a little cheesy at times. But in general, they keep it pretty serious. Yeah, like I said, if I had the money and if I had a studio or if I had some influence, I would really like to see somebody take a serious crack at remaking this movie. Because again, as I was saying earlier,
01:13:13
Speaker
To me, it's kind of depressing that a lot of the themes in this movie are things that we're still dealing with. So you watch a movie like this, and you say, well, damn, I don't care what they say on TV or what they're telling me on the internet, everything like that. As a society, how have we really progressed since then? Right, yeah. And it raises those questions. And it gives you some stuff to think about when you realize that this movie was made
01:13:45
Speaker
40, 40, over 40 years ago. And yeah, we're still dealing with this stuff. It's still there. We're still dealing with the same shit that they deal with in this movie. And like I said, it'll make you think, well, really, how far along have we put? Yeah, we have progressed in some ways. But when you look at, you know, the various things that have happened to
01:14:12
Speaker
so-called minorities in this country in the last three years. It really has to make you think. How far have we really progressed? Right. So it raises some interesting questions about that. Folks, you're going to roll your eyes at a lot of points in this movie. I'm just going to prepare you for that. You are going to roll your eyes a lot, but there's also some other stuff. If you stick with it, I think that it is
01:14:40
Speaker
I'm not going to say it's a good movie. I'm going to say it's a movie that's worth your time. Yeah, it is. Bingo. That's the best way to describe it. Listen, folks, it's on YouTube. It's for free. You're sitting around the house Saturday afternoon. You don't have nothing else better to do and watch that. Give it a try. I'm serious. Give it a try. All right, so is there anything else we should add about this movie? Anything else to touch on?
01:15:10
Speaker
uh if we haven't done it in an hour and a half then we have not done our jobs yeah i don't think there's much more places to really go with it uh you know we talked i think we kind of covered everything the most everything that there is really to cover in this movie yeah there's one thing i did want to talk about though i just remembered i wanted to mention one thing and that is uh tobar miyo is
01:15:37
Speaker
He actually does, like we talked before about how him and the guy who plays Kincaid, they're very sincere in their roles, but I think. Jay Walter Smith. Jay Walter Smith, yes, thank you. Yeah, but my always, I think he's probably the, he has the best performance in this because he does,
01:15:58
Speaker
When he changes, when he gets the powers and he has that speech, he has that conversation with King Kate at the end, it is like he's a completely different person. He does a really good job of portraying him and changing his portrayal and acting like he is a very different person. And like you said, when you combine it with the fact that he has no hair and then his expressions and everything, it's very blank and it is almost like he's become an alien.
01:16:25
Speaker
and also I like the fact that he he he projects a nice quiet confidence you can see why this guy is a leader because if you ever notice when he's given order he never raises his voice no no he he says
01:16:42
Speaker
He gives an order as if he expects to be obeyed. There's not any question you're not going to do it. Therefore, he doesn't have to yell or raise his voice at you. Well, in general, he doesn't show a lot of anger at all. He's very cool and collected throughout the entire movie. Yeah, even in the scene where
01:17:01
Speaker
It's a bunch of white guys, they come to Kincaid's house and they're singing, whistling the battle hymn of the Republic of all things. That's one of those examples of the over the top racism. Yeah, exactly. Just go with it, you know, and they put a and they put a coffin on Kincaid's lawn. Just go with it. But anyway, Abar shows up and he gets into altercation with them and he beats their ass pretty much and throws them in a garbage truck.
01:17:31
Speaker
that his men have brought up because they're going to clean up King K's lawn because white people in the neighborhood have thrown all this garbage on his lawn. So they come to clean it. So he throws the guys in. Even while he's doing all this fighting, like I said, he doesn't seem like he loses his temper. No, no. It looks like he's having fun doing it. Yeah. Yeah. And then he goes to King K. Hey, how you doing, man? What's happening? And I said, wow, this cat is chill. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
01:18:00
Speaker
Yeah, but you know what? And you look at him, and I know that people say, well, who would you compare him to? You know what? He's a good enough actor that he's got his own kind of vibe. Yeah, I can't even say that. He's like Sidney Poitier, or he's like, you know, I don't know, Harry Belafonte, or, you know, he's got his own unique vibe, which I really appreciated, you know, out of this, that I appreciated from this actor, and I think it enhanced.
