December 17, 2019 • 53 mins
Listen to this episode, you will! This week Dani and Ify are joined by Comedian and 'Tigtone' Writer Joseph Scrimshaw to discuss the little green alien from a galaxy far, far away, Yoda! From Baby Yoda to Ghost Yoda, learn a little more about this tiny Jedi on this week's episode of Nerdificent!
FOOTNOTES:
Stuff We Love: 2004 Star Wars novel 'Yoda: Dark Rendezvous'
WIRED Binge-Watching Guide: Star Wars Rebels
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
What is up, everybody, and welcome back to another episode
of Nerdificent Time and one half of your host if
you are sitting across from me as always is Danny Fernandez,
and what is good? I feel like we both have
like really great radio voices right now. When you came in,
you sounded like you were like working at a station.
(00:30):
But do you My favorite thing about she's year round,
but my favorite the thing that reminds me of Christmas
is Delilah. Do you know Delilah? Oh my god, she's
like syndicated. She's syndicated, but it's like Delilah, it's always
like your local, like whatever the Christmas station has turned to. Um,
let me know, y'all if you listen to Delilah. I
(00:51):
definitely did when I was like in Dallas, but I
know she's syndicated all over and so she'll be like
this one is out to a special someone, Um, Richard
and your loved one is sending in Santa Baby, please
come home for Christmas, you know whatever. And so I
always do the jazz one where he's like, hey, how's
it going, y'all? This is Tony Jones over and T Jazz.
(01:16):
This one goes out to Candice. Uh, you know this
one comes from Bobby. He says, I know you're working late. Yes,
come home. There's going to be a play to Rice
for you. Oh my gosh. We should bring in our
guys because he's also in comedy. It is writer comedian
Joseph Scrimshaw. Hey, hey, hello, you also have I was
(01:38):
listening to you talk and I know that you said
you did a storytelling podcast and I'm like that so
makes sense. I mean, you do a bunch of them,
but like your voice is so we have a couple
of those friends. Mark Ellis is another one. Like y'all's
voices are very much Yeah, he's got a radio voice too. Yeah.
I spent years doing theater and then when I started
doing podcasts and be like, oh I don't have to
yell anymore. My voice is an octave lower than I
(02:01):
thought last. You have the rich undertone. It's like a
smooth cup of coffee with Bailey's in it. Thank you,
Bailey's in me right now. Yeah. Well, we always start
our show with what we're seeking out about. Joseph, what
are you seeking out about this week? I am geeking
(02:21):
out about Watchman. But if everybody has come in and
said that to you, I mean other thing I'm gonna
say it. I mean every week, it's just yeah, it
gets better and just sticks in your head. I think
the thing that I love so much is that the
that original comic book also cares about the history of
comic books. So that's what I was waiting to see.
And I love that the Watchman story is using like
(02:43):
the history of media and how like televised visual media
affects people. And yeah, I think that's just like a
brilliant layering into what it is. Were you a big
fan of the comics, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I read them
a lot over different ages, and like the first time
I read it's like cool, some punching, Yeah, some people
are angry, and yeah, I did not fully appreciate what
(03:03):
it was, and so I've read lots of different times
over my life. Yeah. I think what I really like
about this last episode is Damon Lindelof went down even
more than any any anime director ever of the best
fan service I think anybody wants, because I think the
moment that reveal happened, people were like wondering, like we're
(03:25):
gonna see and um, yeah you do. Spoil alert you're
gonna see that thing. Uh, Swan and a fine Watchman
tradition was I know, I know, I love that. Every
actor who's who's done it was like yep, yeah, we're
just gonna do it. Uh. Um yeah, is there anything
(03:48):
you're geeking out about, Danny? Is there anything like a
favor one of your favorite heroes, one of their like, uh,
their trailer for their movie came out. Yeah, I'm geeking
out about two things. One definitely uh you know Wonder Woman.
Of course, I'm excited to see what more eighties stuff
they'll play. I kind of want more of that, uh
(04:08):
like really showing the decade, but who knows. I know
that they also have to make it feel relevant. Um,
I think it's more playful. I'm I'm just fascinating to
see what they're gonna do because it's like who is
the big Like you know, they kind of did that
thing last time where they tricked us about who the
big bad was, so that I mean, I know we
have Cheetah and like, uh yeah, I'm just I'm I'm fascinated. Um.
(04:32):
Also very excited that I finally got to share my
news today about my HBO Max show, which like if
he has known about for a long time, and like,
there's so much hard work that happens behind the scenes
that nobody sees just for this moment. So it was
like kind of just waited. It feels like my entire
life to have my show announced. But yeah, so that
(04:53):
that was a really great, cool day. Thank you, thank you. Yeah.
I mean we've talked about I've talked about like my
history with depression and honestly also treatment a kind of
guinea pig myself. Uh, And so I'm really glad that
HBO Max like saw the value in telling this story
about like the humor that can be found and also
just like kind of making fun of the American health
(05:16):
care system. And you know when people say get help,
you know, ask for help, Like what does that look like?
Because it's not like just one straight trajectory, Okay, everything's
sunshine and rainbows. I asked for help. It's like a
lot of a lot of dark humor and failure along
the way. And so yeah, I'm excited to tell that story.
Thank you every single person that shared that and wrote me.
(05:38):
But today we were talking about something that I've been
seeking about technically extremely a lot into the Internet we're
talking about yoday. And also I'm a slide in baby Yoda.
As I'm a slide I'm gonna slide them in there.
Still don't know if it's everyone says him? Does John
Favreau refer to him as the child the doctor, the
(06:01):
creepy perhaps cloning doctor. Dr Pershing says him, Okay, wow,
So that's why people have been leading with that instead
of the normal reason that people say him, which is sexism. Yeah,
because the first couple of weeks of the Mandalorian, I
was like, uh, well, this would be cool if it
actually turns out to be a girl, like nobody expects it,
(06:22):
and it was like always taking care of this little girl,
daddy daughter, like whatever. So I'm still holding out of it. Yeah,
it is absolutely possible that the doctor did some bad
readings for the brief time that they had with Yoda.
This is like when I adopted my cat when I
was like seven and they said it was a girl
that we took it to the vet and they were like, no,
it's a boy. I did the same thing. Really. Yeah.
(06:43):
The cat came to us on fourth of July and
we named it like a Liberty bell and then like
the nope, and changed the cat's name to uncle. That's
so funny. Um, So, I guess you know your profile
pictures you with Yoda. Would you say that? That's like?
What is your connection? Why do have you watched onto Yoda? First? Like,
(07:05):
I think Yoda just spoke to me as a child
and I had the action figure and I thought about
him a lot, and you know, a lot of the
wisdom certainly came through. But then when I got to
be an adult and tried to reflect, like why did
he grab me when he was when I was a kid.
I think the way he's introduced in Empire strikes back
where he seems weird and kind of grabby and like
he's kind of acting like a child, but he is
(07:29):
secretly wise. And I think that's the way a lot
of kids feel like. They feel like they're kind of
acting out, kind of being a weirdo, and people are like,
can can you? Can you shut up and take me
to the real important person, the adult? And then is
a kid you feel like but no, I I'm wise,
I have things to say. And I think that's why,
especially when people are young, they connect with Yoda. He's
a secretly wise, Weirdoh yeah, and kind of like a
(07:52):
prankster to be honest, there's like so much humor filling him.
And I think this is the best time to interject
because there's a lot of uh, you know, debate because
people get mad that they call the child baby Yoda.
No one cares people and but I but you know,
it's because Yoda's race is never just like you talked
(08:13):
about like they they left it vague, so there isn't
a name for Yoda's race. Fans came out with tridactyls.
Uh oh, I haven't heard that fan theory. Yeah, because
they have three toed feet, so they call them tridactyls,
which I thoroughly reject. Uh, it's gonna be every one
of them is a Yoda. And it's because and it's
(08:35):
funny because like on the one level, it's just easier
and simpler, but on the other other level, that's just
like simple almost human linguistics, where if you the kind
of um colloquialism. Yeah, you typically like when people say, uh,
Q tip, like those are all every Q tip isn't
(08:55):
a Q tip. A Q tip is a brand, but
because it's the one that's more wide clean X to
clean x to band, you know, like that's just a
general thing you do. So, of course the one Yoda
that we've seen, the first one, will refer to the
race as Yoda. And I hope that whoever writes the
movie that finally names the race just trolls everyone. It
(09:18):
calls the race Yoda, so that all the baby And
it's because it's so funny, because also it's like, um,
because it's very it's such an obvious attempt to be pedantic,
because if you're mad at people from for calling baby
Yoda baby Yoda, you're you're purposely ignoring the fact that
there is not a name for the race like your
(09:39):
new Yeah Frankenstein's Monster. Yeah, pedantic, Like yeah, we could
say baby of the same ambiguous species of Yoda that
takes up a lot of doesn't sound funa, it's just yeah,
but yeah, they they are known as uh from for
some people, I'm not tridactyls. Yeah, I think that's a
pretty deep fan conjecture type thing. Yeah, after Yoda, but
(10:03):
before chronologically we saw Yoda with Yattle. Yes, yeah, who
also used the force as well. Can you talk to
us about Yattle for people that don't know, Yeah, Yeah.
So in the Phantom Menace, we see the Jedi Council
and there Yoda is leading it, and then there's just
a random lady Yoda in the background, like really, like
(10:25):
just the puppet was actually designed to possibly be a
younger Yoda. And they're like, we don't that doesn't work.
But how about a lady Yoda And she has long
auburn hair. She does not speak in the movie. Uh,
And then in uh the Legends comic books back in
the day she had some adventures and was fleshed out
in comic books and eventually died. So unattracted it is. Yeah,
(10:49):
the different legs are difficult. In that one, they're like,
she got two broken legs, like she crossed the I'm
not she looks like I don't know, like Mima, or
she's like I don't know, about to pass out, like
she's in the middle of telling a story, and then
just like her eyes roll to the back of her head. Yeah,
this is also a good time, is you you've done
(11:10):
collider and screen junkie stuff, right, And I can tell
because you talk like a movie nerd, And I say
I would love because you're not because you say movie.
Then the year which is something I always forget. Phantom
Menace and I was like, yeah, that that's that's that's
how you win. I could never survive on those because
(11:32):
I'm so bad with years, but gosh, yeah, that um
Phantom Menace was I mean, what are your you know, sidebar?
What is your general idea of the prequels? You know,
I've gone a long journey with the prequels. Bottom line.
I do think there's some rough writing, some rough dialogue,
maybe some rough c g I here and there. But
(11:53):
the more time I've spent with them, I have problems
with the execution, but not the movies. Lucas created really
specific theme and ideas, and I think it all ties
together into a really great story and adds a ton
to the Star Wars mythos. So I'm a big prequel fan.
At his voice, like and it's even the stuff that
I like, I'm not sure about that, like Yattle, Like
I was like, why is there a Yeattle? What the
(12:15):
deal with? You? Just so angry about it? And I
was like, there's a lady Yoda and her names Yattle,
and she's got weird chicken legs, awesome, what's not to enjoy?
I do love the fact that George added another person
to the Yoda race but still was like, we're not
going to give a name real attention to the Baby
Yoda thing of whether or not we're going to discover
(12:35):
because Lucas kind of kept wanting to explain things, and
he added Yattle, but he still didn't want to explain
the race. So it's been one of the really really
hands off things in all of Star Wars. Um. I
just love the wire reminds me of Dragon Ball with
like Goku goten Gohan, Like, I hope they keep doing that.
I hope Baby Yoda is something with Yoda Yattle's saying.
(12:58):
It's like basic on the naming function for both Yoda
and Yattle. It has to be why vowel d vowel
Like yeah, like if it'd be weird to change it
now rule of threes, we have to keep it going.
So maybe, yeah, how I would love Yado Yeddi Yeddi, Yeddi.
