June 5, 2024 • 60 mins
Welcome to the first episode of It's That Bad, where Connor and Gabe look at the irredeemable franchise-crossover cashgrab Alien vs. Predator: Requiem. While fans were unimpressed with Paul W.S. Anderson's first AvP flick, they were even more disgusted with this follow-up that turns two of cinema's most iconic intergalactic Titans of Terror into generic and barely visible creepy crawlers.
So join Gabe and Connor as they talk the Alien and Predator franchises, the state of lighting in Hollywood productions, and what makes AvP Requiem so offensive.
So join Gabe and Connor as they talk the Alien and Predator franchises, the state of lighting in Hollywood productions, and what makes AvP Requiem so offensive.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:16):
Going into this, you know,you have to have a different mindset.
And for people who are obviously comingto a video like this for the first
time, we haven't really done anythinglike this before on purpose. Fans of
the show or followers of the showwill know that February ninth, twenty twenty
three is a day that lives onand not that bad infamy. That was
(00:38):
the day that we decided to divein and talk about a movie, little
movie called water World, and thatepisode just rocked this show to the core.
It made us question everything we wereabout, everything the show was about
to defend movies that people thought wereactually that bad, and we and do
(01:00):
it, and it rocked us sohard that eventually we just said fuck it.
And we found a way to avoidall of that, to avoid more
heartbreak, to avoid more issues,and we did so by just spinning off
the show and talking and just talkingshit about movies that we know are bad.
Now, we're still going to tryto keep it, you know,
civil enough. I'm not going totry to you know, ruin anybody's life
(01:23):
here. But today, as youcan see, we're talking AVP Requiem,
sequel to a movie we've already talkedabout on this show that got decently how
remarks from yourself. I think everybody, no matter what you felt about the
previous AVP movie, you can seea whole gap of quality, right,
Like anybody can see that, right. You can see a gap in a
(01:46):
lot of things, continuity, quality, lighting. There are things that I
do think are better in this movie, which I think we'll get to as
we as we you know, continuethe discussion as soon it came out.
I'm actually really intrigued to get tothose points. But I actually want to
start this show off by kind ofpointing out a huge reason why we're doing
(02:07):
and it's that bad series, becausethat, you know, kind of seems
to contradict our whole ethos of loveand positivity, defending movies, not joining
on the hate. But there isthis weird part of the culture, especially
online, that is very anti criticis very anti criticism, would lead you
(02:30):
to believe that there's no such thingas a bad movie, or at least
not one that you know is fairto criticize publicly. And it's been a
weird thing to see that unravel becauseit has really thrown a lot of the
discourse off. It's thrown it offits head. You know, Michael Bay.
We used to be pretty united inour hostility towards that guy. I'm
(02:54):
not going to go into my ownfeelings about Michael Bay, but that was
a pretty broadca sentence. Now,like you could be a fucking dork if
you shit on Michael Bay. Peoplewill be in your replies, people might
be in your dms, like youmight be in your home, might be
under your bed. Uh. It'sit's kind of crazy and and and in
(03:16):
addition to that, like there,you know, ultimately, in the pursuit
of honesty, sometimes we just haveto say a movie's that bad and that
goes against our show so much thatwe figured, why not just have a
way to go into an episode,uh, knowing you know, we already
know what we think about it.We already know what we think about the
(03:37):
movie. And if neither of ushave any anything all that good to say
about it, why not just dosomething different? And and you know that
helps diversify our channel, which isalways something that we're you know, looking
to do. So it's it alljust works out nicely in a nice it's
that bad flavored bo And personally,I felt like there was a there was
(03:57):
a gap in my online life.I didn't have a space to just vent
jointly about a piece of media thattruly offended me. So there would have
been no way to get a VPrequiem on our show, which would have
been a shame because I would havebottled that rage up until I, you
know, until I exercised my secondAmendment right somewhere tragically. Sole's oh my
(04:24):
god, oh shit. Well let'savoid that, and let's let's talk a
VP requiem. Now, two thousandand seven is the year this movie comes
out, a couple of years probablywhat four years after the original four years?
Yeah, so you know, goingback to this year, we're pretty
(04:46):
young. You know, we're nineyears old. I think I'm still in
grade school. Yeah, what doyou do have any memories of trailers or
hype around this movie? I'm curiousif you have any sort of real man
nice anything. It wasn't like thefirst movie where I saw the poster around
and didn't even know who either ofthose titular characters were. But it was
(05:12):
a poster that you know, madean impression on me. This movie just
came and went. Now, grantedthis is rated R. It wasn't targeted
to anyone thirteen or younger, asthe previous one was right. So that's
probably part of the reason I justmissed this. But I have a theory
that this movie didn't actually come outin two thousand and seven and doesn't actually
(05:34):
exist. I I just think thatthis is like something like they have like
slipped onto some collector's box editions andsnuck onto Hulu to be watched with the
first movie. But I don't thinkthat we can trust this as a real
(05:54):
movie made by real people. Well, sir, I'm happy to be one
to confirmed that this movie did comeout in two thousand and seven. Actually,
I'm kind of surprised because I almostforgot this movie existed, but not
in the traditional sense I remembered everythingI've Honestly, I kind of thought that
this was a Mandela effect. Ireally did, because I would think of
(06:15):
this movie and I'd be like man, I for years I didn't see it.
