SI#128 – Don’t Punch Down - Subtle Interference

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:26):
[Alex] You can't tolerate that.
[Erica] I don't... I'm not a big fan. I don't like... It was incredibly frustrating. Not frustrating. I did it to myself. But I went to C2E2 on Friday. Right. And being the supreme nerd that I am, I dressed up as Radovid from Witcher 3. Okay. Or Witcher Season 3. Hinky as hell. I have a really, like... I had a shitty fur, I had a shitty wig, shitty crown, and I have a slew of very bad Yaskier shirts. And this one was like, it said like Yaskier fan club or something on there. I'm like, oh yes, this will be perfect. I can never wear this out of the house. This shall be the day. No one knew who I was, which was even better, which is like just outstanding. But the crown, I had it on for like six, seven, however fucking long we were there, six, seven hours. and like the whole night and next day i could just feel it and i was just

(01:22):
[Alex] like like the like on your head or like right here and just kind of like the
[Erica] weight of it i kept like moving to adjust it and i'm like dumbass you're not wearing that anymore like
[Alex] this is from now on a it sits on a shelf somewhere it's a piece of art
[Erica] i will say i went uh sleeveless which at a con like that where it's just fucking sweat house the whole day

(01:48):
[Alex] Excellent
[Erica] choice. Excellent choice.
[Alex] So how was C2E2, right?
[Erica] What they call it. It's the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo, I think is the official name.
[Alex] How was it?
[Erica] We had a good time. I went with some friends, longtime listener Sass, our buddy Christy, and we just kind of went. We wandered around Artist Alley. We met a couple friends. We had a good time.

(02:10):
[Alex] Did you see anything you wanted to buy or did you buy anything?
[Erica] For the most part, I kept it to like some stickers. I have some new stickers on my water bottle. I have some new art. One of the Pacific Rim artists I follow was there.
[Alex] That's cool.
[Erica] Like I did not realize that. I was like walking down one of the aisles and I was like, wait a minute.

(02:31):
[Alex] I know this art.
[Erica] In the cold light of 2024. Is that Pacific Rim art? I haven't been to C2E2 since before, like right before the pandemic. The one that was like two weeks before everything shut down. Okay. I remember standing in the line and being like, there's no way that we're not all getting sick. I've made a poor decision. This was a very bad decision. And it was so... We went on a Saturday and it was so crowded and just like... bad but we went on Friday so it was a little not as crowded it was better um I don't know where I was going with that but uh I had been a couple times before that and never see like any Pacific Rim stuff so I was very excited

(03:12):
[Alex] Yeah, that's kind of a strange one to see there, I guess. I mean, just because you don't think of Pacific Rim as a big franchise or anything.
[Erica] No, not really. Not with the way that they fucking handled it. You could have, but you
[Alex] know.
[Erica] C'est la vie. What are you going to do? There wasn't a lot of Witcher stuff either. I only saw a couple pieces of art and maybe a pin here and there.

(03:33):
[Alex] What were you seeing the most of? What was jumping out at you?
[Erica] There was a lot of Baldur's Gate 3 stuff.
[Alex] Okay, that doesn't surprise me.
[Erica] Which isn't surprising. A lot of... Have you heard of Hasbin Hotel?
[Alex] I don't think so.
[Erica] There was a lot of, like, original stuff, which was weird for C2E2. Because it's like... It's like comic stuff, you know? Like, what are we doing? I'm trying to think if there was anything else that really, like, stood out aside from those two. But there was a lot of Baldur's Gate. There was a fair amount of Critical Role. Not as much as the last time I was there, because...

(04:08):
[Alex] Was there a lot of anime stuff?
[Erica] Yeah, there usually is. I actually like anime and manga stuff. I'm not super familiar with all of it anymore, but there was a fair amount of Dungeon Menchi, that delicious in dungeon or whatever it's called, which is I started watching on Netflix. Trigger does the animation. Oh, okay. And I've been enjoying it. I'm like seven episodes in. And it's fun. I'm enjoying myself. Is that

(04:36):
[Alex] another one season show? Because that's usually all Trigger does is one season. I'm assuming
[Erica] so. Because I think it's, they're releasing it week to week, which is weird for Netflix. Okay. And I think they're up to like episode 17 and Trigger usually does what, 24, 26? Something like that?
[Alex] Yeah, yeah. I guess whatever's, yeah, whatever's been ordered or, you know. Do you have a preference on things releasing week to week or versus all at once? Do you care? I know we've talked about this before.

(05:02):
[Erica] Personally, I think from a fandom perspective... Well, here, I'll just say, I do enjoy being able to sit on my ass. And binge. And binge.
[Alex] Sure.
[Erica] I enjoy that. But I do miss the speculating week to week. Like, oh, what's going to happen? You know, engaging in like the community online for longer than like a weekend. Because that really feels like all you get anymore. Yeah.

(05:29):
[Alex] That's the thing, right, is you can get some good press for a show. Like, I've noticed there's been a lot of press for that Fallout show, right, because it seems to be pretty popular. That's what I've
[Erica] heard. And that was week to week, wasn't it? No, they
[Alex] released it all at once.
[Erica] Okay.
[Alex] So that's what I'm saying. Since they released it all at once, I'm guessing, you know, already I've already seen the talk die down, and it's only been a couple weeks. Yeah. So I think, you know, people kind of watch it, they have their discussions, and then you move on, right? Yeah.

(05:58):
[Erica] You have the hardcores who hang around, like, you know, you're... Yeah, no, thousand percent me. Yeah. Where it's you're engaging in the fan art and the fic and, you know, you might be still talking about it and whatever. But I miss that it's not... The only thing that I really have that for consistently, like on a week-to-week thing anymore, is Critical Role.

(06:22):
[Alex] Well, I think it's fun when you have a show when it was good, like Game of Thrones, where it releases week to week. And then you get to talk about it and you get to speculate on what's happening next. I wonder if this is going to happen.
[Erica] I'm nodding.
[Alex] The people who aren't like the book people who already know everything that's going to happen.
[Erica] But even if you were a book person, it was still kind of exciting to see how

(06:44):
[Alex] everyone else is reacting to it as well.
[Erica] I know we're building up to this. I can't wait to see the look on your face when they murder all of your favorite characters.
[Alex] Yeah. And I think that is kind of the... I think we've kind of made fun of the people before who either do or watch the reaction videos, right? But I think that is the fun of that, is to go see someone else's reaction to a thing you

(07:12):
[Erica] enjoy. I think I knew, just to throw it back to Game of Thrones, that the Red Wedding was happening. Because I don't think Bob had read the books yet. i don't remember so seeing his reaction to that was just you know like yeah it was fucking nuts right or even like this season of the witcher where you had the the fucking stuff on uh at aratuza like that's like one of the big like moments in that and seeing watching with my friends and seeing them react to that so i think one has read the books and sass hasn't read the books

(07:46):
[Alex] And that was Bob's version of a YouTube reaction video when he got to sit there and watch you watch Halo. right yes
[Erica] basically yes now
[Alex] you were you were his entertainment yes i
[Erica] i don't i'm not gonna like go online and watch other people like people who i don't know's reactions because i think that's just fucking weird but um yeah no i think he thoroughly enjoyed watching me watch that last episode well and that's

(08:12):
[Alex] like the old uh what is it the parasocial relationship right that's what all those
[Erica] oh sure sure you have to have some kind of you have to care about the person that you're watching right and i don't give a shit about any of those people so
[Alex] other than critical role people
[Erica] sure sure sure
[Alex] so i'm just saying
[Erica] i'm not watching reaction videos from them though

(08:32):
[Alex] maybe you would if they did them laura bailey reacts matt mercer reacts
[Erica] what though it depends
[Alex] Matt Mercer reacts to his own voice acting roles. I don't know.
[Erica] It's blowing my hair back, Alex. You'll think of a better one. You'll think of a better one.

(08:56):
[Alex] So, Jav, you had fun, though, at C2E2?
[Erica] Yeah, I was tired as fuck by the end of the day because I'm old and my body is falling apart. You're not old and your body isn't falling apart.
[Alex] You always want to act. You got a few gray hairs. Now you think you're 60 years old.
[Erica] Now I'm actually doing like rather well, I like to think. No, it's just you're on your feet all day for like seven hours. Your body, the afterward is going to be like, hey. How about we sit down for a little while? How's that sound?

(09:27):
[Alex] That's like one time I went to the, I've been to it more than once, but one time I went to the auto show with Bob and he wants to go around and see everything. And then we've been there like 55 years. And then he's talking about standing in line to ride in a car or something. I was like,
[Erica] absolutely not. I was
[Alex] like, nah, man, I'm just not, I'm not standing in this line an hour and a half to sit in this fucking car.

(09:48):
[Erica] No, that was the best part. Like it was kind of crappy because we left right at like four on a Friday and so and you're on 55 so you're just sitting there yeah and i was like i'm sorry i was in the back seat i'm like i'm sorry ladies i am 1000 going to fall asleep so i apologize in advance but just ignore me

(10:08):
[Alex] That one highway that goes out of the city, they need to build another highway over the top of it. You know? Double up the lanes.
[Erica] There's a few gnarly ones. So it's either 290 or 55. 55 is dog shit. Yeah. because it's like it goes down like you have all of these like other roads coming together so that slows it way the fuck down and then it's like three lanes until you hit like cicero or something and it's just like oh it's just forever i mean i was asleep so it wasn't that bad but

(10:47):
[Alex] The other day I was going to the dentist and the dentist is only like three minutes from my home. So I get in the car, start heading over and right over here for some reason they're working on potholes or not potholes, sewer holes or something. They were doing something with them. No, it's been
[Erica] a nightmare the last couple of days.

(11:09):
[Alex] So the one lane is closed off, of course, from my house all the way to the dentist's house. Or not dentist's house, the dentist's
[Erica] office. I was here for dentist's house, so I'm into that.
[Alex] Some businesses are in homes. Oh,
[Erica] yeah, I get my hair cut in the hairdresser's home. But
[Alex] this one is not. I don't want to go
[Erica] to the dentist's. Oh, my office is in my basement. I'm a dentist. I'm good, thank you, sir. Yeah, no, that's a pass. Thank you.

(11:35):
[Alex] Um... And yeah, so, you know, luckily I had left 15 minutes early, even though I wasn't going to be 15 minutes away. But I just always tend to, I just always tend to arrive places early.
[Erica] When I am late, I get like a thing in the pit of my, I don't like being late. I like to be on time.

(11:58):
[Alex] Well, and what'll happen is, so anyways, it took me all of those 15 minutes to drive that three minutes. Because then anytime there's merging, anytime there's merging, people can't drive.
[Erica] Well, and then a little further down past the two busy streets intersect, and I was making a left turn. from one of them and it's a two lane left turn so and i'm on the inner one and i'm turning and then right as you're coming into the other road they have that lane closed and i was like

(12:36):
[Alex] why if this lane's closed why wasn't this turning lane right i'm
[Erica] like are you trying to cause a massive accident like what the hell man like just close the other lane what are we doing That was fun.
[Alex] By the way, in case you were wondering, we're not doing the two-hour cold opening. I know you enjoyed that.

(12:57):
[Erica] I got a kick out of that. This is
[Alex] Subtle Interference.
[Erica] Hello.
[Alex] That's Erica.
[Erica] Hi.
[Alex] I'm your other host, Alex.
[Erica] Huzzah.
[Alex] Also known, Erica, as the...
[Erica] Scintillating podcast

(13:17):
[Alex] material. eve baity enthusiast i'll get there you'll see
[Erica] that's fine anyway i'll take it your commitment i appreciate your commitment to the bit alex
[Alex] thank you i try poorly apparently but i try oh
[Erica] we're gonna talk about so much culture war nonsense on this podcast
[Alex] oh yeah we are
[Erica] erica's gonna get hot

(13:38):
[Alex] That's why I always bring it up. I
[Erica] know.
[Alex] I'm like, look, everyone's got to get their entertainment. And I get mine by watching you get mad. So, and by the way, you go to the dentist. There's just a standard, you know, cleaning, six-month cleaning. But it had been a year since I had the x-rays. They do the x-rays. And, you know, it always makes you feel good when they do the x-rays and the dentist looks at them and they go, you're all good. No cavities.

(14:01):
[Erica] Wonderful when that happens, isn't it? Yes.
[Alex] Because like three, maybe it was three years ago, I got that fucking root canal. And ever since that root canal, Erica, I've been on it. You know, I've been on it.
[Erica] I have a friend who after she, because apparently when you get pregnant. Oh, the
[Alex] babies want it all. Those
[Erica] little fuckers can leach your calcium out of your teeth.

(14:23):
[Alex] That's scary.
[Erica] This is the thing that can happen. That
[Alex] right there. See, if I were a woman, that right there would be enough to say, get me the surrogate.
[Erica] alex no one talks about any of this stuff they don't tell you all of the horrible gnarly that happens to your body when you get pregnant they only tell you about it afterward and it's like well if i had known half of this this probably wouldn't have ended up happening but she has had an absurd amount of root canals since that she's been pregnant This poor woman. Every time I talk to her, I feel like there's some other tooth malady. And I'm just like, that sounds horrible.

(15:02):
[Alex] Yeah. And I'll say, you know, the root canal is hyped up as this terrible procedure. But I went to the endodontist or whatever, you know, the specialist. And it was the easiest dental thing I've ever had done in my entire life. probably just because i went to the specialist and the guy was good or whatever they know what they're doing

(15:24):
[Erica] and they knock you out and it's like well no i was awake or whatever no
[Alex] i was completely awake it was just yeah he he did like three shots to numb me and on the third one he goes look i'm not gonna lie to you this one's gonna suck but you're gonna be completely numb and he was right that one sucked it was like it was a pretty good pain for like three seconds and but after that you know he came back in like 15 minutes and i was the numbest i've ever been for anything dentist wise like i didn't feel a thing this guy could have shot me in that tooth and i wouldn't have known

(16:01):
[Erica] well and i appreciate he told you that it was gonna suck for a few seconds yeah
[Alex] No, yeah. Tell me what's coming.
[Erica] Right. I appreciate it. And I
[Alex] feel that's why they probably tell you, right, so you don't jerk or something.
[Erica] Well, right. You don't want to be jerking when you've got a giant needle right there. That's no fun.
[Alex] No, and that was the easiest by far any sort of dental thing I've ever had done. So ever since then, you know, I've been really on, like, the flossing and the... brushing your teeth at the same time staying on it you know what i mean and yeah ever since then like like my dentist the other day the other day she just goes i think you're gonna be one of these people i just see every six months and you're never gonna have to see you other than that and i was like i was like no offense but that sounds incredible oh yeah and she was like oh yeah i get it no offense taken

(16:49):
[Erica] absolutely yeah you don't want to have to go to the dentist anymore than you have to
[Alex] no no no one no one likes the dentist and i have a friend who i used to play uh call of duty with like call of duty 4 way back when and we still talk every once in a while and he's a dentist and um somewhere in georgia and yeah he's like no one you know he's like he'll he says it's funny sometimes he just sits there while he's working on people and he just starts talking about random shit or he'll make like bad jokes and there's nothing they can do about it because you're a captive audience like he's he's got you get to listen to yeah he's like i could talk about anything i want and they're just screwed so it's just i don't know though whenever i

(17:32):
[Erica] hear dentist i automatically think of uh you ever see little shop of horrors no oh great movie it's a play it was a movie with like rick moranis and like steve martin and it's from like late 80s early 90s frank oz directed it but steve martin is a dentist in it and he's like a sadist and he has a whole song and it's wonderful it's a delight

(17:58):
[Alex] So I wanted to show you something. I know this has been hyped up.
[Erica] This was very hyped, yes. Bob was like, ooh, Alex has something for you. And he gave me nothing, which was good, because whenever Bob gives me a hint, he gives it all the fuck
[Alex] away. Yeah, he can't help himself. No, he
[Erica] can't help himself.
[Alex] So, now, I've been generally avoiding anything AEW-wise, just because we're going to watch a show... Yeah, I don't know what that sound is. That's the car backing up. That sounds like your car.

