Star Wars Gets Bigger and Smaller at the Same Time

After a couple of weeks away, we're back with a ton of news, helped in large part by the Star Wars Celebration event. Plus, we talk about superhero fatigue, how artificial intelligence is the bogeyman du jour, and looking at things from the bad guys' perspective.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:11):
Hey, everybody, Welcome back to the Large Nerd Drunk Collider
after a bit of a break, where the podcast it's
all about the geeky things in the world around us
and how excited we are about them. WHOA, I am
rusty at this intro. I'm Ariel casting and with me
as always. Is this stupendous and today kind of wacky
Jonathan Strickland, The forest is strong in this And but

(00:35):
wait did we get did we finally get that Young
Guns Star Wars crossover we've been hoping for? I mean,
the day is early yet, Ariel, as far as we know,
that has in fact been announced as we're recording this.
That is true because Star Wars celebration is happening. I

(00:56):
don't think we're gonna get that mash up. It's just you.
You were mighty country, my friend. Well you know, I'm
a little bit country and then a teeny tiny bit
rock and roll. Yeah. Yeah, So yeah, we've been gone
for a couple of weeks. Jonathan had some travel and
then I had some travel. But we are back now

(01:17):
and excited with the plethora of geeksphere happenings that are happening. Yeah, No,
it's a it's gonna be a jam packed episode filled
with news plus you know, some chitter chatter from your
two beloved hosts. But in order for us to get
this ball rolling, because Ariel, she's got places to go

(01:39):
and work to do, so we're gonna jump right in
with thirty seconds or less. Yes, And the first thing
is that it looks like Warner Brothers is planning to
adopt Terry Potter into an HBO Max series. They're in
the final stage of negotiations. We knew this was happening
because as I've already said that, he wants to make

(02:00):
more Harry Potter's Superman, Cameathrone, Lord of the Rings, Sex
in the City, all that stuff. He's like, it's been
so long since we've had these movies. I'm like, it's
because we've already had these movies. Anyhow, it looks like
that is still going forward despite anybody's excitement or not
excitement about that. Yes, indeed, all right, I'm up next,

(02:24):
and my first thirty seconds or less is about a
film adaptation of Lore. Now, this is not the podcast
series by Aaron Mink, but rather a novel written by
Alexandra Bracken, which Hollywood reporter says is Hunger Games meets
Greek mythology. I don't know if I really am down

(02:47):
for that, but then hey, I'm old, so this sounds
like it's like a young adult kind of appeal thing. Anyway,
Amy Pascal is going to produce she produced Spider Man,
and then Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse are going to
be writing the screenplay. So this is very, very early
on in the whole phase. But yeah, I thought it

(03:09):
was interesting. If there are any lower fans out there,
I hope you're looking forward to a film adaptation. Yeah.
I originally thought this was an adaptation of the comic
book Laura Olympus, but to be fair, I'm not familiar
with the novel, so the comic could be based off
the book. I don't know. Sorry, that's the only That's
the only like interjection I have. All Right, the next

(03:30):
thirteen seconds of lest we got an announcement from the
Rock that Mowana is getting a live action adaptation and
that he will be playing Mauie. You know, he's got
a really close relationship with the story in Hawaii's kind
of where he's been a large portion of his life,
and I don't know I super loved him as Maui

(03:54):
and the cartoon. It's another one of those ones where
I feel like trying to take it out of animation
and put it into faux real life it might lose something.
And also like, I love the kind of roundly bulky
Mauie we got in the cartoon and that isn't the rock.
I'm sure he'll slay the part, but at the same time,

(04:15):
he doesn't have the look I want. Yeah, you know,
And here's my little interjection. I'm also going to say,
like it, I understand people who are getting frustrated with
these remakes of animated films out of Disney, particularly when
we're starting to see like even shorter time spans between
when the original came out and when the remake is

(04:37):
coming out. It does feel a little not great to me.
And I don't think Mowana is one that is really
ripe for a live action film. However, that being said,
having a movie where Pacific Islanders get more representation, that's
a good thing. So I don't really feel bad about that.

(05:00):
I just kind of wish they were tackling a different
Pacific Islander based story. Well we'll get to that later. Also,
this leads right into you know, maybe some of the
reason that they are remaking some of their older stuff
is to do with the reason some of the reasons
people are speculating for your next thirty second or less right,

(05:22):
which is Bob Eiger, the CEO who replaced Bob Jpek,
had a lot to say to shareholders in a phone
call earlier this week, and part of that involved a
seventeen billion dollar investment in Walt Disney World over the
next ten years. Now, the word investment to me suggests

(05:42):
that this is about adding to the Walt Disney World area,
not just supporting its day to day operations. And I
think this also probably has a lot to do with politics.
We won't really get into it, but Disney is kind
of in an embad old disagreement with the state of Florida,

(06:04):
and I have a feeling that this was Iger saying, hey, Florida,
we're pouring a ton of investment in your state, so
maybe back off a bit. That's the feeling I got.
But yeah, we'll surely have a lot more to say
about this as actual projects are announced over time. All Right,
The next thing is, it looks like talks are in

(06:26):
the way to get a fifth installment of the Shrek franchise,
which it's been over ten years since the last Shrek
movie and well unless you count post in Boots, which
came out last year, but they're looking to get the
original cast. On the one hand, I definitely think like

(06:46):
the jokes don't all hold up anymore because it's been
over ten years and they were all very timely. On
the other hand, do we really need more Shrek? That
was thirty two seconds whoops? Yeah, and yeah. I have
nothing to add to that other than I never really
I never really got the full appeal of Shrek in
the first place, But we could have a whole episode

(07:09):
dedicated to DreamWorks versus Disney and their philosophies. Instead, I'm
moving on, And the next announcement we have is that
we know that Lelo and Stitch is getting its own
live action remake like so many other Disney animated films,
And now we know the actress who will be playing
the young Lelo. Her name is Maya Kia Looa, and

(07:32):
she will be playing Lilo in Lelo and Stitch. The
only other person that I know for sure has been
announced as being part of this is Zach Gallafanakis, and
as far as I know, they have not revealed what
character he is playing. My guess is Stitch. All right. Next,
if you are a fan of Street Fighter and you

(07:54):
have been craving a wonderful Street Fighter movie since Ralph
Julia was in one way back in the day, you're
in luck because Legendary Pictures has gotten the rights to it.
They're the people who didn't go throwing Godzilla or sorry
no Godzilla versus Kong, Detective Pikachu and Dune, and they
have acquired the film and TV rights to Street Fighter.

(08:14):
And maybe we'll get a good movie. We'll see, yeah,
I mean hope. Springs Eternal, the Mortal Kombat film was
almost good. It definitely had moments that were really cool visually,
although I think overall it kind of was a dud.
But you know, I would love to see a great

(08:35):
Street Fighter movie. Honestly, I think the original Street Fighter
film is entertaining, but not entertaining because it was a
good movie. Okay, because raw Julia is amazing. I mean, yes,
that is undeniable. That's just a truth. Okay. My next
thirty seconds or less, so Josh Freedman has been tapped

(08:58):
to rewrite Fantastic four film for the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The original writers were Jeff Kaplan and Ian Springer, who
were mostly known for doing work in the comedy genre. Well,
they've gotten the boot, and now Josh Friedman is going
to do apparently a full rewrite of the script. He

(09:18):
is more known for science fiction. He co wrote War
of the Worlds and some other sci fi works as well,
So perhaps this is an indication that the Fantastic Four
film is going to have a fundamental change in tone
and go from being maybe a more lighthearted comedic story
to one that's a bit more grounded in tropes of

(09:40):
science fiction. Yeah, we'll see. There's just so a little
known about it. Okay. Next is that The Ballerina, which
is a spin awesome spin off of john Wick, is
getting a release date of June seven to twenty twenty four.
You know, that's not too bad since john Wick four
just came out, and if you're one of the people
who contributed to its seventy three plus million box office

(10:04):
so far and you're sad that there's not any more,
you know, it's not too long of a wait for you.
So yeah, that's that's about it. That's yeah, yeah, I'm
not gonna give any spoilers related to John Wick four,
but I have questions. I haven't watched it yet. I won't.

