Transcript
Speaker: All right, everyone.
Speaker: Let's talk about Halo season two, episode seven.
Speaker: We are getting very, very close.
Speaker: One episode left before.
Speaker: Well, sorry, one episode left, which will be the season finale.
Speaker: But before we get there, we have to start here with episode seven.
Speaker: You know,
Speaker: Rob, obviously I've been very, very critical of the show, even though I've said it does things better than season one.
Speaker: I feel at this point, season two is obviously to me an improvement over season one, whether or not I like it, you know, has, has been a different story.
Speaker: Clearly I have not.
Speaker: You have, uh,
Speaker: been more favorable, gotten more enjoyment.
Speaker: Um, I don't want to dare say like it overall.
Speaker: That's for you to say, but you definitely have gotten more enjoyment.
Speaker: Uh, we had some maybe revelations you would call them in this episode.
Speaker: I think it still suffers from some of the same things that I have complained about, but to me, some good in here too.
Speaker: Um, and maybe the promise of,
Speaker: We're about to turn a corner.
Speaker: Now I've said that before, but again, there are some things in here that I said, maybe we just need to wait to get to season three for this show to be what I want it to be.
Speaker: And if this show goes for, you know, four, five, six seasons and three, four, five, and six are great.
Speaker: I guess who cares about seasons one and two at the end of the day, even if this only goes to a third season and the third season is a holy shit knockout of the park home run.
Speaker: Who cares about season one and two?
Speaker: But we don't know about that yet because we have to get to the end of season two and we have to find out whether or not it's greenlit.
Speaker: I would think it would be considering all metrics of this show show it better than season one.
Speaker: But let's talk about episode seven.
Speaker: Yeah, I've been hearing some of the same stuff that...
Speaker: It's been doing well.
Speaker: People are watching this.
Speaker: I am seeing more buzz about this show in places that I go online and just people talking about it.
Speaker: There's been a lot more written about this show than there was in season one.
Speaker: I feel like this overall so far has been a better season than season one, you know, just as a whole.
Speaker: But I feel like the highs of season one were higher.
Speaker: Certainly the lows of season one were much, much lower.
Speaker: I still don't feel like we've got a great show yet.
Speaker: I think, I think it, a lot of this hinges on the, the season finale as most, you know, seasons of television do whether or not it's going to matter.
Speaker: It would be, it would be incredible to me if this did not get renewed for a third season on a show called halo.
Speaker: That's all about fighting on ring worlds.
Speaker: And we've not even really been to the ring world.
Speaker: Like they're, they're going there this time, but, um,
Speaker: Yeah, I'm hopeful for a third season.
Speaker: And I think we kind of talked about this a little bit last week.
Speaker: There's definitely shows that you recommend to friends and coworkers and acquaintances that you're like, oh yeah, this is a great show.
Speaker: It's one of my favorite of all time.
Speaker: But the first one or two seasons are kind of rough.
Speaker: They don't really find their way.
Speaker: think about how the people talk about the office, you know, like the, it really takes them some time to, to figure out what works about these characters.
Speaker: And then once they do it, it really takes off from there.
Speaker: So maybe this is, maybe this is like that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, it, uh, again, I think there's some, I think there's a lot of good here and, you know, this is really the first episode where I went,
Speaker: The things that they're doing and they're talking about and showing actually make me forgive the lack of, and I'm air quoting master chief.
Speaker: Because you got some, when I say revelations, if you know this series, you got some pretty big moments here in which you're going, okay, I know what this is supposed to be.
Speaker: I know where this is supposed to lead.
Speaker: And those scenes certainly are with Dr. Halsey and Quan.
Speaker: There's a lot in there to talk about, about what they're finding meant and what we're going to see now.
Speaker: if they just play it straight.
Speaker: And that had me really excited.
Speaker: I thought some of that stuff, um, not so much some of the execution with the dialogue.
Speaker: I still cannot stand Quan.
Speaker: I think she's, you know, uh, she is plain vanilla ice cream, which is normally great, but you're just sitting there staring at the scoop on the ground.
Speaker: You can't do anything with it.
Speaker: Like, oh, like,
Speaker: Oh, I want you so bad, but I'm not going to pick you up off the ground and eat garbage.
Speaker: Like, darn it.
Speaker: And it's a shame because she's actually tied to something very interesting right now.
Speaker: But just her character is so...
Speaker: To me, unlikable.
Speaker: Like, it's so unrelatable you can't get attached to it.
Speaker: But I will say, because there's not a ton that I actually had wrong with this episode.
Speaker: But one of the things that I just want to get out of the way, Rob, is, you know, I kind of found it funny that, you know, we finally get Master Chief back in uniform.
Speaker: you know, minus his helmet still, but they're still going on this purpose that it's like, you just have to believe it.
Speaker: And again, I'm saying this from a fan of the show that is just watching the show from the beginning.
Speaker: So I would love to,
Speaker: To talk to somebody because the crazy thing is, is like nobody in my circles is watching or talking about this show.
Speaker: So it's like normally I have a whole group of people that I talk to about something like this.
Speaker: You know, this is not one of them, but.
Speaker: to me, somebody who's new to this universe and is just watching this show and is like, well, I'm not going to go play the games.
Speaker: I'm not going to go bother to read about anything.
Speaker: Like everything I'm getting is from the show and you're enjoying it.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: But there's still all of that.