(18:24):
[Erica] Yeah.
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] But it sounded like that for, like, five minutes.
[Alex] You know what it is? It's because I parked behind there, so now... Oh, he's having... Oh, he's doing the,
[Erica] like, 15 points. But
[Alex] see, I've taken... After that time with you, I've taken to trying to park further back, so this is less of an issue, you know?
[Erica] It wasn't an issue. I got out... It took me, like, a couple times, but I got out. It was fine.

(18:47):
[Alex] Look, when you're pulling out of your garage, you know what you want to do? You want to pull straight back. You want to go
[Erica] straight back. yes that's right so
[Alex] um
[Erica] i don't know why he took that car because it's charging whatever whatever it's fine
[Alex] look the ghost of bob does things that quite frankly no one can understand
[Erica] they're beyond comprehension so it's like he's
[Alex] probably going to do some other crazy shit right now whatever Uh, so I've been generally avoiding the AEW stuff cause I don't, you know, it's like, I want to kind of go in fresh, right? More enjoyable for me. I know some people can, like some of our loyal listeners, they can spoil the shit out of themselves from everything and they could still enjoy it.

(19:25):
[Erica] I will say I can't
[Alex] do
[Erica] that. I'm fine with it, though. I have been. There's a couple wrestling gift makers I've been following on Tumblr and they just spoil the shit out of everything. So I'm like, OK, I may have to stop because I don't watch a ton. So I don't terribly mind. But sometimes it's like, well, that would have been nice to have gone in like not knowing. Right. But so it's not going to dampen my enjoyment of it.

(19:51):
[Alex] dynamite was on a Wednesday, AEW dynamite, their weekly wrestling show. And, um, the NFL draft was Thursday. Now, if you don't know the people who own AEW, Shad Khan is being, it's being run by his son, Tony. Shad owns the Jacksonville Jaguars. So obviously they're going to be at the NFL draft.

(20:16):
[Erica] Yes.
[Alex] So at some point now what happened on AEW, and again, I, oh, this is all I really know. I try not to stay like, you know, see too much, but I saw this because of what I saw next is, Tony Khan got beat up by the Young Bucks. He got hit with a Meltzer driver. So, Tony
[Erica] Khan. Did
[Alex] he,
[Erica] like, sell it okay? Or was it a bad sell? It was fine. Okay.

(20:39):
[Alex] It was fine.
[Erica] Because, you know, sometimes those, like, non-wrestling people taking a move, it's like, oh, you don't know what you're doing, baby. You didn't even try.
[Alex] So at some point during the NFL draft, they cut to the Jaguars' war room, if you will. Some cameras in there. And the camera shot is of Tony Khan, and behind him is his dad shot. And there's a picture of him. This is what he's wearing. Yes. He's got a neck brace on. Yes. And he's selling that he's been hit with the pile driver the night before.

(21:14):
[Erica] Amazing. Is that his dad behind him? Yes. That mustache. His
[Alex] dad has a spectacular mustache. Is amazing. Shad also came out after Tony got hit with that pile driver to check on him. Really? So, yes. He's really selling it. They were selling the beatdown. Oh.
[Erica] Oh my god, I love a shitty neck brace.

(21:34):
[Alex] But you know what's not shitty? That mustache. That
[Erica] mustache is outstanding. It looks painted. It looks fake. I would
[Alex] have a mustache if I knew it was going to look like that.
[Erica] It's like a Super Mario mustache.
[Alex] That's what it is, yes. The Mario mustache is frankly undefeated. In terms of facial hair. He's looking very
[Erica] dapper. I'm, like, very, like, into his whole look. I can't tell if that's, like, a sweater that he's wearing.

(21:55):
[Alex] Who's that? The dad? The dad, yeah. It looks like, it kind of looks like a suit jacket. I couldn't tell. Maybe it is a sweater. Yeah, anyways, so.
[Erica] Selling the beat down, though.
[Alex] Selling the beat down. Atta boy. And, you know, it's like, ShotKhan, he should look good. You know what? He's a fucking billionaire. He should look good.
[Erica] Yes, thousand percent, yes.

(22:16):
[Alex] And you know, the great thing about being a billionaire is you could have a ridiculous mustache and somehow make it work and no one really gets to say anything to you. No one's
[Erica] going to say dick about it, right?
[Alex] I know you don't give two shits about sports, but... I am looking forward to how the Bears can possibly bungle the situation. Did we get a
[Erica] solid pick or what?
[Alex] With the number one pick, they drafted this guy, Caleb Williams, quarterback from USC, former Heisman Trophy winner. Was this the one

(22:43):
[Erica] that was painting his nails?
[Alex] He painted his nails pink. And you know what? If he throws for 40 touchdowns, everyone in the goddamn city would paint their nails pink.
[Erica] You shouldn't care anyway, but...
[Alex] So they drafted him, and then they also had the nine pick where they took a wide receiver. And over the offseason, they also traded for another really good receiver, and they already had a really good receiver. So now the theory is like, okay, they're going to have three really good receivers. People are saying this might be the best receiving core in the whole league. And you've drafted this guy who's supposed to be great. You've already got good running backs. You've already got good tight ends. The offensive line's good. The defense was above average last year. So everyone's kind of like, this team should be good.

(23:31):
[Erica] The operative word there being should.
[Alex] Now, it's the
[Erica] Bears.
[Alex] So they'll probably fuck it up. And here's the thing that aggravates me. This goes for all pro sports teams, but it's really bad in Chicago because all these Chicago teams somehow managed to stay bad for amazing periods of time. Yes. Like, you notice this doesn't happen in other major cities. Like, maybe they're not winning the title every year, but they're kind of always in the mix.

(23:59):
[Erica] The problem is if you're selling out consistently...
[Alex] But they're selling out consistently in New York or LA or whatever. They don't care, though.
[Erica] But maybe they care. They don't care here.
[Alex] Oh, yeah. They don't care here.
[Erica] It's a money-making enterprise, and that's all they give a shit about.
[Alex] Well, and that's the part... See, because...

(24:21):
[Erica] Unless they sell out like $2 million or like their attendance reaches like $2 million in a season or something, they like don't pay taxes to the state.
[Alex] Oh, so they don't even want to pay taxes.
[Erica] They don't want to. Right. Because if they are, then they got to pay. So I don't think that's exactly what it is. I was talking about it with my dad the other day because we were like... arguing about or not arguing because we agree but like how these fucking billionaires come in and like go to a city like you should build me a stadium and it's like how about you suck my dick and build your own fucking stadium

(24:54):
[Alex] Yeah, fuck that bullshit. Build the stadium. You're going to make all the money off of it. The taxpayers are never going to get that goddamn money back.
[Erica] Yeah, but they don't care. They don't want to. It's so that's the right a yacht or something that I could buy for myself. Yeah, I know. Fuck these assholes.
[Alex] It's like to me, that's that is the thing. Fuck them. Because what are you going to do? Leave. OK, leave. Right. We'll get another team in Chicago. We'll be OK.

(25:18):
[Erica] Right. Right. It's like there's not not going to be a football team in Chicago.
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] And we already there's another like baseball team. So
[Alex] let's bring the Cardinals back. There you go. No, actually. Was it the Cardinals? Well, I know they were the Chicago Cardinals, but it might have been the Rams that then moved to St. Louis or moved to L.A. I don't fucking know. I can't remember. I don't even care. Um, no, but it's like, it's, it's amazing because they found themselves in this position now where, and this is, this is what I was getting at is it annoys me because, you know, a team like the bears. They are making so much money, like obscene amounts of money. The tickets, the concessions, the TV deal, parking, yada, you know, merchandise.

(26:03):
[Erica] Special shout out to how shitty parking is at Soldier Field. Oh,
[Alex] that's one of the worst places to go. I
[Erica] did it once. I got tickets from work to like a preseason game. And I was just like, I might just go home. This is fucking terrible. The
[Alex] only good place to park is under the stadium. And that's very limited. That's like you have to be like going to a box or something.

(26:24):
[Erica] Yeah.
[Alex] All the all the other parking you're walking from like 10 miles
[Erica] away. It was terrible. And nowhere takes like either. They didn't take cash and only took card. It was something where I didn't have what they needed me to have. And I was just kind of like, really? Yeah.
[Alex] Yeah, the easiest, nicest places to go to in Chicago are probably, in terms of like somewhat bigger buildings, would be the Allstate Arena. That's pretty easy to get in and out of.

(26:55):
[Erica] I would say getting out sometimes can be a bit of a snarl because there's really like two ways out of that parking lot. You got to like try and park strategically. Every time I've been to the United Center...
[Alex] The United Center is usually great.
[Erica] It's easy to get in and out of. I've never had a
[Alex] problem there. And whatever the fuck they're calling Comiskey now has a great situation over

(27:18):
[Erica] there. What is it... I have no idea.
[Alex] I don't even know. Wrigley and Soldier Field are brutal.
[Erica] Wrigley is a nightmare. It is an absolute nightmare. And, yeah, Soldier Field was not fun either. And, yeah, like, I haven't been to a game at Sox Park, and I couldn't tell you how long. But no one wants to go, so it's, like...

(27:41):
[Alex] Yeah. Well, you could go if you wanted to. It would be very easy, and no one would be there. Especially now, because they're losing, like, every game. Yeah. They do have a good Polish
[Erica] down there,
[Alex] though.
[Erica] So if you want to go and get some decent food and just kind of hang.
[Alex] I'm not a big fan of a Polish sausage. I like an Italian sausage. I'm an Italian sausage fan.

(28:02):
[Erica] Oh, with some grilled onions and some mustard? Yeah, that's right where you want
[Alex] to be. I like me a nice Italian sausage. That's always been my thing. I don't know. Just put some, like, get that jardiniere on there or something. Get a little spicy.
[Erica] Welcome to food talk.
[Alex] Food talk. Hey, there's nothing wrong with food talk. Everyone likes food talk unless you're really hungry and then you don't like food talk. Who doesn't like food talk? Well, your daughter doesn't like food talk. My daughter doesn't like food talk.

(28:35):
[Erica] We're like, we're not like starving her. But you would
[Alex] think.
[Erica] But I'm like, okay. I made her peanut butter and jelly. I've been baking a lot of bread lately. It's just kind of been my thing. Like four years too late. Everybody got on sourdough at the beginning of COVID. I was like, that seems like a giant waste of flour, so I'm not going to bother. But I'm doing it now. So I've been making these beautiful artisan sandwich breads. And my daughter goes up, pokes it with her finger, and she's like, nah. I'm like, it's a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It's bread. You love bread. She tells me, she's like, I want Izzy bread. I don't want mama bread. I'm like, whose kid are you?

(29:19):
[Alex] If I was
[Erica] not present at the birth, I would be like, who are you? Where do you come from? You are not of me. You don't like... Sometimes you just got to walk away for a second because you're just like
[Alex] human. Right there, what you're thinking to yourself is you're saying, you know what? You're lucky, kid, that this isn't 30 years ago. Because you would have got fucking smacked for just starting to utter that sentence. I would have smacked the shit out of you 30 years ago. But we don't do that anymore.

(29:54):
[Erica] Rightfully so. We don't want to give our kids... Some
[Alex] kids need to get beaten. I'll tell you. We
[Erica] were at the playground the other day. And there were these two boys who I was just... I kept looking at Bob and I'm like, I'm enraged. Like, these little shitheads were bullying this other little boy and just being enormous douchebags. And I was just kind of like... You're
[Alex] like, where are your parents? Well,

(30:15):
[Erica] that was the first thing. Nowhere, of course. Like, I think there was, like, baseball games going on. So they were probably, like, from over there. But I was just kind of like... No? Nothing? Anything? Were you
[Alex] like, how much longer do I have to watch this before I just lose it? I
[Erica] legitimately... I was, like, going to school. So I was... I just stopped at the playground for a little while with Bob and Izzy. Because I'm sitting there and I'm like... Say, look at my kid the wrong way. I will destroy you, little boy. I

(30:45):
[Alex] will make a core memory for you that you'll never forget. I
[Erica] was sitting there just like thinking like, what can I say to this kid to make him cry?
[Alex] I've never understood Karens until this moment right now. Oh, my
[Erica] God. I was just kind of like, because you feel bad because the other, their mom of the boy who was getting, like, razzed was trying her best. And she was just like, don't play with them. Don't. But they kept, like, taunting this kid. And he was, like, playing with another kid. And they kept, like, running up by him. And I was just kind of like, I've never wanted to punch two little children in the face more. Yeah. Like, can I suplex these kids? Would anyone mind?

(31:22):
[Alex] It's like that Always Sunny skit. Yes,
[Erica] it's exactly it. Where they stole the bike or whatever, so
[Alex] they beat the shit out of them. And they just start
[Erica] beating the shit out of the children. That is exactly what I wanted to do.
[Alex] Tossing them into cars and punching them and suplexing them. I'm
[Erica] like, how often would I be able to actually chokeslam somebody? I could probably do a double chokeslam with these skinny little fuckers.
[Alex] You could do the delayed chokeslam. Exactly. You hold them up, you hold them there, you hold them there, and then you drop them on their fucking head. Exactly.

