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The Death of Physical Media - Hollywood has lost the plot
14 Plays7 months ago
Brian and Dave speak about AI trends, Hollywood and streaming going quantity over quality, and the death of physical media.
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Transcript
The Death of Physical Media
00:00:01
David Isaacs
All right. Welcome, everybody. This is episode two, the death of physical media. I am joined here by my counterpart, Brian. Brian, how are we doing?
00:00:11
Brian Leithead
Good, good. Glad to be back on this episode, this podcast where we like to call it Lesser Help, where we try and figure out our problems just talking out here on this podcast.
00:00:23
David Isaacs
Oh, yeah. And with that, we are promising to try to clean up the o's and the oms as much as possible, but really working through it.
00:00:33
David Isaacs
We're not.
00:00:33
Brian Leithead
I don't know about that.
00:00:36
David Isaacs
Really working through it, it's probably going to take some time. Editing is kind of tricky. AI has been. Not working as well as I would have hoped and I feel
00:00:48
Brian Leithead
Well.
AI Skepticism and Society Impact
00:00:49
David Isaacs
like they Yeah, Brian.
00:00:52
David Isaacs
I feel like we're just using it. They're using us to train So they marketed it as a something that you could use but it's really we're just guinea pigs being used to train their model and
00:01:04
Brian Leithead
Yeah. For sure. It's like, uh, it's like the morphine drip, right? Or it only works with like one click and then the other clicks are just kind of, uh, psychological in effect. So we're. Those other clicks are really just for training the data model, unfortunately, but, you know, it is what it is. We'll get better, you know, with the ozz and ums and the ozz. We'll clean it up if we have to do it ourselves. And if it takes a hundred episodes, we'll do it.
00:01:30
David Isaacs
Yeah, like I was telling you, I went to my local Taco Bell and they had an AI trying to take my order and it sucked. I didn't know how to replace things.
00:01:42
David Isaacs
Like, let me get the number six or whatever it was instead of a soft, a hard taco, give me a soft taco. And it just kept adding soft tacos to the order.
00:01:49
Brian Leithead
Oh no.
00:01:52
David Isaacs
It wouldn't replace the hard taco that was part of the combo.
00:01:56
Brian Leithead
It's like, dude, where's my car AI edition? You want a soft taco?
00:02:02
David Isaacs
Yeah, I don't know. So I have not gone back since that experience. I refuse to because I ah ah hate feeling like I'm just being used. But don't market a product that says it can do something when it obviously doesn't work. And I'm just feeding you more data to be able to work off of.
00:02:26
David Isaacs
Like that is you don't charge me for a product where you're using my data to make your product better.
00:02:36
Brian Leithead
I agree. I'm glad you don't want to be training the Yokiro Taco Bell data model anymore, Yokiro LLM. So ae yeah, I feel like that's the kind of general consensus right now with a lot of AI products, maybe now chat GPT, but I feel like every time I sign up for some sort of AI product, at it's faulty in function and doesn't want do what I wanted to do. It feels like I'm doing what it wants to do. So that's fun. Also read that James Cameron has signed on to be on some board of directors for an AI product. So I think he knows something, you know, now that we don't know, especially something that he knew back in the 80s. So I don't know. I'm kind of skeptical currently of how AI works, but
00:03:28
Brian Leithead
is also the fear of Skynet, so I don't know, maybe just one day that it's all just training us to take over our nuclear stockpile and take over the world. Who knows?
00:03:39
David Isaacs
Yeah, I think
AI vs Human Creativity
00:03:41
David Isaacs
there's always the general fear that AI is going to take over enslaved humanity or something's going to happen. Nuclear codes get hacked, nukes get fired, whatever apocalypse happens. But I think in the interim and the short term, there's just so much at stake, too, with people's jobs, with Spotify wrapped. There's a lot of talk of how bad it was this year.
00:04:08
David Isaacs
And they included some A.I. podcast that was when I looked at it was four minutes long and was basically just giving me a round of applause at what music I listened to or what podcast that I listened to this year. And it, you know, I didn't get to see I think it was Tempe, Arizona was the most close that my music tastes were. And there were other like fun things that they included last year that they didn't include this year. But They fired a bunch of people they're trying to use AI to replace things and it just isn't there. So now we wanted to talk about like the death of physical media, but I think the We're getting into a stage of where they're trying to create like death of creation like human content creation they're trying to find a way to
00:05:01
David Isaacs
use AI or use data that's already been produced to produce new things. And that was the whole thing with the writer's strike and whatnot. But I think even the bigger picture is with being more late stage capitalism, a lot of the benefits in that that our parents and grandparents had, you know, stop calling things nine to fives. They're not nine to fives anymore. They're eight to fives. We have to They don't pay for lunch anymore. Pensions have gone. Instead you get 401k matching and hopefully the company matches enough because by company match, it leaves a little bit more to be desired, I think. But yeah, so just general depth of physical media. Now we're getting to the point where companies are trying to cut as much costs as possible.
00:05:54
David Isaacs
and sinking all this money into AI, where I really think the work that I do and i I think the work that a lot of other people do, it's not so cut and dry that you can just use AI to replace these people. And instead they're thinking of having people use AI to kind of help them do these jobs. But it's kind of a weird cultural thing where people aren't wanting to use AI because it makes it seem like the AI is more important than they are. And if every company continues on this path, you know, there's going to be less people to be able to buy their product, pay for that subscription for their product.
00:06:35
David Isaacs
or service or what have you so it's really weird it's kind of it's kind of scary when you think about it but I know genuinely generally genuinely whatever there's just so much discourse on a company level so many things that are inefficient when it comes to middle upper management that I really don't have too high expectations that some of this stuff is going to be integrated anytime soon, or the people that want some of this stuff integrated don't really understand how it works. So... We'll see. I don't know if you've, well, you've used chat GPT. I've used chat GPT, but there's other environmental risks. I think it uses a AI uses a ton of power. So I think that's another reason people are saying it's not great, but the general sentiment on Twitter and some other places that are frequent, they're just really demonizing AI. And I think rightfully so. I don't really.
00:07:43
David Isaacs
Find it very useful, especially trying to cut out the uhs and the ums on a podcast or trying to order a fucking taco. Like, are you kidding me? This is this is what we're using this for.
