Episode 606 (Prometheus, Black Goo, and Dumb Geologists)

Mark and Lisa discuss the 2012 science fiction prequel Prometheus. Directed by Ridley Scott, and starring Michael Fassbender, Noomi Rapace, and lots of goo, the popular prequel asks a lot of questions and features a geologist with a rock brain. In this episode, they also talk about black goo, dumb corporations, and the excellence of Michael Fassbender. Enjoy!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:26):
Hello, and welcome to Movies Films an Flicks. I am
Mark Hoffmeyer and joining me someone is someone who probably
should maybe get a backup generator for the black goo
that you have in your freezer. Mm HMMs a lady.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
I need an extra freezer too, because there's too much
black goo in there.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
You have too much.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
I have too much, you know, Like I just I'm
a pack rat. I save everything, and I just feel
like at some point this black gou is just I'm
gonna need more of it than what I have. It's
it's bad. I think I've got a hoarding problem with
the black goo, and I just I do not have
an entire, you know, storage room where I can put
all this stuff, so it kind of goes in every

(01:04):
little nook and cranny that I've got.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
I understand horders, but hordering hoarding probably the most dangerous
substance ever.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
I mean, gener hands on it. No, But we're good
because we've always had a good luck here with not
losing power. So I guess I'm too reliant on the system.
I really should fix that.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
You're like Prometheus, you play with fire.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
I do. I do. It's too bright and shiny and
pretty at least you live in.

Speaker 1 (01:29):
A cold climate for some part of most of the party. Sometimes, Yeah,
you're not living in like, you know, Florida, correct, Oh never, Yeah, okay,
so I feel a little safe. Just don't get another
Where are you getting these from? I?

Speaker 2 (01:43):
Well, you know, I go and explore, and you know,
every now and then, if if I have to play
hooky from school, I just you know, I go find
where there's another sun, and you know, there are these
cool planets with these moons, and it's like, you know,
I just I can't help myself. I just have to
go explore.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
He did a NASA thing for a while. Is that
that's why? That's how you did it?

Speaker 2 (02:03):
I did, That's how I got involved with it.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yep. Well, you know there's probably like there's millions of
other people who billions of other people who I would
not want it in their hands. So I feel kind
of safe with you.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
That's the move, right, you know, like somebody has to
be the one who's dependent and who's reliable and everybody
knows that this stuff will be totally kept safe.

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Do you have an android?

Speaker 2 (02:26):
I mean I have I have an artificial cat. Does
that come?

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Oh? No, that's like double trouble. That's like David times too.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
I know, I know, but as long as I keep
him fed, it's.

Speaker 1 (02:36):
Okay, okay, fair enough, we'll keep him fed. I will
not with black Goood.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
No, no, the black Goood. He doesn't like the taste
of it.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Wait, he's tasted it.

Speaker 2 (02:45):
I did I say that.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
It's an android? It's an android. It's fine, it's.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
Fine, It's okay.

Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, David was fine.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
Yes, totally fine.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
I love Promethea Prometheus, Lisa. The reason we're doing this
episode is because you're not the biggest fan of it,
which is totally fine. But I love it. And Romulus
just came out. I just I'm kind of obsessed with
the Alien franchise. And I have a video coming out
in October, which means I've rewatched all the movies. Commentaries
they want me to figure out how to well, I

(03:13):
don't want to say what it is, but yeah, I
got a video coming out, and it's just made me
spend a lot more time with Covenant and Prometheus, and
I love them more now, really, yeah, I love them.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
I need to rewatch Covenant.

Speaker 1 (03:26):
Fastbender should have gotten an Oscar nom for Covenant. He's incredible.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
I forgot that he was in Covenant.

Speaker 1 (03:34):
Yeah, he's in He's two there's two of them in Covenant.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Oh my god, I completely forgot that. Like I saw
that movie and I wiped my brain of it because
I hated it so much.

Speaker 1 (03:43):
He's he's perfection in it, Like I love him in
it and actually love what Ridley Scott did with these films.
I love the pivot. I you know, it's interesting like
in a day of reboot, in a world of reboot
pulls drastic World, drastic World, yes, Halween, Like, I don't
care about any of those movies. They're reboots but sequels,

(04:05):
and there's nothing new. They offer the world nothing, nothing
except like more merch. But like this one, you know,
prequel asks a lot of questions. Yes, Megan and I
watched it. We immediately went to this place and had
drinks and talked about it for like an hour and
a half. We're just like, so, what was was this? Like?
What did they want to they're coming back to the

(04:26):
planet to kill us? Was it because of Jesus? Like?
Was it because we were just terrible? Why did they
want to kill us? Why did they create us? Who
were they creating? Were they creating What's that was it?
And it was just a really great discussion and like
part of it's the puzzle box crap by lindal Off,
But uh, this is this is one thing, Lisa, I
just want to throw this to you.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
Go for it.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
People make many dumb decisions in these movies.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
Oh they do.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
And you know, if you and I were in a
horror movie, we would make terrible decisions, correct.

Speaker 2 (04:52):
I don't know. I like to think that I'd be
the the snarky one who was like, and why are
we going that way?

Speaker 1 (04:57):
Again? It's just I guess it always bothers me. Even so,
someone being chased by a knife and they're like, don't
do that, and it's like, have you ever been chased
by someone with a knife? So it's okay. So when
Prometheus and a Covenant, I think objectively, subjectively bad moves
are made, right. But I think the reason for that
is is that Ridley Scott is really hammering home that
humans are dumb humans, Like we're nothing in this world.

(05:20):
You know, if you look at the first alien whale
and Lutani, humans are nothing, They're just truckers, and the
second one humans are disposable. Whale and Utani is guilty
for like everything. They get Ripley's DNA. From the third one,
they make the marine sake of Walmart takes over. In
the fourth one, this one they go to the planet.
David opens up the thing like it's all about how
humans are dumb and we're out of our league. I

(05:43):
also love that David was created by a human. David
was immediately superior, and then the humans like, oh no,
and then David goes and kills all the engineers who
created humanity m HM, and the engineers on this planet
and Prometheus were killed by alien that they milked from Xenomorse,
and then that got out of control and then they died.

(06:04):
It's just funny that, like aliens, these aliens in this
franchise are the most passive villains ever. And the first one,
they're chilling for two thousand years, yep, right, they let
them on and aliens they send people to that planet.
And a third one they just the aliens just happens
to be in someone's belly. And the fourth one they're
on a ship and they're idiots and they don't know
how to control them. In this one, David's causing so

(06:27):
many problems. He opens up the door. He gives Logan
Marshall Green the thing like and then Covenant the humans
are the dumbest of dummies. But I think, really is
what Ridley Scott is saying, is that we are humanity
is just we're just specs compared to David. We're specs
compared to these from like these aliens are the perfect thing.
Like even the engineers are dumb and get killed. I

(06:48):
just think the questions that he asks and the topics
that they cover in these warrant at least some respect
because this could have been a crap prequel. This could
have been a stock sequel, but it's not, and I
admire it for it.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
I love that. I mean, I think I'm still stuck,
by the way on the phrase what they milked from
the xenomorphs. I got hung up on that about good
two minutes ago, and I'm still thinking about. I went
right to Robert de Niro, It's like, well, I have nipples,
can you milk me?

Speaker 1 (07:15):
Well came from them?

Speaker 2 (07:16):
No, I know they didn't. Your choice afray the milking
of them. It's like, I get stuck anyway. No, I
think you're right, because there's always been this arrogance, right,
we as as a species, we as you know, pursuers
of information. It's always about this arrogance. It's always about well,
I need to know, and it's like, well you really don't.