Speaker: hearing about what master chief has done to me.
Speaker: He's still not this, this symbol and like what they make him out to be in this show.
Speaker: And even when people see him or he's having his conversations and like, do you know what it would mean to them to see you fight with us?
Speaker: And it's like,
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I did love how when he's walking by though, and he's seeing these billboards, you know, finish his fight master chief.
Speaker: I love how they didn't even bother to actually have his picture be of the suit in the show.
Speaker: They ripped it from the video game with the lighter green, you know, the more, you know, color accurate green armor instead of this darker suit that he has.
Speaker: I just kind of found that funny that, well,
Speaker: What master chief is that?
Speaker: Cause that's not the suit he wears.
Speaker: You know, I kind of sort of caught that a little bit too.
Speaker: And it wasn't until like, there was something about it that just kind of registered in the back of my head, but it wasn't until you just said it there that I really understood why something kind of jumped out at me.
Speaker: I think in, in this, in the universe of what the show is trying to tell, I think that just speaks to some of the propagandist nature of the UNSC.
Speaker: Um, um,
Speaker: Because so much of what they do is built on falsehoods and lie and misdirection and getting people to die valiantly for the cause and things like that.
Speaker: So yeah, they're going to misrepresent it.
Speaker: They're going to gin it up.
Speaker: They're going to really cartoonify it to try to make it look even more a certain way as opposed to the realistic way.
Speaker: But at the same time, and I have this same problem with this episode that I did
Speaker: in previous episodes.
Speaker: And it's a, it's a major complaint that I have about what Perangoski is doing is what,
Speaker: like you're fighting a war for the survival of your species.
Speaker: You don't have to create support.
Speaker: This is not an enemy that there is like mitigating circumstances or like other, like, you know, certain factors like, well, you know, we kind of provoked this.
Speaker: So like, there's none of that.
Speaker: They want to wipe your species from existence, murder all of you.
Speaker: Like you don't need to get the public behind you.
Speaker: They're already there.
Speaker: And that's where so much of this season has been a problem for me.
Speaker: And we see that again in this episode.
Speaker: But it's like you don't need to create a martyr out of chief.
Speaker: The people are already into it.
Speaker: It's not like they're going to pull funding for the war against the covenant because it's like...
Speaker: It's not like modern wars in our world where the public is either behind it, not behind it, or gets tired of it and doesn't want to spend taxpayer dollars on a war in a foreign nation anymore.
Speaker: We're not talking about the war in the Middle East.
Speaker: We're not talking about the war in Afghanistan.
Speaker: We're not talking about Ukraine.
Speaker: We're not talking about any of these things.
Speaker: We're talking about an alien species hell-bent on the elimination of you.
Speaker: You don't need any more support.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, you know, that is the thing that is one of the problems, you know, that I had.
Speaker: And also, too, it ties into, you know, Eccerson, where it's that to me, it was very, very typical.
Speaker: All of a sudden, you know, oh, you can't you're sending them in.
Speaker: This is my life's work.
Speaker: It's like, I don't know.
Speaker: Your cause isn't much nobler than.
Speaker: you know, what's her name, sending all the Spartan threes to their death.
Speaker: Like you were, do you know what it reminded me of?
Speaker: It was giving me, it was giving me a final season game of Thrones vibes where they just sent the Dothraki out against the Knights King just to have them all immediately slaughtered.
Speaker: Like, like just sending out all of your cavalry immediately to just all die with no backup and no support.
Speaker: Like, it just seemed like,
Speaker: for whatever reason, they just wanted to have all those things die.
Speaker: And it's, it's tactically just as stupid to send all of your assets into a wood chipper like that over and over and over again.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: And I understand.
Speaker: I had a little less of an issue with it later when you realize that all she needed was one soldier to get in there with one spike.
Speaker: And it literally takes care of all of those problems.
Speaker: But at the same time, like she's got no backup plan, apparently.
Speaker: So she's just continuing to send all these Spartan threes out as fast as they can make them.
Speaker: And what really makes me ask again is what, what was the benefit of trying to martyr the chief?
Speaker: If all you needed was one spike, he's literally your best soldier.
Speaker: Who's got a better chance of pulling it off than him.
Speaker: And if what you're really trying to do is kill him off, uh, one stone, two birds, one stone.
Speaker: So it makes the whole,
Speaker: Problem I have with them just allowing reach to just get glassed and millions of people to die.
Speaker: All of these military assets to just go up in explosions, especially their best assets.
Speaker: It still makes me scratch my head going, what, why is this here other than to create conflict for the show?
Speaker: I don't understand these decisions.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Because there's naturally enough conflict with your race, your species being extinct.
Speaker: There's enough conflict there.
Speaker: There's enough to go with.
Speaker: And yeah, that's kind of the biggest thing is it's manufactured conflict for the sake of it, where there's just a lot of natural stuff.
Speaker: And I know that a lot of what they are doing was...
Speaker: You know.
Speaker: They call it, I believe, like the Silver Age timeline where this stuff was actually after the games came out, the lore was expanded upon.
Speaker: And I realize there's a time and a place for it, but it's like you could have.
Speaker: boy, you could have done some of this as let's get through halo.
Speaker: And then, I mean, the walking dead did it, obviously, you know, we've talked to, you know, there's been all those talks about ratings and the decline of the walking dead and how it went from being the most popular thing in the world to like, Oh, whatever, I'll catch it.