(13:22):
Are you Yeddi? Oh um? So getting back to the
creation of Yoda. So, the puppet version of Yoda from
the O G series was designed by Jim Henson, voiced
and performed by Frank Oz. The character went c g
I for the two thousands prequel, Oz recounted how director
Ryan Johnson courted his return for The Last Jedi that
(13:43):
said quote, we had lunch and Ryan asked me if
I wanted to be Yoda there, and I said sure.
I thought it was c G I. So I was
shocked when I found out they really wanted to do
the real Yoda, because that's a huge mass of undertaking.
But that's what they did. It just began with Ryan,
and it made sense. You couldn't have c g I
Yoda with Mark Luke because Luke wouldn't have a c
g I Yoda. The only Yoda Luke knew was a
(14:05):
puppet character. That's so sweet. Also, same thing happened with Mandalorian.
I remember, um, I'm forgetting his name, the older general. Yes,
I know where you're going and it's beautiful. Yeah. Do
you want to tell them the what he said? Yeah?
So he I mean, he said a lot of things
about how beautiful the puppet is. But there's there was
alleged report that they were wondering whether the puppet was
(14:25):
working on set and talking about should they c G I,
and apparently were hurts like your coward? Yeah, yeah, that
was so funny, so great. So this is I don't
know if you know this fact. George Lucas had originally
conceived Yoda's full name as being Mint Yoda. Yeah, okay, um.
And then the makeup artist Stewart Freeborn based Yoda's face
(14:47):
partly on his own that's really cool, and partly on
Albert Einstein's, which is not very I can totally a
thousand percent see then also not very flattering at all. Um.
In The Phantom Menace, he was redesigned to look younger.
He was computer generated, as we said, for two distant shots,
but he actually remained mostly a puppet. Yeah. So the
Phantom Menace he he was a puppet for many years,
(15:08):
and then they needed him to be digital for Attack
the Clones for his big lightsaber fight, and then they
went back and put digital Yoda into Phantom Menace. So
if you buy the Blue Rays, now we're watch him
on Disney. Plus, you're not going to see the the
puppet from Phantom Menace. He's all all the time, and
any prequels. Now, that's so interesting. I don't know why,
I guess to match it, I guess I think so
(15:28):
in that that that puppet was interesting. Okay, um, yeah,
so this is just finishing up on what frank Oz said.
He said, people don't realize that A great, a great
part of the reason why Yoda works is because of Mark.
It's because if Mark doesn't believe in that character, nobody
else will. What he does there is extremely important, always
has been. When we got together, it was just like
(15:48):
old times. He never changed. He is just a wonderful guy.
Very funny too. People forget that when you have c
g I you're looking at a tennis ball. Yeah, I
mean there's something to having frank Ozz literally being right there,
like mastering a puppet. Oh yeah, I mean I did.
There was an old show on Fox called Son of Zorn,
which it was a a live action animated show with
(16:10):
a Heman style character that was animated, and uh, I
did an episode and it was my buddy Dan Lippert,
who's like six something like has to be like, I
don't know his actual hype a six three six four,
And he was wearing this all silver suit and then
he had like the like a kind of eyeline on
(16:31):
his head so that people would look up and I
was like, yeah, this this definitely changes it because like
I'm not looking at him and I'm looking at my
friend in a weird silver suit, So so I can
imagine like it's using like those puppets probably give you
a better performance too, because especially if you've ever done
(16:53):
anything like you know, hyper We'll do had like perception
check of Perception Studios and now does it on their own,
where you would do dn D with puppets, and after
a while, it just kind of fades away and it
feels like you're, yeah, you're interacting with a puppet. Yeah,
I mean, I think puppets are so much better than
c J I. But for Empire Strikes Back, I think
(17:17):
there's that such credit to to Mark Hamill, because you know,
sci fi and fantasy wasn't as big of a deal,
and it certainly wasn't a big blockbuster movie to be
taken seriously and like Star Wars breaks the mold actually
having good effects. And then suddenly Mark Hamila has a
chalnge like you're not Harrison and Carry. You're gonna be
fallen in love and you're gonna be alone with the
(17:38):
puppet for most of the movie, and it's going to
be deep philosophy and it's gonna ride your back? Could
you make everyone take that seriously? I don't think people
ever give Mark Camila enough for what he did back
back then. So can you tell us what we know
about Yodo? Like a little bit of his history. I
know that he lives to be nine hundred apparently his
height is blow to be a half feet. That's around
(18:02):
where they are. But like, I just don't I don't know.
I'm moving on. I guess what do we know of
his lore before he meets uh Luke? Yeah, so it's
a there's a little bits and pieces in modern cannon.
(18:23):
So you know, there's the Legends of Star Wars, which
there's all these comic books and various books that have
been written in the years before Disney bought it, and
then two thousand and twelve they buy it and say
we're going to ignore that and call it legends. You
can enjoy it if you want. And then there's modern
Star Wars cannon. So were those written a Star Wars
official Yeah, they were licensed by George Lucas. And then
(18:45):
he sometimes would go like, oh, it's this level canon,
this level canon. Other times you go like, I don't
care that you said something different than what I'm going
to say in the movie, because the movie comes first,
so we kind of licensed them, but he never took
them really seriously, you know, And I think when Disney
takes over, they know the kind of nerds that exist now, like, oh,
everybody's gonna wanting everything to be connected, and if one
thing happens, it's true. So they have been, you know,
(19:07):
they have a story group to keep everything consistent. So
within the modern canon, we know a couple random adventures
Yoda had as he was growing up and being a
Jedi over hundreds of years, but for the most part,
we kind of catch up with him mainly in The
Phantom Menace, and he is leading the Jedi Council. He's
been leading it for a while, and he's the Yoda.
(19:28):
We know he's wise and kind, but he's also kind
of stuck in his ways in getting a little bit rigid.
And that's a large part of the story of the
prequels and the story of the actual Jedi that they've
been around for so long. Yoda has been leading it
for so long that he's getting kind of stuck in
his ways. In a part of Jedi philosophy is you know,
you're never done learning that you should always be open
(19:50):
to new things. And it's Yoda doesn't handle things as
well as he could, which you know, you go to
Phantom Menacing where he meets Anakin and he's he's a
little cold to him. It's like, how do you feel?
And and Anakin's like cold, sir, He's like fear fearing,
like you know, he goes in on this kid right away,
and you're like, damn Yoda. Uh. And that is part
of the storytelling that Yoda has is getting a little
(20:12):
stuck in his ways and a little a little fearful,
a little like overly on guard for anything that might
lead to the dark Side. And is this because it
happens after Count Dooku goes to the dark Side on him. No,
it's actually before Duko has left the Jedi Order because
he has doubts in it. So I think that has
maybe affected Yoda because he's that's his padawan of Doku
(20:33):
as his padawan, and Doku basically said like, I don't
think the Jedi Order is actually working well. You're two
in league with the government and falling what they do
instead of just listening to the will of the force.
Duke has already got some problems, so yeah, they're probably
affected Yoda. But I mean the story that Lucas is
really interested in with the government, the Republic and with
the Jedi Council is that he just doesn't like big organizations.
(20:57):
And you go back there, like he had to leave
the Directors Guild because they were fighting with him about
where the director credit goes on Empire strikes back, and
you know, he's an indie filmmaker who kind of made
one of the biggest things ever kind of on his own.
You know, he got distribution and all that. But so
then he goes back to tell this story and what
do you know, A lot of it's about big organizations
eventually get all crusty, ridgid and full of themselves and
(21:20):
fall apart. Three adventure movies about that. Do we know
how or when he joined the Jedi We don't know
details about that. The best thing that we can kind
of infer is because he is says he Yoda says
he's nine years, nine hundred years old and has been
training Jedi for eight hundred years, that he joined sometime
(21:41):
in before he turned one hundred and baby Yoda is
fifty years. He has fifty yeah, yeah, So that's really interesting.
So I don't know if Baby Yoda is suddenly gonna
be like I've turned fifty. Hello, let's discuss literature. If
he's suddenly going to be like totally advanced, that's so
interesting because yeah, like the introduction of baby Yoda at
(22:02):
fifty just presents so much information and questions about the race,
because if at fifty you're still basically infantile, Like, at
what point do you when are we going to see teenage? Teenage?
I hope that season two of Men. Also, somebody tweeted
and said, like, what if when baby Yoda starts talking,
(22:23):
it's normal and then um, and then regular Yoda like
just had to stroke or something. Yeah, it'll also talks
that way. Okay, never mind, maybe that's just a part
of the species having strokes. Um, we have to take
a really quick break and then we're going to hop
back into more Yota and of course me trying to
(22:44):
shoohorn in Baby Yoda as much as possible. But first
we wanted to talk to y'all about Audible, which if
he I actually use a time. I have so many
books on Audible. Yeah yeah, yeah, I have their membership,
so oh so you're your fancy yeah, and just well
I'm in my car a lot like here in Los Angeles,
(23:04):
literally like it takes like getting traffic everywhere. It's like podcasts,
but audio books. Yes, And so I'm so excited because
I get to tell other people about the gift of
an audible membership, which I don't know if you're definitely
treat yourself give it to a friend for the holiday season,
because I use it religiously. Yeah, especially if you're somewhere
(23:26):
a where there's a lot to a lot of commuting,
you do. I think this is an amazing group, and
now it's the best time to do it because there's
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(23:47):
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(24:07):
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well commuting. Also the gym. I use it a lot
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(24:27):
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slash nerd or texting Nerd to five hundred five hundred,
and we're back. We're still talking about Yoda. Yes, I
had just a couple more quotes that I wanted to
say from Frank Oz. I mean, it's just I think
we really forget that he's the man behind this character.
So he said it's a four person character. I flew
(25:10):
back and forth to London about three times and rehearse
for a couple of weeks with them. It's very intense
rehearsal because you have four people trying to do one
thing very very specifically, so every single word, every single
move had to be rehearsed again and again. Therefore we
don't take time on the set. The last time I
flew over there, I rehearsed with the three guys again
(25:31):
and then we went and shot for a day and
a half, night and a half. Yeah, I mean they're
having they're having I even see this now with the
Mandalorian with the little puppet, but like his ear moves,
his eye moves, his map, like everything has to be
SYNCD up. Yeah. Yeah, and that's it been like this
grand tradition of Yoda is the ear wobble because when
they made the original puppet, they're like, this looks good,
but his mouth moves, his ears wobble a little bit,
(25:53):
and then at the time it's like, what are we
gonna do? And then that became really authentic. So when
they made the digital Yoda, they build into the digital
Yoda that his ears wabble. Yeah, So it's been great
to see baby Yoda's ears being so very expressive. Yes,
So would you say that he has a character trajectory
or does he kind of stay the same. Oh? No,
(26:16):
I think some of it is implied, but it's definitely there.
You know, in the prequels, he goes through the Clone Wars,
he knows that it's kind of that there's something fishy
that he's been, you know, drawn into something. Jedi are
supposed to defend and protect, but they're kind of drawn
into being warriors in the Clone Wars and just the
act of fighting sort of increases the dark side. He's
trying to figure out what's going on with that. Eventually
(26:36):
he realizes that they've been played by City as Palpatine.
And you know, there's a scene in Revenge of the
Sith where he says, so fail Divi, and he really
is owning like, I screwed up. I was not looking
at the big picture and I let fear get to me.
So then when he goes to Dagiba in between the
sequels and hides out in between the prequel trilogy and
the original trilogy, So by the time that Yoda shows
(26:57):
up or that Luke shows up to be rained, he's like,
I'm not sure if I should train him. Maybe it
maybe it'll only make things worse. Uh. So he really
did take time to reflect. And if you watch the
prequels and then compare them to all of Yoda's wisdom
and empire, you can't see a real shift that he
is trying to be much more open and flowing and
(27:19):
really practice what he preaches. And a really fun detail
that came out that I wanted to be sure to share. Uh,
there's a book called From a Certain point of View
that gives a bunch of different characters little chapters. Uh.