(31:50):
[Erica] So yeah, I was like, I have to go. I need to leave or I'm going to start saying something and then I'm going to end up in jail. So I just got to leave.
[Alex] I saw they were doing something on Raw where they were in Kansas City and Patrick Mahomes was there in the front row. So Patrick Mahomes gives Logan Paul his Super Bowl rings to beat someone up with. So I guess Patrick Mahomes is a heel. I was

(32:16):
[Erica] just going to say, what are we doing, man?
[Alex] and uh logan paul starts beating up jay uso or something and braun stroman comes out to make the save and he hit it wasn't still have a job yeah yeah that's
[Erica] nice for him
[Alex] he it wasn't i think he might have been gone for a while he was injured or something i don't know i don't keep up on braun stroman's career no offense braun um

(32:39):
[Erica] catch these hands was a great catchphrase
[Alex] it was and i liked when he would run around the ring just because you know like anything that gets hit by a man moving that size
[Erica] yeah you're getting destroyed at that speed you're getting trucked
[Alex] it's like a freight train just running over
[Erica] my hands on somebody
[Alex] yeah and so it wasn't it wasn't logan it was someone else but they got hit he hit him with like the delayed choke slam he picked him up and held him there for a few seconds and then dropped him um it's

(33:09):
[Erica] just good shit right there
[Alex] And then he went outside and kind of stared down Patrick Mahomes, but didn't do anything because Patrick ain't taking bumps. Nope.
[Erica] No, Kansas City, they are not allowing that.
[Alex] No, I would say that's, I think the first time Patrick Mahomes back hit that mat, he would be like, I'm going right back to football. Yep. Fuck this. Yep. I'd rather, I'd rather get hit by the 350 pound defensive lineman.

(33:39):
[Erica] i did see your guy drew uh re-signed
[Alex] yeah i mean he's been great right i mean i that wasn't
[Erica] surprising it was like of course he's gonna stay
[Alex] yeah he cut some other he cut some promo he was i saw a little clip today he was on the pat mcafee show and he said something like i'm not your typical internet troll i'll talk shit online i'll beat you up physically and then i'll steal your girl too if i or he goes if i wasn't married i'd steal your girl too It's like, yeah, you would, Drew. You really would. I love Drew McIntyre.

(34:11):
[Erica] He's having a good time.
[Alex] It's so funny. It really, and I'll just speak for me. It really does go show you, it goes to show you how important cosmetics is in pro wrestling. or really anything. Because if you go and think about Drew McIntyre pre getting released from WWE, like a decade ago or something, he was tall, but he wasn't all that muscular. He wasn't the beef. He was a little lanky and he didn't have like, he was clean shaven. Now he's got the beard, the long hair. He's fucking huge. And it all comes together and, It literally is straight out of like, he looks like you would just find him on some fucking battlefield somewhere.

(35:00):
[Erica] No, but they're leaning into it, right? Your finisher is called the Claymore. You're like, yeah, you're talking about going out on your shield and shit. Like, all right, man.
[Alex] Yeah, no, it's great. And it's just the whole presentation is just great. And then he's a good promo. He can wrestle. It's really one of those total package guys. It's unfortunate he's kind of like a little bit older because he probably can't do it forever.

(35:23):
[Erica] know but at least I don't think he's I feel like we were looking it up he's younger than we are and I mean if you're lucky and you know you're smart and you're lucky with injuries and shit you can I mean sure you can't go forever but and
[Alex] that's one of those things though right when you're that big eventually your body is gonna be like hey guess what this is a lot of weight you're carrying around

(35:46):
[Erica] we're done we're done ski it's been fun but no mess yeah
[Alex] um i speaking of it's always sunny so this made me think of that this uh so jerry seinfeld i'm gonna tell you the
[Erica] instant you texted me that i immediately thought of it's always sunny
[Alex] now i'm gonna be fair you know what i think i have the quote here let me read this so we're just we'll read the

(36:09):
[Erica] full quote because a lot of times in this culture war bullshit people grab like a tiny sound bite and we explode things
[Alex] so this is what jerry fine seinfeld had to say and well he could speak for himself i don't need to summarize nothing really affects comedy people always need it they need it so badly and they don't get it It used to be you would go home at the end of the day. Most people would go, oh, Cheers is on. Oh, MASH is on. Oh, Marilee Tyler Moore is on. All of the families, all in the family is on. You just expected, and you, by the way, I think it's funny as a side note, he's naming all shit from like the 1900s. Right from like 60 years ago. It's like that's just a show in his age, but yeah. There'll be some funny stuff we can watch on TV tonight. Well, guess what? Where is it? This is the result of the extreme left and PC crap and people worrying so much about offending other people. He said, now going to see standup people are comedy fans are now going to see standup comics because we are not policed by anyone. The audience polices us. We know when we're off track, we know instantly and we adjust to it instantly. But when you write a script and it goes into four or five different hands, committees, groups, Here's our thought about this joke. Well, that's the end of your comedy. And he goes on to talk about there was that episode of Seinfeld where Kramer had homeless people working. They were like pulling rickshaws or something. Yeah, I

(37:32):
[Erica] remember
[Alex] that. Yeah,
[Erica] but like I feel like a lot of Seinfeld 2 was like pretty progressive. And like, yeah, they did push the boundaries on stuff. But I also get annoyed when it's like, well, it's PC and it's the left. I'm like, okay, it's the right. Isn't like writing an ambition about stuff?

(37:53):
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] Come on.
[Alex] So I'm going to be fair. I think he was talking specifically about network TV.
[Erica] Sure.
[Alex] So...
[Erica] Which doesn't really... It's... I don't know that you can compare it to what it was like when even when Seinfeld was on. Right. It's a completely different animal. And

(38:19):
[Alex] so I think it's a I think it's a different animal in a number of different ways. But I think what's very important to remember, right, is because of the rise of streaming. so much stuff just isn't on network tv that would have been before and if you look at network tv and correct me if i'm wrong if you see it differently but i feel like most network tv now is um slanted towards an older audience because that's because that's who's still watching it's basically procedurals and sports

(38:57):
[Erica] I'll tell you right now, I think the last things I'll say that I watched on network TV was probably Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Hannibal, but I still don't understand how that was on NBC. But that's neither here nor there. The last, like, sitcom-y thing I watched was Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

(39:19):
[Alex] Well, and if you just... I was trying to think about this the other night because he made me start thinking about this, and... You know, most TV shows, I especially start thinking about CBS, but most TV shows now are your procedurals. They're in terms of network TV. They're your NCIS, SWAT, CSI.

(39:42):
[Erica] Hawaii five Hawaii
[Alex] five oh CSI Hawaii fuck face you know like they're all they're
[Erica] all I fuck face yeah that show
[Alex] they're all the same show it's all military it's all military and police procedurals right and even a show like young Sheldon. That's a show for old people because who was watching The Big Bang Theory? Old people. And I just think a lot of these shows, even when you think of the last network comedies that were really big, like Two and a Half Men, were like 20-year-olds watching Two and a Half Men. I think that was another show. It was a show about fucking... charlie sheen's old ass landing young women it was like a male fantasy show

(40:27):
[Erica] it was charlie sheen and the guy from like old john hughes movies yeah like
[Alex] and it was it's like look i think two and a half men was a fine show it was fine
[Erica] yeah it's fine it's nothing i'm gonna seek out
[Alex] I just think all these shows, especially now, and that was pre-streaming, but now I think all these shows are being made for an older audience, you know, the Blue Bloods and all that. These are all like 40, 50, probably, I wouldn't even say 40, I would say 50 plus, you know, advertised to those audiences because that's who's still tuning in to watch

(41:03):
[Erica] stuff. Because people our age and younger, we're playing video games or you're watching stuff on Twitch or YouTube or streaming or... You're doing 50,000 other things other than watching network TV. But I was also like, It's Always Sunny has been on for an absurd amount of seasons. And that is the most... They get away with some of the most not PC things in the universe.

(41:28):
[Alex] Yeah, and I'm trying to remember because I haven't watched the last couple seasons. I'm just behind.
[Erica] No, I am too. I think the last one I watched, they were in Ireland. Ireland.
[Alex] I was trying to go back and think about the original season because I'm not sure the original season would be greenlit as it was. You know, when I think about the episode that always stands out to me is I can't remember her name, Elizabeth something. But they had that one woman on where she played the transgender. She was playing that she was transgender and she had the bulge in her pants and Mac was losing his mind because he's, you know, a closeted homosexual at that point. And

(42:08):
[Erica] they're all horrible people.
[Alex] Yeah, they're all monsters. But the way that
[Erica] they brought that back, though, and like turned it on its head where like he sees her in the gym. Like, later in a later season. And she's dating a guy. Like, a big black guy. Do you remember this?
[Alex] I don't.
[Erica] And Mac's like, oh, so you're gay? And he's like, no. And then he's, like, pulling out the Bible and stuff. And the guy's like, oh, let me see that for a second. And he pulls out this line about, like, how, like, black people should be, like, you're slaves. And he's like, oh, is that? That's okay? Because that's in the Bible? And Mac's, like, trying to backtrack because this guy's fucking huge.

(42:49):
[Alex] It's
[Erica] like it's it's like that's funny because you're not punching down.
[Alex] That episode was hilarious. But I'm just saying I'm not sure if that would get greenlit today.
[Erica] Maybe
[Alex] not. But that being said. Yeah. But again, it's
[Erica] also not like a terrible thing because like. Attitudes have changed and it's like that's not a bad thing.

(43:12):
[Alex] So I'm just, but again, it's like, what are we talking about? Because FX is very different from being on NBC. NBC would never have It's Always Sunny. Never in a million years would any episode of It's Always Sunny air on NBC. Probably not. They wouldn't even air it on Fox and that's their network, right? They wouldn't even air it on Fox. so it's a lot of these shows push brown push boundaries i mean you know brooklyn 99 had some off-color jokes um and that was on fax and wasn't it was on nbc later or something the

(43:44):
[Erica] later seasons aired on nbc
[Alex] but that was a show they were it was more like alluding rather than flat out saying it
[Erica] Well, because you're also, though, you're on network TV. Right. Even like when Seinfeld was on, you had a whole episode about masturbating. Like you couldn't just be like, hey, yeah, like we're having a contest. You know, it's you have to be subtle about it. And like stupid people are probably watching it. Like, I don't know. Well,

(44:07):
[Alex] and sometimes that makes it better when you have to find ways to get there where you're not just outright saying something.
[Erica] I completely it's art from adversity. It's like, OK, I want to do this. Oh, but I can't for whatever reason. So how can I go about it and make it better so that we can do it?
[Alex] Well, and sometimes I think, you know, something like video games were better when they were working within certain limitations and you couldn't just do anything that came into your

(44:34):
[Erica] mind. Movies were better. Everything was better when there were limitations to it. And everything wasn't just these giant CGI nightmares. Remember sets? I was watching a clip. It was because, what is it? Captain America, the Winter Soldier is like 10 years this year, which is insane. But it's the fight, that initial fight between Steve and the Winter Soldier. And it's like, oh, they're like interacting with the sets. They're, like, fucking around with the cars that they're, like, standing around. This actually feels like a movie. Remember

(45:05):
[Alex] that? And you see cool stuff whenever you watch... I'm always interested when you watch the behind the scenes of stuff like that where you realize how they did certain effects. Oh, I love that shit. Where a guy is running behind a car, but they are, like, pulling him on a sled, essentially. Yeah. Like, but the car is actually moving. Yeah, no, if that
[Erica] fucker falls, he's dead. No, I love... Tell me everything about the way you made the thing that I like. I love that shit. And now it's just like, well, we plugged it into the computer and there you go. Like, ooh, fascinating.

(45:38):
[Alex] So, I mean, to come back to it, Jerry Seinfeld sounds like an old fuck, which I think, you know, that happens to all of us. I'll be sitting here in 40 years.
[Erica] Yeah, gotta be. What, in the 60s?
[Alex] And look, it's like, again, we're comparing, I guess I keep referencing not network TV comedies, but Curb Your Enthusiasm has been pushing it since day one. I mean, half that fucking show is Nazi jokes. Mm-hmm. And, you know, it's like these shows

(46:08):
[Erica] tell a Nazi joke, but in a way that it's when you like it seems like these people are angry. They can't punch down anymore.
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] Oh, I can't like, you know, be racist anymore. Like, I can't shit on the gays anymore. Well, and
[Alex] that's the thing. It's this thing. When I think about Curb Your Enthusiasm or I think about It's Always Sunny. There is a lot of you know whatever racist jokes or transgender jokes or gay jokes but they find ways into them where like you said it doesn't feel like you're punching down and making fun of an entire group. Right. Whereas I know when Chappelle was putting out some of his recent comedies on Netflix, he was getting a lot of shit because for some reason he's gone down the fucking far right wing rabbit

(46:57):
[Erica] hole. And he's been canceled and silenced on his Netflix like specials. I
[Alex] know the poor
[Erica] man. He doesn't have a platform anymore.
[Alex] but he's making the type of if you go look and i don't i haven't seen him in six months or something so i can't say i remember them but he was making the types of transgender jokes where it feels like you're punching down and you're making fun of a group that's persecuted rather than maybe you're laughing with them about something you're laughing at them and when you're dave chappelle with your millions and millions of dollars making fun of people who are just trying to survive

(47:36):
[Erica] in this like environment yeah you
[Alex] look like a fucking shithead
[Erica] yep and there's
[Alex] no two ways around it
[Erica] i know not everybody thinks that way but i certainly do so it's like i will not be watching your shit sir
[Alex] yeah exactly and i
[Erica] think seinfeld just sounds like an old man yelling at a cloud it's like shut up boomer with your like bajillion dollars and your seinfeld residuals just be quiet

(47:57):
[Alex] and also the reality is okay first of all jerry seinfeld has always had a very pc set i mean he's never been a big like he's making he's not out there doing bill burr's what's the deal with airline food
[Erica] like edgy buddy
[Alex] yeah
[Erica] calm it down
[Alex] that coming from him is hilarious to begin with but then i think also it's just not accepting the reality of the situation which is even if there was going to be a new edgy comedy let's say the 2024 version of seinfeld came out it wouldn't be on abc fox cbs or mbc it would be on netflix or it would be on amazon prime and

(48:41):
[Erica] it
[Alex] Probably, even if it was good. No
[Erica] one would advertise it. You wouldn't know about it. You'd be like, oh, I just heard about this new show. Oh, it's canceled. I mean, it's like... That's the environment we're in now.
[Alex] And I just think, I don't know, I always wonder what has happened to your baseline TV comedy that there isn't another Friends or another Seinfeld or something. I think

(49:07):
[Erica] a big part of it is just like, it was a captive audience. You had CBS, NBC, ABC, and Fox. And
[Alex] they just keep trying. And that's what you had. They keep airing comedies. And you kept trying to throw something at the wall
[Erica] that would work. And it was like, oh, we got Seinfeld. That's a mega hit. All right, great. So then you'd put other stuff around it trying to be like, okay, we'll give it a little bit of a Seinfeld bump. We'll see how it does. They happened to hit with Friends 2. It's not... It's not easy. And the whole reason they had such insane numbers is because there wasn't anything else to do. I was in like, I don't remember how old, like eighth grade, ninth grade. And I remember being at like my friend's house watching the finale of Seinfeld. Like, who does that anymore? You would never do that now. Yeah.