Speaker: Or maybe I won't.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: But you could have done some of this stuff as a spinoff.
Speaker: You know, you could have done.
Speaker: Oh, we're doing one season.
Speaker: That's the fall of reach.
Speaker: A limited time five episode release.
Speaker: You know, I mean, The Walking Dead, the ones who live is six episodes long.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: Like and it arguably has.
Speaker: but not even arguably it has your most popular character and that entire series with, you know, Rick finally coming back to the show and they're only giving him six episodes.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: you have your person who is the mainstay and who people wanted to see in that series and he gets six episodes.
Speaker: So there's, there's something there where you could have done and, and went with, you know, the halo ring and everything else is what they wanted to see.
Speaker: And, and one of those things is what I'm going to talk about in a minute here.
Speaker: So there, there does seem to be, you know, I can't even say there is still those weird decisions because at this point, like, you know,
Speaker: they have to finish the story that, that they've crafted.
Speaker: So, you know, even though it doesn't make sense, I get why it's happening in the context of this is a story that they're telling, not saying that it's good or I enjoy it, but I guess in this episode, maybe I'm a little bit more forgiving.
Speaker: This one kind of was my, okay.
Speaker: Like I was able to maybe kind of,
Speaker: break away and have a little bit of a maybe out of body experience with, okay, what are the things that I actually like?
Speaker: I, I focused more on what I liked about this episode more so than what I did for the first time in a lot of, of these episodes.
Speaker: Um, and go, go ahead.
Speaker: I was just saying, just, it must, uh, you must've caught this on a moment.
Speaker: You were just kind of in a good mood.
Speaker: I'm thinking, cause you, you've given this a lot more credit than you've gotten, uh, than you've given anything else this season.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And again, I think that's because of the fact that, you know, there's certain things that happen here where I go, okay, this is what I want to see or, or this is the lore.
Speaker: And these are the hints that I was waiting for.
Speaker: And, and one of those is, you know, involving Dr. Halsey and, and Quan and I'm, it's slipping my mind right now.
Speaker: The other, the other name, Miranda, Miranda.
Speaker: Um, I don't know why I forgot that having a fricking brain fart.
Speaker: Um, but more connection to the forerunners and certainly a call and a, a wink and a nod to the fact that spoiler alert people.
Speaker: Sorry, if you don't know anything about this, um, cover your ears.
Speaker: The flood is a thing.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: If you know this universe, you know that what they saw and what that is built for is a protection against the flood.
Speaker: And I went, that's what I, this is the lore I want to see.
Speaker: This is what I want it going towards.
Speaker: I want to know that this is where it's going and they could pull the rug out from under me.
Speaker: But this really was one of the very few episodes where I was like, if you're not going to give it to me and we're going to do a slow burn, this is how I wanted it.
Speaker: You've you've done something that actually really captured my interest and I thought was a way to introduce something that was done.
Speaker: Moderate, like moderately well, I still think some of the performances and the dialogue from these actresses was was stilted.
Speaker: but what it was representing was very interesting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The light bridge, the doorway, so cool.
Speaker: And it's amazing that they spent this kind of time really catching the detail and making those things game accurate for this environment when they've literally lit the script of the entire game series on fire up to this point.
Speaker: But they made those details really cool.
Speaker: And to have kind of a forerunner body there,
Speaker: was really kind of like, okay, what's going to be going on here?
Speaker: And the mysticism, not mysticism, but the mystery, I guess, is the word I'm looking for about who these people were and the fact that there's a connection between their DNA and our DNA.
Speaker: All of this stuff is kind of the sci-fi lore that is around a really fun shooting game that keeps you engaged with what actually is happening to the people that are doing the shooting.
Speaker: and why their mission is important and it's and why their mission matters.
Speaker: It's, it was really like, okay, we're, we're starting to get some of the good stuff here.
Speaker: Yeah, I really did.
Speaker: Um, think, you know, we had some pretty good stuff in here.
Speaker: Um, you know, I, I didn't like, um,
Speaker: I didn't like his whole, oh, well, you can't sacrifice my Spartans because this is my life work.
Speaker: I'm like, you should not feel bad about the sacrifice of the Spartan threes, considering you were so complicit in the absolute annihilation of God, what hundreds of thousands of people.
Speaker: You know, he says life's work.
Speaker: That program is like two weeks old.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: It's like, that's it.
Speaker: It's your life's work.
Speaker: Get the hell out of here.
Speaker: So wasn't necessarily, you know, a fan, a fan of that.
Speaker: But.
Speaker: I did actually like, um, I almost want to skip over that opening scene, um, with John and McKee because, oh God, um, you know, if we've talked about two people not having chemistry, um, I don't think those two actors, actor and actress have chemistry together at all.
Speaker: I just don't.
Speaker: Um, I just don't agree with it.
Speaker: And I don't,
Speaker: Again, how many times in a dialogue do we have to get?
Speaker: We're the same.
Speaker: We're not.
Speaker: Oh, I see it.
Speaker: We're like, oh, my God.
Speaker: Like, stop.
Speaker: It's bad.
Speaker: Like, find something else.
Speaker: But, you know, one thing that I did find, I was like, wow, they did a pretty good job here.
Speaker: And I've been pretty critical, I would say, of.
