December 20, 2023 • 74 mins
This week, Kris and Dave reignite the controversy and take a closer look at The Marvels. Did it deserve to fail, or is it a gem of a movie? They also reflect on the end of the Hollywood strikes and lament the cancellation of yet another Warner Bros. movie. Plus, new nerd commendations!
Nerd News
Coyote vs Acme shelved by WB for tax write-off
Byword Big Talk
Nerd Commendations
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
(upbeat music)
(00:02):
It's the most marvelous time of the year.
The marvels has released and we have our review.
Buckle up because the by-word starts now.
(upbeat music)
(upbeat music)
Thank you for joining us on another episode
(00:45):
of the Nerd By-word.
We are here at episode 172.
And we are reviewing the marvels,
characters that are very near and dear to our hearts
and how did it hold up in the movie?
We'll find out with our by-word big talk, but first,
it's time for some very pressing.
(upbeat music)
(01:06):
Dave, same old same old, I guess.
Yeah, it's time to queue up that incredibly memorable
queen baseline because another Warner Brothers movie
bites the dust.
It's almost comical at this point
(01:26):
if it wasn't so very, very depressing.
So the studio has actually produced a $30 million
live action animation hybrid based on the Loonitune's
characters called Kiyode versus Akmi starring
among many others former wrestler John Cena.
The filming for the movie was completed in 2022
(01:49):
and it was originally produced as a HBO Max exclusive.
And of course, as you can imagine,
giving the history of Warner Brothers,
this movie too now will never see the light of day
as it is being shelved, locked in the vault
in order to receive a tax ride off,
joining movies Batgirl and Scooby-Doo's Scoop Holiday Haunt
(02:14):
as tax ride offs.
Admittedly the movie was Greenlit
under the previous regime,
just like the other two movies that have been previously
tax ride off it.
But this one has an additional wrinkle
and that James Gunn was actually involved
in the production of this movie,
(02:34):
including being one of the producers
and helping break the story.
So in short, that seems like a very interesting choice
given the important role that Gunn now plays at Warner.
But I guess the nickel and dime counters decided
that there's more money there
(02:58):
by getting the tax ride off than actually releasing it,
which I find difficult to believe,
even if you decide that you are not gonna make
this some kind of HBO Max thing to drive people
to subscribe to the now renamed Max service.
There was definitely a possibility
of trying to release this thing direct to video
(03:18):
on making a whole bunch of money this way.
The Looney Tunes are obviously still a pretty recognizable brand.
And I find it difficult to believe
that there was not a better way to recoup this money.
So a Warner Brothers spokesperson said in a statement
with the relaunch of Warner Brothers Pictures Animation
(03:38):
in June, the studio has shifted its global strategy
to focus on theatrical releases.
With this new direction, we have made a difficult decision
not to move forward with Coyote versus Acme.
We have tremendous respect for the filmmakers cast
and crew and are grateful for their contributions to the film.
Which is of course absolute baloney,
considering how hardbroken everybody is
(03:59):
and many people who were involved with the film
have already taken the Twitter and Instagram
and various other platforms to complain in great detail
about this move, including director Dave Green,
who had previously directed a TMNT project.
So that is obviously a pedigree that you'll appreciate Chris.
(04:21):
And he said in his statement for three years,
I was lucky enough to make a movie about Wiley Coyote,
the most persistent passionate and resilient character
of all time.
I was surrounded by a brilliant team
who poured their souls into this project for years.
We were all determined to honor the legacies
of these historic characters and actually get them right.
Along the ride, we were embraced by test audience
(04:41):
who rewarded us with fantastic scores.
I'm beyond proud of the final product
and beyond devastated by WB's decision.
But in the spirit of Wiley Coyote,
resilience and persistence win the day.
I've also seen posts from people involved
in scoring the movie and releasing even snippets
of the actual score for people to hear.
(05:01):
The reaction to this online has been pretty similar
to what we've seen with something like Batgirl,
probably even a little more pronounced in the negative
because this movie was based on reports finished ready.
There was no more editing or anything required.
And the thing that is so baffling is what Green
specifically mentioned in his statement,
(05:23):
which is that it tested extremely well with audiences.
You know, there were some reports about Batgirl
in particular not testing very well
and they might have to rework some stuff
and that additional money might be necessary.
So it's maybe perhaps just a little bit easier
to make an argument for that movie to get shelved
rather than investing additional money into it.
(05:45):
But this one was basically finished
and on top of that audience,
that did see it were extremely positive about the movie.
As a big loony toons fan lifelong,
this is pretty disappointing.
I'm a big Wiley Coyote fan anyways.
And so I would have loved to see this.
And I'm starting to wonder how much more often
(06:07):
Warner under this new regime is going to be
so incredibly anti-art as to basically lock away
or destroy entire movies just for a tax write off.
It's incredibly disappointing Chris.
Yeah, I made a point.
Like I was sitting there is like,
if you're like a big name person
(06:28):
and John Cena, like all, there's somebody spinning plates
that we could go on this episode.
We're reviewing the Marvels,
which is not performing well at the box office
domestically as you pointed out.
And is that a signifier of quality film?
Of course not.
(06:51):
John Cena on the other hand,
being involved in this project is a fascinating person
because that ties into my new story, the end of the strike.
He, while the strike was ongoing,
he made a return to the WWE and like, in my opinion,
which I am watching regularly.
My opinion was kind of a lackluster.
(07:13):
However, he did bump up like self-role kind of up in commerce
and kind of give them the John Cena rub
as the self-proclaimed goat,
the greatest of all time, many WWE fans see him
as one of the upper echelon superstars of the modern era.
And for him, and he's done well in my nerd accommodation.
(07:36):
He's in my nerd accommodation as well today.
And he performs well there.
And so he's a big name star.
And for, if you're a big name star with that kind of clout,
why are you signing up for WB projects?
Maybe you're content with taking the paycheck and moving on.
(07:57):
Like, I would assume he's still getting some kind of compensation for this.
And if that's how you feel, then God bless and go on.
But if, and I know if you're a small timer,
if you're a background person, if you're an up-and-comer,
you don't necessarily have that luxury.
But like, how is this salvageable?
(08:20):
Like, how can WB possibly face at this point?
Now granted, Max has great content on that app.
Like, it is heavily in my rotation of streamers.
But I'm just at a loss for what the strategy is here,
moving forward.
(08:41):
Like, as hopeful as I want to be for an invigorated DCU,
I don't know. I don't know, man, at this point.
Yeah, as far as from the actor's perspective,
if you actually want people to see your work,
Warner doesn't seem to be the place to go these days, right?
But even as any creative individual,
(09:02):
like as a director, for example,
like if this new regime is so quick to just shelf something
for a tax ride off,
like how many more tax ride-offs can Warner get at this point?
It seems almost ludicrous, right?
Someone retweeted something that was from January of this year.
(09:25):
So 10 months ago, 10 months ago, and said,
"Oh, the tax ride off that era for WB, Zazlove said, was over."
Well, apparently not.
And how do you feel if your James Gunn,
and you have signed on to be such a preeminent position
for such a well-beloved franchise like DC,
(09:48):
you know, it's not been portrayed all that well,
cinematically, but there's still strong fan bases
for DC comics and those characters.
I'm right over here, yes, I'm right over here.
And you sign on and you are not immune to this,
and the project that you have spent years on,
this is how you're treated.
I hope that check is worth it, bud,
(10:12):
because, in a way.
Yeah, that's just a very messed up situation.
All right, Chris, so you bring us some positive news
and I'm glad to hear something positive for a change.
So let's do that.
Well, the reason that we feel comfortable
opening today's episode four, a review of the Marvels
is because the SAG actress strike is over.
(10:34):
Strike is over.
Now, there is still voting to be done
as of the time of recording in the coming weeks
for SAG after members to vote on this,
but 86% of the negotiation board agreed to this
trying to cover some of the details that are important here.
We have wage increases,
(10:57):
a 7% basic minimum increase,
4% in July, 2024, 3.5% in July 2025.
There's also wage increases for streaming revenue.
Now, how much, how often that's going to be enacted
remains to be seen.
(11:20):
There are protections for artificial intelligence.
Wage increases for background actors, which is really cool.
I think my favorite detail, which was really neat
is hair and makeup representation
for different skin tones, different hair textures.
And one, that should have just been like a dub,
(11:43):
intimacy coordinators on all sets
when you're filming scenes like that.
That can be a sticky situation.
So all signs point to a successful negotiation
and this just shows, in my opinion, the power
(12:04):
when you have strong unions
and you don't take bull crap from the man as it were.
So good on you and we will always champion
workers' rights on this show.
Testify.
This is really exciting, not the least of which I will freely admit.
(12:25):
It's nice to be able to actually talk about some movie
and television projects again, like we are going to today,
not that it's not been a fun era to focus more on comic books
and video games, but you and I are very much a variety
is the spice of life kind of people.
So being able to bounce a little bit more from topic to topic
is going to be nice again.
(12:46):
So doing a movie review this week is something
that I've been looking forward to for a while.
But everything that's been reported so far
on the deal is exactly what the actors have been after
for a while and I'm really, really excited
that they were able to pull this off.
And just see everybody kind of get back to work
in the entertainment industry and start producing again
(13:06):
is just going to be exciting I guess,
and televisions coming back, we're going to have abbreviated
seasons for some stuff, but things are rolling again.
It looks like the most important film personally for me,
Superman Legacy is not even losing its release date
as of right now because apparently there's been
some production design or something going on in the background.
(13:29):
So they're actually able to jump into film
pretty much immediately.
So that's really, really exciting.
It's just it's good to see things get back to it.
As huge pop culture nerds, this is where I've read this
buttered and seeing things happening again and moving
and shaking again is absolutely fantastic.
Absolutely.
(13:50):
All right, that wraps up nerd news for this week
when we return from our first break.
We will be reviewing the Marvels.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
All right, we are back for our main segment.
We call it our byword.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
(14:10):
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And it's been a while since we've been in this seat reviewing
films or television series, but in case you need a refresher,
we typically like to have three big likes a piece
and three big dislikes.
Some of those dislikes can stretch into nitpicks
(14:32):
because we overall enjoyed the project.
But we like to have a balanced approach when we review something.
And then we'll give it an overall grade as people in our day
job are wanting to do, are wanting to do.
But first, Dave, far and away, I could have put this
(14:53):
in the shared document for you, but your first like on the film.
Well, it's probably no surprise
as a huge Miss Marvel fan that Kamala Khan to me
was to stand out of this movie, particularly,
I think in the first half.
She very, very strongly carries her and her family
and all the real fun stuff, especially
(15:15):
when they introduce the notion of switching.
Every time they use their power simultaneously,
how the three characters switch places.
All the most fun stuff somehow happens either
with Kamala Khan's family or with Kamala Khan herself.
I particularly love the moment where she switches
with Carol and is on this planet.
(15:37):
And Carol was fighting all these guys.
And the darn flurk and just like swallows a person
and she's just screaming at the top of her.
Like, oh, I got what just happened.
It's such a perfectly, pitch perfectly acted moment
and so, so Miss Marvel, like straight root from the comics.
I think, oh, my favorite is when she starts talking
(15:58):
to the crew and then Carol shows up and goes,
oh, Kamala, don't talk to them.
(laughs)
She, I will say that in Manvalani continues
to be just a perfect embodiment of this character
every time she's on screen.
And I get such a kick out of the fact that, you know,
Marvel still has the capability, apparently,
to do this absolute pitch perfect casting.
(16:21):
I still think she's probably the best casting
that Marvel has done this face period
and that's saying something because they've had
a few bangers as far as casting is concerned.
But she's just at the top of the list for me.
Everything in this movie that had anything to do with her
was basically flawless.
And I'm saying that sure from a fans perspective of character,
(16:43):
but it's, you know, there's so many adaptations
that play, you know, hard and loose
with a particular character to kind of bend the character
into the story that they're trying to tell.
But in this particular case, I feel it continues on
that the MCU version of Miss Marvel,
despite the tweak in powers from personality
(17:06):
and, you know, just behavior and reactions and everything
is probably one of the best adaptations in the MCU.
And so seeing her again, absolute joy for me in this movie.
Yeah, I totally agree.
And I feel like she's like the heart of this project
and she's the connective tissue between all three
(17:27):
of the characters, all three of the main characters
more on that in a moment.
But, and then like the family element,
like I feel like even with what I love about
Kamala's family is like they're so inviting
and they're so loving and so like Monica,
Carol, Fury, even like they're immediately part of that
(17:50):
that group, so to speak, like immediately.
Like there's a caring there.
I will say that Munibakon is the greatest character
in the history of the MCU and I will stand by that.
Like I love her to the moon and back.
Like she's the best.
And I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better
(18:12):
spokesperson or kind of flagship individual
for the MCU moving forward as they are kind of in a
season of change.
I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better person
to help whether that changed the Naman Balani.
Absolutely man.
(18:33):
I am very interested to talk about your first like here.
I think it's definitely something that we can agree on.
Yeah, so I love, I think my overall thing
that makes me love this movie is it's unapologetic
to the source material.
It's unapologetically a comic book movie
(18:56):
and a lot of the times when comic book movies
kind of fall short for me is where they try to play
to the Genpop or the mass audiences
or the, let's call it is the loser critics
in mass media, the film critics, the Oscar heads,
(19:18):
if you will.
Like so I love that it's unapologetically silly.