(10:25):
I'm not gonna spoil it for you or for anyone
else out there. Okay, moving on. So there is a
graphic novel called Helicious, which is a comic book about
the granddaughter of you know, Satan, who is kind of

(10:46):
wreaking havoc and being a prankster in Hell, but she's
sort of kind of trying to find her own way.
And then she finds out that her favorite rockstar is
scheduled to die, so she's determined to bring him down
to Hell, even though it turns out that's not really
where you're supposed to be. And then they go on
misadventures together. And now it's being turned into an animated series,

(11:10):
and Anthony Keatis, who's best known as being the frontman
for Red Hot Chili Peppers, is attached to star, presumably
as the rock star Briggy Bundy. Interesting concept. I don't
know if i'll watch it. Something else I don't know
if i'll watch because I never watched the original is

(11:32):
it looks like Amazon has ordered a TV TV adaptation
of the movie Cruel Intentions, which was book based on
the book Dangerous Liaisons. I haven't watched or read either.
It looks like they were looking to make this show
as early as twenty twenty one, and it's not the
first time they've tried to make a show back in
twenty sixteen, they tried to make a Cool Intentions show

(11:53):
back in two thousand and four, we got Cool Intentions three.
So um, yeah, if that's your jam, maybe you'll have
something to look forward to. Yeah. To me, the reason
why I wanted to even include this in our lineup
is just because the basic story has a very long
lineage right from being you know, a book too, like

(12:16):
there was a play, there was the you know, the
French interpretation. Then there's the American interpretation John Malkovich in it,
which then, by the way, informed one of the greatest
music videos of all time walking on Broken Glass by
any Lennox. Then you had Cruel Intentions, the teenage version
of the story. And now we've got this and I'm

(12:37):
to me, it sounds like, Hey, Euphoria did a really
good job getting a lot of eyeballs. How about we
do a different version of euphoria where everyone is just
out and out, ready to sleep with one another and
have no issues messing with each other. It's hard for
me to say go ahead, no, go ahead, I was

(13:01):
gonna say, it's hard for me to say what I'm
thinking and keep it family friendly. Also, I didn't realize
you had such strong feelings about cruel intentions. Maybe we
should have moved it to the actual storyline. No, no, no, no,
I suspected that would be a quick and done No. No,
it's just it was just more of like an and
you know, being interested in its lineage. I don't have

(13:21):
much to say about the actual content other than you
know it. It has its audience, and there are different audiences.
There's like the cerebral audience, and then there's the oh audience. Sure,
all right, okay, last one, here we go? Or not

(13:42):
the last one? Not the last one? I forgot we
added more? Okay, all right, sorry, sorry, sorry the third
to last. Okay. So, one of the stories we have here,
it's that My Adventures of Superman and animated series that
is a lighthearted DC animates. It's actually going to adult Swim,
which is a weird place for it to go because

(14:03):
it doesn't feel like an adult swim kind of series
to me. But it also has Jack Quaide voicing the
character of Superman slash Clark Kent. I think that's hilarious
because of course, Jack Quaide is also in the series
The Boys, where his arch nemesis is essentially an evil
version of Superman. But you know it should it looks interesting.

(14:26):
The little sneak peek they have is cute. There's not
much you can say about it because it's it's a
very short snippet, but I'm looking forward to it, m
all right. Next is Paramount Plus. If you don't have
Paramount Plus or if you've dropped it right now, you
can get a three month now through April twenty six.

(14:49):
After that it will automatically roll over to a paid membership,
so just be aware of that. Five dollars a month
for ad supporting or ten a month for no ads,
or bundle with showtime for twelve a month, glad if
you've been wanting to catch the latest season of The
Card in Heaven, wanted to pay for it, or have
already caught up on all the other Paramount Plus stuff
and dropped it for the time being. Hey, you've got
an opportunity. Yes, it is one of the several streaming

(15:14):
series services that I do not subscribe to currently, so
maybe i'll think about it. Okay, here is the last
story for real season. This is what I get for
looking at my tabs instead of looking at our show notes. Yeah.
Our final story is that we get a teaser for
Muppet Mayhem, which is about the Electric Mayhem. That's the

(15:34):
band that is in the Muppet Show universe. And it's
just a teaser, so we don't get a whole lot
to it, but it does make it look like it's
kind of your standard biopic documentary about a rock band,
So that to me seems like it could be a
lot of fun. These are characters who are typically in

(15:55):
a little supporting role. It's very rare to have them
take front and center stage. So I hope that this
project makes it a really fun story that we can,
you know, think of as having that true Muppet chaotic
experience in it. I thought we'd chat just briefly about

(16:16):
some of the stuff we've been up to since we
took our two week hiatus. One of the things I
thought was interesting I still haven't watched. I haven't seen
Dudgeons and Dragons yet. But I've been really surprised at
how reviews have on. You know, for the most part,
been pretty pretty positive for that movie. Yeah, both critically

(16:38):
and and audience wise. It's been pretty fresh. Including friends
of mine who very much loved D and D kind
of all across the spectrum of how they like to
game and what kind of stories they like, have enjoyed this.
It's not from what I hear like. It's just good fun,
is what I hear. With a couple with a lot

(17:00):
of really good Easter eggs and maybe a couple of
tier jerkers if you like either Systems or Lore. Um,
I'm seeing it this weekend. Awesome. Yeah, No, I've got
the theater mostly to myself. Well, what day are you watched?
How I like it? Sunday evening, Easter Sunday evening. Yeah,
I'll be I'll be watching nieces try to find eggs,

(17:23):
and depending on how they are, I might still be
doing that at that time. Listen. I also I like
to do Easter stuff, so I'll be doing Easter stuff
in the morning, and then I have a game, and
then after that game, I'm gonna go watch the movie.
So um, but it's not a D and D game,
it's a it's a different system. Well that's cool. I

(17:44):
am eager to hear your thoughts on it. I almost
went to see it last weekend, but just didn't get
my act together to do it. Something else that we saw,
or at least we always saw the reactions to was
for the Super Mario movie, which is out now, and again,
most of the reviews I've seen have been pretty positive.
The one negative review I saw it really wasn't even

(18:06):
that negative, it was just a little more critical. Was
in the Mary Sue and I think it looked like
the major criticism was that the movie appeared to be
an appeal to nostalgic millennials and that it really wasn't
for other audiences. But I don't think that's necessarily a
bad thing. Sometimes you just know who your audience is. Yeah,

(18:27):
that's true. And you know what, it's not just for millennials,
because my niece and nephews are super excited about seeing it,
so it's also for kids, so you know, I think
I think maybe it was just that some of the
jokes perhaps were felt like they were gearing toward me.
I haven't seen it, So I can't really say it's
just based upon what the review said. And like I said,

(18:49):
every other review I saw was really positive, and I'm
like Mary Sue, you might want to be a little
careful and not try, you know, trying to avoid getting
a reputation of being the poopers of the party. But
also like when you look at most cartoons that require
adults to take children to them, they put in jokes
that the parents will enjoy. And if you've got a

(19:10):
bunch of you know, five to thirteen year olds, because
that in my five to fourteen year olds, because in
my brain, those are the ones that go to the
movies still with their parents. Those parents are more than
likely millennials, so of course you want to appeal to
them as well as the children, because you want to
make it a fun experience for everybody. But not New

(19:32):
New Tunes did it, Animaniacs did it, Tiny Tunes did it,
Hannah Barbara did it. So they're just being cranky. Yeah,
that's that's kind of the feeling I got to now, Ariel,
you've been off on vacation, but has there been anything
in the geekosphere that you were kind of into over

(19:52):
the last couple of weeks that you wanted to touch on.
I haven't watched any Mandalorian yet. I have seen some spoilers,
but not a whole lot. Honestly, while I was in Mexico,
I caught the last five minutes of the first Freddie
versus Jason movie. I caught the last five minutes of

(20:12):
Doctor Sleep, What a Else? And I watched the first
half of that week's Never After episode from Dimension twenty
while sitting by the pool. This is not to brag
on my vacation. It was very relaxing. I just didn't
spend a lot of time watching TV. And when I've
been home, I've been prepping for band gigs and prepping

(20:35):
for travel and trying to get work in a good place.
So other than the standard like Connors and Mike Court
and stuff like that, I haven't watched much. Have you
still not watched episode four of the Last of Us?
I think I'm like three quarters of the way through now.

(20:55):
So the problem is that requires more attention, as as
does Dimension twenty stuff. So like the things that I
watch in the evening, our stuff that my husband also
likes to watch. So and we've been just up to
our vacation we really needed this vacation, and up to
our vacation, we just didn't have a lot of brain power.