(49:59):
[Alex] Yeah, so I don't know. I mean, I just think he's off base with the specific criticism and this whole thing of... And we're going to talk about this again. We're going to talk... We're going to get to it, but we're going to talk about Stellar Blade probably for the last time on this podcast because there's a ton of nonsense surrounding that game. And none of it has to do with the actual game.

(50:19):
[Erica] You know what? Do you remember in a time before the internet echo chamber where I didn't have to hear about any of this nonsense?
[Alex] No, I do not remember. I was like, I don't give a fuck.
[Erica] Who fucking cares? We'll get into fucking Stunner
[Alex] Blade. But I just, this whole idea that, oh, the extreme left has killed comedy or something, or you can't make certain types of jokes or whatever. No, man, you can make your joke. You just can't make the joke. Hey, look how fucking disgusting those transgender people are.

(50:56):
[Erica] Right. And honestly, if that's the joke you want to be making, I don't really want to be listening to your shit anyway.
[Alex] Like, find a way into your joke that's actually fucking funny and creative or something.
[Erica] Comedy's hard. There's a reason for that.
[Alex] And you know what? Some of the funny... It's funny. It's... Some of the funniest people you've... I've never heard, like, Bill Burr bitch about this. Because Bill Burr... And Oswald

(51:19):
[Erica] doesn't bitch about it. Bill Burr
[Alex] just goes and does his fucking set. And he just... Like, he's... It's one of those guys, he's untouchable. Like, I don't know. It's like, if you're untouch... If you're good, you can do whatever you want. I mean, look at fucking...
[Erica] I don't listen to a lot of Bill Burr stuff, but I don't get the sense that he punches down.
[Alex] No, he doesn't.
[Erica] He had, isn't he the one he had a pretty good bit about? Isn't he, is he with a black lady?

(51:41):
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] He was talking about how she was telling him he was ashy because she was like always like putting lotion on. And he was like, what the fuck are you doing? And she's just like, well, I get, you know, ashy if you don't do that and it looks gross. And he's like, oh, I don't have to worry about that. And she just goes up to him and grabs his arm and just runs her nails down his skin. And he's like, oh, it's like puffs of dust. It was fucking gross. And it's like, you can do... Like, it's just not, you can't, you just can't punch down. Yeah. Or else you're an asshole. I just, I don't know. But no, the good, like, people who are good at it, like, I've never heard Patton Oswalt bitch about this shit. Yeah. Because it's just like, okay. Louis Black. I don't think I've ever heard Louis Black bitch about it.

(52:22):
[Alex] And some of these people, I think they spend too much time in their own echo chambers where I don't know who Jerry Seinfeld's hanging out with. I don't know. Other rich fucks. Exactly. But you could start hearing the talking points. You can hear the Joe Rogan talking points from all these people that are in his circle. Uh-huh. Because they're all just sitting around at the fucking comedy store and they're echo chambering each other. And then it's the only thing they think and they think the whole world's like that. And it's like, look, Jerry, you are rich at a level that no one can even comprehend other than maybe like a thousand people on the planet. So you're in a world that no one else can perceive. And this whole idea of you... don't get to say things or you don't get to do things bullshit you could do anything you want you're jerry seinfeld you're uncancellable just like jk rowling she says all her vile shit and you know what she still gets to go around and do whatever the fuck she wants she gets to have a ridiculously successful video game and if she does another book it's gonna sell millions of copies because you're too rich you're untouchable and you have too many fans

(53:32):
[Erica] and people are idiots yes
[Alex] it's like just you're not in the world with the rest of us like like i could be canceled okay jerry seinfeld can't be canceled it's impossible
[Erica] we were getting a little loud when we were at c2e2 though because you would see people in like harry potter stuff and we would just kind of be like
[Alex] no
[Erica] man really

(53:53):
[Alex] but i also think a lot of these people this is the other thing As someone who's perpetually online, and I think you're pretty online too, but probably not like I am. I'm
[Erica] pretty online, yes. And I know what you're going to say, that maybe they don't know. I
[Alex] think a lot of people don't even know. Honestly,
[Erica] I don't know that I agree with that anymore. I think it's very well documented. It's pretty out there. And there's people who are just like...

(54:16):
[Alex] There's a lot of people who just don't care. Well,
[Erica] it really just meant a lot to me. And like, it was a big part of my... It's like, read another book. Read literally any other book. There's so many other books.
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] By people who aren't vile human beings. You know? Why don't you just... You could read another one.
[Alex] Well, and that's the thing. I think there are like three contingents, right? There's the, in terms of still Harry Potter fans, there's the, I agree with her. There's the, I don't care. I like Harry Potter. I don't give a shit about the author. And there's the, I don't even know. And I think some people just straight up don't

(54:49):
[Erica] know. There probably are some people. I will give you that. I don't think the number is that high because she is not subtle about her nonsense either.
[Alex] No, not at all. Nope. And her claiming she got canceled on a podcast or something is just always hilarious. Okay,
[Erica] sweetheart. Okay, all right. Go and fall asleep on your billions of dollars. Shut the fuck up.

(55:10):
[Alex] Life's really hard over there. Oh, I'm
[Erica] weeping for J.K. Rowling. Shut up, Joanne.
[Alex] That's the thing to me. It's always like... Why is it always the people with the most money who are the most thin skin?
[Erica] No, because if they're moderate, because they never get inconvenienced. So when they are moderately inconvenienced in some way or get a little bit of pushback, they lose their fucking minds.

(55:35):
[Alex] It's like, why don't you... This is the thing that always bothers me. Why doesn't someone with the money of a J.K. Rowling... Why don't you go salve fucking hunger or something? You know what I mean? Go salve homelessness. No, no, no. We need to give
[Erica] the money to the hate groups to oppress the trans people. Because that's a thing that she does. So when you buy her books or you support her, that money is just going directly to that.

(56:02):
[Alex] We got to fuck with like the five trans people who exist in a hundred mile radius. Yeah,
[Erica] because fuck those people.
[Alex] That's the thing that always bothers me. It's like they're so... few of these people
[Erica] doesn't even matter if it's just
[Alex] leave them alone one it could be it could be it could be a million just this is a person
[Erica] trying to live their life they're
[Alex] not doing anything that affects anyone else

(56:23):
[Erica] fucking best like we all are and maybe they live their life a little differently than you do you know what everybody fucking does because normal is not a thing that exists so just shut the fuck up joanne and go to bed on your giant piles of money In your fucking castle. Go swim in the vault of gold coins. Right, that you live in somewhere. Go away and shut the fuck up.

(56:45):
[Alex] I agree. I just, it's like, I don't understand the whole need to go after people who aren't affecting anyone else.
[Erica] You know what I would do if I had that much money, Alex? I would vanish. By an island somewhere, and you'd never hear from me again.
[Alex] And I think what goes on is you get this argument going that... Oh, a kid or something. Let's just say kid for the sake of argument. Sees a transgender person and then suddenly that makes them transgender.

(57:18):
[Erica] That's not the way that works.
[Alex] It's like, one, that's not the way that works. Now,
[Erica] maybe you saw somebody and you started having some thoughts that you weren't very comfortable with. That's a you problem. That's not an everybody problem.
[Alex] Yeah. And I think what actually happens, and this is why... I'll speak from my, you know, my point of being able to relate as a straight white male. But I think this is why representation actually does matter in media, because I think if you see transgender people or you see gay people or whatever. You, maybe you have that feeling inside you and you don't know what it is and you say, oh, that's what, that's how I feel, you know, and then maybe that wouldn't have happened 50 years ago or a hundred years ago and it would have been super hard to find other people that were like you.

(58:18):
[Erica] Mm-hmm.
[Alex] Or who were going through the same things that you were or felt the same way you were. Oh, there's a reason that
[Erica] they want to, like, you know, give the fucking attorney generals in the states the power to be like, oh, that's dangerous for children. They can't go online and see that anymore. Because they don't want people seeing that stuff and being like, oh, hey, look, people like me. Somebody I can relate to.
[Alex] Yeah.

(58:39):
[Erica] We have to keep people othered because then we can keep doing the horrible shit that we're doing to them.
[Alex] Yeah, and...
[Erica] But no, say what you want about, like, a Will and Grace or, like, Ellen or something. Those were huge, like, cultural, you know, touchstones where even Seinfeld, not that there's anything wrong with that, people actually sat there and were like,

(59:00):
[Alex] yeah, there really isn't. Yeah.
[Erica] Why you got to be so leftist? Why you got to be so woke, Seinfeld? This extreme PC nonsense.
[Alex] Well, and that is the thing. I mean, look, this is one of these terms. PC, just like woke. The second I hear you say it unironically, I know your brain doesn't function. So you're just a clown in my

(59:31):
[Erica] opinion. Yeah, my eyes glaze over and I'm going to go and find something else. And look, like,
[Alex] see, I'm always the wrong. I am not a practice what I preach person, right? Because look, Jerry Seinfeld said a bunch of stupid shit here. But if I want to watch Seinfeld, I'll watch Seinfeld. You know what I mean? Sure. And so I'm not exactly, like, practicing what I preach. And, you know, all that horrible shit went on at Blizzard. You know, I still play fucking Overwatch, even though we were, like, stealing the milk out of the fridge for the pregnant women or something, you know? Which is, like, about as heinous as it gets, by the way. Oh, that's... I'm breaking

(01:00:07):
[Erica] the leg off of my chair, and I'm impaling you through the heart.
[Alex] I just can't... That's always one of those... Every time I think about that, it just blows my mind. It's one thing to... Feel like you're pranking people, okay? And maybe I can understand how something like that could go too far. But you're actually stealing children's food. Like, does the thought not go through your mind?

(01:00:34):
[Erica] No. There are people who are titanic assholes. There are just some people out there who are just too shitty to deal with.
[Alex] And
[Erica] Blizzard happened to employ a lot of
[Alex] them. Activision and Blizzard were having a good time over there. But
[Erica] you get a bunch of those types of people together and they just keep feeding off of each other and bouncing the shit. You think it's okay.

(01:00:57):
[Alex] It
[Erica] becomes normal.
[Alex] And the other culture war nonsense that I saw, this has been going on for a little while now. I
[Erica] think we've talked about it a couple times.
[Alex] Yeah, so... uh to give some to give some context so stellar blade came out this past weekend i think or something oh it's

(01:01:20):
[Erica] out it's
[Alex] out and the reviews are good it's like last i saw it's like an 83 on metacritic so for a company's first game that isn't like a gotcha booby game that's extremely good i mean it's a booby
[Erica] game but it's not a gotcha game
[Alex] Right, right, right. But it's a full-blown, like, okay, we made a full action video game. Oh, sure, sure, sure. But it's

(01:01:44):
[Erica] like ass and titties for days. Let's not be...
[Alex] Oh, yeah, no. For sure. They know what they're doing. And yeah, 83 is great for anyone. I mean, I think I saw it's something like the PS5's sixth highest rated game ever or something. So, you know, the game is very well made from all accounts I saw. And this was another kind of topic adjacent to it, which is, you know, there's this YouTube channel, Digital Foundry, and they do like technical analysis of all these games, you know, frame rate, resolution, bugs, yada, yada. And they were just going over the game and talking about, you know, it's like the game has like no bugs. Like I played through the whole game twice and he was like, the one bug I found was something related to like surround sound, not working correctly on certain settings. But otherwise the game is like,

(01:02:33):
[Erica] well, and where do you fucking find that anymore? Like a bug free fucking game. And
[Alex] that's the thing. It's like, you think about so many, basically every game comes out now in like a pre-release state and then it's got to be patched for six months. We've
[Erica] talked about that forever too.
[Alex] And so I think part of it is, look, it's not a game coming. Yes, it's Sony-backed. It's essentially a Sony second-party game. They helped fund it. They bought it up. You know, it's not an Activision Blizzard game. It's not an EA game. It's not an Ubisoft game. It's a new IP. Where they know, they know, right, all these game makers, they know, okay, as long as it's not an outright mega disaster, we're going to make our money

(01:03:14):
[Erica] back. We'll be
[Alex] fine. So we can release it, let these bozos beta test it for us, and then we'll patch the shit out of it. Mm-hmm. And this game came out, and as far as anyone can tell, it's supremely well-made. And what that probably goes to show you is there's a lot of really good game developers in South Korea who've been pretty much locked into making gacha games and shitty MMORPGs like Terra or something because that's what sells there. So it's like they got to finally work on something else, and by all accounts, they've pretty much hit it out of the park. And the main criticisms of the game are, one, booby character design, and two, the story isn't that great. What I heard is, and I haven't spoiled myself because, you know, one day I probably will play it like years down the road or something. And that's why we probably won't even talk about it again after this because neither of us are going to play it anytime soon, I'm assuming. um

(01:04:17):
[Erica] oh i'm never going to play it because i couldn't possibly care well if you
[Alex] just like action games though i mean um but so the main criticism is the story's not good except at the end like i heard for whatever reason people feel like the story's like not good not good not good and then all of a sudden apparently in the last like four hours they hit a home run and And they like leave everyone really happy. I'm only

(01:04:43):
[Erica] laughing because like a while back I was talking to somebody. I think it was at work. So it was a very long time ago. I was like, yeah, I'm a big Final Fantasy fan. I haven't really played any lately. And they're like, oh, you should pick up 13. I'm like, really? I heard it wasn't that good. And they're like, yeah, man, like 20 hours in, it gets great. And I was like, I need you to listen to what you just fucking said, bro. I know. 20 hours? Absolutely not. A day? A day. A whole day? No. No.

(01:05:09):
[Alex] Well, I think with this game specifically, you know, people love the actual gameplay.
[Erica] That's what I was going to say. If the gameplay is good and you're having a good time with it and the story is like lackluster at best, that's fine. You throw in a podcast and you just kind of, you know, if you're enjoying yourself.
[Alex] And so, yeah, and apparently they've got a bunch of, like, people are kind of describing it like a new version of almost like an Xbox 360 game where they've thrown a bunch of, like, random shit in there. Like, you've got the, you're sliding down a ramp and you need to move your character side to side and try not to get eaten up by a saw or something. Sure. There's a fishing mini game where like in fucking Yakuza, you all of a sudden you're yanking a whale out of the fucking lake or something, you know. Nonsense. So they've got a bunch of wacky nonsense. I've heard there's some like Resident Evil type sections or something. Amazing. And at the end of it, by the way, you get an outfit I saw where you basically have Leon's jacket. Outstanding. And look, anyone who wears Leon's jacket to me is... Good

(01:06:10):
[Erica] jacket.
[Alex] I mean, it's an outstanding jacket. I want that jacket more than any jacket I've ever seen. I can't rock it like Leon
[Erica] does. Well, who amongst us can, Alex?
[Alex] Eve, apparently. But... No, so that's essentially the main what I've read anyway review of the game is everything is really great other than the story, which also gets great right at the end, but it's a slog otherwise in terms of the story. So whatever. But that's not in any way related to what we're going to talk about. Nope. The controversy around the game, and this was like the mini one. There's like two things. One was... When reviewers got the game, they noticed that at a part of the city There's a shop and it was called like our shop. So the sign says our shop. But then next to it, they had splashed a graphic like it was like a graffiti that said hard. So hard are right next to each other. And so reviewers saw this and probably said something to either Sony or the developer. And by the time the day one patch hit,

(01:07:24):
[Erica] that was that
[Alex] that was gone. And you know what? I would say in this circumstance, if like Insomniac did this or EA did this or something, I'd be like, okay, this had to be on purpose. But a South Korean developer, I think they're just splattering graphics all over a city. I don't think they even know what hard R is. You know what I mean? It's

(01:07:46):
[Erica] kind of a cultural. Yeah. But people got mad.
[Alex] So that was the first claim of, oh, you're censoring the game.
[Erica] You know what's funny, Alex? No one fucking knows what censorship
[Alex] means. No.
[Erica] No one has any idea what it's like to actually be repressed or censored.