It's a comic book movie like the Flurkins,
like the escape strategy of the Flurkins
as your exit strategy.
There's not enough skate pods.
That's okay, just let them completely just eat you
(19:42):
and then they'll just regurgitate you
when we get back on earth.
Like that's our escape strategy
and like that's like one of the biggest climaxes
of the film is hey, all you crew members on this space station
allow yourself to be eaten by these unassuming cat-like creatures
(20:03):
with tentacles inside of it.
It's just, I absolutely love it.
Like the musical planet, like they're then making
tarot like a Disney princess as it were.
Like that was just my only criticism of it is I wanted more.
So we'll get to that in the dislikes,
but like I just love that this is,
(20:25):
I think I said it was like a 70s or 80s Marvel team up book
but with like a much updated like sensibility for equality
and equity and like social awareness.
So like if you can have like one of those books
set in that era without like the tropes
(20:46):
and like the stuff that doesn't age well.
- Yeah, it reminds me a little bit of like one of those 80s
buddy cop movies only less cop, more superhero
and it's three characters instead of just two,
but it really liked the idea of like having these very disparate
characters, you know, teaming up for the story
and trying to find common ground and finding the humor in that.
(21:09):
It reminds me of sort of that kind of movie making,
like you said, updated for, you know, more modern time.
But yeah, it really feels comic booky
and as a huge comic book nerd, you know,
what more can you want from a comic book movie
than actually feel like it could have been a story
in an actual comic book?
- Absolutely love this about this movie.
- Yeah, so your second like we have hinted at
(21:32):
but let's lean full force into it.
- Yeah, so I have my critiques of the movie.
I don't think it was flawless,
but I think the thing that carried the movie
through line from start to finish
was the chemistry between the three leads.
I think whatever was going on there
(21:52):
was lightning in the bottle.
Considering, you know, how these were characters
that were, you know, they were not cast for chemistry,
you know, like these were all people that were cast
in individual projects and then thrown together
for this movie.
And so the fact that they bounce off of each other
so effortlessly and so flawlessly is so lucky for the MCU
(22:15):
because this is the kind of chemistry
that usually you constantly are doing, you know,
repeated screen tests for and you're trying to find
the chemistry between the characters
and these two work, but this one doesn't,
let's get somebody else in here for that.
And there's so much experimentation
to try to find this kind of chemistry.
(22:36):
And the MCU just basically stumbled into it
because I don't think there was any reports that like,
you know, for example, you know, when they cast
in Anvalani that they even put her on screen
with Brie Larson or anything to see
if there's chemistry there or something, you know?
And it is really the MCU just stumbled into absolutely fireworks
(22:56):
of chemistry between these three characters
and these three actors.
And it's joyous when they're on screen together
and they get the bounce off of each other
like it's indescribable fun.
Even when what's on the page necessarily doesn't work perfectly,
they sort of make it work.
I think my favorite moment in the movie period
(23:17):
is when the three characters are trying to get a grip
on the switching and they do like jump rope and stuff together
just trying to, you know, time their switching rights.
- The best sequence on the film, right?
- Best sequence by far, yeah.
And I just absolutely completely 100% carried
by the chemistry of these three women.
And it was just like, I know there's gonna be a lot set
(23:38):
about box office and whether this movie is successful,
blah, blah, blah.
But as far as just these characters interacting
and bouncing off of each other,
like I would love to see more of this.
You know, if there's, you know, gonna be another sequel
to cap Marvel, this is what I want.
I want these three characters in a room together again
because it's absolutely pitch perfect
(23:59):
how they interact with each other.
- I think does it make me sad
the domestic box office, yes.
But I think using that as a criticism of this film
is a disingenuous argument.
This is a feature film that came out
of the film, it was released the day the strike was over.
(24:23):
But you and I both know that blockbusters like this
have pressed tours for at least a month
before its release.
Like Tom Hiddleston and Brie Larson,
the news broke and by the next day,
they were on the Tonight Show.
Like, so I really, like, would it be great
(24:47):
if they surprised us and it performs incredibly well
and it has this great comeback story, sure.
But I'm not using that to color my appreciation of this film.
So I think I know we're in the likes section,
but I want to like make that very, very clear.
But for me, the chemistry is what carries this film
(25:10):
and it makes it rewatchable, what makes it stand out.
And I think it's a testament to each three
of the performers to Brie Larson, to Tiana Paris,
to Amon Valani, to their malleability.
I have not seen any other Amon Valani projects
(25:33):
other than Ms. Marvel.
I've seen bits and pieces of they cloned Tyrone
with Tiana Paris.
I've not seen Candy Man, I wanna see it.
And I've not seen a whole lot of other Brie Larson work,
but I know her range based on clips that I've seen.
So this is not like the most informed opinion in the world.
(25:55):
But based on what I have seen,
I think it's a testament to their malleability
and their acting range.
You also have like the behind the scenes stuff
that we were treated to with like the group chat
with Nia de Costa, like Amon Valani,
while Brie Larson is going on the tonight show,
you have Tiana Paris and Amon Valani out at dinner
(26:17):
for Nia de Costa's birthday.
Like you just have, we kind of lucked into these women
who seemingly just have a genuine affection for one another
and we are reaping the benefits as the audience.
- And I certainly hope that they're not done
(26:37):
with these characters bouncing off of each other.
Like just even if they feel ultimately like this movie
underperformed, it is not because of the chemistry
between the actors.
I think they really lucked into something
that should definitely be further explored.
- I think we are ripe for that story
to be told with how the movie ended.
I think Monica may very well be on her own kind of journey.
(27:01):
We'll see how that story continues.
But I think that Carol and Kamala, I don't know
because maybe Kamala is going a young Avengers,
full spoilers for a movie that you probably should have seen
if you pressed play on this episode.
But so we'll just get into the end credits
(27:24):
and post credits and all the credits.
I think the young Avengers route is really interesting.
I'm interested to see how they fill out that cast officially.
We've had all the rumors.
Rumors is the day is long.
We've had all the rumors.
So I'm interested to see how that goes
(27:47):
but I think also like that final scene
at the house in Louisiana for Carol and Kamala,
I don't think we should throw that away either
because I think there's some beautiful potential there.
And then I think Monica, of course it's freaking beast
would be the first X-Men character in the MCU, but of course it is.
(28:08):
- Ah, ah, but I know too.
- Though I find that very interesting.
Did you note though that he was actually full CGI this time?
I found that interesting because they were able
to kind of keep Kelsey Grammar whose voice is actually
really really good for beast
without having to deal with the limitations of his age.
So these look good.
(28:29):
Like I was kind of shocked how well that model was developed
considering that they've not done this before.
It's not like with the Hulk, where there's all this history
in the back of trying to figure out how the best way
to do the Hulk and they did all the movements and everything
and scanned in the performance and everything.
Like none of that really exists it.
And he looked really, really good.
(28:50):
Like I was kind of shocked how good the CG was on him there.
- If you know anything about the trajectory
of the character of Hank McCoy,
you'll fully appreciate just how perfect
the casting of Kelsey Grammar.
If you know anything about the real life of Kelsey Grammar
is, yeah.
It's on point, but I'm still side-ying it.
(29:11):
I do love because Carol Danvers, veteran X-Men fans
will know, like Claremont had a lot to do with Carol Danvers
back in the 70s and 80s.
And then of course also did the X-Men.
So Carol Danvers featured as a very important character
(29:31):
in X-Men for a very long time.
And so, seeing, I think binaries, the moniker
that they gave Maria's character,
but this kind of seeing that as like an on-ramp
for the X-Men was fascinating and really, really cool to see.
(29:52):
- I'm just gonna say that Rogue just needs to stay away from Carol.
Let's just be clear on that.
Rogue is not allowed to touch Carol in any way she performs.
Stay away.
I don't want any of that.
- I'm kind of fascinated to see it, especially, you know,
if it's been when we get casting.
I don't know, I went off on a tangent there,
(30:15):
but I'm really excited to see,
I think we're still in your second light.
Yeah, I'm really excited to see what the future holds
and hopefully we get more of these three together.
- That brings us to your second light.
And I'm very interested in what you have to say here
because I'm not 100% sure I agree.
I think there's gonna be a little bit of split in here.
(30:35):
- I might, I don't wanna get into the dislikes
for the runtime that we got.
I will say that.
I think each of the three leads had a proportional time
to shine.
(30:57):
Monica cooked with that scene, the fight scene
in the cons residence, like where she was going through guys,
like Kitty Pride was crying and throwing up in the corner,
the way she was phasing through guys.
So I really enjoyed Monica's moments there,
her being the person to make the heroic sacrifice as it were.
(31:21):
I know she's in another dimension now or another reality,
if you will, universe.
But kind of her being the person,
like I love that moment for her
and like how beautiful she looked in that moment.
That was really, really cool.
You had Carol being a complex character.
(31:42):
Like she wasn't one note,
didn't give her enough time to breathe,
really, but more on that later.
And then Kamala being like the central nervous system
of all of these characters.
So do I want more runtime?
Yes.
But for what we got, I love that they were all featured.
(32:05):
- You know, I think I can agree with this more than
I initially thought with what it looked like on the page.
Yeah, I think they did actually decent job bouncing
from character to character.
I didn't feel like there was like a main lead
and then like supporting characters.
It felt like there were three leads.
And that is not always easy for Hollywood to pull off.
(32:27):
But I think in this case, they really did.
It really felt like three leads,
co-equal characters rather than one main lead
and two after thoughts.
And that was a good move, I think, for this movie.
- Yeah.
And we kind of danced around this a little bit,
but your third like, I think, really carried.
- Yeah.
(32:47):
So one of the most unique things in the movie
and the thing that I think worked the best in this movie
was the quantum entanglement angle
where they actually did this whole thing
where the characters would switch places
if they use their powers at the same time.
And in the first half of the film, this led to a lot of fun,
(33:09):
you know, and light humor as they switch places
in ways that they didn't mean to
and we have a lot of interesting sequences
coming out of that Carol at Kamala's house, for example,
Kamala going free fall and Monica trying to save her.
Those sorts of moments, the confusion of it all,
(33:30):
lend a really interesting urgency to every move that they were making
every time that they would use their powers
who were unsure if it would go sideways.
And that was really, really good in the first tap.
And then we had that--
- I know how you feel about the powers of Kamala and everything,
but that did have some nice features for this new powers.
(33:51):
That sequence.
- Yeah, I think all of this made it basically worth it.
Like if this was the angle they were taking,
of course, the entanglement is over now, you know?
So it would be nice if they, after this movie,
they could still like tap into that,
like purposefully do a swap
because what I think made the second half
of the movie work really well is when they were starting to get
(34:12):
a hold of the switching and they started using it in battle
and purpose and we started getting some very interesting action
sequences.
I'm thinking like probably the best X-Men scene to me
in the Fox X-Men movies was Night Crawler at the beginning
of X-2, you know?
- Probably low bar, but yes, incredible low bar, but yeah.
(34:33):
- It was basically that on Roads, you know,
with three characters, instead of just one,
like the movement and the fluidity
of them swapping back and forth
and using that to their advantage
was a ton of fun to watch.
And there were plenty of times where I wish I could just like
immediately sit down and watch it again,
just to get more sense for those sequences
(34:54):
because they were fast paced and we're throwing a lot of stuff
at you, but they were visually super interesting.
It was probably the switching mechanic basically
of the movie was sort of the backbone of what made
the action scenes visually interesting in comparison
to some other super hero flicks.
I really, really liked this.
(35:16):
I think they could have leaned into it even more,
but what they did with it was absolutely awesome.
- Yeah, I love the fight choreography on this.
Like it harkened back to something like Shang-Xhi
with like that was one of the strengths of that film
was the fight, but yeah, I think it was really smartly done.
But yeah, I loved like that one scene
(35:39):
that we kind of got in the trailer
of them just going back and forth
while they're fighting the final boss.
Yeah, I really, really, really enjoyed that element.
- All right, that brings us to your final like
and as a cat daddy, I am not surprised
that this is something that you really appreciate it.
- I just love the flurkins.
(36:00):
I love everything about it.
Like the, there's so much canine propaganda in pop,
(laughing)
there's so much on like, what, look at that dog.
It's a dog, dog, dog, dog.
I don't know why I went in New Jersey with the,
but I'm just kind of exhausted by it.
I also, as of the time recording,
had to check on my mom's dogs
and one of them bit me in the stomach yesterday.
(36:21):
So I'm like, yeah, I don't like dogs.
(laughing)
So, seeing like cats kind of get some of that screen time
was really, really cool, especially when you're not really a cat,
you're an alien.
And I still say like the,
the escape sequence, the escape plan sequence
(36:42):
was just peak comic book movie,
unapologetically comic book movie.
And it was, it was just great, it was perfect.
You and I also talked about like,
goose cleaning himself as a cat does,
as I'm sitting here with my cat next to me,
cleaning himself, like, yeah.
So, I think, I thought it was perfect.
And it's really interesting too because
(37:05):
Breelarson is incredibly allergic to cats.
And so they had to go like CGI with goose in the first film,
I know, I'm not sure how they got around it
this time around, but kudos.
- Yeah, now the Floorkins were great,
great comic relief.
(37:27):
I wish that, you know, like, I always find
that really good comic relief is a running joke
that goes through the movie and then turns a little serious
at the end.
And I think they tried to do that with the whole act of Floorkins,
you know, are save everybody on the station
because they can swallow all these people up
and then regurgitate them.