In Yoda's chapter is kind of he's on Daga but
and he's looking out and sensing everything going on in
the galaxy, and he's wishing that he could train Skywalker.
(27:42):
He wishes that Skywalker would come here because Skywalker is
so disciplined and so ready to learn the ways of
the force. And then you realize he's talking about Leah
and it's this great twist and if you you really
watch it all, it was like, Yeah, Luke's like, I
want to have adventure. I want to go out there.
I want to be uh, you know, a fighter like
my dad and a warrior with a cool sword and lands.
(28:03):
Just like I'm serious, I have to take care of things.
I have to be selfless and put other people first,
and like she is a perfect what a Jedi is
supposed to be. Yeah, so he's like, all right, I
was kind of hoping lay I would show up eventually,
but I guess I'll take Luke. That's so neat. No,
I definitely didn't know that. I also I'm fascinated. So
I mean, if we're looking at the child slash, baby
(28:23):
Yoda obviously is force sensitive. Was I don't remember this
because I don't remember Yattle, but I'm guessing she was. Yeah,
she's on the Jedi Council. Yeah, of course she is. Yeah,
but I'm like, she doesn't Okay, Yeah, you don't get
to see her, you know, throw things around or anything.
That's what I mean about the old Light Saber, at
least on screen. So I wonder if it's just more
inherent in their race species. That's the big question that
(28:47):
Baby Yoda is teasing for people who are, you know,
into this level of Star Wars of like, oh, is
that just two of those? Is that the only two
that ever existed Yoda, Yattle or all of these creatures
ever for sensitive of you know, there's a lot of
people who think that Baby Yoda is going to be
an actual clone of Yoda. Uh yeah, I know. That's
the big thing is people think that that's a clone,
(29:08):
possibly a clone. Yeah, Baby Yoda. Do you how do
you fall on that spectrum of that conspiracy? I always
it works in the history of Star Wars and in
the timeline of Star Wars and all that. But I
always think about, like for these kind of what if,
like well, how would impact the story? And I don't
see how it would super impact the story if it
was it's another Yoda. Yodas had his story. It's completed,
(29:30):
there's an arc, and I think it's much more interesting
if we kind of get a little sense of maybe
what this race is, but more importantly, like what does
it mean for the Mandalorian? You know, I think Baby
Yoda is all about Mandalorian going. I didn't really have
my heart and being a bounty hunter because I'm kind
of a noble guy and now now I gotta be
a dad and I have no idea how to do that.
But I know what it is to be an orphan,
(29:51):
so I am not going to So I think having
the the kid have his his own identity adds more
to that relationship than suddenly the Mandalorian going yes, Yoda,
I've looked at years old passed away like, yeah, it
could happen. They might have a good storytelling reason. But
I was going to say, what are some of your
(30:11):
favorite quotes? Oh yeah, and you'd has got a lot
of great quotes. Uh, empire strikes back. I think there
is a ton that you know, people quote a lot
that are really powerful to do or do not. There
is no try, which I think just boils down to
believe in yourself if you believe you can do it,
if you believe you can sell script and allywood like,
you have to believe that it can happen, right, I
think that is just a great wisdom. I don't think
(30:34):
I told. I can't remember if I told. The podcast
is but Matthew Cherry, who's a director who if you
don't follow, definitely do and he's a part of Monkey Pow,
which is uh or he has worked under Monkey pot
which is Jordan Peel's company. He tweeted months ago in
the summer, sometimes you just have to bet on yourself.
And that was literally when I was going into my
pitch to HBO, Max and like there are a lot
of things working against me with that, and I just
(30:56):
was like, Nope, I'm going to do it. I know
I haven't sold something before, but I'm gonna. You know,
it was just like this thing of like kind of
giving being undeniable, I would say, And if I had
had any wavering sense, I don't think I would have
sold it. And I think I just went in thinking
that I would. So I totally agree. But also, Matthew Cherry,
thank you for tweeting that. I told him so many times.
I like it literally changed my life because it just
(31:19):
changed the framework of changed my my brain when I
was going in there, because I saw his tweet like
right before I went in. Yeah, he was your Yoda.
He was my own Matthew Cherry twitter Yoda. Yeah. So
I think there's great things about like, yeah, just believing yourself.
But I think he also like it just kind of
there's that great scene and Empire strikes back where he
Yoda brings Luke to these tree cave that has evil
(31:41):
spirits in it, you know that that evil presence that
and uh and Luke as him what's in it and
he says, only what you take with you, which is
like such a great idea of just being mindful yourself
of well, what is in any room that you go in, well,
at least what you take with you. You know he's
in there. If you come in with negative energy, that
will for sure be in the room. Um. Another quote
(32:03):
I love is when Luke is asking about how the
force works and how he'll know the difference between the
light side and the dark side. Joda says, you will
know when you are calm, at peace, passive. The Jedi
uses the force for knowledge and defense, never for attack.
And I remember hearing that when I was a kid,
and it's just like I was kind of Luke and like,
but I want to have adventured, and as I get older,
just that idea of just like, Okay, any problem you have,
(32:26):
take a deep breath, be calm, except that you can
only do the things that you can do, So you're
you're passive when other people are upset, and you act
when you need to out of knowledge or defense. Yeah,
And it's just like that that kind of boils down
to even just like having a nice conversation with people,
being a decent driver in traffic, you know, like just
kind of day to day real life stuff is where
(32:48):
as well as deep philosophical. Also, since this is kind
of our first time talking about Star Wars on the pod,
I think we should really discuss the difference between Jedi
and the Seth because I think anyone watching it just
assumes it's good and bad when really it's a little
more complicated than that, because where how it really breaks
down as the Sith wants to take over completely and
(33:11):
the Jedi actually wants balance. They don't want to wipe
out the Sith because they because the Force, the way
the Force works is you need the dark side for
the light side to balance. Uh Is that correct? Did
I goof that up? Well? I think there is a
there's there's debate, and it's definitely Star Wars is art
(33:31):
and you can take it the way you want, and
I have opinions, and in Lucas has been saying some
stuff about this that's been a resurfacing. I think that
the idea of it is the Jedi do want balance
in that accepting that there is light and dark naturally
in the world. There's a cycle of life and death,
and you know, certain trees have to die in order
to be reborn and all that kind of thing. The
(33:53):
Sith when they're like the dark Side, it's entirely selfish.
They want to consume everything, so they want to be
if they want to be on attack. And the Jedi,
and this is another thing that I think is is
great philosophy of the Jedi are like, we are passive,
except with the Sith. They gotta die because otherwise they
(34:13):
will take over everything. Lucas himself has said explicitly. Again,
audiences can interpret it how they want, but Lucas has said,
bringing balance to the force means killing the Sith because
otherwise they will take everything. And that's what makes some
of these quotes even more powerful to me, because he's like,
it's knowledge and defense doesn't mean just never do anything,
but it means only razor blade. Only get violent when
(34:36):
you're actively stopping something evil and unnatural, like the Sith
going we'll take all of it. It's not like we'll
take fifty of the universe the galaxy and be evil
over here and you guys have parties, they'll take it all. Well,
this was so fascinating. As I was listening to you
talk like some of his quotes, I was like, oh,
these reminds me of tenants of martial arts. They're supposed
to us a self defense, right like that, I mean
(34:59):
a ridge landing. People kind of use it for a
lot of different things. But I feel like he's Yodo
reminds me obviously of a guru, and I feel like, um,
this teacher, and um, I feel like there's a lot
of elements of martial arts that's like, um, you're only
supposed to You're not supposed to use it for harm
unless you're you're differ Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Um. Another
(35:23):
quote that people really means a lot to people is
the luminous beings? Are we not this crude matter? And
again it's you know, it's Star Wars and it it
pulls from lots of different ideas and religions, and you
can take it how you want, but I think it's
just a it's a very beautiful idea in the word
luminous gets used a lot in Star Wars because of
the power of that one moment in Empire strikes back
of just that idea that we are more than the
(35:44):
some of our parts, you know, and we are all connected. Yeah, yeah, gosh.
I was going to say some one of the books
that I mentioned, so one with Wayne and dire. He
has something which I think a lot of people like
actually hearing this, is that he like you said, there's
there is dark and light, there's good and bad, and
he said, so, um, that's just how life operates in cycles.
(36:05):
And so if you're having a lot of bad luck,
like if you're just really down, you're having a really
hard time, imagine that good luck is leaning against it.
And I really love that. It's like when you're like,
how can I hold on for hope, I'm having like
the worst time of my life, and it's like, well,
if you're already down, it means you must be going up. Like,
just imagine that good luck is on the other side
(36:25):
waiting to happen. It's like waiting to take its cycle.
So that's just love. It's that good stuff. That's that
good stuff in that Bernie Brown. Um, we have to
take another really quick break and then we're gonna hop
back into more Yoda after this and we are back.
(36:50):
One fact I just wanted to throw in here before
we move on is Lego Yoda. His mini fig was
the first of their figures to be shorter than the
other toys in the Lego Star Wars. Love that So
how small is Baby Yoda gonna be? I personally love
the fact that Disney listened to Jon Favreau about not
having merchandise because obviously that would have spoiled all of
(37:13):
the Baby Yoda stuff. And I know everyone was like, well,
it's just coming out in time for the holidays. I'm like,
but it's not, though, because in order for that to happen,
they would have had to have those cells, like make
up the characters, the models. All of that takes months.
So you're not going to see Baby Yoda merch until Yeah.
I smashed that link for the Funko Pop and it's
like May of next year. Yeah. So it costs Disney
(37:34):
two point seven million with no Baby Yota products available
for the holiday season. We're going to make that up
next totally, no problem, no problem. They'll make back the
price they paid for lucasfilm in the Baby Yoda merch So, Joseph,
can you talk to us a little bit about Clone
Wars Yoda specifically? Yeah, So the Clone Wars you get
(37:55):
to spend a lot of time more time with the
Jedi in particularly the Jedi Council and individual episodes with
Yoda being a wise leader and having a little bit
more of a sense of mirth and humor because that
is a part of his character. But at the end
of The Clone Wars, there's gonna be a new season
coming out in uh February on Disney, plus a final
season the Clone Wars. But in what is right now
(38:16):
the last season of The Clone Wars, Yoda starts hearing
the voice of Quagon Gin, the Jedi played by Liam
Neeson from Phantom, Menace, and Uh. Lucas had always meant
to tell this story in the movies, but he basically
tells the story of how some Jedi can retain their
existence within the Force and appears forced ghosts or force spirits.
(38:37):
So sometimes people like Han should come back and be
a ghost. And like this arc of Yoda is like
no no in in or like Mace Window, like Mace
Window didn't do the training. Uh. Long story short, UH,
Quigan was very interested in this idea that if you
were doing so for a selfless reason, you could retain
your existence within the Force. Because the idea is everybody
(38:58):
passes into the Force where part of the force we
always will be, but you're not aware that, Hey, this
is who I was, and I can talk to people
and all that so quick and kind of half figured
this out. He comes to Yoda and says, I have
this additional train for you to do. You have to
kind of face your dark self. You have to face
the possibilities that you made some mistakes. You have to
face your fear of the future. And through all this
(39:19):
training you will eventually learn to become one with the Force,
but still retain your your identity. And Obi Wan learns
this from Quagon as well, meditating on Tautoween. So that's
why in the original Star Wars movie, when Obi Wan
Kenobi disappears, uh, he doesn't get cut in half by
Darth Vader. He disappears, and later he appears as a
four Spirit. And when Yoda dies in Return of the Jedi,
(39:42):
he disappears, and when Luke dies in Last Jedi, he disappears.