Speaker: You know, Pablo Schreiber and his acting skills in certain scenes.
Speaker: But I thought he did a pretty good job in the scene where he's with.
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: What is her name?
Speaker: Why am I forgetting it, Rob?
Speaker: I told you I'm having.
Speaker: Brain hearts here.
Speaker: Kai.
Speaker: Um, I thought there scene where she's going to go and she's going to be with the Spartans and, you know, he says like, I'm, I can't go with you.
Speaker: I actually thought that was a pretty well acted scene from both of them where I felt some genuine emotion there and like a real, um,
Speaker: yes, I understand why you have to do what you have to do and you understand why I have to do what I'm going to do.
Speaker: And that scene made me feel like, yes, like they've been a team.
Speaker: They know each other.
Speaker: They've, you know, they've been through the ringer together and that mutual respect there.
Speaker: And even after a lot of the missteps that I thought they had between those two characters, I thought they managed to play that off well enough where I was like,
Speaker: Oh, I kind of feel for this.
Speaker: I liked that a lot.
Speaker: I think the dynamic between the two of them is probably the most interesting one on the show overall.
Speaker: The small gripe on that, you know, Kai seemed very loyal to these Spartan threes that she's leading.
Speaker: But again, the program is like two weeks old, maybe three.
Speaker: Like, you know, you think about how long that, you know, the how long has it been since Reach has been destroyed?
Speaker: Has it been a month even like, you know, that's all the longer that this thing's really been, you know, think about Perez.
Speaker: Like she was on reach, not as a Spartan three, like, and now she is.
Speaker: So it can't be that old of a program.
Speaker: It's like a kid with their toys, right?
Speaker: They're, they love it for two to three weeks.
Speaker: And then all of a sudden it's like, I could have just bought them the box that it came in and they would have been fine with it.
Speaker: Like, yeah, it's very much like that.
Speaker: But I agree with you that that scene overall, you know, I liked how that dynamic worked.
Speaker: I did enjoy that.
Speaker: There's there's a scene kind of towards the beginning that I kind of hated.
Speaker: You mentioned the opening one between McKee and John and the less that we talk about that, the better.
Speaker: Almost immediately after I think it is the next scene is when the MPs kind of come in and they're going to arrest John and then they're going to shoot him.
Speaker: And it's just that whole scene is weak.
Speaker: It's really not well explained why they, why they end up choosing not to follow orders.
Speaker: Like, it's just kind of like, they've been following orders on everything else up to this point.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: every time they've had to arrest John or do something that is just under orders, but obviously we as an audience member know isn't right, they've gone along with it.
Speaker: And at this point, they're still drinking the Kool-Aid from the UNSC and Oni on what... That these guys are bad and they're deserters or they're traitors or whatever.
Speaker: He's collaborating with the enemy or whatever.
Speaker: They don't know that any of that stuff is bullshit yet.
Speaker: So it's never really...
Speaker: we're not given great reasons why they choose not to like they, they decided to show up and then they show up and they're like, nah, I'm good.
Speaker: It's terrible.
Speaker: It's almost like there was like a fricking deleted scene where like they saw like, you know, John who was supposed to be, you know, almost a terrorist, you know, a traitor, like save a bunch of people or save their fellow soldiers.
Speaker: And like, oh, well,
Speaker: You know that that realization like oh he's not such a bad guy after all like why would this guy that we were led to believe did all of this like why would he risk his life to save our group or to like no he just walks into the room and all of a sudden they're like oh hey what up man like yeah you know it just doesn't make sense um
Speaker: And, you know, speaking of not making sense and tell me if I missed something here, but I actually went back and rewatched it.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: Soren, I knew you were going there.
Speaker: I knew it.
Speaker: I knew it.
Speaker: He he he finds his son.
Speaker: He beats up these people.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: you know, the same group that turned him into a Spartan.
Speaker: So he, he saves his son and then turns around and basically treats it like he's picking his son up for the weekend.
Speaker: He just, he doesn't like run up to him and hug him and hold him.
Speaker: It's, Hey son, how are you doing?
Speaker: I'm your dad.
Speaker: Like there's no emotion there that like, Oh, I've got them back.
Speaker: There's just nothing.
Speaker: And then,
Speaker: The mom and the son just disappear and he literally stands there.
Speaker: He doesn't know.
Speaker: He doesn't run after them into the mist.
Speaker: He does nothing.
Speaker: He just stands there like a freaking buffoon.
Speaker: Did I miss something with this scene?
Speaker: Is he like, well, that's a lot less stress in my life.
Speaker: Like what?
Speaker: I don't understand what happened.
Speaker: If you missed it, then so did I, because the last two or three episodes that this plot has been running for, I've not understood anything.
Speaker: It's like he's not going to reclaim his son because he's going to allow him to become a Spartan when he's only ever hated the UNSC and what they did do it.
Speaker: Like, you know, he's got that mutation of his arm or whatever.
Speaker: You know, he was raiding their ships and their resources.
Speaker: Like, so then he just flips to wanting to be back as a Spartan and have his son go through the same trauma he did.
Speaker: Explain this to me like I'm five.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What...
Speaker: What?
Speaker: Like, are you are you kidding me?
Speaker: This this makes no sense at all for any interest that I had in the character of Soren.
Speaker: It's gone.
Speaker: Like, I just want this dude off the show.