So, you know, two thousandand seven, I know it's coming
out. I'm aware of the firstmovie. I had seen a TV edit
of the first movie by this pointin time in two thousand and seven,
so I was aware of it,and I'm like, man, that would
be really cool to see that.And then I hear it's rated R and
I'm like, oh, my parentsare never gonna let me see that.
(06:36):
But I really wanted to see it. I was excited. I saw the
poster. I thought the poster lookedawesome. I was so excited, and
then I never heard anything about itfor like I don't even know, probably
ten years. I didn't hear anything. I never watched it, and so
the movie was never released because itwasn't real because it didn't exist. Well,
(06:58):
dude, And here's what's crazy,right, is like one day I'm
sitting there and I'm just like,okay, I'm flipping through channels and sure
enough, TV editive AVP is onand I'm like, whoa, okay,
yeah, like that's you know,throwing it back. Because this is how
I first saw this movie. Thisis cool. And I was like,
wait a minute, there's a sequelthrough this, And I looked, I'm
(07:18):
like, I bet they're playing itafter this. Supposedly there is a sequel,
Like, I'm like, maybe they'replaying it after this. No,
it's you know, a completely differentmovie. Okay, that's weird. And
then I looked up the sequel andI'm like, oh, okay, I
saw the rotten Tomato score. Isaw, I saw the reaction, started
reading reviews on IMDb, speaking ofthe reaction. God, for me,
(07:41):
my exposure to this movie was fromonline reviewers like okay, people like the
nostalgia critic or that genre of intranetcritic. Right. I saw a couple
of reviews like that of this movie. And the thing is, those kinds
of reviews don't ever get to theheart of what the experience of watching this
(08:05):
movie would feel like. Because youcan joke about how impossibly hard it is
to see a movie, but yougot to actually stit down and watch the
screen for ninety minutes and see likeone or two images flick by and that
whole time. I'm talking like likeblink and you miss it. Or you
(08:28):
can just keep your eyes closed,same effect. Yeah, I honestly this
movie is sort of I honestly believethis. I think you could listen to
this movie as opposed to watching it, and it'd be just about the same
experience, if not a better experience, because you're not straining to see what's
happening. I think you could probablyfigure it out a little easier by show
(08:50):
then there's nothing to distract you fromthe Then there's nothing to distract you from
the dialogue, which is another nocalamity. It's like a you know,
poorly written audio book. You know, it's it's basically what this movie is.
It's just a poorly written audio versionof a terrible book. I think
that was probably the main line ofcriticism against the movie was that it was
(09:15):
so poorly lit. But the weirdthing is, actually, now the art
of cinematography has fallen off so hardto wear. Like HBO shows like season
eight of Game of Thrones, peopleare complaining they can't see a damn thing,
and the cinematographer says, well,maybe if you had an Imax CV
like I do, you could seefine. So that's the state of lighting
(09:39):
in Hollywood productions now. But thiswas weird back then. These are two
of the most iconic movie monsters.This is a sequel to a movie that
made hundreds of millions of dollars atthe box office. So why does it
look like this? How Come II don't recognize any of the actors.
How Come I've never heard of thesedirectors? Like there was this some kind
(10:01):
of conspiratorial essence to this movie.Of it was not supposed to happen,
I would believe that it was justI guess we should get into the plot
quote unquote, that this is justone of those monster attacks of small town
scripts that was dusted off and findand replace Predator and Alien into the script,
(10:26):
right, because there is nothing ofessence to this movie that has anything
to do with Predator or Alien.And it's kind of upsetting for me because
I'm gonna be honest, like,as far as the premise is concerned,
like just coming up with the ideaof a small you know, Colorado town
(10:48):
being the site at which the Aliensand the Predator will face off again,
right, and the pred aliens aswell, That in principle is really cool.
And when I was rewatching this movie, I realized I don't remember a
thing from this I had watched itfive or six years ago. At this
(11:11):
point, I don't remember. ThinkI even made a mistake by watching it
too early in the day today becauseI don't remember any of the character's names
right now. That's how memorable thismovie is to me. I remember one.
I remember Dallas because one of thefew references to the Alien franchise is
the character Dallas, you know fromthe original, played by Tom Scarrett.