(01:08:07):
[Alex] No, this is our problems in the world. This is the problem. That the hard R sign got changed.
[Erica] Right. This is the biggest issue of your life right now. That you're going to flock to the internet to bitch about. That must be nice.
[Alex] And there's honestly a shocking amount of people that don't even know what hard R means. I remember sometime last year, Linus Sebastian, who is the owner of the Linus Tech Tips YouTube channel, huge YouTube channel, employs like 50 people or something, was doing a podcast where he said, like for some reason hard R got brought up and he said, oh, you know, yeah, I used to use the hard R, but I don't anymore. And his co-host was like, what like wait a second wait a second and after a few seconds he's like wait a second what do you mean and what he meant was he used to say r as in referencing someone with a mental disability right a word that we don't use anymore yeah that's what he meant not hard r like a hard r movie no no right not hard r like a um like

(01:09:12):
[Erica] a rating
[Alex] No, no, not hard R. His co-host thought he was saying hard R like a racist word, like hard R, like the N word with the hard R.
[Erica] Interesting. See, to me, so we might not even be on the same page. For me, it's a hard R is an R-rated movie that like... pushes that r as far as no no no

(01:09:36):
[Alex] so when people say hard r when they saw that sign that said hard r what people think that's referencing is the n word with the hard r on the end
[Erica] so we're getting mad about that yes not being in the game
[Alex] yes that's what people were like you're censoring this So that was like the little one. That was the little one. And I think even the chuds realized that's not going to stay in the game. And that was a mistake. They didn't. They're just. It's like this is a piece of art that's apparently all over this city. And it just happened to end up next to this our shop sign. Right. And again, I don't think.

(01:10:16):
[Erica] Alex, I'm flabbergasted again.
[Alex] This is a new layer for you.
[Erica] Why would you be mad about that? Why would you be mad about that? Why is that? That's what makes you mad?
[Alex] Now, this is what's funny, because right now, you didn't even know what hard R meant, and you live in the United

(01:10:39):
[Erica] States. Well, I have a different context for it. Like I said, hard R for me is a movie thing. I had never heard of it in that context.
[Alex] Yeah.
[Erica] I don't run in a lot of circles where people are like, ooh, I'm eager to say this or whatever. anyway
[Alex] so so yes that got edited out on the day one patch so literally they're censoring the game unless you were playing and this goes for the next thing as well with the costume but unless you were playing a um disc version of it where you don't connect your ps5 to the internet to get an update you are never going to see that right okay

(01:11:17):
[Erica] censorship alex the other
[Alex] thing they did and again This was changed, like, in the versions the reviewers had. So this was changed previous to the reviewers even getting to play, but it's on the disc like this. There's a costume where, you know, and Eve has like 30 outfits. I was going to

(01:11:40):
[Erica] say one costume. One costume. One. One.
[Alex] Eve has like 30 outfits you can get throughout this game and some are covered up. Some are quite revealing.
[Erica] There's one you showed me where it was like, is that supposed to be a jacket? It's covering her collarbones. What is this to be?
[Alex] But I also showed you a few where she is covered head to toe.

(01:12:01):
[Erica] Yes.
[Alex] And so there are there is a variety and you can kind of, you know, it's like.
[Erica] Pick your poison.
[Alex] You can have what you want out of it. Now, no matter what, there's going to be jiggle no matter what outfit you put her in. But so in this one outfit, it's like supposed to be like a bunny girl outfit. So it kind of looks like a one piece swimsuit. You can look this up if you want.

(01:12:24):
[Erica] Kind of a Playboy bunny kind of situation.
[Alex] Yeah, it kind of looks like a one-piece swimsuit. There's a cut down the middle, like a deep neckline. And so in the original version... um
[Erica] that we had to go like data mining
[Alex] you had to go find you had to go so we're running on a disc
[Erica] looking for reasons to get mad yes what's happening okay

(01:12:47):
[Alex] in the original version there the plunging neckline was just open they added like a little like black cloth at the bottom which barely covers up anything
[Erica] censorship censorship
[Alex] And on the sides, on like her hips, they widened the outfit just like a little bit. And now here's the thing. I don't know if for some reason this outfit got flagged by maybe Sony or some ratings board somewhere. I don't fucking know. Or maybe whoever designed the outfit just... They just decided, hey, I like the way this looks better. Maybe they just wanted it this way. Yeah, maybe they just wanted it that way, exactly. And the developer, when asked about it, the CEO was even like, you know, we put the... That's the version of the outfit we wanted to show you. Now, is he going to say that Sony told us to change it? Are you really

(01:13:40):
[Erica] fucking, like, we're talking about this? No.
[Alex] Yeah, is he going to say Sony told us to change this? Well, of course he isn't.
[Erica] Right.
[Alex] But... i don't know man and and my thing is is if that outfit was actually being quote-unquote censored i'll just use their terminology then why aren't the other 15 outfits where she's wearing less clothing than that one being changed i don't

(01:14:05):
[Erica] know what censorship is the game not coming out at all the game get like oh this is too risque for us we're gonna shelve it and we're not gonna release it at all yeah
[Alex] Like, there's an outfit where she's just in a bikini. It's like, so...
[Erica] So why are we bitching about this one when you can go stare at that one? I don't understand.
[Alex] well the reason you bitch about it is because you want to generate clicks well of course and you want to generate views of course and you're doing this whole thing where you have to get like performative outrage about everything um but but which

(01:14:39):
[Erica] can we just for a moment is there anything more exhausting than the performative outrage
[Alex] No, it's the worst. Do
[Erica] you remember it was early internet and all the reviewers felt that they had to do that angry video game nerd thing? He kind of started that. James Rolfe, I want to say his name was. He reviewed old NES games. It's funny to talk about it as an original idea now because everybody and their fucking mother does this. He was

(01:15:08):
[Alex] ahead of the curve. He
[Erica] was. He was one of the first dudes to do that. And then it just became like, oh, well, he was successful doing this. I must be angry when I'm reviewing things. And it was just like... It was like when everything had to be grimdark and you're just kind of like, I don't want to. Can I get some sunshine? I don't fucking care anymore. You've ruined this for me. It's ruined.

(01:15:28):
[Alex] There's sunshine. There's sunshine all over Eve's ass.
[Erica] Well, good. I'm glad
[Alex] she's getting plenty of sun.
[Erica] Amazing.
[Alex] So but my thing is, this is what bothers me is I know it's all performative and I know we're trying to generate clicks. Oh, it's all in
[Erica] pursuits of like, right. Making some scratch for sure.
[Alex] And I get all that. But what bothers me is you have such an incredible amount of people that are so stupid that they actually buy into this when it only takes half a second to think to yourself. Now, wait a second. If they were actually being told to change that outfit. then wouldn't they be told to change the other 10 or 15 outfits that are just as, if not more, revealing?

(01:16:17):
[Erica] See, but what you're using is cognitive brain power.
[Alex] I don't have much of it.
[Erica] No, a lot of people just don't have any of that. And really, they just like to jump on Twitter and, like, scream at each other. Because we're addicted to that platform for some reason.
[Alex] I don't get it, but yeah.
[Erica] And I mean, like... What a stupid, with everything going on in the world, this is the hill you choose to die on.

(01:16:46):
[Alex] I know, it's amazing. The
[Erica] pixelated character, I can't see a little bit of her hip. I'm mad.
[Alex] Well, and also, here's the thing, okay? To me, is the character sexier if she's just naked? Like, is that what these dudes are saying? Like, do they just need to wait for her to come out on PC and wait for the nude mod? You know what I mean? Because to

(01:17:09):
[Erica] some people who, I mean, I'm not going to, you know, like, make stereotypical just, like, judgments about whatever. Because you find sexy what you find sexy, but... i i i just i don't know i'm flabbergasted i just don't get it i don't understand it like this is what especially when there's other shit to ogle like what are we talking about

(01:17:34):
[Alex] so in some people someone started up a petition or something to uncensor stellar
[Erica] go touch some grass
[Alex] did you watch those videos
[Erica] Which ones? Did you send me some stuff?
[Alex] It was the videos where people were on that petition website. It's like inbred losers talking about how they want to please Sony uncensor Stellar Blade. I

(01:18:00):
[Erica] may have watched a few of those. It just blocked it because my brain was just very angry.
[Alex] and i'm watching them and i'm just like how is this real like how do these people exist in the real world where they're without irony posting videos of themselves asking sony to not censor stellar blade

(01:18:21):
[Erica] i want to see more of the uh the fake person's hip
[Alex] that's literally what it is that
[Erica] can i see more of the fake person's hip please
[Alex] And there's so much porn out there, Erica.
[Erica] That's what I really don't understand. Is it's like, and I understand the brain rot. We're sitting in a den of it right now. Like, I understand that. You can't help what grabs your brain stem and shakes you around for a while, right? That's just a thing that happens to people. But yeah, like you said, like, isn't there already like a fuck ton of porn of this character online?

(01:18:57):
[Alex] I'm sure. Like,
[Erica] there's no way there isn't.
[Alex] Well, there's a fuck ton of porn of anything, especially if it's popular. Knock
[Erica] that safe search off and go to town, my brother. How much
[Alex] witcher porn must there be out there? A lot. Terabytes?
[Erica] A lot.
[Alex] What's above terabytes? Petabytes? I don't even know. There's
[Erica] a lot.
[Alex] There's got to be so much witcher porn and so much Final Fantasy porn and so much whatever.

(01:19:22):
[Erica] Dragon Ball, Sailor Moon. Tomb Raider. Literally anything you can think of, there is porn of.
[Alex] And lots of it. And whatever flavor you like, it's out there. You just gotta
[Erica] look.
[Alex] And if you want the version of Eve where a little bit more of her hip is showing, one, just wait for it to come to PC and mod it. Because you know that'll happen. This is

(01:19:43):
[Erica] the other thing. You're taking so much time to post videos of yourself, unironically, bitching about this shit online. Well, you could be searching. You could be searching for your pornography, jerk. You could be jerking to the porn you like. Right! And not making a fool of yourself online.
[Alex] And once it's there, you can never get away from it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's just, I don't know, man. I know we're... For me, I'm more interested in it from a, it's amazing if a person just keeps, or a group of people or whatever just keeps saying it and saying it and saying it.

(01:20:19):
[Erica] It becomes real.
[Alex] How now it becomes real. And you start reading where people everywhere are like, oh, Sony censored Stellar Blade. It's like.
[Erica] That's not what happened.
[Alex] And this goes with anything, right? This happens in politics. This happens with anything.
[Erica] Yep. Because people can't be bothered to like, you know.
[Alex] Think about it for just a half a second.

(01:20:40):
[Erica] Because that's hard to do, Alex. It's hard. I don't want to think. I want to look at the couple extra like millimeters of hip on the fake lady's body. i'll never know the touch of a real woman
[Alex] and i was reading this one review where it was it was kind of like talking about how i don't remember every last facet of it but it was kind of talking about how it's so funny that all the chuds have latched onto this game like it's their game or something because when you actually play the game you realize like uh there's a lot of Again, I haven't played it, but just remember what this person was saying. You know, there's a lot of feminine ideas in the game. Eve acts very femininely. She doesn't act masculine, so she's not like something the Chuds would enjoy. That's

(01:21:31):
[Erica] not necessarily true. The little wayfish, like, oh, I don't know what I'm doing. I need help.
[Alex] yeah i mean i don't think it's that so much but um and it's just like the whole game is like i don't know people are like oh it's like the whole game is like you're dressing up this girl like it's like she's got all these different outfits and earrings and hairstyles and hair colors and it's like it's not very like uh i don't know it's just funny because there's a lot of things in it that were almost designed in a way to appeal to women yeah Except the fact that her boobs are jiggling all over the place everywhere she goes. But that's just life. I mean,

(01:22:06):
[Erica] we've talked about that. That just becomes more, like, funny more than anything. Because it is just kind of like... That's how I feel. Have you never seen, like... Because
[Alex] it's so over the top. A
[Erica] well-endowed woman before? Like, that's really not the way they work.
[Alex] But hey,
[Erica] go off, man.
[Alex] I don't know. I'm more always amazed how people get sucked in by, like, the... culture war of it all and you know you just repeat it non-stop and the people just i don't know i don't know how you get people out of all these bad mindsets because it feels like you have a Whole generation growing up now where they're coming up on, and this especially goes for young men, I think are being poisoned by this, where they're coming up on like Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro. And I don't know if that's because there isn't like good male role models or if they feel lost or they feel like, left behind in some way like i don't know what's going on

(01:23:11):
[Erica] but they're in these cultural bubbles where they hear a lot about how yes it isn't fair to like oh we're giving so much away to like other people and we don't have what and if you get a little mad like say you're a teenager you ask a girl out she says no you're gonna be a little pissed off about it you jump online you start like looking for stuff you start falling down some of these fucking holes

(01:23:34):
[Alex] yeah
[Erica] Yeah, I'm really eager to have my daughter come up in this environment. It's going to be fun.
[Alex] I'm just wondering what you do to make things better.
[Erica] Honestly, I have absolutely no idea.
[Alex] Yeah, I don't know. It's interesting. Because you can see a whole generation being poisoned in a way. And I think, you know, I saw like polling data the other day showing that, you know, for very obvious reasons, young women are tending to vote Democrat. Whereas as a whole, young men do tend to vote Democrat, but not in the numbers that women do.

(01:24:14):
[Erica] Right. I mean, that's not surprising to me at all.
[Alex] So it's just like... How do you get some of these people back? How do you appeal to them? I have a
[Erica] few ideas, but I'm not going to talk about them on this podcast.
[Alex] Interesting. As a topic change, I've got no way to cleanly move into this. I heard the rumor is that Linkin Park might start touring again. Really? But they are maybe going to use a female vocalist.