01:18:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's too bad that he'd only other basically anything else he'd been in was basically as an extra because he he's got some talent there and it would have been interesting to see like how he would have grown as an actor if he had been given some better roles. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I definitely could have seen him becoming going on to more dramatic roles, you know, action movies and stuff like that because he's got the chops even in even in this movie with the limited
01:18:59
Speaker
time that we see him in a way. But those scenes that he's in, he owns those scenes. Yeah, definitely. You know, he owns them. Yeah. He's a good actor. I'm like, you know what? Even though they are not what I would call polished actors. Again, I have to go back to the sincerity of the performances. Everybody in the movie is sincere. They work with what they got. Yeah. Yeah.
01:19:27
Speaker
And know what? I can't ask no more of anybody in any field than that. You know, they work with what they have. And I mean, you know, they sell their characters and they sell the story, which is, which is basically as an actor, that's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to sell your character and you're supposed to sell the story. Right. And that's what actors in this movie do. OK, so do we have anything else to add?
01:19:54
Speaker
Only that you should, like I said, Saturday afternoon, you don't have anything else to do. Folks, it's on YouTube. You don't have to pay to see it. And it's a pretty good print. That's on there too. It's pretty good. It's not HD quality, but it's not bad. Right, right. So yeah, so check it out. Give it a watch. Sit through the painful parts. There is stuff worth watching in this movie.
01:20:23
Speaker
And other than that, Derek, do you have anything you want to announce? Anything you got coming out? Let me see. No, the only thing I had coming out was the two Dylan books that came out in December. I am going to start work on a new project.
Upcoming Projects and Podcast Promotion
01:20:46
Speaker
Airship 27, a few years ago, Charles Saunders,
01:20:51
Speaker
wrote a book called Dambala, which is about a black pope hero in 1930s Harlem. So a couple of weeks ago, well, not a couple of weeks ago, about two weeks ago, I get a letter from Charles Saunders himself, who I am fortunate enough to have become friends with. I read his books when I was back in high school. So I've worshipped this guy as a writer.
01:21:20
Speaker
Yeah, but he created Imaro, which is like a black Conan. Right. Yeah, type character. Sure. Yeah, he also did. Did he do Metembu for Black Hope? Yeah. Yeah. OK, I actually use that in a paper I wrote in grad school. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. Comparing Metembu and Tarzan of the Apes and like showing different racial perspectives on the two different approaches to the Jungle Hero.
01:21:51
Speaker
Well, what had happened was that Charles had been in touch with Ron Fortier, the captain of Asher 27. And he's working on something now. And while Ron wanted a sequel to Dambala, Charles, you know, he felt he couldn't do it at this time since all of his energies was going into this other project that he's doing.
01:22:18
Speaker
So Ron and Charles asked me to write a sequel to Don Bala. So that's what I'm going to be doing for the foreseeable future. I'm going to be, you know, working on that. So you folks can look forward to that. You know, do I have anything else? I have a couple of things I'm working on, but nothing, you know what? Because I don't like talking about stuff too much in
01:22:47
Speaker
This is kind of weird. But if I talk too much about a project that I'm working on, it kind of releases the pressure. And then I feel like I don't have to write it. Yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah. So I noticed some writers that love going on and oh, well, I'm working on this. I'm working on that. And you know what?
01:23:07
Speaker
That's fine. If you can do that, that's OK. But to me, if I talk too much about it, then I don't feel like I have to write it. Right. So I just like prefer to just keep what I'm working on to myself until it's finished or at least close to or at least until it's so close to completion that there's no way I cannot finish it. Yeah, yeah. Well, damn, it's 90 percent done. Now, you know, what am I going to do? Stop now. Oh.
01:23:37
Speaker
Yeah. So that's what I'm doing. You know, there's a couple of things I got, you know, going on, you know, I'm finally, I'm finally going to finish that book of Sebastian Ridge stories that I did. I wanted to have it finished before the, what's the name of that damn book?