(11:35):
So it skates by with some references. But here's the thing. Yes,
it's a fun premise for a movie. I know that because it's been done
in Gremlins, it was done inthe Blob, it was done in both
Blops. It's been done to death. I mean, it is actually probably
one of the staple kind of settingsfor a monster flick. Small town invaded
(11:58):
by ex terrestriels and they fumbled that. That's the tragedy of it. What
one thing I want to understand iswhy a movie that sounds like it should
be my thing on paper? Whichthis is why I just, I mean,
I really struggle to get through thisone man, Like there's really no
(12:18):
two ways of getting about it.No, I feel the same way,
especially after Like you, so Ialready established no memory of this except for
how dark it was obviously when itfirst started. And we're introduced to this
like hunter right and his son,and these two characters are in the woods
and you know whatever, they're outhunting. I'm like, ooh, what
(12:41):
a cool idea for a predator movie. Like a guy trying to keep his
son safe from the Predator. They'reboth hunters, the predator, you know,
hunts the alien. You know.That's a cool idea. It's kind
of like what they did in Pray, which I think is a great example
of how you do Predator. Andthen and then they just kill him and
they move on to the most insufferablegroup of ass hats. They kill him,
(13:05):
and they and then they fucking chestburst his little son, his son
to prove that this is an Rrated movie. Really gnarly stuff, man,
really cool stuff in my in myMonster v. Monster Flake to see
a child mutilation of a small child. Yeah, that's what the fans were
(13:28):
clamoring for. Now, let melet me ask you this. We talked
about how much the first one madeat the box office, which which ended
up coming out to one hundred andseventy seven point four million dollars at the
box office. Pretty successful on whatit was like sixty seventy million dollar budget.
It's actually lower than I would haveguessed. I would have thought it
broke the two hundred million. Iwould have thought so too. I'm a
little surprised. I guarantee you though, that that a lot of their money
(13:52):
came from home media sales, Ican just guarantee that that movie did great
once an Oh and actually that's agreat point. So if you have ever
seen a sequel that came out waylater than the original and you're wondering why
did they wait till long, it'sbecause finally they made enough money in DBD
or home media sales to justify asequel. That's the exact story of a
(14:13):
Punisher war Zone, which you know, is a prequel to a movie that
didn't do great at the box office, but they sold so many DVDs that
they figured, you know, theremust be a market for a sequel,
right, And in that case,it was a miscalculation. I don't know
what the box office stats are withAVP Requim, probably because it never came
(14:35):
out. Because it does, itdoes not exist. I was just about
to ask you what would you whatwould you gather? Now? Now,
mind you, budget was forty million, so they had less money to work
with. But still that forty milliontoday would be over sixty million. You
have offended me with that number.This was a forty million dollar production million
dollar movies, believe it or not. Forty million dollars. How much do
(14:56):
you think they made back at Idon't believe it. This is this is
what we call Hollywood account. Theydidn't have enough money for lighting with,
they didn't have enough money for aname actor. Do you know any of
the actors in this production? Ican't name a single one. No.
I I vaguely recognized the sheriff.I think he's a character actor who is
(15:18):
who has popped up here and there, but not not like a Jon Tuturo
character actor, like a famous one, like he's like, oh yeah,
I think I think I've seen him, Like I think, oh yeah,
I don't know a single person.I would guess that this made sixty million.
I don't know why I threw thatnumber out. Just no way.
(15:39):
It did as good as the firstNo where, no way. It even
sniffed that. So you said,you said about sixty double it that ten?
Really one hundred and thirty million dollars? This man really? Yeah?
Can you believe that? One hundredand thirty million dollars? And again we
have to talk about the significance ofthat, because some people don't know this
(16:02):
movie exists. I had a coworkera number of years ago. We were
talking about cool like, you know, like versus movies. You know,
like if Frankenzein versus Wolfman all thosethings, and he brought up Alien Versus
Predator and I was like, well, you know, it sucks they couldn't
make a worthy sequel that. He'slike, yeah, I would have killed
to see a sequel. And Iwas like, well, they made one.
(16:22):
And he was like, what doyou mean they made one. I
was like, no, they did, they made one. He had no
idea it even came out one hundredand thirty million dollars at the box office.
And nobody knows this thing exists,or if they do, they it's
like it's like a Voldemort. Youknow, you can't talk about it.
It's crazy to me. I rememberdoing promotion for the Predator Key of Key
(16:45):
and Peel mentioned that he marathon allthe Predator movies, including and he turned
to the camera and he looked likea mob was about to stick on him
and he said even even Alien VersusPredator requiem. So the the stigma around
this movie is very real, andI think it has a chilling effect on
(17:07):
any possibility of a fandom or ayou know, just even a continued conversation.
This is probably an opening weekend.It probably made a lot opening weekend.
Maybe maybe made some on DVD sales, But if you do like it,
I think it's probably like too guiltyof a pleasure for you to own
(17:30):
or for you to express. Youknow, it's like probably being a communist
in the thirties. Well you knowwhat though, Like I want to say,
like you know, I've gone onrecord on our show as saying,
when I go into a movie,I want to like it, you know,
I want to have a good time. I'm never going into a movie
unless I hate the director, youknow, Like if somebody's making me watch
(17:52):
a Neuve Bowl movie for some reason, I'm not I'm not gonna try to
like it because I don't like theguy. I don't want to say anything
he does is good, and luckilyhe makes it for me not to do
that. But I wanted to likethis movie so bad. I think the
branding's pretty cool. Honestly, Ithink the AVP logo that they came up
with in the first movie, usedagain for this one, is a great
way to brand a movie. Theyhad a really cool cover that they made
(18:15):
for this Real Dark tried to pushthat horror edge, right, you know.