Speaker: I want I want him, the wife, the kid, just let them go back to their little meteor and be space pirates or whatever and never see them again.
Speaker: I don't need them in the show anymore.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And hopefully we get the only thing that I hate about that is, um, uh, it seems like we're going to have to get some sort of finality in the season finale of that storyline.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Preferably, I'd love not to see it at all, but I don't want that dragged into season three.
Speaker: I don't want it my season finale because, you know, the the ending of this episode, again, I've been wrong before, but gives you the the hope of.
Speaker: Oh, here's what it gave me.
Speaker: It gave me that feeling of, and I know a lot of people didn't like it when it first happened.
Speaker: I wasn't one of those people.
Speaker: I was an initial reaction to the ending of the Halo 2 game.
Speaker: And Rob, you'll know this.
Speaker: We've talked about this before, like people that were around when Halo 2 first came out.
Speaker: There were some divided opinions on the ending of Halo 2.
Speaker: I was a fan right off the bat.
Speaker: I was like,
Speaker: Hell yeah!
Speaker: Like, oh god!
Speaker: Um...
Speaker: I'm just, I'm so like, oh, that's so awesome.
Speaker: Because basically the ending of Halo 2 is, you know, Master Chief and he's on the ship and he's asked, you know, Master Chief, what are you doing?
Speaker: He's like, sir, finishing this fight.
Speaker: And I was just like, back then I was like, oh my God, I can't wait for Halo 3.
Speaker: Like, this is freaking awesome.
Speaker: Like, that's Master Chief.
Speaker: And the ending of this episode is,
Speaker: kind of gave me that feeling of, oh man, like here's master chief going to finish this fight.
Speaker: And, and that's what I want is I want,
Speaker: Master Chief, he can even have his helmet off for a little bit of it.
Speaker: I don't care.
Speaker: But I want Master Chief going, I'm going into battle.
Speaker: Like, you're going to see 117.
Speaker: That's what this episode gave me.
Speaker: Now, again, I might be hyping myself up, but this episode really made me go, yes, like, go get him, Master Chief.
Speaker: And I have not had that feeling with this show, admittedly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, seeing him in the, in the Pelican, actually, I think it's a condor on his way to the ring world.
Speaker: Like it gives me hope that at some point the ring world is going to be exploding.
Speaker: He's going to be driving a warthog and we're going to have this great orchestra playing the theme song with the heavy metal guitar.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Like it gives me hope that that'll happen, that we're going to have him, you know, master chief doing master chief things.
Speaker: Like it's,
Speaker: It could happen.
Speaker: It could absolutely happen.
Speaker: I'm optimistic.
Speaker: So I guess the question that I want to ask, let's go ahead and predict.
Speaker: Do you think you will be satisfied by next week's season finale or not?
Speaker: Will you regard, do you expect to be sitting here next week saying, I was satisfied with that?
Speaker: I actually have a resounding yes for that.
Speaker: I oddly do too.
Speaker: For as much as I've complained and we've complained.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, I believe so.
Speaker: You know, I was good.
Speaker: Lord, with this show, I was the Cavaliers fan burning LeBron's jersey when he went to the heat.
Speaker: Like, I'm the guy putting my copies of Halo video games in a trash can and lighting it on fire.
Speaker: Like, screw you.
Speaker: Like, yeah, you know, I've been.
Speaker: very vocal about my dislike for this show, but there, there was just something overall about this episode where again, whether it be the right frame of mind or whatever the case may be.
Speaker: And I really don't care what you chalk it up to.
Speaker: There's just something about this episode that I went, huh?
Speaker: I feel like they struck the right balance of,
Speaker: Halo and what they're trying to do with Halo.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: When this thing gets things right, wow, is it fun.
Speaker: It's good.
Speaker: You know, the battle scenes, when you've got human forces and covenant forces going at each other, it's really well done.
Speaker: And we have to be getting some of that next week.
Speaker: Hopefully they kind of tie some of this up.
Speaker: I'm hoping they can figure out a way to
Speaker: alleviate some of the issues I've had with the overall strategy of, of the human forces that seem to make no sense at all.
Speaker: If they can wrap up some of these other side plots that have just not been compelling, I gotta be saying, I don't really know what's going on with McKee and I don't care that I don't know.
Speaker: That's where I'm at with that character right now.
Speaker: It's just, she's on screen and then she's off screen and then I'm more interested in whatever happened before and after.
Speaker: And I just like there, there,
Speaker: Something is going on there, but I just, I can't be bothered to care about it.
Speaker: I think one.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: I'm horrible.
Speaker: You know what I want for her character?
Speaker: an energy sword well no i want her character to succumb to the flood if she has to stay on until season three and it's like oh even if it's episode one or two and they get like you know they get to the ring world at the end of this season but season three is really where we get you know the kickoff and
Speaker: boy, I would love for her to just be engulfed in a swarm of flood.
Speaker: I want her to be standing there and...
Speaker: I'm sorry, audience.
Speaker: You call me sick.
Speaker: I want John to be standing there and just watch her get obliterated.
Speaker: I'm one.
Speaker: I think you could actually make that really good TV.
Speaker: And maybe you could draw some major emotion out of that.
Speaker: But I'm just I'm done with her.
Speaker: Like, I'm done with her.
Speaker: I'm blessed.
Speaker: I'm tied to the frickin arbiter.
Speaker: Like, no, I'm done with it.