(21:18):
So it was like we finished off History of the
World Part two, which was so so about half good
and about half really grown, super grown and cringe, and
then you know, we watched stuff that was easy and
lighthearted and even stuff that we've kind of already seen before,
just because we didn't have a lot of energy to

(21:39):
put into any shows prior to vacation, and we didn't
have a lot of brainpower. We were juggling a lot
of things to get everything ready, Like we had to
put my cat into boarding. This is more information than
any of you needed about my personal life, but now
you have it. So now we're back, we're going to
start stuff up again and start watching new stuff, and
I'm going to make him watch a whole bunch of
stuff with me. But it's kind of been path of

(22:00):
least Resistance and Last of Us requires just it requires attention.
I tried to half watch it and that does not work. Yeah,
now that's that's totally fair. The really the only thing
like I same for me, I haven't been watching a
whole lot of stuff like I did. Catch up on
Night Court, which ridiculous. And then also I watched the

(22:23):
first two episodes of season two of Schmiga DN, the
Schmicago season, and man, if you love musicals and you
love like catching references to musicals, you need to watch
at least season two, Like, really, you need the first
season so you have the grounding. But the second season

(22:45):
so far, I think is even better and more entertaining
than the first one. And I say that even though
I'm not the biggest fan of the musicals, that they
are referencing stuff like Chicago and Cabaret and Pippin and
Hair and Sweet Charity and Sweeney Todd and Company. There's
a lot of Sondheim references in this one, but it's

(23:08):
it's fun like, and it's it's fun to watch them
poke fun at the stereotypes of musicals, my favorite being
a musical number about how shocking the musical number is,
and nothing about is particularly shocking to a modern audience.
But they are referencing the fact that when these musicals
came out, they were really challenging a lot of social norms,

(23:30):
and it's just that now society accepts certain things a
lot more readily than it used to and so it's
not really shocking anymore. It's kind of like if you
were to go see Rocky Horror today, I don't think
it would be nearly as scandalous as it was when
it came out in the seventies. I mean, it all
depends on the cast members who are performing in front
of it. There's there's a lot of things that intent

(23:53):
will make feel darker or lighter regardless of what the
words or the topic is. Um I have found because
Cabaret is still even though it's not as shocking as
it was back in the day, like it still feels
pretty grungy to me. Well, yeah, no, no, Cabaret definitely
has like it has that sort of sleazy feel to it.

(24:15):
And plus, I mean you have the underlying threat of
the Nazis all the way through Cabaret, and like that's
never going to feel like it's a minor thing, right,
That's always going to feel like it's a really dark
and important part of the story. Yeah. But I mean,
like even Chicago, I think it's because they're they are

(24:36):
dark storylines and they are kind of gritty and maybe
sleazy is the right word, because I can't figure out
what that word is like, it's not shocking anymore, but
it's still has that kind of visceral under I can't
even think of the right word. It's it's definitely that

(24:58):
visceral undertone to it, and I'm like, it's still it
still gives me the intended feels. Yeah, well, and like
the story certainly can still have an impact. It's just
that like certain like the song references things like I
have a tattoo. Doesn't that shock you? Like the characters
are like no, not not really, like because like that's

(25:20):
kind of a normal thing now, So that's sort of
the tropes that they're poking fun at. But yeah, I
think I think if you're a fan of musicals, you
should definitely check out The first season of Shmigadoon was
cute and had moments that I thought were really entertaining.
I just feel like this one, the second season, already
is stronger than the first season was. But we're only

(25:40):
two episodes and the third one doesn't come out until
next week, so I have to wait a while until
the next one, and I'm chopping at the bit. Yeah,
poor Jonathan message me was like, I messed up. I
messed up big. It didn't relea solid once, which is
very funny. Yeah, because the first two episodes were out,
but then what they did aerial because it didn't say this,

(26:00):
but what they did and hbo oh, I'm so mad actually,
Apple Apple, I'm so mad at you. Yeah, it's it's
one of the few streaming services I subscribe to, the
Apple I'm so mad at you. So what you did
was you had episode one, you had episode two, and
then in the Little Carousel, they had a thumbnail for

(26:21):
episode three, even though there wasn't an episode three to
actually show yet. It was the thumbnail for three to
say like, this is coming soon. But I didn't just
say coming soon. So when I started pushing play, I
was like, oh, they dropped the whole season at once.
I can binge the whole thing. And then two episodes in,
I was like, why is it suddenly switching to a
different series. Yeah, Hulu does that too, but it can

(26:47):
be frustrating. So anything else that you watched, No, let's
move on to all the news we have to talk about. Okay.
If that sounded cranky, it wasn't. I was generally genuinely
interested that note. Really, Chicago is like the only thing
relatively geeky. That's new that I caught. Everything else I've

(27:10):
been watching has been kind of like what you were saying,
like the low effort sort of stuff that I had
in the background because I was trying to do other
stuff at the same time. Yeah, honestly though, Like, there's
still a bunch of movies that I actually want to
go see. So I still need to see the new
Creed movieum, and Redfield comes out April fourteenth, so um,

(27:35):
you know, there's there's a whole bunch of stuff that
has come out recently in movies that I haven't watched,
as well as like I still haven't seen the immeasurable
weight of immense immense weight of a measurable talent or
everything everywhere all at once or nope. Um, So I
am going to start putting TV stuff in there now
that I'm back from vacation. I'm all nice and refreshed,
so slightly itchy. Do you guys know that you can

(27:56):
get a rash from sargass and seaweed U anyhow? Aerial
can at least yes, I have sensitive skin. Um, my
husband not bothered at all. Um, And I'm okay, it's okay.
It's just a little itchy. Um anyhow, Uh yeah, it's
a lot, so much good stuff, so much of your stuff. Okay,

(28:17):
you're right, we should we should move on though, Um yes, war. Yeah,
there's so much to talk about. Because if you thought
maybe we were inundated with Star Wars before, well you
ain't seen nothing yet, because they have announced a whole
bunch of different projects that are in the pipeline I'll

(28:39):
keep in mind, and one that isn't even Star Wars
come on now, that's well, I mean a couple that aren't.
But yeah. The one of the things I wanted to
mention though, was that, you know, we've also seen projects
get pulled, right Rhan Johnson. Ryan Johnson was supposed to
do a trilogy that has apparently been completely abandoned. Oh sad. Yeah,

(29:01):
there was the one where oh I forgot her name,
the the director of Wonder Woman that she was going
to do. Yes, I think there was one that she
was supposed to do that is now kind of dead
in the water too. But there's a bunch you can do,
like a Squadron movie about X Wing pilot. Yeah. So,
but there is a lot of stuff that has been announced,

(29:24):
including things like when we could expect andor season two,
which will be like next year. I still haven't watched
Indoor season one, so I needed to get on that.
They talked about, you know, the Acolyte a little bit,
although we go ahead, No, you go ahead, and then
I'll say my thought I was gonna say, they showed

(29:45):
a teaser to the crowd, but we have not yet
seen it as we're recording this. No, Honestly, of all
the things they announced, it is what I am most
excited about. Um, but partially because I misread what they
said it was going to be. Like. So some of
the things we are we're going to talk about a
little bit later because we did get some trailers. Um
but Accolytes on one of them, as Jonathan just said,

(30:06):
they said it's Frozen meets kill Bill. But my brain
went to, uh, what is that that? My brain went
to snow Piercer meets kill Bill, and so I thought
it was a very different show. Let it go, Ariel

(30:28):
now Accolyte, it seems a little bit different. So I'm
kind of excited about that. I also have not well
I started Andre, but I haven't finished it. Yeah, so
Acolyte is supposed to be set before the events of
the prequel trilogy, and it's from the perspective of the
bad guys who are the underdogs, and I don't know,
I mean, it might end up being a really entertaining series.

(30:50):
I'm kind of I'm kind of over the whole. Hey,
let's look at this from the bad guy's point of view,
largely because the bad guys, at least in the original
trilogy of Star Wars were essentially Nazis and I am
not interested in being told to empathize with them. So
so maybe, you know, maybe it's gonna be a little different.