00:07:56
Brian Leithead
Yeah, I totally didn't know about the Taco Bell thing until you said something. But I, I'll use it like I'll use chat TBT for like, like boilerplate code for if I'm doing like a brand page. So I work for a plumbing company and we are part of their e commerce division. So I do a lot of like Amazon, eBay, Walmart, marketplace,
00:08:18
Brian Leithead
things of that nature. And the the program that we use, it's called like channel advisor is a pretty intuitive program. They're starting to generate their own, you know, kind of AI, quote unquote, data analysis, for the people who are kind of maybe new to data analysts or e commerce, you know, a lot of people who are are on e commerce are starting their own company,
00:08:43
Brian Leithead
You know, they're maybe looking for an easy way and a cost efficient way to do things, um, for their website. And I'm running my own side business and you know, the amount of programs that people offer me on a day to day basis for, for AI, it's, you know, you're going to, uh, move your, your website or build your website for you in 10 to 15 minutes.
00:09:03
Brian Leithead
And that's like, when I, when I, when I do this product, it's, you know, it looks like a big pile of shit. Like I'm trying to order Taco Bell front the drive-thru.
00:09:11
David Isaacs
Yeah.
00:09:14
Brian Leithead
You know, it really does dehumanize and devalue maybe the human principle in in work and kind of that creativity. ah ah Again, It's not like I'm saying that AI, in my opinion, is completely useless or anything of that nature. It's just it has its purpose. And I think companies trying to rely on it. Now, I work for a company of 75 people. The, the cost for, and i'm I'm especially in an industry that you can't really benefit AI that much, right? Like we somehow build like a customer kiosk where a plumber can come up and make their own orders. But, you know, the family that owns the company is a very customer first and they want to have that sort of relation, personal relationships. So.
00:10:06
Brian Leithead
Um, again, I don't know if they're necessarily against the idea of AI, but, um, they are definitely a personable and, uh, customer friendly forward company. So, um, and they've had relationships with some plumbing companies going back a hundred years. I mean, my company's been open for since 1920. So not necessarily old school. They, they're ah the, my direct VP is, uh, very technology forward.
00:10:36
Brian Leithead
Um, and especially with getting new business ideas, but none of which of this involves AI. So, um, again, I think it has its place in the world. Uh, Taco Bell is not one of them. I mean, I feel like if I go through a Taco Bell, even with AI, the order is going to be wrong 90% of the time anyway. So setting your expectations accordingly.
The Decline of Content Quality in Media
00:11:00
Brian Leithead
Um, although the 90% that I've 99% chance I've driven through Taco Bell. I was probably drunk or high so you know Whatever I would still eat the food anyway, but that's a ah ah different topic so Yeah, I AI definitely takes the the human the human nature out of an interaction of Everyday life for me and I will use it when I need it But it's not the first thing on my mind when I wake up
00:11:33
David Isaacs
Well, you weren't going, you weren't driving high or drunk through the Taco Bells though, right?
00:11:38
Brian Leithead
correct yeah that uh is not what i was doing i was the passenger but apparently i was uh you know one responsible for the orders even though i was incoherent at those at that time yeah i don't want to get canceled over taco bell orders to make that the ai get canceled for that
00:11:44
David Isaacs
Gotcha.
00:11:51
David Isaacs
Right. Now I just wanted to make sure we cleared that up just so it wasn't taken out of context anywhere.
00:12:03
David Isaacs
Yeah, well, that was the weird thing because there were still people listening to it. So after 30 seconds, a minute of trying to explain like how it should change my order. Somebody had answered like, oh, yeah, let me take care of that for you. So they're still listening on it. And I know there's been talk of.
00:12:27
David Isaacs
robots, AI, replacing fast food workers. There has been talk about that for a long time, even without AI robots doing things instead of people. But again, I think the, there needs to be more of a fraternity of companies that kind of get to and understand that. With out these workers in specific areas, like you cut off, let's say 1% of the workforce in a year.
00:12:57
David Isaacs
or 10%, five, 10% of the workforce in a year, it's going to drop pretty much every company's profits. And the people that are currently right now, you know, it's just my opinion, but a lot of people bought houses over the last few years, or our rent prices have gone up a ton, housing prices have gone up a ton. A lot of people's money is going into these mortgages or being able to pay the rent or just regular things that they need, groceries, bills and things of that nature. So I think companies in general at this point, like the more they try to take away from their employees, if every company is doing that, then you're losing out on these customers, your ability to grow and the things that you're doing for your business. So yeah, maybe you shouldn't be more worried about trying to capitalize on AI.
00:13:56
David Isaacs
trying to cut down on the cost it is for these workers and that, because with prices gone up, even at Taco Bell, and I think fast food places, inflation has been up a lot more because they started pricing based on the convenience that people are, once they show up, you know, they're less likely to leave than they are to actually order something. Maybe they're ordering less or whatnot. I don't know. I don't know all the the inner workings of the fast food economy and that, but I think just from a large, um, high, high level view, high level picture of just where we're at in industry and business altogether. It's like, I think if they just did, and even when I went to school for this stuff, most companies operate in a way that they really teach you to not operate in.
00:14:49
David Isaacs
But that's where it comes to be. We're trying to keep up with the Joneses, trying to do what these other companies are doing. And when you see Microsoft working within in. Well, Microsoft works within video, but more working with open AI and other companies start to follow suit, even if they don't have.
00:15:10
David Isaacs
Very much of an understanding of what AI can do for them, but now they're just hemorrhaging money trying to put together something that can give them some idea of a competitive advantage in whatever area and I think it I don't know. I'm hoping we get to a point where we kind of revert from technology, where we stop becoming so dependent on it. I think the VR is one of those areas that I think it's something that they continue to try to advance on, but a lot of people don't want it. But it's also hard to see with the newer generation coming up.
00:15:52
David Isaacs
how ingrained that is with them, because that's just how it continues to iterate. You know, it was our generation with computers where our parents didn't have computers or smartphones. Now every kid's got a smartphone or an iPad or things like that. So it's kind of hard to see like where it's trending at because they, the companies want to start them young in terms of getting the products in their hands and getting them using them on a daily basis or wanting to pay for them and subscriptions for streaming services or whatnot. So it is very, uh, kind of strange, kind of weird thinking about, you know, what the next generation, what's going to be the thing that they start up that the generations prior haven't really been integrated with.