(01:24:51):
[Erica] Oh, interesting.
[Alex] Which I think is an interesting way to kind of do like a clean, like we're not trying to bring someone in to imitate Chester Bennington. Actually, I think that's
[Erica] probably a really good idea because... Yeah, it's we're going for a different sound because how could we ever replace him? Yeah, it's

(01:25:12):
[Alex] impossible. We're talking about... He really was one of the greatest singers to ever live, really. So it's
[Erica] like... Well, he had a very distinct voice. And Linkin Park... I mean, say what you want about him. I was a big fan. It's still in. It's a very distinct sound. They really kind of... You had your nu metal, but I always thought of Linkin Park above that, almost. Not that nu metal is bad, but...

(01:25:42):
[Alex] They were doing it the best of anyone.
[Erica] Right. And did it in like a different kind of way. So it just had a very fresh, very kind of unique sound.
[Alex] Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I don't know. I think it's interesting. I mean, the first rumor I heard, which I think got shot down fairly quickly, was that they were trying to get Amy Lee to tour with them. I don't know why that. From Evanescence. Definitely a

(01:26:04):
[Erica] name that immediately popped into my head. And
[Alex] she said they haven't asked her and she wouldn't even. Because I think Evanescence still tours. Yeah, I think so. And she said she was like, I'd be happy to maybe do like some guest spots. Right, but I'm not. I don't have the time to do that all the time. Because, yeah, I think I think they might still tour. um but i mean she's obviously an incredible singer

(01:26:26):
[Erica] oh yeah
[Alex] um but there's other incredible female ironically
[Erica] love evanescence like here's the thing those early aughts there's a lot of shit music i learned something we had some good
[Alex] stuff too i learned something today i didn't know which is you know evanescence original hit bring me to life you know they have the rapping sections on there They originally asked Mike Shinoda from Lincoln Park to do those wrapping sections.

(01:26:51):
[Erica] Interesting.
[Alex] And he said no. He just wasn't interested. But, you know... No, apparently at some point I was reading at some point, Amy Lee and Chester Bennington like ran into each other at a, at like a recording studio. And this is before Evanescence took off. This is when they were recording their first album. And she was telling him, you know, like the, the, the label wants us to be you. Like they want us to be you guys. And we're like, and he's like, oh, that sucks. You know, I'm sorry. Cause it's like, they want to do their own thing. They don't want to just be you. and yet so it's like apparently they had like hit it off right out of the gate and it was like yeah mike shinoda got asked to do those rapping sections on bring me to life and because that's i guess like if you kind of look at it that song was kind of like

(01:27:43):
[Erica] there's a similar
[Alex] there is a similar vibe to lincoln park and that's the only song i can recall where they ever had someone else on their rapping so it was like they did like that one song it was like make the record label happy but otherwise we're gonna do our cd
[Erica] right have the one single that's clearly what they want and then we'll have the rest that's that's

(01:28:05):
[Alex] and look i can't say the record label was necessarily wrong because that's a great song and it was a huge hit yes so you know sometimes you can one of the
[Erica] best parts of that daredevil movie
[Alex] probably the only good part of that daredevil movie um
[Erica] been a long time since i've watched
[Alex] but yeah i mean it's like so that's kind of one of the funny things right where sometimes both people can be right you know it's like hey this was a good song but on the other hand this isn't what we want to do

(01:28:29):
[Erica] right alex just realized i don't remember if we talked about this already witcher season four is in production
[Alex] oh boy we
[Erica] got a video
[Alex] is he huge
[Erica] oh There's, like, pictures of Liam's, like...
[Alex] He's been hitting the gym. He's been hitting the gym. The gym.
[Erica] Yeah, we got a video of the... I guess it was a table read or something. Okay. Just to show that, okay, we're back. We're in production. Look at all of our leads being very... You know, having some good chemistry and, you know, having a good time and very, you know, like... Everything is fine. We're doing good. But... So, yeah. Season four is in production.

(01:29:14):
[Alex] Yeah, I was trying to look up, like... A video here. Or the image or something. Like, is there a picture out there of him? Of Liam? Yeah, give me a
[Erica] sec. Give me moments.
[Alex] I just want to see. Is this dude, like, huge?
[Erica] He's bulked up quite a bit. I don't know, like... The last thing I saw him in was that Independence Day-like sequel that was garbage. And that's a long time ago. Oh, give me a second here. I feel like we were posting that around. scintillating podcast content as we scroll through our phones

(01:30:04):
[Alex] i'm sorry i just i'm just curious yeah it's not i mean i see this photo he posted on instagram i mean he's looking pretty yeah
[Erica] the black and white one yeah yeah
[Alex] i mean he's looking jacked the head's looking a little small you know he's looking
[Erica] jacked joey fucking baity his goddamn like biceps are like fighting to get out of his fucking shirt at that goddamn table read like sir i'm not complaining but sir

(01:30:32):
[Alex] Yeah, so I don't know. I mean, I'm interested in the new season of The Witcher just to see how it is. Because, you know, I wasn't a huge fan of last season. I mean, I haven't really... I guess, to be fair, I haven't been a big fan. I've been critical of the show overall. Which
[Erica] is fine.
[Alex] I'm still
[Erica] watching. But you're also still watching Halo, so that doesn't really say much. Well, there's

(01:30:53):
[Alex] an aspect of being dedicated to this podcast as well.
[Erica] Fair, fair,
[Alex] fair. Um... But yeah, I mean, I'm interested to see it. It'll give us something to talk about and see how Hemsworth... Like
[Erica] two years? Yeah,
[Alex] it'll... I'll be interested to see how Hemsworth is because I do think... Look, I don't know what was going on with the production or who was pissed at who or who talked shit about who or whatever. I think our guy Cavill was good in that role.

(01:31:24):
[Erica] I would agree.
[Alex] I think he was the least of that show's problems would be my way of looking at it.
[Erica] From, like you said, from what I've kind of read and heard, i will be interested to see how the production is moving forward i think even getting because we you don't get a lot of behind the scenes stuff from the show really at all like they've never done anything like that before and part of that i think is the here we are we're back look at everybody smiling and having a good time and that kind of very pr kind of thing but even the fact that they're showing it or able to show it is kind of reassuring. Here's the thing. Yeah. I'm on board for the next two seasons. They did also announce season five will be it. They're only doing two more seasons. Which I'm fine with. I like when a show knows we have an ending so you don't have like a lost situation where we're just writing nonsense until we figure out when we're done. Or you have to worry about the random ass cancellation and you don't get...

(01:32:33):
[Alex] You don't get the full story. Right,
[Erica] so I've seen some people are concerned that we might not have enough time to tell the whole story. I feel like there's a lot of faffing about in the books that you could probably...
[Alex] I think there's also been a fair amount of faffing about on this show.
[Erica] Sure, sure, sure, sure. But yeah, I just think, I don't think it'll be hard to adapt the last couple books into two seasons. And

(01:32:56):
[Alex] I think the good news is, is you know you have two seasons. So now you can write towards a goal, right? Or go backwards, write backwards, right? But, you know, it's like, yeah, I think that could be a good thing, though. Oh, rather than just I'm not. Oh, I got to write a season. I got to write another season. At the end of the fifth season, they go, hey, you're canceled. It's like, well, fuck. Now we didn't get to finish. You

(01:33:18):
[Erica] didn't get to finish. You know where we
[Alex] faffed about because we thought we were just watching. We were just writing forever.
[Erica] We know where we're ending. So now we can write towards an ending. I have no problem with that at all.
[Alex] now um i started watching a show i've only watched the first episode speaking of a something that is actually finished on like um another project these two worked on um i watched the first episode of three body problem on netflix oh yeah And do you know who the producers are? Yeah, I know exactly who the producers are because there's

(01:33:49):
[Erica] absolutely no reason I saw they were producing. So I was like, oh, I'm interested in reading that book. And then I saw, oh, it's going to be a show. Awesome. And then I saw who was producing and I was like, absolutely not.
[Alex] Now, let's be fair. Let's be fair.
[Erica] Sure.
[Alex] When they were producing Game of Thrones, when they actually had material to pull from, Game of Thrones was good. Even really good, right? And what I'll say, I looked this up the second I saw these two were producing it. Benioff and Weiss. three body problem and there's some other i think there's other trilogy

(01:34:31):
[Erica] and they are all this is done the
[Alex] books are done and completed so in theory we're now in their wheelhouse of what they're good at
[Erica] however
[Alex] i know a lot of faith has been lost i'll just say i enjoyed the first episode okay first episode you know

(01:34:52):
[Erica] what maybe it's great but i'm good thanks
[Alex] It's only the first episode. I'll just say we're in their wheelhouse, right? And I think some people are just gifted at certain things and not at others. I would agree with that. I mean, look at, I mean, we always bring up like Zack Schneider. Look at 300. He's literally adapting panels right out of a goddamn comic book. I think I remember

(01:35:19):
[Erica] reading that.
[Alex] Straight from it.
[Erica] They didn't even have like storyboards. It was just using the panels from the comics.
[Alex] Yeah, and that movie's incredible. I love that fucking movie. And, like, that's his skill. He shouldn't be out there... I'm not looking to Zach
[Erica] for original ideas. He
[Alex] shouldn't be writing original scripts. No. He should just be adapting things beat for beat.

(01:35:43):
[Erica] I think he'd be good, like, art department director of photography. I don't know that he should be really necessarily directing anything, but... Hollywood disagrees with me. They keep giving him more. Giving him stuff. And you know what? He's got the right friends or something. Good for you, man. Like, good for you. So, I don't
[Alex] know. I just, you know, maybe... I don't know if it's that,
[Erica] like, he's got the diehard fans and so they know they've got, like, that built-in, like, audience or whatever. But... I've heard that Rebel Moon movie. Not great. Those movies are pretty bad.

(01:36:17):
[Alex] Not great. Yeah, that's what I've heard. Not great. Not great, Erica.
[Erica] Not great,
[Alex] Bob. The other thing, I don't know if you have any grand ideas of what to talk about, but I have one more good topic.
[Erica] I can't remember. Did I mention? Was it upstairs I talked about I was watching Delicious in Dungeon? I don't think I said it

(01:36:37):
[Alex] down here. I can't remember. Yeah,
[Erica] I don't remember either. This is the
[Alex] problem when you talk before the podcast.
[Erica] Yep.
[Alex] No, I remember you saying you watched some episodes of that on Netflix.
[Erica] Yeah, I've watched... I think I'm through six or seven. And I'm enjoying it so far. It's basically like your basic D&D party goes into this like... There's some convoluted backstory, but... they're going through these dungeons um the main character's sister gets like eaten by this red dragon but she manages to do a teleport spell that gets the rest of the party out of the dungeon so they're trying to get back down to save her because resurrection magic exists in this world so like if we can get to her before she's fully digested we can save her uh but they're broke because they left all their equipment down when they were transported So they're like, the way we can save money is we can like eat the monsters that we find. We could like cook the monsters that we find, which the two people in the party are like, that is disgusting. We're not doing that. But they end up meeting this other like dwarf that lives in the dungeons. And it's like this amazing cook. And like, they're slowly journeying down. And it's, I think we're, you know how with, at least with, is it Kill la Kill? You kind of had your, establishing of the norm sure then it really like kicked up into insanity yeah i think i'm approaching the kick up to insanity okay i'm i think it's i'm assuming it's only going to be one season because that's trigger um but i'm enjoying it so far and they're like short episodes you know 20 22 minutes so

(01:38:19):
[Alex] Yeah, and there's a bunch of Studio Trigger animes out there if you want to watch other Trigger animes. And they're all supposed to be either good or great.
[Erica] Yeah. So I'm enjoying myself so far.
[Alex] So I was putzing around on the Microsoft store the other day on my Xbox, and I saw that Resident Evil 4 Remake Gold Edition, which is like it includes the Ada DLC separate ways, was on sale for $40. And I have a lot of Microsoft Rewards funny money, which is basically like... You get on there and you like mash a couple of keys on your keyboard to do searches and then they give you money. So that takes like a minute a day and you stack up like over the course of a few years, you somehow stack up hundreds of dollars of fake money.

(01:39:11):
[Erica] There you go.
[Alex] Which then turns into real money when you buy something with it. Sure. So it was $40. I was like, you know what? I'll give $40 of fun out of this game.
[Erica] I was going to say, yeah, I think you... The base original game, like, yeah, for $40. I'd play the original for $40 again. Yeah,
[Alex] so... Oh, yeah. I've played like three or four hours. So one, I'm having a blast. It's great. It's interesting because it's like they're taking you through some areas you've seen before, like the village and, you know, the town square or they got the guy burning on the fucking cross or whatever. And a lot of the areas look the same, but different things are happening in the same areas. And there's new areas that weren't there before. It's not like a one-to-one. It's more like a Final Fantasy VII remake. Now, obviously, that was taking... a 2D game and making it 3D and adding onto it and everything. So it's not exactly comparable, but there's like all new areas in this that I swear weren't there before. No,

(01:40:20):
[Erica] I heard they added a lot to it.
[Alex] Yeah, and all the same weapons are there, but they're balanced differently. So it's not as, like, clean cut as to what you should be using. Like, for example, you know, like, in Resident Evil 4, I don't know if you remember, but the Red 9 was, like, by far and away the best handgun. Like, you just, like, it was like shooting a shotgun at the fucking enemy. And in this game, it still does the most damage. It still has that identity. But, like... The handgun I'm using doesn't hit as hard, but has a really high chance to like crit enemies, like instantly pop their head. So it's like, okay. actually kind of like this one better just because i have that high chance of just insta killing someone right um and the other way it's different is in all i know i don't think you've played any of the recent ones but in all these re remake games like two three and four they um have a different system for shooting so what it is uh is like you have a crosshair And when you're moving around, the crosshair widens. And if you stop and stand still, the crosshair tightens up. And when it tightens up, you have a higher chance to, like, crit enemies and do more damage. So they brought that into this game, which if you remember in original Resident Evil 4, they're all just laser sights. There is no, like, bloom system like that. But you can, from the vendor, you know... What are you buying?