(31:12):
But like, I'm not so big on let's feel for
the bad guys. I agree that is how the original
trilogy portrayed them, and I would be happy to keep
them there, But since then they've done a whole bunch
of lore about you know, emotion isn't necessarily a bad thing,
and you need a balance between the two, and I
don't I don't want to look at the bad guys

(31:34):
like they are good guys. But it is one of
the universes that I have more easily been able to say, yes,
both sides are wrong, Yeah, no, no, no, that's fair,
Like like it's hard because the original trilogy we don't
really get a deep look at Jedi and their philosophy

(31:57):
like that was really expanded upon by other types of
media like video games, books, comic books, animated series, that
sort of stuff where we start to see like Jedi
being portrayed as being almost almost like a vulcan in
Star Trek, Like you have to divorce yourself from all
emotion in order to be a Jedi. You know, even

(32:19):
positive emotions can lead to bad things, so you're not
supposed to be emotional at all. You're supposed to be stoic.
And I didn't really get that sense as much in
the original trilogy. I got that through the build out
of the universe, but that really does seem to be
where a lot of the materials going. We also got
to see an actual trailer for Ahsoka, or a little teaser,

(32:42):
which we'll talk about a little bit. I thought it
looked good. I love the tiny hint. We got a
Grand Admiral Thrawn. I didn't even recognize Mary Elizabeth Winstead
in it. I thought you said we're talking about it later. Well,
now we're talking about now, Jonathan. I can't see your face.

(33:04):
We've got our cameras turned off. It's hard to follow. Yes, no,
it's okay. Um, have you watched Star Wars, Clone Wars
or Star Wars Rebels the cartoons I've seen, I've seen
like the first episode, Like I tried to watch it
some of that early on, and it was before it
really started to catch on, so I didn't. I didn't

(33:26):
stick with it. So no, I honestly the real answer,
there is no gotcha. I've seen like an episode or two,
which you know, all of all of our mutual friends
and probably friends who are not mutual as well who
have watched those series are super excited for this trailer.
It hits them in all the right spots. But honestly,
for someone who is not as invested in those stories,

(33:48):
I did watch the Clone Wars movie, like the really
cool like two D animated one that happened a long
time ago, UM, and I liked that. But you know,
even as someone who is not as familiar with the
lore and doesn't recognize as many Easter eggs right off,
I still quite enjoyed the trailer. UM. I didn't expect
to be excited for Ahsoka Ahsoka Ashoka Asoka. I still

(34:12):
can't say her name not same here. I mean like
because again, neither of us were watching the media where
this character was really prominent. She she was Anakin's padawan
in the lore of like the Clone Wars and and
that sort of stuff. And she showed up in season
two of The Mandalorian and uh I was played very well.

(34:37):
She also she also showed up in bubble Feed. Poor thing,
did she? Yeah, I don't even remember. Oh, that's right,
in the Mandalorian. Yeah, in the two Mandalorian ebys. Yeah. Yeah,
that that's why I didn't remember, because I was like,
I don't remember her stinking up the place, and like, oh,

(34:57):
it's because it was in one of the one of
the mandalori Arian episodes that was nestled into the book
of Boba Fett. And other than the fact that the
Mandalorian totally went to the Citadel from mass effect in
those episodes, they were kind of weak Mandalorian episodes too. Yeah,
but but super strong Boba Fett episodes. Yes, Okay, so

(35:19):
I'm gonna I'm gonna mark that off as talked about. Okay,
but we can also chat about some of the other
stuff that was in celebration, Like they announced so many
movies they announced, not just stuff that would happen before
the series, because there's apparently going to be a movie
that takes place in the era before the prequels. They

(35:41):
talked about one that took would take place after Rise
of Skywalker and would see the return of a particular
actress playing a particular Jedi. Yep, Daisy Ridley will be
back as Ray. The events in the new movie will
take place fifteen years after Rise of Skywalker. Honestly, like,
I like Daisy Ridley, and I kind of liked Trey.

(36:04):
I did not think that the second trilogy got or
the third trilogy the try the Yeah, the third of
the trilogy of movies. It's weird because is a nine movies. Anyhow,
I need more caffeine, everybody. I didn't thought. I think
it got a good enough reaction to warrant another movie

(36:26):
in that part of the universe I have any I
still have not watched Rise of Skywalker. Like, and again,
I've said this before on this show. If you had
told the young boy version of me back in the
eighties when I was I was the biggest Star Wars
fan in the world, that there would be a Star
Wars movie that would come out that would conclude the

(36:48):
Skywalker saga, and I would just never bother to get
around to watch it. I would have thought you were insane.
But that's the way it is, because I just the
Third trilogy, like, I do not like the prequels at all.
I am not a prequel fan. I there are moments

(37:08):
of them that I found interesting, but they're just moments.
As a whole. I really did not like them, and
I feel very much the same way about the Third Trilogy.
And part of the reason is because there was there
was behind the scenes, a big reversal over and over again,
right because you had Part seven. Then Ryan Johnson comes

(37:29):
in with Part eight and decides to subvert everything, which
is not necessarily a bad choice in its own but
it did upset the apple cart. And then jj Abrams
comes in with Number nine and tries to put everything
back on the track that Number seven was on, and
it just starts to feel like every movie is contradicting
the one before it, and that's frustrating from a fan experience,

(37:53):
at least for me. I'm not I don't mean to
paint every fan with the same brush, but that's why
I'm not really hooked in on another film post rise
of Skywalker, even though I think Daisy Ridley is a
great actress and I think she deserved better. Yeah, I

(38:15):
my husband and I have talked about this in at
length as well as you and I have. But I
just I'm done with the Skywalkers. Their story has been told,
it's been overtold. I didn't mind the Rhea Johnson movie.
I just it felt out of place, like you said,
but I kind of enjoyed it, minus the luke milking

(38:36):
some green milk. No, but anyhow, a green milking is
not for me. But but yeah, no, I'm just I'm
done with the Skywalkers. There is such an expansive Star
Wars universe that why are we doing all these prequels
in sequels that have been overtold? And I think it's

(38:57):
even kind of affected like my enjoyed enjoyment of like
and Or because I loved Rogue one. I thought it
was a great movie, whether or not you think it
was a great Star Wars movie because it was pretty dark.
I really enjoyed it. But the and Or TV show,
and you know, as soon as I say, stopped focusing

(39:17):
on the Skywalkers, and they focus on and Or. I'm like,
it didn't really hit me, but yeah, there's so much
to explore, and we don't need more prequels. I think
part of the reason I didn't like and Or was
it was a prequel. I had already seen the end
of the story. I didn't really care about the beginning.
I felt like I had gotten a full story in
Rogue one, and I feel that way about a lot

(39:40):
of these things, even kind of acolyte Um. I just
I'm I am getting burnt out, and I need them to, Yeah,
get further away from this from this one span. Yeah,
focus on the horse people or the rabbit people, or
or go way way way a back like in Nights

(40:01):
of the Old Republic games, and you're dealing with stuff
that happens millennia before the events of the original trilogy,
so there's no connection with those characters. Because there are
a lot of different complaints about Star Wars that all
tie into this, right. One is that while it's supposed
to be set in a whole galaxy, that galaxy feels

(40:22):
awful small because you keep going back to the same
freaking planets. How many times do we have to go
to Tattooine right, Like, this is supposed to be a
galaxy filled with worlds, and yet we keep going back
to the same like four or five. So that's one
of the things. It also feels like it's a galaxy
where it's supposed to be huge, and yet people just
keep on running into each other. It's like, you know,

(40:45):
I've had that weird experience where I'm someplace where I
don't expect to see someone I know, and then I
see someone I know, and you're like, oh, small world,
that's amazing. But in Star Wars, it's like it happens
every freaking day, to the point where you're like, are
there only eight people in this galaxy and everybody else?
As a non player character, I mean, it's like playing

(41:06):
Star Wars The Old Republic, except for in Star Wars
the Old Republic, you come across so many new storylines
and people and just occasionally get somebody you recognize. So
it's really awesome and fun. That was the MMO they
came out with that developed by Bio Word. I think
it's still out there. Um, I have it on my computer.
I think I thought there was talk of them doing

(41:27):
a remaster of at least one of those, so I'm
not sure, but I think I think it's a remaster
of Knights of the Old Republic, which is more like
Mass Effect than World of Warcraft. Yes, but I thought
they did so Knights Knights of the Republic the Star
Wars MMO did put for anybody who hasn't played it
did play like Mass Effect, as in like you had