00:16:48
Brian Leithead
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, kind of touching back on the point. I mean, so for context, David and I kind of got to know each other in a coding bootcamp.
00:16:59
Brian Leithead
We both fell for that Ponzi scheme back in 2022. And, you know, yeah, yeah, since then.
00:17:03
David Isaacs
Yeah, we got fucked.
00:17:06
Brian Leithead
So we, we started in September or I guess maybe October of 2022. And then I think, was it November or December? It was the first major layoff, right?
00:17:17
Brian Leithead
And then What was it? Was that Microsoft? I forget. There was a huge major layoff. And then in 2023, there was almost 200,000 people laid off. So between the time that we started bootcamp and now, I mean, there's been what, almost half a million layoffs just in the tech industry because of AI and other technology advancements. Now you, you know, it's like, they're really targeting, like you said, younger and younger.
00:17:47
Brian Leithead
audiences or kids to move this technology. I mean, that's kind of really always been the case. I mean, look back at like Home Alone when they had the voice changer, the voice recorder thing. Really, it was to target kids and just, you know, that's how the sales, right? I mean, look at any movie, any kids movie, the whole point is to sell merchandise. So if you market it a Moana, now every kid's gonna want a Moana,
00:18:17
Brian Leithead
action figure or doll, whatever you want to call it nowadays. Um, but now it's, it's AI and it's, it's VR. It's all this, this technology and it's, you know, like you said, we, each generation is getting more and more advanced technology and it's kind of almost like, uh, feels like it's kind of coming like to a world war one standpoint. What I mean by that is, uh,
00:18:43
Brian Leithead
The war tactics of World War I were far, far outdated for what the technology was. And that's why you had trench warfare and, you know, some military lines didn't move for four years of the war. So it's like, we're kind of coming to this point of attrition where it's like, does society kind of, it's like a tug and pull, does society been to technology or has technology been to society in Right now, everything's based on consuming content and just pumping out more and more maybe of less quality stuff. goes for AI, that goes for TV shows, that goes for a lot of things. But it's just more incentive to pump out, in my opinion, less quality things for the sake of
00:19:35
Brian Leithead
moving this product.
00:19:39
David Isaacs
Yeah.
00:19:39
Brian Leithead
I think it definitely makes for a lesser experience for us as a whole. I mean, you know, you look at Star Wars and it's like, yeah, I mean, a lot of the things since Disney has taken over hasn't been great, in my opinion. Some of it's been okay, but they just keep making things year after year and then None of it's really great, but it's just kind of firing up the people who grew up watching it from like the 70s and 80s. And that's just kind of turned them into a toxic fan base. And I'm just worried that it's going to kind of turn society into that as a whole. I don't know what your thoughts are about that.
00:20:21
David Isaacs
Well, there's a few things I think the Steve Jobs was. Maybe it was Steve Jobs or some CEO or whatnot kind of originated back. There's a quote from Henry Ford, and he had said, if I asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster their horses. And with jobs or whatever CEO said, it's like you're convincing the people what they want.
00:20:51
David Isaacs
Is if they ask you for something, you know, it's they don't really have a concept of like what the next thing is going to be. And kind of similar to what I was saying with, you know, the newer generation coming up, you know, like, what is the, what is the thing currently right now that they're saying you need? And I think it's AI currently as a product service, whatever you would call it.
00:21:18
David Isaacs
but yeah with Star Wars or other things like the reboots and that I think the The problem is is that Hollywood streaming services or whatnot, they're just creating so much content and they're kind of muddying the waters for what a good show, what a good movie is supposed to be. But I think if they can I think they think that if they continue doing it this way, then the next generation coming up or even the current generation will start thinking, you know, like, though this is just the norm.
00:21:53
David Isaacs
Like they'll have no concept of like what a good TV show is supposed to be. They wouldn't have seen True Detective season one. They wouldn't have seen Band of Brothers or The Sopranos. And they'll just watch and consume something, especially with Star Wars. The universe is so vast. So many stories. You know, it seemed like there's.
00:22:18
David Isaacs
nowhere to go, but up with the prequel trilogy that came out in the early 2000s, people originally hated it, hated it so much. And then the third trilogy comes out and then all of a sudden the prequel trilogy is seen in this better light. I'm like, no, no, no, no. I remember people hating this like Phantom Menace.
00:22:44
David Isaacs
was, you know, this was before social media, but anybody you talk to like, oh, that movie sucked. But now you're getting to a point where the newer and newer iterations of Marvel, Star Wars, some of these other franchises are just getting so bad that the content that they had produced previously is might be seen in a ah better light.
00:23:12
David Isaacs
But that's that's kind of where I'm not really understanding because streaming streaming kind of put the industry kind of flipped the industry on its head. And it's hard to get good people to work for editing, directing to do like a score, actors, writers, you know, the whole lot. So I think it's genuinely
Challenges of Adapting Existing Content
00:23:37
David Isaacs
harder to get good people in place to make something.
00:23:41
David Isaacs
So I think that's part of it. But I also think that these companies are just trying to pump out so much like original content that they don't have to pay for other movies and things on their platforms anymore. But I think yeah if I was thinking like a Hollywood executive, I think they're just pumping all this stuff out, so people just of get used to it.
00:24:05
David Isaacs
And it might not be the greatest thing, but hey, it's new. And that's where I got into going back and looking at some of these movies that were highly rated that didn't get a lot of notice.
00:24:21
David Isaacs
Right. I went and watched Insomnia, Christopher Nolan film with Al Pacino.
00:24:26
Brian Leithead
Oh good movie.
00:24:31
David Isaacs
and very good movie. Love and Monsters was a 2021 or 2020 movie that was supposed to come out right around the COVID shutdown in March of 2020. Dylan O'Brien movie. Very good movie. Very good.
00:24:50
David Isaacs
But then you have, I have not, for whatever Netflix movies that have been produced, maybe less than 10% of them have been worth anything.
00:24:51
Brian Leithead
Yeah, I like that.
00:25:04
David Isaacs
A lot of the, the Marvel stuff when it first came out, you know, you had Falcon and Winter Soldier, that was fine. Scarlet Witch, I forget the WandaVision.
00:25:16
David Isaacs
That was that was good. The Hawkeye and.
00:25:22
David Isaacs
Haley Steinfeld, I forget her character's name, not not as great of a show, but there are.