Speaker: You can.
Speaker: So much of it doesn't make sense.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It just doesn't.
Speaker: The mysticism again in this show is, is always a miss whenever they try to pull it out.
Speaker: Stick with the sci-fi less with the mysticism.
Speaker: It never lands.
Speaker: It's, it's not compelling.
Speaker: It doesn't make sense.
Speaker: They don't even follow their own rules half the time with, with how some of the stuff works.
Speaker: They don't even bother to establish rules.
Speaker: I think sometimes it's just like more sci-fi in your sci-fi.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Let's add more fantasy into this.
Speaker: Yeah, it's totally just I don't care.
Speaker: Like, it's whatever.
Speaker: Yeah, I could I could get into your idea.
Speaker: I kind of wonder, and I was thinking about this as it became obvious that they intend to use the flood at some point.
Speaker: Will people who are just watching this show without a familiarity with the games that they're allegedly derived from.
Speaker: when the flood shows up and we kind of have this zombie story now that it's going to turn into, will, will people go, okay, what just happened?
Speaker: Why did this just shift into a totally different genre?
Speaker: Like I thought I was watching one type of show.
Speaker: I was thinking about that.
Speaker: Will people with, who don't know this, this property have that, have that feeling.
Speaker: And I think that'll be interesting to see how they work that in.
Speaker: See, I, I don't think, I don't think there'll be like, why did this change?
Speaker: Because, um,
Speaker: I feel like the way this show is, and I feel, you know, the way that this season has been perceived, um, I believe they will, they will keep the same people on, you know, um, that, that did season two because it's better rated, um, you know, in almost every single metric, they will keep the show runners on this time for season three, unless for whatever reason, the show runners don't want to be a part of it.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: And I feel like they're going to take, you know, two, maybe three episodes max where you get a lot of exposition, maybe from Halsey and things like that, where if Quan and, you know, are still going to be in this show going forward, I feel like you're going to get an episode of them exploring things and you're going to get a lot of expositional dialogue or, you
Speaker: shots, murals, you know, from the forerunners of this race.
Speaker: So people will be like, oh, so, you know, this is why X was created.
Speaker: This is what this means.
Speaker: This is what they saw in episode seven of season two.
Speaker: I think they might unfortunately take too much time to actually exposition it because they've already shown that, you
Speaker: we're not just making this show.
Speaker: So it's okay.
Speaker: The fans, they've sometimes gone out of their way.
Speaker: I feel to annihilate the fans of this series to make it more encompassing.
Speaker: So I don't think it'll be like a real, well, what the hell?
Speaker: Like, where is this?
Speaker: Why is this switching genres?
Speaker: Like, why is this like sort of this monster mash kind of thing?
Speaker: I think they're going to take too many episodes to actually explain what the hell's going on.
Speaker: That could happen, or I'll tell you, I'll give you the, here's a free idea to the producers.
Speaker: Just have 343 Guilty Spark show up, give like a couple of sentences of like bored explanation of what's going on, and just have them just be totally blasé, like, what, you didn't know that, and just move on?
Speaker: That's what I want.
Speaker: You know, good lord, I almost forgot.
Speaker: Like, I literally forgot up until you just mentioned that.
Speaker: Yeah, like just let him show up, say like three things just as bored as he possibly can say it in his monotone kind of like robot voice.
Speaker: And then just like, but you already knew that, didn't you?
Speaker: Like just the way that he does it and just like and then just leave it at that.
Speaker: And then no further explanation needed.
Speaker: Like, oh.
Speaker: Yeah, I think we haven't had a chance to kind of touch on yet.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: was very effective for me.
Speaker: There were two moments in this episode where Miranda refers to Halsey as mom.
Speaker: And I thought, okay, that was, that's kind of an interesting step here.
Speaker: Um, I thought the first mom was, I thought the first mom was effective.
Speaker: I thought the second one was not necessary.
Speaker: Um, yeah,
Speaker: Because of the fact that she had called her Halsey before that as well.
Speaker: I thought the first one was very effective.
Speaker: I thought that the placement of the second one was a little off.
Speaker: But I did kind of go, oh, like, yeah, you know, that's actually something here.
Speaker: And it made me think about that relationship to a degree I hadn't thought of it when they first, like, re-meet, so to speak.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: When, when Miranda is asking Halsey about Jacob and, and just kind of how that happened, the opportunity for two people who are grieving for different reasons, but, but kind of the same reason and, and not able to get over their own issues with one another to be able to allow them to grieve together and kind of heal together because that relationship just doesn't exist.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: if it starts to get to that point where maybe they can have that, I thought this could, this could get interesting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I definitely think there's some interesting stuff there.
Speaker: And I thought Miranda did a good job of, you know, that first like, Oh, well, if anybody could,
Speaker: make it out and you know what it's it's him and well no I I saw it I thought that was a well acted scene like yeah like oh okay yeah I I feel for you yeah I I kind of would like to see how that continues to progress you know I don't need Quan involved like I think she's just kind of gets in the way of it and and again it's it's it's this extra again this is layer of mysticism that is not needed in this universe for me to enjoy it
Speaker: Yeah, again, it's mystic enough.
Speaker: Like, it's a goddamn... You're fighting an alien race with a giant ring that houses a planet inside of it.
Speaker: Like, I don't need anything else.