(41:51):
a different dialogue options that would branch off and into
different choose your own adventure lines. So yeah, and you
could you could either be light Side or dark Side,
or try and walk the middle Row. And that was
one of those pieces I was talking about earlier that
really kind of explored this idea of the Jedi being

(42:14):
so repressive with their emotions that it ultimately hurts them.
That was explored in those games. Yeah. We also got
Star Wars Goonies, which we didn't get a first trailer
for it, but I don't think I watched it. No, No,
we didn't get it. Well, the crowd at celebration got it,
but it hasn't been released to the public yet. Yeah,

(42:35):
it's called Star Wars Skeleton Crew and it has Jude
Law in it and a bunch of young actors playing
characters in the Star Wars universe. I don't know if
they're supposed to be like Jedi in training or if
it's something else. I don't know, because there was very
few details given about what this is apart from it's
a bunch of kids running around in the forest and

(42:57):
having adventures. I will say, you know, I've already thrown
there Y Sue under the bus once, but I'm gonna
do it again. I'll be careful. Well, I went. I
went to the site and because I saw that they
had an article about this, and the article we're referencing
comes out of IGN, but IGN was giving kind of
a rundown of the entire list of announcements, and so

(43:20):
I went to see the Mary Sue's article just about
Skeleton Crew to kind of get a better idea of
what it was about. They included a YouTube video, but
it was a fan made trailer where it was just
taking a bunch of different clips of Jude Law from
different films and stitching it with some scenes from different

(43:42):
Star Wars properties and putting it together as if it
were a trailer and had nothing to do with children
at all. No kids show up in this trailer at all.
And I'm just like can you not include fake trailers
as part of your actual article about this thing because
it gives the wrong impression. Yeah. I wonder if somebody

(44:04):
just didn't pay enough attention. Yeah, we have a lot
more to talk about, and we are already very far
into our episodes, so we'll probably pick it up. I'm
gonna say, let's go ahead and talk about the other
thing they showed at Star Wars celebration, despite the fact
that it's not Star Wars, which is the Indiana Jones trailer.
Sounds good, the new one, Yes, you've already had one

(44:25):
after you. I'm sorry. You put a lot of work
into organizing our lives. No, no, no, no, all around it.
It should totally be with the other celebration stuff. I
just messed up when I was when I was grouping
things together. No, it should not be. It's not Star Wars. No,
but it's lucasfilm, so you know it kind of falls

(44:46):
into that same thing. But yeah, we got a new
trailer for Indiana Jones. Now the people at celebration got
not just the new trailer, but additional several minutes of
footage from the film. I will say the trailer looks good. Uh,
I kind of wonder. In the trailer, there's a moment
where Indiana Jones's god daughter appears to totally um abandoned him,

(45:13):
and it really makes me wonder what's the story behind
that moment. But apart from that, I thought it looked
pretty good. If you haven't watched the trailers yet, yeah,
that's the character Phoebe waller Bridge is playing, honestly. Yeah,
I I also thought it looked good. Um. I like
that Indiana Jones is just a flat out going into
retirement kind of in the trailer. Um. Yeah, I did

(45:36):
not expect to be into this trailer and it looks
like quite a bit of fun. And I will probably
see it in the theater even Um, it definitely still
not gonna sit. You're not gonna set your expectations too high,
No I'm not. No. Yeah, well, I mean I will
say it does look better than Crystal Skull, but then
that is a very low bar for me. It's not

(46:00):
my least favorite movie. And I did see Crystal Skull
in the theater as well. It wasn't good. But if
you have a there's a different Indiana Jones that you
hate more than Crystal Skull. Oh no, there's just a
different movie I hate. Oh well, yeah, sure, no, I mean, yes,
there are other movies I've seen that are worse than
Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but in the Indiana Jones series,
I don't think there is. Sure. Sure, there are moments

(46:26):
in the rest of the Indiana Jones series that I
might stick down there with it, but not overall movies.
We also did get a bunch more stuff from Disney
this past week, the first of which was a super
awesome new trailer for Across the Spider Verse. Yeah, technically

(46:46):
I guess that's Sony, not Disney, but it is, which
is my fault. It's my fault again for putting it
in that lineup in that spot. But yeah, we think
of it as Disney because of course it does tie
into the Marvel universe in general, but Sony still has
the rights to Spider Man. But yeah, I really, I
mean Into the Spider Verse was one of those super

(47:10):
surprised movies for me, which is weird because I didn't
watch it when it first came out. It took a
little bit before I watched it, but I was going
into it with low expectations and then I was delighted
by how amazing that movie was. I have very high
expectations for across the Spider Verse, and so far the
trailer is making me feel pretty confident that that's the

(47:32):
way to go. Yeah, I failed you as a friend
if you went in with low expectations. I saw it
over that Christmas holiday that it came out in the
movie theater. I will say though, I love the art style,
but watching it on the big screen gave me a
little bit of eyestraam because the way that they did
the red blue kind of echo illustration in it while

(47:53):
it was two mirror comic books. And I've said this
on the show before, but if you're a new listener,
you get to hear it, and if you're an old listener,
I'm sorry you're hearing it again. It made it feel
like it was a three D movie, and it made
my eyes want to adjust to it like a booze
a three D movie, and at times not through the
whole movie got a little difficult for me to stare at. Gotcha,

(48:15):
but I loved this story. I only saw it on
my television at home. I didn't see it in the theater,
so I saw it when it came to streaming and
I was so impressed by it, and I will definitely
go to the theater to see Across the Spider Verse.
I'm very curious to find out what the what's behind

(48:37):
the conflict that we're seeing in the trailer. I don't
want to say too much in case people are trying
to to go into it without any spoilers whatsoever. Like
I know folks who will avoid trailers so that they
can really go into a film fresh, and I don't
want to spoil anything. But I am really wondering what
is the source because we get a hint of what

(48:58):
the conflict is, just a tiny and I really want
to know more about what is going on. I mean,
we get to see who, we get to see a
couple of the villains in more fullness or I don't
even know if villain's the right word. Again, if we
want to be in vague terms, you should watch the
trailer if you want to see it, if you weren't

(49:20):
worried about spoiling the movie. But I think that this
movie will have some really nice fun takes on the
key components to what makes Spider Man spider Man without
being too rehashed and I think they've I think they've
just had a lot of fun. There are even some

(49:41):
like ridiculous pop culture references in there that I was
honestly surprised that as many people knew them as do now.
It just it looks delightful. I agree with you. I'll
probably see it in the theater. Yeah, well, well, something
that we won't see in the theater because it's coming
to stret a Secret Invasion. Secret Invasion, it's not that's

(50:05):
not a movie, that's a series on Disney. Plus what
if I get to a movie theater really early and
I sitting there and I put my headphones in and
I watch it on my phone. That's all right, pedantic girl,
you can be quiet now. So Secret Invasion, obviously, this
is the series is going to bring back, uh, you know,
our our our beloved Nick Fury. He comes back to

(50:27):
deal with a big old mess on Earth that has
to do with um some some change links that are
causing all sorts of problems. And we still don't understand
what the whole reason behind the invasion is. Like that
hasn't really been touched on because last time we saw
anything about these these aliens, they were just looking for

(50:50):
a place to survive where they weren't going to be,
you know, hunted to extinction, and now it looks like
they're on the offense on Earth and it's like, what
is going on and why is it happening? We don't
really know, but it does look like it's going to
be packed with action, and there's a few returning faces

(51:10):
as well. Yes, we did actually see Nick Fury and
one of the crawl is that it the Cree the
Cree scroll scrolls and Cree you two. I met this
scroll the scrolls. We did see one of the scrolls
and Nick Fury in an easter egg after a previous

(51:33):
movie where they seem to be getting along. So I'm
betting it's a super complex story. It does look interesting. Again,
with like Star Wars and Marvel fatigue, this is it
looks interesting, it looks good. I'm sure it will be fantastic.
It's not one of the ones that I'm like super
excited to watch. I mean, I'm excited just to see

(51:54):
more Nick Fury, and I'm guessing this is probably going
to be his way of bowing out of the Marvel
cinematic universe by the end of it. That's my guess
because that kind of feels like what the current phases are.
It's sort of like the Changing of the guard where
we're seeing more and more characters from the first few