01:23:59
Speaker
Straight out of Deadwood. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah, cuz that's got a new Sebastian Rich story in there But I've got five that I did before that which a lot of people haven't seen also So I've got those in a book. So I'm finally going to put that out there I wanted to have that out there before then the other one came out so people could have picked it up, but Things didn't work out. So what are you going to do? Yeah, I just picked myself back up and
01:24:29
Speaker
start all over again. Well, on my front, I got Lucifer Rising. It's the first book in the Morningstar series. It just came out a few weeks ago, actually. I think it came out about a month ago now, actually. It's a spin-off from my Luther Cross urban fantasy series. So this has Lucifer coming up from hell, and I know some people are thinking, well, it's going to be just like the TV show.
01:24:57
Speaker
It's not, there's enough differences in it that I think you're going to find an interesting read. So that's out now, that's up on Amazon. You can go to PercivalConstein.com for more information on that. My other podcast, Japan on Film, the fourth season started about a month ago.
01:25:17
Speaker
And so by the time this comes out, I think or no. Yeah, but so about two two episodes have been released so far with that. There's one we talk about Throne of Blood, the old Akira Kurosawa Macbeth adaptation. That's the one I got to listen to. I love that movie Throne of Blood.
01:25:35
Speaker
You'll find some interesting stuff that we talked about because that conversation went in interesting directions that neither me or Aaron, who was my guest on that episode, expected it to go in. That discussion surprised both of us. We also talked about One Cut of the Dead in a recent episode.
01:25:54
Speaker
next episode, which is going to be coming out probably a week after this one, is going to be talking about the Twilight Samurai. And after that, we're going to be recording next week, actually, but we haven't obviously recorded it yet, but it's on the schedule, is your friend of mine, Mark Buskin. He's going to be coming on and he's going to be talking about Shin Godzilla.
01:26:19
Speaker
He's gonna be talking about Godzilla. That can't be a real Godzilla kick lately. Oh yeah, yeah, that's why I, because I saw him posting all these Godzilla reviews up, so I went to him and I said, hey, you know, I've got Shin Godzilla, which was the last Japanese Godzilla film that was made, and I hadn't watched it yet.
01:26:36
Speaker
Would you want to come out and talk about it? And he said, yeah, sure. We had a way for him to finish up with find a break in his in his school schedule because he's a lot busier guy than I am. But we're able to work it out. And so he's going to come on to talk about that. And then
01:26:51
Speaker
After that, another episode. We've got two more episodes scheduled on the schedule for this season at least. And both of them are going to be covering really out there Japanese sci-fi. One is Message from Space, which was a Japanese Star Wars knockoff.
01:27:08
Speaker
And I don't know. Is that the one with Starman? Is that the one with what? Starman. What's the actor's name? I don't know his name, but it's like a superhero is created by a consortium of aliens, and he's sent to Earth to battle these aliens. Never mind. It's not the same movie. I don't think so. No, no. This is a 1978 movie. It was actually a low budget Star Wars ripoff.
01:27:38
Speaker
and oddly enough directed by Kinji Fukasaku who directed the Battle Royale and the Yakuza Papers movies which are really serious really good movies but then he also directed this like low-budget sci-fi Star Wars knockoff so it's gonna be interesting talking about that okay the movie yeah the movie I'm thinking it was made back in the 1960s but speaking of Godzilla can I ask you one question real quick yeah
01:28:04
Speaker
Why can't Americans make a good Godzilla movie? Man, it's like American Studios should not be allowed to make any more Godzilla movies. What? You didn't like the last two? I just saw Godzilla King of the Monsters. And you didn't like it? Oh my god. Really? I thought it was great. I like both of the last ones they made. The one they made in, what was it, 2014? And then King of the Monsters. And yeah, I liked them both. And I'm looking forward to Godzilla versus Kong.
01:28:30
Speaker
I like the one with the one in 24. That's the one with Matthew Broderick? No, no. That was the one in like 1999 or something like that, 1997. So it worked for one in 2014. That was the one with Ken Watanabe. It's the, like, King of the Monsters is the sequel to that one. It also had, maybe not, because it also had Bryan Cranston had a small part in it and. Oh, that's the one where we never see Godzilla.