(01:41:48):
[Erica] What are you buying? what are you selling
[Alex] and he he sells the laser sight for only specific weapons though so like the red nine for example does not get the laser sight
[Erica] interesting
[Alex] um but the weapon i'm using the it's like the sentinel nine that does get the laser sight so i'm that's the other reason i've been enjoying using that is it's like oh i don't have to wait for the aim to tighten up i can just fire away

(01:42:12):
[Erica] right you've got that already
[Alex] um So that's different, and the game feels much more, I would say, even action-packed than that one was. It's like a lot of big gunfights, like a lot of enemies running at you, and they're doing a lot of head-bobbing and diving in different ways. And one of the other really cool things is I remember seeing the knife parries in the videos leading up to the release of this. But you don't even have to have the knife. You don't actually bring the knife out. It's not like a weapon you switch into. So what you do is like if, say, an enemy throws an axe at you. You can parry

(01:42:54):
[Erica] it with a knife.
[Alex] Right. Or let's say they run at you with a knife or with an axe or with like a pitchfork or something. You can hit LB at the right time and parry the attack away at any time. Nice. Yeah. And then they have this thing where sometimes when you kill enemies, they start like kind of like like struggling on the ground or something. And if you don't knife them fast when they're on the ground,

(01:43:23):
[Erica] they get the head
[Alex] or they turn into another version of a zombie or something. so yeah it's like and the knife has durability and you pick up other shitty knives along the way so you kind of always want to use your shitty knife first and run through the durability on those and let them break and then just lose them out of your inventory um before you like use up your good knife because when you go to the vendor you want to repair it so its durability is high Because if you don't have any knives and no durability, you can't parry and you can't stab these enemies. And the knife actually does good damage. And that's another interesting thing is the shooting range is back. But they've changed these mini games and they've actually made them, like, much harder. So... What it is, it's not just like, you know how in Resident Evil 4, the shooting range was just, oh, shoot these targets, try to headshot them, and don't shoot the good guy or whatever. You know, you remember that? In this one, it's still don't shoot the good guy, but there's also these skulls on some of the enemies, and you have to shoot the skull to get the best score. So as you're going through these shooting ranges to get the absolute best score... not only do you need to hit every target, but you need to hit every skull as well. So, and because remember you're shooting weapons that have bloom, it's hard to hit far away targets. Sure. So at the end of this first shooting range, for example, at the very end of it, like the whole shooting range is pretty easy, but at the very end of it, you have a skull that goes along the far back and you're using a pistol with bloom and So it goes along the far back, it just tracks right to left, and if you don't hit it on that one chance, it goes away and that's it, and you've got to do the whole shooting range over again to get the best score. So I had to do this bitch like nine times because what happens is, one, not only do you have to deal with the weapon bloom, but even when you're sitting there and you're waiting for it and your aim is tightened up, Well, there's still sway on the weapon, you know, from your character standing there breathing. So you're like sitting there and it's like, OK, I can't move my aim because if I move my aim, the bloom expands. So I just have to sit there and basically pray when this goes across my sights that my aim just so happens to be on that small fucking skull. And so I had to do this like literally 10 times. I was not happy. And what's interesting about these shooting ranges now is they give you these gold and silver tokens or something. And you put them into a machine. And what I've learned is the machine per playthrough has set rewards. You get these charms. Is it like

(01:46:28):
[Erica] a gacha pond kind of thing?
[Alex] Right. And so these charms give you some sort of bonus. So, for example, I was reading some of the really good ones are there's a charm that gives you 8% movement speed. There's another charm, this is the one I got, which gives you a 20% extra chance to crit an enemy on melee. Ooh. and on apparently melee crits insta kill and any enemy that hits them so um you know 20 chance to insta kill an enemy with a knife strike is pretty pretty strong and there's other ones that just like maybe when you craft ammo you get another 20 percent ammo or something like that whatever so you know there's some there the greener appeals you for more stuff like that So what I learned though is the results of this gotcha machine are set per playthrough. So what you can do is you can go in and you can put the tokens in in various quantities. to figure out what your results are going to be and then reload your save and get what you want so like on mine i figured out if i put in you know like three golds and then three golds again i get this melee crit bonus charm um and but yeah if you like sit there and you go one gold and two silvers or two golds and one silver and then you put in that combo three times or something you'll get something else. So you kind of got to sit there and actually chart out what all the possible rewards are. You don't

(01:48:03):
[Erica] have to do that. You
[Alex] don't have to.
[Erica] However. But I want
[Alex] to. No, I like to math all the fun out of the game.
[Erica] Oh, of course, of course.
[Alex] And so, yeah, you can have as many of these charms as you want. And if you play through the game more than once, your results out of this machine will then change and you can get different ones. But, yeah, you can attach three of these to your attache case and get those bonuses just permanently. I

(01:48:33):
[Erica] mean, that's pretty sweet.
[Alex] um and the attache case you can also you have like your baseline one and that's what i'm still using but there are other ones you can get as well they give you some sort of bonus so um for example there's one in the shop i could get so there's crafting in this game which is like if you get gunpowder And then you get, um, some other material that you have to carry around. You can make whatever hand cannon ammo or handgun, shotgun, rifle, whatever. And, uh... But that

(01:49:04):
[Erica] stuff all takes up space?
[Alex] Yes, it takes up space in your inventory. Okay. And, uh... So, yeah, there's another case that, like, increases your drop rate of, like, gunpowder. And I heard there's another case that increases your drop rate of red herbs. Okay. Like, so, you know, you can kind of have these different cases. You could equip whatever one you like, equip whatever charms you like. So you can have a little bit of, like, customization over what drops. Customization is pretty cool.

(01:49:36):
[Erica] So I remember there were different attache cases in the first, in the original, but it was just a size thing.
[Alex] Right. And that's still there. You still get the size upgrades, but separately you can get these bonuses.
[Erica] Because it was always very satisfying to fit everything in its little spot.
[Alex] Yeah. And well, what happened to me recently, because I got to the part, you remember like the lake monster you had to fight?

(01:49:58):
[Erica] Del Lago. You know, I played that game. So many goddamn times, Alex. It's absurd.
[Alex] So, shortly after that lake monster fight, my inventory was just jam-fucking-packed with, like... vipers i killed because like i can't remember what it was like in the original game but in this one you kill the viper and then i think wasn't it that they used to drop eggs the vipers when you would kill

(01:50:30):
[Erica] yeah they would jump out of the boxes yeah and then yeah sometimes if you kill them they would drop an egg or there would be something in the box with them um yeah
[Alex] so yeah so now now you actually pick up the viper and you can eat the viper to restore health so that takes up some space if you kill fish and pick them up that takes up space so i'm like running around after this fight and legitimately i've got like three full heals i've got a million vipers a million gunpowder and everything and it's like i think i'm gonna have to sell healing items because i bonkers

(01:51:09):
[Erica] for resident evil
[Alex] i know it's like i'm fucking like just my pack is just filled with shit because
[Erica] usually your first playthrough you're like i do not have enough healing for this fuck
[Alex] um well and i think part of what's going on is it feels like because you're fighting so many more enemies than you usually do in a resident i think they're throwing a lot of ammo at you like it seems like any time i start to get even remotely low on handgun ammo all of a sudden like every enemy drops handgun ammo so yeah i think they definitely this is not a resident evil where they're trying to get you to run away from enemies they want you to fight them

(01:51:48):
[Erica] I mean, and the original four was like that. I just remember it was stingier with the ammo than what you're describing.
[Alex] Yeah, no, they're pretty generous with the ammo.
[Erica] Because those originals, like one through four, one and two especially, I never really played three. I remember being very stingy with the ammo.
[Alex] Now, I'm about to get to the point where I'm going to get Ashley. And I really hope that damn woman isn't so annoying this time around. Yeah. leon help i fucking hated her

(01:52:20):
[Erica] oh
[Alex] i hated her i would have killed her and handed her over if i could have
[Erica] great
[Alex] yeah hopefully they still have like the fucking garbage cans you can toss her oh
[Erica] yeah that was great go hide hide while i take care of this please
[Alex] I'll never forget that. That first like big area in the castle where like a million enemies are trying to attack you. She's trying to do the cranks. They're picking her up and carrying her away. But I also remember, I think it was like when you beat the game, you would get the armor for her where she was like invulnerable. And if the enemies tried to pick her up, she would crush her. She would crush them. So, I mean, they've added a lot of, like, dynamic stuff to the fighting. It's a lot. It's all, like, good additions. And they've added more, you know, in the original game, they had, like, oh, in that opening area, you could shoot, like, the blue, like, medals or whatever. They had

(01:53:19):
[Erica] those throughout the entire game. And I think if you collected all of them in an area, you either got, like,
[Alex] a weapon or something.
[Erica] Either a weapon or an upgrade or, yeah, something.
[Alex] So they have that stuff still, but just like it was pretty much, but they also added like other requests, like get a golden egg and sell it and I'll give you something or get a, you know, three vipers and sell them and I'll give you something. It's usually spinals and then you can trade the spinals in. Oh,

(01:53:47):
[Erica] the spinels.
[Alex] yeah for like whatever um yellow herbs or maybe an attachment for a weapon or something like that
[Erica] sell them and then i feel like you could get like treasure maps yeah in the original you can still get the treasure and they would show you where those um blue medallions were as well as other like items that were like super rare like um that you could put other jewels in and then you could sell those for like a fuck ton of money or whatever

(01:54:16):
[Alex] yeah there's still the treasure maps there's still basically everything you would expect there to be it's just all been evolved in some way or for example like the sniper rifle you know how you just get it in Resident Evil 4 in this one it shows up in the vendors shop and you need to buy
[Erica] it
[Alex] and if you buy it during the chapter where he first this happens with other stuff too if you buy it in the chapter where he first gives you the option he gives you the scope for it for free

(01:54:46):
[Erica] Oh,
[Alex] nice. But if you don't buy it in that chapter and you wait, then you would have to buy the scope as well.
[Erica] Gotcha. Because you might not have the money when
[Alex] you
[Erica] first need them.
[Alex] If you're not playing well or something. Also, they still have the treasure combination system, but now there's some whole like... page where it tells you like oh if you put two reds and two yellows into this treasure like gems okay yeah it'll be like you'll get x amount of money it's like it's not like a multiplier because

(01:55:17):
[Erica] before it did not tell you that it was just like you would find like a cool like lantern you'd be like oh let me sell this and then later you would find like gems for it yeah you'd be like
[Alex] fuck Yeah. No. Now they tell you when stuff is just for selling or if it's combinable.
[Erica] So some quality of life stuff.
[Alex] Yeah. And it's different the way they've done it. We're like, you know, you have like red gems, blue gems and yellow as far as I've seen. and uh they're in like either circle or square shapes so like some treasures might require two circles and two squares or something sure um and ideally like to get the most value you want to put all of the same color in them or put like one of each color in them because i think there actually is up to five different colored gems so if you the best value would be to put five hold on to it individually value gems then sell it for the most money yeah so like right now i'm still carrying around like three or four combinable treasures because i'm waiting for the gems to drop that i need so then i can go along and like massively upgrade my weapons right you know and get the most value bang for

(01:56:32):
[Erica] your
[Alex] buck
[Erica] if
[Alex] And I haven't really had any issue yet. You know, like, generally, you know how it goes in a Resident Evil game. You really don't need to upgrade reload speed or rate of fire. I
[Erica] was always... I liked being able to reload fast, though. That was... I would always upgrade that. So that would be more... Yeah. So that would
[Alex] be an appealing one for you. I'm more focused on power. Sure. Because then I feel like, okay, power allows you to be the most ammo efficient. Um... and like on this shotgun i was using for example its base ammo is only two so like i was upgrading the ammo on that because it's like okay having to reload every two shots is not a ideal situation um the only thing that's changed and you could argue maybe this is even for the better the only thing that's changed is it does not do the resident evil thing where if you have like half ammo or no ammo in a weapon and then you upgrade its ammo capacity you know they would fill up the magazine that does not happen in this game

(01:57:32):
[Erica] oh interesting now
[Alex] ammo is so plentiful it doesn't really doesn't really matter and also it is kind of nice to just be like because see like in village i was doing that where it's like oh i used up all the ammo on my rifle you know what i'm just gonna leave it empty and try to make it back to the vendor to get all that free ammo you know and you don't have to do that in this game you just you can call a duty it up every two shots you take you can reload your gun if you want to so Yeah, but I mean, just what I've played, I just beat, like, you know, El Gigante. The dog shows up to help you out. Oh, the dog that you saved at

(01:58:10):
[Erica] the beginning? Hell yeah. The
[Alex] dog's in a different place. Oh, okay. You gotta look around. You gotta listen. Because
[Erica] he's pretty obvious in the original, if memory serves. Yeah,
[Alex] there's a lot of stuff that's in a different place. The map's laid out differently. I like
[Erica] that, though, because you do feel like it's yes i have played this before
[Alex] but it's new and i'm
[Erica] familiar but i'm still having a new experience
[Alex] and i remember i think it was last year when remake came out maybe i

(01:58:32):
[Erica] think you're right
[Alex] and people were like oh should this be allowed to be in contention for game of the year and it's like if this was a pure remaster i would say maybe not if it was just like the exact same game but just a frame rate and graphical upgrade
[Erica] yeah but if that's the best thing that came out this year
[Alex] Sure. But I'm just saying. Right. Sure. But this is like this feels like a new game. Like there's familiar things and some of it is the same. Like you still like remember at the start, like it's one of the first areas you hit where it's like a farm. And that's where a lot of those blue metals were and stuff like that's still there, but it's not laid out quite the same. And other stuff happens like the second time you come back to the village, all of a sudden that big tower that was there gets like blown to smithereens and a bunch of dogs come out and attack you. So it's like, yeah, you're you're in the same area.

(01:59:28):
[Erica] but different stuff but
[Alex] different things are happening and different pathways are opening up that weren't there before and so it's very it's fun it's really great i mean it's it's really a high-end game
[Erica] nice i'm glad oh you're getting your money's worth
[Alex] It's like, you know, it's like, hey, let's get more games like this. Take your time. Make a really great game. Have a really great team on it.

(01:59:51):
[Erica] I will wait. Make the thing
[Alex] good. And Leon is still corny as fuck. He still delivers all his lines. That was the best
[Erica] part of that fucking game was the corny dialogue. At the
[Alex] beginning when the bell rings and they all leave and he's just standing around and he's watching them all go and he just goes, where's everybody going? Bingo. Bingo.

(02:00:14):
[Erica] like thank you for preserving that capcom thank you
[Alex] and it's all just shit like that and there are times like he was going through it's like leon knows he's in this fucking hell on earth situation he's going through he's seeing things there's like women being sacrificed and he's just like what the fuck
[Erica] right no once you get to the castle you're dealing with like what

(02:00:44):
[Alex] Yeah, and the vendor, he has a lot more lines. Like, you know, you show up and he'll be like, oh, break time's over. Not
[Erica] enough cash, stranger. I loved him. Oh, I just love that game so much. I'm glad the remake is good.
[Alex] I think he says something along the lines of like, You know, you might be wondering, where'd we get all this stuff? And you don't want to know, stranger. Is it

(02:01:10):
[Erica] the same voice actor?
[Alex] I don't think it's the same voice actor. That makes me a little sad. I realize it's been like 20 years. I don't think anyone's the same voice
[Erica] actor. Okay, okay. Because, yeah, so good.
[Alex] But it's still, yeah, it's still great deliveries and really well done. And you could see the guy is trying to do an imitation of that voice.
[Erica] Sure, sure. But it's

(02:01:30):
[Alex] his own thing, too.
[Erica] you gotta make it your own for sure
[Alex] so we'll see i imagine by the time we record again i'll probably have beaten it at least once i don't know how long it is because it feels like they've added on so i
[Erica] think in two weeks though you'll probably be either done or close to being
[Alex] done yeah i mean i can run through games pretty fast indeed
[Erica] Well, we made it past two hours.