And a lot of this might be a little bit
more relevant to Rise of Skywalker because a lot of
people think there's gonna be a four Spirit party. So
if people are watching, go like, why did my random
favorite Jedi come back? That that Yo to Arc and
that that wisdom the end experience that you need in a
(40:04):
a particular idea that you need to have like a
selfless reason to retain your Yeah, you can't just be
like I just want like being me. I don't want
to stop. And the idea is they learned this so
they could help Luke finish his journey. And you know,
that's why Yoda is showing up to Luke in the
Last Jedi, because that's kind of the point of continuing
(40:24):
to have your identity within the Force is to be
able to help people. So everyone thinks that we're going
to get a force ghost Luke. Yeah, I mean that's
almost certain sense smart camels in the cast okay um
but also other force ghosts. Yeah, possibly Leiah you mean no,
because she's she could have trained. We don't know, but
(40:46):
like we know that Quigan in theory, Liam Neeson in
theory could appear um Obi one Kenobi. They've got some
work to do on that. But I see what you mean.
Because this is the last one of this chapter, there
might be some of the past. Yeah. Yeah, and in
theory because Anakin pops up right at the end of
Return of the Jedi, his forced spirit appears to Luke.
(41:07):
So like you know, everybody's the walks are dancing, everybody's partying,
and Luke kind of looks off at the distance and
he sees Obi one as a forced spirit. He sees
Yoda and then he sees his father join him. So
that suggests that Anakin has somehow learned to retain his existence.
So then that your mind starts going like, I bet
Anakin would maybe have some things to say about what
(41:28):
his grandson's choices are, right, So there's a possibility of
that as well. Also, Um, Force awakens. I was such
a troll and I just kept calling her race Guywalker.
We have yet to see the full truth. I love
just being a edge lord. Um. So between this between
(41:50):
Clone Wars and Rebels, are those two like beloved property?
I feel like I'm not as in the I'm the
general fan base, but I'm not like, you know, as
hardcore as you are. Do our both of those shows,
which are both animated. Um, are they both beloved the same?
Do you feel like the fan base kind of latches
onto one more than the other? I think they're pretty even. Yeah.
(42:11):
And so Clone Wars Lucas was just sort of like,
I didn't get to do all the stories I want
to do, I want to play, and he hired this
young person is his kind of padawan learner Dave Filoni.
So the Clone Wars are some great stuff because George
Lucas would say, like, I have an idea, and then
Feloni would kind of execute it. So it's kind of
the best of both worlds. And then when Disney took
over and they wanted the new animated series, Feloni ran Rebels,
(42:34):
So there's a real connection in the Mandalorian. He's involved
with the Mandalorian as well. Yeah, so there's a real
like the Star Wars lore of there's always a wise
master who passes on knowledge the young person, but then
it's the young generations turned to pick up the mantle.
Like that has literally happened in real life with George
Lucas and Dave Foloni. Um. What about Yoda and Rebels. Yeah,
(42:59):
he pops up, uh. I think at least once, maybe twice. Uh.
And there's some interesting stuff there because Yo Dig admits.
One of the big things is he admits that he
made some mistakes in the in the prequel era, that
he let his fear control him is a big thing
in Star Wars that fear is the path to the
dark side and another great kind of self help thing
from Star Wars that as soon as you are afraid
(43:21):
of losing something, then that makes you angry and hateful
and all those kind of things. So, uh, that's a
big part of his cannon, and that is kind of
the place where he fully admits that he made some mistakes.
You actually have a quote from him here from Rebels.
It says, I lost my way for a long time,
but now I have an opportunity to change things. And
then he finishes with the last Chance. Um so I
(43:44):
was just like what you were saying. Yeah, yeah, And
he and he guides Ezra a little bit and guides
him to his destiny, that he has a specific destiny,
and he sort of implies that, yeah, it's okay to fight,
but you need to figure out how to fight in
and when to fight. So a lot of a lot
of continuing great Yoda wisdom, but he's not in Rebels
(44:04):
a ton. It's just one or two pop ups. If
you want fun gifts, if you're sitting around going how
should I communicate with friends? There's so many great Yoda
gifts that express disappointment, exasperation, wanting to go somewhere quickly.
One of my favorite Yoda gifts. There's a moment in
Revenge of the Sith when he's gonna confront Palpatine. He
(44:24):
walks in and he does just a little hand gesture
and two guards slam into the wall. It's great for
when you're upset. Oh my gosh, I'm gonna handle this. Whoop.
I think I gave I gave one of my ex
is like a Yoda like Valentine. I think I said,
like Yoda best Valentine or something. And now we're broken up,
(44:46):
my dad humor. Um, so this is we talked. We
kind of touched on Warner Warner her sog uh and
it said, uh, that upond a bond seeing baby Yoda. Uh.
He forgot. He was holding a puppet in again doing
baby speak as the puppet had a song. I don't
want to do someone have video of that. I really
(45:07):
want all the weren't hurts behind the scenes, that audio
of the cowards comment. I need that in my life.
His baby cous Did you see that? Someone tweeted like
the combination of it. It's a combination of animals and
I think there's an actual voice being manipulated in that
whole mix. So this tweet is from matthew Wood. It
(45:28):
says Baby Yoda's voice by a combination of baby samples,
bat eared Foxes, No wonder So Cute, Kinka Jews, and
the sound design vocal talents of Dave Accord ps. He
also voiced Baby Rohoda the Hutlet for the Clone Wars. Yeah,
that's the jab the huts child. Well, and I saw
(45:49):
the baby Java or whatever. Did you see that? Yeah,
that someone did of because it was like baby like,
oh no, that's like, oh shoot, who else in Star
Wars should have a baby kind of thing? Yeah, yeah,
but there is. It's the Clone Wars movie that kicks
off the whole series. Has got a lot of quality
time with the job as Baby Rod of the Hutlet.
(46:13):
Can I ask you a question? Why? So? Why does
baby you to speak to you? Is it just the absolute,
just intrinsic cuteness that you want to cuddle and take
care of the baby. You know? I follow a lot
of baby animals on Instagram, so yes, I mean I'm
gonna be I follow a baby pig, I follow baby Fox,
I follow Juniper the Fox. Shout out to everyone else
(46:35):
that follows Juniper. Um, you know, I have my baby Molly.
I think that he has this animal quality right too,
and also like kind of baby like he's like a
baby human hybrid, you know. Yeah, um, like just enough
human qualities and movement, but also very much like a
cute little animal. And um the cooing got me and
(46:59):
his dumb little teeth that s his little teeth. I
think he's just so innocent and needs Like yeah, he's strong,
but like so innocent and just like calls to be
protected and brings out like it's almost like he's a
test himself, Like he's like you know what I mean,
like attest to like the true your human nature, like
(47:20):
if you're like you said with Mando, like that's his
It's almost like he's called to protect this little thing
like you cannot help you can't help it, and so
like he's almost a testament himself of like to the
good I guess, like it's like, oh, this was all
a test just to see if you would take care
of this, you know. It's like his species is innately
(47:42):
like constantly testing people for the light that they have
inside of them. Yeah, And I love that when we
see him use the force, it just feels totally intuitive,
like he saw this this guy who seems to be
trying to protect him get hit by this big beast
several times and look like he's going to I so,
just out of total kindness and intuition, he reaches his
(48:04):
little hand out and gives it as all and then
has to take a picture nap his I'm not gonna
lie his three footed feet, like I can't handle here something.
He's normally wearing little brown loafers, but sometimes they're off
and he has his little coffee and I hate it.
I'm like, oh god, no, put it back unders out.
(48:25):
Ryan Johnson presents claws out well if he is an
actual parent. Do you get nervous about Mando's bad parenting
of baby Yoda? No? No, I relate with Mando a lot,
like especially when he that that trying to explain everything
you need that child to do as if they're functioning
(48:46):
adult and watching them like listen and then still do
what they were going to do. Anyway, I was like, yeah,
all parents fall into that trap. I think, yeah, no logic.
I want to hit that button and hands like I
told you don't hit don't hit that, but oh my god,
because it's bright. I'm not against all other franchises making
(49:08):
baby versions of the ill but excepted. You see, someone
made the baby Thanos and I was like, yes, snap,
oh man, I was gonna say, is there anything else
that we should mention that we left out? I know,
you know, it's kind of a mystery, to be honest,
and that's why it was funny. Like um, our friend
Ash Crossing who couldn't come on tonight, but she was
(49:30):
going to be your your co guest and uh, I
can't remember if it was her. Somebody like, well, actually,
it's fascinating because there's not a ton known about the
history of their species. Yeah, the species are really mysterious.
And I think that's a big question of how deep
is the Mandalorian going to go or is that going
to be part of it? Of like, we don't know
where this baby came from. Mean people wanted for I
(49:51):
want to take some samples for it for something, and
we don't know. And I think that's a big part
of the fun, fun mystery. And I think it's possible
that we won't learn a lot more and we'll stay
mysterious in this will just be a new character we
get to know. Oh, I have a question, do you
think that they're from eggs. I would love them to
just come from somewhere weird at one point the belly button.
I want them to come from him. This mysterious unfound
(50:14):
moon full of forest powers, and it's got some trees
and every once in a while the trees just drip rows.
Like I want it to be something like they are
deeply connected, they are of the forest and like every
you know, two thousand years four drips. I would love
that because there's something just really I think, deep and
fun and spiritual about them as as truly mysterious creatures,
(50:38):
you know. And I don't want it to be like
I mean, there was all the jokes and it's fun
of like when did Yoden Yett to look up and
like leave some mystery? Let him drink from a tree? Yeah? Never.
They probably mate by touching fingers or something. Yeah, you know,
if he in in dragon Ball, Piccolo his species, they
like remember that scene where he's like coughing out an egg.
(51:00):
He's like spitting up an egg. So I feel like
that could be what happens. Oh yeah, yeah, I love that. Yeah,
maybe it's a Gremlins thing, like one of their rights.
I don't know. I think the only other thing that
that I don't know if we touched on a lot,
that I'd like to say about Yoda is I think
one of the great things about his character is that
he does have a sense of humor, in a sense
(51:20):
of whimsy and like when the character is relaxing at
his best. There's a scene in Attack the Clones where
Obi one is looking for information because he can't find
a planet in the archive, and Yoda turns to all
the little kids he's training. Master ob One has lost
a planet. How embarrassing. How embarrassing. It's just like he
feels like you're kind of your sweet old uncle who
has this sense of Yeah, I've got all this wisdom,
(51:43):
I know all this philosophy, I've got all these concerns
and responsibilities. But the reason we're doing all this is
because life is beautiful and it's good to be with
people you care about and appreciate and have a sense
of whimsy and joy. And I think that is a
huge part of Yoda's character as well. Yoda, um, well,
y'all have been asking us to touch on Star Wars
(52:05):
and if he and I have put it off for
almost two years, mainly just because it's such a huge thing,
so we thought, okay, maybe we can tackle characters or um,
you know, we're gonna so starting in the new year,
we're actually going to do a multipart dive into Star
Wars some of the things that don't always get talked about,
like having an entire episode devoted to Yoda. Yeah, so
(52:25):
you'll be seeing more of that in Thank you so
much for coming on. Just you don't where can people
find you anything you want to plug? Yeah, you can
find me on Twitter and Instagram is at Joseph Scrimshaw
and you can go to my website Joseph scrimshaw dot
com for other podcasts. Do a podcast called Obsessed and
a Star Wars one called Fourth Center, and you can
check out the show on Adult swim tiktoone that I
am a writer for and so is Iffy. Yeah we
(52:47):
beat ticktooning. Yeah, and you know me as always if
you wide away on Twitter and Instagram, if D's on Twitch,
the discord is Discord dot g g slash Salt Squad.
There's a Nerdificent ab where you can talk all things Nerdificent,
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H Thank y'all, to all the mods and then of
(53:09):
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Give it to people for the holidays. They need them.
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the things saying thank you for supporting us. We have
more in store for y'all in and as we always say,
(53:30):
stay nerdy, Stay nerdy.