00:25:25
Brian Leithead
Oh, yeah.
00:25:30
David Isaacs
After true dissects, the season four, I stopped paying for streaming services like I that that really just set me off just so bad and.
00:25:42
Brian Leithead
Yeah, I They were dealing with the the supernatural part of you the universe, but they kind of forced a lot of connections that didn't need to necessarily happen. and all that first few episodes are fine but it just like the climax and and the payoff for the show are just so not worth it that um and then you know it didn't have uh i forget how you pronounce his name nick pizzalato the you know the creator of the show and the writer of the show like
00:26:15
Brian Leithead
wasn't attached at any point, and I understand that he screwed up season two and three. took his time with season one and he wrote it by himself, but then they wanted to keep creating these these these new seasons with different perspectives, different characters, and had to get new writers involved, so it kind of just got diluted down.
00:26:36
Brian Leithead
But yeah, i that's just kind of where we're at as far as content and really society as a general is everything was in my opinion and this is gonna make me sound so old my boomer take of everything's just not as good as it used to be like not even as of 10 years ago like for me when streaming really started going downhill it was with the movie bright which is the Christmas movie with where it's not really Christmasy but it came out around Christmas with Will Smith where he isn't like this like medieval he's like an LAPD officer
00:27:12
Brian Leithead
who is partners with an orc and there's like this whole murder mystery kind of thing vibe to it and like it had some good visuals it just like there's no substance to the story and then after that it's just because Netflix and these streaming services are just so desperate to keep like coming out with these like quote unquote hitters and for them to have their content consumed by their subscribers they just are just pumping out these like middling average things and like I just i I don't pay for Netflix anymore like I might pay for it again when Stranger Things was it season 17 feels like finally comes out after like two or three years and it's gonna be hard not to believe that those kids are still like 14 because they're all I'm pretty sure they're all in their early to mid 20s now I have to check on that but
00:28:09
Brian Leithead
They're definitely way, way, way older looking than when they started the show. So, ah ah you know, I don't know. i'm I'm kind of at a loss of as far as like good quality shows to suggest to people. You know, it's like back in the day, I could be like, oh yeah, I watched, you know, Simpsons season one through eight or watch Family Guy, even went to like, I don't even know what season we're on, 14 or something.
00:28:36
Brian Leithead
I just don't have that like confidence to be able to ah ah say that for any show or any movie that's on a streaming service right now. I could suggest a couple of theater movies or broadways, but yeah, I about watching or consuming any content on streaming platform at this time.
00:28:57
David Isaacs
Yeah, it's it's very it's very quantity over quality. And I will say Apple TV seems to be better in terms of quality shrinking after watching season one, recommending it to everyone. Season two has just been.
00:29:16
David Isaacs
I hate it. I really hate it. They the tone like Bill Lawrence is great Ted Lasso scrubs. They're apparently rebooting scrubs. And that's another thing with the reboots that I think they just can they just let these things die. And now Bill Lauren. So that's for ABC for the scrubs reboot. And then Bill Lawrence is tied to a different HBO project with Steve Carell. So it's it's twofold in the fact that They have writers or these show creators that are very good and now are being stretched too thin and the other side you have you know, God knows who producing episodes of TV for other TV shows or creating these movies for original content for Netflix or Amazon or whoever so I will give props to
00:30:10
David Isaacs
shrinking. It seems like everyone I talk to like season two, I hate it. Like the tone there. There's something there with like emotional.
00:30:20
David Isaacs
How do I explain this? But they go from like trying to be funny to trying to be serious, trying to be funny. And it's a sitcom. It's following like different people's conversations in different places.
00:30:33
David Isaacs
So they'll go from these people. Something serious just happened. Oh, let's jump over here. And this is like a funny like witty banter conversation happening.
00:30:43
David Isaacs
And I don't know. I feel like the tone's off. Silo season two is pretty close to House of the Dragon season two for me that the show is just starting to slow down so much.
00:30:54
Brian Leithead
Oh no.
00:30:59
David Isaacs
So there's a lot of the the insight into the industry. There's a lot of stuff going on. So it's either they're pumping it out with. God knows who creating it or they're a good creator. Now they're being stretched too thin because all these companies want to pay them a ton of money or these shows that realize that they have captivated an audience and have now just slowed things down so much to just try to get people to try to pump out more seasons of it. And Silo is not an original content. It's based off of a book series. House of the Dragon was based on
00:31:37
David Isaacs
I was it like a 14 page something from George RR Martin and the whole.
00:31:43
Brian Leithead
Well, there's there's a few different like kind of short stories that it's based on but yeah I mean the premise of it was yeah, I was like one short story out of one of the collections from ah Song of Ice and Fire Right
00:31:57
David Isaacs
Right, so let me bitch about Hollywood even more. There is there is so much good fantasy, sci-fi, writings, books.
00:32:10
David Isaacs
Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson, I have not read yet. Highly like most things by Brandon Sanderson are just great. Red Rising, I've read six of the books, the seventh book supposed to be coming out.
00:32:21
David Isaacs
It's basically Game of Thrones in space. Incredible.
00:32:24
Brian Leithead
Ooh.
00:32:25
David Isaacs
The first book of the it's called The Will of the Many, first book of a trilogy by an author James Islington, I believe is his name. Incredible book, but instead of creating new. And instead of marketing, trying to create like new new worlds, giving these authors money or just trying to create something new, they are continuous continuously with movies or even TV shows with the rings of power, trying to use old IP as a way to market like a new story within that universe.
00:33:03
David Isaacs
And I think it's it's awful. Like, give give us something newer, even Gladiator 2, which the sword and sandals movie, the best sword and sandals movie that Ridley Scott has made since Gladiator one. And most people enjoy that movie. But there are still a lot of stuff that I've left the theater like they could have changed five things and it would have been a great movie. But instead, there were pandering.
00:33:33
David Isaacs
to the original story, like you don't need to. You've already done it's already called gladiator to. Like if people hadn't seen the first one, you can give them a short recap of what had happened in the first one instead of pandering.
00:33:40
Brian Leithead
Yeah.