(07:38):
You want to know, but you will live without knowing.
And I mean, you've got Mary Shelley, who was what
seventeen nineteen years old writing one of the greatest Gothic
horror novels, if not the greatest novel of all time,
one of these amazing texts, and it's all about this
guy who is obsessed with finding out right, he wants

(07:59):
to know if he can create life, and he gives
up everything and he completely falls apart because he just
has to know, you know, and there are all of
these mistakes that are made, and so you've got that
whole thread here. Everything in all of these films, especially
horror films, is you know, curiosity kills the cat, this

(08:19):
idea of there are things that we are just not
meant to know, and if we just left them alone,
we'd probably be much better off. I mean, you brought
up Jurassic part go right back to the nineteen ninety
three film and the brilliance of Ian Malcolm who says,
you know, your scientists were more interested in determining whether
they could They didn't stop to consider whether they should. Right.

(08:42):
It's one of those brilliant memes, and it's absolutely this
hind perfect description of what we do with things. You know,
here's the red button on the wall. Well, what is
that red button? Meme? Let's push it. I mean to
be fair, though, as an intellectual, as somebody who is
curious about things, I do like to know what happens

(09:03):
when you push the red button. So I can't sit
here and say, you know, me on my pedestal. I
know what it's like, and I think it's always better
to be safe. It's never better to be safe, because
the risks are what make things exciting, and the risks
are what help us advance. But at the same time,
there should be some respective or respectful, cautious decision making here.

(09:24):
They don't do any of that, you know, like the
number of times I'm watching them and I'm like, did
you stop and think even for fifteen seconds? Did you
ever ever?

Speaker 1 (09:33):
It's Hubert Striven likes really is I'm telling you it
is the height of hubris. You know, Guy Pierce's character
I want immortality, so I want to go meet my creator. Yes,
you know what's interesting. Everybody on that doesn't matter. Nobody,
the rock guy doesn't matter, race Ball doesn't matter. None
of them matter. They are all unimportant. And this is

(09:56):
another whale bs like like they're the worst. And I
just think it's interesting that, you know, you have these
people like what's hunt for our creators? But they find
a planet that was like that was just made to
make mass weapons of destruction. It's a military installation. I
got run over because the engineers got killed. And also
too like another thing I love about the Alien franchise,

(10:18):
it's it's kind of about creation as well. Where at
the beginning of Prometheus, this guy who's milked goo from
a xenomorph to create life, then they can also destroy
life with that. If you think about the xenomorph, the
process of their lives, they go in, they come out
as a xenomorph, and it's all about like mankind's creation
and how creation can run away from people, how they

(10:41):
don't understand it. And so you know, I know some
people are probably thinking I'm digging way too deep. I
got a shovel and now I'm fifty feet in the ground.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
Nope, you've got an English teacher here with you. This
is what we do.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
And I but I love that this movie asked those questions.
I really do. And and you know what, there are
some bad decisions made in this movie. But I mean
if you look at all the explorers and they're stupid Hubris,
and how many people died on expeditions to go to
the North Pole? Like how many people died because someone
wanted to explore?

Speaker 2 (11:10):
Yes?

Speaker 1 (11:10):
I think for me is I totally understand why they
did this, spent trillions of dollars for this, and I
guess you know that that fifield they look at a
snake and like, oh, like can they get murdered?

Speaker 2 (11:21):
Oh that's please?

Speaker 1 (11:22):
But see, I just think they're dumb, Like I think
Ridley Scott. Ridley Scott, he made the last duel that
movie Rocks. He's there. I haven't see that incredible and
he's there, he is still there, And I don't think
he just was like oh yeah, just like this guy
like this. I think I really think they're just idiots,
Hubris of mankind? You know, did they even bring good

(11:44):
scientists on this? Doud? This is probably all like he
probably trusted those two right, And he probably trusted Idris's
character because he's a great pilot and he can get
you there.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well, they tell you he's a shitty pilot. Oh yeah,
he says, you're a ship's but you're a ship pilot.
We're not going anywhere.

Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, that's what there it is. He's a good captain,
bad pilot, you know you So, I who did they
even bring out to this because this is all just
about Peter Wayland. Everyone else dies yep. And and I
I think if you think about adventures in the past
where people go, it's always the crew that dies. It's like,

(12:22):
who even went out there to do this? And I
love that about it, Like Milburn's an idiot, like like
Fifield's an idiot.

Speaker 2 (12:30):
God so much it's.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
Almost comically so. But I also think, if that's what's
gonna if that's what's gonna prevent you from liking a
movie with some really interesting ideas and amazing visuals, like
when that engineer is getting pulled into the run, yes
by that that giant face hugger, Like that is a
gorgeous visual. And I just think the the the positives

(12:54):
far awaigh the negatives m hm. So like for you, Like,
what what are like, You're not a big fan of
this movie? Is that? Like? Where does that come from?

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Well, so it's interesting because I was thinking about this.
I have not seen this film in twelve years. Oh okay,
because I saw it in the theater and the irony
of the whole thing. You know, my husband came with
me to see this movie. You know, my brother and
I we were like, oh, new Alien prequel. We got
to go see this. It's gonna be amazing. You watch
those trailers. This, by the way, is before I stopped

(13:24):
watching trailers, just to put that out there because everyone's
sick of hearing me say, well, I actually did watch
this one, and I got myself so excited for it
because that trailer is one of the greatest trailers in
the history of trailers.

Speaker 1 (13:35):
Yeah, to the point.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
That after I saw the film and I hated the film,
every now and then I would go back to the
trailer and I'd get excited to watch a movie that
I know I had already seen and that I knew
I hated this. There's something to that, because it's like
I knew I hated the movie. I thought it was awful,
though it was beautiful, and then just being like, oh
my god, I can't wait to see this movie. No,

(13:57):
you've already seen it. You hated it. It was terrible. But
any so, you know, we saw the film. My husband
is not a horror fan. That one big surgery scene
in particular especially threw him off. And I'm like, this
poor guy is never gonna go out with me again
because I brought him to the movie and he says
this horrible thing. Just all of the above. So like,
we left that theater angry because it wasn't an alien film, right,

(14:21):
Like this thing was was advertising it's the alien prequel.
We're going back to this world and bah, and there's
none of it. There's little suggestions of it. There's easter
eggs of it, but that's about it. It's not an
alien film. And I today, yesterday, having rewatched the film
twelve years later, now recognize that I was a victim

(14:44):
of misconception, and frankly, I'm now gonna hold this film
as one of the reasons why I'm glad I've given
up trailers, because it put an idea in my head
of what this should be. All of the information I
knew going into I knew I thought I knew air
quotes going into it completely ruined my watching of this film,

(15:09):
my acceptance of this film. In fact, for years I've
talked about The Village Shyamalan's The Village, and I know
we've talked about Lady in the Water, so I'm sure
I yammered on about this then. But people hated the Village,
and I've always blamed the advertising campaign which set that
movie up as a horror film, and people went to
go see this horror film they thought, which wasn't at

(15:29):
all a horror film, and they thought it was a
bad movie, and so everybody shut down said this is terrible,
this socks this guy's no good blah blah blah, when
in reality it's a great film. He just didn't know
what they were watching and they were unable to make
the adjustment. Well, it turns out I was a victim
of that myself, and I'm only finding this out twelve
years later. I can admit when I'm wrong, and I

