108. Michael B(oth) Jordans

Transcript

Speaker: This episode, we review... a lot Like a lot of things. ah Arguably too many things, man. ah We... yeah Yeah. Movies, television programs, trailers even we review.

Speaker: So many movies. Honestly, I can't even quite remember how many things we reviewed because we kind of did it out of order because we did this with like pickups. So I actually... I can't tell you exactly what we reviewed. We we talked about focaccia bread at one point. We did.

Speaker: Yeah. The Alexander Cook's recipe. Great. yes I would recommend that one. yeah This is a full-on advertisement for whatever Alexander Cook says. Yeah. It's a website.

Speaker: It's good. Okay. ah good Good to know. Okay, well... but Just look at the description. Yeah, just look just read the description if you want to know what we reviewed. reviewed lots of things. So many things. It's crazy.

Speaker: In fact, my name is Simon Eadie. And I'm Adrian Pinter. Welcome to Split Focus, a film and TV podcast, episode 108! eat um um but but but That was good.

Speaker: Would it have been so much to just say that we a we reviewed Sinners and Daredevil Born Again? and and know Warfare and The Last of Us. The Last of Us Part 2, Episode 1 and 2.

Speaker: Yeah. I also talked about um Kid Detective. Great movie. Kid Detective. You did. You did. Very good. Talked about that. Yeah. Kid Detective. Yeah. We talked about Star Wars.

Speaker: like we didn't We didn't give any any notion that we even talked about Star Wars. Yeah. I feel like we failed in this cold open, you know? We did we didn't really talk about the things we talked about. You're right.

Speaker: We can just leave this in. Welcome to episode 108 of Split Focus, a film and TV podcast. I did that out of order. Again, i screwed up. You do it. You do it this time.

Speaker: My name is Simon Eadie. No, I'm sorry. And I'm Adrian Pinter. Welcome to Split Focus, a film and TV podcast, episode 108. All right, I'm so hungry.

Speaker: laa lao la la la la away

Speaker: Bye.

Speaker: to be it office Adrian, Adrian, Adrian. I started the, I started, I sent you the invite for this podcast. We're recording here. And then a minute later, a minute later, the dog pukes all over the floor. Just like, just like, spews his puke everywhere.

Speaker: Unbelievable. Is he okay? fine. He just pukes because he eats garbage out in the backyard constantly. He just likes eating garbage because we don't like him to eat garbage. And so he thinks it's smart to eat garbage because we don't want it.

Speaker: You know? Yeah, that makes sense. um Dog logic. yeah What kind of garbage? Any like specific garbage he prefers? Really anything. Really? Like if if there's a there's turds out there, he'll eat them. if there' is ah If there's a dead rabbit, he'll eat it. If there's a dead squirrel that's been like mangled by some kind of rodent, ah mangled by a rodent, that's weird. it It is a rodent, but it would be mangled by like a cat.

Speaker: By a larger rodent. Yeah, is a cat a large rodent? No, i was thinking like a like a raccoon, a raccoon's rodents. They're pissed.

Speaker: I don't know. I don't know. This ain't a mammal podcast, Adrian. So I don't know. Yeah, but it is a film and TV podcast. And on a on a on a segue to that just briefly, and it's kind of like a half segue. I've been playing the Indiana Jones game and it's incredibly cinematic.

Speaker: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle on PS5 just launched. And it's great. And i can't ah can't stress enough how immersed I am and how how much I keep thinking about it.

Speaker: Even while recording here today. I'm like, oh, it's pretty fun. You're thinking about it right now. Yeah, yeah. It's really, it's excellent. It's excellent. You can play while we're recording. I won't judge. I'll read the notes.

Speaker: Yeah. or Our focus is split, Adrian. Yeah. oh I get it. I literally play video game while I'm while i'm recording. It's the name of our show, Simon. Split focus. I get it.

Speaker: That's cool, man. Yeah, it looks good. It looks fun. um I'm not an indie guy, as you know. I've never watched a single Indiana Jones movie. um I've always said I will.

Speaker: haven't gotten around to it. I will one day, though. I will. Yeah. I don't see why I wouldn't. I like Harrison Ford. Yeah. I like...

Speaker: adventure movies oh adventure yeah i like i like uncharted which indiana jones is based off of as far as i understand oh yeah um that would make logical sense timeline wise yeah time travel um so yeah no it seems up my alley so i'm glad that you're enjoying it man you know i i've i've also been playing games but nothing really cinematic you know played through sekiro I beat everything you can in Sekiro. I got the platinum. I got my gamer cred card.

Speaker: Difficult game. And I always say very difficult. games it's It's very difficult. I always say like, yeah I'm not that good at games, but like this is like one of those things where i'm like, you know what? Actually, I'm pretty decent because I conquered this. Did it take me a while? Did I die hundreds of times? Most definitely.

Speaker: Most definitely. But I accomplished it. I did everything you could. And I'm pleased. Does that just make you a hardworking gamer, though, or a skilled gamer?

Speaker: you know i don't know. Are you talented? No. Are you hardworking? i'm I think I'm hardworking. I think, yeah. You know what? When you say it like that, I don't I'm talented. You just put effort in. Yeah.

Speaker: Which I feel like matters more. People who have like natural talent versus skill, as an example. I guess you would be skilled because you were good at it at the end. You know you were able to conquer that platinum. I find that that's always a distinction I always like to make.

Speaker: yeah Was this filmmaker skilled at what they did or were they just naturally talented? Because I feel like naturally talented way less impressive. They put less work in to make it happen. So I like to talk about that distinction oftentimes.

Speaker: That's in my life. But yeah. Okay, man. It's cool. um The segue to gaming that's related to what we talk about on a consistent basis. I want to talk about the fact that The Last of Us...

Speaker: The Last of Us released as a package called The Last of Us Complete. Oh, yeah. And I just wanted to ask about what you thought about that title. So The Last of Us Part 1 and Part 2 on PlayStation 5.

Speaker: it was ah it was like announced as like a package that was going to be sold in the PlayStation Store. The thing that I'm bringing up here is it is called Complete. And because it's called Complete, the question is, are they actually not doing The Last of Us Part 3?

Speaker: And what does that mean for the HBO show currently airing on HBO. I don't know if what you think about that. I kind of wanted to ask you and see what you think. I have some thoughts as well, but yeah, what do you think about that? Yeah. I mean, I'm a little bit disappointed to hear that that's, you know, if, if that truly is the complete story, um It makes me a little sad. I think i think the way Last Us Part II ends like begs to to continue.

Speaker: um as As much as I love that ending, it's I feel like there's more to tell. And I feel like you could tell a lot in that universe in general, whether you know you're continuing you know the main character storylines or or you know you're just playing around more in that universe.

Speaker: So um I'm a little bit disappointed about that. And I think we talked about it, maybe the the one of the first episodes, we we like re restarted our our show, how with the HBO series, like if they would continue the story past part two in the show, and how much I would ultimately hate that. So um yeah, I hope on their own. Yeah, without having a game to be based on you mean?

Speaker: Yeah, correct. Yeah. Like I would much rather i want to play that experience. I love movies. I love TV, but I love video games, too. And, you know, I think. It'd be almost one unfair in a way if if they continued that story just in, you know, in my opinion, a lesser form, although still great.

Speaker: um So, yeah, like what what are you thinking about all this, man? What do you think about complete? Them saying complete kind of made me think it was complete, but I talked to. To other people that I kind of work with, and they thought that that just meant that was a marketing beat, and there was a lie, and that there was a part three coming inevitably.

Speaker: And I just feel like based on what Neil Druckmann's been saying, the creator of The Last of Us, the the Naughty Dog studio head. and actually executive producer and director on the HBO TV series, what he's been saying about part three maybe not happening.

Speaker: I feel like, I don't know, I feel like he might be done with this. There's a lot of controversy with The Last of Us. like People didn't like part two. lot of people did like part two, but it's very divisive.

Speaker: And so I don't know that he's not done is the point I'm making. I feel like he could be finished with it. He just might be checked out. He's like, I'm going to do it. I'm going to finish this in the show.

Speaker: It also sounded like in an interview i heard recently that he was like, I think or maybe it was Craig Mazin, the showrunner for The Last of Us on HBO. He was kind of saying that the TV series would have like, it would have a definitive end, like that we would end it.

Speaker: um I wonder how many seasons this means. I feel like it's still maybe going to be four seasons. There was that eight an HBO executive that was recently asked that question, like, how many seasons is the HBO b show going to be? And it kind of sounded like maybe it was going to be four.

Speaker: um Three or four was kind of what the the numbers being thrown around were. So we'll see. But yeah, it does sound like the games are done. And so that would mean that this part two... Season two is kind of the beginning of the end, I guess, of the show.

Speaker: And in ah possibly, we'll see. Yeah. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's a bummer all around. i guess we'll see how how how that show plays out. The show's already been renewed for a season three as well. Like, I think it got renewed, like, just before the the first episode aired.

Speaker: um Spoilers for the montage. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. i actually I even scrolled down. I read through the montage. I just like quickly. i'm like, is it there? i couldn't see it. I couldn't see it, Simon. Maybe it's not in there.

Speaker: Maybe you're right. Maybe I just didnt didn't include that for some reason. oh Oh yeah, now you're making me look stupid, but at the end of the day, you're the dumb idiot. You're the big dumb dumb idiot.

Speaker: Yeah. That's weird. I wrote one. I didn't see it last week. Yeah. Montage. What the heck? One early montage that you didn't even write down. I'm bringing it in. I didn't even write it in.

Speaker: Yeah. So yeah, it's already been renewed for a season three prior to the first episode airing. So yeah, I don't know. I can see them extending. i mean, part two is a long ass game, man. It's like 30 hours. um So i I can see them extending it to, you know, three seasons easily, like ah up to season four, I say.

Speaker: Yeah, yeah. But again, three seasons for one game. Yeah. Yeah. Like I can see them doing that. I think there's a lot to play around with. There's a lot of extra story you can tell. You know, you talked about like flashbacks and everything like that. I think they could They could easily fill it in.

Speaker: um Right. By the time we're recording this podcast, this episode 108 here, it's interesting because the first episode of the show is what we've seen already.

Speaker: um And it's crazy because the the timeline is accelerated almost in that first episode. it It's just kind of interesting to say, the the think about how it's accelerated sort of ah for the game in ah in a strange way.

Speaker: um And then also simultaneously, we're thinking that they're going to extend it to four seasons, which I think is funny. I know they're going down. It's going to get slowed down by a massive amount, I think, in in episode two, which yeah actually in episode 108, we will talk about because we're going to travel to the future and have that spliced in. But it is interesting. We'll see what happens. It's interesting, though, because like...

Speaker: in that first episode, they're planting seeds for things that never happened in the game. So I feel like already like you can, yeah, you know, add episodes that have nothing to do with what happened in the game at all.

Speaker: So I'm very curious um how it's all going to play out. I know I was like a little softer on that first episode. episode compared to you i thought i thought it was good but like you know i didn't love it and i know you thought it was like genuinely great or excellent i think is the word you use so hopefully uh much higher on the second episode i would like to be i would like to see i guess we'll see in this episode was slow focused i guess we'll see in like an hour yeah of listening time for the audience but yeah but not us we won't see for at least another six hours and 39 minutes simon Man, time travel is a beautiful thing, isn't it? Yeah, it's crazy.

Speaker: All right. Let's move into some of the a few quick bites of film and and film and TV industry news. Adrian, a few quick bites, quick bites. Yeah, I set you up for that.

Speaker: um But yeah, the first thing i want to talk about briefly here, man. i'm I'm kind of annoyed ah with the with the with the situation with the Minecraft movie. The A-Minecraft movie, I guess.

Speaker: Because it's called A-Minecraft movie. ah Directed by jordan ah jared Jared Hess of Napoleon Dynamite fame. Yeah. I, I think that the, the way that audiences are reacting in the theater, throwing popcorn on the floor and yelling and screaming and bringing chickens into theaters, like live chickens into theaters ah for that, especially for that chicken jockey scene. I think it's disrespectful.

Speaker: I think it's disrespectful. I think, Parents just sitting by and saying, oh, they're just kids. Or Jared Hess specifically, and this is the biggest thing that I think is ridiculous. Jared Hess saying, for instance, it's weird, quote, it's weird when you're having too much fun and the cops get called.

Speaker: It's funny because I think it's just literally cheering and throwing popcorn, which is so funny to me that cops are getting called for popcorn. Yeah, it's hilarious. I've seen so many funny videos. It's great, especially when people are climbing on their friend's shoulders and standing up and cheering for those moments.

Speaker: It's like this crazy anticipation, but man, I'm just glad people are making memories with their friends and family. Jared Hess, go to those fucking theaters and clean it up then.

Speaker: Don't make these like minimum wage workers clean it up after your fucking fans are going crazy. Jared, why don't you go direct the Kool-Aid movie? Jared. Jared. Yeah. how like How much money did he make as an example? like Contrast yeah that with the this is so It just seems so out of touch with reality.

Speaker: But I just think like there's like a lack of common decency more and more in this because of precedence set by things like this. And I think a good example of that actually is we just saw a movie in IMAX, which we're going to talk about in in a short while.

Speaker: And the experience in the theater wasn't good. I'll throw it to you because feel like you're passionate about this. Yeah, there's some dumb twat sitting like two seats like two seats two rows in front of us. And the guy was on his phone for quite literally like the entire movie.

Speaker: the The entire movie is just texting on WhatsApp. what What do you got to say? And he's like, he's like sending like 18 messages in a row to someone. I feel like he was probably fighting with his girlfriend. I hope your girlfriend breaks up with you, you bald bitch texting in the goddamn theater.

Speaker: he was fucking yeah he was bald he was actually bald um and and and the light on his phone was reflecting on it even more shining into my eyes brightly fuck that guy i hate that guy and then there was a few seats down from us it's okay if you're bald by the way i'm not talking shit about bald people i'm just talking about shit about this one specific fucker and then there's there's there's these three people seats down from me to my left hand side and they were just yapping the entire movie help the Shut the fuck up.

Speaker: You're in a movie theater. we're We're paying the extra but money for the IMAX experience. Well, I didn't pay. You paid for my ticket, which I really appreciate. Thank you. ah But it's like, fuck you guys.

Speaker: It is expensive too. Like these are like, I'm surprised they are doing that. Cause it doesn't make any sense. Like just go to a different movie theater. Yeah. like I got that theory. Don't go to the movie theater. No period. Don't go to the movie theater. If you are going to,

Speaker: Bring in a chicken, throw popcorn, fricking be on your phone, chat with your friends. Don't go into the movie theater. Get out, break your legs on the way out and then crawl to your car, drive home and stay at home and until your legs get infected because you never actually went to the doctors to get it checked.

Speaker: Yikes. Yeah. Okay. Makes me angry, dude. I hate it. i love the movie theater experience. And again, with Jared Hess talking about, oh, cops getting cold for throwing. Dude, they're disrupting an experience. like People paid money for this. I understand. It must be a cool experience for the people celebrating.

Speaker: I will always think about when we watch you know Avengers Infinity War and Endgame and Spider-Man No Way Home where people cheered at specific parts. But that's not disrupting. No one was f freaking snapping their fingers and killing half the freaking theater.

Speaker: you know, celebrating this movie, everyone was just cheering, excited. It's just again, sorry, i'm i'm I'm getting angry very early this up episode. I apologize, actually, I should take a step back. But i agree, except for the legs breaking and the violence part. but and maybe the bold bitch, you know, name calling. But regardless of that, like, I don't understand.

Speaker: we There is a there is a courtesy of going to the theater. There is like you can hear, you can gasp, you can, you know, oh, wow, look that's crazy. Like that. Actually, I remember distinctly that Jedi Jedi, um the last Jedi. Oh, yeah.

Speaker: There's a few moments in that movie that people were. That's why it's so shocking. I saw that movie twice in theaters and both times people were having ah ball. yeah Nobody was leaving the theater and saying, well, Wow, that was bad. Wow, that was the worst movie I've ever seen.

Speaker: Because that's what people we talk about now. That's how they say, that's what they talk how they talk to me about The Last Jedi today when I talk them outside the theater. But anyway, yeah, I agree. I don't understand. There's like, again, there's like a lack of, we're we're recording this on Easter, on Easter Sunday, literally. On 420 Easter Sunday.

Speaker: And what is this? Yeah. A crossover episode? Yeah. Yeah. Classic. But like, it's strange. I don't, I'm not a very religious person, but one of the things that I feel like religion brings to the table potentially is like, and I feel like our society has grown more secular.

Speaker: I feel like religion can, and it doesn't always, it can incite morality. I feel like it can. And there's there's one specific piece of morality that I learned growing up, religious or not, the golden rule.

Speaker: You know what I'm saying? Treat others the way you want to be treated? Exactly. You know it. You know it. You know what I'm saying? And so there's this aspect that a lot of society lately, and even like in and like political spheres, actually, but ah just in general,

Speaker: they it did They just don't follow the golden reel. of ah real The golden reel. is a that's only That's the name of our podcast now, actually. We're changing the name. The reel. That's not bad, actually. yeah Huh.

Speaker: It's too late now. We're 108 episodes in. But regardless of that, the golden and they don't follow the golden rule. And they just don't follow us. They don't think outside themselves. I don't think Jared Hess is thinking outside of himself.

Speaker: about how he's sitting at home just looking at the clips like, oh, wow, they brought a live chicken in. Oh. If you were in that theater and you were watching Quentin Tarantino movie, You're watching Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and somebody just starts yapping, yelling, matt and you're trying to listen to what Leonardo DiCaprio is saying.

Speaker: You can't hear him because you people are but have a live chicken in your face. yeah don't think you'd be okay with that. and you like you make it No, you make it more relatable. People are at Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. They're celebrating. Everyone pulls out a flamethrower and just lights the fucking building on fire.

Speaker: yeah That's more in line. But yeah, it's absurd. i do agree with you. It's just that that's the part problem is like I get the impression that either Hess is not thinking what he would feel like if that happened to him, if he was watching a movie he was interested in, or Hess just realizes this is a shit movie that's 41% of Rotten Tomatoes and people, the the actual experience of going to this movie,

Speaker: is the people in the theater not the not what's on the screen, which is pretty depressing at another level. So if that's the case, I mean, no problem, man. It's 41% of Rotten Tomatoes. But if I was going to see the movie, I'm not going there to see a a guy with a chicken on somebody else's shoulders.

Speaker: That's all I'm to say. I'm there for Jared Hess's movie. And so i don't know how Jared has camp connect the two things. You're literally a creative who made this. Don't you want people to see it? Not see someone on, so on someone else's ah shoulders being like celebrated. Yes.

Speaker: Yeah. Chicken, chicken jockey. Remember the shit that is. Then to be fair, like newsflash, Jared Hess, bringing up my, my white right here. Newsflash buddy.

Speaker: No one's there to see your movie. They're they're there because Minecraft is in the name. Quite literally. Yeah, but that's sad. Yeah. He has no cultural significance.

Speaker: Yeah, he made Napoleon Dynamite fucking 20 years ago, and it had it had its place in time, but he hasn't made anything of value since. i It might be good better than it was reviewed, though. I don't know. Maybe.

Speaker: i'm not going go to the theater and see it. I might have gone. had i not seen this bullshit happening. Mm-hmm. but yeah But I don't know if he wants that audience. He wants the audience of people who are freaking out and and tossing their drink on the floor so that the theater staff can clean it.

Speaker: And then he's celebrating that online so that that can happen more. Anyway, and let's move on.

Speaker: We're riled up. We're riled up to start. All right, buddy. we should We should see if we can interview Jared Hess and then just talk shit to him the entire time. yeah Oh, yeah. You think this is a good idea? Dude, we're not a professional podcast.

Speaker: We don't have any sponsors. We're not doing this for anyone. We just give them various scenarios. It's like, would you think it's a good idea to go see the Irishman theaters and then somebody takes out a gun and then shoots you in the back of the head?

Speaker: Huh? Yeah. Would you like someone to fucking shoot a nuke into the theater when you're watching Oppenheimer, buddy? Yeah, would you like to, when you go to see The Little Mermaid, would you like somebody to fill the entire ah auditorium with with water and you just have to swim in there and try to listen to the to the weird weird sea creatures singing a song yeah underwater while you try to survive because you don't have enough oxygen because you're not trained?

Speaker: Like, ah who is it? Who is it that's trained for seven minutes? that Wasn't that Tom Cruise? Tom Cruise? ah Zoe Saldana? Oh, for Avatar. Oh, yeah, Tom Cruise could breathe underwater for a massive amount of time. No, Kate Winslet.

Speaker: Kate Winslet. She did that? For Avatar, yeah. Oh yeah, she did that for Avatar. Yeah, we made a silly video about it. Yeah, I forgot about that. Seven minutes.

Speaker: Yeah, anyway. yeah yeah yeah but Yeah, Tom Cruise did it too. Anyway. The spinny thing. The spinny, I'm not sure. the Mission Impossible 3, wasn't it? With the water spinning? No, no, no, no. Later on, later on. It was like one of the more recent movies. the Mission Impossible 4?