00:33:49
David Isaacs
Like I just don't get it. You you want to create something new. You want to do something to add to the story. Yet so much of the story is just pandering to older stuff. And even with True Detective season four, like we had talked about, and it's not like they didn't do that in season three as well. Like Nick Pozzolato or how are you pronounce his name? Like he is not unguilty of creating whatever season two and season three was, you know, but that's the other part of
00:34:21
David Isaacs
We don't know looking in like who got their fingers in on it. To change some of this stuff. And to further continue on it like Halo TV show.
00:34:35
Brian Leithead
What a pile of shit that was.
00:34:37
David Isaacs
Like, what the fuck is that? You have volumes, volumes of works that people that didn't play the video games would have enjoyed, would have liked it a lot.
00:34:50
David Isaacs
You know, it's space Marines against aliens. Dr.
00:34:55
Brian Leithead
We.
00:34:55
David Isaacs
Halsey, Master Chief, the Spartans in general, like just let Master Chief be an autistic Chad. He doesn't have to be this character that's there's something more about him.
00:35:10
David Isaacs
No, it you've ostracized the entire fan base that was most of who was going to watch your show, you would ostracize them. And it's not like they wouldn't have had things to complain about.
00:35:29
David Isaacs
if you were to change small stuff anyways. But those people, me included, would have been fine with just taking the cutscenes from Halo 2 and turning that into a show. Like if you were to just take all the cutscenes, I'd go on YouTube and there's a video that it's all the cutscenes of Halo Season 2 and it's an hour long.
00:35:52
David Isaacs
And I'll watch it. I've played the game however, many times I'll go back. I'll watch Rocky four. I know what happens. I still get pumped. But to do that to original content, like how original you want to call it, like doing your own iteration of something fine, but you, it, it baffles me just how out of touch they are with adapting original content as well.
00:36:19
Brian Leithead
Yeah, I mean, going back to Lord of the Rings, Rings of Power, I mean, the literal premise of this is based on 120 pages, I think actually even less than that out of the Cimarillion. They're trying to cut eight episodes, so 40 episodes, cause they have at least a minimum of five season commitment to this. And it's, I think season one and two were both eight episodes, but so you're committing at least 40 episodes to 120 pages session of a book, hey that was really just a collection of of things to begin with, and you're trying to piece a story together out of that. Like, I'm sure, I know that the Tolkien estate has signed off on this, but I'm pretty sure J.R. Tolkien's spinning in his grave currently because some of the things that they've done is cool. They, you know, they had ends, they've had, they've made elves kind of look
00:37:18
Brian Leithead
more human than they appeared in the movies like that's all cool but it doesn't advance Tolkien's works in any stretch of the imagination and then kind of going back to and like why wouldn't you just build off of the movies like I know they're separate entities and they are separate licensing but you maybe consulted Peter Jackson for the first season, you filmed in New Zealand, but you wanted the tax breaks, so you moved it back to England. But you don't capture any of the magic of the movies. Granted, you know, they're, they're, if you want to talk about a toxic fan base, I mean, what are the rings fans going back to even like the seventies before there were even chat boards were threatening to kill like Ralph Bakshi for turning it into a cartoon.
00:38:11
Brian Leithead
Then when they, you know, New Line Cinema and Peter Jackson got it, then more death threats happened. But then all of a sudden now, 20 years later, uh, you know, it's a, it's a beloved movie series. Um, so, I mean, that's a, that's a separate problem of people really don't know what they, they want sometimes, but, um, you're, you're just stretching everything so thin and you're trying to meet these, these moving targets that are so small.
00:38:41
Brian Leithead
with loaded gun of a caliber, you don't even know what you have. So it's like big missile, small target, or vice versa. And
Nostalgia for Physical Media
00:38:53
Brian Leithead
it's just like, it's just complete nonsense. And then I don't know, I could go on and on about how much I hate Hollywood and what this whole industry has become, you know, but we're,
00:39:07
Brian Leithead
kind of maybe stretching this topic thin, but I miss physical media. I still buy Blu-rays and DVDs. like I still go to the movie theater. I still buy popcorn. I do all of these things because I don't want to sit at my house all day on a computer watching like next episode of Hawkeye. I want to go out and have that real genuine experience, whether it's you, my wife, my other acquaintances, my other friends. like want to have like different varying opinions and i just don't want to get into that like online argument with somebody because with they appreciated Lord of the Rings Rings of Power because it was it wasn't the movie so it was something different but like and i don't want to be like sound like that token purist but i am and i hate the Lord of Rings of Power so again that's another i could fill an entire episode about how much i hate the Rings of Power
00:40:02
Brian Leithead
And it makes me so sad that shrinking season two does not sound as good as season one because I really did like season one because I didn't have any expectations for it. And I love Jason Seagal. It had all those awkward, you know, kind of humorous moments. But then also it actually had like a general connection with people, like with the characters. And I looked at about the show, but if it's trying to be completely serious, that just makes me so sad.
00:40:31
David Isaacs
it in know these characters on kind of a more personal basis. And I think the them being therapists aspects of it, and you have the neighbors and the patients and all these things, you know, was like a really good balance. And there's stuff in season two that is like that, like ah ah just the tones off for me and not only the tone, but just like the cutting between trying to be serious to not being as serious
00:41:03
David Isaacs
You know, I think in sitcoms, modern family did this very well, but it's kind of like the the different families all learning the same lesson in different ways.
00:41:14
Brian Leithead
Yeah.
00:41:14
David Isaacs
Which I thought was good, like I really enjoyed modern family for that sense. I mean, that's one of the ones that it's kind of like the office for me that I can put on in the background and.
00:41:26
David Isaacs
Not to pay much attention to it. It's like very witty, very funny and actors, actresses, everybody in that show was just so great. And even in shrinking season two, you know, the, the acting's good, but the dialogue and like the way that people interact is just like so.
00:41:45
David Isaacs
not close to like what a normal conversation would be. And I think that's really what's like turning me off of it is that it it doesn't feel that personal anymore because the the way these conversations and the way that they interact with each other is just so not realistic. But in terms of Yeah, so there are a couple things that we're trying to talk about here, but the.
00:42:15
Brian Leithead
Yeah, that's what happens when you talk about your passionate IPs, right?