But even that scene came across as incredibly humorous.
(37:51):
And so, there's never that moment
where the joke kind of turns serious,
which I think would have been fun.
I think, I'm gonna talk a lot about this kind of thing
in my dislike, so I don't wanna harp on it.
But I will agree that the presence of the Floorkins
was extremely positive for this movie.
- All right, Dave, something, as we head into the dislikes,
(38:11):
something that we agreed upon,
although what you have in parentheses,
I think is a little too harsh.
- I'm not, I'm not equaling the two, okay?
Let me, let me, let me, let me,
I'm very clear of that.
- I was, I'm not, I'm saying it's a similar issue,
but it's a, it's also a matter of scale, I think.
(38:33):
I think to me, one of the big problems
when we talked about Ant-Man and the Wasp Quantumania
is that it didn't feel always like it wanted to deal
with the emotional fallout of some of the things that happened.
I was, I was particularly disappointed looking back at that,
at that review that we did,
with how little they spent dealing
(38:57):
with the emotional fallout of the blip
and the fact that Ant-Man was gone
for a huge chunk of his daughters upbringing
and they never really deal with that.
They never lean into that strong enough.
It's hinted at and then glossed over
and then everybody just kind of moves on.
And I think that some of that is happening in this movie too.
(39:19):
I think that the emotional stakes never went big enough.
And I wish that they would have really leaned into that.
And I know this is a too-witched sword.
I know that this movie is already dealing
with plenty of misogyny online being thrown its way.
And I can just imagine if they would have went bigger
with the emotional content,
then it would be like,
(39:39):
"Oh, look, there's these three emotional women
that are trying to do."
- The Michael Burnham of it all.
- Exactly.
And I understand the hesitance to do that.
But I think it's becoming,
for whatever the motivation is,
it's becoming a pattern across MCU movies
that they're not really ringing emotionally true anymore.
(40:00):
They never pushed themselves far enough.
For example, when we're dealing with Monica
and Carol in this movie,
that resentment is so quickly pushed aside and moved on from
just a couple of very short scenes.
They never have a real blow up,
they never really lay into each other.
(40:21):
The guilt that Carol deals with for not coming back,
the fact that Monica needed her,
that the whole blip thing,
they never really let that,
they never really throw that relationship in the slow cooker
and let it slowly build pressure and then release.
It's just like, here's a couple of quick scenes
and let's move on from that, we're having fun.
(40:44):
And to a certain extent, I understand that.
I know that this is a very fun flick,
but there is so much ripe, dramatic potential here.
And I think one of the great pushes
in polls of earlier MCU entries
was that they were able to be both dramatic and humorous.
And I think maybe the scales are tipping a little too far
into the humor sometimes because it's becoming
(41:07):
now a thing where it doesn't feel emotionally always honest.
There is a moment in the movie where Carol sort of snaps
at Kamala early on and then like five minutes later
in the movie she says, hey, sorry for snapping at you.
And it's just, they move on.
And that's it, right?
And I think that there is a real missed opportunity
in Kamala and her hero worship being very difficult
(41:31):
for Carol to deal with because Carol is carrying
disgilt about Hala around with her this whole movie, right?
And then maybe being a little harsh towards her,
being annoyed with the hero worship.
And we don't quite understand why until they get to this big
reveal about what happened with Hala
and that she blames herself and it's her fault
and she doesn't think she's worthy, right?
(41:52):
And then that twists that around and gives us a new perspective
on the characters.
It also would have be hoved a little bit for Kamala
to go through a process of dealing with her hero worship
a little, you know, like starting in this hero worship
mode and slowly come to the realization that Carol is human
and flawed and maybe they won't get along
and then meeting in the middle finally at the end, you know?
(42:13):
So these emotional arcs are all hinted at in the movie.
But they're very flat, they're very static.
There isn't a slow build to a grand crescendo
in these relationships, right?
And that's kind of, you know, that is one of the main problems
to me of the movie, especially when you have three leads
(42:34):
that are so good with each other and have such great chemistry,
you know, really giving them a few dramatic scenes
where they really are bumping heads to chew on
and then coming out of that conflict the other end stronger
and more bound together, that's the kind of stuff
that I'm here for.
So is it as extreme as quantum mania in missing the mark
(42:55):
when it comes to the emotional content?
No, I don't think so.
And I think that the creators of this movie
were aware of the dramatic potential
and hint at it throughout, but it feels very truncated
in those areas.
And that's, I'll talk a little bit more about
some other missed opportunities, but I think to me
that is the overall tale of this movie is that it's good
(43:18):
and it's fun and that's wonderful,
but I think it could have been great.
Like I think there's so much more that was left on the table
particularly in the relationship between these three women
that could have, you know,
it could have had a little bit more meat on the bones
of this movie, I think Chris.
Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and color outside the lines here
and kind of merge my first dislike
(43:40):
because it's very similar.
It's very tangential.
And that's the fact that it's very rushed.
In fact, I saw a fan theory where that this film
is told from Kamala's perspective and that makes sense.
Because we skirt past all the heavy stuff
and we talk about the good stuff
and the hero worshipy stuff and like,
hey, look at this awesome stuff.
But I think, and when I say it's rushed
(44:07):
and when I say the motion,
when I agree with you that the motions need to be bigger
and that needs to be room to breathe
in some of those scenes and some of that stuff needs to play out.
Some of this may be having off screen.
I think Monica in particular is asked to forgive
a whole hell of a lot
in a very short amount of time.
(44:29):
She has this person who is almost like a parental guardian
type figure and this was kind of the inherent
problem with making her a child in the first Captain Marvel movie.
And now that, that, you know, that problem has come home to roost
(44:53):
where she's a grown woman greeted after 30 years.
We're saying 30 years of abandonment by Carol
with a childhood nickname.
Pike just, hey, it's been a week or two since I've seen you.
No, it's been 30 years.
And you can have all the good intentions of the world
(45:15):
of saving all parts of the galaxy, but it cannot be
at the cost of your loved ones.
Or at the very least, if it is at the cost of your loved ones,
then you need to do a lot of, you know,
heavy lifting to repair that relationship.
And I don't think that happened here.
I don't think enough of that happened here.
(45:39):
Now, I agree with all the other points it just felt like Maria
can, excuse me, Monica and Maria, but Monica continues to get
short-changed in these, in these scenarios.
I don't even want to go on a tangent on the one division of it all
of how she was treated, mistreated.
So yeah, it felt very rushed and it felt
(46:06):
very, it's funny because when you were laying it out
of like how it could have played out, Tony Stark was allowed
that moment in Captain America Civil War.
He was allowed that emotional heft when he finds out
that Bucky Barnes was the person that killed his parents.
He was allowed that levity.
(46:30):
He was allowed that time to be righteous anger, if you would,
to experience righteous anger, if you will.
But now we have a film with a female director
with three female leads, two of which are women of color,
and they are not allowed that levity.
That's a problem.
(46:51):
And maybe if we rope quantum media in with this,
yes, I'll even allow if we want to rope Thor 11 Thunder
into this, it seems if we're putting point A to B
to C that post infinity war and end game,
Fiege, whoever you want to say is hesitant to put audiences
(47:16):
through that amount of emotional bereavement, if you will,
like with what we had with the snap and all of that stuff,
they're not as committed to break the hearts of our audiences.
The one exception is Wakanda forever,
(47:39):
which read into that what you will.
I think the real world forced that onto them.
I think the MCU has found itself in a place
where they want to just make light-hearted popcorn flicks.
And that is fine to a certain extent,
but that doesn't mean that those movies don't deserve
(48:02):
a strong emotional through line.
And you can make a fun popcorn flick
that has a strong emotional through line.
And to your point, you're right, the movie was too short, right?
But I'm not saying we need to like a three hour epic here or something.
I think at 10 to 15 minutes,
10 to 15 minutes to spend a little bit more time
(48:24):
with the emotional arc of the movie,
I think you come out of this with a much, much stronger flick.
And I'll talk a little bit more about some other missed opportunities later
with my last dislike, but I think the runtime is part of the problem here.
I think everything is a little truncated,
(48:45):
and the emotional arcs are one of the things that got short-changed here.
Speaking of being short-changed,
I think we're going to probably tie in our second dislikes again here,
but go off, Dave.
So I'm going to tell you right now,
I cannot recall for the life of me the name of the villain of this movie.
I know your name is how we asked in,
but unfortunately, that's mostly because she's married to Tom Hiddleston.
(49:07):
But I'm asking sincerely, do you after watching the movie Remember the Name of the main antagonist?
I'm pretty good. I'm pretty good with names. I think it's dark then.
Let me go go go go go.
I see that's what I'm saying though.
I am okay with names, not maybe like,
not maybe as good as a script here,
but I'm usually decent with names and I could not remember the name.
(49:28):
And that is a problem.
Because this villain here had tremendous potential because let's just go ahead and say it,
"Darben was right."
Carol came to her planet and messed with stuff that she probably should have not
messed with the way she did.
She thought she was liberating everybody and instead she pooped the bed and the whole
(49:50):
planet ended up, you know, a complete mess.
And she had every right to be mad about this, right?
And so there is a great
a great hook between the villain and one of the main characters that the main character,
Carol did something wrong, horrible to this woman's entire planet and civilization.
(50:12):
And she should try to make it right.
But at the same time, this is a villain and she's doing it the wrong way, right?
So there is beautiful conflict baked into the base concept.
And yet for some reason, the villain is incredibly flat in this movie, right?
I'm always looking for these great moments, right?
(50:32):
And there it is.
It's not because of their performance because that performance.
The performance?
No, I'm not complete.
I'm not.
No, this is on the page, man.
This is the writing wasn't there for this villain, right?
And maybe this again, because the movie was rushed and the emotional stuff, which was
short-changed, but the core concept of the villain was an emotional anger connection with
(50:56):
Carol Danvers.
And then they didn't lean into that.
Not nearly strong enough to make this a memorable villain.
And how fast she ended up being dispatched at the end just for the main villain is not suddenly
a hole in space that needs to be closed.
Like, you know what I'm saying?
She didn't even really factor than in the grand finale of the movie.
(51:19):
And I'm saying it's true.
Marvel has a villain problem.
Like their villains are never as memorable as they should be.
They, you know, they can pull off at Thanos, for example, but, but for the most part in these
like standalone movies, more often than not, the villains are just very undercooked.
(51:40):
It's like they don't want to really lean into the villain and like, they know said good
writing, man.
Thanos just had good writing, right?
What was a flawless, no, that was intentional because they were building something.
A lot of these one off villains, they don't, they see them as a means to an end.
They don't see them as a final end game.
And that's a problem.
(52:00):
Yeah, it is because every, every villain should be treated as a significant threat, right?
I mean, at the end, they even say like, like Kamala's mom says to her, hey, you saved the whole
world, you saved the universe.
And it never felt like it was a universe level threat, you know, the villain just kind
of stumbling around with his bangled punching holes in the reality, you know, like, oops.
(52:24):
You know, it's just it never felt.
Like a significant threat.
And like you said, the performance was definitely there, but it wasn't on the page.
And I think one of the things that Marvel has to do at some point is take a long look in the mirror and say,
what are we doing with our villains here?
You know, when you, when you reflect a little bit on, on the stuff that works over at DC and it's not a lot,
(52:49):
let's admit it.
OK, the DC movies have been pretty poopy.
But when you look at one that works, it always circles back around a really strong memorable villain performance, right?
When you look at Heath Ledger's Joker, for example, or if you look at the, if you look at the riddler and the penguin and their performances in the Batman,
(53:11):
even if you look at like Michael Shannon in Man of Steel, like his sword was very, very good, right?
So you hit me with a memorable villain performance and it elevates the project overall.
And here the performance certainly was, was there, but it just did not exist on the page.
And an actor cannot, you know, pull additional scenes that help make the villain more compelling on the page out of thin air, right?
(53:38):
There's only so much an actor can do at that point.
And so I think, I think the MCU needs to spend a little bit more time letting their villains cook just a little more.
Yeah, and that's why I said my second dislike was the more Cree buildup was necessary.
I mean, you think about how integral Cree,
CreeDum is with Carol Danvers.
(54:00):
I mean, it's part of her DNA.
Make with that what you will, but like, so more of that buildup was necessary.
And it just, it simply wasn't there.
And it is a continual problem.
All right, let's, let's, let's go with your final dislike for the Marvels tape.
(54:22):
For me, the entire movie, as I've mentioned, is kind of a tale of missed opportunities.
And my biggest dislike was just that they didn't let, you know, the emotions run as hot and as high as they could have in order to make this, you know, extremely compelling, right?
But that is not the only missed opportunity we're dealing with here.
(54:44):
As I'm watching the movie, I always think this is where they could go with this and they didn't, you know, this is where they could go if they fully commit and they don't.
Great example. So they go to this planet where everybody communicates in song, right?
You got Brelarson who's a singer and a good one at that, right?
And they do this little tiny dance duet thing and it's cute and all blah, blah, blah.
(55:08):
And then the water gets sucked out, right, from the planet to go to Hala and that's it.
We're just done with this place. We're done with her, you know, marriage of convenience husband. We have no idea what happened to him.
We never go back to the planet. We never solve the problem of the water being gone.
And one of the things I'm thinking through all this is imagine again, if they would lean into the emotion of it.
(55:31):
And we could have these people who communicate through song singing this beautiful sad lamentation as their planet is dying, you know, and you could hit the audience in the fields and immediately make the audience feel the stakes of what is happening here and make the villain.