01:28:58
Speaker
Right, yeah, yeah. He comes out at the end, but yeah, mostly you don't really see him. Boy, you like the Matthew Broderick one? OK. Now, wait a minute. Hold on. Before you rag on me, it's not a good monster movie, but it's not a good Godzilla movie. OK.
01:29:19
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I got it. It's a good thing. This is the Superhero Cinephile show, because if you were on the if you were saying that on my Japan podcast, I think that, you know, some people might start rioting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know what? When it comes to Godzilla movies, my taste is very eclectic. Like, I don't know. Godzilla King of the Monsters. I don't know. Godzilla was fat. Mm hmm.
01:29:46
Speaker
Who needs a fat Godzilla? He's not fat. He's just big boned, all right? Why do you got a body-shamed Godzilla? And I felt that the creatures in this movie, first of all, they were way too big and too powerful. Well, you got the effects. You might as well go all out. That's the way I thought they were trying to do with that. Yeah, well, yeah. Yeah, there's that. OK.
01:30:24
Speaker
I don't know.
01:30:26
Speaker
If that's what you want from a Godzilla movie, that's definitely what you got. You got monsters. I do love the more serious Godzilla movies. The original one is amazing. It's a work of art. I haven't seen Shin Godzilla yet, but I'm going to be watching it soon to prepare for my interview with Mark. But from what I've heard of it, it also is in that more serious vein.
01:30:52
Speaker
I mean, the sad truth is, is that for most of Godzilla's existence, it has just been giant monsters beating the crap out of each other. Which is what it's supposed to be. You know, I mean, listen, as far as I'm concerned, listen, give me Godzilla. Give me Mothra.
01:31:11
Speaker
especially when it's got the but see I like the one from the 60s we had them two little broads that started singing they kept them in the box and then we'd come out and then soon them chicks start that shit you know it was about to get real because I love them chicks
01:31:32
Speaker
That was, uh, the three-headed monster. You know, yeah. Ghidorah. Yeah, as long as you're giving them three in a movie, I'm happy. You got all three of them in King of the Monsters. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, cool. All right, uh, now, uh, very last thing is next episode, next three episodes, actually. Uh, so this is my pick now, and I'm...
01:32:00
Speaker
I'm really excited to do these next three episodes with you because this is something I've been wanting to talk about ever since it came out. And we are going to be covering the entire first season of Watchmen. We're splitting up. We're going to be covering all nine episodes. And because there is so much to talk about in each one of these episodes, we're going to be covering them over the course of three episodes. So in the next episode, we're going to be talking about only the first three episodes of the Watchmen TV show.
01:32:27
Speaker
Right. And yeah, I'm really looking forward to this. The second one and second one, we do the next three and the third episode, the last two. So, yeah. So I'm looking forward to doing this, too. I'm going to go back. I'm going to rewatch all of all these episodes obsessively and take obsessive thoughts on me. Oh, there's just so much in it. So, yeah, it's going to be honest. So much in it. Yeah, because I mean, this I don't know. I don't know about you, but for me, like for my money,
01:32:56
Speaker
That's easily the best TV show of 2019, maybe the best TV show of the decade. Well, I haven't seen a lot of TV shows, so I wouldn't go there. But, but I will say that if you talk about like the best thing I saw as far as TV shows go to 19 or 2019, yeah. Watchmen was it. Yeah. Even my wife like Watchmen, my wife don't don't don't got nothing from no superhero movies at all.
01:33:25
Speaker
But she loved to watch it. So a lot of people I know don't like superhero movies. They only watched it because of who was in it, of course, who was starring in it. You know, they say, OK, well, I want to watch it because she's in it. They ended up loving it. Yeah. Yeah.