(52:15):
phases of the Marvel Cinematic Universe taking a step back,
either because they're retired or they dated, and then new
ones are taking their place. So my guess is we're
going to see Nick Fury take a step back at
the end of this series. That's just based on nothing
more than just my gut feeling. But yeah, I'm I

(52:37):
am anticipating this one a little bit, but like you,
I am, I'm feeling that burden. We'll talk more about
superhero fatigue in just a couple of minutes, but yeah, yeah,
and we gotta rush or we will run out of time.
Next was The Guardians of the Three final trailer. The
Guardians of the Guardians of the Three, Guardians of the

(52:59):
Galaxy three Final Trailer. I don't think we needed another one.
The first one was a mix of like fun and sad.
It went from like fun to sad. It was like huh, psich,
you're gonna cry. The second one was more fun, and
this third one is just sad. In fact, it is
so sad that I watched the trailer through on two
time speed so I could get through it. And uh,

(53:21):
this is gonna shock everybody, including Jonathan. This might be
one that I am definitely waiting for spoilers on this
one because I have big does the dog die anxiety syndrome? Um,
but uh, much like I did watch through all of Firefly,

(53:44):
but I never watched the movie afterwards because I found
out that Wash died. Um spoiler. Jonathan is not a spoiler.
Never watched betrayal. Also, you know, I'm not the hugest
Firefi flan firefive flan. Definitely not a fire five flan,

(54:05):
but I'm also not a huge fire five fire Gosh
darn it, I do that Firefly. No, I'm gonna do this.
I'm gonna do this Firefly fan. Okay, but Ariel, when
you were in Mexico, did you have any firefive fly
fan flan? Yes, and I brought some good throw it

(54:25):
at you. Okay. Actually I didn't have any flan in Mexico.
I'm more of a tres le chaise, but uh, yeah
I had. I will say that that. Yeah, I agree
with you that this No, that's a lie. I had
sweetcorn flan and it was really good. Oh good. Yeah,
this trailer is really emotional, and like we've been James

(54:47):
Gunn has said from the get go that this was
going to be a truly emotional conclusion to the Guardians
of the Galaxy films, at least as far as he's doing.
You know, maybe you will get a different incarnation of
that group in the future. Like that's possible because there
have been different versions of Guardians of the Galaxy in
the comics, So maybe we'll get that. And we don't

(55:08):
know which ones are going to make it through and
which ones aren't. I've talked about in the past about
the characters I thought who are not gonna make it.
But we'll see. Yeah, this looks like it's gonna be
a tough watch. Yeah. I may not watch it. I
just may not watch it. We'll have to see something

(55:30):
else I'm uncertain if I'm going to watch. Is the
Pixar movie Elemental. Uh. This is weird because every time
a new trailer comes out, it feels like it's a
different thing than what the previous one was hinting at,
because like I think we I think I mentioned that
it felt like it was a combination of what was

(55:52):
it inside out and Zootopia. Yeah, yeah, that it felt
like it was that. Now it feels like it's less
that and more of a star crossed lovers kind of story,
like two people who should not be matched up have
developed feelings for each other kind of thing, which is
vaguely's Utopia also turning red about generational expectations. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

(56:21):
it looks cute like this one. This one doesn't hook
me the way some trailers have for past Pixar films,
where I saw it and then immediately thought, oh man,
I can't wait for that to come out. But I
could definitely see myself seeing this one. But it might
be one of the ones where I wait until it's
streaming and I don't go see it on the big screen.

(56:44):
I agree. I love the art style. This story just
feels like it's already been told to me, And it's
not a bad story. Specifically, it feels like it's already
been told by Pixar. Yeah, now that's fair. I think
that's a total fair criticism. All right. Apparently my speaking
has also translated to my typing, because next we're talking

(57:05):
about the Blue Beetle trailer. But I totally typed it
as a Boo Beetle trailer, which also works. Yeah, yeah,
we we had I think we had had a teaser
for Blue Beetle previously, but we actually got a full
trailer for it. The internet went kind of crazy because
the Blue Blue Beetles dad calls Batman a fascist, and

(57:28):
I'm like, why, One, why do you care so much?
And two this is the superhero's dad who is obviously
a little out of touch, so you're not necessarily supposed
to agree with him, like I mean Batman also, like,
first of all, there's so many different incarnations of Batman,
we don't even know which one he's talking about at

(57:50):
this point. But um, I mean, but yeah, I would
definitely say Batman's a vigilante, vigilante, not a fascist. But
there are there are versions of Batman where he's portrayed
as more I mean actually most of the time, he's
not portrayed as a fascist at all. In fact, quite
the opposite, because he's about yeah, he's about fighting against

(58:11):
what he perceives as being evil, even if it breaks
the law, whereas Superman is typically the one who's portrayed
as the fascist because he follows the law. Even if
the law is unjust. That's kind of the whole point
of the Batman versus Superman stuff that Frank Miller did

(58:33):
years ago. But anyway, I was unaware of the brewjaha
because I'm not on social media anymore, so I didn't
even know that that was like a thing. I just
thought the trailer looked fine. You see, I think the
trailer looked like a lot of fun. I was really
worried because it's I was worried about two things. I

(58:54):
was excited about Blue Beetle because if we also get
a Booster Gold, which I think we've heard about. I
think James Gunn has said we're getting Booster Gold. Right. Yeah, well,
at least that was there was a point where that
was definitely the case. I don't know if it still
is with all the different changes that have happened in
the DC universe. That being said, blue Beetle and Booster
Gold have a very fun relationship. So I was worried

(59:17):
about two things with this movie coming out, both of
which seem to not be the case. One, I was
worried about it getting scrapped like that girl, and it didn't.
But that's because it's coming out in movie theaters. I
honestly thought it was coming out on HBO, so that
on me two, I was worried it was going to
be like Zach Snyder Dark, which I didn't think it
could be. You know, I don't think it should be.
Rather it could be, it shouldn't be. It looks like

(59:39):
a lot of fun, I think, and I I love Jolo, Marion, Duenna,
Enya May Duan. Jeff looked up how to pronounce his name,
but I can't talk today, so forgive me no. I
was going to say that it kind kind of gave

(01:00:00):
me vibes of if you took Iron Man and mixed
it with the greatest American hero. Oh see that. I
love both of those. So but it is interesting because
there are you know, this is not the only previous
DC movie that hasn't gotten scrapped, some of them because

(01:00:23):
they were way far into development. But um, you know,
like James Gunn said, the flat the upcoming Flashpoint movie
is like one of the best superhero movies he's ever seen,
which kind of leads into and I'm sorry if you
have something else about Blue Beetle to say say it
now before I awesome, Okay, which watched the trailer. If
you like Blue Beetle, you might like it. I mean,

(01:00:44):
name my blue car after it. Anyhow, It's not a
Beetle though, so that's going to be confusing. James Gunn
was talking about how superhero fatigue is a real thing,
because you know, everybody's talking about it with Gardens in
the Galaxy three and him taking over DC, and he
says that he doesn't even think it's fatigue of superheroes.
It's fatigue of story. If you don't have a story

(01:01:05):
that connects to people's hearts and a story that people
can really invest in what is happening to the characters,
if it's all spectacle, then that's what causes a fatigue.
And you know, I honestly I kind of agree with him. However,
there have been so many superhero stories told that that

(01:01:27):
is a mighty challenge to do. I'm guessing that Blue
Beetle and Flashpoint both have decent stories for James Gunn
to be behind it. But yeah, it is another thing
that makes me vaguely optimistic about him taking over DC
is the knowledge because I really agree with him that

(01:01:48):
fatigue comes from not having a good story, because like
Wanda vision was phenomenal. Right, yeah, no, I feel the
same way. I think this is how I feel about
action movies too, right, Like if if it's just an
action film where stuff explodes and people go fast. This
is why I cannot stand the thought of trying to
watch Fast and Furious, because to me, those movies come

(01:02:12):
across as if they're about nothing else other than the spectacle,
especially the further in you go, And so I have
no interest in those movies because if there's nothing for
me to connect with on an emotional level, what do
I care? If a bunch of CGI cars are barely
dodging out of the way of CGI obstacles, it doesn't

(01:02:34):
mean anything. And the same thing, Yeah, I need to
have I need to have characters that I actually care
about to at least some degree. Otherwise there are no stakes.
If there are no stakes, then yeah, why do I
care if someone wins or loses? Right? If there are
no emotional stakes, then it doesn't matter. So I feel