(15:52):
was wrong about Prometheus. I don't think it's the most
brilliant film in the world. I'm not going to carry
on about how it's the best one in the franchise,
but I having forgotten most of it because I put
it out of my brain for twelve years, and looking
at it again with fresh eyes, it is still gorgeous.
I said it was gorgeous. Then I was like, it's

(16:12):
a shame how beautiful this movie is because the rest
of it is crap. You view Prometheus as a standalone film,
I think twelve years later, I'm more mature as a
film viewer. I'm more mature as a reader, as a
narratologist of somebody who takes stories on and again. This
is going to be one more example of why giving
up trailers was the best decision I've ever made as

(16:34):
a film viewer, because going into a movie cold and
not knowing what's coming allows me to sit back and say,
I'm going to look at what this auteur has put
in front of me, and I'm going to say, Okay,
I'm going to take what you've given me from a
blank slate and let's see what you got. And I
think that's a big deal. What you're talking about Ridley

(16:54):
Scott doing with this film, with these other films, and
how he's you know, putting messages out there. There are
a lot of illusions here that suggest here's what humanity is,
here's what we are, here's what we're going to be,
et cetera, et cetera. I I've changed my mind. So
it's like I came into this when you asked me.
It's like, hey, let's do Prometheus. We do a lot

(17:16):
of contentious films, you know. I think about Mother, which
is our lost episode.

Speaker 1 (17:21):
Yeah, yeah, that one.

Speaker 2 (17:23):
Oh my god. I loved that movie. But see, I
went into that movie not having the faintest idea what
it was. I went into that movie thinking it was
a home invasion movie insurance. To some point it is.
But I was able to watch that film in the
theater and just be like, oh, that's what we're doing.
Oh okay, that's who that is. Oh I see it,
and to appreciate it for what it was. And Prometheus

(17:46):
did not get that fair shake from me. In twenty twelve.

Speaker 1 (17:50):
Listen, it's no Alien. Well what is like? I hate
when people say it's not as good. I made a
joke when I was like, don't watch Romulus, because when
I watch went to the press screen of Romulus, Someone's like,
well those alien that was their that was their main takeaway.
It's like, nothing's as good as alien.

Speaker 2 (18:04):
No, it never would be like I hate it?

Speaker 1 (18:07):
Like what what like.

Speaker 2 (18:09):
You hate the reaction or you hate Romulus.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
Like Wilt Chamberlain's I loved I like Romulus straightforward.

Speaker 2 (18:14):
That may mean to be our next episode.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
Yeah, there we go. Uh, Like you know, Wilt Chamberlain's
going one hundred points in the game, right, someone goes
and score sixty. You're not gonna be like that game sucked,
you know, like you no, that wasn't that that's a
huge Like listen, there's so like few games that have
like over seventy points, right, those are the all timers.
Like people don't do that every week. Movies can't do
that every week, like you know, baseball players back three

(18:38):
hundred like you know, you know if you like, there's
so few amazing seasons. You can't compare a movie to
the greatest movie. You can't. But people do it. And
so but they're like, well yeah, because they're in the
same franchise, like no, no, and and you know, for me,
like I don't think Prometheus is there. I don't if
there's too many characters. I think it it's it's the

(19:02):
fifield and like race Father idiots like it really there
are moments that that take you out of the movie,
like even Guy Pierce just like his old guy makeup
and and all that. But most importantly though, it has ideas,
and I think it challenges people. Yes, and I think
the idea of David, who you know, David was created

(19:23):
by man, and David immediately agreed figured out that he
was better. I will never die, I am the greatest.
And then you know in Covenant, they ended up fixing
him and making him less human. But this David is
such an incredible like humanity, you know, you know, it's interesting,
like the engineers could create humanity, you know, with alien

(19:46):
goo that they borrowed like Prometheus. Prometheus borrowed, stole fire,
they stole alien group to create life, like they're gonna
it's gonna kick him the ass of you know what's crazy,
the alien group that they stole or milked came back
to kill them. Yes, And so I interesting, Yes.

Speaker 2 (20:02):
I mean you bring up Prometheus and this idea of
this Titan who goes against what all of the other
gods and all of the other Titans are thinking, and
it's like, you know, I'm going to give fire to
these these people to man I'm going to give fire
to them because they need it. I want them to
be able to do this. And of course, you know,
he gets burned by that to literally pun on that,

(20:24):
to be silly about it, but you know, and then
there's that punishment. But again, Prometheus himself, a titan, even
made that wrong judgment. But that being said, if you
don't allow for the attempt, there's going to be no progress,
you know, And it was it was either gonna work
or it wasn't gonna work. And you know what, it
didn't work. Okay, so we're gonna have to move on

(20:45):
with that. But I mean, the next time it might work.
And so he may not have been there to make
it work, but the next person who tries could, you know,
And that is that this is the interest of science,
and this is the interest of Again, I'm going back
to Shell, this idea that the hubris of man going
against nature or trying to take on nature, if that

(21:08):
makes sense, you know, the whole there's a major theme
in Frankenstein, this idea of do we play God? Do
we create what we were? Or what I see? I
say we work because I'm putting judgment on it. But
you know what, we were never meant to create. Well,
who's to say we weren't meant to create? Right, It's
like we're going to play god and we're going to

(21:30):
create life, but then we can't handle what we've created exactly,
you know, like this is this, Yeah, this is a
philosophy class. This is when we start going in circles.
And this is when people get frustrated because you want
an answer and there isn't one, because there are things
in this world, in this universe that we do not

(21:52):
have the capacity to understand, and not even David has
the capacity to understand. Because David goes into these places
and start poking around with things with his fingers and goes, oh,
what's this purpose? Though he perfectly is like I'm gonna
touch this and I'm gonna do that because that's his programming.
But even he gets burned by it and he realizes that,

(22:14):
you know, he gets his head ripped off and he's like,
well that didn't work. You know, it's just this, and
he's he's lay his head is lying there on the ground,
and he's still able to talk and he's still able
to communicate, and he's like, yeah, I need your help,
and so like even David becomes more human, becomes more

(22:35):
humble because he even he realizes this perfect being, you
cannot do it on your own, you know. And now
I'm gonna become I'm gonna become this like fan of
Prometheus now because I can I can feel it happening
the way I'm talking about, Like I want to teach
this now, and that's that's that's gonna be a thing.
But it's like this idea of watching the way we

(22:55):
behave and the way we prejudge and determine or someone
else what their capabilities are, and how that comes back
to bite us time and time and time again.

Speaker 1 (23:07):
Always does. And you know what kind of annoys me
is we're talking about philosophy. There's some people are like, oh,
Prometheus just does like freshman philosophy. This this isn't a
twenty five thousand dollars experimental philosophy film. This isn't a
one hundred thousand dollars philosophical philosophy film. This isn't a

(23:28):
million dollar a twenty four film with philosophy. This is
one hundred million dollar blockbuster. You can't have doctorate philosophy
in this movie, like you, I'm sorry, all this MCU,
all these Star Treks, all these star wars. You can't
be a doctorate in philosophy. You have very basic ideas.

(23:50):
And that's just the way it is. So the fact
that a movie like this would tackle that is far
more ambitious than like I'd see ninety nine point nine
percent of other blockbusters. Like I think, I think the
questions are really interesting, like these engineers created humanity and
then they're like, man, humanity sucks. We're gonna go kill him,

(24:12):
like we're gonna start over, and then they get killed
by what they created to kill us.

Speaker 2 (24:17):
Yes, exactly.