01:33:41
Speaker
I mean, I mean, it got so much press. It got so much coverage, like stuff that you people who don't usually like superhero stuff, like you said, like Patricia, they they found they love this show. And it's there. There's just like folks, we're going to get into it and we're really going to go in deep with this because there's just so much to talk about. And let me just say this real quick. I think and I'll go into this more. But I think that the reason why people
01:34:07
Speaker
liked it so much is because, just like the movie that we were talking about now, see how I brought that back, folks? A-Bar, The Last Black, it wasn't just about superheroes and superpowers. Right. You know, and I think that
01:34:22
Speaker
In order, you need shows like Watchmen to show people who are not into superheroes like me and you and a lot of our fans and friends and listeners of this podcast. See, we're all into stuff with superheroes simply because we're into superheroes. But if you want to get
01:34:40
Speaker
People who don't know anything about superheroes get them to watch it. It's got to be about something more than the costumes and the powers and People punching each other through walls. Absolutely. Yeah, and that's the show does very well. So yeah And this is gonna be the first time we're actually covering a TV show like I know we did crisis but crisis I look at as a movie that aired on TV and
01:35:04
Speaker
Me too, yeah. As a matter of fact, I think that whenever they put, I don't know if it's out of Blu-ray yet, but I think that's what they should do. They should edit it into one five-hour, four-hour movie. Well, I don't know about in the States, but in Japan, they actually did that with some of these CW crossovers. I've been in the video store and I saw Crisis on Earth-X was there on the shelf, is one whole uncut video.
01:35:32
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. That's what they should do, because that's what they actually, that's what those crossovers actually are, you know, their movies. Yeah, their movies, they're just split up and aired on TV. So yeah, this is gonna be the first TV show. Like, you know, mostly we're covering movies on this show. Some people have asked us, are you gonna be doing this TV series? Are you gonna be doing this TV series? Folks, mostly we're trying to focus on movies. When we do a TV show, it's gonna be because there's a really special reason for it, at least for the time being, I think.
01:36:02
Speaker
Right. Right. So we're not going to, you know, if there is a TV show that you want us to talk about or anything like that, you got to give us a compelling reason to do it. Right. Yeah. Don't. Yeah. No, don't. Well, I think it would be cool that you would. Well, yeah. Be cool if I did a lot of things.
01:36:23
Speaker
But I don't do them. I don't do them. And don't get me wrong, I appreciate the fact that you're listening to us and you're listening to the rant and rave and pontificate and go off on tangents about this stuff and everything like that.
01:36:38
Speaker
But still, we're trying to maintain a certain level of professionalism and focus here. So that's what we do. Well, that's actually a good segue. And the last thing is, don't forget, we got a Patreon page. So if you go to patreon.com slash supercinemapod, you can donate to the show because, you know what?
01:37:02
Speaker
We got bills to pay to, folks. We got to pay for hosting service. We got to pay for programs to run the show to make sure it sounds good coming in. So if you can give us a little bit there, it helps us out. If you can kick in a few bucks a month is all it really takes. And quite frankly, the best way to get me to do anything is to throw money at it. There you go.
01:37:34
Speaker
Well, Derek, thanks again for another great episode. Thank you. Who else do I have to talk about this stuff with except for you? If I didn't have you to talk to every, what? What do we do? It's like every week every other week? Every other week, yeah. Who else do I have to talk to this stuff about? It's been one of the highlights of my months coming in and doing these episodes with you twice a month.
01:38:00
Speaker
All right, folks, hopefully you agree. And yeah, make sure you visit us on the web, superherocinephiles.com, Facebook group, SuperheroCinephiles. And I just started an Instagram page for us, SuperCinemapod. So you can follow us on Instagram. At the time we're recording this, there's nothing up there yet. But I'm going to start posting some images and stuff on there of superhero movies and that kind of stuff. And I'll do the same. Yeah, OK. All right, thanks a lot. And we will talk to you next time.
01:38:30
Speaker
OK, good night. God bless. Thank you.
01:38:39
Speaker
Thanks for listening to the Superhero Cinephiles Podcast. If you have any questions or comments about this or any other episode, or if you have a superhero movie or TV show you'd like us to cover in a future episode, you can email us at superheroescinephiles at gmail.com, or you can also visit us on the web at superheroescinephiles.com. If you like what you hear, leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. Each review helps us reach more potential listeners.
01:39:06
Speaker
You can also support the show by renting or purchasing the movies discussed, or by picking up our books, all of which can be accessed through the website, as well as find links to our social media presences. The theme music for this show is a shortened version of Superhero Showdown, a royalty-free piece of music, courtesy of pheasantlionstudios.com.