00:42:20
David Isaacs
Yeah, yeah, but yeah, the the death of physical media, so I was thinking about it and we were even talking last night
00:42:31
David Isaacs
like the the prototypical like neighborhood kid or your cousin that would have the you know the hooters posters or the sports illustrated swimsuit up you know like the horny teenage kid tropes you kind of tell like you walk into the room and like see that stuff you know when i was a kid and it was the neighborhood kid or my cousin you know had certain posters and stuff up and uh with other people as well, you know, like decorating rooms and that, like posters, magazines.
00:43:02
David Isaacs
We used to have Game Informer, Nintendo Power, used to have the guidebooks to video games, the books of cheat codes that you would get at video game cheat codes that you would get at local book fairs.
00:43:17
David Isaacs
And just in terms of video games, yeah, with like all the discs,
00:43:17
Brian Leithead
Yeah.
00:43:22
David Isaacs
And I still have... I rebuilt my Nintendo 64 collection a few years ago. Seemed like the cartridges and I still have all my GameCube stuff. And yeah, it's fun to go in. You got the case and you have a little booklet that explains things, the game manual and the discs. But the... what really hit me is going to sporting events. So me and my friend, Swadley,
00:43:53
David Isaacs
Like, you know, Swiley, obviously, but for those that don't know, you know, we go to, we went to two or three DCFC games together this year.
00:43:55
Brian Leithead
Right, right.
00:44:02
Brian Leithead
Oh nice.
00:44:04
David Isaacs
And I used to miss like going to the big house or going to a lion's game or a tiger's game. Like back as a kid, you know, you'd have the physical tickets and they'd be great.
00:44:15
David Isaacs
They'd be embossed or you'd have like a picture of a specific highlight or whatever that was on it. And my stepdad went to game five of 2004 NBA finals. So we had like that ticket stub saved where they clinched the title Pistons clinched the NBA title. And yeah, just kind of missing things in that perspective. But I used to read the newspaper, you know, it was kind of.
00:44:42
David Isaacs
kind of cool to get up, you know, the newspapers out and you look at it and see kind of what's happening in the news and everything. And it was a great way to consume media outside of, you know, just doom scrolling on Twitter and getting to see, you know, whatever's happening nationally, but also DVDs and that like going to Blockbuster as a kid was just such a core experience and I just bought the, there's a Blockbuster like party game that I'm playing and I'm playing, you know, when my sisters come over for Christmas so we can play that, but just like a core memory, core experience to go in there and pick out like which movies you were gonna watch for that weekend as a kid or which video games you were gonna rent and what have you.
00:45:33
David Isaacs
And I know downloading games and the technology around memory that's expanded so much from when we were kids 20, 30 years ago or whatever. Just the how much more convenient companies have made things that make it so that physical media in general has just gone away because you can do pretty much any everything on your iPhone. You know, if you want to play games, you can play games on there. If you want to get the news, you can get news. You can watch Netflix. You can watch whatever streaming service or whatnot that you want. And that's great and all, but it doesn't mean that the nostalgic feeling of that is.
00:46:20
David Isaacs
You know, it's really core to my childhood. And I do have ah ah a buddy that has a room set up in his house, like a family video store and his DVD collections, movie collections. And, you know, he'll set him up for like Christmas and he'll have the the Christmas display of movies or the movies that he has come in or he'll show you, you know, some of these weird movies that he has. And I don't know, it's it is such a great experience and The movie theaters, I wish like more people would go and support some of these things. Obviously there's movies that come out and even movies that came out.
00:47:01
David Isaacs
When we were kids, you know, like throughout time that just suck, right? So I don't know if there's really more content that comes out that sucks than there did back then. But yeah, the the movie theater is still like a great experience. And like I said, just went and seen Gladiator two. Was it last weekend?
00:47:25
David Isaacs
And yeah, I mean, there are things that would change about the film, but it's cool to get a group of people out to go and do something. Right. Like there's not as much. Personalness around like talking about a TV show that you watched by yourself. It's good to get out to movie theaters and be able to have those conversations after the movies to figure out, you know, what people thought about it.
00:47:52
Brian Leithead
Yeah, my wife and I were down in Ohio for Thanksgiving, and we went and saw Moana 2 with her cousins at the local movie theater there. And yeah, it was a great experience. I mean, the movie itself is OK, and it's kind of you like a 1.5, more than a 2. It had great OK music. It's a Disney, almost Pixar-ish movie, so it's going to have great graphics and visuals, right? But it was the experience. We all got a giant tub of popcorn. You know, we went and saw it in 3D. The movie, the roof was leaking, apparently, because her cousin got dripped on and instantly freaked out and went and sat at the end of the aisle.
00:48:40
Brian Leithead
It's a fun experience you wouldn't be, it it maybe be able to have if you're just sitting at home on your couch, right? Like that's a, that's a memory that you form that you're going to be able to, to cherish and share with them for years to come. Um, and that's like, that's the whole thing for me is I can, my wife and I have our own separate shows that we watch, but you know, we'll watch, we're watching, um, Oh gosh, it's, uh,
00:49:10
Brian Leithead
It's made from some of the creators of The Office. It's like a hospital show. I forget the name of it. It's got David Allen Hyde and a couple other actors you'd recognize. But it's kind of like an office show. both love The Office. So we watched it, and we enjoy that. But that's something that we cherish, though, that we enjoy, that we have overlap, the Venn diagram, if you will, of The Office.
00:49:37
Brian Leithead
watch the show and we kind of have similar, maybe different takeaways from it, but we have that discussion. then we also have our own separate shows and, you know, if if I'm watching, gosh, like Tulsa King, which is another show, by the way, that season two is not go nearly as good as season one, but she'll come in and she'll kind of like listen or pay attention to it for a second and, you know, maybe get a laugh or give her opinion like,
00:50:03
Brian Leithead
that person so ugly or x y and z walk away but it's the personal experiences that i generally you know kind of harken back of this is what i miss about i used to go to the movie theater way more than i do now i mean i still go try and go once a month but i was going like every week to see even if know it was something ridiculous um like a guy rich in movie like i saw rock and rolla in theaters and that was
00:50:33
Brian Leithead
well over 15 years ago but again that was a movie that made me did maybe a hundred million dollars at the box office and but not a lot of people saw it until it came out and onto streaming my friend when I saw it we we skipped out of work we went to I think like it was like a three o'clock showing we saw it but we have the experience that we both called in sick to the same work you know played hooky and that we once saw, you know, a decent movie. we still quote it to really this day. And yeah, again, AI streaming, I don't feel like the sense of maybe tribalism as as do with other folks. It was like maybe when I was a kid, like you talked about N64, I still have mine and I still, I'll still jam
00:51:30
Brian Leithead
WWF no mercy. Like might actually turn it on after we hang up on this podcast, like the nostalgia and just the personal, the generating a memory that I'll have forever. And it's everything to me. I, I miss the times of when I was a kid of when I could go to blockbuster, you know, rent a DVD and Or even, you know, go and sneak into like family video into like the, uh, the nudie, the nudie films section when I was like 13, just to say that I did that.