Speaker: I don't remember what impossible five. It's one of the movies with Rebecca Ferguson in it. Okay. Mission impossible. Oh my God. Do we need to water pool whirlpool? This, you know, what's crazy about this is that it's a perfect segue because the next thing we're going talk about is all the trailers that came out this last two weeks, Adrian. And this last two weeks, there's some pretty big header trailers. One of which was mission impossible, the final reckoning, which I imagine you saw.

Speaker: I did indeed. it looks fantastic. It was on Mission Impossible Rogue Nation, by the way. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Which is the fourth one? Okay. So not three.

Speaker: Wasn't that five? It might be five. Maybe you're right. I think it might be four of these. Regardless, yeah. So what did you think about the... Well, I'll just give you throw out the trailers that we saw this week. It is five. It is five.

Speaker: Excellent. All right. yeah We did it. We fact-checked ourselves. Yeah. yeah Yeah. The trailers that came out this week that we saw, i think you saw them all. Mission Impossible Final Reckoning. The Fionnishan Scheme trailer, Wes Anderson film.

Speaker: The Eddington trailer, Ari Oster's film. Fantastic Four First Steps, like a bigger, like bolder trailer. And then the new 28 Years Later trailer, which revealed a lot more than the first one did, certainly.

Speaker: Any of these stick out to you? And what did you think? Yeah, I mean, we're already talking about Mission Impossible. So that final reckoning trailer, holy moly. Did you see the the bit with the plane thing? Like where they're talking about him being on the plane?

Speaker: Cold on the plane? Oh, it's a different video. like Yeah, it's a different video. It's like Tom Cruise being on the plane and they're like, you can't even breathe up there. there's no you You're going so fast Tom Cruise won't even be able to breathe up there.

Speaker: I didn't see that. That sounds good. It's really cool, man. I can't wait for the final reckoning. that That trailer was so supreme. And they're really building up that this is going to be the final movie in the Mission Impossible franchise. Very nostalgic.

Speaker: Yes. That trailer. Yeah. Back to the the old roots of the Mission Impossible series to to show off some of the the new stuff. It's pretty cool. Yeah. I'm very excited. And to see what is Tom Cruise getting up to you again? This crazy fella. He's doing the craziest stunts.

Speaker: Tom Cruise is a goddamn treasure. Yeah. He's a damn treasure. And he has he has moved the action genre forward to a place that is arguably unmatched in regards to these crazy stunts.

Speaker: So, yeah, don't know. Yeah. Yeah. You'd say it's almost Mission Impossible. No, it is Mission Impossible. It is. That's the franchise that we're talking about right now.

Speaker: Yeah, for sure. so That's good. i also like Nick Offerman in everything he's in. So it was nice to see him in this as well. i am a I'm hoping it does better because I think that the last last Mission Impossible movie, 2022, right? Three. 2021.

Speaker: three twenty one No. 2023? I don't think so. Yeah, man. It was... Regardless, it didn't do that well. 2023. Yeah. To be fair, like like it it did ah amazing critically, but like the reason it didn't do that well is because, um like if I recall correctly, like they were filming this during COVID,

Speaker: And i know they were paying everyone's salaries even when they couldn't film. So like the movie itself costed significantly more than it typically would have because I think Tom Cruise really pushed to make sure that everyone continues to get paid and everything like that.

Speaker: I know it didn't do crazy box office wise like in comparison. But yeah again, I think there –

Speaker: there was a lot going on in regards to, its to, to its budget. um And then I think it came out like around the same time as like, like Barbie and and Oppenheimer, if I recall correctly, it was like a month before it was little bit time before, but you honestly, yeah, it still did. okay The $571 million, dollars but compared to the the two before that, like mission impossible, fallout made 791 million.

Speaker: It's a pretty big hole. That was awesome. Henry Cavill with a mustache? I know. Henry Cavill with his CGI'd off mustache in Justice League? Right. Henry Cavill reloading his arms like they're guns?

Speaker: Oh, dude, that was fucking cool. In the bathroom? Oh, my God. what a great What a great fight scene. What a great movie that is. It's awesome. That's the best one by far, I think. i but Maybe not by far. I thought Dead Reckoning was great.

Speaker: It was excellent. Yeah, I love all of them. Except for two. But yeah, then there's the Fantastic Four First Steps trailer. I thought that was pretty cool and enlightening. I feel like it gave gave us some more plot details that we didn't necessarily know about. I feel like we knew that Silver Surfer was in it, but now we see her in action.

Speaker: Julia Garner. cool Yeah, Julia Garner from Ozark. Yes. a Silver Surfer. It looks good. It looks very good. It looks and interesting. like You see Galactus. You see his big shoe walking through New York.

Speaker: just walking through those streets, hitting cars and stuff. It's pretty interesting. It's cool. Like the the design, it seems very comic accurate. Although I haven't really read the comics too much to be totally transparent.

Speaker: um But it is, it seems neat. Like I'm curious where this is going to end. Cause like, this is clearly a different universe than what the main MCU is so i'm curious how this is going to connect with the wider universe and avengers doomsday and and all of that stuff um but again i just hope the movie itself apart from how it's going to connect to everything is good on its own um yeah and i'm quite confident it does look good so far the cast is pretty killer

Speaker: Yeah. yeah Vanessa Kirby's pregnant. The year of Pedro Pascal. Not her, but the invisible woman. He's pregnant, yeah. Yeah, she's pregnant. Pedro Pascal, also pregnant. It whole new meaning to first steps.

Speaker: Yeah. I guess. Yeah. Is that what that's supposed to mean? i Mean? Yeah. I was assuming that first steps stood for Galactus's big shoes walking through New York City. His first steps. Oh, there's also that. Lots of first steps. Wow.

Speaker: You also see Fantastic Four for the first time in the MCU. Yeah. yeah Yeah, there's lots of so many first steps. the The music, the theme that they have is so good for it. it's like singing just like Fantastic Four and like the way it does that. Michael Chiquino.

Speaker: Michael Giacchino kills it. he's He's a good guy. feel like he's like he's grown in massive popularity. We're going to talk about built music, I think, a lot in this and this episode of our show because there's there's another thing that we we saw that music is incredible.

Speaker: The sound design is incredible. But yeah, Michael Giacchino, he really it really does a good job with everything. Up, Lost, was kind of two of his starting spots.

Speaker: But the Pixar's up was excellent, of course. That that score is and incredible. Inside Out. Yes. So good. Yes. So good. The Batman, more recently. Mm-hmm.

Speaker: It's true. He did the Batman. Yeah. His directorial debut in the Werewolf by Night. Yeah, that was cool, too. Yeah. Yeah, pretty awesome stuff. All right. Well, any of the other trailers stand out to you?

Speaker: Oh, dude. Um... Yeah, the 28 Days, sorry, 28 Years Later trailer. yeah These trailers are phenomenal, man. they yeah ah like They're doing such a brilliant job showing the tone of what this movie is, but I still don't really know what the plot is and like what the what the focus is and what they're trying to accomplish, if they're even trying to accomplish anything.

Speaker: yeah If there's like some overarching like the or like story that they're going to play out. ah But everything about this from the like visual aesthetic, the audio, again, music in that trailer.

Speaker: um Not just the music, but the audio, as you point out, like that that voiceover work over the radio, that radio kind of. Like you're very eerie that speaking of lost, actually, that's one of the first big moments in loss where I was really like, there was like shivers down my spine in the first episode of loss with the French woman speaking over the, over that radio.

Speaker: It's incredible. It's so awesome. Was it wait? Was it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what it is. And then it's just like iteration seven, nine, two, three, four. It kind of reminds me of that. It's just something very eerie about it, but also the tone of the trailer and the way that the the filter they put over it and the way it's filmed. it It's like it was filmed back when 28 Days Later was made in the way that the it looks older, which is really neat too. Yeah.

Speaker: And again, this is the first movie that was filmed completely on iPhone. Start to finish. They filmed the entire movie on iPhone. Wow. I'm sure they use like additional tools and lenses and stuff, obviously, but. Interesting. So it's post-processing to make it look like 28 Days Later.

Speaker: That's pretty neat. Cool, man. Yeah. 28 Days Later, like when you look at it, like it does not like, like it looks very old. Like they they, that movie was like fairly low budget in terms of like the the equipment they used, I feel like.

Speaker: They probably just shooting on a basic little camcorder, but God, is that movie phenomenal. yeah it's excellent did you ever watch 28 weeks later did we we did we ever talk about did you yeah i have it's it's nowhere near as good it's not directed by like danny boyle or written by alex garland or anything right yeah but the the the opening scene of 28 weeks later is phenomenal like it's it's by far the best part of the movie and like one of the best parts and in that series well i guess two two movies but yeah the rest of the movie is kind of like meh um

Speaker: So yeah, I'm curious how that this is all going to play out with 28 years later. I had Jeremy Renner's in that and Rose Byrne. That's cool. Yeah. It's interesting.

Speaker: Yeah. It's neat. It's neat. Neato Eddington. It's like a COVID ah covid movie. You saw the trailer for that? I did indeed. Joaquin Phoenix and Pedro Pascal again? Wait, is that even coming out this year? That's the other question. Good question.

Speaker: I'll look that up. Ari Aster, though, like Midsommar is excellent. As we, I think we both agree. i think Hereditary is really great too. I never ended up watching Bo is Afraid, but I definitely intend to. I just, I know. too too I just never did.

Speaker: You want to sit down and watch it together and next to each other? Possible. Possible. It's a long movie. And I feel like I, long movies I can't watch on my own because my, I just can't focus. Like at at home, too many distractions.

Speaker: Cat walks around. I pet my cat. Phone's right there. too Too much going on. My fiancee does not want to watch that movie. There's no way she's going to watch it. She doesn't want to watch any more Ari Aster movies. She watched Hereditary once.

Speaker: She said it was good. Never wants to watch it again. She watched Midsommar. She thought it was like a good movie. Never wants to watch it again. Doesn't like thinking about it. And then once Bo is afraid came around, she's like, she just straight up told me, no, she's like, I'm not going to watch it.

Speaker: Okay. So, so um I need you to watch this with me. um According to Google search, um July 2025 is Oh, wow.

Speaker: So it really is the year of Pedro Pascal. Like this is actually legitimately. He's got three huge that. Well, Eddington won't be nearly as big as Fantastic Four or The Last of Us on HBO. yeah But yeah, it's still pretty impressive.

Speaker: OK, that's pretty neat. Pretty neat. And then the Fionician scheme. Did you see the I did Wes Anderson trailer? I love Wes Anderson. This is such a Wes Anderson trailer, though. It's such a Wes Anderson movie. like you could just I feel like becomes more and more Wes Anderson as time goes on. you know like No one's doing exactly what he's doing at all.

Speaker: Or not even exactly. like They're barely doing it in any way. yeah he's just He's so precision-driven. It's so clear. Every shot is so specific and so so staged in such a way that...

Speaker: Like there's not a hair out of place. It's incredible. I'm very excited this. Like his movies feel like he creates dioramas and then like shoots these dioramas and then moves the camera accordingly within these sets. And yeah, I like Wes Anderson. Like I've seen ah like a few of his movies. I haven't watched all all this stuff. And I just think you have to be in a specific mood to watch that style and tone of movie.

Speaker: I feel like I can't be in the mood. And like when I watch that trail, I'm like, this is good. But like, it just looks like what he does all the time, which isn't necessarily a bad thing because literally no one else is doing it.

Speaker: Right. But know yeah, i don't know. What was his last movie that we we watched in theaters? It's like ah the anthology one with the three short stories. I think he came out with something on Netflix, like a short film.

Speaker: but He came out with multiple short films, but no, that wasn't the last one he did. He did. Oh, yeah. I got to pull it up here. He did... I really liked it too, and now I'm forgetting what it was.

Speaker: He did ah just a regular, not a... That was a strange anthology inside a movie with the one you're talking about. The French Dispatch was the thing he did Yeah, that's the one I'm thinking of. Asteroid City was his last one, which I did not watch. Sorry, yeah. french f French Dispatch is the one that's almost like an anthology inside one movie.

Speaker: Asteroid City I saw in theaters, and I really loved it. And then he did a few short story type situations on Netflix, which I also saw. Those were good. I really liked specific. I didn't love the French Dispatch, actually, but I really liked Asteroid City a lot.

Speaker: I thought it was excellent. um But my fiance loves Wes Anderson movies. It's like her favorite, favorite thing outside of maybe monster movies, which is maybe even Trump's Wes Anderson movies.

Speaker: There's a certain style to it. It's just very comforting in some way. Even like there's like a Instagram page I follow. It's like, and what is it called? There's something Wes Anderson everywhere something like that.

Speaker: you're like You see, i i don't I'm butchering the name of it. Regardless of that, is like they find Wes Anderson-y things in the world and they just take a photo of it. It's like various countries. It's like the Grand Budapest Hotel in real life kind of situation. Like, oh, look at the framing of this. or Yeah, it's it's neat.

Speaker: It's cool. don't know. It's awesome style. Yeah, I'm excited. I'm excited for all of these trailers. gonna be It's going to be interesting. Eddington, i'm I'm not really sure what exactly it's about as as much as it seems to be about COVID and the reaction to COVID.

Speaker: I read somewhere that it was like Joaquin Phoenix's character and Pedro Pascal's character character like ah battling it out in a small town during COVID in some way. know if you know anything about it.

Speaker: No, no. i just I just saw that trailer. I'm like, I will watch this movie. It looks wacky. Yeah, it's exciting. um It looks really good. Okay. All right. Well, moving on to the next quick bite of news here.

Speaker: ah Death Stranding 2. It's Death Stranding 2. What the heck? Yeah, I just saw that. I'm like, wait a second. Why did try Death Stranding? A Death Stranding movie is set to be directed by A Quiet Place Day One and Pig director Michael Cernoski for Studio A24.

Speaker: We knew that already before that Death Stranding was becoming a movie. That's basically Hideo Kojima, the gentleman, the auteur who makes the game Death Stranding. He made the games Metal Gear Solid.

Speaker: um One through five. I think all of them, right? Yeah. That's and the baby. Yeah, there's other Metal Gear Solid as well. They have a Peace Walker. Yeah, in-betweens. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker: Little slight spinoffs. But yeah, he he made Death Stranding starring Norman Reedus and various big-name directors, actually. Mostly. And some big-name actors, ah like...

Speaker: Margaret Qualley. Yeah, Margaret Qualley. And Leah Seydoux, who's also in a and Wes Anderson movies. Yeah, that's true. Including The French Dispatch, actually.

Speaker: Mm-hmm. And so, yeah, so the he want he is a big film guy. He loves films. He loves, he wants, and he wants to make them work. Movies become films and kind of merge the mediums in certain ways.

Speaker: Regardless of that, the Quiet Place Day One director, Michael Cernoski, has been tapped to direct the Death Stranding movie. And I'm wondering how much Hideo Kojima will be actually a part of this process.

Speaker: But what do you think about making a movie out of Death Stranding in general? But also, what do you think about Michael Sarnowski being tapped to direct it? Yeah, so I'll start with Death Stranding being made into a movie. I think this is going to be an interesting play because I just recently played through Death Stranding.

Speaker: um Again, i i played it when it originally released and then just replayed it um within the past month or so. Um, and it's, it's a game I really love. I think it's like something very special and the, the, the mechanics of you're, you're playing Norman Reedus holding a funky fetus and reconnecting the world, delivering packages is, is, is cool from a gameplay perspective. It's very unique and it's something that I've never played, but one of the best parts about that game is how crazy the story is and how much lore there is.

Speaker: And I think because of that and the amount of lore and everything that's happening within the world, I don't know how you can make or like fit all of that into a movie. Like I just genuinely don't know how someone can do that.

Speaker: Right. am I agree. Yeah. i I don't, I'm not saying like Michael Cernoski can't do it and that it's going to be bad. I'm very curious. I would, I would like to see this.

Speaker: I just don't know. Like, that's a big ass. That's a big accomplishment to fit everything. Yeah. To fit what a Death Stranding is, to fit in, you know, these twists and turns on of the story in, to fit in all the characters. You know, you got Deadman, Die Hardman, Mama, like these these crazy character names. Right. And those get kind of like, those names and the reason why they have them also kind of get explained a lot of the time throughout the game in, like, little messages that you read or and all that.

Speaker: right So I'm very curious. um I think this has like a lot of potential, obviously. And i've I've only seen A Quiet Place day one out of Michael Cernoski's films. Did you ever watch Pig? No, I completely intend to, though. Yeah. That is a movie that I've always intended to. And seeing this news again reminded me that I should watch that because it's on Crave, I think.

Speaker: Oh. Yeah. Streaming service Crave TV in Canada. So I intend to watch it. But yeah, well, it's also interesting. It's which just attaches itself to really interesting, slightly and independent movies.

Speaker: Mm hmm. And so it's it's cool. I don't know. like I agree with you. And I think what you just said is really well said. I don't know what what are you going to do here? There's a wackiness of Kojima's style of directing. And you kind of you buy into it throughout the journey in his games. I feel like you buy into the wacky names and the wacky situations.

Speaker: Norman Reedus, as you mentioned, has a fetus strapped to his chest that lets him know of various... enemy entities in the world yeah it's like what it's strange it's very strange and a lot of the the neat thing about that game is the gameplay is so neat that what actually speaking of covid with eddington it's kind of a prediction of covid in a weird way he didn't like this game came out in 2019 and then it it's it's essentially about norman reedus connecting the world through like

Speaker: delivering packages that are in a strange way, but also people are separated. Like they're not connected. They have to social distance, which is such a strange like prediction of the future in ah in a, like weird. It's very strange that that, that he was able to predict that.

Speaker: And I think he thought it was weird too. Like Kojima, like I don't think he, he really, obviously didn't know that there was going to be a worldwide pandemic, but yeah. I don't know what could possibly, what what this movie could possibly be. It shouldn't it be a TV show potentially, but then also is that too wacky for a TV show? do you maybe want to just like throw it at the audience real quick? And they're like, yeah, Die Hardman. That makes sense.

Speaker: Yeah. That name is normal. That's a normal name for a guy. Yeah. No, it's, it's interesting. Sam Porter Bridges. Right. He's literally a deliverer.

Speaker: ah Yeah. Deliverer of packages. And his name is Porter. yeah the like the he builds bridges and his name yeah yeah literally like it's a lot of it's on the nose and like again kojima has like this style why does it work that's the question why does it even work in the game i can't even explain it he's got a magic touch that doesn't make sense he's in it it's just on the cusp of being a like ah like over the top and where he he just knows how to balance that level of campiness and cool So well, he can dial it back. Like it it is over the top.

Speaker: It is like that. That is for sure a fact. It's over the top, but he dials it back to a point where we can accept it as an audience. And we don't think this is can't be nonsense. Yeah. You know, like how do you do it?

Speaker: It's cool, dude. and you know and again like coming up with characters that like hartman like he's a character in the game and like he lives his life on 24 minute cycles where he dies for three minutes and then comes back for 21 minutes and then it just continues to repeat and that's his entire life it's like how do you come up with such cool ideas like that and for whatever reason it makes sense in the confines of this world and like he plays around with it and the characters are just kind of like yeah that's kind of weird but like it makes sense like it's it's very neat and i don't know i'm curious like i really liked a quiet place day one i don't think it's as good as you know part one and two of a quiet place but it is still a really good movie it's heartfelt it's um i really enjoyed it so again like i hope this guy does well and you know a twenty four i think has mostly a good track record in the movies that they decide to make i think recently they've had a few misses um

Speaker: I think like Y2K was like a pretty big miss. um Like yeah both like critically and and commercially. um i had another one, but I forgot it. Death of a Unicorn was okay.

Speaker: Yeah. Oh yeah. Death of a Unicorn. That's actually another example. I was like, it's just kind of fine, but we'll be talking about a movie they just came out with recently a little later as well, which was phenomenal. So again, right they, I think their track record is typically very good and it's positive.

Speaker: So yeah, Yeah. And ah honestly, i'm I'm confident that Hideo Kojima likes a lot. Like he's a big film, but he probably loves a lot of A24 movies and I'm sure he seeks them out. I would not be surprised if he was like, I want A24 to produce this, to like make this.

Speaker: Yeah. And he probably chose Michael Sternoski to direct it as well because I'm confident he likes the movie Pig and was like, i'm go I want this guy to. It's got to be. Yeah. Yeah. got it like he he has a vision and and like you mentioned there are a lot of big directors and actors in his games like again mads mckel uh mickelson's in the game he has that's an that's another big one i didn't say him yeah yeah guillermo del toro is a literal character that like he doesn't voice his character but his his body's in it he has a nicholas winding refin the guy that did drive in this like yeah there's so many people conan yeah isn't it

Speaker: but but Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of also like interesting cameos, but like Nicholas Wending Refn is it's like a main character. Same with Guillermo del Toro. Yeah. Which is interesting.