Therefore, even feel more dangerous because you are directly confronted with the pain of these characters as their planet is dying around them because the water got sucked out of it, you know.
(56:00):
And so why not lean into this musical thing if you're if you're introducing it, you introduce it and you have a little goofy fun with it.
But then you're not you're not willing to flip around and make it this this emotional moment as well, right.
The same thing applies to the first planet they go to and things go sideways, right.
Like we get this moment where Kamala feels bad because they can't save everybody and then, you know, brush it off. We got to move on, right.
(56:26):
And I think that Kamala being as as softhearted and good as she is would have probably struggled significantly more with that.
And then you could circle around towards the end where she maybe gets to actually save some people and feel like that sort of a, you know, redemption for her because she failed earlier on if that makes sense.
Right. Like there's all these little moments peppered throughout. I'm like, that's really cool.
(56:50):
Now, are you going to turn this up to 11? Are you going to push it a little harder? You know, and then they don't.
And that thing with the song planet in particular just really bugged me because that is such a cool idea to play with.
And then you introduce it for a one-off joke and then completely drop the idea, drop the concept.
(57:10):
Suddenly the prince is bilingual and can speak and then something happens to the planet and you never deal with the fall out of that.
You never go back to it. You never deal with those characters again.
I think there were so many cool moments in there that could have been great moments and we just didn't get those.
And that just makes me sad for the movie, you know.
(57:33):
Yeah, speaking of missed opportunities, my greatest disappointment with the MCU probably is the scrolls because
and I'm just going to go ahead with with my third dislike and they're kind of malleable. We are I think we're of a similar mindset with this film.
Are we going to do something with them or not? Because I think my favorite thing from the first Captain Marvel movie,
(58:01):
which overly hated by misogynistic pieces of crap. But I enjoyed it and my favorite thing about it was
reinterpreting the scrolls as refugees. And I thought that was such a fascinating thing. And then we have
I really enjoyed the beginning parts of Secret Invasion.
(58:25):
And then it just
do do just everybody project out. You remember the beginning of Scary Movie 2, Dave?
Yes, everybody's just vomiting on each other like that that parody of the exercise where everybody's just
you vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit that was the final half of Secret Invasion and you see
(58:48):
stuff behind the scenes and you understand why. But like so like are we going to do something with these scrolls
or not? And I think it's probably the biggest missed opportunity of the MCU at large is to do something with this
really interesting real life analogy. And we don't know what to do with it. Keep fumbling that bag.
(59:11):
So yeah, I'm right there with you. Now I'm not going to judge this movie too harshly on that
because of I'm going to be protective of it because number one because of the characters and all of the
bulls the bull crap that it's going to get from the worst elements of
(59:31):
Andum and the internet. Yeah, we're looking at you Alan Ang. Yeah, but oh man he did some follow-up stuff
like defending him and it just made it worse. But yeah, so I think when you love something I think you
(59:52):
critique it and you want to make it better. So yeah, I think I think the scrolls are one of the greatest
disappointments I've had with the MCU and just another kind of symptom of the same kind of medical
condition if you will. It's hilarious to me that secret invasion was apparently so unpopular that
(01:00:13):
they just completely ignored in this movie. Like wasn't the main beef of the scrolls in secret invasion
that it's been like 20 years and Nick Fury didn't actually help them find a new home and then you
started this movie in their own later. Like 30 years and not one planet was like okay, not one.
But what cracks me up is in the beginning of this movie they're all sitting happily on their own
(01:00:37):
planet and I'm like wasn't the beef at the beginning of secret invasion that they didn't have
their own planet? What happened? Well, it was like a refugee camp like was that. But I mean like
we all watch an episode of Star Trek. Like how many times have we seen that story play out of like
people who need a place to live? Like come on. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I agree that the scrolls are
(01:01:02):
interesting. Either interpretation is actually interesting. What they've done in the comic books
has been interesting with them too. What they're doing, what they were doing in cap Marvel with them
was interesting and then ever since they just kind of dropped the ball with them. And I think there
were built, I wish they were building towards something with the scrolls because they're such an
interesting concept. And now they just really just like fumbling them over and over again.
(01:01:26):
So now the status in the MCU is basically that the surviving scrolls are living on earth
with Thor and his peeps as as guardians, right? And that's just where they're hanging now.
Well, I think and comic book creators are not immune to bad ideas. But I think this may be a
(01:01:50):
symptom of the further you get away from the source material and the people who know how to write
them well. This might be like a symptom of that problem. Mm potentially. Final verdict, Chris.
I like I said, I'm not going to be too overly harsh on this. I had a great time. I was happy
watching this movie. So I'm going A minus. Yeah, well, you know when it comes down to it, you and I
(01:02:15):
are little different when it comes to grading. But I think this was a solid B movie. There were
things that I wanted from up that I didn't get. But I I'm not going to sit here and say this is a
trash movie or deserves, you know, fail at the box office or something. I think this is by far
better than something like quantum mania. It's a big step back in the right direction. The leads are
(01:02:37):
super likable. The chemistry is palpable. The the concept of the switching powers was really cool.
There was a lot of cool action sequences there. I think my griping about this movie is predominantly
that it is such a good movie and I like it so much that I just wanted it to be better in these
specific areas. So I could say this isn't just a good movie. It's a great movie, you know, and it's
(01:03:00):
good. It could have been great. It is very good still though. So I like it. Is it better is it better
than the first one? I think it's different enough from the first one to say that that's a very
apples to orangish comparison, you know. I like them both equally, I would say, just in different ways
if that makes sense. Yeah. I think I get this one a slight nod. I think in the infantilization of
(01:03:26):
of monicas as a big monica fan, it's really hard for me. Now that doesn't short change the
relationship between Carol and Maria, which is great. But I think that's probably still like this
stinger from the first Captain Marvel movie that I can't quite just get over. All right, that wraps
(01:03:47):
up our byword big talk. What did you think of the Marvels? Be sure to hit us up on socials
at Nerd Byword across them individually, that nerd Dave, that nerd Chris. But when we come back,
we are giving you the good stuff. Nerd commentations.
(01:04:08):
We are back for our final segment where we have different things in media that we enjoy and we want
you to check them out too. We call them. All right, Dave. So this is the rare case where I make a
nerd accommodation and then you lap me in said nerd accommodation. So go off. So Star Trek
(01:04:35):
Lower Decks season four just wrapped up and considering we're in the nerd accommodation segment of
the episode, you can probably guess how I felt about it. Chris, a nerd commended Lower Decks to me
and I just completely have eaten this show up. I didn't think I was going to love this as much as I do.
But my god, do I love Lower Decks? I think what's the best thing about is that it's not so much a
(01:05:02):
parody as just a humorous look at Star Trek. So it is still Star Trek. It still feels like Star
Trek. It has the same texture. It's not, you know, ha ha, look how stupid Star Trek is. But more ha ha,
you know, look at the kind of thing we build and how you can twist it around and actually have a
little bit of fun with it. But it still feels real and authentic to what Star Trek is all about.
(01:05:27):
And I think season four in a lot of ways sort of represents the best of what Lower Decks has to offer.
So there's 10 episodes in the season and there are some real bangers in here. The first episode is
a tribute to Star Trek Voyager essentially. So if you've seen Star Trek Voyager, this is the episode
for you. They have a lot of fun with the absolute bonkers nature of that show compared to some other
(01:05:52):
Star Trek's. They even basically run sort of a riff off of the two vix episode or two characters,
two Valkanelix got merged in the transporter. And Jane way was like, oh, there's a whole new being
that was created. I don't care, throw them in the transporter and kill them because I want to split
them back up in the two people. And it's like one of the singular most divisive episodes and Star Trek.
(01:06:15):
And they're like, we're not just going to do this with one character. We're going to do it with
almost all the characters on the ship. Let's just keep merging them and see what happens. You know,
they do a lot of fun in the third episode in the cradle of Excellent where they lean into like
the the trope and Star Trek of like evil artificial intelligence. That's a lot of fun.
(01:06:37):
They have an episode where they deal with betazoids that works incredibly well.
Episode six is probably the nearest and nearest to my heart. It's called Parth for Ring these
heart, a heart place and it is, it's flawless. I just want to say this as they go to the
Foringie homeworld for Enganar to try to get them to join the Federation and we get some callbacks
(01:07:01):
to some let's say Chris favorite character, some Star Trek deep space nine. That was really, really
cool. Episode eight stands as probably one of my all-time favorite episodes in all the Star Trek.
It's just called caves and all the characters get you guessed it stuck in a cave and recount other
(01:07:23):
times they have been stuck in caves because getting stuck in a cave is a Star Trek mainstay.
I love when they get beamed down at the start and Mariners like caves, man cave suck, you know that's
something bad is going to happen in this cave. It's like yes, every time. There's a really cool
through line with Mariners character as she gets a promotion and she has to start dealing,
(01:07:47):
you know, a little bit with herself, destructive nature which reaches a crescendo in the two part
finale where they actually bring back a character from Star Trek the next generation in a really
cool way as a villain this time around and it leaves in a fascinating place where one of the main
(01:08:09):
characters has to actually leave the ship and return to her people and of course we want to now know
heading into season five how they're going to bring her back. It's just there's so much good stuff
here. The people who make this show love and understand Star Trek I think is the biggest thing that
I need to say here like it is not making fun of Star Trek but more a friendly I guess ribbing
(01:08:34):
between friends and that's exactly what it feels like and it feels very much like this is the kind of
stuff that could actually be happening in the background of you know regular Star Trek that we've
watched you know like as crazy a Star Trek can get you know why not have a computer simulation
that looks like the Federation badge go insane and then achieve Godhood. Why not? It's what we do
(01:08:58):
at Star Trek right? So Star Trek Lower Decks is a fantastic series if you've not checked it out
you really really should and season four is an absolute home run you know in the in the wake of the
totally awesome crossover that they had with strange new worlds I almost wish that we could get
more live action of these characters because they're just these these characters are so quintessential
(01:09:20):
Star Trek it's so so very good Chris. It's a perfect show and I've just been so busy so caught up with
everything that I haven't I think I started the first two or three episodes of season three and
I've just fallen off the wagon I need to get back on because I love these characters so much and
I absolutely agree it's like it's like a of friends and family roast like of Star Trek like yeah the
(01:09:47):
other day you and I went to a bookstore and you asked if I was gonna be okay with all that physical
media and predictably after 35 minutes in the store I bought nothing because I have all of it digital
easily so yeah that's that Star Trek Lower Decks like is just like friends who like throw shade at each
other who roast each other but it's all in good fun and that's what makes it the best.
(01:10:10):
All right so what do you have for Nerd Commentation this week Chris?
Well the band has been lifted for you know the Saga After Strike and one of the unfortunate casualties
similarly to the Marvels but that was completely released in the Strike and did not get any
(01:10:31):
promotional material is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mutant Mayhem. Now I saw this twice in theaters
I saw it once on like opening day because I had some free time and then my son wanted to go for his birthday
back in August so I truly truly love this film. I bought it on digital when it released and then
(01:10:53):
like a week later it was released on Paramount Plus so there are multiple ways that you can watch this
it is now streaming on Paramount Plus an incredible voice cast. What I love about this movie is it's
the first time that we've really truly seen Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles be teenagers. There are
(01:11:14):
aspects of it that I was just like hmm this is very very different but when it comes to this like my
age old thing is it's an alternate universe. So I'm not going to be like the harshest critic on this
because I feel like the best interpretation of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is still the
IDW comic book series so there are elements that of course are unique to the comic book series and
(01:11:37):
don't show up in other forms of the turtles but that doesn't mean that this is not a standout
wonderful project. Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Jeff Rowe, you know that these people love this property
they love these characters and it absolutely shows up on screen. I think there's some unfair
kind of comparison shopping with like into the spiderverse across the spiderverse films when it comes
(01:12:03):
to like animation styles and stuff like this I think more like why do we have to compare them and
contrast them like yes they're all great. I think the I think far in a way like the real scene
Steelers here are the four Teenage Actors, Micah Abbey, Shaman Brown Jr., Nicholas Cantoo, and
(01:12:28):
Brady Noon that portray the turtles also shouts to Iowa Debris who if you haven't watched the bear
yet Dave go freaking watch the bear. This is it's not a nerdy thing per se but it's one of the most
you have to watch it shows in pop culture over the past decade. It's one of the best put together
(01:12:49):
things and just a masterpiece so I love her I'll watch anything that she's in and she's great as April
in here. There's a really beautiful kind of through line about being an outsider being weird
even April you know she's a human teenage girl but she's like an an outcast social outcast to begin
(01:13:14):
the film and she kind of is struggling to find her place in high school like who can't relate to that
so I think it's a it's a really beautiful film. I had some so I wasn't sure how I felt about the
portrayal of Splinter about halfway through the film and then the kind of thematic through line
(01:13:36):
kind of dropped and came into its full bloom at the end of the film and it was just a really beautiful
kind of message of about accepting other people despite their differences. So yeah,
incredible rewatch value it's hilarious from start to finish like I really really love this film.
(01:13:58):
I haven't seen it yet but the way you're talking about it I definitely need to check it out.
Sounds absolutely amyally man. All right that wraps up Episode 172 of The Nerd Byword Podcast. We
hope you enjoyed what you heard and if you do like and subscribe on your favorite podcasting
platform whether that's Apple, Spotify or NerdByword.com. And find us on social media @NerdByword or
(01:14:22):
individually @NerdDave or @NerdCris and we'd love to hear your take on the Marvels or anything else
that you want to know about in big old letters. And as always stay well and stay nerdy.