(01:02:55):
the same way that James Gunn was saying. I think
the pace at which these things have been coming out
has made it almost impossible to create stories that have
really good resonance because you're just constantly moving on to
the next thing. And I think part of the problem
here is that we have seen Marvel and Star Wars,

(01:03:19):
like Disney in general, set these crazy release schedules that
end up making it very difficult to tell stories that
resonate and still also get check all the other boxes
for spectacle right, and so we end up with spectacle

(01:03:41):
often spectacle that suffers from very obvious CGI, which again
just makes it feel empty and you don't have the
anchor there for the audience to really care about what's
going on. Yeah. Yeah, Also, I mean some of it

(01:04:01):
is superhero because as much as I love those stories,
I'm really Jonson for some new stories. So let's talk
about some new stories coming out. The first is we
got a trailer for Simulant, which first I read is Stimulant. Listen,
my speaking and typing has also gone over into my

(01:04:22):
reading my reading, because like yesterday, my friends shared a
an article about a serial coming out that had like
raspberry and blueberry flavored cereal and then macaron flavored marshmallows,
and I thought it said macaroni and I was extra confused,
and I thought Simulant was Stimulant. So when you put

(01:04:42):
aka Blade Runner, But from the replicant perspective, I was like,
how does that match? And then every time they said
simulant in the trailer, I heard stimulant. Yeah. So the
little snide subtitle I put about Blade Runner from the
replicant perspective pretty much tells you kind of the vibe
of this movie. It's it's set in a future, not

(01:05:05):
too distant future next Sunday, a d maybe, where it
is possible to create robots that are almost perfect replicas
of people. And the way the movie seems to be
positioning it is that this is a way that a
company you know, makes money by by convincing people who
are grieving due to the loss of a loved one

(01:05:28):
to get a replica of that loved one. The replicas
are generally unaware that they are a replica. They think
of themselves as being the continuation of the person who
has died. And so your main character is a guy
who finds out that he's not human, he's a simulant.

(01:05:48):
He encounters a person who is trying to free simulants
so that one they're aware of what they are, and too,
they do not have the RoboCup like restricts programmed into
them that otherwise prevent them from having free will. And
I'm like, all of these ideas that are being explored
here I've seen before, but this does at least look

(01:06:11):
pretty slick and interesting. Uh. It's it's not like it's
a new concept, but it does look like at least
it's executed. Well. Yeah, it also doesn't look like a
sequel or a spinoff of something directly, even if it
is in spirit. But no, I agree, it's it's not
a new concept. It seems like AI sentience. I'd be

(01:06:33):
really interested to look at a timeline because it because
it comes and goes. It like it's like the tide Um.
Whenever we get AI movies, we get a whole slew
of them, and then they all go away. Because we've
got another artificial intelligence getting sentience movie to talk about
in a couple more trailers if you want, we can

(01:06:54):
even just jump to that since it is thematic, I mean,
it's fine with me, sure. Sure. So the other one
is called The Artifice Girl, and it is about an
AI that is so realistic that basically the authorities think
that it is a real girl who's gone missing, and
they go after her creator. But then it turns out

(01:07:14):
that that AI has a will of her own and
is using it kind of deviously, yeah, overtly deviously. The
trailer doesn't spoil too much, right, but it does tappen
too something that is like a legitimate point of discussion
within the AI community, which is there's this general concept

(01:07:37):
of how do you protect the world from a superhuman
intelligent artificial intelligence? Right, if it reaches superhuman levels, how
do you make sure that that doesn't end up hurting people?
And one argument you have often heard if you if
you follow those fields, is you would design the system

(01:07:57):
in such a way where it's standalone. It's not connected
to other systems. Right, there's an air gap, so it's
not like it's connected to the internet, so that it
could not somehow break free and then take control of
other stuff. And that way you've isolated it and you
can still use it for what it was meant to do,
but it can't escape its confines. And then people who

(01:08:20):
argue against that say, no, you've said already it's superhuman,
which means it will be able to figure us out
better than we can, which means it will find ways
to convince us to remove those restrictions and to allow
it to escape. There's even a guy who ran an
experiment where the experiment was he went on a message

(01:08:43):
board and he invited people to role play as if
he were the AI in the box, and he says,
if I can convince you to let me out of
the box, you have to come on this forum and
tell people that you did, but you cannot tell them
how it happened. You can't reveal any information. This is
just a thought experiment to see if I can convince

(01:09:03):
you to let me out of the box. And you
don't give any more details. And sure enough, every time
you ran it, sooner or later the person would go
on the forum and say I let him out of
the box. And it's like, okay, well, if that's possible,
then AI could do it. That seems to be kind
of the underlying tone of this trailer. Yeah, first of all,

(01:09:26):
that's really cool. I hadn't heard of that before. It's
it also to me like if you're superhuman, maybe you
don't need a human to let you out of the box.
Maybe you'll figure a way to break out yourself. Yeah,
but you know it is it is a very long
standing cover one if those people knew that he was
actually human and not an AI. You know, I don't
know if that's swayed there. Yeah, decisions at all, sure,

(01:09:51):
But how much artificial learning makes you sentient? You know? Yeah,
Because that's the point is AI's learned so much that
they basically developed their own opinions and things like that,
as opposed to it just being programming. And it's really
hard to tell the difference sometimes. Heck, my best friend

(01:10:12):
slash sister has an AI puppy, and like it is
hard not to treat that thing like a real puppy.
So yeah, I mean, that's the thing is that like,
AI can be very very good at simulating things that
we associate with life. But the question then is at
what point in the complexity would you just go ahead

(01:10:34):
and say this is life. It's just life in a
different manifestation than what we're used to versus this is
just a very sophisticated program that's running on rules that
you can't necessarily see. But it's literally just a series
of rules. And if you were to strip all that away,
you just be left with circuits and no nothing else,

(01:10:57):
Like there's no other kind of intelligence or soul or
anything else. You would associate with it. I mean, but
if you just strip away like my my flesh and
my muscles, you end up with just a skeleton. Right. Um,
It's it's a very complex question. It's a little scary
to think about as especially as like a people pleasing,
bleeding heart person like you know I am and I

(01:11:18):
know you you are? Often yeah, no, always, you know Ariel.
I'll say that at the end, we'll just learn the
lesson that the skeleton was inside you all alone. I mean,
that is true. But this is this is too complex
for me. I need I need us to talk about
something much less serious and much less difficult to understand,
which is this new Barbie movie that's coming out the

(01:11:41):
new trailer. Look, I was you guys heard us talk
about it. I was not really on board for a
Barbie movie. I was happy for the people who wanted it,
but I didn't want it. But now I really really
do want this movie and I'm looking forward to it. Yeah.
I Uh. The thing that appeals to me about it
is that it feels cheeky without going overboard, right Like

(01:12:04):
it's they're clearly winking and nodding to the audience. It's
like you were saying earlier it's got stuff in it
for the adults, where the adults are totally going to
pick up on the cheeky humor that's being delivered, and
the kids are just going to enjoy the surface level story. Yeah,
it's I you know, I don't know if this is

(01:12:26):
a kids movie, We'll have to see. It also has
a lot of Barbie lore if you if you have
played with Barbie for a long time and remember some
of the old iterations that fail or succeeded. Honestly, I
would be in this movie just to watch Ryan Gosling
and Simu Liu have a Ken off, which from this
latest trailer trailer is definitely happening. Yeah, I'm in it

(01:12:50):
just for that. Well, so Seemulu is in Simulant as well.
I will watch that actor in many things because he's
very good. Yes, and good for him for landing very
different roles. That's cool too. But one I think it's
hilarious that they're living in a world where most people

(01:13:10):
are named either Barbie or Ken. Obviously there are going
to be other names too, because Barbie does have her
friends in the lore, but a lot of the characters
are just called Barbies. So they just call each other
Hi Barbie, Hi Barbie, how are you Barbie? That kind
of stuff that that cracked me up. And I'm very
very curious about whether or not they actually make it
into the real world. I'm assuming they do, but you

(01:13:32):
do see a sign at one point where it says,
this way to the real world. So if you look
so part part of this latest along with this latest trailer,
they came out with a bunch of advertising for all
the different characters. One of them is like, this is Barbie.
This is also Barbie, with different actors in there as
they're Barbie characters. This Barbie's a mermaid. This Barbie's a diplomat.