Pretty unique name of Requiem, likeoh, for the time. I'm
like, okay, you know,there's says a lot of stuff going for
it, and then it ruins everybit of it. It ruins every bit
of it throughout that time. Andyou did not mention the hook of having
a predalien, which is a reallycool idea, in a very cool idea.
(18:40):
It is the only real continuity fromthe original movie if you even want
to okay, if you even wantto say that, how long must they
have been above earth for for this? Like? How long does it take
a pre daim to grow up?Like, isn't this supposed to be like
right after the events of the firstmovie? It is right after the events
of the first movie. So howis the pre daily the predalien at the
end of the first movie is thelittle baby alien that pops out of the
(19:03):
predator's stomach. It's a full grownpred alien in this movie. Well,
these things grow up really fast?Is it that fast? It's pretty fast?
Wow, I did not know that. I figured it took a little
longer than like a day for thesethings decreased. Now that's actually that that
tracks? Okay, then then I'mthen I'm wrong here. I will I
(19:25):
will give the movie points for that. Then I will also give the movie
one point for one cool reference,which is that the predators sent to dispatch
of the surviving xenomorphs He's Wolf,which is obviously a reference to Harvey kai
Tell's character in pulp Fiction. Uh, which is one of those more cool
references. Not not not somebody sayingget to the chopper or any dumb shit
(19:48):
like that. So I give themovie one point, and on paper,
right, yeah, I would loveto see these characters go back to their
horror roots, right, the dangerousroots, the violence that shocked people.
But at the same time, itblows so hard. It's it's really difficult
(20:17):
to sum up a movie like AVPRequiem because you want to call it generic.
In some ways, it is likeour main group of characters and the
issues that they're dealing with are thingsthat you've seen in countless movies, right,
Like they're just stock characters that werenot meant to care about, and
moments in this movie are incredibly generic. But like you said, at the
(20:41):
time, it really wasn't the normfor a movie to be as like dark
as this sci fi unless the moviewas horror based first. It was like
a horror sci fi you didn't seea lot of sci fi horror around this
period of time, you know thatleans more of the sci fi route,
tries to go into this horror routeand fails. Miserb It's really hard to
sum up what this movie is supposedto be. I mean, it doesn't
(21:07):
accomplish anything. It's supposed to bea really mean throwback to eighties, a
you know, monster movie set ina small town I guess, But even
with that, it takes it tothis grand level where like now they're bringing
(21:29):
nukes into the situation and and youknow the nat Well, okay, like
before we before we get to that, let's address this this thing we've both
brought up. Okay, the charactersare are so generic that that calling them
generic kind of like degrades the wordgeneric, right, because they're not even
a generic version of a type.I mean, there is not even like
(21:52):
a recognizable archetype except maybe you know, the kind of the fugitive older brother,
although where he got the skill toyou know, battle aliens and predators
with whatever kind of small town primeoutfit he was running with. You know,
we don't know any details because we'renot supposed to care. And that's
(22:15):
the thing why are these characters soimpossible to care about? When you know,
you go back to these other examplesI've thrown out the Blob movies,
grumlins. You know, why dowe care about those characters and not these,
Like I'm asking why. I thinkit's just because they mean nothing.
(22:41):
I mean, like they I'll givethem enough credit for trying to set up
scenarios that would make us like generally, like, here's an idea that would
that that could make an audience careabout a character. Right. They introduced
this thing of like, oh,here's this guy trying to you know,
conflicted about turning his life around.But now his little brother is kind of
(23:02):
following in his footsteps, right,and his best friend is the cop.
Now, okay, right, okay, you got to go somewhere with that.
You got to make it mean something. You have to you have to
give us moments throughout that make uscare about it. Emotional moments between the
older brother who just got out ofjail and the younger brother, moments between
the cop, moments where he's beingtested. Right, you know, maybe
(23:22):
I should you know, go backto my criminal ways or whatever. It
doesn't fit in a movie like thisbecause it just doesn't feel Am I wrong?
Like it doesn't feel like in analien versus predator movie? What I
mean, I don't know if that'sthe case. What I think is that
the filmmakers did not care about thesecharacters. I can agree there. You
(23:45):
cannot watch the ending of this movieand come away thinking that any any above
the line person gave two fucks aboutabout the movie that they made about the
characters. Nobody's and nobody in theaudience is in tears know when they when
they dropped a nuke on the townor anything. I was in tears from
laughter. Oh god, No,it's it's kind of frustrating because, like
(24:14):
you know, like I mentioned earlier, the whole idea of this like and
and it's why I love the moviepraise so much, is they try to
take this character right and they tellyou enough of this of this character story
and who they are as a person. But they they also introduce a really
cool monster for this person to fight, and they connect this person with the
(24:34):
monster. They have similar things aboutthem, they do similar things, They
they fight in similar ways. There, they have a similar goal in mind.