Speaker 1 (24:18):
You know, watching David and his AI and you know
he like when Numia Repass is like, don't open the door,
he goes oops ooop and then sorry halfway there already,
and they're like Logan Marshall Green, would you do anything
to do this? Yeah, bloop. He knows everything about them,
he's setting this off. He's watching He's like like ash
an alien, who's a pain in the ass. Ash is
a pain because he works for Whyland. Yes that's his programming.

(24:40):
But in this one, David's curious and you know they
had to fix that type of droid because he was
almost too human, too lifelike, they made almost too perfect
of a creation. Then they're like, oh no, this thing's
way better than us, right, And so I don't know.
I just love that idea, Like I love that he's
just playing games with these people's lives. I love that,

(25:00):
you know, new member of Pasco's survive and she gets
that c section. He's like, I didn't think you were
capable of that, Like you didn't know humans could do that.
I don't I just I just think it's really interesting
how you know these quests for knowledge, and like the
quest for knowledge is that these engineers milked a perfect species.
They pulled their goo and created us, Like we don't.

Speaker 2 (25:21):
Even know what created them exactly.

Speaker 1 (25:23):
And I love there's a mural in the room of
a deacon. It's called the Deacon xenomorph, so it's a
deacon and that's the one that pops out of the
engineer at the end. They almost worshiped this deacon because
that's I think what they drew the life from. Yes,
like they milked, they milked it. I don't know, maybe
they captured it and milked it and that's what they worshiped.

(25:45):
That's how they create and that's how they destroyed. I
almost don't think the evolution of what a xenomorph is matters.
I just think what it represents is something that can
never be controlled, that will be worshiped, that's misunderstood. What
humans and you will continue to do for a lifetime
is like try to wrangle it. Like those idiots and
Alien Resurrection, they had three of them and then they're

(26:06):
like two of them killed, one of them melted through
the ground, and then they murdered everyone. Like this is
a creature that can, like it's worse than kudzu, Like
it spreads faster than kudzu, and like we can't control it.
But yet all wail in Utani does is try to
control it. All the engineers try to do is control it,
and they can't. And that's what Zeno Morris represent. They
weigh and wait, they lay in wait for two thousand years,

(26:27):
an alien on that ship and then one of them's
opened up and all hell breaks loose. Thousands of years
they're below that thing. These are like dorm it perfect
species that are almost passive, passive antagonists. And I don't
think we don't need to go to their home planet.
We don't need to know what they are. We just
need to know that we will never control them. And
I think that's what Ridley Scott's trying to say. Like

(26:48):
I I think, I don't know. I just think that's
really interesting.

Speaker 2 (26:50):
That's like, no, I think I agree with you. You know,
like you're talking about you know, Logan mor Marshall Green's
character Holloway, and I think he and Shaw are like
this duality of man right, Like he's the one who's
all over the knowledge and we're gonna keep going, We're
gonna keep doing the thing. And he's you know, I

(27:11):
don't know how far I want to go on this,
but I guess you could get into some sort of
gender theory with this, but the idea that he's the
male and he's brushed and he's like, I'm gonna do
the thing and we're gonna do the thing, babe, and babe,
you need to do this. You know. He calls David
boy and I was like, Okay, I see this guy,
you know, like I see the I see the man.

(27:34):
I see the I mean, you want to get into it.
I mean I see the white man looking at this
and looking at who he perceives as a lesser being.
And he calls him boy. I mean it with Romulus.
There's a lot of criticism out there about the character
of Andy, who's an artificial and who is actually a
broken artificial at first, like he was put together. I

(27:55):
can't remember the main character's name, by Rain, by Rain's father.
He was like rap metal and he was like rebuilt.
And so he's a little you know, he's got a
couple of of of struggles. So he's an artificial that
isn't even you know, mistine like David. And the fact
that he's played by a black actor who ps is

(28:17):
the best damn thing.

Speaker 1 (28:18):
And this is incredible.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (28:21):
Somebody wrote a review and they're like, oh, he almost
cries all the time. It's like, shut up, it's interesting.
He's broken.

Speaker 2 (28:28):
David's fascinating.

Speaker 1 (28:29):
David's glitch. Like, you know, I talked to Norbert about
my buddy Norbert on an episode, like he doesn't think
that David is broken. He just thinks, like David is
almost too good. I mean, David's gone mad. David's law, Yeah, exactly.
So why can't Andy, who's clearly built from like gum,
duct tape and toothpicks, have some glitches? Like it's yes,

(28:52):
I don't want to talk about it.

Speaker 2 (28:55):
But I completely agree with you. And I mean, to
a certain point, David is because David isn't David. David
is emulating Peter O'Toole and Lawrence of Arabia. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
Yeah, even he is.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
Looking elsewhere and saying that's who I want to be, right, Like,
David is not purely David. David is trying to be
something that he sees on TV. Right, So even David
has has human elements. But I mean, like somebody like Andy.
There are there are criticisms of Romulus saying that, oh,

(29:27):
this is a this is an allusion to slavery and
the way they treat Andy, and because he's played by
a black actor and YadA, YadA, you know where this
is going. But I think that what Shaw and Holloway
do and the way Holloway treats David, this idea of
I'm human, I'm the scientist. I'm the one who discovered

(29:49):
these things, so clearly I'm the one who knows everything. Well,
guess what Halloway's Hubris definitely comes back and ruins him
because David victim to his own. Yeah, David is like, uh, huh,
I'm gonna show you, right, because if David, if David
is a pure AI had zero human emotions, there would

(30:11):
have been no reason to do it except for I
want to see what happens if I do this. But
his choice of Holloway is definitely tinged with revenge. It
all you want to do a jerk to me, I'm
coming back at you. He definitely sucks and he is
the one who goes running in without being cautious, whereas Shaw.

Speaker 1 (30:33):
It takes a damn helmet off.

Speaker 2 (30:35):
Oh my god, the helmet thing. I throughout this whole movie,
I'm like, why are we all taking the helmets off?
And then I was fine with it. At first, I
was like, Okay, dude, you be the You be the
the dumb ass who's gonna do it first. But then
when they were doing it later when they went back,
so they had that whole situation. They're there in the
first time, and they noticing that everything is changing, that

(30:56):
everything's opening up because they've changed the atmosphere in that
tomb space, right, But then when they go back, they
know they've changed the atmosphere, they know things are getting weird.
They take the helmets off again. I'd be like, nope,
we took them off once and we changed things, and
we need to be careful. Now there is no caution.

(31:17):
And even Shaw loses the caution. She is sort of
this embodiment of I'm going to explore, but I'm not
going to leave Roy Jenkins my way into this Jenkins,
I love Leroy Jay this idea of I'm going to
go in, but I'm going to be respectful. Right, and
again gender theory here, I wonder about this because Shaw,

(31:42):
who is you know, one of what three women? You have? Ford,
you have Vickars, but Vickers doesn't go off the ship,
so she kind of doesn't count. But between Ford and Shaw,
they are much more cautious of things, whereas the men

(32:02):
are kind of like, I'm gonna do my thing. I'm
going to go here. You know, you've got Fifield, who's
just an obnoxious jokester and he's.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
Synecon Weed in this suit.

Speaker 2 (32:13):
Who is this guy? But you know, it's interesting to
see how each character represents sort of these caricatures of
what we are in humanity. You know, you could identify
various archetypes in each of these characters. I don't remember
how I started, but.