What is up, everybody, and welcome back to another episode
of Nerdificent Time and one half of your host if
you are sitting across from me as always is Danny Fernandez,
and what is good? I feel like we both have
like really great radio voices right now. When you came in,
you sounded like you were like working at a station.
(00:30):
But do you My favorite thing about she's year round,
but my favorite the thing that reminds me of Christmas
is Delilah. Do you know Delilah? Oh my god, she's
like syndicated. She's syndicated, but it's like Delilah, it's always
like your local, like whatever the Christmas station has turned to. Um,
let me know, y'all if you listen to Delilah. I
(00:51):
definitely did when I was like in Dallas, but I
know she's syndicated all over and so she'll be like
this one is out to a special someone, Um, Richard
and your loved one is sending in Santa Baby, please
come home for Christmas, you know whatever. And so I
always do the jazz one where he's like, hey, how's
it going, y'all? This is Tony Jones over and T Jazz.
(01:16):
This one goes out to Candice. Uh, you know this
one comes from Bobby. He says, I know you're working late. Yes,
come home. There's going to be a play to Rice
for you. Oh my gosh. We should bring in our
guys because he's also in comedy. It is writer comedian
Joseph Scrimshaw. Hey, hey, hello, you also have I was
(01:38):
listening to you talk and I know that you said
you did a storytelling podcast and I'm like that so
makes sense. I mean, you do a bunch of them,
but like your voice is so we have a couple
of those friends. Mark Ellis is another one. Like y'all's
voices are very much Yeah, he's got a radio voice too. Yeah.
I spent years doing theater and then when I started
doing podcasts and be like, oh I don't have to
yell anymore. My voice is an octave lower than I
(02:01):
thought last. You have the rich undertone. It's like a
smooth cup of coffee with Bailey's in it. Thank you,
Bailey's in me right now. Yeah. Well, we always start
our show with what we're seeking out about. Joseph, what
are you seeking out about this week? I am geeking
(02:21):
out about Watchman. But if everybody has come in and
said that to you, I mean other thing I'm gonna
say it. I mean every week, it's just yeah, it
gets better and just sticks in your head. I think
the thing that I love so much is that the
that original comic book also cares about the history of
comic books. So that's what I was waiting to see.
And I love that the Watchman story is using like
(02:43):
the history of media and how like televised visual media
affects people. And yeah, I think that's just like a
brilliant layering into what it is. Were you a big
fan of the comics, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I read them
a lot over different ages, and like the first time
I read it's like cool, some punching, Yeah, some people
are angry, and yeah, I did not fully appreciate what
(03:03):
it was, and so I've read lots of different times
over my life. Yeah. I think what I really like
about this last episode is Damon Lindelof went down even
more than any any anime director ever of the best
fan service I think anybody wants, because I think the
moment that reveal happened, people were like wondering, like we're
(03:25):
gonna see and um, yeah you do. Spoil alert you're
gonna see that thing. Uh, Swan and a fine Watchman
tradition was I know, I know, I love that. Every
actor who's who's done it was like yep, yeah, we're
just gonna do it. Uh. Um yeah, is there anything
(03:48):
you're geeking out about, Danny? Is there anything like a
favor one of your favorite heroes, one of their like, uh,
their trailer for their movie came out. Yeah, I'm geeking
out about two things. One definitely uh you know Wonder Woman.
Of course, I'm excited to see what more eighties stuff
they'll play. I kind of want more of that, uh
(04:08):
like really showing the decade, but who knows. I know
that they also have to make it feel relevant. Um,
I think it's more playful. I'm I'm just fascinating to
see what they're gonna do because it's like who is
the big Like you know, they kind of did that
thing last time where they tricked us about who the
big bad was, so that I mean, I know we
have Cheetah and like, uh yeah, I'm just I'm I'm fascinated. Um.
(04:32):
Also very excited that I finally got to share my
news today about my HBO Max show, which like if
he has known about for a long time, and like,
there's so much hard work that happens behind the scenes
that nobody sees just for this moment. So it was
like kind of just waited. It feels like my entire
life to have my show announced. But yeah, so that
(04:53):
that was a really great, cool day. Thank you, thank you. Yeah.
I mean we've talked about I've talked about like my
history with depression and honestly also treatment a kind of
guinea pig myself. Uh, And so I'm really glad that
HBO Max like saw the value in telling this story
about like the humor that can be found and also
just like kind of making fun of the American health
(05:16):
care system. And you know when people say get help,
you know, ask for help, Like what does that look like?
Because it's not like just one straight trajectory, Okay, everything's
sunshine and rainbows. I asked for help. It's like a
lot of a lot of dark humor and failure along
the way. And so yeah, I'm excited to tell that story.
Thank you every single person that shared that and wrote me.
(05:38):
But today we were talking about something that I've been
seeking about technically extremely a lot into the Internet we're
talking about yoday. And also I'm a slide in baby Yoda.
As I'm a slide I'm gonna slide them in there.
Still don't know if it's everyone says him? Does John
Favreau refer to him as the child the doctor, the
(06:01):
creepy perhaps cloning doctor. Dr Pershing says him, Okay, wow,
So that's why people have been leading with that instead
of the normal reason that people say him, which is sexism. Yeah,
because the first couple of weeks of the Mandalorian, I
was like, uh, well, this would be cool if it
actually turns out to be a girl, like nobody expects it,
(06:22):
and it was like always taking care of this little girl,
daddy daughter, like whatever. So I'm still holding out of it. Yeah,
it is absolutely possible that the doctor did some bad
readings for the brief time that they had with Yoda.
This is like when I adopted my cat when I
was like seven and they said it was a girl
that we took it to the vet and they were like, no,
it's a boy. I did the same thing. Really. Yeah.
(06:43):
The cat came to us on fourth of July and
we named it like a Liberty bell and then like
the nope, and changed the cat's name to uncle. That's
so funny. Um, So, I guess you know your profile
pictures you with Yoda. Would you say that? That's like?
What is your connection? Why do have you watched onto Yoda? First? Like,
(07:05):
I think Yoda just spoke to me as a child
and I had the action figure and I thought about
him a lot, and you know, a lot of the
wisdom certainly came through. But then when I got to
be an adult and tried to reflect, like why did
he grab me when he was when I was a kid.
I think the way he's introduced in Empire strikes back
where he seems weird and kind of grabby and like
he's kind of acting like a child, but he is
(07:29):
secretly wise. And I think that's the way a lot
of kids feel like. They feel like they're kind of
acting out, kind of being a weirdo, and people are like,
can can you? Can you shut up and take me
to the real important person, the adult? And then is
a kid you feel like but no, I I'm wise,
I have things to say. And I think that's why,
especially when people are young, they connect with Yoda. He's
a secretly wise, Weirdoh yeah, and kind of like a
(07:52):
prankster to be honest, there's like so much humor filling him.
And I think this is the best time to interject
because there's a lot of uh, you know, debate because
people get mad that they call the child baby Yoda.
No one cares people and but I but you know,
it's because Yoda's race is never just like you talked
(08:13):
about like they they left it vague, so there isn't
a name for Yoda's race. Fans came out with tridactyls.
Uh oh, I haven't heard that fan theory. Yeah, because
they have three toed feet, so they call them tridactyls,
which I thoroughly reject. Uh, it's gonna be every one
of them is a Yoda. And it's because and it's
(08:35):
funny because like on the one level, it's just easier
and simpler, but on the other other level, that's just
like simple almost human linguistics, where if you the kind
of um colloquialism. Yeah, you typically like when people say, uh,
Q tip, like those are all every Q tip isn't
(08:55):
a Q tip. A Q tip is a brand, but
because it's the one that's more wide clean X to
clean x to band, you know, like that's just a
general thing you do. So, of course the one Yoda
that we've seen, the first one, will refer to the
race as Yoda. And I hope that whoever writes the
movie that finally names the race just trolls everyone. It
(09:18):
calls the race Yoda, so that all the baby And
it's because it's so funny, because also it's like, um,
because it's very it's such an obvious attempt to be pedantic,
because if you're mad at people from for calling baby
Yoda baby Yoda, you're you're purposely ignoring the fact that
there is not a name for the race like your
(09:39):
new Yeah Frankenstein's Monster. Yeah, pedantic, Like yeah, we could
say baby of the same ambiguous species of Yoda that
takes up a lot of doesn't sound funa, it's just yeah,
but yeah, they they are known as uh from for
some people, I'm not tridactyls. Yeah, I think that's a
pretty deep fan conjecture type thing. Yeah, after Yoda, but
(10:03):
before chronologically we saw Yoda with Yattle. Yes, yeah, who
also used the force as well. Can you talk to
us about Yattle for people that don't know, Yeah, Yeah.
So in the Phantom Menace, we see the Jedi Council
and there Yoda is leading it, and then there's just
a random lady Yoda in the background, like really, like
(10:25):
just the puppet was actually designed to possibly be a
younger Yoda. And they're like, we don't that doesn't work.
But how about a lady Yoda And she has long
auburn hair. She does not speak in the movie. Uh,
And then in uh the Legends comic books back in
the day she had some adventures and was fleshed out
in comic books and eventually died. So unattracted it is. Yeah,
(10:49):
the different legs are difficult. In that one, they're like,
she got two broken legs, like she crossed the I'm
not she looks like I don't know, like Mima, or
she's like I don't know, about to pass out, like
she's in the middle of telling a story, and then
just like her eyes roll to the back of her head. Yeah,
this is also a good time, is you you've done
(11:10):
collider and screen junkie stuff, right, And I can tell
because you talk like a movie nerd, And I say
I would love because you're not because you say movie.
Then the year which is something I always forget. Phantom
Menace and I was like, yeah, that that's that's that's
how you win. I could never survive on those because
(11:32):
I'm so bad with years, but gosh, yeah, that um
Phantom Menace was I mean, what are your you know, sidebar?
What is your general idea of the prequels? You know,
I've gone a long journey with the prequels. Bottom line.
I do think there's some rough writing, some rough dialogue,
maybe some rough c g I here and there. But
(11:53):
the more time I've spent with them, I have problems
with the execution, but not the movies. Lucas created really
specific theme and ideas, and I think it all ties
together into a really great story and adds a ton
to the Star Wars mythos. So I'm a big prequel fan.
At his voice, like and it's even the stuff that
I like, I'm not sure about that, like Yattle, Like
I was like, why is there a Yeattle? What the
(12:15):
deal with? You? Just so angry about it? And I
was like, there's a lady Yoda and her names Yattle,
and she's got weird chicken legs, awesome, what's not to enjoy?
I do love the fact that George added another person
to the Yoda race but still was like, we're not
going to give a name real attention to the Baby
Yoda thing of whether or not we're going to discover
(12:35):
because Lucas kind of kept wanting to explain things, and
he added Yattle, but he still didn't want to explain
the race. So it's been one of the really really
hands off things in all of Star Wars. Um. I
just love the wire reminds me of Dragon Ball with
like Goku goten Gohan, Like, I hope they keep doing that.
I hope Baby Yoda is something with Yoda Yattle's saying.
(12:58):
It's like basic on the naming function for both Yoda
and Yattle. It has to be why vowel d vowel
Like yeah, like if it'd be weird to change it
now rule of threes, we have to keep it going.
So maybe, yeah, how I would love Yado Yeddi Yeddi, Yeddi.
(13:22):
Are you Yeddi? Oh um? So getting back to the
creation of Yoda. So, the puppet version of Yoda from
the O G series was designed by Jim Henson, voiced
and performed by Frank Oz. The character went c g
I for the two thousands prequel, Oz recounted how director
Ryan Johnson courted his return for The Last Jedi that
(13:43):
said quote, we had lunch and Ryan asked me if
I wanted to be Yoda there, and I said sure.
I thought it was c G I. So I was
shocked when I found out they really wanted to do
the real Yoda, because that's a huge mass of undertaking.