(upbeat music)
(00:02):
It's the most marvelous time of the year.
The marvels has released and we have our review.
Buckle up because the by-word starts now.
(upbeat music)
(upbeat music)
Thank you for joining us on another episode
(00:45):
of the Nerd By-word.
We are here at episode 172.
And we are reviewing the marvels,
characters that are very near and dear to our hearts
and how did it hold up in the movie?
We'll find out with our by-word big talk, but first,
it's time for some very pressing.
(upbeat music)
(01:06):
Dave, same old same old, I guess.
Yeah, it's time to queue up that incredibly memorable
queen baseline because another Warner Brothers movie
bites the dust.
It's almost comical at this point
(01:26):
if it wasn't so very, very depressing.
So the studio has actually produced a $30 million
live action animation hybrid based on the Loonitune's
characters called Kiyode versus Akmi starring
among many others former wrestler John Cena.
The filming for the movie was completed in 2022
(01:49):
and it was originally produced as a HBO Max exclusive.
And of course, as you can imagine,
giving the history of Warner Brothers,
this movie too now will never see the light of day
as it is being shelved, locked in the vault
in order to receive a tax ride off,
joining movies Batgirl and Scooby-Doo's Scoop Holiday Haunt
(02:14):
as tax ride offs.
Admittedly the movie was Greenlit
under the previous regime,
just like the other two movies that have been previously
tax ride off it.
But this one has an additional wrinkle
and that James Gunn was actually involved
in the production of this movie,
(02:34):
including being one of the producers
and helping break the story.
So in short, that seems like a very interesting choice
given the important role that Gunn now plays at Warner.
But I guess the nickel and dime counters decided
that there's more money there
(02:58):
by getting the tax ride off than actually releasing it,
which I find difficult to believe,
even if you decide that you are not gonna make
this some kind of HBO Max thing to drive people
to subscribe to the now renamed Max service.
There was definitely a possibility
of trying to release this thing direct to video
(03:18):
on making a whole bunch of money this way.
The Looney Tunes are obviously still a pretty recognizable brand.
And I find it difficult to believe
that there was not a better way to recoup this money.
So a Warner Brothers spokesperson said in a statement
with the relaunch of Warner Brothers Pictures Animation
(03:38):
in June, the studio has shifted its global strategy
to focus on theatrical releases.
With this new direction, we have made a difficult decision
not to move forward with Coyote versus Acme.
We have tremendous respect for the filmmakers cast
and crew and are grateful for their contributions to the film.
Which is of course absolute baloney,
considering how hardbroken everybody is
(03:59):
and many people who were involved with the film
have already taken the Twitter and Instagram
and various other platforms to complain in great detail
about this move, including director Dave Green,
who had previously directed a TMNT project.
So that is obviously a pedigree that you'll appreciate Chris.
(04:21):
And he said in his statement for three years,
I was lucky enough to make a movie about Wiley Coyote,
the most persistent passionate and resilient character
of all time.
I was surrounded by a brilliant team
who poured their souls into this project for years.
We were all determined to honor the legacies
of these historic characters and actually get them right.
Along the ride, we were embraced by test audience
(04:41):
who rewarded us with fantastic scores.
I'm beyond proud of the final product
and beyond devastated by WB's decision.
But in the spirit of Wiley Coyote,
resilience and persistence win the day.
I've also seen posts from people involved
in scoring the movie and releasing even snippets
of the actual score for people to hear.
(05:01):
The reaction to this online has been pretty similar
to what we've seen with something like Batgirl,
probably even a little more pronounced in the negative
because this movie was based on reports finished ready.
There was no more editing or anything required.
And the thing that is so baffling is what Green
specifically mentioned in his statement,
(05:23):
which is that it tested extremely well with audiences.
You know, there were some reports about Batgirl
in particular not testing very well
and they might have to rework some stuff
and that additional money might be necessary.
So it's maybe perhaps just a little bit easier
to make an argument for that movie to get shelved
rather than investing additional money into it.
(05:45):
But this one was basically finished
and on top of that audience,
that did see it were extremely positive about the movie.
As a big loony toons fan lifelong,
this is pretty disappointing.
I'm a big Wiley Coyote fan anyways.
And so I would have loved to see this.
And I'm starting to wonder how much more often
(06:07):
Warner under this new regime is going to be
so incredibly anti-art as to basically lock away
or destroy entire movies just for a tax write off.
It's incredibly disappointing Chris.
Yeah, I made a point.
Like I was sitting there is like,
if you're like a big name person
(06:28):
and John Cena, like all, there's somebody spinning plates
that we could go on this episode.
We're reviewing the Marvels,
which is not performing well at the box office
domestically as you pointed out.
And is that a signifier of quality film?
Of course not.
(06:51):
John Cena on the other hand,
being involved in this project is a fascinating person
because that ties into my new story, the end of the strike.
He, while the strike was ongoing,
he made a return to the WWE and like, in my opinion,
which I am watching regularly.
My opinion was kind of a lackluster.
(07:13):
However, he did bump up like self-role kind of up in commerce
and kind of give them the John Cena rub
as the self-proclaimed goat,
the greatest of all time, many WWE fans see him
as one of the upper echelon superstars of the modern era.
And for him, and he's done well in my nerd accommodation.
(07:36):
He's in my nerd accommodation as well today.
And he performs well there.
And so he's a big name star.
And for, if you're a big name star with that kind of clout,
why are you signing up for WB projects?
Maybe you're content with taking the paycheck and moving on.
(07:57):
Like, I would assume he's still getting some kind of compensation for this.
And if that's how you feel, then God bless and go on.
But if, and I know if you're a small timer,
if you're a background person, if you're an up-and-comer,
you don't necessarily have that luxury.
But like, how is this salvageable?
(08:20):
Like, how can WB possibly face at this point?
Now granted, Max has great content on that app.
Like, it is heavily in my rotation of streamers.
But I'm just at a loss for what the strategy is here,
moving forward.
(08:41):
Like, as hopeful as I want to be for an invigorated DCU,
I don't know. I don't know, man, at this point.
Yeah, as far as from the actor's perspective,
if you actually want people to see your work,
Warner doesn't seem to be the place to go these days, right?
But even as any creative individual,
(09:02):
like as a director, for example,
like if this new regime is so quick to just shelf something
for a tax ride off,
like how many more tax ride-offs can Warner get at this point?
It seems almost ludicrous, right?
Someone retweeted something that was from January of this year.
(09:25):
So 10 months ago, 10 months ago, and said,
"Oh, the tax ride off that era for WB, Zazlove said, was over."
Well, apparently not.
And how do you feel if your James Gunn,
and you have signed on to be such a preeminent position
for such a well-beloved franchise like DC,
(09:48):
you know, it's not been portrayed all that well,
cinematically, but there's still strong fan bases
for DC comics and those characters.
I'm right over here, yes, I'm right over here.
And you sign on and you are not immune to this,
and the project that you have spent years on,
this is how you're treated.
I hope that check is worth it, bud,
(10:12):
because, in a way.
Yeah, that's just a very messed up situation.
All right, Chris, so you bring us some positive news
and I'm glad to hear something positive for a change.
So let's do that.
Well, the reason that we feel comfortable
opening today's episode four, a review of the Marvels
is because the SAG actress strike is over.
(10:34):
Strike is over.
Now, there is still voting to be done
as of the time of recording in the coming weeks
for SAG after members to vote on this,
but 86% of the negotiation board agreed to this
trying to cover some of the details that are important here.
We have wage increases,
(10:57):
a 7% basic minimum increase,
4% in July, 2024, 3.5% in July 2025.
There's also wage increases for streaming revenue.
Now, how much, how often that's going to be enacted
remains to be seen.
(11:20):
There are protections for artificial intelligence.
Wage increases for background actors, which is really cool.
I think my favorite detail, which was really neat
is hair and makeup representation
for different skin tones, different hair textures.
And one, that should have just been like a dub,
(11:43):
intimacy coordinators on all sets
when you're filming scenes like that.
That can be a sticky situation.
So all signs point to a successful negotiation
and this just shows, in my opinion, the power
(12:04):
when you have strong unions
and you don't take bull crap from the man as it were.
So good on you and we will always champion
workers' rights on this show.
Testify.
This is really exciting, not the least of which I will freely admit.
(12:25):
It's nice to be able to actually talk about some movie
and television projects again, like we are going to today,
not that it's not been a fun era to focus more on comic books
and video games, but you and I are very much a variety
is the spice of life kind of people.
So being able to bounce a little bit more from topic to topic
is going to be nice again.
(12:46):
So doing a movie review this week is something
that I've been looking forward to for a while.
But everything that's been reported so far
on the deal is exactly what the actors have been after
for a while and I'm really, really excited
that they were able to pull this off.
And just see everybody kind of get back to work
in the entertainment industry and start producing again
(13:06):
is just going to be exciting I guess,
and televisions coming back, we're going to have abbreviated
seasons for some stuff, but things are rolling again.
It looks like the most important film personally for me,
Superman Legacy is not even losing its release date
as of right now because apparently there's been
some production design or something going on in the background.
(13:29):
So they're actually able to jump into film
pretty much immediately.
So that's really, really exciting.
It's just it's good to see things get back to it.
As huge pop culture nerds, this is where I've read this
buttered and seeing things happening again and moving
and shaking again is absolutely fantastic.
Absolutely.
(13:50):
All right, that wraps up nerd news for this week
when we return from our first break.
We will be reviewing the Marvels.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
All right, we are back for our main segment.
We call it our byword.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
(14:10):
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And it's been a while since we've been in this seat reviewing
films or television series, but in case you need a refresher,
we typically like to have three big likes a piece
and three big dislikes.
Some of those dislikes can stretch into nitpicks
(14:32):
because we overall enjoyed the project.
But we like to have a balanced approach when we review something.
And then we'll give it an overall grade as people in our day
job are wanting to do, are wanting to do.
But first, Dave, far and away, I could have put this
(14:53):
in the shared document for you, but your first like on the film.
Well, it's probably no surprise
as a huge Miss Marvel fan that Kamala Khan to me
was to stand out of this movie, particularly,
I think in the first half.
She very, very strongly carries her and her family
and all the real fun stuff, especially
(15:15):
when they introduce the notion of switching.
Every time they use their power simultaneously,
how the three characters switch places.
All the most fun stuff somehow happens either
with Kamala Khan's family or with Kamala Khan herself.
I particularly love the moment where she switches
with Carol and is on this planet.
(15:37):
And Carol was fighting all these guys.
And the darn flurk and just like swallows a person
and she's just screaming at the top of her.
Like, oh, I got what just happened.
It's such a perfectly, pitch perfectly acted moment
and so, so Miss Marvel, like straight root from the comics.
I think, oh, my favorite is when she starts talking
(15:58):
to the crew and then Carol shows up and goes,
oh, Kamala, don't talk to them.
(laughs)
She, I will say that in Manvalani continues
to be just a perfect embodiment of this character
every time she's on screen.
And I get such a kick out of the fact that, you know,
Marvel still has the capability, apparently,
to do this absolute pitch perfect casting.
(16:21):
I still think she's probably the best casting
that Marvel has done this face period
and that's saying something because they've had
a few bangers as far as casting is concerned.
But she's just at the top of the list for me.
Everything in this movie that had anything to do with her
was basically flawless.
And I'm saying that sure from a fans perspective of character,
(16:43):
but it's, you know, there's so many adaptations
that play, you know, hard and loose
with a particular character to kind of bend the character
into the story that they're trying to tell.
But in this particular case, I feel it continues on
that the MCU version of Miss Marvel,
despite the tweak in powers from personality
(17:06):
and, you know, just behavior and reactions and everything
is probably one of the best adaptations in the MCU.
And so seeing her again, absolute joy for me in this movie.
Yeah, I totally agree.
And I feel like she's like the heart of this project
and she's the connective tissue between all three
(17:27):
of the characters, all three of the main characters
more on that in a moment.
But, and then like the family element,
like I feel like even with what I love about
Kamala's family is like they're so inviting
and they're so loving and so like Monica,
Carol, Fury, even like they're immediately part of that
(17:50):
that group, so to speak, like immediately.
Like there's a caring there.
I will say that Munibakon is the greatest character
in the history of the MCU and I will stand by that.
Like I love her to the moon and back.
Like she's the best.
And I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better
(18:12):
spokesperson or kind of flagship individual
for the MCU moving forward as they are kind of in a
season of change.
I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better person
to help whether that changed the Naman Balani.
Absolutely man.
(18:33):
I am very interested to talk about your first like here.
I think it's definitely something that we can agree on.
Yeah, so I love, I think my overall thing
that makes me love this movie is it's unapologetic
to the source material.
It's unapologetically a comic book movie
(18:56):
and a lot of the times when comic book movies
kind of fall short for me is where they try to play
to the Genpop or the mass audiences
or the, let's call it is the loser critics
in mass media, the film critics, the Oscar heads,
(19:18):
if you will.
Like so I love that it's unapologetically silly.
It's a comic book movie like the Flurkins,
like the escape strategy of the Flurkins
as your exit strategy.
There's not enough skate pods.
That's okay, just let them completely just eat you
(19:42):
and then they'll just regurgitate you
when we get back on earth.