They're both hunters, they're both tryingto make it they're both trying to
prove themselves. These are things thatmake you care about a character. And
again they they they lobbed it upand then they completely whiffed. And I
(24:55):
don't know how you whiff so bad. You could have just made this the
smallest movie ever. I know,forty million dollars a lot of money to
work with, but you didn't needany of these characters. Just give us
the dad and the kid throughout thewhole movie and we're good. That's all
you'd need to do. We havea reason to care, just just from
the dad trying to protect his son. We have a reason to care.
(25:18):
But they okay, actually do something, they need something, they wanted another
Freddie versus Jason. I can seethat. I can certainly see that.
That's all you would get. Like, if you try to understand what the
filmmakers must know about alien and Predatorcharacters from this movie, you couldn't extrapolate
(25:44):
that they knew much of anything outsideof that they're monsters, right, and
the other the best Aliens movies andeven the Predator movies you know that aren't
aren't on par with the best,but but still, you know, have
been embraced by the fans are reallylike about the mythology of these characters.
(26:07):
Like it's like like Predators is likeliterally a trip throughout the whole world of
these creatures. So these are notcharacters that are like stand ins, right,
These are not things you can swapout. I've never seen two iconic
franchises denigrated this way so haphazardly.I mean, you have your hands on
(26:32):
the two most popular movie monsters nowlike bar None, and you get to
make a movie with them, youshould like, the excitement should thrill you.
And instead they were trying to figureout how to make them as indistinguishable
as possible, I mean quite literallyin some scenes. You know, I
(26:55):
had issues with how they shot thefight sequences between these these in the in
the first movie. Just didn't lovethe camera work and didn't love the way
that they went about shooting them,and and you know, but but I
acknowledge that it's it was cool tosee predators and aliens face off. You
I thought that was even tell sometimeswhich one is which I thought it was
ironic that you did not love thefights in the first movie because they were
(27:18):
w W E S fuck no.So there were Again, there are things
I like about them. And Ihave gone back and watched the movie since
then, and there are things,there are more things I appreciate about it,
uh than than the last time wetalked about, you know, aliens
facing off with predators, which isanother issue. The first movie was alien
versus predator. This is aliens versuspredator, which I guess is more uh,
(27:41):
you know, I guess that's itexplains more there are there are multiple
aliens, but it's just kind ofweird for a sequel to change up the
titling that much. But yeah,problems aside with the first movie, Like
there are scenes in this where thepredator is fighting the predalien or is fighting
(28:03):
an alien, and in like thecamera, the way the camera is cutting
and the way that the lighting isdone, you actually can't distinguish which one
is which at some points did thepredator just hit the alien or did the
alien just hit the predator? Actuallycan too, I don't. I can't
make a mental image of the predalienright now because I never got a good
look at the think, so Ionly can because I had the task of
(28:27):
creating at the task of having tocreate a thumbnail for this, and I
had to view an image of it, which which leads me to like I
want to say, if you dolook at behind the scenes things for this
movie and the few times we cansee these things, I actually think that
the design of the Predators, especially, it's better in this as compared to
(28:48):
the first one. For me,I think that the effects team with building
these creatures did a great job,even the Predalien, which you don't get
to see a whole lot of.And I know that justification of the filmmakers
which is so frustrating is that well, it hides the effects. It makes
them look more real. Not forme, it makes them look non existent
(29:10):
or lazy, but it bothers methat much more because when you see those
behind the scenes shots or when yousee you know, a few times we
get to see these creatures throughout this, they look really good. Yeah,
there's a really terrible trend of obscuredeffects work circa two thousand's early twenty ten.
(29:30):
I felt that this was a problemoutside of horror. Like Man of
Steel, it wasn't dim, butthe shaky cam was so egregious that you
couldn't make out the fantastic set designthat had been constructed. And there I
think that was like an earnest stylisticchoice from Zach's shaky camp. Snyder himself
(29:55):
this was this was I think justvery a fumbling attempt at maybe obscuring effects
that you just weren't. It's notthat they thought that the effects were bad,
but they didn't know how to filmthem. In addition to having competent
effects people, you the director,you need to do your job. You
(30:17):
need to photograph these things to bringout their full you know, to fully
realize them as characters. Right,we'll go back and watch again the best
movies of either of these entries.The camera work is as in table as
the effects design. And these guys, again I don't remember their names.
They have one other full feature motionpicture under their belt. For director.
(30:42):
It looks like their brothers, Colinand Greg Strauss. Their other movies,
Skyline from twenty ten has a onepoint eight and this has a one point
six. So and that's it forthem. They have one short film called
Mute. It only has been rateda total of nine times, with a
two and a half, a two, and a one three in each.