Speaker 1 (32:31):
That's that's always been the franchise is what I love
what you're saying, Yes, remember the first one. You have
the kind of union guys, the guys who want the union.
You have the rational Ripley. You have the the man
I forget her name, but you have like the very
emotional the other woman who's like very like slappy. And
you have the Captain who who is good but he's
also like yeah, arrogant, like they do this. You have
the the Android who represents Wayland's mother, the Controller. You

(32:57):
have this very they're all stock characters, like if you
think about aliens. I love Sigourney Weavers. She earned her
Oscar nomination, but she becomes kind of like the mother
figure because she becomes the voice of reason. You have
Paul Riser, who dis oozes Whyland. You have Michael Bean
who's like the one nice guy. You have the brash guy.
You have the tough lady Alien three. You have the

(33:19):
tough convict, the good convict, the Christian convict, the psycho convict,
Alien Resurrection. You have the jerks, the all that like
the character the I think it's always been that.

Speaker 2 (33:29):
Yeah, damn, I wish I could teach these like the
more I think about it, the more I'm like, oh
my god, I can't teach these because there's other options,
but they're.

Speaker 1 (33:36):
So good, and like, that's why I love David, because
I think David and Ripley are the best characters of
the franchise, because especially when you watch Covenant when there's
two of them.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
I need to watch it again. I deliberately didn't watch
it because I'm like, I'm gonna blend them and I'm
gonna forget which movie was which. But now I feel
like I should have watched it because of like I
want to talk more about it.

Speaker 1 (33:55):
These bosos. They do some bozo stuff in that movie,
and I think Ridley's God is just having fun with it.
It's like, Okay, you want some slasher crap, sure, I'll
add that in there. But I I you know what's
interesting too about like Ripley. She's not successful, Ripley dies,
you know, Ripley's ship crashes, Ripley and the planet blows up,
Ripley sacrifices herself. Ripley's DNA has taken her fire Her

(34:19):
fire jump is unsuccessful. According to Alien Resurrection, you know,
the most successful characters is her clone, Yes, that like,
so if you she Ripley's like one of the smartest
characters in history, one of the greatest action heroes ever.
I'm not gonna say, like lady action heroes, one of
the greatest period. But the most successful version of her

(34:41):
in this franchise is the upgrade. It's like David, he's successful,
he's that and I, I don't know, I just like,
I think that's.

Speaker 2 (34:50):
Damn excited about a movie I hated.

Speaker 1 (34:54):
I'm telling like the.

Speaker 2 (34:57):
Because I remember, I remember you first asked me about this,
and I'll like, I need you to explain to me
why I'm why I'm wrong, or what I missed, and
I'm glad to be like, you know what I did
miss it. It makes me wonder if I'm going to
come back to Romulus years from now and I'm going
to say the same thing because it didn't like Romulas.
I thought Romulos was boring.

Speaker 1 (35:15):
I mean, that's a Fetti Alvarez thing. Though his movies,
these movies though they're talking about, like you know, like
the slavery angle of it, he doesn't think that deep
about it. And also the actor had David Johnson had
a lot of say in his character oh, like so good.
I don't. I don't think. But I also think his
movies are like Evil Dead, Good Remake, Bloody.

Speaker 2 (35:33):
Is Shit, loved It mean, yes.

Speaker 1 (35:37):
Don't breathe mean all three of his movies have bonkers ending.
When I saw the ending of this, I'm like, well,
this isn't you know? Every Alien has attacked on Ending.
Alien was supposed to end with her and the thing
and then the alien's in there, Aliens, the Queen, Aliens
on the ship. Alien three, like the thing survives comes
out again, then she has to sacrifice herself. Alien four

(35:57):
the creature and jumps on the ship and so it
always has attacked on Ending and then tossing Fettialvaz, I
knew the ending would be crazy, yes, and you know what,
like I think you're just I think it's just a
very simple film. And also it talks about the black goop.
Actually shows one of the face huggers being milked for
the black goot. Right, So so like I think it's fine,

(36:21):
but I don't. In my head, I just know what
Fettialvaz does, like he is just mean. People will die
hard and won't do it though, Yeah, and it'll be
like fine and I think I liked Romulus just because
I just was like, it's gonna be a Fettialvaz alien film. Yeah,
so my expectations weren't huge.

Speaker 2 (36:39):
If my expectations well, because I mean, going into it,
I hated Prometheus, I hated Covenant even more, and I'm like, well,
let's go three for three, and I thought we did.
It makes me wonder like okay, because everybody who's loving it,
like it's getting such good reviews, and I'm thinking what
did I miss? Again? It was like, what did I
miss that everybody else is loving? Because I was bored

(37:00):
and again hadn't watched any trailers, didn't go in with
any expectations this time around. So I think Prometheus and
Romulus are going to be an interesting pairing for me
in the future. This idea of like, what is it
that everybody else is loving that I didn't see. I'm
not one of those people who were like, well it
wasn't as good as Alien and Aliens, Like I know better,
I go into everything is. I'm not a franchise nerd.

(37:21):
I hate when movies have sequels. Do not do sequels.
Give me standalone films and make them good, you know,
like if you're gonna do another one, it needs to
act as a standalone. For me, I'm the jerk reader
who give me a trilogy. I'm gonna read the first
book and I'm gonna stop. So I don't want to
get exhausted by franchises and by series. But I just
I don't know. I thought a lot of it was lazy.

(37:42):
I thought a lot of it was silly. There was
no real danger involved, and that was actually a problem
I had with Covenant. I remember complaining about the writing
of Covenant because every time the characters get into some
sort of danger, it was like, oh my god, there's danger.
Oh wait, it's okay again, and oh no, there's did Nope,
we're okay, Like I thought, everything was resolved way too
quickly and very unbelievably. Again, though, when did Covenant come out?

(38:07):
I haven't seen it since I saw it in the theater,
and you know, this week, I'm now gonna watch it
again because now, talking with you, this is a terrible
side effect of being friends with you. Mark. Now I'm
gonna sit down and I'm gonna watch the whole damn thing.
I'm gonna watch every movie. I'm gonna walk my way
through it again. But I'm having a Star Wars dilemma.
Do I start with Prometheus and work my way through chronologically,

(38:28):
or do I start with Alien and then walk back
and damn it, Mark, this is what my student. This
is what our students feel like, because we talk to
them and we get all excited about these things and
then we're like, damn it, you're making me think and
you're making me enjoy it.

Speaker 1 (38:41):
Hey, why are we doing this? This is the thing.
I love when students begrudgingly like to learn.

Speaker 2 (38:46):
This is good though, because I have to go back
to school next week and I'm having a hard time
accepting it. But coming up with this conversation is making
me go, I'm kind of into it.