Like that's our escape strategy
and like that's like one of the biggest climaxes
of the film is hey, all you crew members on this space station
allow yourself to be eaten by these unassuming cat-like creatures
(20:03):
with tentacles inside of it.
It's just, I absolutely love it.
Like the musical planet, like they're then making
tarot like a Disney princess as it were.
Like that was just my only criticism of it is I wanted more.
So we'll get to that in the dislikes,
but like I just love that this is,
(20:25):
I think I said it was like a 70s or 80s Marvel team up book
but with like a much updated like sensibility for equality
and equity and like social awareness.
So like if you can have like one of those books
set in that era without like the tropes
(20:46):
and like the stuff that doesn't age well.
- Yeah, it reminds me a little bit of like one of those 80s
buddy cop movies only less cop, more superhero
and it's three characters instead of just two,
but it really liked the idea of like having these very disparate
characters, you know, teaming up for the story
and trying to find common ground and finding the humor in that.
(21:09):
It reminds me of sort of that kind of movie making,
like you said, updated for, you know, more modern time.
But yeah, it really feels comic booky
and as a huge comic book nerd, you know,
what more can you want from a comic book movie
than actually feel like it could have been a story
in an actual comic book?
- Absolutely love this about this movie.
- Yeah, so your second like we have hinted at
(21:32):
but let's lean full force into it.
- Yeah, so I have my critiques of the movie.
I don't think it was flawless,
but I think the thing that carried the movie
through line from start to finish
was the chemistry between the three leads.
I think whatever was going on there
(21:52):
was lightning in the bottle.
Considering, you know, how these were characters
that were, you know, they were not cast for chemistry,
you know, like these were all people that were cast
in individual projects and then thrown together
for this movie.
And so the fact that they bounce off of each other
so effortlessly and so flawlessly is so lucky for the MCU
(22:15):
because this is the kind of chemistry
that usually you constantly are doing, you know,
repeated screen tests for and you're trying to find
the chemistry between the characters
and these two work, but this one doesn't,
let's get somebody else in here for that.
And there's so much experimentation
to try to find this kind of chemistry.
(22:36):
And the MCU just basically stumbled into it
because I don't think there was any reports that like,
you know, for example, you know, when they cast
in Anvalani that they even put her on screen
with Brie Larson or anything to see
if there's chemistry there or something, you know?
And it is really the MCU just stumbled into absolutely fireworks
(22:56):
of chemistry between these three characters
and these three actors.
And it's joyous when they're on screen together
and they get the bounce off of each other
like it's indescribable fun.
Even when what's on the page necessarily doesn't work perfectly,
they sort of make it work.
I think my favorite moment in the movie period
(23:17):
is when the three characters are trying to get a grip
on the switching and they do like jump rope and stuff together
just trying to, you know, time their switching rights.
- The best sequence on the film, right?
- Best sequence by far, yeah.
And I just absolutely completely 100% carried
by the chemistry of these three women.
And it was just like, I know there's gonna be a lot set
(23:38):
about box office and whether this movie is successful,
blah, blah, blah.
But as far as just these characters interacting
and bouncing off of each other,
like I would love to see more of this.
You know, if there's, you know, gonna be another sequel
to cap Marvel, this is what I want.
I want these three characters in a room together again
because it's absolutely pitch perfect
(23:59):
how they interact with each other.
- I think does it make me sad
the domestic box office, yes.
But I think using that as a criticism of this film
is a disingenuous argument.
This is a feature film that came out
of the film, it was released the day the strike was over.
(24:23):
But you and I both know that blockbusters like this
have pressed tours for at least a month
before its release.
Like Tom Hiddleston and Brie Larson,
the news broke and by the next day,
they were on the Tonight Show.
Like, so I really, like, would it be great
(24:47):
if they surprised us and it performs incredibly well
and it has this great comeback story, sure.
But I'm not using that to color my appreciation of this film.
So I think I know we're in the likes section,
but I want to like make that very, very clear.
But for me, the chemistry is what carries this film
(25:10):
and it makes it rewatchable, what makes it stand out.
And I think it's a testament to each three
of the performers to Brie Larson, to Tiana Paris,
to Amon Valani, to their malleability.
I have not seen any other Amon Valani projects
(25:33):
other than Ms. Marvel.
I've seen bits and pieces of they cloned Tyrone
with Tiana Paris.
I've not seen Candy Man, I wanna see it.
And I've not seen a whole lot of other Brie Larson work,
but I know her range based on clips that I've seen.
So this is not like the most informed opinion in the world.
(25:55):
But based on what I have seen,
I think it's a testament to their malleability
and their acting range.
You also have like the behind the scenes stuff
that we were treated to with like the group chat
with Nia de Costa, like Amon Valani,
while Brie Larson is going on the tonight show,
you have Tiana Paris and Amon Valani out at dinner
(26:17):
for Nia de Costa's birthday.
Like you just have, we kind of lucked into these women
who seemingly just have a genuine affection for one another
and we are reaping the benefits as the audience.
- And I certainly hope that they're not done
(26:37):
with these characters bouncing off of each other.
Like just even if they feel ultimately like this movie
underperformed, it is not because of the chemistry
between the actors.
I think they really lucked into something
that should definitely be further explored.
- I think we are ripe for that story
to be told with how the movie ended.
I think Monica may very well be on her own kind of journey.
(27:01):
We'll see how that story continues.
But I think that Carol and Kamala, I don't know
because maybe Kamala is going a young Avengers,
full spoilers for a movie that you probably should have seen
if you pressed play on this episode.
But so we'll just get into the end credits
(27:24):
and post credits and all the credits.
I think the young Avengers route is really interesting.
I'm interested to see how they fill out that cast officially.
We've had all the rumors.
Rumors is the day is long.
We've had all the rumors.
So I'm interested to see how that goes
(27:47):
but I think also like that final scene
at the house in Louisiana for Carol and Kamala,
I don't think we should throw that away either
because I think there's some beautiful potential there.
And then I think Monica, of course it's freaking beast
would be the first X-Men character in the MCU, but of course it is.
(28:08):
- Ah, ah, but I know too.
- Though I find that very interesting.
Did you note though that he was actually full CGI this time?
I found that interesting because they were able
to kind of keep Kelsey Grammar whose voice is actually
really really good for beast
without having to deal with the limitations of his age.
So these look good.
(28:29):
Like I was kind of shocked how well that model was developed
considering that they've not done this before.
It's not like with the Hulk, where there's all this history
in the back of trying to figure out how the best way
to do the Hulk and they did all the movements and everything
and scanned in the performance and everything.
Like none of that really exists it.
And he looked really, really good.
(28:50):
Like I was kind of shocked how good the CG was on him there.
- If you know anything about the trajectory
of the character of Hank McCoy,
you'll fully appreciate just how perfect
the casting of Kelsey Grammar.
If you know anything about the real life of Kelsey Grammar
is, yeah.
It's on point, but I'm still side-ying it.
(29:11):
I do love because Carol Danvers, veteran X-Men fans
will know, like Claremont had a lot to do with Carol Danvers
back in the 70s and 80s.
And then of course also did the X-Men.
So Carol Danvers featured as a very important character
(29:31):
in X-Men for a very long time.
And so, seeing, I think binaries, the moniker
that they gave Maria's character,
but this kind of seeing that as like an on-ramp
for the X-Men was fascinating and really, really cool to see.
(29:52):
- I'm just gonna say that Rogue just needs to stay away from Carol.
Let's just be clear on that.
Rogue is not allowed to touch Carol in any way she performs.
Stay away.
I don't want any of that.
- I'm kind of fascinated to see it, especially, you know,
if it's been when we get casting.
I don't know, I went off on a tangent there,
(30:15):
but I'm really excited to see,
I think we're still in your second light.
Yeah, I'm really excited to see what the future holds
and hopefully we get more of these three together.
- That brings us to your second light.
And I'm very interested in what you have to say here
because I'm not 100% sure I agree.
I think there's gonna be a little bit of split in here.
(30:35):
- I might, I don't wanna get into the dislikes
for the runtime that we got.
I will say that.
I think each of the three leads had a proportional time
to shine.
(30:57):
Monica cooked with that scene, the fight scene
in the cons residence, like where she was going through guys,
like Kitty Pride was crying and throwing up in the corner,
the way she was phasing through guys.
So I really enjoyed Monica's moments there,
her being the person to make the heroic sacrifice as it were.
(31:21):
I know she's in another dimension now or another reality,
if you will, universe.
But kind of her being the person,
like I love that moment for her
and like how beautiful she looked in that moment.
That was really, really cool.
You had Carol being a complex character.
(31:42):
Like she wasn't one note,
didn't give her enough time to breathe,
really, but more on that later.
And then Kamala being like the central nervous system
of all of these characters.
So do I want more runtime?
Yes.
But for what we got, I love that they were all featured.
(32:05):
- You know, I think I can agree with this more than
I initially thought with what it looked like on the page.
Yeah, I think they did actually decent job bouncing
from character to character.
I didn't feel like there was like a main lead
and then like supporting characters.
It felt like there were three leads.
And that is not always easy for Hollywood to pull off.
(32:27):
But I think in this case, they really did.
It really felt like three leads,
co-equal characters rather than one main lead
and two after thoughts.
And that was a good move, I think, for this movie.
- Yeah.
And we kind of danced around this a little bit,
but your third like, I think, really carried.
- Yeah.
(32:47):
So one of the most unique things in the movie
and the thing that I think worked the best in this movie
was the quantum entanglement angle
where they actually did this whole thing
where the characters would switch places
if they use their powers at the same time.
And in the first half of the film, this led to a lot of fun,
(33:09):
you know, and light humor as they switch places
in ways that they didn't mean to
and we have a lot of interesting sequences
coming out of that Carol at Kamala's house, for example,
Kamala going free fall and Monica trying to save her.
Those sorts of moments, the confusion of it all,
(33:30):
lend a really interesting urgency to every move that they were making
every time that they would use their powers
who were unsure if it would go sideways.
And that was really, really good in the first tap.
And then we had that--
- I know how you feel about the powers of Kamala and everything,
but that did have some nice features for this new powers.
(33:51):
That sequence.
- Yeah, I think all of this made it basically worth it.
Like if this was the angle they were taking,
of course, the entanglement is over now, you know?
So it would be nice if they, after this movie,
they could still like tap into that,
like purposefully do a swap
because what I think made the second half
of the movie work really well is when they were starting to get
(34:12):
a hold of the switching and they started using it in battle
and purpose and we started getting some very interesting action
sequences.
I'm thinking like probably the best X-Men scene to me
in the Fox X-Men movies was Night Crawler at the beginning
of X-2, you know?
- Probably low bar, but yes, incredible low bar, but yeah.
(34:33):
- It was basically that on Roads, you know,
with three characters, instead of just one,
like the movement and the fluidity
of them swapping back and forth
and using that to their advantage
was a ton of fun to watch.
And there were plenty of times where I wish I could just like
immediately sit down and watch it again,
just to get more sense for those sequences
(34:54):
because they were fast paced and we're throwing a lot of stuff
at you, but they were visually super interesting.
It was probably the switching mechanic basically
of the movie was sort of the backbone of what made
the action scenes visually interesting in comparison
to some other super hero flicks.
I really, really liked this.
(35:16):
I think they could have leaned into it even more,
but what they did with it was absolutely awesome.
- Yeah, I love the fight choreography on this.
Like it harkened back to something like Shang-Xhi
with like that was one of the strengths of that film
was the fight, but yeah, I think it was really smartly done.
But yeah, I loved like that one scene
(35:39):
that we kind of got in the trailer
of them just going back and forth
while they're fighting the final boss.
Yeah, I really, really, really enjoyed that element.
- All right, that brings us to your final like
and as a cat daddy, I am not surprised
that this is something that you really appreciate it.
- I just love the flurkins.
(36:00):
I love everything about it.
Like the, there's so much canine propaganda in pop,
(laughing)
there's so much on like, what, look at that dog.
It's a dog, dog, dog, dog.
I don't know why I went in New Jersey with the,
but I'm just kind of exhausted by it.
I also, as of the time recording,
had to check on my mom's dogs
and one of them bit me in the stomach yesterday.
(36:21):
So I'm like, yeah, I don't like dogs.
(laughing)
So, seeing like cats kind of get some of that screen time
was really, really cool, especially when you're not really a cat,
you're an alien.
And I still say like the,
the escape sequence, the escape plan sequence
(36:42):
was just peak comic book movie,
unapologetically comic book movie.
And it was, it was just great, it was perfect.
You and I also talked about like,
goose cleaning himself as a cat does,
as I'm sitting here with my cat next to me,
cleaning himself, like, yeah.
So, I think, I thought it was perfect.
And it's really interesting too because
(37:05):
Breelarson is incredibly allergic to cats.
And so they had to go like CGI with goose in the first film,
I know, I'm not sure how they got around it
this time around, but kudos.
- Yeah, now the Floorkins were great,
great comic relief.
(37:27):
I wish that, you know, like, I always find
that really good comic relief is a running joke
that goes through the movie and then turns a little serious
at the end.
And I think they tried to do that with the whole act of Floorkins,
you know, are save everybody on the station
because they can swallow all these people up
and then regurgitate them.
But even that scene came across as incredibly humorous.
(37:51):
And so, there's never that moment
where the joke kind of turns serious,
which I think would have been fun.
I think, I'm gonna talk a lot about this kind of thing
in my dislike, so I don't wanna harp on it.