Speaker: It's like they're directors. They're not even, they don't act in things just generally. So it's such an interesting choice. But like yeah my question to you is, do you think he's going like when they make this movie, are they going to try to bring in some of those actors? Like do you think they'll...

Speaker: bring in Norman Reedus to play the main character. Do you think they're going to try to get god to bring in Margaret Qualley to play Mama? like But I don't even know. like The question is, like aren't you going to show a different side of Death Stranding? Why do we need it? This is a weird one. like You didn't necessarily need to make The Last of Us, but do we do we make this into a movie that's just a shorter form version of the game? It's interesting. like you know what I mean? yeah why it's I don't know. i'm i'm I think you're smart to bring in Norman Reedus as the main character, or you do something completely different.

Speaker: If you're not going to do Norman Reedus, don't do the story of Sam Porter Bridges. Do something different inside the world. That's kind of my perspective. Because I feel like he's an actor.

Speaker: He's acting today. It's not like he just retired. And yeah I'm sure he would love to do it. It's a big, big A24 film, potentially. Yeah, just do do it right. Do it the that way. It's like, but how can you tell that story in the timeline know of an hour and a half to two and a half hour movie?

Speaker: I don't know. Good luck. like Good luck to you. so Let's see. How long are all the cut scenes in Death Stranding? Oh, good question. But they're not even going to... like They have to take out some some of the elements of the story. There's no way they're going to try to cover it all. So right now, the the the game movie, all cut scenes... Interesting. So one...

Speaker: One. Okay. It's yeah. This gamers little playground is the the YouTube channel. so This is who you trust. This is you trust. It's it's 11 hours and 17 minutes.

Speaker: Okay. And then there is another channel. called Gamers Prey, and that's seven hours and 22 minutes. So either way, at at its short, it's seven hours and 22 minutes. At its long, it's 11 hours and 37 minutes.

Speaker: But that doesn't even include all the dialogue that happens when you're just delivering packages. or you know that are just like in in the notes that you find around the world and in the emails that you receive from the people that you've connected.

Speaker: So yeah. the The stuff when you're delivering packages, like when Norman Reedus says, hey, this is like a ride with Norman Reedus. I love that. Yeah. good Yeah. When you make, cause yeah, you can make a motorcycle in the game and it's, it's literally like the, I think it says like a reverse trike.

Speaker: It's like ride version or something like that, like ride. And then, so it looks like the motorcycle from yeah ride with Norman Reedus. Right. Yeah. All right. I guess we'll see. Yeah.

Speaker: Okay. well Well, let's move on to what we've been watching this week, Adrian. Okay.

Speaker: We have been watching a lot. I'm going to stick to the stuff that I think that we watched together and that we're going to talk together about. So I'm going to throw it to you if you've got anything you watched not with me or um alongside me and in ah and a separate home.

Speaker: Yes, Simon, I got a couple of things. The Valley is back. Season two of The Valley. Oh, dear. This is a spinoff show of Vanderpump Rules. It it stars Jax Taylor from Vanderpump, Brittany from Vanderpump, Kristen from Vanderpump.

Speaker: um Yeah, season two is back. This season looks like it's going to wacky. Crazy. The drama. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Anyways, I won't talk about that. Because I know you care a lot about it, but I don't want to waste um the the listeners time.

Speaker: Okay. um But again, I've been mentioning, like watching the OC with my fiance. We're on season three. And one of the main actors in the OC is Adam Brody. Right?

Speaker: Yeah. So ah me and my fiance are little bit maybe an Adam Brody kick. We want to see some some things with Adam Brody in it. Right? Because we watched Nobody Wants This last year, um which is like him with Kristen Bell, a Netflix show. Really good. It's like kind of like a rom-com, but TV show.

Speaker: But he came out with a movie back in... that that He started in a movie back in, want 2022? No, 2020. Shazam!

Speaker: No, no, actually. Shazam 2, the second Shazam. Yeah. With Adam Brody. Yeah. No, um it's a 2020 film called The Kid Detective. Oh.

Speaker: And it is, again, stars Adam Brody. And the premise is is quite simple. It's... Adam Brody, he's 31 now. um But when he was a kid, he in in in the small town that he grew up, he was like a very good detective and people really loved him.

Speaker: They would hire him for a bunch of things like, oh, who stole my locker money? All of that sort of stuff, just like these kind of small things around town. And he was very gifted at it. Right. Right. But, you know, after he was he was running that for a couple years and his his secretary when he was a kid was the mayor's daughter. And this happens in the first like couple minutes of the movie. So, again, I'm just setting it up.

Speaker: um But randomly, she was kidnapped. Right. And the police are like looking for who kidnapped this young woman. And when they traditionally would reach out to him to help with these like, you know, smaller cases, they shut him out and they didn't want him to help because it was like a very serious crime.

Speaker: So he kind of grew up after, you know, like it. It happened when he was like 14 years old. He's 31 now. And from that point on in his life, he kind of started questioning if he was actually a good detective or if it's kind of all in his head.

Speaker: He could never figure out who kidnapped like this, this young woman. And it kind of goes from there. So he's 31. He's kind of washed up. He still has his detective agency. People kind of show up asking him to like find a cat, but nothing real until this young woman shows up to his office and asked him to solve the murder of her boyfriend that that that got killed like a few nights ago.

Speaker: So that's that's kind of the setup of the movie and him kind of going out and trying to figure out, you you know, who killed this kid, even though he's kind of a washed out detective. He's not a cop, nothing nothing nothing like that.

Speaker: um He just is this old kid detective. And it's a very, very good movie. Like I genuinely love this. I think the tone of it is... really great. It's very dry. The humor throughout the movie is very dry. um Adam Brody plays a very like sardonic character, um very like monotone the way he acts, but it it adds a lot of humor to the situations that he like puts themselves in, but it's not a comedy. Like I think it's a drama and kind of mystery first with a lot of comedic beats like sprinkled throughout.

Speaker: um And something that I highly recommend, like if you want like a, just a good, sort of like, I guess murder mystery, for lack of a better term, like a mystery movie with a incredibly satisfying conclusion.

Speaker: i i highly recommend The Kid Detective. I think it's rated quite well on on Rotten Tomatoes. um and And again, like Adam Brody does an amazing performance and it was it's it's cool to but When you're watching kind of like this this actor, because he's he's young in the O.C. He's like early 20s when that's going on. Now he's like kind of 40 years old when and that movie came out or late 30s. I don't know the exact timeline.

Speaker: But like to see how similar he looks, but also like kind of his acting mannerisms, how it still is kind of like some of the O.C., like one of his earlier jobs in the O.C. and how he like kind of acted in that movie translates to ah movie that came out, you know over 15 years later.

Speaker: So um have you ever heard of the Kid Detective Simon? I think I might have heard of it, but I definitely have not seen it. I don't think I've even seen a trailer for it. It's 85% on Rotten Tomatoes, though. So very well reviewed.

Speaker: Yeah. Pretty cool. I genuinely enjoy it. I really recommend it, man. If you want to watch a movie, you sit down, watch it with your fiancé. Give it a look, dude.

Speaker: Give it a look. I can't remember if we watched it on a streaming service, though, or if I rented it. now that i'm talking about it don't remember just kind of in the mood i think it used to be on amazon prime and then when ah we're it's still on prime okay yeah it's it's on prime video okay okay yeah so i know you got amazon prime so give it a look man do give it a look give it a try cool anything else you watched no no no this period this period of two weeks No.

Speaker: Adrian, let's get right into it. Season two, episode one of HBO's The Last of Us has now aired on HBO, obviously. And we're going to review it here. We're going to do a review discussion.

Speaker: We're start with non-spoilers and then get into spoilers a little later. And so I will ask you high-level thoughts. What did you think of The Last of Us? Season two, episode one.

Speaker: Yeah, Simon. So, um yeah, just i guess like a little bit of background here. You know, I am someone that absolutely loves The Last of Us Part II, the video game. It is, you know, one of my favorite games of all time.

Speaker: I believe it is a masterpiece. And the way it tells its story in particular is a way that I'm ah that I find incredibly impactful and and Perfect.

Speaker: um I think with the start of Last of Us Season 2, as, again, someone that really loves um the video game, I i found this good. Like, I find this a good start to a season.

Speaker: However, you know, me kind of coming in here with... you know, I guess specific expectations on on how this story has been told and how I want it to be told left me um a little, don't want to say disappointed, but confused.

Speaker: I think they do some pretty substantial changes um to how this story is going to be told, in particular with the first scene of this episode that really threw me off. um And yeah, again, it just...

Speaker: It, you know, for something that I'm arguably very, very, I don't want to say protective over, but something that I love so much in in in how it's done. um It yeah, again, kind of threw me for a loop watching this first episode, but I do think it is really great.

Speaker: I think the casting is phenomenal. um I think it looks really good. um You know, obviously HBO comes in with very high budgets for their show and they're, they're, you know, willing to, um you know, create something that looks spectacular. And I think the show does look spectacular.

Speaker: um But yeah, I, I, Ultimately, I think it's a good start. And that's really how I feel about this. What about you, man? I thought it was excellent. I thought it was a great start for season two. i I remember the game.

Speaker: Sure. i think that they they said they were going to do changes and i'm i'm I'm good with them. I think and it it looks to be on a pretty good pretty good pace for the next seven or next six episodes, I suppose.

Speaker: I think that, as you said, the production design is killer. I think the writing is killer. I think the cinematography is killer. i like the way Obviously, the production values for HBO are very high generally.

Speaker: The thing that I feel like I really like, though, is the pacing. I thought the pacing was quite good and I thought it was quite exciting throughout. I thought they did a great job trying to throw in action where there maybe wasn't in the game in some weird way, even though the funny thing is I feel like in the game there's more action overall than like the first season of the show, as an example, because the TV show and it's not really all about the actions.

Speaker: You can you can really put drama in there. um But I didn't think it was boring. I thought it was pretty exciting in the right ways. And I think they did did a good job with that. I think the ensemble cast killed it. I think that the consternation about Bella Ramsey not being the right choice to play Ellie is stupid.

Speaker: And we've seen this online repeatedly. It happened for the first season and it's kind of happening again for some dumb reason. And I think that's just, it's just completely dumb. And I think when you watch like Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey play off of each other in this episode, it kind of just, I feel like dispels that for, I hope for everybody um just because, because Bella Ramsey just did a great job.

Speaker: um yeah Yeah, I tend to agree with you on that. i think I was a little worried going into this season because of the trailers and how, you know, this season takes place five years after ah the first season, like where where the first season ends.

Speaker: And, you know, looking at those trailers, I found that Bella Ramsey's Ellie did not look older Like I thought she looked like the same 14 year old girl that she did in in the first season but as this first episode played out, um you know, I quickly realized I was wrong in that assumption I think.

Speaker: Bella Ramsey's performance in particular how well she conveys that extra level of maturity while still being you know kind of young and and fun and and wacky like like her character is.

Speaker: um I think they did a really good job kind of showing that and even just kind of the outfits that she's wearing and she does honestly look like a 19 year old kid um versus that 14 year old, you know, girl that she was in in in that first season.

Speaker: um But I do agree like I think the way her and Petra Pascal play off each other is is great. I think there's a lot of impact in that. um Yeah. Cool.

Speaker: Yeah, there's one particular scene I talked about production design um that sticks out for me in the games. And there's this one scene in Jackson um that really... really pulled me in as ah as an audience member of the of the game, of of ah as ah as a fan of the game.

Speaker: And as a fan of the game before the game even launched, because at an E3 event, PlayStation had put on this huge show where they had the audience kind of go into this actual location. And they pulled that location so well into the into the into the season, into this episode.

Speaker: I was like shocked. I thought it was great. The way it was shot was brilliant. It yeah made me feel like I was transported back to when I played this in 2020. it's Yeah, it's almost a shot-for-shot remake of that exact scene in in the game.

Speaker: It's excellent. And I just thought that the production design and the music in that scene and, the again, the the staging of it, wow. Really great. Just awesome. And I... I don't know. I, I did like the pacing. I know that you might not have, um, you know, I, I think the, you know, introduction of the new characters is, is really great. I think Isabella Merced, uh, in, in particular ah is incredibly charismatic and charming in, yeah in the role of Dina.

Speaker: Um, I think she fits right into that role and I think she's a standout in this first episode. Um, and Catherine O'Hara being in this as well and kind of her role, which is, she's playing a, ah wholly original character as well.

Speaker: Um, that's not in the game. And I find that sort of aspect really cool and unique. And I mean, I'm just a big fan of Catherine O'Hara in general. I think she's phenomenal. So it's it's nice to see her here.

Speaker: Yeah, she's great. Yeah. No, the ensemble overall is it's really great. And they they all fall into the rules just perfectly. It just feels like they are these characters and there's no one really. i wouldn't say they're not seen stealing because they're not doing a great job. They are. They're just not seen stealing in that. They just you just feel like you're transported into that world as the audience.

Speaker: And that's what I think they really killed it. Yeah, like that's the that's the aspect that they really killed it. um But yeah, for sure. Okay, cool. All right. So Adrian, let's take a ah closer look at The Last of Us on HBO season two, episode two now.

Speaker: hmm.

Speaker: My goodness, what an what an episode. What an episode. It's quite the episode. i don't know how much we can really talk about. its it's It's a lot of it. You would potentially get into spoilers, but we can talk about it on a technical level.

Speaker: I'll throw it to you first. I'm sure you've had some time to think about this, considering we had some technical difficulties off the top here. So what did you think of The Last of Us on HBO Season 2, Episode 2? Yeah, I think this is a great episode. However, there was a few things about it that... no There's a couple of things about it that I'm going to nitpick on once we dive deeper into spoilers. But there are a couple of big things about this episode that I think is weird and and a bad...

Speaker: creative decision in a lot of ways. um Which again, we'll dive a little bit deeper into it. um the There were actually like actual points in this episode where I felt like the writing was like kind of bad, weirdly enough.

Speaker: Interesting. um don't Not necessarily in the dialogue, but in in what occurs. um So again, we'll we'll dive into that a little bit. um I really like, you know, young Mazzino as the character Jesse gets a little bit more play in this episode.

Speaker: Amazing. He does a... Stellar job impeccable even I I loved him in this episode again gets more play than the first and I think this guy is really just fitting into that role so well um I think the performances from everyone were amazing this episode um some emotional beats uh that that really hit hard honestly um But again, there is enough to, I think, hold this episode back a bit. and And I'm excited to kind of dive a little bit deeper into that. And maybe maybe you'll convince me otherwise.

Speaker: um But yeah, ah what what did you think about this, man?

Speaker: I really liked it. um it It is really good. It's funny. Again, you we sometimes have the same notes and like almost exactly. When we talked about sinners, you you wrote somewhere, you said something about being a masterpiece. And i was like, that's exactly what I wrote about that exact same scene. And so young Mazzino is the example here. I feel like he's just killing it. And the chemistry between young Mazzino and Bella Ramsey's Ellie I think it's really great and very cool. And like the the beginning of the episode, et cetera, they they did a great job. They play off each other really well, which is awesome. I thought Gabriel Luna's character, he's he's just generally, Gabriel Luna's just a solid actor and he just does a solid job throughout. I also think that the makeup for this show, we didn't really talk about it on the episode one, a Closer Look.

Speaker: um So I just want to point that out here again, like the monster makeup for The Infected is just really, really great. And it was... On display here is it's going to be, I'm sure, throughout the season constantly, but I thought it was it was excellent.

Speaker: um I also think that on a plot perspective, they set up the anticipation fairly well throughout this episode. it It really got me at an emotional level, which I really was impressed by. I thought it was cool because I know what's going to happen generally because I played the video game.

Speaker: Yep. So that's pretty neat as well. and And I will just say like, It's cool. Like the director of this is Mark Milod who directed the menu and the movie we saw together in theaters with Ralph Fiennes.

Speaker: And I think he's a pretty solid director. It's cool. He's, this is an interesting director because he directs a lot of like the big HBO fair, like Game of Thrones, but also shows like Succession.

Speaker: And I think he's directed a lot of episodes of Succession, but also the menu, which I really particularly like the menu. Me too. Yeah. Yeah. And I thought he did a really good job here too. but But yeah, yeah yeah it's it's interesting.

Speaker: I think we should just jump into spoilers because this is one of those episodes that's tough to talk about too specifically, especially from a plot perspective. But but yeah, there' it it's it was good. I really did like it though.

Speaker: I did like it. I don't think I liked it as much of the as the first episode, but maybe... I'm just biased. We just watched this episode like literally moments ago that we came off watching this. We're jumping into as fresh as it's ever been for us doing a review, which is interesting because sometimes I can shape my perspective over time. And this time, ah can't really do that. I have no time to do that in a weird way. I wrote some notes, but I'm like, I'm still kind of reeling from It's cool. I watched this with my fiance as well. And I feel like, you know, it was it was fun to watch it with somebody who doesn't know the plot.

Speaker: I think you might have the same perspective. No, like my my fiance played the games with me. like ah Oh, she all right. She knows the full story. never mind. She knows the plot. yeah Okay, so it doesn't matter. So I didn't have that and experience. I'm curious to hear that perspective.

Speaker: Did you watch the first season with your family? um A few episodes, not all of it. Okay. Yeah. Because they obviously didn't play it. like you're Correct. But they really liked it. So again, I want to, they're not watching the season right now um because they're they're leaving on vacation in like a couple of weeks.

Speaker: So they won't be able to watch it when they're out. So they just want to like wait and watch it all when they, when they come home. Okay. Okay. Well, yeah I really liked it. i'm i'm I'm assuming you liked it, but maybe didn't really like it.

Speaker: Yeah, no, I liked it. Again, there's a couple things. Maybe maybe I'm, again, we're we're coming off fresh, so maybe you'll change my perspective on this. But okay yeah, kind I kind of want to dive into spoilers. All right.

Speaker: Well, let's move on then, Adrian. Sounds good. Let's get into Warfare, Adrian. buthow If we may here. Yes. Warfare is the Alex Garland directed, ah Ray Mendoza directed film with a pretty awesome cast.

Speaker: pretty star-studded cast of a few gentlemen. But it's, man, I don't know. what The last time I remember being this stressed out in a movie, watching a movie, was Uncut Gems, in in theaters, at least. Yeah.

Speaker: And, yeah. Basically, takes place... this a play I'm trying to look up here while I'm talking. I can't seem to figure it out. Like, is it... Oh, it is. It is Iraq. Yeah. Okay. I thought maybe it was Afghanistan.

Speaker: um But yeah, it's it takes place in Iraq. Soldiers are are basically doing like a recon mission, like US soldiers, and they get have found out.

Speaker: And then all hell breaks loose. It's just... It's incredibly real and incredibly immersive. And it yeah just, it pulls you in and everything about it, the visual effects and how intense the sound design is and the, how specific the set design in the costume seem to be. They just nail the realism and it's based real life memories from Ray Mendoza's time in service to his country in, in the U S military.

Speaker: It's a It's a harrowing, it's a harrowing tale, but it's just a harrowing movie to watch. on On a plot perspective, there's not a lot of plot. I guess that's the one criticism I can have, but I don't think that's really a criticism. It's just a fact.

Speaker: Yeah, it's, it's, it's, yeah, it's not a plot. It's like, this is a day. This is what happened over the course of like an hour and 15 minutes in in one day is essentially the the the premise of the movie.

Speaker: Because there's kind of the the this the the first shot of the film, kind of like a setup shot, um you know, following that, like where they went, like how they got into the position that they were in.

Speaker: And then essentially from the point the action starts to the end of the movie, it's there's no like time cuts or time skips. It's it's just going. So yeah, like it not much of a plot, but again, it's based on real life. It doesn't necessarily yeah need one.

Speaker: Um, it's not really a hero story or anything like that either. Like, no it it shows the horrors of war and probably the best way that I've ever seen it. Like I think personally, yeah the problem with a lot of war movies just traditionally is they kind of glorify war even without trying sometimes.

Speaker: Yeah. Because you want to have a hero and a protagonist to your story and they kind of do here, but they're not heroes. They're protagonists. Sure. But they're, they just, it, it isn't good.

Speaker: Yeah. War. Yeah. Like they being in a battle like this is shit. And I think the way the movie starts is like a scene in the from the trailer, like right the first scene of the movie. There's just like this is this kind of happiness and in this camaraderie among this troop of soldiers.

Speaker: and And it's cool, but you can kind of see this as a foreshadowing to the dangers and the the horrors coming up in the movie. Because you if you've seen the trailer, you know. You could see that it's not going to be sunshine and rainbows. As you mentioned many times when we saw the trailer in theaters before another movie, saw this trailer I think twice before we saw the like together in a theater.

Speaker: And both times you're like, this is going to be a ah ah really good movie to to to watch. and then you Or it's going to be really enjoyable. And then you corrected yourself and said, well, maybe not enjoyable.