Speaker 1 (38:54):
The problem with Covenant is it features the least important
human characters of the franchise. They are you know, Catherine
Watterson's a good actor, but they are the don't I
don't even know any other names, Like I know Rain's name,
Like I I know the names of the characters. Yeah,
Like I know, you said Covenant and I went wait, sorry,
Like I'm just saying, like I think a movie is

(39:15):
good when I remember the names of the Hudson you
know what I mean, Like I know the names of
the characters, I don't know any of their names. The
reason the movie works those is because of Fastbender, where
you know, humans do the dumbest things on that movie too.
They just press buttons and then like a soldier walks
up to a thing and goes and then it spores
come into his face and you're like an idiot. But like,

(39:38):
I think that's what Ridley Scott's doing. It's you know,
at the end of the day, at the end of Covenant.
I don't want to spoil it, but like you remember
the ending of Covenant. Nope, okay, I'm not gonna say it,
but I think it's all about those androids. It's like
the story isn't about the humans anymore. It's just they
show up to be vehicles to get eggs put in

(39:58):
their sea. Yes, and that's all they're there for. And
I don't mind that. And I don't know, just watching
Fastbender in that movie and like what he's doing. I
don't think I like Prometheus more than Covenant, but I
do think that Covenant just it's just an odd duck.
It's an odd duck, and it's mean, and it's yeah, exactly,

(40:20):
and I just think, you know, Prometheus for me, is
is just a movie that I think you're right though,
I think a big problem with trailers and like what
is this? And this is why reboot poles are so
popular because they give you exactly kind of what you wanted, yes,
and you know you don't even have you don't even
have to market it different. You just gotta be like, hey,

(40:42):
this is everything you've seen before, with new characters and
old characters, and so there's gonna be no when you
walk into a reboot hole. There's gonna be no. I
thought this would be this and it's not, which is
brilliant for big budget filmmaking, Like Prometheus was quite a risk,
and that trailer was incredible and listen, there aren't zeno
more like end, there's the Xenomorph, the Deacon pops up right,

(41:02):
But yeah, it's not. But like really, Scott on a
comment I was listening all the commentaries for this episode,
this video I'm writing, and by Scott's just like I
want to know why that ship is there, who brought
it there, why did it end up there? And and
you know what, we don't know more than one Yeah,
that's the.

Speaker 2 (41:17):
Different reveals there's more than one there.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
And that one crashed, that the engineers are messed up.
How many times have the engineers messed up? Yes, like
that was going somewhere else, and they tell.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
Us that right from the beginning. When you get that
like that replay whatever it is that they call it,
because I kept like, that's one of those questions you
talk about all the questions you get with Prometheus, the
question of okay, so we see, you know, David did
whatever he did, and we get this sort of like replay.
It makes me think of like like ghost energy. Right,

(41:49):
there's certain hauntings where you can't there's not an intelligent haunting.
It's just sort of like pressing rewind and play on
a on a video over and over again. It just happens.
It's sort of that where shows the engineers running in terror,
trying to get into this room, and it's like, well,
if this is quote unquote god, this is what created us,

(42:12):
Well guess what the engineers were also afraid. And at
no point do they look at that and go gee,
we should probably tread carefully here.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
Yeah, well, I think that's when David's like ooh, Like
that's when David. David snags the good to put into
into Holloway's drink, like he he instigates all of that.
He even opens the door, No mean passes like we
should open the door, and he's like, I'm gonna open
the door. I'm gonna push that boo And yeah they don't.

(42:41):
But I think that's hubris. I mean, there are people
who packed three ships and travel across the world. They
go to the like it's you know, some people call
it amazing exploring, and I think exploring is necessary, but
you also have to stand that there's a certain hubrist
that goes along with that, and there's a certain like
a lot of you are gonna die, but you're gonna
get me there, like there's And so for me watching

(43:04):
this movie and just realizing the engineers died and the
engineers created us, and the engineers didn't even create the goo,
they just milked it, it's like, who the hell are
these engineers? Yes, And I think that's a cool question.
I like that aliens represent this very passive antagonist where
their their perfection. They can float in space for one

(43:25):
hundred years. You put them on your ship, you're dead.
Like they they represent kind of just something that can
never be controlled, but people keep wanting to control it.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
And they know what the morphs are. You're gonna laugh
so hard at me. Xenomorphs are cats. Yeah, xenomorphs are cats.
Don't poke the sleeping cat, because when you're gonna get screwed,
you know, like if the cat wants to deal with you,
the cat will come to you. You know, like talk
about a passive aggressor. Yeah, this is a matter of

(43:54):
their perfectly fine little being. But we want to go
up to them and poke them and and they're gonna
get mad and scratch us. This is what it is like.
The xenom worphs, the engineers are just as fallible as
we are. It's like, I want to see what this does,
and I want to watch what this does, and you know,
like it's it's the ultimate inn f around and find out.

Speaker 1 (44:14):
Yeah, you know, and they did.

Speaker 2 (44:16):
They do, but see and then the other side of.

Speaker 1 (44:18):
Them all and then gets his own head wrapped off.

Speaker 2 (44:22):
What's brilliant about this is we look at all of
these people in history and even in modern day, these
people who have the money and have the means to
try the thing, and we say, you're a lunatic, right, Like,
we look in the history books at all of these
explorers in history and we revere them. We revered them

(44:44):
because they were successful. But if we think about the
number of people.

Speaker 1 (44:48):
Who who kill people.

Speaker 2 (44:51):
Yes, people of the day looked at these people and went,
you're an idiot, what are you doing? Like, think about
these billionllionaires, these multi billionaires who built their own little
submarine and decided they were going to go explore the
depths of the ocean. I mean, they were completely ripped
apart on the internet and the whole world is like

(45:12):
you idiot. Yeah, but guess what if they had been successful?
What would that have turned into? You know, like we
look at the Hubris and we go, well, you should
have known better. Well, you should have known better is
what brings us the results of what we find. You know,
Like you think about how we know that you shouldn't
mix certain cleaning agents because it's gonna screw you up. Well,

(45:33):
the only reason we know that is because somebody tried
and it didn't end up well for them. But now
we have that information. Yeah, you know, Like it's fascinating
to step back and look at things purely objectively. Take
the judgment of it. You shouldn't have done that because
that was stupid. But had it been a different result,
we wouldn't be calling it stupid. We'd been calling it brave.

Speaker 1 (45:54):
I mean, for what every very successful venture, there's been
thousands of failed ones.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
Yes, this is why they call it failing forward. Yeah,
and you're gonna screw up in order to figure out
what's wrong so that next time you can try and
do it right.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
And I think there's a great I think that's pretty
great about the resiliency of humans. We'll just keep going
until we blow up our planet. But I think, but
I mean, look at it, look at everyone with these
xenomors like whalen Utani's like, I want this. You know,
an alien doesn't need a face hugger. An alien can
take you, smack you and a bunch of goo. It
creates more gow like I don't know how, it's like

(46:28):
it's a human amount of good and it just smacks
you into a wall. You become a human host and
then you pop a xenomorph out, So they don't even
need face huggers. Like these are things that can just
spread and they can adapt, they can swim, they can
like it's not like cuds you that dies during the winter.
It's not like invasive animals that that slowly evolve like

(46:49):
it's they're they're like, you know, pythons will never take
over Minnesota, thank god, you know, but like Zeno Mars could, right,
and it's like, but hell, you know what should probably
we should put them on our spaceship. We should just
see what happened. It's like, no, like stop, but I
think that's humanity though, yes, And I don't know, I

(47:09):
guess just for me watching this Prometheus and like, we're
gonna go find who created us and then they go
to a military in storage installation that's devoid of people
for thousands of years because they were killed by what
they made.

Speaker 2 (47:20):
Wonder why?