(02:01:51):
[Alex] Well, we always do. We
[Erica] didn't have any Halo talk. I was a little worried. Because that's been...
[Alex] Is there anything you want to watch that we can bag on? Because, see, that's the key, right? Is it has to be watchable. But to discuss it on the podcast, you also want to shit on it. Because otherwise, if you're not shitting on it, it's hard to talk about
[Erica] it. Yeah. Yeah.

(02:02:14):
[Alex] That's the tough part.
[Erica] Yeah. I mean, we could watch this Fallout show.
[Alex] Oh my God. That reminds me. I was telling the ghost of Bob about this. So I had been going to this guy's YouTube channel because when new hell divers content would come out, he was doing like weapon testing. And that was all his YouTube channel was, was just like hell divers videos. And you know, Oh, this weapons, like you shoot at this enemy in this way, it does this much damage, that sort of stuff. Okay. I go there one day and all of a sudden there's a new video and it's the main character from the fallout show. And next to it, it says woke trash.

(02:02:57):
[Erica] Oh, were you the most sad so
[Alex] i go and i'm like first of all i'm not logged in so this isn't going to affect any like well actually i don't even get recommendations i have that all disabled but i wasn't logged in so i was like i'm gonna click on this because i gotta know
[Erica] right
[Alex] how stupid this guy actually is so all of a sudden he's talking about like dei and woke garbage and they've ruined fallout and yada yada is like he's going on for 20 minutes about how they've ruined fallout with this tv show and how terrible it is and he doesn't understand why everyone loves it

(02:03:38):
[Erica] also dei for the masses
[Alex] uh diversity uh something or other
[Erica] oh yeah i yeah
[Alex] I don't know. It's always trying to insult people who, like, want diversity and stuff. Right.
[Erica] Because what a horrible thing.
[Alex] So that's just the whole thing.
[Erica] Don't you just want to watch the same thing over and over and over

(02:03:59):
[Alex] and over? He's bitching that in every single screenshot of the show, like, every single picture, there's got to be, like, an Asian person and a white person and a Mexican person. You know, it's like they're trying to hit, like, quotas on every single picture.
[Erica] Mm-hmm. so he's bitching about pictures or did he actually watch the show no no
[Alex] no like he was actually watching it I should be saying scenes

(02:04:24):
[Erica] but anyways it's funnier though if he's just looking at images and bitching about it
[Alex] I was just curious like how much how stupid this guy was going to be and it turned out very stupid But then I go and look at his comments and it's all just, and I would never be caught dead commenting on a YouTube video, but it's all the comments are just, dude, I just come here for hell divers weapon testing. Why are you torching your YouTube channel?

(02:04:49):
[Erica] Like you had a good thing going, bro.
[Alex] Yeah, and it's like every single comment was, why have you destroyed your own YouTube channel? Because
[Erica] here's the thing. The majority of people don't care.
[Alex] No.
[Erica] And it's like, I don't want... I get enough of this culture war nonsense everywhere. Literally everywhere. You know what I want to do? I want to hear about how much damage the Shadi does. Can you just tell

(02:05:13):
[Alex] me that? It was just like a fun game. We were having... dropping in and shooting having
[Erica] a good time man and then you gotta fly in with woke nonsense and now we're done
[Alex] yeah
[Erica] i
[Alex] instantly unsubscribed i was like i'm gonna watch this just like so i can see how dumb you are and i instantly i unsubscribed previous to watching the video like it's like okay just just off the thumbnail i know you're an idiot now i just want to know how stupid are you because as i've said before once you unironically say woke

(02:05:44):
[Erica] we're done
[Alex] that's it
[Erica] I have a platform now. Now I can complain.
[Alex] Like, everyone wants to be, like, yeah, the React, like, grifter content guy. Like, it's all just a grift. And, like, I get it, man. I get it. If I could do the grift, I'd do the grift.
[Erica] But you need to find the new thing, though. Like, we've already, the woke nonsense grift.

(02:06:07):
[Alex] Everyone's already got that audience.
[Erica] That's on lockdown. You gotta find the new grift. That's
[Alex] saturated.
[Erica] Yes. It's like with the cooking videos, like Binging with Babish came out and it was like, everybody wants to do a cooking channel. And it's like, we're good. We're good. Different stuff. We need a new thing. You need a new
[Alex] twist or you need to hit a new market or something. Otherwise people are like, people like their comfy thing that they already are into.

(02:06:31):
[Erica] Right. Like I have to, like I still watch Claire Saffitz. She was from the Bon Appetit Test Kitchen or what's her name? Carla Lally music I like her videos but it's like I have relationships like parasocial relationships with these people I've been watching them for years yeah I'm not getting into a new cooking show on YouTube it's just not a thing that's like yeah

(02:06:54):
[Alex] it's like on YouTube I've I follow this one channel it's for a fox sanctuary in like Minnesota or something And all it is is this woman and some other people who volunteer there, like, look after and take care of these, like, 50 foxes. And they go to, like, fur farms and, you know, basically buy the foxes off these fur farmers to save them. Or some of the foxes, for whatever reason, they're not what the fur farmers want. So if they don't take them, they're just going to be killed. Yeah. Because none of these foxes can survive in the wild. They weren't brought up in the wild. They're dependent on people. So it's like I go there. It's like I like the one Finnegan Fox, you know, and Dixie. It's like they've got personality. She plays with them. You know what? If she went on there and I heard her political views, she'd probably say some stupid shit and then I wouldn't want to watch it anymore. But it's like your video is just like the channel is just does nice things for faxes.

(02:07:58):
[Erica] Right, this is what we're doing. So if you want to start a separate channel for your political nonsense, that's probably a better idea. Hey, go check out my political channel. You know what? I don't want to do that. I'm going to hang out with the foxes, thank
[Alex] you.
[Erica] It'd be like, because I think she's actually not doing it anymore, which is depressing, but I followed somebody on YouTube who does highlights of the Critical Role streams every week. And it's fun to go back and like, okay, I remember that. That was really funny. It'd be like if they suddenly were like, woke nonsense and this is no thank you no you've ruined it for me it's it's done i'm turned off

(02:08:35):
[Alex] it's like you can tell sometimes when you're watching something you could tell they don't have like the political views that maybe completely line up with yours and everyone isn't going to agree and i don't expect
[Erica] everybody to completely line up with me i just kind of expect you to be like a decent human being yeah that's really all i'm asking for you know

(02:08:57):
[Alex] If you can't do that, just shut up. Just shut up. That's
[Erica] the thing. It's like if unless you're going to go for the I'm going to try and make my millions being the right wing, you know, grifter or whatever. And hey, more power to you. I'm just I want nothing to do with that. It's just don't even fucking talk about it. The
[Alex] thing is, man, whether it's right wing or left wing or whatever, there's only space for so many Jordan Peterson's or Ben Shapiro's. It's like they're they're taking up they're sucking up most of the air.

(02:09:29):
[Erica] Right.
[Alex] So it's not easy to get going in that space. And when like everyone thinks they're going to be the next grifter, you know, it's like you just find YouTube is just filled with grifters and Twitter is filled with grifters. Everyone thinks they're going to pull this off. It's like not many people can make this happen. It's just like OnlyFans. There's like... probably a thousand women on only fans that make 99 of the money and they are killing it they're in the vault of gold coins and everyone else is posting their nudes and they're making like 100 bucks you know that's just like twitch anything else

(02:10:03):
[Erica] there's only so i look at it like with patreon i follow a couple artists i allow myself like 10 15 bucks a month whatever because it's like i would love to follow more people yeah but there's i'm not gonna i can't throw money at
[Alex] everyone
[Erica] right so you know if oh i'm following this one channel they haven't really posted in a while okay i'm gonna switch over to somebody that you know maybe does post a lot or something else new that i found and it's just kind of like there's only so much to go around guys

(02:10:34):
[Alex] Yeah. There's only so much time. There's only so much money. Except in gacha games. Let me tell you something. Every month, the reports come out on how much gacha games made on mobile, and the numbers just keep going up. Like, Genshin Impact last month made like $150 million. Good for them. honkai star rail made like a hundred million dollars and it's like where the fuck like are these just all like doctors who just have endless money or something like who has all the money to throw at these goddamn gotcha

(02:11:06):
[Erica] probably just like a couple of really rich fucks who have all of the money in the universe and they
[Alex] want the strongest character to flex on everyone else
[Erica] pretty much because when you have that kind of money that's all you care about anymore
[Alex] And gotcha games are completely unlike everything else because like if you're, I don't know. I'm trying to think of a good example. If you were buying like loot boxes on Overwatch or something, I feel like people were almost like ashamed. It was like, oh, I don't want people to know how much money I've thrown out the window on these stupid loot boxes.

(02:11:45):
[Erica] No, it's like when I was spending some money on Pokemon Go. I'm like, I'm not going to talk about this. No one will ever know.
[Alex] On gacha games, they flex. People want people to know, oh, no, look at my account. I have spent like $50,000 on this bitch and you cannot compete with me. Like, they want you to know.

(02:12:05):
[Erica] It's like, maybe not in this, but other things. Maybe, honey, maybe. My kid's still going to get to go to college.
[Alex] Maybe they have so much money that theirs is too. Or maybe they're homeless. It just
[Erica] doesn't matter. Right.
[Alex] i saw this one youtuber this is like switching between the two topics i saw this one youtuber and literally the whole gimmick of his channel was he was a gotcha player and when like really good characters are coming out or something he would pretend i think he was pretending just based on the nature of the channel that he was becoming homeless to be able to afford to pull for the character i mean so like he would literally go at night to like under passes and shit and like pretend to camp out to save money i

(02:12:59):
[Erica] mean hopefully it's just a commitment i think it's
[Alex] a commitment to the vet and it was a funny bit
[Erica] oh no that's hysterical
[Alex] yeah amazing it was
[Erica] amazing
[Alex] it was so fun there there is and that's like i saw like he had like only like 40k subscribers on youtube like nobody watches this

(02:13:20):
[Erica] but honestly 40k
[Alex] no sure
[Erica] that's respectable but you're
[Alex] not gonna make like a living off that no um but it's like some side but it was like he found his little niche he's doing his little like i'm homeless but i play i'm homeless to be able to afford to spend money on gacha games it was just like a funny little gimmick
[Erica] Right, but you got, there you go. And be happy with it. You know, you try and grow your channel, but sometimes you're just going to have 40K and you just got to deal with it.

(02:13:49):
[Alex] All right.
[Erica] All righty. You got anything else?
[Alex] No, I had fun.
[Erica] We will discuss and try and see if we can't find a new show to bitch about at
[Alex] you people. Yeah, we need, it's like, it just has to be in that perfect spot. It can't be so bad that it's unwatchable. We need to do a
[Erica] little research. Maybe we can throw a little poll out there, see if there's like... you guys have any suggestions
[Alex] oh yeah that's right email us at us

(02:14:12):
[Erica] at us there you go don't
[Alex] at me
[Erica] yeah no i i yeah i won't pay attention but yeah if you have some way of communicating with us and there's a show it's got to be
[Alex] good but also bad
[Erica] let's be fun bad
[Alex] yeah it has to be fun
[Erica] if we can find a fun bad show to like watch and discuss that'd be glorious
[Alex] We could start watching that new season of Challenge All-Stars where all the people are on it.

(02:14:36):
[Erica] That's like four
[Alex] episodes in.
[Erica] That's fair. We could start on that. I don't know why, but I fell off hard.
[Alex] Well, there were just so many. There were just seasons where it's like, I just don't care about any of these people. Yeah,
[Erica] it just kind of got bad.
[Alex] But now it's like this season of Challenge All-Stars, it's like, okay, you've got a lot of people on here that I enjoy. Folks that I give
[Erica] a shit about,
[Alex] sure. Yeah, they're fucking old, but I don't care. You know what? You're old too, Erica.

(02:14:57):
[Erica] I'm old. It's fine.
[Alex] i'm not old i don't i don't have any gray hair yet
[Erica] yes time makes fools of us all
[Alex] oh yeah they'll come for me eventually you should think
[Erica] about fallout 2 though because i have i've heard it's good and i wouldn't be like super mad about watching a good show
[Alex] okay i'll consider it
[Erica] i mean we maybe watch the first episode and we could have like a discussion what about

(02:15:19):
[Alex] three body problem
[Erica] i'm not watching anything by those people i'm done they're done so broken up it's done
[Alex] What if it turns out to be great? I
[Erica] don't care. Great. You know what? That's great for them. What
[Alex] if they do five seasons? Let's do the question. Because I think your opinion would change. They do five seasons. You hear they stick the landing and it's an incredible show. Would you then go back and watch it? That's

(02:15:45):
[Erica] one thing. Yeah, I'd probably go back. Maybe.
[Alex] See, that's reasonable.
[Erica] right but no right now right
[Alex] now no
[Erica] fuck those guys no because now you got me angry about game of thrones again do you know how insulting those last two seasons were
[Alex] it was more like three seasons but yeah where he was like what was
[Erica] the one oh well danny just forgot that the iron fleet was there how about you go fuck yourself dude really

(02:16:08):
[Alex] i'll never i'll never forget that behind the scenes video of the table read for the last season
[Erica] book on all of their faces they're
[Alex] all just like sitting there and they all know it's shit but they can't say anything and then the one guy i always forget his name was the varus or whatever who was bald He does his table read and then he just tosses the script onto the middle of the table and disgust. He couldn't even hide it. It's like, this is, I can't even, that's one of those things. Can you even believe HBO aired that? You know what I mean? Like, how does that get through the levels?

(02:16:44):
[Erica] Unless they were just kind of like, people will watch it, whatever. It's views.
[Alex] We need to fill up this amount of content and this is what we got.
[Erica] We filmed it. We may as well put it out there.
[Alex] Maybe that was the best they had.
[Erica] You heel turned Danny in the previously on of that one episode. Are you kidding me? Fuck you.

(02:17:08):
[Alex] Let's do a Game of Thrones rewatch of just the last two
[Erica] seasons. I don't think I could sit through it.
[Alex] I don't think so either. It'd be
[Erica] different now because you know, right? But when you were watching it live, it was just kind of like, oh no.
[Alex] going to turn this around right
[Erica] you kept telling yourself that if you go back and you listen to that podcast bob and i did about game of thrones what was it beyond the red waste or whatever the fuck i guarantee you at least once every single episode on that back half we were probably like oh it'll get better

(02:17:41):
[Alex] it's like it's like that meme with hayden christiansen and natalie portman where it's always like it's gonna get better right
[Erica] right when he's just sitting there yeah yeah exactly No. Yeah. Great. You know what? If you go like seven seasons and you get a movie and it's wonderful and everybody loves it. One thing. We're one episode in. No.

(02:18:04):
[Alex] All right. Hug me. Hold me tight.

(02:18:39):
[Bob] This has been a Puma Knife Production.

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SI#128 – Don’t Punch Down

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}SI#128 – Don’t Punch Down