Speaker: Yeah. Because it's it's ah it's an incredible piece of art. It's amazing. And it just doesn't, it never pulls its punches in terms of showing you the horrors of war. And yeah, I think the acting from All Involved was great. I think the ensemble is incredible in terms of like, none of nobody really stuck out as like ah the star player of this entire series.

Speaker: film There's no like, again, there's no, there is no Ethan Hunt from Mission Impossible. There there is no Tom Cruise character. it's It's just a bunch of human beings. And just you can, you just feel for them because it's such a horrible situation.

Speaker: Yeah. And yeah, like, I feel like a lot of these war movies, as as you mentioned, it it is like a hero's tale. And I feel like a lot of it can be almost like, American military propaganda. Like, look how great um America is. Like, yeah they're good people. Like, every soldier is a good person and they're doing their best to protect their country. And like in this, that they don't shy away from like, no, like the the Iraqi people view the Americans as as the bad, bad guys. Like they have to do some awful things in in this movie to make sure they survive.

Speaker: um And it's it is very... realistic as someone who has never been in the military or experienced anything remotely like it. It seems like the most realistic portrayal of a situation like that. And it's the brutality of it is man.

Speaker: Yeah. there's There's a couple of scenes um that it is genuinely just like disgusting. And like the idea that these guys who are just regular dudes have, have experienced something as harrowing as this.

Speaker: And we're somehow I don't want to say prepared because I don't think they're like, you can ever be prepared for a situation like that fully, but like trying to figure out how the hell can we get out of this situation? What's the best thing that we can do?

Speaker: All of that. It's, it's, it's so well done. And the anxiety of all the actors I think really showed through. And again, like, yeah, As you mentioned, this was directed by ah Ray Mendoza.

Speaker: um And he he as a is a character in that movie. that There's someone that that plays him. But he's not the focus of the movie at all, which is know just kind of crazy. like And I think there's – I'm sure there was a lot of um you know conversations had between a lot of the guys that were in that situation to kind of fill in the blanks.

Speaker: Yeah. And yeah, I think this is like a brilliant piece of art. I really, really love this movie a lot. Don't know if I want to watch it anytime soon. No, again thanks summer again yeah. again something like that.

Speaker: Yeah. The amount of levity is interesting too. Like... there's that There's a camaraderie in the beginning of the movie, and then you kind of get this idea that these this is their situation.

Speaker: They're living in this situation, and they're joking around with each other because this is the situation that they're in. There was somebody who recently told me, like they were talking about The Last of Us, and they were saying, like no, they wouldn't do this in the apocalypse. They were talking about like the idea of of going after somebody for revenge as an example, and that's just not something you would do in the apocalypse. Yeah.

Speaker: And I was like, are you sure though? The thing is, is when somebody finds themselves in a situation, their, their mind, their, their psychological state adjusts to that situation. And they, they live in that moment.

Speaker: And I feel like that that I think the levity actually added to the realism in a huge way. That's very interesting too. Like the, these guys are kind of like joking around with each other as they're doing this recon mission. I thought that was like, wow.

Speaker: that's that's um That makes sense. And you've got to get to know them in these like so little subtle ways. There's no exposition at all. and like The lack of oxford exposition is also incredible. just We're going to show you, not tell the whole time.

Speaker: and Yeah, it's incredible. it's like the they Also, like the demonstration of the fragility of human life is a note I have here. It's like, Jesus Christ. like It's crazy. it's it's It's really cool, and I feel like Again, I don't think I've ever seen anything that's not that's so much of not a glorification of war.

Speaker: Like where it's a war movie that really is that it a cautionary tale more than anything else. And I bring this up as well, because you said something, you kind of, you you hinted at this earlier, but you kind of mentioned this, but like the the trailer, I was watching the trailer initially and on YouTube again. And when I scrolled down, somebody's like, oh, it's a it's a propaganda film for the United States military.

Speaker: It's like another propaganda film for the United States military. It's like, you got that from the trailer where? like I was like, what are you talking about? And then if you watch the movie, like, how can you watch the movie and feel like that?

Speaker: that That's the kind of the question I feel like. Yeah. That's no, there's no way. And you mentioned that idea. Like, it's not a propaganda. It isn't. Like, to me, it isn't. I don't know. I mean, I guess you could watch it if you're kind of something.

Speaker: Up with you, I guess. I guess i don't know. But it isn't that. in yeah I also say that the sound design specifically is so, so excellent.

Speaker: there's this moment There's this moment where they're they have these like radio calls going over the radio. And that just... Because of the moment that they were in in the plot line, it was so anxiety-inducing.

Speaker: I don't think... ah There's also a thing where like you and I both for not this reason at all, but we've been on radio before radio comms. And when you're on talking to somebody in person and you're on a radio comm at the same time, it can be really annoying.

Speaker: Like it's just really annoying. And it kind of put me back into that situation, but times 25 million. And then we, you know, like not similar at all, but it's like, yeah I, you know what I'm talking about?

Speaker: it's It's crazy. The retail experience is is not similar. Yeah. But the the point is, is like that that situation that they're in, it was just so that is such an anxiety inducing moment. That's probably the the the peak of the anxiety of the radio calls happening while they're dealing with some serious shit.

Speaker: It's crazy. andrea Unreal. On a technical level, this movie is flawless. they I saw, before you came into the theater, because you went to the bathroom, we spoiler alert, we watched Sinners yesterday in IMAX. and so That's where the bald the the the bald-headed fuck was. that That was on his phone the entire time. Three people yapping.

Speaker: And before you came into the theater, they were doing an advertisement for Warfare. And they were talking about how, I think it was like Will Poulter, one of the actors in the movie. And Will Poulter was talking about how they they they were running multiple cameras at the same time.

Speaker: And you never really knew when they were exactly filming sometimes. So you you had, there was they called it almost like a stage play. Where they were staged, they always had to be on their game constantly because you didn't know when the camera was going to come around.

Speaker: It was almost like a continuous one-er. You're doing a one-shot take of the whole thing for certain aspects of the film. They're like 10-minute takes sometimes. I was like, wow, that's that's really interesting too. Because these guys, again, you can see it. They're immersed. you theyre you As an audience, you're immersed.

Speaker: Everyone just kind of falls into it. Like you're you're there for real. They filmed this over like a course of a month or something like that. it was like really small period of time. And they did a boot camp before that to try to get them there a few weeks or something like that to do a boot camp to train them on like these military practices on like how to hold a gun. Of course, all the weapon training you would require and...

Speaker: what it would be like to be in this situation, I suppose. And man, I feel, i again, i also have not served in the military. So i just like you said before, like we don't have the best perspective if this is that realistic.

Speaker: It seemed realistic to me. And because of the fact that it's being directed by Ray Mendoza, I think that's, a in it and this is based on his memory. Mm-hmm. i It does seem like the most realistic war movie that I've ever seen, personally, at least in a modern warfare sense.

Speaker: So, yeah, harrowing is the word would use. But yes incredible. ah really Really great from for pretty much every angle.

Speaker: Yeah. And again, just just to kind of cap it off on on the sound design bit, the the use of quiet and then like like ah like a large dynamic range of of audio made this a a a fantastic the theatrical experience. The use of, again, like these yeah quiet you know, moments in the movie only to be interrupted by loud explosions or gunshots. It's it's shocking. Like I jumped out of my seat, um you know, a couple times there. And I think, yeah, the sound design, I think, is is one thing that um really set this movie apart from

Speaker: you know, other movies themselves. like it Again, like I think the closest, another war film, but again, very different in its in in its depiction is in Dunkirk. I think Dunkirk's audio design and sound design is phenomenal as well. Like mean every single gunshot that you hear in Dunkirk is so ear piercingly loud compared to everything else that's going on.

Speaker: And yeah, I really love this movie. It's really good. Really, really, really good. Was there any music in this at all? I can't recall. I'm looking this up. Well, there is. Is there a musical score? The first scene.

Speaker: i don't think there's a score. That's what I mean, like a musical score. and i don't think there is. They just relied on the sound effects, which are incredible. Yeah. and that's And that's where the silence comes into play, too.

Speaker: It's interesting. Lately, not that related, but i I sometimes play video games to feel more immersed. They turn off the like the actual musical score. it's not It's not an indictment of the musical score. It's not like I don't like the score and Kingdom Come Deliverance is an example.

Speaker: But Kingdom Come Deliverance is a first person medieval game in which you're constantly traveling from point A to point B. And there's this like beautiful aspect of hearing the the sound effects of nature while you do that. And hearing the same song over and over again eventually takes me out of it.

Speaker: i see I play that the same way when I play Skyrim and various other games. And there's like so many sound of design elements and not the score. And so I like to listen to things on an immersive level so I can see why they wouldn't put a score in this because you just, you're not taking the audience out of it in in it.

Speaker: Like by doing that, you just completely make them feel like they're in it by not having a any music other than the music that the characters are hearing in the,

Speaker: Actually, specifically, that makes it – we made fun of this. Somebody said this on ah on a podcast recently, but it's it's all diegetic sound, actually.

Speaker: that's what that That's what that word means. We talked about that. But yeah, the diegetic, I believe, is there – yeah, you're hearing it within the context of the story. and is able to be heard by the characters. There's no score because we we don't hear, like the audience does, like, not the audience, but the soldiers don't hear musical score, obviously, only the audience does.

Speaker: So diegetic sound is all the sound that they're hearing inside the world. Like they're obviously the dialogue and the crazy explosions and shit. But yeah, it's really good. Yeah.

Speaker: Okay, well, let's move on. Oh, I guess we can score it for the for the sake of it here. What's your score for this particular film?

Speaker: Thinking about it. Oh, yeah. I think, I don't know. i like, yeah, I don't really have any criticism. I think this is a five out of five for me. Like it's interesting. Okay. It is really good.

Speaker: I guess I can drop it in a 4.5 because I don't want to watch it again anytime soon. But like even that, it's it's not, I don't want to watch it because it's so good because it's so harrowing. So yeah. Yeah. Five out of five on on on my scale.

Speaker: Awesome. Okay. It's interesting too. Also, it's an hour and a half long. oh yeah. You didn't talk about that. Yeah. How crazy is it? It did not feel like that. It felt like I was in there for at least four and a half hours. Yeah. I know. Longest hour and a half of my life.

Speaker: Jesus Christ. Which is a compliment. It doesn't sound like one, but it is. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I rate a 4.5 out of 5. So we're at 9.5 out 10 for this one on our potato meter, as you call it.

Speaker: 100% on rotten potatoes. Yeah, I guess. That's not how our score works, but sure. we're We're still working on it. We're still working it. You're building the website. Yeah, yeah shouldn yeah. Well, no.

Speaker: have I've made no progress, but sure. All right. potatoes Let's move on now to the other movie we saw in theaters recently. We saw yesterday. We just mentioned it. We saw it in IMAX. We saw Sinners, which is Ryan Coogler's film, the director of Creed and Black Panther, and Black Panther 2.

Speaker: Mm-hmm. Wakanda forever. um But yeah, we saw this film yesterday in IMAX. You had asked me if you wanted to just go see this in theaters, like ah as a matinee in a random theater. And I was like, I had already seen a a clip of Ryan Coogler. It's like a Kodak clip of him going through all the formats that he made this film for.

Speaker: And he was so passionate about it. He talked about like 70 millimeter and talked about IMAX. He talked about how Christopher Nolan's eye director he looks up up to, which is cool because I mean, Ludwig Goranson is a composer that they both use pretty extensively.

Speaker: Ludwig Goranson's score in this is so crazy good. It's unbelievable. um But yeah, so I suggested we go to imax because of how passionate, honestly, Ryan Coogler was in this clip.

Speaker: That's really what happened. And we almost went to the place with 70 millimeter imaxs like the fifteen perforation IMAX, like But we couldn't because we were doing this last minute and they had sold out all the tickets in our Colossus Toronto Theater.

Speaker: And so in Vaughan. And so we went to the next best thing, which was IMAX in Mississauga, which is a great theater. The Mississauga theater, I think the square one theaters is excellent. I think they do a great job. And sometimes they have 70 millimeter, but they just didn't have it this time.

Speaker: But yeah, I was blown away by his clip. I seen the trailer for Sinners with you. I think we saw that twice too in theaters in the trailer. And I wasn't that impressed. I got to be honest. I was not that enthralled by it. I was like, oh, this looks cool.

Speaker: Ryan Coogler is great. I'm like, this guy's great. I mean, I really like like what he's he's done with like Black Panther as an example. So I'm like, do i really want to see this in theaters? But then after seeing that, again, after seeing that clip, the IMAX breakdown of like how passionate he was and how he talked about how Ludwig Gorenson scores like a rock concert, I was like, oh, I really want to see this in theaters. Anyway, I'll throw it to you. What was your impressions of this film, um having seen it in an IMAX? I know, obviously, the theater-going experience wasn't the most ah ideal this time around, as we discussed earlier. But apart from that, what you think?

Speaker: Yeah, no, I thought this movie was excellent. um This is one of those movies where I almost wish I didn't see the trailer. Because like, funnily enough, I think yeah the trailer shows only the latter half of the movie.

Speaker: um It doesn't show anything else. So I kind of was a little left a little disappointed because there's a lot of buildup. And since I know the outcome of of certain characters, it kind of left...

Speaker: I don't want to disappointment, because I was still enthralled the entire time. And I thought like, and like the way things broke out was... was was different from what I expected kind of walking in, but you could kind of predict things just before they're happening because of how the the trailer shows, you know, right what what occurred.

Speaker: So yeah, not a good trailer, like a pretty bad trailer actually. Yeah. And marketing, it was focused on marketing the movie because the marketable elements of the last half.

Speaker: Mm-hmm. Um, so I, I, yeah, I wish I didn't see that. If you haven't seen the trailer, don't, you know don't watch it. Just go watch this movie, kind of go into it. Um, but I think this movie, yeah, again, absolutely excellent.

Speaker: Um, you, you already touched on it, the music in this movie. immaculate There is a a concert, like a rock concert scene in particular. I'm doing like air quotes. Cause it's not really a rock concert, but like, like there's a scene in particular with with music playing and it's like, yeah, I don't even know three to five minutes. Just,

Speaker: Beautiful from not only the music and how it kind of expands as that scene's playing out, but the set design and how it changes the choreography before all the, all the people dancing in the background, everything about that scene. That was the scene where I was sitting there like, oh my God, I'm witnessing a masterpiece.

Speaker: Like I literally. That's what I've written here. I wrote that scene as a masterpiece and they pretty much did it in one shot. Yeah. Which is nuts. Yeah. Amazing.

Speaker: They did it because it's obvious, but but it looks like it is. And that's like the Birdman effect. I guess they just pulled that off. I don't know what, how he pulled this off. It was really awesome. I also didn't expect it. It's a completely unexpected scene.

Speaker: yes again we won't spoil it here it's it's incredible it's like about the midway point almost on the mark i think yeah um yeah yeah crazy it yeah it was brilliant and yeah i i quite literally i had an internal dialogue i'm like i'm watching like something like that is so special right now yeah and at that point in an imax too the way it was shot in imax too with like the full frame and then i don't know if that that part was always in full height or they went to the the like the wider ratio.

Speaker: They widescreen versus like, that's what's something that's really neat about this movie is that it constantly was changing. That's another reason why I wanted to see it in IMAX. The ratio changed from like that almost like a four, three ratio to like a very ultra widescreen constantly. And they would actually move the letterbox bars as the scenes would ah progress.

Speaker: Certain directors don't use letterboxing appropriately. They don't use their framing. appropriately but they because because they change their frames randomly. But then the better directors, they typically use framing to actually create bigger effects on an emotional level for the audience.

Speaker: And obviously Ryan Coogler is the latter. like He took the framing and... he makes us feel like we're there. If that was, we talked about a warfare being an incredibly immersive experience.

Speaker: This was an incredibly immersive experience. And I almost, I don't want to go see it again necessarily because there's just so many movies coming out, but I almost want to see it in a smaller theater because I'm wondering if I would get the same effect. But the, the big sound of Dolby Atmos mixed with the IMAX aspects and then just the way it's edited and shot and the acting and everything. I was like, wow, I'm, I'm, I'm immersed. I'm completely engrossed in this film.

Speaker: it it It was, yeah, that it's incredible. It was, it was very, very good. Overall, but also Miles Katon, dude. Yeah, guys was crazy. He's a newcomer to the industry, really.

Speaker: And he's like 22 or something. He's not even a young dude. And he's like a main he's basically the main character of this other than Michael. Michael B. Jordan.

Speaker: Michael B. Jordans, I guess. Yeah, Michael Both Jordans. Michael Both Jordans. Yes. The twins. he They play Smoke and Stack. Yeah. I say they, because he's two guys. Yeah. He plays Smoke and Stack. But then Miles Katon is like incredible. and i'm like, I must have seen this kid before.

Speaker: and No, i' know yes he's so good. Honestly, yeah I saw him in the trailer. I've seen him. Yeah, exactly. He's just so good. And his voice is so good, man. It's crazy.

Speaker: He's so good in in so many scenes like of the musical nature. Jamie Lawson, also for and although I've seen her in other things like The Batman, she's she's great too.

Speaker: And her like her voice is incredible too. The musical ah elements of this. Ludwig Gornson, who's also an executive producer of this film, he murdered. he murdered He did such a great job.

Speaker: Yeah. He murdered like some of the characters did in this movie. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, it was it was yeah just all around ah brilliant. And yeah, like the the Miles Caton or Caton Caton.

Speaker: I feel like we should figure that out. Yeah. Miles Caton. That kid's going places for sure. Oh, dude, 100%. That's his voice, man. Like he he sings. Like I looked into it because I was like, um'm like was is this this guy like yeah actually this musically talented? He is, man.

Speaker: That was his voice. He was singing. know. So I – It's Caton. Kayton. Okay. Good to know. So I, I looked up that as well. It's funny that we did that because I was like, it's almost doesn't feel real. Like he's not, there's no way he sounds like that. And then I looked it up and I saw a performance with Ludwig Goranson on stage with miles Kayton.

Speaker: And they're singing on stage in front of the sinners manner in front of, I don't know, some audience somewhere. I don't even know. It's a small audience. Like it's a small stage. It looked like some bar somewhere. I'm like, what is this? The promotion for this film.

Speaker: Oh my God. Uh, Sorry, quickie. I hope to goodness they do this for the Oscars next year. They have like a ah the musical performance. Oh, he's going to get nominated. 100% that, that, that, that Ludwig Goranson's like that, that performance. What's the name of that song now?

Speaker: um but that one big performance the one you're kind of mentioning is the is the is the one i feel like it's going to get nominated for sure it's got a and probably going to win i feel like we could just predict that right now is there yeah anything going to top that i don't think so i'm not sure but uh but yeah no it's it's incredible yeah no there's also like this aspect we talked about it being immersive like it transported me to a place in time to 1932, Mississippi.

Speaker: There's element of like the way that the set design and the costumes and the way the dialects of the actors, it's so spot on across the board. Like, like Hailee Steinfeld is an example in the film and her accent just seems like impeccable.

Speaker: It is. They're all incredible. there're also There's no performance that is not good in this. Every single character, every single actor in this movie brings their a game. And I think a lot of that has to do with the direction of Ryan Coogler as well.

Speaker: there's There's for sure. Yeah. He's that's an exacting director. Like in the in the elements of like, I don't know what it is. Sometimes you see a period piece and you're kind of don't believe it in a weird way. like when you see one on like at a TV episode, they're doing a flashback.

Speaker: You know what I'm talking Like they they they do it. They try to pull it off and there's something missed. There's like something missing. me You can't put your finger on it. This just felt like I was transported to 1932 Clarksville. That's what it felt like.

Speaker: And it's just, yeah, Michael B. Jordan kills it too. Like in two different roles. Yeah, Michael B. Jordan and Michael Twin Jordan. Both of them. yeah Yeah, Michael both Jordans.

Speaker: Yeah. Just murdered. Delroy Lindo, so good too. Also like added a lot of levity. Like a a lot of the like so funny moments we were Delroy Lindo. Yeah. I feel like. That is the one thing that I really want to take home or like sell about this movie is like this movie is funny, like genuinely funny a lot of the time.

Speaker: um And yeah, like the way they play off each other. Cornbread ah is played by Omar Benson Miller, a great character. And one person that ah stands out who's I guess like the villain of the movie is ah ah Jack O'Connell, who I know from Skins. Yeah.

Speaker: from way back in the day okay i was wondering where that guy came from too because that guy like he's he's so good dude he's so good too yeah yeah i really like this guy he plays a character named cook and skins i think these seasons two sorry three four and seven um so like yeah seeing him because i haven't really seen him in anything else since it was really cool to see um Yeah, holy moly, dude.

Speaker: Holy moly. it's It's incredible. yeah like There's also like the, we again, going back to immersion, but also on a character development standpoint, but they all feel like real people to a like a massive degree. Because the way that they're building character development over time, that's why it's so crazy that the last half of the movie is what's shown in the trailer. Because there's so much that happens in the beginning that really pulls you into the world in an end. in a very immersive way, even though there's not anything nearly as exciting as what's happening in the trailer happening, but it's exciting because you, you feel like you're pulled into a point in place in time.