Speaker 1 (47:20):
Yeah, And I love that, Like it's very nihilistic and
it's very interesting, and that's far more interesting to me
than be like, okay, so a xenomorph, right, it's on
a planet of xenomors. It's like, I mean that's in
the comics. There's like Planet Xenomors and there's like different
brands and stuff like oh cool, yeah, fine, Like it's

(47:42):
more interesting to just know that these things what they represent,
like Michael Myers represents the Boogeyman, unstoppable killing machine, like
I think, I think some of the best villains represent something,
and I think that's what these do. And so that's
why I've always loved and Listen, I'm defending a movie
that has a seven point zero score on Rotten Tomatoes

(48:06):
on IMD, I'm it's it has a seventy plus score
seventy three Rotten Tomatoes. I mean the Prometheus Brock box
office was what Prometheus box off made four hundred and
three million dollars worldwide, So I mean, and it's budget. Okay,
it's a budget Black Adam costs three hundred and fifty
million dollars. Right, There are movies out there now that

(48:28):
cost three Battleship cost like three hundred million. This movie
costs one hundred and thirty. Bridley Scott makes movies in
eight days. That's why I love him. Yes, this is
a big, bold, beautiful, awesome. There's a c section of
an alien. It's crazy.

Speaker 2 (48:45):
I still hate that scene.

Speaker 1 (48:46):
It's insane. And then you see the Staples going into
it like it's a ballsy movie. But it only costs
one hundred and thirty. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:54):
Books amazing. I love the movies that spend far more
money that looks like shit doesn't look like this exactly.

Speaker 1 (49:02):
The Gray Man. That movie on Netflix costs three hundred million. Well,
you have to pay the actors a lot upfront because
there's no back end. That's all one of the worst
things I've ever seen in my life, exactly. And this
movie one hundred and thirty mil. Ask some interesting questions,
feature some kind of question old deafs. It's wonderful. I
don't care. I dig it and I do too.

Speaker 2 (49:19):
I think I do too. I think I'm a fan now, Mark, Hey,
it's so strange, but it's yeah, it's true, like it
just I guess I needed time. I needed time to
forget it and come back to it as if I
was watching it for the first time.

Speaker 1 (49:31):
But you are one hundred percent right. It's you know.
When I watch Black Widow for the first time, I
didn't like it because it wasn't but see, I like,
it's a different reason from you, Like you have an
idea of a movie built up in your head based
on the trailers, and then it's not that movie. For me.
I didn't like Black Widow because it should have been
like Scarlett Johanson Swansong and should have focused on her

(49:52):
but instead of brings in her family. But then I
thought to myself, like, a movie's not bad, and I'm
not comparing what our two situations, but I'm just like, well,
something I've learned. It's like you stop watching trailers. So
then that stopped. And then so for me, I think
with Black Litto, it wasn't what I wanted it to be.
But that doesn't mean it's bad. It just means it
wasn't what I wanted it to be. And when I

(50:12):
reframed it in my head, I can enjoy it. Like
I'm not saying it changed the world. No movies changed
the world, and if they do, that'd be crazy. But seriously,
I think once I was able to reframe it in
my head of like, it doesn't matter what you wanted,
it's what the movie is, Like, you're not entitled to that.
I can enjoy it now. And I think you're right there.
With Prometheus, it it was like we're gonna explain the

(50:34):
alien and then they don't.

Speaker 2 (50:36):
Yeah, they just don't. And I agree with you.

Speaker 1 (50:39):
I get it.

Speaker 2 (50:40):
It's it's interesting because you know, like I I again,
I'm gonna I'm gonna dip into my own hubris for
a minute. But I feel that I have the ability
to look at things objectively. And one of the things
I talk about with my students is, oh, that movie sucked,
And I'm like, well, did it or did you just
dislike it?

Speaker 1 (50:57):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (50:57):
Right, because you can talk about movies that are good,
movies that like what is the what does good even mean?
But like you can say this movie has quality to it,
I just don't care for it. And there was a
summer I don't think it was last year, there was
two summers back. I decided that I was gonna spend
some time watching movies that I really don't like but
everybody else does, and see, like, can I change my

(51:20):
own mind? So Sean of the Dead, for example, I
don't like this movie. I don't like it. It's not
for me. Is it a great movie for what it does? Absolutely?
And then it was like, no, let me watch the
movies I should like and don't. Event Horizon is at
the top of that list where this should be a
movie that I adore because horror fans are all about
this movie and I think it's awful, and I'm able

(51:41):
to explain it now, right, Like, so you have an
ending and I'm not gonna get too into it, but
you have an ending where there's this suggestion posed but
then I assert they pull the punch. You're going to
show me what hell is, but you're not gonna excuse me.
You're going to say here is hell. You're not gonna
show it to me, Like, don't Clive barker me and

(52:02):
then tease me and say I'm not gonna show it
to you. And it's like, no, you pulled the punch.
I wanted you to go one step further. You don't
show me everything, but give me something, don't hint at it,
and then yank it from me. And Session nine is
another one where this is a psychological thriller, this crazy film,
and it doesn't work for me. And so like looking
at Prometheus is kind of cool for me because I

(52:24):
hated it. I've now revisited it and I've changed my mind.
You know, it's nice to do that because I'm baffled
by movies that I should like but I don't. And
then I'm like, what did I miss? I feel like
it's a failing of my own. I've never seen it.
Is that crazy.

Speaker 1 (52:42):
I'm not a fan of it a lot.

Speaker 2 (52:43):
There's a lot of people who either love it or
hate it, worshiped it. Yeah, and I mean like so,
for example, like I've just gotten very good at knowing
what I will like and just it's not for me
is the way you say it. Now, It's like, you know,
there are movies out there that people like that are
not for me. Now, I will also assert that there
are movies out there that are not good movies, and

(53:06):
I will argue why, right, Like so the the twenty
sixteen Ghostbusters. I'm sorry, it's not a good movie. It's
poorly written, it's got a terrible villain. This is a
whole other tangent. There are people who like it, and
I don't understand why, because it's got every last failing
And I promise I am not a fanboy saying ooh,
it's because it's girls. Mainly, it's because the writing is

(53:28):
terrible and they did not give four brilliant comedians what
they could have done.

Speaker 1 (53:32):
And they're all four quipsters. Ghostbusters works because all of
them are different. Yes, oh they're all they all got jokes. Yes,
I guess the problem. You know what I think about
the Ghostbusters movie. It's like, you know when people go
super hard on something and then other people start defending it. Yes,
I think fanboys were so hard on it. Yeah, that

(53:52):
other people are like, no, it's not that bad, but
it's not very good.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
It's not good.

Speaker 1 (53:57):
I mean, it's just I could. I loved all those actors.
I love all of them. But yeah, when when they're
all four funny and they're all four are joke like,
that doesn't that's not how things work. And the villain
I don't even know what the villain is, the rash Yeah,
and so, but I think.

Speaker 2 (54:11):
You needs it has to be an ensemble.

Speaker 1 (54:14):
When people go way too hard on it, people start
sticking up for it. Like look at Last Jedi. Yeah,
people people like Last Jedi. I love I love the
visuals of it. But I also think it's kind of
weird that in the first film they blow up three
planets of billions of people, and then they spend the
second film being like, well, the rebels and the the
bad guys are the same, because you guys use the

(54:36):
same people. It's like no, like like we are rebelling
against a group of people who kill billions. They were
not the same but they tried to like, sorry, but
I still visuals. But yeah, people love it. They're like, oh,
it's the best Star Wars movie. You're like, no, it's
fun and I like the ideas, but yeah, it's I thought.

Speaker 2 (54:54):
I look it up because I can't remember the order.
I'm not a Star Wars person, but I've seen all
of them. Last Jedi was like literally the last one.

Speaker 1 (55:01):
Right, No, that was Rise of Skywalker.

Speaker 2 (55:03):
So that was the one I didn't like at all.

Speaker 1 (55:05):
This is the one I this is what I compared to. J. J.
Abrams comes in, makes a remake, he remakes New Hope,
Lady on a planet gets in a thing a death star.