(31:07):
So they don't have a great trackrecord. But you know you said it
earlier, and you said something that'sreally important. You get the opportunity to
direct two of the most iconic charactersin science fiction. I mean these in
science fiction films. These are twoof the most important and well known monsters
(31:29):
in that world, especially the Xenomorphthe Aliens. Yes, and you were
so lucky to be able to directa movie with these two. I would,
man, I would do so manythings to be able to get the
opportunity to direct a movie or writea movie or both. If I was
able to do so for characters likethis, I would do so much preparation,
(31:55):
so much background, put so muchcare into it, because these are
characters that you can't help but loveif you love the genre, and if
you're bringing in directors that don't carejust because they're cheap, I can guarantee
you that maybe the movie wouldn't havebeen as technically proficient, but it wasn't
technically proficient with these guys. Justhire some fucking amateur off the street and
(32:15):
they could. I think if someif you hired a first time director who
did not know what they were doingbut love these characters, I am confident
they could have done a better jobthan these two schmucks did. And they
could be nice guys. I don'tknow. I'm usually very passive about that,
but I'm kind of angry about thismovie because you said it perfectly.
You are lucky to be able todirect these characters and to just give up
(32:37):
and not care and tell your DPwho. I don't know who the DP
was on this movie. I don'tknow if they if they're any good,
I'm gonna I'm gonna look at thatwhile I'm saying this. But but to
just tell them just just don't lightit. Just put one blue light above
these two monsters fighting and just letthe audience, you know, make up
the rest with their eyes, youknow, let let their let their mind
(33:00):
and just make up what else ishappening on screen. It's baffling to me.
This movie does serve the purpose ofreminding people that even the type of
genre fair that we think of asbeing the schlockiest still takes effort the end.
It can be done competently or incompetently. Right. This has basically the
(33:21):
same kind of of like your shitheel ensemble that you would see in the
Friday of the Thirteenth remake, right, and that movie gets flat for that.
But man, you cannot Compare thetwo of these, like, and
there's a perfect one to one example. Right. The bully in this like,
I don't I can't remember his name. Yeah, I can't remember anything
(33:42):
he said, and I certainly don'tremember his death scene. I remember that
he died, but there's nothing evenlike rewarding about it. Even though he's
like he's the guy you hate,the movie keeps reminding you. Right.
Compare that with Trent. I mean, Trent has now become one of the
most quoted characters in like in horrorfandom, you know, for the last
(34:02):
twenty five years, and his deathscene is like the stuff of legends.
And let me just say this foundthe cinematographer. And now I'm pissed.
Now, I'm really pissed off atthese fuckers. Let me read you a
couple of credits under this cinematographer's belt. Okay, the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre,
(34:23):
Daniel Pearl shot this, huh yep, Friday remake, Texas Massacre remake,
Invaders from Mars. This guy knowshow to shoot a movie. I'm
not even surprised though. I'm notsurprised though, because this does have I
think it's grasping at the Platinum Dunes. She is the Platinum Dunes, isn't
(34:49):
it? Is it it? Ithink so? I thought so. I
think they were involved in this.Well, that would make this the inbread
you know, know, the inbreddaughter of of I'm sorry, Session Entertainment
now rat Pack. Okay, yeah, my mistake, because if Platinum Dunes
(35:10):
released this, that would make thisthe worst thing they've ever done. It
would have had many more explosions andprobably would have been Honestly, and I
can't believe saying this probably would havebeen more enjoyable. It would have been
more enjoyable. Are you kidding me? I mean they did. They did
two other movies that this. Thiscinematographer is did the Friday remake and the
Texas Chainsaw remake. Both of thoseare Platinum Dunes, and both of them
(35:34):
looked better than this movie, wereshot better than this movie, had better
better than this movie, and bythe way, I think are both good
movies, very good. I can'tfathom what went into making this, and
the more I'm talking, you know, before we started shooting this, I
was like, man, I hopeI have enough to say about this,
and now like I've I've gotten sofrustrated about this movie? Help me out
(36:01):
here, Where can we go withthis? That? That that that kind
of leads away from anger, butyou can laugh at it. I'm gonna
ask you, do you think thisis the worst movie in either franchise?
Quality wise? I'd say yes.I think I would rather watch this than
Predators, though really I can't standAdrian Brody or that movie. So whoa,
(36:27):
whoa, whoa. Now we've nowwe've stumbled onto what will surely be
a riveting discussion. What's your problemwith Adrian Brody? I just don't like
him, man. I don't likehis face, I don't like the way
he acts. I don't like anythingabout him and I and I I think
it all started with Predators. Ihated Predators when I saw it. I've
heard a bunch of praise for itrecently, which baffles me because all me
(36:50):
and my friends used to do waswas ship on that movie. And I
don't know, I just every timeI see Adrian Brody it's like, no,
I'm not gonna see that movie.I just don't like the guy.
I'm sure he's pleasant, I don'tknow, I haven't read it. It's
probably not pleasant, especially if you'rehalle Berry presenting him with an oscar.
Yeah, yeah, I don't care. It's just very very cool because that's
(37:14):
not that's not one of the easyones to take shots at, right,
that's actually one of the one ofthe okay ones. Right, people like
are all right with Predators? Me? I put it on the show if
I could. Yeah? Me,I no, man. I So this
is definitely the worst Alien movie,but not the worst Predator movie. Do
(37:37):
you think Shane Black's Predators or Iwas about to say I was about to
say. I was about to say, this is not even the worst Predator
movie written by a Shane because Iget a kick out of Predator too.