Speaker: It's really cool. It's really, I don't know. There's also this element of like the myth of it all, like the myth of this, the, like the deep South and like this, like idea of these magical elements and they, how they were treated.

Speaker: it's it's that's a neat aspect you can see that like there's some kind of magical element in the trailer and the how they kind of they they dive into that in a way that people don't quite believe it but they they've heard of stories but they never they think they're children's stories there's that aspects too that's really cool yeah i don't know i thought yeah the lighting is excellent too yeah like it's it's it's like basically a lot of it takes place in ah in a night And yeah, I don't know. The ending?

Speaker: There's kind of a few endings, to be honest. That's only maybe my only yeah main criticism. I feel like there's maybe too many endings. It reminds me of Return of the King or something like that, like Lord of the Rings. like It ends a few times. Let's end it twice, maybe not three or four times. I'm okay i'm okay because every ending was somehow more satisfying. like it just it I was like, I've never been more satisfied at the end of a movie in regards to how the ending plays it, not not only just the ending, but again, the the entire movie as a whole, right. And you're finishing it. And then yeah, the first ending happens. You're like, Oh, that was, that was great.

Speaker: And there's another ending that happens. Like, Oh, that was really great. And then like the final ending that happens and you're like, Oh my God, I'm so like, every time it happened, I was like even more impressed and happier the the the way it kind of, ah it's it's a perfect package.

Speaker: I like ah Ryan Coogler has created this, this gift. to us and we and and i want to urge people to go to the theater and watch this movie because this is a gift to humanity i'm going that far his passion lifts off the screen is kind of the way i would describe it to you like i was i was seeing his passion in the description in that kodak video about like various formats to go see this movie his passion is lifted off the screen he clearly puts so much time and he puts so much devil in the detail on what

Speaker: this movie would become in, in it's like when it kind of came together and, and all the people that were involved, like again, Ludwig Gornstein, I imagine was really involved the whole time to make this like work in such a seamless way. There's there's also moments of silence in this film too, that actually kind of, i don't know if you recall that too, there's because of, i think the IMAX aspect too, is it, there was moments where I get got jump scared, especially because of sound.

Speaker: Yeah. Yes. The sound really got me to be scared. It's not really a horror movie, but it is. It is. It is. yeah Yeah. If we can call Get Out a horror movie, this is definitely a horror movie. Most definitely.

Speaker: It can be very scary at times. And in a... really cool way. There's also like this aspect of like, there's monsters in the film. Sorry, I'll let you, I'll let you say, don't want to go too far. Oh no, no, Ultimately all I wanted to say, like, I think like this is more of a horror movie than like companion as an example that we watched a few episodes ago. Like this, this to me is way more horror focused than, than, than companion.

Speaker: so there's The way it's shot and the way that the CG the or the VFX or whatever is used to to kind of to kind of get the idea of these monsters as well come to come across to the audience and make you feel nervous about it. I feel like the way it's done in that way is like it's a masterclass as well.

Speaker: And it's interesting because like when you look at the movie Wolfman, which I keep bringing up as ah as a cautionary tale, but that movie does it in the opposite way. Like shoots like a full frame of ah of the of the villain in a weird way. And then you're like, okay. Well, the monster doesn't seem that scary. It's just like, but this, the monster scene. What? Yeah.

Speaker: what It's a big rodent. The wolfman is a big rodent. Basically. But in this, like the the monsters feel like they're constantly scary. Like there's like never a moment where I'm not scared of them.

Speaker: yeah It's kind of insane. Like you never, it never takes the wind out of its sails by the way it's shot. It's like, and there's just people. and In a way, like if you see the trailer again, it's like, man, it's this is man, that's a masterclass.

Speaker: It's interesting to Ryan Coogler is in the works. He's for a few years. He's been trying to make X-Files come back, which is kind of neat because it's kind of related in that regard. He hasn't really done too much horror from ah on a mainstream perspective that I've seen.

Speaker: So, yeah, X-Files is horror, basically. So it'd be interesting to see how he pulls that off. But it's curious. Yeah, you were saying he was just talking to like Gillian Anderson from X-Files to see like if she's interested and he seems like he's got... he She might do it. maybe if i mean Maybe if Gillian Anderson sees this movie, she'll be like, oh yeah, I'm in.

Speaker: yeah That's what I would do if I was Gillian Anderson. That's for sure. Come back to the X-Files revival. But yeah. I have no attachment to X-Files, but I would i would watch that if he he's the guy that brought it back it's interesting because like so I've only seen um Black Panther like one and two and now sinners of his movies because I know he directed the Creed trilogy but I was like I'm not going to watch those because I've never watched any of the Rocky movies I've no like I'm not in the right yeah universe universe yeah you just see Rocky one I feel like and then I don't know that's I have to see Creed 2 that's a good point though like I really want to see Creed Creed as well or Creed 2 the movie

Speaker: c createed Creed 1 and 2. Okay. And 3? What about Creed 3? Creed 3 is not Ryan Coogler. Oh, is it not? I don't believe so, no.

Speaker: I think he did 1 and 2. Oh! Michael B. Jordan directed Creed 3. Yeah, it's Michael B. Jordan. right Interesting. Okay. Which is also pretty interesting, actually. Yeah.

Speaker: But yeah, Ryan Coogler co-wrote the story. Of Creed three. Interesting. Okay, cool. But yeah, he had a movie that came out in 2013 that I like just looking it up called Fruitvale Station. It's a crime thriller movie rated incredibly well.

Speaker: 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, 212 reviews. I never even heard of this thing. And that's, I guess, one of his first directed movies starring Michael B. Jordan. Yeah, as well. So I'm going to add this to my watch list, I think.

Speaker: Oh, and Octavia Spencer. Wow. Yeah. Ooh. and chad michael murray is it actually yeah he's in it as well from the habit tv series is one tree hill yeah he was lot of things what do you mean what what happened to that guy he's in the hit show sullivan's crossing since 2023 and he was also in the merry gentleman um in 2024 i know he's in things but i mean he's not in like big things yeah he's not in things that's right But yeah.

Speaker: All right. Cool, man. Well, yeah. Sinners, what do you rate it? Unless you've got more, to more to say. I mean, what else is there to say? It's a masterpiece. Yeah. No, agree. Yeah. Yeah. It's phenomenal. And again, I, I'm, I'm going to also give this movie a five out of five. It's again, like these are the two best movies I have seen this year, but by a mile, I think sinners is my favorite movie of of the year.

Speaker: For sure. But it doesn't take away from how phenomenal warfare was. Yeah, i think this this movie is a five out of five. i would This is a movie I would watch again. Like if my fiance was like, you know what? I'll watch it. I would go immediately.

Speaker: I would watch it. Start to finish. So good. Brilliant. Chef's Kiss. Chef's Kiss. Five out of five. Another one. That's great. What are you going to give it a 4.5 out of 5 again?

Speaker: Oh, my God. Oh, my God. My fives are reserved for like the thing that like completely blows me away to the map. I have so few 5 out of 5s in Letterboxd, as an example, for scores. I was dabbling in this. I thought maybe it could be a 5, but I decided on a 4.5, which for me is like...

Speaker: is excellent. It's a masterpiece, essentially. It's it's incredible. yeah it's just It has to touch me on another level. Like, Anora, as an example, I thought was a 5 out of 5. I also really loved Coda. yeah guto was If it ends in an A, we're going to do it.

Speaker: I'm kidding. So if it was Sinnerza. Sinnerza? No. Sinnerza. no and we're far No. It's excellent. yeah It was excellent. It was such a great IMAX experience. and It's nice to see an IMAX movie that isn't Well, I was going to say it isn't a superhero movie, but I always see Nolan's movies in IMAX, it seems like. So that's not necessarily true. But it's either a Nolan movie or for me, or it's a it's a superhero movie, like a huge temple superhero film.

Speaker: So it's cool to see another director's work and in IMAX and one that is so passionate about the formats and just everything that this movie was. So it's excellent. Yeah, another 9.5 out of 10.

Speaker: Wow. Look at us go. Look at that. Rotten potatoes. All right, the last thing we watched. We just finished up. You watched it week to week. I watched it sort of week to week, and by the end of it, I ended up watching it week to week. But it was Daredevil Born Again, the return of Daredevil and Charlie Cox as Daredevil, as Matt Murdock slash Daredevil, and Vincent D'Onofrio as Kingpin in this Disney Plus series, which is definitely rated mature. And and and I think that was pretty much a so like definitely –

Speaker: if they have that wasn't acknowledged throughout the season, it was definitely acknowledged in the last episode and the finale. It was acknowledged in the first 10 minutes of this season. It was acknowledged. But in in a different way, like yeah yeah they pepper in the the rated N elements. You know what I'm saying?

Speaker: But the last you were telling me that too. and He says fuck now. Yeah. Yeah. I was telling you this. You telling me this on the way, I think it was in the car, right? Yeah, I was in the car ride just before ah your dad called on the phone. And then I thought he said, how is it going, Simon? But he had said, how is it going, son? And I said, and i said ah I'm doing great. How are you? And then I realized, oh, no that's so embarrassing.

Speaker: um It's not embarrassing. I was so embarrassed. My dad's already signing the adoption papers. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I was like, I'm like, oh man. And then the, the, the best part of that is that your dad would just double down on what he said. And then you answered.

Speaker: And then he's like, how are you doing Simon as well? I'm like, God, Jesus Christ. I really misheard you. I love how you didn't mishear him though. And we're in the same car in the same closity closeness to the speaker.

Speaker: So anyway, anxiety, good stuff. but But yeah, anyway. Yeah, so Daredevil Born Again. We both got to the end.

Speaker: We're going to do for this a closer look. So we will get to spoilers in the Closer Look episode of this. Okay. But let's just get right into the non-spoiler aspects now, especially for the episode 108 content that we're creating here.

Speaker: What did you think of Daredevil Born Again on a high-level thoughts perspective? I thought it was... Well, well... well What were you going to say, man? Nothing.

Speaker: No, please. You're making fun my stutter? Yeah. It's quite ableist. Stuttering Simon. You were going to say bitch. Yeah. I know you were. You going say, you stuttering bitch.

Speaker: Yeah, I was. I was. But I saw myself. You bald bitch. yeah you Oh, oh, I forgot to say this about Sinners. Okay. So the crazy thing is like, you're like, I love the endings and I kept getting better and better. You know what also got better? The guy freaking walked out before the before the last ending.

Speaker: Oh my God. Yeah. That stupid bald bitch. The guy was that was on his phone for the entire fucking movie that didn't even care about this movie. That was on it. Texting the entire time. Literally the credit start gets up, walks out.

Speaker: Oh yeah. That is one thing. Stay until the end. Like there, there's actually an end credits, like, which is weird, but it's not like a superhero and credits like, Oh, this is what's to come. It's just satisfying endings.

Speaker: One within the credits early on in the credits and then one at directly at the end. So, right. Yeah. Um, yeah, like that fucking fucker, dude. God. well Anyway. Okay.

Speaker: Daredevil. Daredevil born again. What are your high level thoughts?

Speaker: I thought it was good. I thought it was pretty good. I liked it. I thought um it's cool to kind of see this. you know, the our our the the old version of Daredevil from Netflix kind of back.

Speaker: um yeah It feels like a sequel that's taking place quite a few years later from, you know, kind of the original show, many references to it.

Speaker: um And I think this is a great kind of continuation of of what happened before. um I think there's like a lot that obviously happened kind of in between those, those, you know, the the end of the Netflix season to the start of this season that I kind of wish we we learned a little bit more about. We saw glimpses into that with, um you know, She-Hulk as an example, like mapmer ah Matt Murdoch is in that show.

Speaker: um Yes. He's, ooh, it's an older movie. Can I spoil? Like, just a cameo in a movie? He's, he's, Oh, I see what you mean. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. you can he's He's in like ah like a cameo appearance in Spider-Man No Way Home.

Speaker: Yeah, yeah. We're not talking about plot points. It's a cameo at this point. How many years ago was that? Yeah. 23. Actually, that's not that long ago. Yeah. If you wanted to watch it, you would have watched it. no, it was 20... Was it pre-COVID?

Speaker: 2023. Yeah, it was 2023. No, was it 2022? Dude, no. That was pre-COVID. No Way Home? No. No, Spider-Man was the return to the theaters post-COVID. Remember? You're right. Because Far From Home came out after Endgame. Yeah, like Spider-Man No Way Home was like the first big movie that people were like, oh, theaters aren't dead. Oh, oh, good to know.

Speaker: Oh, you're right. got like this, like, but yeah, yeah, he's in, he's in it briefly. Yeah. Which is cool. So they kind of threw him in there. They threw him in She-Hulk, which is great.

Speaker: Yeah, I think at this point it would be a spoiler to say he's in Chee Hulk if it's a spoiler to say he's in No Way Home. Yeah, I guess. Yes. I feel like I wouldn't spoil necessarily like the cameos in Deadpool and Wolverine because there's so many cameos of that. And and it's still recent. Including Matt Murdock, yeah. No, I'm just kidding. He's not a now.

Speaker: Or is he? I'll never tell. we just covered her bases. Okay. yeah um so But yeah, anyway, you know, yeah, it's cool. It's it's nice to see ah to see him back. It's cool that, you know what's interesting? Disney just didn't make the mistake.

Speaker: They didn't make the mistake of recasting it and trying to do a show and then failing and then going back and saying, actually, Netflix did it right. We're going to do it again. You know what i'm saying? Like, they did a great job with actually pulling in the actors from Netflix, they, they went back to it and they, they brought back the same plot points and do all that stuff in some way. They didn't just like ditch it.

Speaker: They did a great job with that aspect and rated, made it rated M. They didn't try to dumb it down. They, they made the right choices and it's Disney. So to they could have easily been like, no, we're going to make it E for everyone or whatever the rating is.

Speaker: Yeah. It is interesting though, because they almost made the mistake Right. And it got a lot of backlash because when they like originally when this when the show was going to come out, they they said like, hey, Foggy Nelson and Debra Ann Wool's character. um God, why am I forgetting her name?

Speaker: Karen. hey Karen. Like they're dead. Like we're going into the show. They're already dead. It's going be grounded. They, they recasted, um, Vanessa, like that actress, they originally had her as a different actress. Yeah. man And then, so like they were making a lot of mistakes and a lot of this news was coming out.

Speaker: And I think people put up enough of a fuss for them to kind of go back to the drawing board and rework it. And I guess reduce it from 18 to nine episodes. And Do you think it was a fuss that was the fans though? I don't think so. Who is really paying attention to it that much? I imagine that it's internally they there was a fuss. There was a probably two parts of Disney.

Speaker: there's also the people from the Netflix series that might have just pushed back and made it happen. You know what i mean? Like, I don't know if the fans could have had that much leverage because we didn't see anything yet. There's not like there was even a trailer. We didn't even know what was happening. And then you're right, though. But they still learned and they didn't launch anything that was bad before. It's a pretty that's a testament to them. They they did they did actually did a good job where a lot of big companies, and including Disney, make mistakes that are ah like are really stupid and they're obviously easily avoidable.

Speaker: And they just make these mistakes because they don't pay any attention to the what but people actually want. like ah Like they never hired Nathan Fillion to do nat Uncharted until it was way too late and they never did it.

Speaker: It too old at that point. It's like, why didn't you just do it this way? Is it because you're stubborn? You want Mark Wahlberg to play the role that makes no sense? So I don't know. It's silly stuff. But um but yeah, it's it's pretty neat.

Speaker: Anything else you want to add before I... Yeah, I think the introduction of a lot of the new characters for this show, um i liked a lot of the new cast. Sure, yeah. I mentioned... Earlier on, um when we talked about it, like the introduction of a character named Heather and how they're, there's like a like a, like a romantic relationship between her and Matt Murdoch that they kind of like force on that. I felt was incredibly rushed.

Speaker: And I stand by that statement, but I also said that Heather's actually a good character. I, I think by the end of the show, I just, I, I actually full, you know, full one 80 on that. I think she's a bad character. I think oh the decisions they made with her character were really dumb.

Speaker: Um, and I did not like it. So I'm excited to kind of dive into that a little bit more with you. Um, Later, post. Yeah. not yeah one way Once we go into spoilers. Yeah, on the poster look.

Speaker: Yeah, like so I think... I mean, to be fair, even the Netflix show, that it had its ups and downs. I think like season two is a pretty forgettable season of TV and definitely not as good as seasons one and three.

Speaker: So like i I think this this season, from what I remember, is better than the second season, but I don't think it is as good as that first and the third season because I felt like it was a little inconsistent. It felt...

Speaker: funnily enough, I think you were mentioning this. It's, it almost feels episodic in some way at, at times while there is still an overarching story, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but there were times where like, it felt like things were getting set up only to kind of be brushed under the, you know, brushed under the rug and and not really referenced again.

Speaker: Um, Which again, i think is is both good and bad. Like it's it's good because it made for interesting episodes, but for the overarching story, it kind of felt like it was pointless and went nowhere.

Speaker: um But I thought it was good. like ah Like I liked it. I'm excited to see what's to come for season two and... um how it will play out because the way it ends is spectacular. I think that like that last episode is like, holy fucking shit, dude. Like I was sitting there. I audibly gasped multiple times in that episode.

Speaker: my My fiance was like downstairs in the basement and she like heard me going like, Oh my God, dude. I was like laughing at the brutality of of some of the scenes. She didn't watch it with you, eh? No, she never watched any of the Daredevil stuff. She doesn't really care.

Speaker: so So she had no interest. But yeah, what what did you think? Because were you watching this with your fiance, I guess? I'm assuming yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, i somehow convinced her to watch the first three seasons. I was interested to watch it over again anyway.

Speaker: And it was nice to prep for this as well because I knew this was coming eventually. And here it is. And so it was nice to know and catch up on that before. We finished it about a year and a half ago, I think, or a year ago.

Speaker: but But yeah, I really... like it and I think it improved in some aspects throughout the season but i also think like it I just I respect that they really kind of respect the original show in large ways that as I mentioned already I also like there's this there's this taking their time with it that they they just don't care that much that it's not it's not a full on action TV show.

Speaker: And they really take their time and make it a law show or make it a more psychological thriller. And there's like, that's something that's very impressive because they, there's obviously pressures from ah potential greater Marvel audience to make it just a full on action, action set piece after action set piece and just focus on the fight choreography constantly, which they didn't do.

Speaker: And I'm really impressed with the the the pacing of it. And I like the episodic nature of it. There's something about it. almost reminds me of Mandalorian in a way where Mandalorian is kind of ah um an episodic show. but You jump in and you kind of feel like it's almost like a popcorn thing. You're you're excited to see what the next chapter is.

Speaker: And I kind of felt like that here too. And it almost comes off as a comic book. A lot of comic books can be episodic in that way. You know what i mean? Like it's cool. i like this. It was... It's neat. The music was pretty great. Honestly, I love the new that that the spin on the the initial theme and and the spin on the original like um like the original what i'm trying to say that the theme. The starting of the show.

Speaker: Not the score. The starting, the beginning. the opening sequence Opening sequence. Thank you Which is awesome. um So I appreciate that too. I think that the opening sequence is great.

Speaker: I don't know. I thought the showrunner did a great job. i thought John, John Bernthal, I'm not saying where he's in it, but he think he did a great job. The cast largely did a great job. I think the returning cast killed it. Mm-hmm.

Speaker: And i mentioned on a previous episode of this show, I think might have been last episode 107, that the heist episode was really crazy good. It was like, there' like a and I said this already, but the lawyering episodes where Matt Murdock goes into lawyer mode.

Speaker: I thought that that was excellent too. and i And I almost wanted to see more and more of that as it went. That's actually so cool. Yeah, I really like it. don't know if i said this already, but the symmetricality in the fight scenes was really excellent.

Speaker: Like the way that they showed, i don't know you you recall this, but they do this many times, where they have ah Fisk fighting somebody and potentially Matt fighting somebody, and they have them showing showing them the clipping between them over and over again.

Speaker: There's this idea of showing the the similarity of the darkness of Fisk, Wilson Fisk, Kingpin, and the darkness of Matt Murdock, Daredevil. And that there's this idea that like where where is their breaking point and how are they similar?

Speaker: And they do that somewhat with other characters as well. i'm not going to spoil anything, but there's this that aspect of it, the symmetricality of showing the side-by-side view of these different characters and kind of making like drawing similarities and differences in the way it's shot as opposed to it being more deliberate or exposition-based.

Speaker: I thought that that was really cool and it happens constantly and I thought it was It was really neat. And then, of course, they did do some great fight choreography throughout. I thought that the fight choreography and the brutality of it was great. And they didn't pull their punches. It's definitely the most violent Disney Plus show in terms of it being a Disney Plus show.

Speaker: Like if we look at like Moon Knight, I thought Moon Knight completely pulled his punches. I don't know. That's TVMA. In what way? I don't know whether they see it twice. Wasn't it? Dude, I have no recollection. Maybe it didn't end up being that.