00:52:03
Brian Leithead
Um, and you know, going over to my grandma's house, cause I didn't have cable and watching like the scrambled porn channel, hoping to see like a titty or something or whatever, a forehead maybe, but can't really get that now.
00:52:20
Brian Leithead
Everything is a one click away.
00:52:22
David Isaacs
You had the you had the scramble porn channel, too.
00:52:26
Brian Leithead
Yeah, we had a scramble for our channel.
00:52:28
David Isaacs
Oh, God.
00:52:29
Brian Leithead
Yeah, skin of Max.
00:52:33
David Isaacs
Yeah, I think it was Wow Cable or something. I don't know. Yeah, I remember that. I kind of wish that I wasn't subjected to pornography so young.
00:52:46
Brian Leithead
Yeah, we were.
00:52:46
David Isaacs
That's porn is another thing that needs to be gotten rid of, not in the sense of like needs to be shut down. I mean, people have their own freedom to make whatever they want, but I think the it's really ruining a lot of people, but that's a topic for a different time.
00:53:08
Brian Leithead
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, I guess I was kind of just like my final wrap up point for that was just, yeah, I mean, yeah, I had a titty channel, a scrambled titty channel, but I have the memory of that say that I still have that, you know, I feel like I'm Abe Simpson sitting on a tree stump telling him about how I had a lemon tree or something. So yeah,
00:53:36
Brian Leithead
Oh, as far as, uh, you know, something tangible, I still buy calendars. Um, you know, it's not like the swimsuit or some sort of manly one. I actually just bought, um, he's a comedian named Stavros Halkius.
00:53:49
Brian Leithead
He's a, uh, very chunky man and he does, um, tasteful nude, quote unquote, um, calendar. I bought that part of black Friday sale and I have that in my basement.
00:54:02
Brian Leithead
Um, I can share that on media, but.
00:54:03
David Isaacs
Nice.
00:54:05
Brian Leithead
Yeah, I like having a calendar. I like having a clock. That's not my phone. Like, I still have a giant alarm clock with illuminated, like, LED numbers. Just because I like, when I wake up, I like knowing what time it is, and I don't have to, you know, turn on my phone for blue light. That messes with my brain.
00:54:25
David Isaacs
Yeah, yeah. at At the gym, they'll have the the wall clocks that are still analog. I think they call them just the the the hands.
00:54:33
Brian Leithead
Yeah.
00:54:37
David Isaacs
So anytime in the sauna, I'll like look out and see like what time it is and then, you know, get back in. So I know what time to get out and stuff. Yeah, I probably need to get a calendar.
00:54:49
David Isaacs
I probably need to start putting more things into my phone calendar to remind myself of things.
00:54:55
Brian Leithead
Yeah, same, same.
00:54:55
David Isaacs
But. Yeah, the the nostalgia and yeah, just growing up like I still write things down. Like there there have been studies on and even in college, I took notes on notepads and there have been studies that say you retain that information better.
00:55:04
Brian Leithead
Oh.
00:55:13
David Isaacs
I haven't looked into those studies very much to kind of see the the validity, because I hate when Shapiro or some of these studies have shown like, yeah.
00:55:21
Brian Leithead
Yeah, one. That's a pretty good Shapiro.
00:55:24
David Isaacs
Yeah, I need to I need to know how many people are in that study. I need to know the demographics. I need to know how many times these have been replicated, but regardless of If those studies are valid, I still like writing things down. I got like little legal pads and that. And that's one of the things that I think I need to get better at is taking notes and like how you were saying before we got on about time management and that. So I think that's definitely something that I want to work on. And I know we kind of went off key here, didn't talk too much about personal improvement and kind of like where we're at and what goals that we want to work on.
00:56:03
Brian Leithead
Yeah, happens.
00:56:03
David Isaacs
I think for me, the time management thing is something that I'm going to look more into and focus a little bit more on and kind of. Another point to talk about that I don't think we've touched on is the nostalgia factor between different things. because nostalgia is good in some things to be able to go back. Like it reminds you of a simpler time. You know, as a kid, you didn't have as many worries and, you know, it kind of brings you back to a place to where you're more relaxed or you didn't have to worry about stuff like, you know, kind of talking in circles here, but
00:56:41
David Isaacs
I think it works well, like for video games, such as, you know, we had Ocarina Time, Majora's Mask, Legend of Zelda, or whatever Legend of Zelda was your Legend of Zelda growing up. And that continued on, like that series has gone on for well over 30 years and kind of like the newer generations at how what we had talked about their Ocarina time was Breath of the Wild or other people's Ocarina time was Wind Waker that came out on the GameCube.
00:57:16
David Isaacs
So there's certain IPs. IPs. ah Nintendo does it, I think, better than any other gaming company. I feel like most gaming companies, they kind of get away from that kind of stuff. But the continuation of that RPG style game in the Legend of Zelda, I think has been really great and.
00:57:36
David Isaacs
Some of the older people that I know that had played Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom really just didn't enjoy it as much. And I don't know if that's because they compared it more to Ocarina time or not. But that is one thing that I can kind of tip my hat towards, especially with Nintendo and the Mario games and the Mario parties, Mario carts, things of that nature that just continue on.
00:58:04
David Isaacs
And it's kind of cool, kind of fun to think about like, like your son, like what's going to be his when he's older, like what his nostalgia game is going to be or something.
00:58:14
Brian Leithead
Yeah, ah right right now and he's obsessed with Mr. Rachel, who's a, you know, sing along type of personality YouTube. So he isn't really broken away from that. So I'm not sure if he's going to be like 19 or 20 and watch, trying to watch my Rachel videos in college or something, but we'll see.
00:58:35
David Isaacs
Yeah. Well, whatever. Whenever he starts picking up video games or stuff, maybe you're going to have to
00:58:40
Brian Leithead
Right.