Speaker: I don't need mystic women walking across the desert who are dead leading you to something.
Speaker: Like, I don't need that.
Speaker: It's unnecessary.
Speaker: So, but, um, you know, I don't really have, um, I don't have anything else.
Speaker: Are there any final thoughts?
Speaker: Um, you know, that wouldn't be part of our, our, our popcorn time review section that you have.
Speaker: I'm good.
Speaker: Let's grab some popcorn.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So with popcorn time, this is going to be probably one of my favorite ones to do for this show, because, you know, again, doing this, there are times when we've reviewed movies that it's like, oh, it's terrible.
Speaker: But and Rob knows this better than most.
Speaker: I live for some of that terrible stuff where I get.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: enjoyment out of it.
Speaker: And I'm like this.
Speaker: I love talking about how bad it is because either it's so self-aware that it's bad, that it's funny, or it's so unintentionally unaware that
Speaker: of how bad it is that that makes it funny as well.
Speaker: Cause it's like, wow, you, you really thought that you were like delivering Shakespeare here.
Speaker: Um, you know, and, and there's different varying degrees, but I never like reviewing something.
Speaker: And I've said that with a couple episodes between seasons one and two, I've said that with movies where I'm like, I don't like to just rag doll on something because I know there's still no matter what,
Speaker: a lot of hard work that goes into it.
Speaker: There's a lot of people that are away from their families, away from a loved one if they don't have kids or something that put a lot of effort, a lot of time.
Speaker: And I'm sure that can be devastating to sit there and go.
Speaker: And you've seen it with so many people where
Speaker: you know, Jake Lloyd from Star Wars and, you know, all of these people that get this backlash about their performances or about the property that they were in.
Speaker: And it's like, you know, Rob, you and I have said it like it's never okay to sit there and like personally attack somebody.
Speaker: Like I can sit here and say, I don't think this person was very good on it, but I'm not sitting there and saying, you
Speaker: You're a horrible human being.
Speaker: You should die.
Speaker: Like, you know, it never gets to that level.
Speaker: But I still don't like to rag on something when it's bad.
Speaker: And I also don't think it makes for a very good review because there's not too much to say.
Speaker: So with all that being said, I really feel like this episode was, for me, this was the even the
Speaker: the season for net, like this was one of the best episodes out of the two seasons.
Speaker: Um, believable performances, lore that I was interested in storyline threads that made me go, Oh yeah, you know what?
Speaker: These two have a relationship.
Speaker: There's something there.
Speaker: I'd like to see that developed in pending danger more so than boy, there's something worse than the covenant out there.
Speaker: Um, the anticipation of, um,
Speaker: the full-fledged halo ring and like you said what could we see from that an all-out battle um this really was kind of a an episode for all the senses so to speak and i haven't really been this excited about this show in general but even with its flaws there was something about this episode that i stayed attached to the television because there hasn't been one episode in season two where i haven't went
Speaker: oh, Jesus Christ, like, this is boring.
Speaker: Or like, why is this show so bad?
Speaker: This was not that episode.
Speaker: This was, all right, I'm watching.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: There was something bad there.
Speaker: Didn't linger too long.
Speaker: You did something to make up for it.
Speaker: So I actually give this episode four buckets.
Speaker: I really enjoyed it.
Speaker: Gave me a lot of hope.
Speaker: And yeah, I just think they did.
Speaker: You know, usually it was for every one step forward.
Speaker: It was three or four steps back.
Speaker: I thought with this episode for any one step they took back, they took two or three steps forward with what I wanted to see.
Speaker: So I enjoyed it and it gets a four from me.
Speaker: So I think you talked me into raising mine a little bit, but not by much.
Speaker: And you definitely, I think, like this more than I did.
Speaker: I'm going with a three.
Speaker: There's still some things that I'm just like, God, why is this here?
Speaker: This doesn't make sense.
Speaker: This doesn't make sense.
Speaker: I need things to make sense.
Speaker: I need things to have obvious reasons why.
Speaker: Or at least some of the actions of the UNSC, even if it's not...
Speaker: It's obvious what they're doing, at least, okay, like, there's got to be a secret meaning here, why they're doing this, or why they're allowing this obviously stupid thing that they're doing to happen.
Speaker: And I don't think that's actually the case.
Speaker: I think it is just, I think it just really is as dumb as we think it is.
Speaker: So, so there are those things here.
Speaker: Um, but some of the other parts do work and are effective and I am excited for next week and I am looking forward to it.
Speaker: And I do think it'll be a pretty satisfying resolution.
Speaker: Uh, but this one for me, I just on its own is a three.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, I, I think this is the first, is this the first time that I've ever rated an episode higher than you?
Speaker: Uh, at least in season two.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: I don't remember season one, but it definitely in season two.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'd have to go back and look in the show notes, um, for those episode recaps, but yeah, definitely for season two.
Speaker: But, um, yeah, this, this is the first one where I've said, Hey, uh,
Speaker: I liked Halo.
Speaker: So it was a good, it was, it was a good feeling though.
Speaker: It was, it was a good feeling to watch this episode and actually watch it, not sit there and feel like it was dragging and, and just do it.
Speaker: Cause again, I feel like sometimes it just, it doesn't lead to a lot to talk about without repeating.
Speaker: I just didn't like it.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: We're going to be coming up on the season finale.
Speaker: I look forward to that.