Speaker: But they said it was so forgettable. Somebody had said that that that this is the most brutal we've ever been or something like Kevin Feige, I I think he did, but it wasn't R-rated. Like, it still wasn't. I think it was still on the thing.

Speaker: That show, I don't remember much of it. I remember the ending was pretty okay. I think the ending ending kind of sucked. Very forgettable. ah The CGI, i remember being atrocious. Yeah.

Speaker: According to Google ai the Disney Plus series, the Moon Knight is rated TVMA. Like what a waste of, what a waste of, waste of rating. What's the point of doing that? Sure about that? Yeah, it seemed like a waste. This, they clearly did waste it, especially because of the end.

Speaker: but but But yeah, no, it's excellent. I really thought it was good. And I really like this return to form for like Vincent D'Onofrio, Matt Murdock and that relationship.

Speaker: It's so interesting to watch. And the right, they show in the trailer, doesn't show TVMA? It shows TV 14. Oh, wait, does it show TVMA for Daredevil then?

Speaker: Let's see, let's see.

Speaker: But then what the he Oh, you know what it is? Yeah. Daredevil born again is TVMA. You know what? That's what you get for for trusting Google AI ever. Don't ever trust Google AI. That's the moral of the story. Is this wrong?

Speaker: Every time. At some point in the blurb, somewhere, it's incorrect. Yeah. yeah Trying to do a quick search, make it fast? No, can't be right. why is it Again, why does Google AI exist if it can't be right 99% of the time? There's no point. Just remove it from prime time.

Speaker: Not ready to go. Anyway, yeah regardless of that. But yeah, interesting. So no, didn't we have another show though? We did have one Marvel show that was TVMA, didn't we? No. This is the first one. Was Werewolf by Night then? That would be the only other one, but I don't think even that one was. don't think it is. That one's TV14 as well.

Speaker: Yeah, okay. Interesting. All right, well, cool. Yeah. But yeah, I really liked it. I liked it. And I think it it did the original show justice. And I'm very excited to see where it goes from here.

Speaker: And i was saying before, like, again, that relationship between Matt and and Fisk and how Fisk is a f freaking just like shown in the trailer. He's the mayor. and think that's such a good way to...

Speaker: to pull the story in an interesting direction. And I think when we talk about spoilers, we also, I want to talk about that actually the mayor aspect of Fisk and what that means for the MCU potentially. And that's, that's an interesting aspect too.

Speaker: But yeah yeah, I think we're good to go. If you want to talk about spoilers, unless you've got more to say about the non-spoiler, Um, I guess my only other like non-spoiler thing, I think Michael Gandolfini is a standout in the new cast.

Speaker: I think he is brilliant. standard and Not really standout because there's no standouts in warfare, but he's great in warfare as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So i do I do want to mention that as well.

Speaker: And again, like like like we briefly talked about, I do really like the introduction of most of the new characters. Like Kirsten's great, played by Nicky M. James. Um, Yeah, good stuff, good stuff.

Speaker: Okay, let's move on. Okay, now on to the montage, a sequence of our show in which I briefly present seven of the bi-weeks smaller news stories as Adrian delivers a brisk verdict.

Speaker: Number one, according to publication Deadline, the Pride and Prejudice limited series at Netflix has cast Slow Horses actor Jack Loudon, The Bear actor Olivia Colman, and Deadpool and Wolverine actor Emma Corrin All those actors from an animal-related property.

Speaker: ah Horses, bears, wolverines. huh Number two. According to publication Variety, Apple TV Plus series Mythic Quest is officially game over after its recently aired fourth season.

Speaker: The finale, which just aired on March 29th, will be updated to properly give the show a series finale send-off. Looks like I'm not the only person that thought it it's not as good as it was before. um I'll probably just finish the season so I can wrap the series because I want three, four episodes. Number three, according to Deadline, House of the Dragon star Emma Darcy has been cast in the upcoming Tom Cruise starring film from The Revenant director Alejandro G. Inaritu. Interesting. Cool beans. I'll watch that, presumably.

Speaker: Number four. As reported by Deadline, Jurassic Park star Sam Neill has been cast in the next Godzilla and Kong-centered MonsterVerse film from Legendary Pictures. Neill will join cast members Caitlin Dever, Jack O'Connell, Delroy Lindo, Matthew Modine, Alicia Debnam Carey, and Dan Stevens.

Speaker: This is fantastic. I love this. I love Sam Neill. I like these Godzilla movies, the the most recent ones. They're fun. They're stupid. This is awesome. And Jack O'Connell, he's in this as well. You're you're literally just talking. that You've never seen him in anything. Where did this guy come from?

Speaker: You don't know where he came from, but now you know where you go. Is this Cotton Eye Joe reference? Yeah. Okay. Number five. As reported by Deadline, X-Men star James Marsden and Adrian's man crush has been cast in season two of the recently renewed Jon Hamm starring dramedy Apple TV Plus series, Your Friends and Neighbors.

Speaker: You're right. He is one of my man crushes. Him and Glenn Powell, Simon. Maybe I'll watch this your friends and neighbors. Number six. According to Deadline, director Denis Villeneuve is planning to shoot Dune III during the summer of 2025 and is eyeing Mickey 17 actor Robert Pattinson to play a villain in the film. Neato.

Speaker: Cool. I watched Dune III. I thought Dune II was pretty damn good. I'm kind of surprised that they're going this quick. I don't know why I thought they were going to way longer, but they're not. Number seven.

Speaker: As announced by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, starting with the 2028 Oscar Ceremony that will include films released in the year 2027, the Academy Awards will include an award for achievement in stunt design that will honor the film with the best stunts.

Speaker: The next new award to be presented at an Academy Award Ceremony will be achievement in casting, which will be presented at the 2026 Oscars and include films from 2025. Oh, okay. so I think we already know who's going to win the achievement in casting. It's whoever casted that. I already forgot the guy's name from Sinners.

Speaker: I should have had it open. I'm messing up. Oh, Miles Caton. But it's unfortunate. They should they should do the the stunt design thing and and retroactively give it to i'm Tom Cruise and T for all the Mission Impossible movies.

Speaker: And a bonus, number eight. As Variety reports, HBO's The Last of Us TV series has been renewed for a third season. yes The second season premiere on April 13th reportedly had a same-day viewership total.

Speaker: 13% higher than that of the record-breaking first season premiere in 2023. Oh, okay. Last of Us, biggest show on HBO. I see you added a little bit of a tidbit to the end there to make it seem like you had this ready to go.

Speaker: But let's be real, you you didn't you weren't prepared. You didn't have this in the montage. I broke the scoop. I broke the scoop at the start. I guess you'll never know. And that concludes the montage.

Speaker: Okay. All right. All right. I love all the montage. One of these charms of the montage is that the montage is seven of the bi-week smaller news stories, but every week for the last like three, every episode for the last like three episodes, I've added a a bonus that ends up it never is seven. don't know. There's something about that. there's There's a charm to it. I like it.

Speaker: I'm hungry, Adrian. I think my brain, food, this is exactly what I'm talking about. my My brain is not fed properly, and so it's it's screwing up more often, and it's lacking the ability to find certain words. Like, when we, for instance, when we reviewed Daredevil Born Again, we i was trying to talk about the opening sequence, and I could not remember the words opening and sequence in sequence together, which is unfortunate. But anyway, it is what it is.

Speaker: What are you going to eat? trying my best. Later. ah We're eating a beef ah dip that we we we like scoop. We have like ah some focaccia and the dip is going to be like layers. It's going to be like ground beef, little bit of sour cream, some salsa, some vegetables, obviously some cheese.

Speaker: And we dip it in with the focaccia we have from the night before, which we ate with our spaghetti. Nice. Okay. What kind of vegetables you putting in? Like lettuce, tomato, onion? No, onion and pepper. Like your favorite pepper, bell pepper.

Speaker: i Yeah. i Again, i don't i I've been getting better with bell peppers, man. I eat them. I'll even eat them cooked. I like bell peppers in salad pretty much. They will be cooked in this case.

Speaker: But I i don't i think it's a dominant flavor. I think it takes over... a lot of dishes and and that's why I don't love it. I couldn't disagree more. I'd eat it, but I'd prefer it not being there.

Speaker: I don't even know how you believe that because you're such a good cook from my experience. So i it always shocks me when you say it's overpowering. It is an overpowering flavor, Simon. It is. I don't agree.

Speaker: I don't agree, but regardless of that, um speaking of good cooks... The focaccio bread that my fiance makes? Killer. Oh, what recipe does Can you ask Dawn what recipe she uses? it the Alexandra Cooks recipe? I'll get her to tell you.

Speaker: Do it now. No, no. Do it live. No, no. Fuck it. Let's do it live. She's not behind me, so I can't. I saw her walk up the stairs. When? I don't know. Not useful.

Speaker: Okay. Well, we're going move on now. We're going move on to... The topic of the show, or our split focus special segment, Adrian, for episode 108. A topic which concerns the Star Wars celebration. 2025.

Speaker: ah you Are you good? I'm just texting Don what recipe she is. Jesus Christ. It's not urgent. Are you going to make focaccia while we're doing the show here? going to forget. I love making focaccia. won't forget. I'll remember. We'll be good. I think she might have even heard me.

Speaker: I think I can hear her now. and Unless that's the cat. It's hard to know. What do you mean? oh she's right there. Simon, she's right there. Oh, Don. He wants the bocaccio recipe. recipe which Which one do you use? podcast

Speaker: Is it the Alexandra Cooks? He wonders if it's the Alexandra Cooks. Yes. It is. that's a good That's the one I use. It's really good. It's a really good one.

Speaker: I'm like your owl. Yeah. I'm not your owl, Adrian. who Okay, I'm going to move on now. Thank you. He says thank you. Okay.

Speaker: All right, moving on to that Split Focus special segment about the Star Wars celebration. As is now an annual tradition, Disney and Lucasfilm presented their Star Wars celebration to Star Wars fans during the weekend of April 18th to 20th.

Speaker: But this time, the conference took place in Tokyo, Japan.

Speaker: During the celebration, various Star Wars announcements were made about upcoming film and TV projects. On day one, they hyped up the Pedro Pascal, Sigourney Weaver starring film The Mandalorian and Grogu with its May 22nd, 2026 release date and announced that the Deadpool and Wolverine director Sean Levy's Ryan Gosling starring film would be titled Star Wars Starfighter with a planned release date of May 28th, 2027.

Speaker: Starfighter is currently in pre-production and is set to take place after the events of director J.J. Abrams' The Rise of Skywalker, but has been written to be a standalone film within the greater Star Wars franchise.

Speaker: On April 18th, they also announced an animated series centered around Sith Lord Darth Maul, which is set to star longtime Darth Maul voice actor Sam Witwer. I feel like this is a good break because we can talk about briefly.

Speaker: yeah What they talked about during day one. at the at the Star Wars conference. What did you think of the news? I feel like the biggest news by far is the Starfighter news.

Speaker: I think that's pretty obvious. We knew about Sean Levy making a movie. It was rumored that Ryan Gosling did, in fact, get the job as the lead. Now we know it's called Star Wars Starfighter and takes place after the events of Rise of Skywalker.

Speaker: thought Yeah. This is interesting because this is the first piece of content that Um, this is the first piece of content that's going to take place after the J.J. Abrams, like trilogy, the the the most recent trilogy. I guess it's not his trilogy.

Speaker: um Correct? Like there's there's not been any content. I believe so. Okay. This is interesting. I'm very curious. I know it is being, you know, set as like its own standalone thing, but I wonder what...

Speaker: you know if the events that happened before um are going to be referenced and and what implications that'll have on the wider universe. um Hopefully not much because that was a bad movie.

Speaker: The Rise of Skywalker was bad and I don't want it to have any implications to the wider universe. But hey, baby, that's showbiz, I guess. This is cool. i'm I'm intrigued. I love Ryan the Goose Gosling as an actor. I think he's great.

Speaker: um Sean Levy is... an okay director. I like Deadpool and Wolverine quite a bit. I think, I think that's a great movie. um The Adam project though, Very forgettable. I was just talking to my fiance about it randomly the other day because I read the news about this.

Speaker: And she's like, oh, yeah. And then I was like, yeah, like I don't even remember who's really in it. And she's like, yeah, Ryan Reynolds. And then I was like, it Mark Ruffalo in it? Yeah. and She's like, what the fuck? And I had to look up ah to check if Mark Ruffalo was in it.

Speaker: um And other actors that I already forgot, even though I just looked it up the other day. So like i I think like this creative team um or at least Sean Levy, like hopefully it's good.

Speaker: You know, but that's that's all I'm doing. i hope it's I hope it's good. Sean Levy, he's his best... I feel like his best work in the last 10 years, potentially, is his major contributions to Stranger Things.

Speaker: He's a major director for those... for many of the episodes, Stranger Things. In fact, he might have even directed the first episode of Stranger Things. Like, he he's been ingrained in that that world. That's that's my...

Speaker: that's That's something I don't want to forget about Sean Levy. Like, he's not as hit and miss as another director-writer we're goingnna talk about shortly here. um And I feel like he he's pretty he's pretty cool because of that. Because I would also agree, like, there's a he's got a hit and miss track record, especially the Adam Project. but But there's also... Like, i even, like, Deadpool and Wolverine was good. I liked it a lot. i liked it a lot, yeah.

Speaker: But I feel like it's not...

Speaker: It's not like top tier. And I do want Star Wars to go on a path of making movies that people like and also are critically acclaimed simultaneously. Not the J.J. Abrams monstrosity that is Rise of Skywalker, which is according to Rotten Tomatoes, fans liked. I have my doubts that that's largely the opinion and not the opinion of a massive number of people who have review bombed it.

Speaker: if you Review imploded it. I don't even know what you did. and They made it go up for the audience score. You good? Yeah. I just, I get like viscerally angry when I think of that movie.

Speaker: Oh, okay. I'm so sorry. Yeah. all right. Well, yeah, that's cool. I'm excited about this. It's cool it's called Starfighter. heck does that mean? I'm curious about this. Gosselin was cool. I saw him in an interview that said, don't tell don't ever tell me the odds on the top of his hat.

Speaker: yeah With like Sean Levy and like a like a reporter or like one of the setup people they had from Disney to ah interview them in front of hundreds of fans. So that's pretty cool too.

Speaker: I don't know. We'll see. I'm excited for The Mandalorian and Grogu, which will be the first movie that they're That they get off the ground since 2019. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. I'll be honest with you. When who went when they where and they like showed Pedro Pascal coming out on stage for this, i there was a second like, oh, damn, they're adding Pedro Pascal to this universe.

Speaker: And then I had to remember that he is technically the Mandalorian. like he He's been playing that role. but it's just his voice. Like you don't really see him. Um, you did show yeah. like yeah So sweet and like, I genuinely forgot.

Speaker: Um, so yeah, I think, yeah, like I, I would have been more excited about this Mandalorian Grogu movie if I didn't think season three was just a whatever season of television. It's like, yeah yeah, yeah, it's just, it's, I think it's mediocre.

Speaker: It's not bad. It's not good. It's just ah season a season of TV. Um, um Yeah, and there's not going to be any Carl Weathers, which kind of sucks. Yeah. That's a really shitty part.

Speaker: I feel like he's a pretty significant part of that overall journey that Mando has. So it's kind of shit. Yeah, that is the worst season by a bit of a margin. season two like They really needed to have a better plan for season three because season two ends in such a way that you really could have gone to a movie from that.

Speaker: Why even make a movie? like Why make a third season at all? And then they stopped after the third season. We haven't had Mandalorian for like how many years? What a weird choice, right? Yeah. Isn't that strange? Yeah.

Speaker: Yeah, it is strange. And again, I feel like a better launching off port and point, not only the end of season two, but the episode in the book of Boba Fett, like Boba Fett, which is again, just a essentially another episode of the Mandalorian.

Speaker: Like just do it from there, you know, just pick it up yeah directly. that would have been Okay. Yeah. They they had that because book of Boba Fett was before season three. I don't really understand. Like they were not such a high with the shows. Maybe they saw the viewership decline at season three and maybe rightfully so. Cause it wasn't good.

Speaker: It wasn't as good. Like they, they, they missed out on the, some of the magic of season two. i don't know. Like you gotta, you gotta plot first, right? Plot is King. Like you gotta know what you're doing to keep keep going. It's like I can't even believe that they, I'm shocked that they didn't make another season already.

Speaker: That's what I'm confused about. I thought they were milking it a little bit after season three, but I still enjoyed it. And I thought, Oh, they're going to keep doing it. But it's like, no, you just decided to leave it after that. That's what you decided to leave it after on a low.

Speaker: okay. Yeah. The lowest point the Mandalorian has ever been. That's where you decided that you're and again, not bad. It's just not nearly as good as season two is ending. So yeah, they're very confusing or the book of Boba Fett, as you mentioned.

Speaker: So are you good? Yeah. I'm just like looking up the timeline. I'm trying to think of like when that season came out versus when rise of Skywalker came out.

Speaker: Right. And like why, like if, if that had anything to do with it, but no, like Mandalorian season two came out in 2020. after eyes of skywalker and it was and it was a great up season of tv so yeah um also something just quick quick i said do you hear things from the outdoors can you pick up on dogs barking and stuff i can't no it's in the distance i just want to make sure it's not coming through on the microphone we got a we got our gain levels pretty solid i feel like okay cool cool just want to make sure about that So yeah yeah, I do find it interesting.

Speaker: I'll probably watch it, I guess. I'll watch it with you if you want to go. um I'm not excited, really. Mandalorian Grogu? Oh, 100% I'm going to see it. Okay, I'll watch with Not even a question. I've seen every Star Wars movie in theaters since... The first one, A New Hope. feel like Phantom Menace.

Speaker: No, you went to A New Hope. You weren't even born Did I miss Clone Wars? No, I saw it in theaters. hundred percent 100%. I've seen everyone since, yeah, including Solo, which people didn't go see.

Speaker: The fact that they stopped making movies after it, pretty much, that's the movie's fault. It wasn't Rise of Skywalker that made Kathleen Kennedy and the rest of her team skittish about making movies. It was definitely Solo, the Solo story.

Speaker: No, so well, Solo came out before Rise Skywalker. It didn't matter. they They didn't care about that. Rise of Skywalker, people still went to see. i don't think they they got scared because they that movie just didn't do well, right?

Speaker: I'm fairly certain. Rise Skywalker is also critically panned, but I don't think that affected it because it still sold I'm pretty sure it still did well, relatively speaking. But okay, let's move on to day two, Adrian. During day two... Oh, wait, disney we didn't even talk about the Darth Maul thing.

Speaker: Oh, yeah, that's exciting. Are you excited for that? Are you i know into the animated stuff? I haven't really watched a lot of the animated stuff from from the Star Wars canon because it's just too much. Yeah, no, I don't care that much about it. um Yeah, I haven't really watched much of the animated stuff. like ah One of my like good friends, Peter, like he he actually really loves the Clone Wars and Rebels. like he He likes it.

Speaker: It's funny. I think he's more into the animated Star Wars, like the Dave Filoni Star Wars, than the wider universe. I think he even watched the Bad Batch, but I don't think he watches like... I don't think you watch like the book of Boba Fett or Mandalorian or Ahsoka or any of that stuff, which is funny. Okay. Maybe you watched Ahsoka just cause that's like a direct continuation of the clone wars.

Speaker: um Interesting. But yeah, like it it is interesting. it it It's cool too. Cause like, ah like Sam Witwer, I like, I don't see him in too, too much, but whenever he shows up, you know, I, I do like him. I think he's a good actor. He's,

Speaker: um like he's played Darth Maul for quite some time and he obviously has a passion for star Wars. Like he played star killer in like the, the force unleashed games on like the PS two, or three generation of stuff.

Speaker: Um, so like, yeah, it is neat. And there's a lot of time, I guess, where they can explore what Darth Maul has been up to, even though we kind of know where it ends in, in multiple fronts.

Speaker: Um, I think you can do some pretty cool things there. Um,

Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. But I'm not going to watch it. it's It's my point. There's just too much on the animated front. So I just stick to the live action. I've seen every live action thing now. But. All of it You watched Ahsoka?

Speaker: Yeah. Yeah, I watched it almost like um at launch. Oh, why did I forget about that? That's good to know. I'm trying to think. Have I not seen one anything? No, remember, I've i've compared Ahsoka to The Acolyte.

Speaker: I believe The Acolyte's a better show. Oh, yeah. I have that controversial opinion that I'm sure most people don't believe. The Acolyte is not bad. People are just complaining about it. It's not excellent.

Speaker: Certainly. It's no Sinners. It's just, it's it's really unique in the Star Wars universe in comparison to Ahsoka's like retreaded water of like a children's show again. It's it's cool. It's fun. It's good.

Speaker: it' It's not bad. i like it. But I think that, yeah. We're going to get to Ahsoka now, so let's just that. But anyway, during day two, Disney presented an Ahsoka panel where they showed off Game of Thrones actor Rory McCann in his role replacing late actor Ray Stevenson as complicated villain character Balin Skull.