Speaker 2 (55:15):
I think that's what I thought. Skywalker, Rise of sky
one of those two. I looked at and I went,
it's the same movie.

Speaker 1 (55:22):
Watching it again, it's the same as Star Wars. You
know you have Yes, she has a mentor. The mentor dies,
So that's lazy to me. This is this is my visual. J.
J Abrams made a couch and that couch was a remake.
JJ Abrams watches this. I'm sorry. Ryan Johnson watches The
Chappelle Show. He stees he sees was it like Rick

(55:43):
James killing that couch like f your couch. Like Ryan
Johnson goes up to the couch and just steps on
it and like he's has mud called. He just goes
plays football in the mud and like lays on the couch.
He wrecked the couch, like he's like, f your couch.
Jj Abrams. He destroys the helmet. He like Rai's parents
are nothing like he everything JJ Abrams does. He's like

(56:04):
you suck, Like, yes, oh you got Finn john By.
I'm just gonna put him on this ship.

Speaker 2 (56:09):
And sent contest who in control and you're.

Speaker 1 (56:12):
Like sends him away and then the other guy was
fired and then they're like jj Abrams come back. Jj
Abrams refixes the helmet. The helmet he so he comes
back and he cleans his couch, but it's still dirty,
like and so it's just rises sky. It's like what
it was, Yeah, exactly. I don't I think I like
Last Jedi more than Force Awakens, because for Force Awakens
is a remake. Yeah, I'll automatically put something ahead of that.

(56:35):
But then like as opposed to JJ maybe following through
what Ryan, He's like, no, screw Ryan Johnson, Like Rai's
parents were something like, but like it's all bad producing,
it's bad. Yeah, all that.

Speaker 2 (56:48):
So it's a lot again. We're back to the egos.
We're back to the hubris, Like whose vision is going
to be the one that stands? You know? I just
this is why I don't like franchises, Like, give me
a good standalone film.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
Well, if it's a franchise, at least have Chad Stileski
like John Wick see it through. You know, you have
someone see it through.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
That's true too. But half the time, and there's another
perfect example. I have not seen anything except the first
John Wick.

Speaker 1 (57:13):
Okay, y, I love that.

Speaker 2 (57:15):
I think that first movie is great. I don't need more,
you do.

Speaker 1 (57:18):
I like about the first one though it's like you
started a lot of shit, John, this is gonna follow you.

Speaker 2 (57:24):
You know, there are gonna be repercussions.

Speaker 1 (57:26):
But I think that's kind of that's a very natural,
organic progression. But like I don't look at Thor like
the first two Thor movies come out. Taiko saw the
first one, like, the second one's bad, it's fine, it's cromulent,
but the third one, Taik, like everyone I did see Ragnarok,
like he kills all the characters from the first two
off immediately, and it's like, why even enjoy this? Then,

(57:47):
if you're just gonna like, say, the rest of the
franchise sucks, it's true, but this one I don't know.
I love Prometheus. I'm glad we did that.

Speaker 2 (57:55):
You know what I like about Prometheus? I like And
again this is more my brain. There was so many
things about Prometheus that are left unanswered, and my brain
really does go to I'm not meant to understand. The
whole point is there will always be questions that we
will not have an answer to, and you need to
look at it and go there are going to be
things beyond my understanding in life. And it's okay. I

(58:17):
don't need every last question answered. I don't need every
last thing tied up in a nice, neat package. I
love and thrive on ambiguity. And if you set these
things up, well, it's wonderful because it gives you something
to talk about, right. It gives us the opportunity to
have podcast episodes where we can go on and ramble
about these things, and it's what makes things fun.

Speaker 1 (58:38):
And it's a good question. I think movies, I think
you can step out of movies asking bad questions m hm.
But this one it's like, who's our creator? They show up? Oh,
you created us? Yeah, you want to ask some coffee? Yeah,
iring some coffee?

Speaker 2 (58:52):
You know.

Speaker 1 (58:52):
No, we'll never know. And I like that these Zeno
morse represents something will never control. Yes, our creator. Our
creators created us with their gou and then they killed
like and it.

Speaker 2 (59:05):
Realized that they should probably destroy us, which is interesting, right,
It's like, oops, we made a mistaken.

Speaker 1 (59:13):
And then we make it worse. Yes, like thumb. I
love it all right, Lisa. Where can people find you?

Speaker 2 (59:19):
You can find me on the rabbit Hole podcast Network
some suggestions for you. You can catch me on the
Gift of Horror, which is a show that Jason Soto
and I are putting together. We have identified a number
of subgenres of horror films, so we each choose a
film in that subgenre and we gift it to each other.
So each episode we talk about two different films and

(59:40):
then we kind of measure out which one's better. A
little bit of bragging rights there, and then you can
catch me on Pictures and Conversations, a rabbit Hole Podcast
book club, and that comes out the twentieth of every month.
In September, we're talking about Incidents around the House by
Josh Mahlerman, and for October we're talking about Hemlock Island

(01:00:03):
by Kelly Armstrong. So if you're a reader, come join us.
You know, we always announce what our next books are
going to be at the end of each episode, so
you have a month to catch up and join us
when we release the episodes.

Speaker 1 (01:00:14):
I love it. I'm reading a book about a guy
who gets swallowed by a whale, and that's.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
The book is so good. Whale Fall is so good.
I love it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:22):
Whenever I so. I used to travel a lot and
I read a lot of books, but now whenever I
try to read a book at night, I fall asleep.
So I got a trip coming up. Audiobooks, man, So
I just finished Verna Herzog's audiobook that was there you go.
But I like reading.

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
I like reading, I but see audiobooks are still reading.

Speaker 1 (01:00:41):
But music.

Speaker 2 (01:00:42):
I only do audiobooks in the car, which means that
I'm a podcaster who never listens to podcasts, but I
listen to audiobooks. I have digital books because they're on
my phone every time I'm in a waiting room or something,
or when I'm sitting at the movie not watching trailers,
I'm reading. I'm sitting there reading on my phone. But
then I've got library books, I've got a kindle, I've

(01:01:03):
got actual books. I read in every last format you
give me, because the more times I can take in stories,
the happier I am.

Speaker 1 (01:01:10):
I need read.

Speaker 2 (01:01:10):
Railfall is amazing, Daniel Krause, look that one up.

Speaker 1 (01:01:14):
So yeah, I've been I'll probably been able to finish that,
so I'm exciting.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
So good.

Speaker 1 (01:01:19):
Well, Lisa, thank you for joining.

Speaker 2 (01:01:20):
Me, Thank you for having me. It's always such fun
chatting with you.

Speaker 1 (01:01:23):
This was good. I think this is gonna be the
most MFF episode or I'm like, yeah, that's right, like
where my voice goes like really, yeah, that's gonna be
my that's gonna be the number one.

Speaker 2 (01:01:32):
We keep trying to find something that I'm gonna argue
with you about, but we didn't.

Speaker 1 (01:01:37):
Arguing sounds terrible. I like discussions.

Speaker 2 (01:01:40):
That's true. That's true.

Speaker 1 (01:01:41):
You don't like Larry row And I'm not talking about
Larry Crown. That's the worst movie ever made.

Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
I don't think i've seen it.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
I hate it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
It's weird the movies I've not seen.

Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
It's really kind of embarrass It's good you haven't seen it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:50):
Because it's I guess for some horrible all right, all.

Speaker 1 (01:01:54):
Right, So for me, Mark Off, Myron, for Lisa lay
this movie some of the plates. We'll see you next week.