But I will agree that the presence of the Floorkins
was extremely positive for this movie.
- All right, Dave, something, as we head into the dislikes,
(38:11):
something that we agreed upon,
although what you have in parentheses,
I think is a little too harsh.
- I'm not, I'm not equaling the two, okay?
Let me, let me, let me, let me,
I'm very clear of that.
- I was, I'm not, I'm saying it's a similar issue,
but it's a, it's also a matter of scale, I think.
(38:33):
I think to me, one of the big problems
when we talked about Ant-Man and the Wasp Quantumania
is that it didn't feel always like it wanted to deal
with the emotional fallout of some of the things that happened.
I was, I was particularly disappointed looking back at that,
at that review that we did,
with how little they spent dealing
(38:57):
with the emotional fallout of the blip
and the fact that Ant-Man was gone
for a huge chunk of his daughters upbringing
and they never really deal with that.
They never lean into that strong enough.
It's hinted at and then glossed over
and then everybody just kind of moves on.
And I think that some of that is happening in this movie too.
(39:19):
I think that the emotional stakes never went big enough.
And I wish that they would have really leaned into that.
And I know this is a too-witched sword.
I know that this movie is already dealing
with plenty of misogyny online being thrown its way.
And I can just imagine if they would have went bigger
with the emotional content,
then it would be like,
(39:39):
"Oh, look, there's these three emotional women
that are trying to do."
- The Michael Burnham of it all.
- Exactly.
And I understand the hesitance to do that.
But I think it's becoming,
for whatever the motivation is,
it's becoming a pattern across MCU movies
that they're not really ringing emotionally true anymore.
(40:00):
They never pushed themselves far enough.
For example, when we're dealing with Monica
and Carol in this movie,
that resentment is so quickly pushed aside and moved on from
just a couple of very short scenes.
They never have a real blow up,
they never really lay into each other.
(40:21):
The guilt that Carol deals with for not coming back,
the fact that Monica needed her,
that the whole blip thing,
they never really let that,
they never really throw that relationship in the slow cooker
and let it slowly build pressure and then release.
It's just like, here's a couple of quick scenes
and let's move on from that, we're having fun.
(40:44):
And to a certain extent, I understand that.
I know that this is a very fun flick,
but there is so much ripe, dramatic potential here.
And I think one of the great pushes
in polls of earlier MCU entries
was that they were able to be both dramatic and humorous.
And I think maybe the scales are tipping a little too far
into the humor sometimes because it's becoming
(41:07):
now a thing where it doesn't feel emotionally always honest.
There is a moment in the movie where Carol sort of snaps
at Kamala early on and then like five minutes later
in the movie she says, hey, sorry for snapping at you.
And it's just, they move on.
And that's it, right?
And I think that there is a real missed opportunity
in Kamala and her hero worship being very difficult
(41:31):
for Carol to deal with because Carol is carrying
disgilt about Hala around with her this whole movie, right?
And then maybe being a little harsh towards her,
being annoyed with the hero worship.
And we don't quite understand why until they get to this big
reveal about what happened with Hala
and that she blames herself and it's her fault
and she doesn't think she's worthy, right?
(41:52):
And then that twists that around and gives us a new perspective
on the characters.
It also would have be hoved a little bit for Kamala
to go through a process of dealing with her hero worship
a little, you know, like starting in this hero worship
mode and slowly come to the realization that Carol is human
and flawed and maybe they won't get along
and then meeting in the middle finally at the end, you know?
(42:13):
So these emotional arcs are all hinted at in the movie.
But they're very flat, they're very static.
There isn't a slow build to a grand crescendo
in these relationships, right?
And that's kind of, you know, that is one of the main problems
to me of the movie, especially when you have three leads
(42:34):
that are so good with each other and have such great chemistry,
you know, really giving them a few dramatic scenes
where they really are bumping heads to chew on
and then coming out of that conflict the other end stronger
and more bound together, that's the kind of stuff
that I'm here for.
So is it as extreme as quantum mania in missing the mark
(42:55):
when it comes to the emotional content?
No, I don't think so.
And I think that the creators of this movie
were aware of the dramatic potential
and hint at it throughout, but it feels very truncated
in those areas.
And that's, I'll talk a little bit more about
some other missed opportunities, but I think to me
that is the overall tale of this movie is that it's good
(43:18):
and it's fun and that's wonderful,
but I think it could have been great.
Like I think there's so much more that was left on the table
particularly in the relationship between these three women
that could have, you know,
it could have had a little bit more meat on the bones
of this movie, I think Chris.
Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and color outside the lines here
and kind of merge my first dislike
(43:40):
because it's very similar.
It's very tangential.
And that's the fact that it's very rushed.
In fact, I saw a fan theory where that this film
is told from Kamala's perspective and that makes sense.
Because we skirt past all the heavy stuff
and we talk about the good stuff
and the hero worshipy stuff and like,
hey, look at this awesome stuff.
But I think, and when I say it's rushed
(44:07):
and when I say the motion,
when I agree with you that the motions need to be bigger
and that needs to be room to breathe
in some of those scenes and some of that stuff needs to play out.
Some of this may be having off screen.
I think Monica in particular is asked to forgive
a whole hell of a lot
in a very short amount of time.
(44:29):
She has this person who is almost like a parental guardian
type figure and this was kind of the inherent
problem with making her a child in the first Captain Marvel movie.
And now that, that, you know, that problem has come home to roost
(44:53):
where she's a grown woman greeted after 30 years.
We're saying 30 years of abandonment by Carol
with a childhood nickname.
Pike just, hey, it's been a week or two since I've seen you.
No, it's been 30 years.
And you can have all the good intentions of the world
(45:15):
of saving all parts of the galaxy, but it cannot be
at the cost of your loved ones.
Or at the very least, if it is at the cost of your loved ones,
then you need to do a lot of, you know,
heavy lifting to repair that relationship.
And I don't think that happened here.
I don't think enough of that happened here.
(45:39):
Now, I agree with all the other points it just felt like Maria
can, excuse me, Monica and Maria, but Monica continues to get
short-changed in these, in these scenarios.
I don't even want to go on a tangent on the one division of it all
of how she was treated, mistreated.
So yeah, it felt very rushed and it felt
(46:06):
very, it's funny because when you were laying it out
of like how it could have played out, Tony Stark was allowed
that moment in Captain America Civil War.
He was allowed that emotional heft when he finds out
that Bucky Barnes was the person that killed his parents.
He was allowed that levity.
(46:30):
He was allowed that time to be righteous anger, if you would,
to experience righteous anger, if you will.
But now we have a film with a female director
with three female leads, two of which are women of color,
and they are not allowed that levity.
That's a problem.
(46:51):
And maybe if we rope quantum media in with this,
yes, I'll even allow if we want to rope Thor 11 Thunder
into this, it seems if we're putting point A to B
to C that post infinity war and end game,
Fiege, whoever you want to say is hesitant to put audiences
(47:16):
through that amount of emotional bereavement, if you will,
like with what we had with the snap and all of that stuff,
they're not as committed to break the hearts of our audiences.
The one exception is Wakanda forever,
(47:39):
which read into that what you will.
I think the real world forced that onto them.
I think the MCU has found itself in a place
where they want to just make light-hearted popcorn flicks.
And that is fine to a certain extent,
but that doesn't mean that those movies don't deserve
(48:02):
a strong emotional through line.
And you can make a fun popcorn flick
that has a strong emotional through line.
And to your point, you're right, the movie was too short, right?
But I'm not saying we need to like a three hour epic here or something.
I think at 10 to 15 minutes,
10 to 15 minutes to spend a little bit more time
(48:24):
with the emotional arc of the movie,
I think you come out of this with a much, much stronger flick.
And I'll talk a little bit more about some other missed opportunities later
with my last dislike, but I think the runtime is part of the problem here.
I think everything is a little truncated,
(48:45):
and the emotional arcs are one of the things that got short-changed here.
Speaking of being short-changed,
I think we're going to probably tie in our second dislikes again here,
but go off, Dave.
So I'm going to tell you right now,
I cannot recall for the life of me the name of the villain of this movie.
I know your name is how we asked in,
but unfortunately, that's mostly because she's married to Tom Hiddleston.
(49:07):
But I'm asking sincerely, do you after watching the movie Remember the Name of the main antagonist?
I'm pretty good. I'm pretty good with names. I think it's dark then.
Let me go go go go go.
I see that's what I'm saying though.
I am okay with names, not maybe like,
not maybe as good as a script here,
but I'm usually decent with names and I could not remember the name.
(49:28):
And that is a problem.
Because this villain here had tremendous potential because let's just go ahead and say it,
"Darben was right."
Carol came to her planet and messed with stuff that she probably should have not
messed with the way she did.
She thought she was liberating everybody and instead she pooped the bed and the whole
(49:50):
planet ended up, you know, a complete mess.
And she had every right to be mad about this, right?
And so there is a great
a great hook between the villain and one of the main characters that the main character,
Carol did something wrong, horrible to this woman's entire planet and civilization.
(50:12):
And she should try to make it right.
But at the same time, this is a villain and she's doing it the wrong way, right?
So there is beautiful conflict baked into the base concept.
And yet for some reason, the villain is incredibly flat in this movie, right?
I'm always looking for these great moments, right?
(50:32):
And there it is.
It's not because of their performance because that performance.
The performance?
No, I'm not complete.
I'm not.
No, this is on the page, man.
This is the writing wasn't there for this villain, right?
And maybe this again, because the movie was rushed and the emotional stuff, which was
short-changed, but the core concept of the villain was an emotional anger connection with
(50:56):
Carol Danvers.
And then they didn't lean into that.
Not nearly strong enough to make this a memorable villain.
And how fast she ended up being dispatched at the end just for the main villain is not suddenly
a hole in space that needs to be closed.
Like, you know what I'm saying?
She didn't even really factor than in the grand finale of the movie.
(51:19):
And I'm saying it's true.
Marvel has a villain problem.
Like their villains are never as memorable as they should be.
They, you know, they can pull off at Thanos, for example, but, but for the most part in these
like standalone movies, more often than not, the villains are just very undercooked.
(51:40):
It's like they don't want to really lean into the villain and like, they know said good
writing, man.
Thanos just had good writing, right?
What was a flawless, no, that was intentional because they were building something.
A lot of these one off villains, they don't, they see them as a means to an end.
They don't see them as a final end game.
And that's a problem.
(52:00):
Yeah, it is because every, every villain should be treated as a significant threat, right?
I mean, at the end, they even say like, like Kamala's mom says to her, hey, you saved the whole
world, you saved the universe.
And it never felt like it was a universe level threat, you know, the villain just kind
of stumbling around with his bangled punching holes in the reality, you know, like, oops.
(52:24):
You know, it's just it never felt.
Like a significant threat.
And like you said, the performance was definitely there, but it wasn't on the page.
And I think one of the things that Marvel has to do at some point is take a long look in the mirror and say,
what are we doing with our villains here?
You know, when you, when you reflect a little bit on, on the stuff that works over at DC and it's not a lot,
(52:49):
let's admit it.
OK, the DC movies have been pretty poopy.
But when you look at one that works, it always circles back around a really strong memorable villain performance, right?
When you look at Heath Ledger's Joker, for example, or if you look at the, if you look at the riddler and the penguin and their performances in the Batman,
(53:11):
even if you look at like Michael Shannon in Man of Steel, like his sword was very, very good, right?
So you hit me with a memorable villain performance and it elevates the project overall.
And here the performance certainly was, was there, but it just did not exist on the page.
And an actor cannot, you know, pull additional scenes that help make the villain more compelling on the page out of thin air, right?
(53:38):
There's only so much an actor can do at that point.
And so I think, I think the MCU needs to spend a little bit more time letting their villains cook just a little more.
Yeah, and that's why I said my second dislike was the more Cree buildup was necessary.
I mean, you think about how integral Cree,
CreeDum is with Carol Danvers.
(54:00):
I mean, it's part of her DNA.
Make with that what you will, but like, so more of that buildup was necessary.
And it just, it simply wasn't there.
And it is a continual problem.
All right, let's, let's, let's go with your final dislike for the Marvels tape.
(54:22):
For me, the entire movie, as I've mentioned, is kind of a tale of missed opportunities.
And my biggest dislike was just that they didn't let, you know, the emotions run as hot and as high as they could have in order to make this, you know, extremely compelling, right?
But that is not the only missed opportunity we're dealing with here.
(54:44):
As I'm watching the movie, I always think this is where they could go with this and they didn't, you know, this is where they could go if they fully commit and they don't.
Great example. So they go to this planet where everybody communicates in song, right?
You got Brelarson who's a singer and a good one at that, right?
And they do this little tiny dance duet thing and it's cute and all blah, blah, blah.
(55:08):
And then the water gets sucked out, right, from the planet to go to Hala and that's it.
We're just done with this place. We're done with her, you know, marriage of convenience husband. We have no idea what happened to him.
We never go back to the planet. We never solve the problem of the water being gone.
And one of the things I'm thinking through all this is imagine again, if they would lean into the emotion of it.
(55:31):
And we could have these people who communicate through song singing this beautiful sad lamentation as their planet is dying, you know, and you could hit the audience in the fields and immediately make the audience feel the stakes of what is happening here and make the villain.
Therefore, even feel more dangerous because you are directly confronted with the pain of these characters as their planet is dying around them because the water got sucked out of it, you know.