(01:13:53):
This is a Ken. You guessed it. This is also
a Ken. Hey, this is a Ken. There's only one Alan,
which if you don't know who Alan is, don't feel bad.
It was a Barbie figure at one point, but very
very briefly. And there are some spoilers as to whether
or not that happens in that marketing. I won't tell you,

(01:14:13):
Jona Hunt. I don't know if that told you, but
I'm not going to go into it more. However, that
marketing is hilarious. I also really like that, um, some
of the some of the Barbies are definitely plus sized,
and it was a more recent thing that Barbie came
out with different body types and heights and things like that,

(01:14:36):
which one meant they could sell more clothes because your
clothes won't fit across all Barbies. Two minute was a
little more realistic, but they didn't really have any very
plus size Barbies. It looks like there are some more
plus size actresses playing Barbies in this, of which I
would consider myself a plus size actress right now, so
that's not a distant anyway, and I'm very excited for that. Yeah,

(01:14:59):
I I have to admit that this trailer, and again,
it gives me vibes of like the Brady movies. They
came out the Brady Bunch films, where you know, they
were both paying homage to this source material while also
being super you know, cheeky and silly about it and
just just having fun with the concept. This. This has

(01:15:21):
a lot of the same vibe to me. Yeah, the
next three trailers I didn't know super about. They look interesting.
I don't know a whole lot about them. Let's go
through them super super quick because we're looking super super
long and you still have to tell people how to
contact you. So yes, we have Hip Hypnotic, which is
a movie coming out with um oh my gosh Ben

(01:15:44):
Affleck about a guy whose daughter has been kind of kidnapped,
and the villain is someone who has hypnotic powers. He
can speak to you and make you do what he
wants or believe what he wants. And it's very slick
how they portray that in the trailer. I think it
looks very good. Yeah, it makes me think of mister
Purple from the why can I not think of her name?

(01:16:06):
The Jica jess Thank you Jessica Jones. Yeah, it makes
me think of the Purple Man from Jessica Jones. And
it's the same sort of thing as like the fiction
of this world is that there are people known as
hypnotics who have learned how to manipulate sound and eye
contact in these sort of things to essentially erase your

(01:16:30):
willpower and turn you into their puppet for a given
amount of time, and then they have you do whatever
it is and then you end up taking the blame
for it. That seems to be the long and short
of the basic premise. I think it looks interesting. I
think if I can get past the ridiculous conceit of

(01:16:52):
the film and I can just buy into it, and
if I could just say, like, just think of it
as magic, it's just magic, then I think I can
handle it. Them is that I have a lot of
like skepticism about hypnosis in general, that I have to
get past its first. It's a superpower and yet that's
not a lot. That's what I have to do, though,
I have to think of it as a super human

(01:17:14):
kind of concept as opposed to no, these are people
who just managed to develop the skill, and I'm like, Okay, no,
you gotta If you say it's superpowered, then I can
totally go with you on this trip. But otherwise it
starts to make me get antsy, which is weird. Personal
hang up, I get it. That's what you have to
do with half to sci fi out there, Like source

(01:17:35):
Code is a fun movie if you don't think about
the fact that it's not source Code in any way whatsoever.
That the other two movies we have one is Silo,
which is an Apple TV movie coming out, so yeay
excited to getting to watch that about it's basically like
The Truman Show meets Fallout, which Jonathan might disagree with

(01:17:55):
my my think about that, as a bunch of people
who are in a silo kind of bunkerish kind of
situation been told they can never go outside, they have
images of what's outside, and they start questioning it about
what whether that's really the outside or not, or whether
they've been put in here and lied to, And every
so often people kind of try to subvert the system,
and then if you say you want to go outside,

(01:18:15):
they'll put you outside and you'll never hear from them again.
So everybody assumes that they've been dyed or horribly destroyed
or whatever. Again, not a new concept, but it looks
well done and I'm actually interested to watch it. Yeah.
It's based off a series of books that were written
by a person who first started just by doing self
publishing through Amazon's platform, and this is one of those

(01:18:35):
crazy success stories that occasionally happens for people who are
doing that sort of thing. His works got optioned to
be published internationally, and the film rights got optioned and
now it's being turned into a movie. So it's an
awesome success story on that regard. I would also say
that in addition to fall Out and Truman Show, I

(01:18:58):
would throw in a little bit of urine talent the
musical in here where no spoilers for You're in Town,
but there's a whole thing about what people are being
told and their suspicions about how that might not line
up with what is real, and so yeah, it's it
looks to me like a pretty cool adaptation of something

(01:19:19):
that I had not heard about until I saw this trailer. Yeah,
and the last is something that when you hear about,
you're going to are still, which I think I already mentioned.
It's kind of a documentary. It is a documentary where
Michael J. Fox himself is included about Michael J. Fox,
about his rise to fame and then his fight with Parkinson's.

(01:19:40):
You hear that and you go, oh, this is going
to be really depressing, and I'm sure they're going to
be some very sad, heartfelt moments, but the trailer for
it makes it look exceptionally uplifting, and it's really really
amazing to watch Michael J. Fox create this piece of
media to both celebrate his successes and his trials and
give people hope who maybe are all so dealing with Parkinson's. Yeah,

(01:20:02):
I've seen interviews in the past with Michael J. Fox
where he was addressing his fight with Parkinson's and the
way his family has helped him and everything, and it's
always been a mixture of inspiring and entertaining. I'll never forget.
There was a great one where he was talking about
how someone on Twitter was calling him out about using

(01:20:26):
his condition and leveraging it for sympathy or something, and
like it was a really nasty tweet, right, like it
was someone being really trollish toward him. And he doesn't
really he says, you know, I don't really use social
media that much. So my son told me, Like I
was like, I don't know how I should respond to
this guy. And my son told me just type in smh.

(01:20:47):
And so he did, not knowing what stood for it, and
and he says, what does that mean? He's just shaking
my head. And it was about like Parkinson's and about
how Parkinson's had affected him, and so then the shaking
my head ends up being a meta Joe because of
course with Parkinson's he has less control over his motive functions, right,
And it was like it was the best because the guy,

(01:21:09):
the guy who was trolling him came back with like,
you're the king man, that was the best response you
possibly could have done. And it just shows like Michael J.
Fox maintains a real positive outlook and a sense of
humor about things, even in the most difficult of situations,
which is incredible. So I am really eager to see

(01:21:31):
this documentary. Me too, Me too. And what a great
thank you for sharing that story he had another one
I hadn't heard. What a great way to end this episode.
If you've stuck around with us for this well over
an hour episode, thank you. We've really we hope you're
geeking out about these things as much as we are.
If you want to write to Jonathan, how should they

(01:21:52):
do that, Jonathan, Well, what they'll have to do is
they will have to stare out at the slowly rotating
spiral shape and take slow, deep breaths and gently start
to feel their eyelids getting heavier and heavier untill they're
all almost closed. And just as their body starts to

(01:22:14):
sink into the surface they're sitting or laying on, as
they feel themselves slip away and their will power becoming
my own, they should slip twenty dollars and then the
envelope and then leave it under that rock. Over on
the corner and I'll make sure to pick it up
and I'll get back to you and when I snap

(01:22:36):
my fingers, he will be awake. What what just happened? Um?
I feel like I should foolishly give away about twenty
dollars somewhere. UM, if you can, I'd like to give
away my money wisely. I like, I like to be generous,
but I like to do it wisely. M shucks. If

(01:22:56):
you'd like to reach us, since I guess Jonathan didn't
tell us anything, you can do so on social media
on Twitter where ellenc Underscore podcast on Facebook, Discord and Instagram.
We're a large norddrun collider, or you can email us
at large nerd drun pod at gmail dot com. Um.
I love the people who have joined the Discord channel.
It's fun to chat with you about what you've been

(01:23:17):
watching and get your reactions. Uh, it's it's great to
get your emails as well and your Facebook messages. And
you know, if we're slow to respond, it's just because
we're busy, but we do see it, and we do
love you and we love being back and we hope
you have an amazing week. And until next time, I

(01:23:38):
am aerial Casting and I am Jonathan. Hey, I got
an idea for Star Wars Strickland. It's no, It's no.
The Large nerddrun Collider was created by aerialcaston and produced, edited, published, deleted, undeleted,

(01:24:00):
Wish Again, Curse That by Jonathan String music by Kevin McLeod,
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