I don't think it's a better movie, but that could be not that bad.
I've had it on my list sincethe show started, so I wouldn't
(37:59):
be surprised to see it jump onhere. I have a bit of an
exciting answer. I think for myfavorite and the Predator, because I pray
is actually my favorite. That's agood answer. That's a good answer,
really well done, a really uniqueway to do the character, and I
would love to see I've heard thatthey're going to do different versions of it,
like throughout history and in different environments. And I hope that they're able
(38:20):
to do that because I think itworked really well. Man. You love
it when people finally get the ideathat they should have gotten twenty five years
ago. Yeah, even for Predatortwo. Like Predator two, I'll give
credit for because, like, Ithink it's kind of cool of a cool
idea to like take the Predator andinstead of putting him in a jungle,
putting him in a concrete jungle,I think is like a cool carryover.
(38:44):
But the fact that it took himso long to think of, like,
oh, let's take Predator back intime to a different time period. Let's
you know, take him to let'shave him face off with you know,
an indigenous tribe or i'd I've heardit rumors of like a samurai or you
know things samurai the most people's choice. I wouldn't mind saying the Predator in
(39:06):
the wild West, I've heard,I've heard, think, dude, the
pitches I've heard are like so likeI've heard like Predator in World War One,
which would sound so cool, evenlike Predator, Like, you know,
another rumor I heard was, yeah, the samurai thing. Uh,
I think a medieval Night, Medieval, the Right facing off against a Night.
(39:30):
There's so many and you know what, like, all of those are
good ideas if they're executed in inyou know, as expertly as I feel
Prey was. There were issues withPrey. Don't get me wrong. It's
not a perfect movie, but it'sdefinitely my favorite in the in the Predator
verse. Unfortunately I can't be asas exciting in the Alien franchise. Aliens
is the best movie, though Ilike some that people don't like. I
(39:52):
like Alien three. Yeah, youlike Alien three? Okay, So I
like Alien Resurrection, so yeah,and I I don't. I don't know
if I like Alien Resurrection, butI'm glad it exists because it's a weird
movie. It's a weird one.Yeah, but it's got so much energy
and it's zany. It's free andliberated. I dig I will defend it's
(40:16):
right to exist. I will notdefend this movie's right to exist. Getting
us back on AVP R AVP R. Yeah, Oh well, let's let's
ask another prompt. Okay of theof the monster movie set in a small
(40:37):
town? Okay, what's your favoriteof that genre? Oh? Man,
I might have to take a moment. Do you have one? Off the
bat? I think I do.What do you got? I got The
Blob nineteen eighty eight? Real Ones? No, real Ones? No?
You know who wrote that movie?Man, Frank Darabond? Really yeah,
(41:01):
I didn't know that. How didI never know that? And that would
explain why there are at least threeWalking Dead actors in the cast of that
movie. Oh, I guess so. Oh man, I didn't even think
about that. Oh Man. Mastermovies set in a small town, and
(41:23):
I think the go to one isGremlins. Gremlins is I actually prefer Gremlins
too over Gremlins. But it's notset in a small town. It's not
set in a small town. NoPredators, small town, the Witch?
No, no, you you went, I went too far, a completely
(41:49):
different place. Yeah, I don't. I don't know that. I can
think of a favorite off the topof my head. Honestly, if I
had to say one right now,just off the bat, I'd probably say
Gremlin. It's it's the easiest answer. It's such a precious sub genre to
me. Unfortunately, you know,I I pitched one of my own monster
(42:09):
movie set in a small town,and I got pushback from execs because that's
too old fashioned. But what isStranger Things but five seasons of monsters invade
a small town? Yeah, that'svery true. Well I guess I guess
it would be my answer. Thendarry is a small town, so sure
I'm gonna go Yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah, okay, Yeah I
(42:35):
did. I mean Stephen King Ithink made his bones on those kind of
stories. Yeah, And I thinkI know it might be controversial that I
didn't pick the twenty seventeen version andI picked the nineteen ninety version, but
fuck you guys. Tim Curry's great. So Timurry is great. I love
it. I love it is great. So getting defensive about a totally acceptable
(42:58):
opinion, that's ex. Dude,I had, I had. I've had
people tell me I'm crazy for that, just like I would tell somebody they're
crazy if they said that they preferthis movie to h to the first one,
which I, by the way,like I called a v P.