But that's what they did. It just began with Ryan,
and it made sense. You couldn't have c g I
Yoda with Mark Luke because Luke wouldn't have a c
g I Yoda. The only Yoda Luke knew was a
(14:05):
puppet character. That's so sweet. Also, same thing happened with Mandalorian.
I remember, um, I'm forgetting his name, the older general. Yes,
I know where you're going and it's beautiful. Yeah. Do
you want to tell them the what he said? Yeah?
So he I mean, he said a lot of things
about how beautiful the puppet is. But there's there was
alleged report that they were wondering whether the puppet was
(14:25):
working on set and talking about should they c G I,
and apparently were hurts like your coward? Yeah, yeah, that
was so funny, so great. So this is I don't
know if you know this fact. George Lucas had originally
conceived Yoda's full name as being Mint Yoda. Yeah, okay, um.
And then the makeup artist Stewart Freeborn based Yoda's face
(14:47):
partly on his own that's really cool, and partly on
Albert Einstein's, which is not very I can totally a
thousand percent see then also not very flattering at all. Um.
In The Phantom Menace, he was redesigned to look younger.
He was computer generated, as we said, for two distant shots,
but he actually remained mostly a puppet. Yeah. So the
Phantom Menace he he was a puppet for many years,
(15:08):
and then they needed him to be digital for Attack
the Clones for his big lightsaber fight, and then they
went back and put digital Yoda into Phantom Menace. So
if you buy the Blue Rays, now we're watch him
on Disney. Plus, you're not going to see the the
puppet from Phantom Menace. He's all all the time, and
any prequels. Now, that's so interesting. I don't know why,
I guess to match it, I guess I think so
(15:28):
in that that that puppet was interesting. Okay, um, yeah,
so this is just finishing up on what frank Oz said.
He said, people don't realize that A great, a great
part of the reason why Yoda works is because of Mark.
It's because if Mark doesn't believe in that character, nobody
else will. What he does there is extremely important, always
has been. When we got together, it was just like
(15:48):
old times. He never changed. He is just a wonderful guy.
Very funny too. People forget that when you have c
g I you're looking at a tennis ball. Yeah, I
mean there's something to having frank Ozz literally being right there,
like mastering a puppet. Oh yeah, I mean I did.
There was an old show on Fox called Son of Zorn,
which it was a a live action animated show with
(16:10):
a Heman style character that was animated, and uh, I
did an episode and it was my buddy Dan Lippert,
who's like six something like has to be like, I
don't know his actual hype a six three six four,
And he was wearing this all silver suit and then
he had like the like a kind of eyeline on
(16:31):
his head so that people would look up and I
was like, yeah, this this definitely changes it because like
I'm not looking at him and I'm looking at my
friend in a weird silver suit, So so I can
imagine like it's using like those puppets probably give you
a better performance too, because especially if you've ever done
(16:53):
anything like you know, hyper We'll do had like perception
check of Perception Studios and now does it on their own,
where you would do dn D with puppets, and after
a while, it just kind of fades away and it
feels like you're, yeah, you're interacting with a puppet. Yeah,
I mean, I think puppets are so much better than
c J I. But for Empire Strikes Back, I think
(17:17):
there's that such credit to to Mark Hamill, because you know,
sci fi and fantasy wasn't as big of a deal,
and it certainly wasn't a big blockbuster movie to be
taken seriously and like Star Wars breaks the mold actually
having good effects. And then suddenly Mark Hamila has a
chalnge like you're not Harrison and Carry. You're gonna be
fallen in love and you're gonna be alone with the
(17:38):
puppet for most of the movie, and it's going to
be deep philosophy and it's gonna ride your back? Could
you make everyone take that seriously? I don't think people
ever give Mark Camila enough for what he did back
back then. So can you tell us what we know
about Yodo? Like a little bit of his history. I
know that he lives to be nine hundred apparently his
height is blow to be a half feet. That's around
(18:02):
where they are. But like, I just don't I don't know.
I'm moving on. I guess what do we know of
his lore before he meets uh Luke? Yeah, so it's
a there's a little bits and pieces in modern cannon.
(18:23):
So you know, there's the Legends of Star Wars, which
there's all these comic books and various books that have
been written in the years before Disney bought it, and
then two thousand and twelve they buy it and say
we're going to ignore that and call it legends. You
can enjoy it if you want. And then there's modern
Star Wars cannon. So were those written a Star Wars
official Yeah, they were licensed by George Lucas. And then
(18:45):
he sometimes would go like, oh, it's this level canon,
this level canon. Other times you go like, I don't
care that you said something different than what I'm going
to say in the movie, because the movie comes first,
so we kind of licensed them, but he never took
them really seriously, you know, And I think when Disney
takes over, they know the kind of nerds that exist now, like, oh,
everybody's gonna wanting everything to be connected, and if one
thing happens, it's true. So they have been, you know,
(19:07):
they have a story group to keep everything consistent. So
within the modern canon, we know a couple random adventures
Yoda had as he was growing up and being a
Jedi over hundreds of years, but for the most part,
we kind of catch up with him mainly in The
Phantom Menace, and he is leading the Jedi Council. He's
been leading it for a while, and he's the Yoda.
(19:28):
We know he's wise and kind, but he's also kind
of stuck in his ways in getting a little bit rigid.
And that's a large part of the story of the
prequels and the story of the actual Jedi that they've
been around for so long. Yoda has been leading it
for so long that he's getting kind of stuck in
his ways. In a part of Jedi philosophy is you know,
you're never done learning that you should always be open
(19:50):
to new things. And it's Yoda doesn't handle things as
well as he could, which you know, you go to
Phantom Menacing where he meets Anakin and he's he's a
little cold to him. It's like, how do you feel?
And and Anakin's like cold, sir, He's like fear fearing,
like you know, he goes in on this kid right away,
and you're like, damn Yoda. Uh. And that is part
of the storytelling that Yoda has is getting a little
(20:12):
stuck in his ways and a little a little fearful,
a little like overly on guard for anything that might
lead to the dark Side. And is this because it
happens after Count Dooku goes to the dark Side on him. No,
it's actually before Duko has left the Jedi Order because
he has doubts in it. So I think that has
maybe affected Yoda because he's that's his padawan of Doku
(20:33):
as his padawan, and Doku basically said like, I don't
think the Jedi Order is actually working well. You're two
in league with the government and falling what they do
instead of just listening to the will of the force.
Duke has already got some problems, so yeah, they're probably
affected Yoda. But I mean the story that Lucas is
really interested in with the government, the Republic and with
the Jedi Council is that he just doesn't like big organizations.
(20:57):
And you go back there, like he had to leave
the Directors Guild because they were fighting with him about
where the director credit goes on Empire strikes back, and
you know, he's an indie filmmaker who kind of made
one of the biggest things ever kind of on his own.
You know, he got distribution and all that. But so
then he goes back to tell this story and what
do you know, A lot of it's about big organizations
eventually get all crusty, ridgid and full of themselves and
(21:20):
fall apart. Three adventure movies about that. Do we know
how or when he joined the Jedi We don't know
details about that. The best thing that we can kind
of infer is because he is says he Yoda says
he's nine years, nine hundred years old and has been
training Jedi for eight hundred years, that he joined sometime
(21:41):
in before he turned one hundred and baby Yoda is
fifty years. He has fifty yeah, yeah, So that's really interesting.
So I don't know if Baby Yoda is suddenly gonna
be like I've turned fifty. Hello, let's discuss literature. If
he's suddenly going to be like totally advanced, that's so
interesting because yeah, like the introduction of baby Yoda at
(22:02):
fifty just presents so much information and questions about the race,
because if at fifty you're still basically infantile, Like, at
what point do you when are we going to see teenage? Teenage?
I hope that season two of Men. Also, somebody tweeted
and said, like, what if when baby Yoda starts talking,
(22:23):
it's normal and then um, and then regular Yoda like
just had to stroke or something. Yeah, it'll also talks
that way. Okay, never mind, maybe that's just a part
of the species having strokes. Um, we have to take
a really quick break and then we're going to hop
back into more Yota and of course me trying to
(22:44):
shoohorn in Baby Yoda as much as possible. But first
we wanted to talk to y'all about Audible, which if
he I actually use a time. I have so many
books on Audible. Yeah yeah, yeah, I have their membership,
so oh so you're your fancy yeah, and just well
I'm in my car a lot like here in Los Angeles,
(23:04):
literally like it takes like getting traffic everywhere. It's like podcasts,
but audio books. Yes, And so I'm so excited because
I get to tell other people about the gift of
an audible membership, which I don't know if you're definitely
treat yourself give it to a friend for the holiday season,
because I use it religiously. Yeah, especially if you're somewhere
(23:26):
a where there's a lot to a lot of commuting,
you do. I think this is an amazing group, and
now it's the best time to do it because there's
a special offer off your first three months. Yeah. You
have access to an unbeatable selection of audio books, including bestsellers, motivation, mysteries, thrillers, memoirs,
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(23:47):
in the self help section and I love it, no
worries at all. I love Burnet Brown a lot of
their book A lot of their audio books are read
by the author, and I have a ton from Wayne
Dyer as well. I could go on and on. A man, Well,
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(24:07):
anywhere else, and you can listen on any device, anytime,
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well commuting. Also the gym. I use it a lot
when I clean. It's like the only thing that will
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(24:27):
limited time, you can get three months of Audible for
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(24:49):
slash nerd or texting Nerd to five hundred five hundred,
and we're back. We're still talking about Yoda. Yes, I
had just a couple more quotes that I wanted to
say from Frank Oz. I mean, it's just I think
we really forget that he's the man behind this character.
So he said it's a four person character. I flew
(25:10):
back and forth to London about three times and rehearse
for a couple of weeks with them. It's very intense
rehearsal because you have four people trying to do one
thing very very specifically, so every single word, every single
move had to be rehearsed again and again. Therefore we
don't take time on the set. The last time I
flew over there, I rehearsed with the three guys again
(25:31):
and then we went and shot for a day and
a half, night and a half. Yeah, I mean they're
having they're having I even see this now with the
Mandalorian with the little puppet, but like his ear moves,
his eye moves, his map, like everything has to be
SYNCD up. Yeah. Yeah, and that's it been like this
grand tradition of Yoda is the ear wobble because when
they made the original puppet, they're like, this looks good,
but his mouth moves, his ears wobble a little bit,
(25:53):
and then at the time it's like, what are we
gonna do? And then that became really authentic. So when
they made the digital Yoda, they build into the digital
Yoda that his ears wabble. Yeah, So it's been great
to see baby Yoda's ears being so very expressive. Yes,
So would you say that he has a character trajectory
or does he kind of stay the same. Oh? No,
(26:16):
I think some of it is implied, but it's definitely there.
You know, in the prequels, he goes through the Clone Wars,
he knows that it's kind of that there's something fishy
that he's been, you know, drawn into something. Jedi are
supposed to defend and protect, but they're kind of drawn
into being warriors in the Clone Wars and just the
act of fighting sort of increases the dark side. He's
trying to figure out what's going on with that. Eventually
(26:36):
he realizes that they've been played by City as Palpatine.
And you know, there's a scene in Revenge of the
Sith where he says, so fail Divi, and he really
is owning like, I screwed up. I was not looking
at the big picture and I let fear get to me.
So then when he goes to Dagiba in between the
sequels and hides out in between the prequel trilogy and
the original trilogy, So by the time that Yoda shows
(26:57):
up or that Luke shows up to be rained, he's like,
I'm not sure if I should train him. Maybe it
maybe it'll only make things worse. Uh. So he really
did take time to reflect. And if you watch the
prequels and then compare them to all of Yoda's wisdom
and empire, you can't see a real shift that he
is trying to be much more open and flowing and
(27:19):
really practice what he preaches. And a really fun detail
that came out that I wanted to be sure to share. Uh,
there's a book called From a Certain point of View
that gives a bunch of different characters little chapters. Uh.
In Yoda's chapter is kind of he's on Daga but
and he's looking out and sensing everything going on in
the galaxy, and he's wishing that he could train Skywalker.