Speaker: Getting a little bit busier of a week.
Speaker: We are going with Ghostbusters Answer the Call.
Speaker: That'll be coming out this week as we move along in the series of Ghostbusters.
Speaker: Also going to be diving into X-Men 97.
Speaker: Absolutely my favorite character.
Speaker: show when I was a kid, X-Men, the animated series, uh, watched it religiously, bought the VHSs, uh, rewatched it the first day I got Disney plus when that launched, um, you know, just a show that I grew up with, bought the FLIR cards, um,
Speaker: Just in such an iconic show and iconic theme.
Speaker: And Rob, you and I have talked about this, that as good as the MCU was for me personally, you know, X-Men was the thing for me.
Speaker: I wasn't.
Speaker: a Marvel guy when I was growing, I was an X-Men guy.
Speaker: I wasn't all Thor and Captain America and this and that I was X-Men.
Speaker: So, you know, when those X-Men movies came out, that's what I wanted.
Speaker: You know, that's, oh my God, X2 is incredible.
Speaker: Logan, the Wolverine, um,
Speaker: You know, I think X-Men First Class, Days of Future Past there to me, some of those moments in those movies are better than some of the great moments in some of the stuff that they've done in the MCU.
Speaker: So, you know, X-Men 97 is something that I am so, so looking forward to.
Speaker: Yeah, I think that you can draw a lot of the success of adaptions of comic books.
Speaker: You can draw a straight line to the X-Men animated series.
Speaker: So much of the buzz around comics was X-Men.
Speaker: And certainly the animated series really gave a great framework.
Speaker: There was the all-time classic arcade side-scrolling beat-em-up that was adapted directly from this.
Speaker: There's a lot that if this show didn't exist and if it wasn't the way that we remember it, if it didn't have those nostalgic feelings, you wonder how viable other comic book adaptions would have ever become.
Speaker: I'm not saying the MCU wouldn't have existed, but I'm wondering if it would have existed without something like this to really set the stage that you can take these popular characters that were huge at the time.
Speaker: I mean, you're right.
Speaker: It was...
Speaker: there were the X-Men books and Spider-Man people read, but outside of Spider-Man, like Thor, nobody was reading Thor, like Namor, nobody was reading Namor back then or Silver Surfer.
Speaker: Like nobody, nobody gave a shit.
Speaker: It was X-Men.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And you talked about it when we were reviewing the MCU, you know, as we're wrapping up, you know, Iron Man was what?
Speaker: Like the number, like,
Speaker: all the way back in like the one, like the best selling comic before that movie was like 27th.
Speaker: He got beat by Buffy, the vampire slayer, right?
Speaker: Like a, as a comic book as a smashing success.
Speaker: So it was, yeah, the X-Men were, you know, the X-Men were the thing.
Speaker: Everybody knew that.
Speaker: And, you know, going back and, and watching that cartoon as an adult, there's all of these things that like one that show holds up incredibly well.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: for the first few seasons.
Speaker: Now those later seasons, when they change the animation, there's, there's some definite misses.
Speaker: Um, but you still get some pretty good episodes in there.
Speaker: Um, but you go through that first and second and third season, and there's some very like, um,
Speaker: adult real world, you know, topics and things that you can now sit there and go, this is the message that creators were, were also sending, um, you know, with the X-Men and what it represented with society.
Speaker: There's, there's so much that you can pick from, or you can just choose to say, um,
Speaker: Well, geez, I like it.
Speaker: I like Wolverine's attitude.
Speaker: I like Xavier's hopelessness, optimistic that Magneto's going to turn himself around and humans.
Speaker: There's just so many good things about that show to enjoy.
Speaker: So, yeah, I'm really excited.
Speaker: I almost wish they'd take the approach of dropping everything at once, but we're only getting those first two episodes.
Speaker: And then weekly until...
Speaker: uh, all 10 episodes released.
Speaker: So we'll be, uh, doing that series as well.
Speaker: And then I got to figure out time to get out and see Winnie the Pooh, Blood and Honey 2, and Godzilla Kong, the new empire.
Speaker: Um, so a lot of stuff coming out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So for listeners who had kind of been noticing that some of the content was dripping, dripping, dripping when you were used to a little bit more regularity.
Speaker: Oh, don't worry.
Speaker: We got you, baby.
Speaker: We got you.
Speaker: Regularity is coming back.
Speaker: So even trying to convince Rob to get back into our watch parties of the Resident Evil movies.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: you know, so we'll see if I sometimes I, I gotta, I gotta bribe them with a six pack and pizza, but we'll see.
Speaker: We'll see what happens there.
Speaker: But listeners, thank you so much for, you know, joining us for this season two recap of halo.
Speaker: We have one more episode to go.
Speaker: I look forward to, you know,
Speaker: joining with Rob and bringing that to you.
Speaker: So listeners, before we sign off, make sure you go into the show notes.
Speaker: If you want to contact the show, comment on anything, you can get all of our links for Facebook, TikTok, Instagram,
Speaker: Any of those are in the show notes.
Speaker: If you want to email the show with what you'd like to see next or anything, just take the letters of the show.
Speaker: Matt goes to the movies and condense that down.
Speaker: It is MGTTMPodcast at gmail.com.
Speaker: Send us over your ideas, what you've thought of this or any episode, and we will be back very soon with more reviews.
Speaker: Thanks, everybody.