Speaker: And they revealed that Darth Vader actor Hayden Christensen would be returning to the Ahsoka TV series for season two. Andor showrunner Tony Gilroy and Cassian Andor star Diego Luna also hyped up the upcoming final season of Andor during the Andor panel.

Speaker: Luna stated, quote, It's so big in every possible way. There's more adventure, action, and drama. We're getting close to Rogue One, so everything matters so much. It's emotionally charged.

Speaker: It's going to be intense. And when you finish watching this c this second and last season, go straight to Rogue One because you're going to see a different film, unquote. Will do Diego Luna.

Speaker: Will do. I will do that. that is some As a promise I'll make, I'm going to watch Rogue One after i see. Me too. And or season two. But yeah, so Ahsoka is cool.

Speaker: I honestly loved Ray Stevenson in that role as Balin Skull.

Speaker: i I like Ray Stevenson actually as an actor. So it's sad that he passed away. pass where yeah But it's also sad for fans as well for another reason. So yeah, it's sad. I do. I'm curious what Rory McCann will do because he's a pretty different actor.

Speaker: There's more subtlety in Ray Stevenson's acting from my... viewership of Rory McCann. So I'm curious to see. I don't know. i'm not I haven't seen enough with Rory McCann to know. I've seen Ray Stevenson a lot more. So we'll see how it goes. I'm super curious.

Speaker: The picture they showed of Rory McCann, really really cool. like He looks awesome. So we'll see how that goes. But yeah, Hayden Christensen returning.

Speaker: is neat. I don't know what they're going to do with that. That's a confusing one. I'm like, alright, cool. Good for you. I guess. I don't know. Christensen said something along the lines of, like, I like returning to this role and being, like, the the softer side of it, of Anakin, as opposed to, like, the the harsh Darth version.

Speaker: Are they doing, like, flashbacks? Like, is that what what they're doing? Sort of. Yeah, they sort of sort of did a flashback in the first season. It's like, hey, look at me. I'm i' young Anakin now.

Speaker: sort It was pretty cool. It's done well, actually. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. It's good. It's good. You can see where they take the flavorings of an animated show and the way they do this. You can do an animated show now. like there's like we always talk about ah We've talked about that, but we've heard it other people talk about it too. like You can't do Horizon as a... You can't do it live action.

Speaker: You know, like the PlayStation's Horizon series, Horizon Zero Dawn and Forbidden West. It's like, yeah, you can. In 2025, you can do it. It's just a question of how much money you're spend and...

Speaker: Is it a good idea to do a movie versus a show? Maybe because of budgets, but you can do it because you you've you've basically translated this animated series into ah into a competent TV series with characters with serious makeup, obviously with Rosario Dawson playing Ahsoka.

Speaker: So like, I don't know. I feel like it's definitely possible in 2025 with the visual effects aspect of what we've got. Yeah, most certainly. I just feel like people like that that say those things just don't watch enough TV.

Speaker: Right. Understand. Yeah. Yeah. That's it. Which is OK. It's just it's that like off the cuff, like, oh, no way they could do It's like, no, you could. It's going to be expensive. Um, but I think that horizon movie has actually shifted to a movie, to a movie, right? Yeah. I think we talked about that.

Speaker: Um, it was going to be a TV show on Netflix and they switched this switcheroo. Um, which, which I'm happy about. Cause I feel like we'll see more robotic dinosaurs, but again, we're not talking about that. Yeah. For this cool. Like I, I probably won't watch Ahsoka. I haven't even seen the first season. I don't plan to kind of get around to it, you know, but and or is what I think made me fall back in love with star Wars for, for a brief period.

Speaker: Um, And I'm very excited for season two. Yeah. I it's, it's soon, baby. It's very soon. um And it's three episodes each week for four weeks.

Speaker: And I'm gonna, I'm, I'm, I'm doing what, what Diego Luna is saying. um' I'm, I'm going to be watching it. You know, those three episodes, those three episodes, and then those final three, I'm going to watch it right into road one.

Speaker: That's exactly what I'm going to do. And I can't wait. Road one, in my opinion, is one of the best star Wars movies. If not the best, like I think you could make a valid argument that it is the best. But Andor, that season of television, the first season of television, is, in my professional opinion, the best Star Wars content we have ever received.

Speaker: Period. Full stop. Loved it. I'm hyped for season two. And it's nice to be excited about Star Wars again. yeah It's excellent. And like there is and think it just proves that like Star Wars is a genre in many ways, and you can make really awesome stories within this galaxy.

Speaker: Mm-hmm. And people complaining about Star Wars are people who don't like some of the Star Wars. like You can have some that you don't like. The problem is in the Skywalker saga, it's literally ah an ending to it's something that the Star Wars has kind of hinged on for years. That's the issue with ending Rise of Skywalker in such a devastating way, I think for me anyway.

Speaker: Because it's such an important piece of it. If they screwed up Andor, you're like, ah Oh, well, you did. You so happen to make one of the best Star Wars things in the show that is the least consequential, theoretically, which sucks.

Speaker: Yeah, it is consequential, I guess, but it's like it's it's it's diving into like a smaller subset of like the rebels. And it's ah it's not really it's not crucial. No, it's not crucial for the overall timeline.

Speaker: It's like it's kind of like. Kingdom Hearts, you know, Kingdom Hearts. The best games are theoretically not the most important and pieces of the story.

Speaker: Theoretically, on a gameplay perspective, and like you know what I mean? like Two could be theoretical theoretically the best game, but it doesn't matter because the story is best in other aspects. and i kind of You're more of a Kingdom Hearts guy than me. but You know what i mean, though, right? It's a convoluted nature of of that.

Speaker: as a Yeah, that's too much of a deep cut. Kingdom Hearts is too ridiculous, but anyway. Yeah. But yeah, yeah, it's ah it's intriguing. It's intriguing. I'm very excited about this. I am going to watch the first season again, though, so I'm going to be behind for sure for Andor. I will just say that. So I will not watched.

Speaker: And it's interesting. I forgot that they're doing three, three, and three. and three like they're They're splitting up the season. They're dropping three episodes. I don't why they're doing that. Do they not have enough faith? I guess they don't. They don't have enough faith that people who are Star Wars fans like good.

Speaker: good TV shows. I guess. well Why aren't you dropping this week to week? like It's an excellent TV show. like As a whole, it's a TV series that could be nominated for an Emmy, like Best best Show.

Speaker: I also think that... like Andor is a different beast compared to other Star Wars content where it's not as like fantastical and over the top and there's nothing, it's not like exciting every step of the way. There's no like awe and wonder at all times. count of It's slow, dude. Like it's a slow paced, brilliantly written show. And I think like, if you are like,

Speaker: i i but I agree with you. I don't think they have faith that the vast Star Wars audience is willing to kind of sit through one episode a week that's slow. And they're like, oh, nothing happened. This sucked. It's like now, like, just do the three. Because, like, to be fair, the the first season was kind of told in, in you know,

Speaker: three episode chunks. Like it felt like these contained like three episode arcs. And Which is really, really cool. Like it's rare for a live action show to do that. I'm thinking even just shows in general, like the show that I'm thinking of kind of did that was like arcane. Arcane.

Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's like, it's not really that common to do it that way. And they have, I just like this idea of them telling the story as well. It's the second to last season. That's it. We know what we're telling. This is the story.

Speaker: Also, Alan Tudyk is back. And I love Alan Tudyk is, what is it? K2SO. K2SO, yeah. Yeah, I love him in general and everything he's in. So I'm like, oh, man, this going to be going to get to see the relationship. I thought we were going to see them become friends in the first season. But like, it's really cool. design Yeah, yeah, it's excellent. Yeah, it's cool that they they have that opportunity now.

Speaker: I don't know. I'm very excited about this. um But I do want to watch and or season one again, because I watched the first year that came out. So I don't know. i I love it a lot and i and I kind of just want to refresh it because I think it's such an excellent thing. So to watch the whole thing in one shot will be pretty satisfying, I imagine.

Speaker: It's worth it. Yeah. that's that's the plan. That's plan. Okay. Day three, not as much happened. But day three's announcements largely surrounded anime anthology series, Star Wars Visions Volume 3. Volume 3 will debut on Disney Plus on October 26th.

Speaker: They also announced that longer-form Visions spinoff animated films would be developed. The first to premiere is a spinoff of the ninth Jedi from Volume 1 of Visions, which is set to be called Star Wars Visions Presents the Ninth Jedi.

Speaker: I wasn't going to stop here, but I may as well do it. Do you have any interest in visions before I just move on? um No, I never watched it. heard it's good. It is pretty good. You like anime, so I'm curious to see what you would think about it. it Each episode is like, it's an anthology series, obviously, but every episode is kind of different, like a different story. And they're not canon.

Speaker: They're just random. Oh, they're not canon. That's unfortunate. That's what's kind of cool, though. They just take liberties, which is really cool, so they can do random things. Some of them, I watched, I think, three of them, and I think one of them was excellent, and the other two were okay from from my perspective. But you might like it even more because you're an anime fan, too.

Speaker: Is it all... I thought each episode was also like a different like it was a different yeah director and art style and everything, right? Yeah. Yeah. Like, you correct me if I'm wrong. You're an expert on this, I imagine. But like, anime is Japanese animation, right? That's the basic idea. Typically, yeah. That's what you...

Speaker: So its it is different ah different art styles in different studios each time. And they showed like when they did this, they did a splash screen for day three. They showed like the various studios working on that. One of them was Studio Trigger actually, which didn't they do?

Speaker: Cyberpunk. Yeah, Edgerunners. So there's some cool ones in there. So it's it's maybe worth jumping into just because they're also easily digestible. You what I mean? Yeah. But moving on to my looking forward segment here.

Speaker: notably Notably absent from the Star Wars celebration was actor Daisy Ridley's Rey-centered follow-up film from Ms. Marvel director Charmaine Obeyed Chinoy, Thor Ragnarok director Taika Waititi's Star Wars movie, and Logan director James Mangold's Star Wars film.

Speaker: Perhaps more pressingly, despite being reportedly greenlit for a new trilogy of Skywalker Saga-connected sequel films, X-Men Dark Phoenix writer-producer Simon Kinberg was also not present at the Star Wars celebration to present his trilogy.

Speaker: As fans of Star Wars may recall, Lucasfilm has struggled to get any movies off the ground since the ninth film in the Skywalker saga, The Rise of Skywalker. Creators like Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins and Game of Thrones writers Benioff and Weiss have been announced had been announced to be making huge Star Wars film projects, only to be only to seemingly find themselves in a sort of development hell for their movies.

Speaker: The Jon Favreau-directed Mandalorian and Grogu will be the first film since 2019 to actually release boldly in theaters in 2026.

Speaker: So, I wanted to talk about this as a whole because I thought it would be a fun thing to talk about. We didn't talk about the Simon Kinberg being tapped as ah as a as a trilogy writer, trilogy showrunner, I guess, for the...

Speaker: three movies theoretically in the Skywalker saga. It's weird. I got conflicting reports on this. And then I read the insider report and he was saying that he believes the deadline report claims that it will be in fact, 10, 11, and 12 for the movies that is, that is being, that he's in charge of like star Wars. 10, 11, 12.

Speaker: Yeah. ten eleven twelve yeah So, ah yeah, it's interesting, especially because Taika Waititi as well, like thinking of the other creators making Star Wars stuff, where are they? Like, what is happening here?

Speaker: Where is Taika Waititi's movie? Where is James Mangal's movie? Although James Mangal's a very busy dude. Yeah. So is Taika, to be fair. But... Yeah. Charmaine obeyed Chenoye barely know at all.

Speaker: I'm kind of shocked that she was tapped for such an important Disney property. she had She directed a few miss Marvel episodes, but other than that, her... Her movies are not, it doesn't look like they're Hollywood.

Speaker: they're They're like, she's made a lot of stuff, but she's made like and in, in other avenues, independent movies and different studios that are outside of Hollywood, I think.

Speaker: ah So that's an interesting thing too. But anything you want to pull from this, anything you're interested, obviously we're going to talk about Simon Kinberg being tapped for a trilogy of Star films. Yeah.

Speaker: Yeah. We can just get into that if you want. Yeah, man. I,

Speaker: i I just – I can't fathom Disney's decision-making skills in in this in this Disney Star Wars era. it's It's jarring, man. they they They have made some quality decisions, but at the same time, like –

Speaker: I mean, you mentioned it earlier. Solo, I think, really made them gun-shy to greenlight more movies. And I think they they were also just far more willing to kind of cut projects as soon as a director maybe...

Speaker: Missed. Patty Jenkins, it seemed like that that movie was looking good until Wonder Woman, the second Wonder Woman movie came out and wasn't reviewed well, and it kind of disappeared. Game of Thrones guys, the Benioff and Weiss, seemed like they were going to do that Star Wars thing. They had that, um i they were doing Game of Thrones. They had that Confederate show that they announced that got canceled.

Speaker: because they were going to do this Star Wars thing. Game of Thrones ended bad. We haven't heard anything about the Star Wars thing. Taika Waititi, you know, Thor Ragnarok did well, gets picked up for this. Thor Love and Thunder did not do well.

Speaker: Haven't heard a thing. ah James Mangold is, I think, does consistently good stuff. But even him, like he did the most recent Indiana Jones movie, which I know, I don't think was particularly well loved. I think it was kind of like, uh,

Speaker: You know, some people liked it, some people didn't. um Yeah, and as you mentioned, the Charmino Bade Chinoy, like, i I don't really know anything about them. So, yeah, um it is weird. And then what seemed like the most confident they've been in bringing someone on is freaking bringing on Simon Kinberg that made...

Speaker: Garbage. like let's Let's be totally blunt. He made just a movie. He made garbage. He had so much to do with ah the inconsistency of the X-Men franchise. and it's And it's baffling decision-making. like It's one of those things like...

Speaker: I mean, i've I've heard it before. I've heard other people say it, but like people at the top of a lot of these studios don't know what the fuck they're doing. And I think the Disney execs had no idea what they were really doing with Star Wars.

Speaker: Essentially, again, creating the, the the the the most you know, episode seven, eight, nine without a plan, like things like that. just, what are you guys doing? You have something that can genuinely be amazing.

Speaker: um And there's no sort of organization in this. I loved Star Wars. Loved it. You know, like I grew up watching the the original trilogy, um but obviously I grew up watching the the new trilogy because that that's the generation I'm from.

Speaker: And literally, the Rise of Skywalker made me fall out of love with this. And I you know kept on watching stuff out of it, like the Mandalorian stuff. and then But at a certain point, I'm like, I'm tired. like I don't want to take all this mediocrity until, again, and or most recently, brought me kind of back into the universe and made me re-fall in love and made me realize, shit, there's a lot of great that can be done in this. I just think...

Speaker: Why Simon Kinberg, dude? Like, why? It's shocking. Dude, why? Come on, man. why Like, that's all i that's all I can ask. it just what What does this guy have over the movie industry? How does this guy keep on getting jobs?

Speaker: how did how did How did this guy run a franchise into the fucking ground with the X-Men movies? Created some of the worst fucking pieces of content in in that X-Men franchise. I know he had his hands in like ah Days of Future Past as well, which was phenomenal.

Speaker: but But the problem is is that when you look at his track record, there's not good. the Days of Future Past, he's part of Days of Future Past, but there's also other writers. Yeah. like And so then it makes you wonder, like, okay, well, was he the good one? Because Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn also write wrote Days of Future Past for Bryan Singer as the director.

Speaker: So how much did, yeah like, when you look at the rest of Singer's, sorry, Singer, when you look at the rest of Kinberg's track record and you see that it's roughly not good, like, generally, then you must, you think, like, well, maybe he wasn't the positive part.

Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Because obviously Matthew Vaughn has had a better track record, although recently not so good with Argyle. but Yeah, and even even the The King's Man, i don't think. I love The King's Man.

Speaker: The third one? never watched it. look But I know it wasn't reviewed particularly well. I don't know why. That's a mystery. I like a lot. It's confusing, actually. Argyle is pretty flawed. But it's still a fun movie to watch. That's Apple TV+, right?

Speaker: Yeah, it's still fun, though. um It's pretty fun to watch. It was a little ridiculous. It's too silly. it It jumps the shark too much. But oh yeah, it's okay. It's good.

Speaker: i I'm a fan of Sam Rockwell. He kills it and everything. But yeah anyway. ah Yeah, no, it's crazy. Like Simon Kinberg, right? He's recently been making the show Invasion.

Speaker: Worst part of Invasion? The writing. Mr. and Mrs.... Mr. and Mrs. Smith is where he got his start. That's kind of where he, I think that's where people thought, whoa, Mr. and Mrs. Smith. He's, you know, look at this thing ah in terms of popular things. But then right after Mr. and Mrs. Smith, he wrote X-Men Last Stand.

Speaker: and And then you have Jumper, which speaking of Hayden Christensen, I guess, that is, I'm pretty sure, pretty well badly reviewed, although people like it, like fans like it. liked it when I was a child that didn't have a good understanding of movies.

Speaker: He had a hand in the screenplay for Sherlock Holmes with Robert Downey Jr. So that that's cool. I like that movie enough. He wrote This Means War, Apparently, X-Men Days of Future Past with two other people.

Speaker: Fan-Fortastic? Gotta love that one. don't know you remember that. He wrote that. No, I didn't know that. kind of forgot about that. That's crazy. that's the craziest That's probably the craziest one on here. And I didn't know he wrote that either.

Speaker: Fantastic Four with... Also written by Jeremy Slater. That's funny. And Josh Trank, who directed it. And I've never seen that guy again.

Speaker: Yeah, that guy, I feel like he fell off after making that movie. Because there was also all this stuff on set that him and Miles Teller were like bashing heads. and didn't they get in like a fist fight or some shit did they on set oh i remember hearing about that and and they were like definitely talking shit about each other after because it it kind of that that halted miles teller's career a little bit too if i recall yeah well he has but he hasn't been as in as much i don't think since then because uh the gorge he starred in whiplash before fantastic four right yeah that's a pretty good cast michael b jordan's in fantastic four i know dude

Speaker: That's a wasted opportunity. Yeah, Jeremy Slater. I'm mentioning Jeremy Slater because Jeremy Slater is one of the writers for... I think he's... Wait, isn't he doesn't need a screen... He's literally the showrunner for Moon Knight.

Speaker: That seems right. I just don't – I don't understand, though, how you're – you made a good point earlier. How are you Disney? You have the biggest franchise in terms of cohesive storytelling of all time in the history of Hollywood, the MCU.

Speaker: And then you're like, you know, we can just wing it with Star Wars. And then you're you're you are willing to make a big – boom with this. You want to make this cohesive thing that you have characters like tossing it, throwing in characters from various places and they jump into various TV shows and movies. You want them to be connected, interconnected, which is great. I like the interconnected stuff. That's cool.

Speaker: But then you thought you were just going to wing it? Like J.J. Abrams is like, oh, I'll come in for the last one. I'll just write it. Like, no, you're not going to just write it. You didn't write it from the beginning? It's crazy. I imagine, though, the one thing that will happen here is Kinberg seems to be writing a trilogy so he knows he's in it for the trilogy so theoretically but imagine though it's crazy though think about how star wars has failed in in theaters right it's failed one movie after another like some last jedi was critically beloved and then panned on us on the perspective of fans and then solo no one watched it like each movie is separate it succeeds or dies we don't know what will happen you tap simon kinberg to write all three immediately

Speaker: Simon Kinberg. That's who you chose? Because you launched one movie. It reminds me Zack Snyder, right? Zack Snyder gets tapped to write out the DC Universe. He's like going to be the the showrunner, essentially. He's like the DC Universe figurehead.

Speaker: He's the guy. Right, but I don't think he wanted to do that. I think he wanted to just do his thing and then leave. But then he got he got, I think he got roped in or something. Something happened there. Yeah, because his original plan was literally just Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, Justice League.

Speaker: Like, I think that was the the original plan. But it all went awry somewhere down the line. But regardless of that, like you think like about Simon Kimberg and think it was Zack Snyder. Zack Snyder kind of succeeded with Man of Steel. It did well.

Speaker: Batman versus Superman didn't do well enough at all. And then Justice League, There's tragedy in his family, whatever. But it's like you they're already feeling like they didn't like Zack Snyder's vision at that point.

Speaker: Simon Kinberg is known for Invasion right now. And that show is badly written. He's known for Fanfartastic. he's He's known for Dark Phoenix and your favorite bagel-throwing movie, X-Men Apocalypse.

Speaker: You went your trunk and you threw a bagel across... the dark parking lot in the night after we got out of that movie because you didn't like it. I was like, ah you opened your trunk and pick up the bagel and threw it. And I was like, I was just witness to it. It was, it was good. It was a good time. But with the the movie was horrible and it was a complete waste of Oscar Isaac, Isaac's potential.