(27:42):
He wishes that Skywalker would come here because Skywalker is
so disciplined and so ready to learn the ways of
the force. And then you realize he's talking about Leah
and it's this great twist and if you you really
watch it all, it was like, Yeah, Luke's like, I
want to have adventure. I want to go out there.
I want to be uh, you know, a fighter like
my dad and a warrior with a cool sword and lands.
(28:03):
Just like I'm serious, I have to take care of things.
I have to be selfless and put other people first,
and like she is a perfect what a Jedi is
supposed to be. Yeah, so he's like, all right, I
was kind of hoping lay I would show up eventually,
but I guess I'll take Luke. That's so neat. No,
I definitely didn't know that. I also I'm fascinated. So
I mean, if we're looking at the child slash, baby
(28:23):
Yoda obviously is force sensitive. Was I don't remember this
because I don't remember Yattle, but I'm guessing she was. Yeah,
she's on the Jedi Council. Yeah, of course she is. Yeah,
but I'm like, she doesn't Okay, Yeah, you don't get
to see her, you know, throw things around or anything.
That's what I mean about the old Light Saber, at
least on screen. So I wonder if it's just more
inherent in their race species. That's the big question that
(28:47):
Baby Yoda is teasing for people who are, you know,
into this level of Star Wars of like, oh, is
that just two of those? Is that the only two
that ever existed Yoda, Yattle or all of these creatures
ever for sensitive of you know, there's a lot of
people who think that Baby Yoda is going to be
an actual clone of Yoda. Uh yeah, I know. That's
the big thing is people think that that's a clone,
(29:08):
possibly a clone. Yeah, Baby Yoda. Do you how do
you fall on that spectrum of that conspiracy? I always
it works in the history of Star Wars and in
the timeline of Star Wars and all that. But I
always think about, like for these kind of what if,
like well, how would impact the story? And I don't
see how it would super impact the story if it
was it's another Yoda. Yodas had his story. It's completed,
(29:30):
there's an arc, and I think it's much more interesting
if we kind of get a little sense of maybe
what this race is, but more importantly, like what does
it mean for the Mandalorian? You know, I think Baby
Yoda is all about Mandalorian going. I didn't really have
my heart and being a bounty hunter because I'm kind
of a noble guy and now now I gotta be
a dad and I have no idea how to do that.
But I know what it is to be an orphan,
(29:51):
so I am not going to So I think having
the the kid have his his own identity adds more
to that relationship than suddenly the Mandalorian going yes, Yoda,
I've looked at years old passed away like, yeah, it
could happen. They might have a good storytelling reason. But
I was going to say, what are some of your
(30:11):
favorite quotes? Oh yeah, and you'd has got a lot
of great quotes. Uh, empire strikes back. I think there
is a ton that you know, people quote a lot
that are really powerful to do or do not. There
is no try, which I think just boils down to
believe in yourself if you believe you can do it,
if you believe you can sell script and allywood like,
you have to believe that it can happen, right, I
think that is just a great wisdom. I don't think
(30:34):
I told. I can't remember if I told. The podcast
is but Matthew Cherry, who's a director who if you
don't follow, definitely do and he's a part of Monkey Pow,
which is uh or he has worked under Monkey pot
which is Jordan Peel's company. He tweeted months ago in
the summer, sometimes you just have to bet on yourself.
And that was literally when I was going into my
pitch to HBO, Max and like there are a lot
of things working against me with that, and I just
(30:56):
was like, Nope, I'm going to do it. I know
I haven't sold something before, but I'm gonna. You know,
it was just like this thing of like kind of
giving being undeniable, I would say, And if I had
had any wavering sense, I don't think I would have
sold it. And I think I just went in thinking
that I would. So I totally agree. But also, Matthew Cherry,
thank you for tweeting that. I told him so many times.
I like it literally changed my life because it just
(31:19):
changed the framework of changed my my brain when I
was going in there, because I saw his tweet like
right before I went in. Yeah, he was your Yoda.
He was my own Matthew Cherry twitter Yoda. Yeah. So
I think there's great things about like, yeah, just believing yourself.
But I think he also like it just kind of
there's that great scene and Empire strikes back where he
Yoda brings Luke to these tree cave that has evil
(31:41):
spirits in it, you know that that evil presence that
and uh and Luke as him what's in it and
he says, only what you take with you, which is
like such a great idea of just being mindful yourself
of well, what is in any room that you go in, well,
at least what you take with you. You know he's
in there. If you come in with negative energy, that
will for sure be in the room. Um. Another quote
(32:03):
I love is when Luke is asking about how the
force works and how he'll know the difference between the
light side and the dark side. Joda says, you will
know when you are calm, at peace, passive. The Jedi
uses the force for knowledge and defense, never for attack.
And I remember hearing that when I was a kid,
and it's just like I was kind of Luke and like,
but I want to have adventured, and as I get older,
just that idea of just like, Okay, any problem you have,
(32:26):
take a deep breath, be calm, except that you can
only do the things that you can do, So you're
you're passive when other people are upset, and you act
when you need to out of knowledge or defense. Yeah,
And it's just like that that kind of boils down
to even just like having a nice conversation with people,
being a decent driver in traffic, you know, like just
kind of day to day real life stuff is where
(32:48):
as well as deep philosophical. Also, since this is kind
of our first time talking about Star Wars on the pod,
I think we should really discuss the difference between Jedi
and the Seth because I think anyone watching it just
assumes it's good and bad when really it's a little
more complicated than that, because where how it really breaks
down as the Sith wants to take over completely and
(33:11):
the Jedi actually wants balance. They don't want to wipe
out the Sith because they because the Force, the way
the Force works is you need the dark side for
the light side to balance. Uh Is that correct? Did
I goof that up? Well? I think there is a
there's there's debate, and it's definitely Star Wars is art
(33:31):
and you can take it the way you want, and
I have opinions, and in Lucas has been saying some
stuff about this that's been a resurfacing. I think that
the idea of it is the Jedi do want balance
in that accepting that there is light and dark naturally
in the world. There's a cycle of life and death,
and you know, certain trees have to die in order
to be reborn and all that kind of thing. The
(33:53):
Sith when they're like the dark Side, it's entirely selfish.
They want to consume everything, so they want to be
if they want to be on attack. And the Jedi,
and this is another thing that I think is is
great philosophy of the Jedi are like, we are passive,
except with the Sith. They gotta die because otherwise they
(34:13):
will take over everything. Lucas himself has said explicitly. Again,
audiences can interpret it how they want, but Lucas has said,
bringing balance to the force means killing the Sith because
otherwise they will take everything. And that's what makes some
of these quotes even more powerful to me, because he's like,
it's knowledge and defense doesn't mean just never do anything,
but it means only razor blade. Only get violent when
(34:36):
you're actively stopping something evil and unnatural, like the Sith
going we'll take all of it. It's not like we'll
take fifty of the universe the galaxy and be evil
over here and you guys have parties, they'll take it all. Well,
this was so fascinating. As I was listening to you
talk like some of his quotes, I was like, oh,
these reminds me of tenants of martial arts. They're supposed
to us a self defense, right like that, I mean
(34:59):
a ridge landing. People kind of use it for a
lot of different things. But I feel like he's Yodo
reminds me obviously of a guru, and I feel like, um,
this teacher, and um, I feel like there's a lot
of elements of martial arts that's like, um, you're only
supposed to You're not supposed to use it for harm
unless you're you're differ Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Um. Another
(35:23):
quote that people really means a lot to people is
the luminous beings? Are we not this crude matter? And
again it's you know, it's Star Wars and it it
pulls from lots of different ideas and religions, and you
can take it how you want, but I think it's
just a it's a very beautiful idea in the word
luminous gets used a lot in Star Wars because of
the power of that one moment in Empire strikes back
of just that idea that we are more than the
(35:44):
some of our parts, you know, and we are all connected. Yeah, yeah, gosh.
I was going to say some one of the books
that I mentioned, so one with Wayne and dire. He
has something which I think a lot of people like
actually hearing this, is that he like you said, there's
there is dark and light, there's good and bad, and
he said, so, um, that's just how life operates in cycles.
(36:05):
And so if you're having a lot of bad luck,
like if you're just really down, you're having a really
hard time, imagine that good luck is leaning against it.
And I really love that. It's like when you're like,
how can I hold on for hope, I'm having like
the worst time of my life, and it's like, well,
if you're already down, it means you must be going up. Like,
just imagine that good luck is on the other side
(36:25):
waiting to happen. It's like waiting to take its cycle.
So that's just love. It's that good stuff. That's that
good stuff in that Bernie Brown. Um, we have to
take another really quick break and then we're gonna hop
back into more Yoda after this and we are back.
(36:50):
One fact I just wanted to throw in here before
we move on is Lego Yoda. His mini fig was
the first of their figures to be shorter than the
other toys in the Lego Star Wars. Love that So
how small is Baby Yoda gonna be? I personally love
the fact that Disney listened to Jon Favreau about not
having merchandise because obviously that would have spoiled all of
(37:13):
the Baby Yoda stuff. And I know everyone was like, well,
it's just coming out in time for the holidays. I'm like,
but it's not, though, because in order for that to happen,
they would have had to have those cells, like make
up the characters, the models. All of that takes months.
So you're not going to see Baby Yoda merch until Yeah.
I smashed that link for the Funko Pop and it's
like May of next year. Yeah. So it costs Disney
(37:34):
two point seven million with no Baby Yota products available
for the holiday season. We're going to make that up
next totally, no problem, no problem. They'll make back the
price they paid for lucasfilm in the Baby Yoda merch So, Joseph,
can you talk to us a little bit about Clone
Wars Yoda specifically? Yeah, So the Clone Wars you get
(37:55):
to spend a lot of time more time with the
Jedi in particularly the Jedi Council and individual episodes with
Yoda being a wise leader and having a little bit
more of a sense of mirth and humor because that
is a part of his character. But at the end
of The Clone Wars, there's gonna be a new season
coming out in uh February on Disney, plus a final
season the Clone Wars. But in what is right now
(38:16):
the last season of The Clone Wars, Yoda starts hearing
the voice of Quagon Gin, the Jedi played by Liam
Neeson from Phantom, Menace, and Uh. Lucas had always meant
to tell this story in the movies, but he basically
tells the story of how some Jedi can retain their
existence within the Force and appears forced ghosts or force spirits.
(38:37):
So sometimes people like Han should come back and be
a ghost. And like this arc of Yoda is like
no no in in or like Mace Window, like Mace
Window didn't do the training. Uh. Long story short, UH,
Quigan was very interested in this idea that if you
were doing so for a selfless reason, you could retain
your existence within the Force. Because the idea is everybody
(38:58):
passes into the Force where part of the force we
always will be, but you're not aware that, Hey, this
is who I was, and I can talk to people
and all that so quick and kind of half figured
this out. He comes to Yoda and says, I have
this additional train for you to do. You have to
kind of face your dark self. You have to face
the possibilities that you made some mistakes. You have to
face your fear of the future. And through all this
(39:19):
training you will eventually learn to become one with the Force,
but still retain your your identity. And Obi Wan learns
this from Quagon as well, meditating on Tautoween. So that's
why in the original Star Wars movie, when Obi Wan
Kenobi disappears, uh, he doesn't get cut in half by
Darth Vader. He disappears, and later he appears as a
four Spirit. And when Yoda dies in Return of the Jedi,
(39:42):
he disappears, and when Luke dies in Last Jedi, he disappears.