(56:00):
And so why not lean into this musical thing if you're if you're introducing it, you introduce it and you have a little goofy fun with it.
But then you're not you're not willing to flip around and make it this this emotional moment as well, right.
The same thing applies to the first planet they go to and things go sideways, right.
Like we get this moment where Kamala feels bad because they can't save everybody and then, you know, brush it off. We got to move on, right.
(56:26):
And I think that Kamala being as as softhearted and good as she is would have probably struggled significantly more with that.
And then you could circle around towards the end where she maybe gets to actually save some people and feel like that sort of a, you know, redemption for her because she failed earlier on if that makes sense.
Right. Like there's all these little moments peppered throughout. I'm like, that's really cool.
(56:50):
Now, are you going to turn this up to 11? Are you going to push it a little harder? You know, and then they don't.
And that thing with the song planet in particular just really bugged me because that is such a cool idea to play with.
And then you introduce it for a one-off joke and then completely drop the idea, drop the concept.
(57:10):
Suddenly the prince is bilingual and can speak and then something happens to the planet and you never deal with the fall out of that.
You never go back to it. You never deal with those characters again.
I think there were so many cool moments in there that could have been great moments and we just didn't get those.
And that just makes me sad for the movie, you know.
(57:33):
Yeah, speaking of missed opportunities, my greatest disappointment with the MCU probably is the scrolls because
and I'm just going to go ahead with with my third dislike and they're kind of malleable. We are I think we're of a similar mindset with this film.
Are we going to do something with them or not? Because I think my favorite thing from the first Captain Marvel movie,
(58:01):
which overly hated by misogynistic pieces of crap. But I enjoyed it and my favorite thing about it was
reinterpreting the scrolls as refugees. And I thought that was such a fascinating thing. And then we have
I really enjoyed the beginning parts of Secret Invasion.
(58:25):
And then it just
do do just everybody project out. You remember the beginning of Scary Movie 2, Dave?
Yes, everybody's just vomiting on each other like that that parody of the exercise where everybody's just
you vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit vomit that was the final half of Secret Invasion and you see
(58:48):
stuff behind the scenes and you understand why. But like so like are we going to do something with these scrolls
or not? And I think it's probably the biggest missed opportunity of the MCU at large is to do something with this
really interesting real life analogy. And we don't know what to do with it. Keep fumbling that bag.
(59:11):
So yeah, I'm right there with you. Now I'm not going to judge this movie too harshly on that
because of I'm going to be protective of it because number one because of the characters and all of the
bulls the bull crap that it's going to get from the worst elements of
(59:31):
Andum and the internet. Yeah, we're looking at you Alan Ang. Yeah, but oh man he did some follow-up stuff
like defending him and it just made it worse. But yeah, so I think when you love something I think you
(59:52):
critique it and you want to make it better. So yeah, I think I think the scrolls are one of the greatest
disappointments I've had with the MCU and just another kind of symptom of the same kind of medical
condition if you will. It's hilarious to me that secret invasion was apparently so unpopular that
(01:00:13):
they just completely ignored in this movie. Like wasn't the main beef of the scrolls in secret invasion
that it's been like 20 years and Nick Fury didn't actually help them find a new home and then you
started this movie in their own later. Like 30 years and not one planet was like okay, not one.
But what cracks me up is in the beginning of this movie they're all sitting happily on their own
(01:00:37):
planet and I'm like wasn't the beef at the beginning of secret invasion that they didn't have
their own planet? What happened? Well, it was like a refugee camp like was that. But I mean like
we all watch an episode of Star Trek. Like how many times have we seen that story play out of like
people who need a place to live? Like come on. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I agree that the scrolls are
(01:01:02):
interesting. Either interpretation is actually interesting. What they've done in the comic books
has been interesting with them too. What they're doing, what they were doing in cap Marvel with them
was interesting and then ever since they just kind of dropped the ball with them. And I think there
were built, I wish they were building towards something with the scrolls because they're such an
interesting concept. And now they just really just like fumbling them over and over again.
(01:01:26):
So now the status in the MCU is basically that the surviving scrolls are living on earth
with Thor and his peeps as as guardians, right? And that's just where they're hanging now.
Well, I think and comic book creators are not immune to bad ideas. But I think this may be a
(01:01:50):
symptom of the further you get away from the source material and the people who know how to write
them well. This might be like a symptom of that problem. Mm potentially. Final verdict, Chris.
I like I said, I'm not going to be too overly harsh on this. I had a great time. I was happy
watching this movie. So I'm going A minus. Yeah, well, you know when it comes down to it, you and I
(01:02:15):
are little different when it comes to grading. But I think this was a solid B movie. There were
things that I wanted from up that I didn't get. But I I'm not going to sit here and say this is a
trash movie or deserves, you know, fail at the box office or something. I think this is by far
better than something like quantum mania. It's a big step back in the right direction. The leads are
(01:02:37):
super likable. The chemistry is palpable. The the concept of the switching powers was really cool.
There was a lot of cool action sequences there. I think my griping about this movie is predominantly
that it is such a good movie and I like it so much that I just wanted it to be better in these
specific areas. So I could say this isn't just a good movie. It's a great movie, you know, and it's
(01:03:00):
good. It could have been great. It is very good still though. So I like it. Is it better is it better
than the first one? I think it's different enough from the first one to say that that's a very
apples to orangish comparison, you know. I like them both equally, I would say, just in different ways
if that makes sense. Yeah. I think I get this one a slight nod. I think in the infantilization of
(01:03:26):
of monicas as a big monica fan, it's really hard for me. Now that doesn't short change the
relationship between Carol and Maria, which is great. But I think that's probably still like this
stinger from the first Captain Marvel movie that I can't quite just get over. All right, that wraps
(01:03:47):
up our byword big talk. What did you think of the Marvels? Be sure to hit us up on socials
at Nerd Byword across them individually, that nerd Dave, that nerd Chris. But when we come back,
we are giving you the good stuff. Nerd commentations.
(01:04:08):
We are back for our final segment where we have different things in media that we enjoy and we want
you to check them out too. We call them. All right, Dave. So this is the rare case where I make a
nerd accommodation and then you lap me in said nerd accommodation. So go off. So Star Trek
(01:04:35):
Lower Decks season four just wrapped up and considering we're in the nerd accommodation segment of
the episode, you can probably guess how I felt about it. Chris, a nerd commended Lower Decks to me
and I just completely have eaten this show up. I didn't think I was going to love this as much as I do.
But my god, do I love Lower Decks? I think what's the best thing about is that it's not so much a
(01:05:02):
parody as just a humorous look at Star Trek. So it is still Star Trek. It still feels like Star
Trek. It has the same texture. It's not, you know, ha ha, look how stupid Star Trek is. But more ha ha,
you know, look at the kind of thing we build and how you can twist it around and actually have a
little bit of fun with it. But it still feels real and authentic to what Star Trek is all about.
(01:05:27):
And I think season four in a lot of ways sort of represents the best of what Lower Decks has to offer.
So there's 10 episodes in the season and there are some real bangers in here. The first episode is
a tribute to Star Trek Voyager essentially. So if you've seen Star Trek Voyager, this is the episode
for you. They have a lot of fun with the absolute bonkers nature of that show compared to some other
(01:05:52):
Star Trek's. They even basically run sort of a riff off of the two vix episode or two characters,
two Valkanelix got merged in the transporter. And Jane way was like, oh, there's a whole new being
that was created. I don't care, throw them in the transporter and kill them because I want to split
them back up in the two people. And it's like one of the singular most divisive episodes and Star Trek.
(01:06:15):
And they're like, we're not just going to do this with one character. We're going to do it with
almost all the characters on the ship. Let's just keep merging them and see what happens. You know,
they do a lot of fun in the third episode in the cradle of Excellent where they lean into like
the the trope and Star Trek of like evil artificial intelligence. That's a lot of fun.
(01:06:37):
They have an episode where they deal with betazoids that works incredibly well.
Episode six is probably the nearest and nearest to my heart. It's called Parth for Ring these
heart, a heart place and it is, it's flawless. I just want to say this as they go to the
Foringie homeworld for Enganar to try to get them to join the Federation and we get some callbacks
(01:07:01):
to some let's say Chris favorite character, some Star Trek deep space nine. That was really, really
cool. Episode eight stands as probably one of my all-time favorite episodes in all the Star Trek.
It's just called caves and all the characters get you guessed it stuck in a cave and recount other
(01:07:23):
times they have been stuck in caves because getting stuck in a cave is a Star Trek mainstay.
I love when they get beamed down at the start and Mariners like caves, man cave suck, you know that's
something bad is going to happen in this cave. It's like yes, every time. There's a really cool
through line with Mariners character as she gets a promotion and she has to start dealing,
(01:07:47):
you know, a little bit with herself, destructive nature which reaches a crescendo in the two part
finale where they actually bring back a character from Star Trek the next generation in a really
cool way as a villain this time around and it leaves in a fascinating place where one of the main
(01:08:09):
characters has to actually leave the ship and return to her people and of course we want to now know
heading into season five how they're going to bring her back. It's just there's so much good stuff
here. The people who make this show love and understand Star Trek I think is the biggest thing that
I need to say here like it is not making fun of Star Trek but more a friendly I guess ribbing
(01:08:34):
between friends and that's exactly what it feels like and it feels very much like this is the kind of
stuff that could actually be happening in the background of you know regular Star Trek that we've
watched you know like as crazy a Star Trek can get you know why not have a computer simulation
that looks like the Federation badge go insane and then achieve Godhood. Why not? It's what we do
(01:08:58):
at Star Trek right? So Star Trek Lower Decks is a fantastic series if you've not checked it out
you really really should and season four is an absolute home run you know in the in the wake of the
totally awesome crossover that they had with strange new worlds I almost wish that we could get
more live action of these characters because they're just these these characters are so quintessential
(01:09:20):
Star Trek it's so so very good Chris. It's a perfect show and I've just been so busy so caught up with
everything that I haven't I think I started the first two or three episodes of season three and
I've just fallen off the wagon I need to get back on because I love these characters so much and
I absolutely agree it's like it's like a of friends and family roast like of Star Trek like yeah the
(01:09:47):
other day you and I went to a bookstore and you asked if I was gonna be okay with all that physical
media and predictably after 35 minutes in the store I bought nothing because I have all of it digital
easily so yeah that's that Star Trek Lower Decks like is just like friends who like throw shade at each
other who roast each other but it's all in good fun and that's what makes it the best.
(01:10:10):
All right so what do you have for Nerd Commentation this week Chris?
Well the band has been lifted for you know the Saga After Strike and one of the unfortunate casualties
similarly to the Marvels but that was completely released in the Strike and did not get any
(01:10:31):
promotional material is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mutant Mayhem. Now I saw this twice in theaters
I saw it once on like opening day because I had some free time and then my son wanted to go for his birthday
back in August so I truly truly love this film. I bought it on digital when it released and then
(01:10:53):
like a week later it was released on Paramount Plus so there are multiple ways that you can watch this
it is now streaming on Paramount Plus an incredible voice cast. What I love about this movie is it's
the first time that we've really truly seen Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles be teenagers. There are
(01:11:14):
aspects of it that I was just like hmm this is very very different but when it comes to this like my
age old thing is it's an alternate universe. So I'm not going to be like the harshest critic on this
because I feel like the best interpretation of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is still the
IDW comic book series so there are elements that of course are unique to the comic book series and
(01:11:37):
don't show up in other forms of the turtles but that doesn't mean that this is not a standout
wonderful project. Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Jeff Rowe, you know that these people love this property
they love these characters and it absolutely shows up on screen. I think there's some unfair
kind of comparison shopping with like into the spiderverse across the spiderverse films when it comes
(01:12:03):
to like animation styles and stuff like this I think more like why do we have to compare them and
contrast them like yes they're all great. I think the I think far in a way like the real scene
Steelers here are the four Teenage Actors, Micah Abbey, Shaman Brown Jr., Nicholas Cantoo, and
(01:12:28):
Brady Noon that portray the turtles also shouts to Iowa Debris who if you haven't watched the bear
yet Dave go freaking watch the bear. This is it's not a nerdy thing per se but it's one of the most
you have to watch it shows in pop culture over the past decade. It's one of the best put together
(01:12:49):
things and just a masterpiece so I love her I'll watch anything that she's in and she's great as April
in here. There's a really beautiful kind of through line about being an outsider being weird
even April you know she's a human teenage girl but she's like an an outcast social outcast to begin
(01:13:14):
the film and she kind of is struggling to find her place in high school like who can't relate to that
so I think it's a it's a really beautiful film. I had some so I wasn't sure how I felt about the
portrayal of Splinter about halfway through the film and then the kind of thematic through line
(01:13:36):
kind of dropped and came into its full bloom at the end of the film and it was just a really beautiful
kind of message of about accepting other people despite their differences. So yeah,
incredible rewatch value it's hilarious from start to finish like I really really love this film.
(01:13:58):
I haven't seen it yet but the way you're talking about it I definitely need to check it out.
Sounds absolutely amyally man. All right that wraps up Episode 172 of The Nerd Byword Podcast. We
hope you enjoyed what you heard and if you do like and subscribe on your favorite podcasting
platform whether that's Apple, Spotify or NerdByword.com. And find us on social media @NerdByword or
(01:14:22):
individually @NerdDave or @NerdCris and we'd love to hear your take on the Marvels or anything else
that you want to know about in big old letters. And as always stay well and stay nerdy.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.