Expanding Media Consumption Beyond Nostalgia
00:58:41
Brian Leithead
Right.
00:58:42
David Isaacs
force him to start playing video games or what have you.
00:58:48
Brian Leithead
Yeah, yeah, I won't, uh, because like my brother and sister grew up with like Mario, um, but Metroid, that kind of generation of NES. Whereas I grew up with like Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil because that's what my brother was playing at the time. And that's the video games that I got into. So I think my, uh, my video game, uh, maybe nostalgia is different from, well, I mean, it's not always going to be different from person to person, but mine's maybe a little bit more twisted than Some other people.
00:59:20
David Isaacs
Yeah, yeah, I get it. My. Kind of like the earliest memories that I can remember were getting a Game Boy Color when I was pretty young. I could have been. Two or three years old, and it was a blister pack that had the Game Boy Color and had Pokemon Blue.
00:59:40
Brian Leithead
Oh, man.
00:59:41
David Isaacs
And I think my grandma had gotten me Pokemon Yellow as well. And I played the crap out of those games. even as a, you know, I didn't have really the skills or the knowledge to get through. I mean, I had the Charizard that was level 50. All my other Pokemon were like level six that was used for HMs and stuff. And never really got through those games until I had gotten older, but there's still ones that I can get back to. And the remakes that they had, like those are the Fire Red and Leaf Green.
01:00:17
David Isaacs
You know, I that was what ten years after they had come out or something like that seemed going back and playing it with the the better graphics and
01:00:22
Brian Leithead
Yeah.
01:00:28
David Isaacs
everything just just so great the way that this stuff kind of iterates on itself but i think and i wanted to touch on it and we could talk a little bit more on it and a different episode but i do think that nostalgia can kind of work against you sometimes as well not only you know i'm not sitting here playing pokemon blue and i should be working or whatever, but in terms of concerts and what I wanted to touch on when we talked before we had gotten on the episode, but I i looked up Bob Dylan's Stevie Nicks tickets. I was going to try to see if I could get those for a wedding present for a couple of my friends, in not great seats with obstructed views.
01:01:14
David Isaacs
And I think the new Linkin Park singer, Emily Armstrong, the music that they've released is pretty classic Linkin Park, but.
01:01:25
Brian Leithead
Yeah, they haven't their base for sure.
01:01:28
David Isaacs
Yeah, and she can't do. A lot of what Chester, I mean, she can do a lot of what Chester did, but not. Can't do everything. So Chester Bennington being in the old Lincoln park singer who passed the away a few years ago. So she can't do everything, but the newer iterations have been pretty good, pretty classic Lincoln park. I don't like you said, they haven't straight or anything, but I do think those are going to be other tickets that are just going to be so expensive.
01:02:01
David Isaacs
So what I wanted to convey is the point of There's other times where it's better to keep an open mind and look at different things, because knowing with Star Wars, knowing with Lord of the Rings or these different IPs, when people get their hands on them, they're not going to be nearly as good as the older iterations, where regardless of nostalgia, the three Lord of the Rings movies, I think, are all in the IMDb top 100.
01:02:30
Brian Leithead
Thank you.
01:02:31
David Isaacs
So the argument can't really be made in the original trilogy of Star Wars, I think are all up there, too. So it can't really be made that it's nostalgia. That's not why you don't like some of the older stuff. But they're working at a disadvantage anyways to try to get anywhere close to that level of quality. But kind of come to understand that if you can expand and for books, for movies, for TV shows, for music.
01:02:59
David Isaacs
Kind of look to other things, figure out other things that you like, because you'll end up maybe not being as mad watching Rings of Power or not having to spend as much money to watch a band that was key to your childhood or what have you.
01:03:07
Brian Leithead
Thank you.
01:03:18
David Isaacs
So it's it's cool to think about, but also like the other part of it when I'm thinking like, I've seen so many movies or watched so many TV shows or expanded my music knowledge into other areas that I wouldn't have before, but being open-minded and looking at reviews or things that are kind of underappreciated that maybe didn't get a lot of money at the box office, maybe that artists that are more unknown or just indie games in general because AAA games have been just such dog shit for the most part. So yeah, for anyone listening, just expand your horizons a little bit. Not preaching to you, but hope that you do.
01:04:04
Brian Leithead
Yeah, have
Episode Wrap-up and Future Plans
01:04:04
Brian Leithead
the Leonardo Caprio mindset where everyone in the 90s hated him when he did Titanic and ah ah Romeo and Juliet. But then, you know, you grow up and kind of learn to accept that he was great in those movies, number one. And then number two, he's just a great actor. His, you know, choice of women, women's age is a different story. But, you know, he's He's a great actor, you know, I don't think he can really deny that. Um, but you know, there's definitely that, that hate for Leah, especially among, um, you know, guys, because he was like the, the hottie that every, uh, girl in the 90s had on their, their poster on their wall. So, um, it's just about growth, just learning to accept certain things like that.
01:04:57
David Isaacs
Yeah, not only other things that you might enjoy, but other hobbies that you can get into like we did with the coding bootcamp. But that was thinking that we'd be able to find a different type of job, which you were able to, but, you know, grass isn't always greener on the other side now, is it?
01:05:19
Brian Leithead
yeah nope different episode different episode but yeah it's not it's not always sunny in Philadelphia that's for sure but
01:05:31
David Isaacs
Right. OK, well, I think that's. I don't know if you have anything else. I think we could kind of wrap it up there, but yeah, I would like to maybe structure things a little bit better and maybe we have to be a little bit more disciplined on specific topics, but I know we can.
01:05:52
David Isaacs
This podcast could be 12 hours long if I had enough time to bitch about Hollywood.
01:05:57
Brian Leithead
Yeah, that episode definitely got away from us, but that's what happens when you talk about rings of power in season 4 of True Detective. It's gonna bite ya. Overall, I don't have anything else to remember to keep your pets spayed and neutered.
01:06:17
David Isaacs
Yeah, expand your horizons, get some sleep.
01:06:20
Brian Leithead
Yeah. Don't, don't spare new to your, uh, your horizons.
01:06:25
David Isaacs
There you go. All right. Thanks, Brian. We'll talk again next week.
01:06:31
Brian Leithead
All right. Bye everybody.