And a lot of this might be a little bit
more relevant to Rise of Skywalker because a lot of
people think there's gonna be a four Spirit party. So
if people are watching, go like, why did my random
favorite Jedi come back? That that Yo to Arc and
that that wisdom the end experience that you need in a
(40:04):
a particular idea that you need to have like a
selfless reason to retain your Yeah, you can't just be
like I just want like being me. I don't want
to stop. And the idea is they learned this so
they could help Luke finish his journey. And you know,
that's why Yoda is showing up to Luke in the
Last Jedi, because that's kind of the point of continuing
(40:24):
to have your identity within the Force is to be
able to help people. So everyone thinks that we're going
to get a force ghost Luke. Yeah, I mean that's
almost certain sense smart camels in the cast okay um
but also other force ghosts. Yeah, possibly Leiah you mean no,
because she's she could have trained. We don't know, but
(40:46):
like we know that Quigan in theory, Liam Neeson in
theory could appear um Obi one Kenobi. They've got some
work to do on that. But I see what you mean.
Because this is the last one of this chapter, there
might be some of the past. Yeah. Yeah, and in
theory because Anakin pops up right at the end of
Return of the Jedi, his forced spirit appears to Luke.
(41:07):
So like you know, everybody's the walks are dancing, everybody's partying,
and Luke kind of looks off at the distance and
he sees Obi one as a forced spirit. He sees
Yoda and then he sees his father join him. So
that suggests that Anakin has somehow learned to retain his existence.
So then that your mind starts going like, I bet
Anakin would maybe have some things to say about what
(41:28):
his grandson's choices are, right, So there's a possibility of
that as well. Also, Um, Force awakens. I was such
a troll and I just kept calling her race Guywalker.
We have yet to see the full truth. I love
just being a edge lord. Um. So between this between
(41:50):
Clone Wars and Rebels, are those two like beloved property?
I feel like I'm not as in the I'm the
general fan base, but I'm not like, you know, as
hardcore as you are. Do our both of those shows,
which are both animated. Um, are they both beloved the same?
Do you feel like the fan base kind of latches
onto one more than the other? I think they're pretty even. Yeah.
(42:11):
And so Clone Wars Lucas was just sort of like,
I didn't get to do all the stories I want
to do, I want to play, and he hired this
young person is his kind of padawan learner Dave Filoni.
So the Clone Wars are some great stuff because George
Lucas would say, like, I have an idea, and then
Feloni would kind of execute it. So it's kind of
the best of both worlds. And then when Disney took
over and they wanted the new animated series, Feloni ran Rebels,
(42:34):
So there's a real connection in the Mandalorian. He's involved
with the Mandalorian as well. Yeah, so there's a real
like the Star Wars lore of there's always a wise
master who passes on knowledge the young person, but then
it's the young generations turned to pick up the mantle.
Like that has literally happened in real life with George
Lucas and Dave Foloni. Um. What about Yoda and Rebels. Yeah,
(42:59):
he pops up, uh. I think at least once, maybe twice. Uh.
And there's some interesting stuff there because Yo Dig admits.
One of the big things is he admits that he
made some mistakes in the in the prequel era, that
he let his fear control him is a big thing
in Star Wars that fear is the path to the
dark side and another great kind of self help thing
from Star Wars that as soon as you are afraid
(43:21):
of losing something, then that makes you angry and hateful
and all those kind of things. So, uh, that's a
big part of his cannon, and that is kind of
the place where he fully admits that he made some mistakes.
You actually have a quote from him here from Rebels.
It says, I lost my way for a long time,
but now I have an opportunity to change things. And
then he finishes with the last Chance. Um so I
(43:44):
was just like what you were saying. Yeah, yeah, And
he and he guides Ezra a little bit and guides
him to his destiny, that he has a specific destiny,
and he sort of implies that, yeah, it's okay to fight,
but you need to figure out how to fight in
and when to fight. So a lot of a lot
of continuing great Yoda wisdom, but he's not in Rebels
(44:04):
a ton. It's just one or two pop ups. If
you want fun gifts, if you're sitting around going how
should I communicate with friends? There's so many great Yoda
gifts that express disappointment, exasperation, wanting to go somewhere quickly.
One of my favorite Yoda gifts. There's a moment in
Revenge of the Sith when he's gonna confront Palpatine. He
(44:24):
walks in and he does just a little hand gesture
and two guards slam into the wall. It's great for
when you're upset. Oh my gosh, I'm gonna handle this. Whoop.
I think I gave I gave one of my ex
is like a Yoda like Valentine. I think I said,
like Yoda best Valentine or something. And now we're broken up,
(44:46):
my dad humor. Um, so this is we talked. We
kind of touched on Warner Warner her sog uh and
it said, uh, that upond a bond seeing baby Yoda. Uh.
He forgot. He was holding a puppet in again doing
baby speak as the puppet had a song. I don't
want to do someone have video of that. I really
(45:07):
want all the weren't hurts behind the scenes, that audio
of the cowards comment. I need that in my life.
His baby cous Did you see that? Someone tweeted like
the combination of it. It's a combination of animals and
I think there's an actual voice being manipulated in that
whole mix. So this tweet is from matthew Wood. It
(45:28):
says Baby Yoda's voice by a combination of baby samples,
bat eared Foxes, No wonder So Cute, Kinka Jews, and
the sound design vocal talents of Dave Accord ps. He
also voiced Baby Rohoda the Hutlet for the Clone Wars. Yeah,
that's the jab the huts child. Well, and I saw
(45:49):
the baby Java or whatever. Did you see that? Yeah,
that someone did of because it was like baby like,
oh no, that's like, oh shoot, who else in Star
Wars should have a baby kind of thing? Yeah, yeah,
but there is. It's the Clone Wars movie that kicks
off the whole series. Has got a lot of quality
time with the job as Baby Rod of the Hutlet.
(46:13):
Can I ask you a question? Why? So? Why does
baby you to speak to you? Is it just the absolute,
just intrinsic cuteness that you want to cuddle and take
care of the baby. You know? I follow a lot
of baby animals on Instagram, so yes, I mean I'm
gonna be I follow a baby pig, I follow baby Fox,
I follow Juniper the Fox. Shout out to everyone else
(46:35):
that follows Juniper. Um, you know, I have my baby Molly.
I think that he has this animal quality right too,
and also like kind of baby like he's like a
baby human hybrid, you know. Yeah, um, like just enough
human qualities and movement, but also very much like a
cute little animal. And um the cooing got me and
(46:59):
his dumb little teeth that s his little teeth. I
think he's just so innocent and needs Like yeah, he's strong,
but like so innocent and just like calls to be
protected and brings out like it's almost like he's a
test himself, Like he's like you know what I mean,
like attest to like the true your human nature, like
(47:20):
if you're like you said with Mando, like that's his
It's almost like he's called to protect this little thing
like you cannot help you can't help it, and so
like he's almost a testament himself of like to the
good I guess, like it's like, oh, this was all
a test just to see if you would take care
of this, you know. It's like his species is innately
(47:42):
like constantly testing people for the light that they have
inside of them. Yeah, And I love that when we
see him use the force, it just feels totally intuitive,
like he saw this this guy who seems to be
trying to protect him get hit by this big beast
several times and look like he's going to I so,
just out of total kindness and intuition, he reaches his
(48:04):
little hand out and gives it as all and then
has to take a picture nap his I'm not gonna
lie his three footed feet, like I can't handle here something.
He's normally wearing little brown loafers, but sometimes they're off
and he has his little coffee and I hate it.
I'm like, oh god, no, put it back unders out.
(48:25):
Ryan Johnson presents claws out well if he is an
actual parent. Do you get nervous about Mando's bad parenting
of baby Yoda? No? No, I relate with Mando a lot,
like especially when he that that trying to explain everything
you need that child to do as if they're functioning
(48:46):
adult and watching them like listen and then still do
what they were going to do. Anyway, I was like, yeah,
all parents fall into that trap. I think, yeah, no logic.
I want to hit that button and hands like I
told you don't hit don't hit that, but oh my god,
because it's bright. I'm not against all other franchises making
(49:08):
baby versions of the ill but excepted. You see, someone
made the baby Thanos and I was like, yes, snap,
oh man, I was gonna say, is there anything else
that we should mention that we left out? I know,
you know, it's kind of a mystery, to be honest,
and that's why it was funny. Like um, our friend
Ash Crossing who couldn't come on tonight, but she was
(49:30):
going to be your your co guest and uh, I
can't remember if it was her. Somebody like, well, actually,
it's fascinating because there's not a ton known about the
history of their species. Yeah, the species are really mysterious.
And I think that's a big question of how deep
is the Mandalorian going to go or is that going
to be part of it? Of like, we don't know
where this baby came from. Mean people wanted for I
(49:51):
want to take some samples for it for something, and
we don't know. And I think that's a big part
of the fun, fun mystery. And I think it's possible
that we won't learn a lot more and we'll stay
mysterious in this will just be a new character we
get to know. Oh, I have a question, do you
think that they're from eggs. I would love them to
just come from somewhere weird at one point the belly button.
I want them to come from him. This mysterious unfound
(50:14):
moon full of forest powers, and it's got some trees
and every once in a while the trees just drip rows.
Like I want it to be something like they are
deeply connected, they are of the forest and like every
you know, two thousand years four drips. I would love
that because there's something just really I think, deep and
fun and spiritual about them as as truly mysterious creatures,
(50:38):
you know. And I don't want it to be like
I mean, there was all the jokes and it's fun
of like when did Yoden Yett to look up and
like leave some mystery? Let him drink from a tree? Yeah? Never.
They probably mate by touching fingers or something. Yeah, you know,
if he in in dragon Ball, Piccolo his species, they
like remember that scene where he's like coughing out an egg.
(51:00):
He's like spitting up an egg. So I feel like
that could be what happens. Oh yeah, yeah, I love that. Yeah,
maybe it's a Gremlins thing, like one of their rights.
I don't know. I think the only other thing that
that I don't know if we touched on a lot,
that I'd like to say about Yoda is I think
one of the great things about his character is that
he does have a sense of humor, in a sense
(51:20):
of whimsy and like when the character is relaxing at
his best. There's a scene in Attack the Clones where
Obi one is looking for information because he can't find
a planet in the archive, and Yoda turns to all
the little kids he's training. Master ob One has lost
a planet. How embarrassing. How embarrassing. It's just like he
feels like you're kind of your sweet old uncle who
has this sense of Yeah, I've got all this wisdom,
(51:43):
I know all this philosophy, I've got all these concerns
and responsibilities. But the reason we're doing all this is
because life is beautiful and it's good to be with
people you care about and appreciate and have a sense
of whimsy and joy. And I think that is a
huge part of Yoda's character as well. Yoda, um, well,
y'all have been asking us to touch on Star Wars
(52:05):
and if he and I have put it off for
almost two years, mainly just because it's such a huge thing,
so we thought, okay, maybe we can tackle characters or um,
you know, we're gonna so starting in the new year,
we're actually going to do a multipart dive into Star
Wars some of the things that don't always get talked about,
like having an entire episode devoted to Yoda. Yeah, so
(52:25):
you'll be seeing more of that in Thank you so
much for coming on. Just you don't where can people
find you anything you want to plug? Yeah, you can
find me on Twitter and Instagram is at Joseph Scrimshaw
and you can go to my website Joseph scrimshaw dot
com for other podcasts. Do a podcast called Obsessed and
a Star Wars one called Fourth Center, and you can
check out the show on Adult swim tiktoone that I
am a writer for and so is Iffy. Yeah we
(52:47):
beat ticktooning. Yeah, and you know me as always if
you wide away on Twitter and Instagram, if D's on Twitch,
the discord is Discord dot g g slash Salt Squad.
There's a Nerdificent ab where you can talk all things Nerdificent,
and our footnotes are dropped in their Thanks to flickery.
H Thank y'all, to all the mods and then of
(53:09):
course T Public dot Com, Forward slash nerdifficent get T shirts.
Give it to people for the holidays. They need them.
They're cold, so you can make them warm by buying
the merch. Yes, I'm at miss Danny Fernandez and all
the things saying thank you for supporting us. We have
more in store for y'all in and as we always say,
(53:30):
stay nerdy, Stay nerdy.
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Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.