Speaker: A hundred percent. Like Oscar Isaac was just an incredible actor and what a waste. So it's just, it's crazy. It's the most befuddling thing I could imagine. And and they didn't even have him on stage here.

Speaker: And I'm pretty sure the last movie in this entire list of movies that I learned about was literally Sean Levy's movie. Am I wrong? i think it's the last one I knew about.

Speaker: I think all these other ones I knew about before, even including the Simon Kinberg trilogy. Well, Simon Kinberg trilogy, we learned about in November of last year. So maybe Sean Levy's movie. Didn't we learn about it this year? i feel like that was a this year thing that we learned about. it yeah like How does it get off the ground so quick and the other ones you don't have any...

Speaker: perspective on when they're coming out they're not at star wars celebration at all i don't know what's going on over there there's something wrong there's something clearly wrong and they got the shows going the shows are cooking you know they're great i think largely the shows were a success story i think there's some like some missteps like i think kenobi is boring and useless not useful even though ewan mcgregor is like amazing actually kenobi is the same way that the prequels are in some way yeah I like the prequels to be honest, but like Clone Wars, like the the the saving grace of the clone, not Clone Wars, the attack of the clones, the same grace as Ewan McGregor, but the overall movies and, you know, it's a simulation of a Star Wars movie, not a, not a good movie kind of thing.

Speaker: I don't know. i don't know. don't know.

Speaker: Yeah, Benny and F. Weiss, that was never going to happen. That was like a negotiating tactic. They're like the Netflix, like, oh, look how much we're going to get from Disney. We're going to make Star Wars. And then Netflix is like, okay, we'll pay you more money for the three body problem.

Speaker: Okay, no problem. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Disney's going to pay. Oh, yeah. We're Netflix. It's like dig yeah big dick energy. There's like swinging the dick around and then they, you know what I mean? Like, that's what it feels like it was. Like, how do they, how do you bail on Star Wars?

Speaker: i that How do you bail on Game of Thrones? Yeah, they just, you mean they didn't do House of the Dragon? that what mean? not only that, they rushed those last two seasons dramatically because of all this stuff. I feel like they they kind of tapped out.

Speaker: because they had like a so much potential of what could come next with star wars that confederate show again which seemed like a cool idea like what if the confederacy won yeah how do you bail on hbo i guess is the better yeah yeah because that's confederate i'm pretty sure confederate was supposed to be an hbo show it was it was i think they had trailer dude they're like a concept trailer i thought and maybe it's a cool idea yeah and then yeah then i don't know did you watch through body problem do you it was it good so much to say about that show.

Speaker: don't like it. I think the writing is bad, but I don't know if the book is bad. um i don't I don't know. if i That's too bad. i was going to watch it. Maybe you should, because maybe I'm wrong.

Speaker: I don't understand. i don't understand it. It's badly written. I think there's it's it's riddled with plot holes. To the point where my fiance, we were watching it. And one episode, she's like, you know, we don't have to watch this.

Speaker: Because I'm just complaining about it. I'm like, yeah, I know. But like the production value is incredible. The cast is great. It's Isaac Gonzalez and um I'm blanking on all the names of the actors. The dude the dude for who plays Sam.

Speaker: Yeah, Samuel Tarly. He's in it too. Oh, and it's freaking Jonathan Price, who I love. think he's a great actor. You should marry him.

Speaker: I don't love him like that. i love him as his work. I love his body of work. Anyway. You love his body? Oh my god, dude. it's a its The show is so flawed because it's it's so... it it's just the the It doesn't make sense. It's about like aliens, right?

Speaker: Basically. You made me like it because it's interesting. Oh, it's about aliens? The three-body problem? Extraterrestrial beings. It's about the outside of our Earth. I'll be honest. I have no idea what the premise of that show I thought it was about virtual reality.

Speaker: Science fiction... In some way it is, sure. ah It's got really cool concepts, like really cool concepts, but largely it doesn't make any sense. If you think about it in a deep way, think about it deeply, like the plot and what's happening in the plot and what's going on, you'd be like, no, that doesn't that doesn't add up here.

Speaker: And maybe I'm wrong, but I don't know. Maybe they're going to prove me wrong in season two. I'm willing to like open up the can of worms for season two. I think Invasion is worse in its writing. But the monsters are cool in that.

Speaker: Actually, that's the best part about that. The CG in Invasion about aliens as well. Science fiction elements there, that's definitely aliens. That's obvious. It's called Invasion. But there's like the the visual effects in that show.

Speaker: Very good. I think they're pretty cool. And the aliens are for pretty awesome design. yeah it's right yeah anyway pretty okay that three body problem show 79 tomato 77 popcorn yeah yeah people like it maybe you are wrong simon maybe i'll watch it i don't think they're thinking deeply about it that's the problem like by like the by the middle of the season you're like oh wait i'm understanding i like there's some problems here like why the choice is being made like for various characters

Speaker: like i don't i don't think they would I don't think they would do that. I don't know. it's it's yeah it It gets crazier and crazier as it goes. and I'm like, no, I don't think so. and dont i know oh so so um Oh, yeah, he's so good.

Speaker: it's um Benedict Wong is in it as well. Mm-hmm. He's great. And the dude who plays, what's his name? The Scottish guy in game of Thrones. I like him lot. Oh, the actor. It's Liam Cunningham, right?

Speaker: Yeah, Liam Cunningham. That's right. Very good. You're feeding my my very hungry brain here. Thank you. All right. Well, that's it. Because I'm literally, my food. my might Actually, at one point, my stomach was literally grumbling on camera. I feel like it was. You could hear it.

Speaker: Yeah, okay. Well, let's move on, I think. Unless you've got more to say about this. Any thoughts? No, man. No, I've got no thoughts. I don't even think. Do you think the Simon Kimberk thing is going to go away, though? you think it's not going to happen?

Speaker: God, I hope so. Yeah, but how do you know what? Who cares? It might actually be better than what we just got because at least it's one cohesive vision. Who knows? Maybe Simon Kinberg really loved Star Wars and is like, I've been waiting all my life to do this. Watch Invasion. And this is going to be his best work.

Speaker: Watch Invasion and then maybe you disagree that it's bad and then will you can think that he's done a good job because it's the thing he's done the most recently. Yeah. That's the trick.

Speaker: Yeah, I honestly i rather ah have you watch the Acolyte though. And then we could talk about the Acolyte and we I would do in a closer look about the Acolyte and we would talk about it in depth because that show legitimately was completely critically panned.

Speaker: It's like to me, that's the equivalent of like Dragon Age the Veil Garden video games or like people getting upset about Marathon, the Bungie game that's coming up in September. I just don't understand it. It's like people are freaking out about nothing.

Speaker: Like nothing at all. And then they they looked they all the fans that liked it couldn't get it to to get enough viewership to get it off the ground. ah You said a few numbers there. Yeah, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny didn't do super well, but it did okay with Rotten Tomatoes critics.

Speaker: It didn't sell super well. So like, oh, this is domestic, I think, but it's still like 175 million. You also talked about Rise of Skywalker. we We talked about how... Solo sold less than it.

Speaker: um Crazy. Rise of Skywalker worldwide did $1.07 billion. dollars That's unbelievable. I didn't know that. Solo, a Star Wars story, though, it sold worldwide $392.9 million, which is way less than a Star Wars movie is supposed to, I guess, according to Kathleen Kennedy and team.

Speaker: And so I imagine it cost a lot to make. It's a Star Wars movie. CG is just costly in general and then you spend the money on the marketing which did they even spend money on the marketing for Solo? That was that was the problem with that. I don't remember.

Speaker: People literally thought oh wait yeah this is a Star Wars movie we just saw because it came out like a few months later. Yeah. They were trying to do they were that was the thing they took a page out of the Marvel playbook for that though.

Speaker: They're like oh well Marvel can do it. Yeah, Marvel can do it if the they do do it differently than that. like i think It's not the same thing. i think The Last Jedi was like still in some theaters when Solo came out. like yeah you like yeah like I feel like when we watched Solo, like there was still one theater playing The Last Jedi.

Speaker: Yeah, like they they they took a page out of the Marvel book for that, but then they didn't take a page of the Marvel book for like making a cohesive connected storyline. Yeah. Like, come on. This is like the equivalent of doing Black Widow movie, actually, the Black Widow movie going back in time. So you can't you can't pepper in the, but you know, the end credit scenes or the extra cameos because you're doing a back like back in time. So it doesn't make it as relevant.

Speaker: like I feel like that might have hurt Black Widow too because you can't... Nobody's like anticipating you're going to see like the Hulk show up because it's... Well, I guess he could have because it's not back in time completely. but By that time, Black Widow was kind of on the outs from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. it's like it's It becomes less interesting. I think people like the modern storytelling. I think that might help their franchise bets. But anyway, okay, let's move on.

Speaker: Let's move on now, Adrian, to... adrianne to A look to the future! Second Earth Show! In which we present at least three of our picks for the TV series or movies that look most interesting to us.

Speaker: That are releasing between April 22nd and May 5th, 2025. I'll let you go first, as is customary. Sure, man. I mean, we've been talking about it. We brought it up multiple times this episode.

Speaker: Baby, I'm talking Andor, season two, the premiere. Coming out Tuesday, April 22nd at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Taking that exact slot that Daredevil took, but they're releasing three episodes.

Speaker: um Yeah, man. Stoked. We already talked about it bunch. We don't have to ramble on too much longer, but hell yeah. and I'll just make the connection that like it's interesting. Daredevil, a very slow and deliberate Marvel show, the slow and slowest and deliberate most deliberate Marvel show. Deliberatist.

Speaker: To put it into the same slot like and or into the same slot is actually more wise than I could have even imagined. Because we talked about how Daredevil... and and or we're gonna like be not overlapping and so this makes more sense than ever now i think but yeah it's cool it's cool very excited yeah that's definitely the most anticipated thing that is on my list here too uh the next thing i want to talk about though is thunderbolts adrian thunderbolts asterisk ah which comes out may 2nd which i am very excited about yeah um it may not be as hype as and or for me but thunderbolts with the

Speaker: The pretty cool cast of characters, pretty star-studded cast. I think the trailers look really good. I watched a few behind-the-scenes, like stunt trailers. i don't know if you saw any of those. No.

Speaker: Yelena Belova actor, Florence Pugh, was apparently, she she advocated for jumping off a building, like the second tallest building in the world. And Kevin Feige is like, yeah yeah, we probably make it happen. And then later on, later on they're like, oh no, actually we we can't get the insurance. And she's like, no, you said you would do it. And she forced them to do it.

Speaker: So she got to jump off and do her own stunt to jump off the second tallest building in the world. That's just pretty cool. Yeah, it's awesome. It's so cool. And the marketing for this, For this movie, it's been cool. The marketing... like um trail. like they they they did a Did you see the one where they they David Harbour drives like ah a limousine and they they walk into the... What was that? o CinemaCon, I think.

Speaker: They walked into CinemaCon and it looked like they just came out of Vegas. and No, I didn't see that. got His shirt is like half open and David Harbour is like, dude, this is a classy joint. like Put your shirt on.

Speaker: It's good. this is like a lot of like There's a lot of quips and it looks like they're having a lot of fun and I feel like that passion is going to move over to the screen as well let's hope so i hope it it it looks good i like jake schreier i think that the things i've seen that jake schreier has made like the creator of beef or not the creator of beef but the director of beef and the director of this film i think he's been great so i'm curious to see i just don't want to don't want it to be another nomadland director chloe zhao situation

Speaker: So it doesn't look like that though. It does look like a lot, a ton of fun. It does. Yeah. Great. I'm very excited. I'm excited about this. And I'm again, just so curious where, where task master is going end up in this, in this movie.

Speaker: you You were obsessed with this. Cause she's dead. She's dead. oh you're saying it's to be clear to the audience. You're saying she's dead. Cause she's barely in the trailers. She is in the trailer though. When they do the, the little title card.

Speaker: This is the best thing ever. When they show the cast, it's like, oh, it's Red Guardian. it's It's Black Widow. It's New Black Widow. And then they just said, yeah, yeah. And then they're like, oh, it's it's Bucky. And then they're like, it's Taskmaster. like, wait, she's not in the rest of this trailer. What are you talking about?

Speaker: It is a little bit suspect. I am curious, like, what's going on. yeah yeah maybe she's dead i don't know but i think she's gonna get kidnapped maybe she's they're going on ah a trip to go find her you know i hope so yeah i'll eat my words man if if she's somehow alive they they just decided to like trick everyone cool i'll eat my words but that motherfucker's dead All right. If you say so.

Speaker: guess we'll see. We'll see shortly. We'll see by next episode of Spill Focus, by episode 109. Okay, buddy. What is your second pick here? My second pick, Simon, is you.

Speaker: me Yeah, you. No, Simon. The Netflix series, You. It's coming back for its fifth and final season on April 24th. Okay. Yeah. Last season.

Speaker: I'm excited. I like you. Oh, thanks, man. I like you too. All right. Well, the next pick I have here is Until Dawn, the horror movie from PlayStation Studios. That is a sort sort of loosely based on the video game.

Speaker: it seems that the concepts i feel like the concepts they pulled enough of the concept of it of the game that i can see how they they made a movie out of it um but it looks like really creative this idea of like the repeating night scenario until you can survive the night repeating night until you can survive the night that's huh yeah interesting makes sense we gotta survive until dawn it's the name of the movie we gotta do that he says it yeah i wouldn't be good gonna need and It be cool if they made an Until Dawn sequel based on the movie concept. Because the movie concept is actually a really neat concept for a video game.

Speaker: Isn't it? hu kind of a cool idea it's almost like a roguelike i was just gonna say yeah it's it's very roguelike gotta to survive the the whole night and if you don't it starts over it but it's a different set it but it's also a horror as well that's really kind of cool like man are they gonna do that sony come on buddies come on there's they're they're they're it's rumored that they're making a sequel like like a yeah but it looked like it was directly related related like by at the end of until dawn the they did a remaster at the end of the remaster

Speaker: Is it a remake? Yeah, I think they they said it was a remake. right that Those terms are very loose. Let's just say that. I don't know. Regardless, who cares?

Speaker: i But yeah, Until Dawn Remaster, if you get to the end of it, remake, sorry, excuse me. They never even used the terms, actually. Those terms remade. they just said So that must be why it's a remake, because they would use the term otherwise.

Speaker: But that Until Dawn, they just recently did they did it end credits scene. And they kind of reveal what's going to happen. Yeah, I didn't watch it. I don't know. so it feels like it's going to be related to the actual game, not to the any kind of movie universe. But...

Speaker: I guess we'll see. Are you excited for this? Do you want to see Until Dawn? Yeah, I do. move I do. I do want to see it. Okay. We'll watch it. Okay. Sounds good. You and All right. All right.

Speaker: What's next? What's next on your list? The next movie on my list, I guess the only movie on my list, is a movie called... The Legend of Ochi.

Speaker: Oh, cool. I have that on here, too. i didn't know picked that one. It's an A24 movie. Willem Dafoe is in it. Yeah. Finn Wolfhard is in it. Yeah. It stars this little fella.

Speaker: Yeah, I can barely see that. He's a little cute-looking puppet man. Yeah. It kind of reminds me of E.T. It looks like it's going to be sad.

Speaker: It looks like you're going to cry. I don't know if I'm in the mood to watch that right now, but I'll get around to it probably, presumably. yeah Depending on how well it's reviewed. Okay, cool. yeah My next pick is The Accountant 2, Adrian.

Speaker: The Accountant 2. We can count to two. Stars bob John Bernthal. like that. That's good Well, they're accountants, so I bloody hope so. But it's ah John Bernthal and Ben Affleck.

Speaker: Accounting. Not really a lot of accounting. I'm pretty sure it's lot of gunplay and people getting shot. Yeah, where's where's Anna Kendrick? Where's Kendrick? Oh, she was in the first one.

Speaker: Yeah, she was Ben Affleck's therapist and also love interest. She she would have been fired. You can't do that. I don't think that's allowed.

Speaker: That's why. That's why she's not in it. Yeah. Malpractice. Malpractice. That's right. She's out she also dies. Oh. In between. Oh, okay. I'm assuming. I don't know.

Speaker: Did she die in the movie? No, was spoiling it. Okay, good. Well, now that's a spoiler, too. Did she die in the movie? I don't know. We'll never Covering our bases. Covering our bases.

Speaker: All right. Well, Accountant 2. Did you like Accountant 1? Didn't we see that together in the theaters? Yeah. Did we do? Was it a work trip? Yes. It was weird work trip from one of our retail stores. We went we went together and they they like subsidized the cost of the ticket.

Speaker: Yeah. like It was like movie night. Yeah, it was. but in the theaters. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. we you like Were we the ones pushing the movies? might have organized that because we liked the movies. Yeah, that could have been us. But was it the best movie to choose? I don't know.

Speaker: It's unknown. No, definitely not. I don't remember it, but I remember being like, it was fine. don't think it was anything spectacular. To be honest, I didn't remember Anna Kendrick was in it until you just said it right now. I did remember John Berthold, though, because they play brothers, right? They're brothers?

Speaker: Two brothers. Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting. Yeah, I don't know if I want to see this. I honestly, I'm more interested in Rami Malek's The Amateur. yeah Because they're kind of a similar concept of a movie, yeah actually. But that movie did not get reviewed well. Isn't it like a 40% of Rotten Tomatoes? The Amateur?

Speaker: Yeah. don't It's not reviewed well at all. That's why I didn't ask to go with you to go see it. 60. 61%. Oh, that's not that bad. Audience score is 88. Okay. ah Popcorn meter.

Speaker: All right. It's cool. I don't know. I like, it's like Rami Malek doing some like somewhat Mr. Robot type things while being a CIA agent. I don't know. I, I kind of, I kind of into it.

Speaker: Cause he didn't, he like designed one the CIA agents, like systems. And then they're like, Oh, he's the guy who made all your systems and you just didn't take them seriously. It's like one of the lines in the trailer.

Speaker: Yeah. Cause it's his wife gets killed and he's kind of going out going after them, but they don't, they don't want him to do it. And they're like, you couldn't do it anyway. John Bernthal is also in that movie. Funnily enough. I know. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker: yeah don't burn i'd be curious i do want to watch drop more though so like if i'm yeah gonna go to the movie before until dawn i want to watch drop right drop the movie that nobody thought was gonna be well at least you didn't think it was gonna be good because they revealed the whole movie in the trailer at least you know i i didn't say that it wasn't gonna be good i knew it was gonna be good because it's christopher landon who i like yeah but when i just thought they revealed too much in the trailer sometimes make is a bad sign Yeah.

Speaker: You know what you mean? i think I said, like, I wish they didn't show that much, but I was confident in this movie because Christopher Landon, I like. He did a Happy Death Day, Happy Death Day to You, and Freaky, which which are all really good movies.

Speaker: And he was supposed to do ah Scream 7, 8? Yeah. whatever the next screen movie going to be. And then he also wrote hard eyes, which again, I stand by the fact that I think he had a bunch of ideas that he wanted to use for scream.

Speaker: He quit that, or he's not doing that. he's like I'm just going to make this movie and write a, use a lot of the those similar elements and make into hard eyes. Right. Yeah. So cool. All right. You have any others? Do you want to point out here? Are you, you good to go?

Speaker: I think I'm good. I think I'm good. I think I'm done. Okay. want you to eat, man. You're hungry. I am very hungry. You're hungry little boy. Hippo. Yep. well. Welcome to the first scraps.

Speaker: That's pretty much it for episode 109, Adrian. I appreciate you joining me, as always. it's It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been super fun. yeah It's been all right. I feel like when you combine the the closer look elements, like the the various reviews into this episode, I have i have no idea what how long this episode can end up being. I feel like I predict it's going to be like three hours and maybe 30 minutes. I'm not actually sure.

Speaker: My guess is it's going to be seven hours, personally. Whoa, that's a bit of a long episode. Yeah, sir I agree. and don't know why we went on that long. Yeah, I guess we'll we never know.

Speaker: I guess we do know at this point, actually, when the audience is hearing this, actually, when they're listening. We would have known. They do know, yeah, they would know, actually. a look to the future. I'm bringing it back. Are you doing that because you want to get the thunder noise? Like the thunder with the...

Speaker: Oh, you could do that if you wanted to. You don't have to. was just kind of saying that. I was making a reference. I'm not doing it. It just happens when you say that those that word, that key phrase. A look to the future?

Speaker: Shit. Don't do it like that. First of all, I'm not sure it happened there because you didn't do it in a way that was like, you didn't give it in A to the future. look to the future.

Speaker: Yeah, that one might have happened, actually. That one might have happened. The other one might not have. But you never know. I can't tell you how it happens because it happens on its own. Anyways, regardless of that, this has been episode 108 of Split Focus, a film and TV podcast. And I appreciate you listening, audience.

Speaker: My name is Simon Eadie, and this is Adrian Pinter waving on the screen here that you can't see because this is audio only. Signing off. Thank you. Take care. Goodbye. Goodbye.

Speaker: A look to the future!