I said it was that bad whenwe covered it. And I have to
say, after rewatching a VP R, like I would revisit a VP now
(43:20):
and I think I'd have a differentopinion because I appreciate it more knowing what
came after it. I actually rememberyou agreeing with me on a VP I
don't remember us coming on down ondifferent verdicts. So that's interesting. So
tell me we should have We shouldhave gotten around to this earlier. But
what are the things that you dolike more about a VP R than a
(43:44):
VP blank. Yes, some ofthem are are more in concept. You
know. I'm one of those peoplelike if you if you have a good
idea, I'm not going to shyaway from it and you know, and
not celebrate it. The idea ofmaking it more of like a like a
horror showdown as opposed to like theaction adventure sort of tone that the first
(44:05):
one took I think was a reallycool idea. Creature design is absolutely something
that I think they did better.Unfortunately you don't get to see as much
of it as you should, butI absolutely think it was better. One
of my problems with the first onewas how the predators looked. I didn't
think they looked great at all.I thought they looked it was one of
the worst looks of predators had inmy opinion. They completely turned it around
(44:30):
in this movie. For me,I think they absolutely did better. The
Xenomorphs I think it's hard to getwrong. So you know, I'm not
gonna say that they did it better. I mean, I didn't think they
did a good job at it inthis movie, so I'm not gonna shit
on it. And I do likethis the idea of this setting a little
bit more than the Arctic setting.I think the Arctic setting is really cool,
(44:53):
but I don't know that it didas much for the alien and predator.
I like the idea of, like, here's like the woods, small
town setting, you know, aplace where something like this could feasibly happen
and the United States government would justdecide to wipe it off the face of
the planet instead of dealing with itproperly. There's a bit of a like
(45:16):
a Branch Davidian vibe going on here, man, Like I didn't I didn't
dig that, man, I comeon, I think somebody would notice if
we'd knew an American town off themap. I'll say this, I was
kind of surprised that they didn't golike full board with the bummer ending,
you know, like they knew thetown right, and then the survivors get
(45:38):
away, and then there comes apoint and correct me if I'm wrong.
Because again, this movie is veryforgettable for me. But there's a moment
where like the military kind of surroundsour survivors, right, and I'm surprised
they didn't just kill me. Ithink I think they flinched. I mean,
which you show mutilation. That couldhave been a studio note and you
(46:04):
know, hey, maybe there couldhave been a sequel and our favorite characters
in the franchise could have returned forthat. I mean, can you imagine
can you imagine the rematch with can'tthink of a single name, the Pizza
Guy? Yeah, dude, ifthe Pizza Guy got a rematch with the
Predator, it would have move overInfinity War, move move over Batman,
(46:30):
be Superman. Now. I wantto ask you this though, Like you
know, obviously a big thing todayis you know, the idea of like
a legacy sequel or something like that. Not saying that a legacy sequel will
not for this. No, wouldyou want to see them take another attempt
at an alien versus Predator showdown,whether it's connecting to the first movie or
(46:50):
not. No, I think Imean that's we're in a free for all
state with that. I mean,we we really don't need to connect it
to the to the pre entries.I guess I wouldn't have a problem if
if there was a legacy, alegacy sequel to the first a VP and
not even but how do you evenbuild off of a VP reckquam they knuke
(47:14):
that whole town? Yeah you can't. I mean, well, you know,
I honestly would would would like tosee them attempt this whole concept.
I like, just forget the othertwo happened. Do a VP again,
Just just redo it. Give somebodywho appreciates the franchise the rains to do
it. I know the way thattwentieth century pictures now, I think it's
(47:37):
twentieth century pictures, right, nottwentieth century studios. Studios. I know
they're not huge on doing like massivebudgets for movies like these, but why
can't we get a straight to HuluAlien Versus Predator movie? I think they
could do it. They're expensive,man, I mean yeah, but you
(47:58):
know, I mean Prey was successfuland Pray was even successful. When they
they they were pretty much forced todo a home media release when everybody was
like, hey, let us buythis movie. So they said, okay,
we'll take We'll you know, keepit on Hulu, but you can
buy it now, and it didcrazy numbers like the just bump it up
a little bit, okay, andand let a filmmaker who cares about it
(48:20):
go in there. Even unknown actorsI'm cool with, Like, you know,
you some actors that we don't know, pray. I didn't know any
of the actors in Prey. Idon't think that really worked to the advantage.
That really worked to the advantage.And we did know the director.
Okay, there was a Yeah themarket I love to see that. I
(48:40):
think people have turned on the crossovermovie to some extent. Uh. I
know, a New Kong, aNew Kong VI Goddilla just came out,
and I see some mild enthusiasm.But people say it's fun. It's fun,
but nobody wants more. I'm nothearing demands for more, right,
(49:01):
I love crossover, but give meas many as you can. I don't
care how shitty they are. Imean total Freddy versus Jason apologist mane oh
yeah, and you know, likethere are some that I just wouldn't want
to see, you know, likemake it make sense. I am a
big opponent of the Michael versus Pinheadidea that people keep pushing. But like
Friday the Thirteenth is pushing this wholeJason universe bullshit right now, right,
(49:23):
And so they're just doing everything theycan to not make a movie. But
I see an opportunity with that.Fuck you want to put Jason everywhere crossover?
Give us another crossover. I don'tcare who it is. Throw anybody
against Jason. I don't care.Give me something. I'd like to see
two icons face off against each other. I'm a box office horror man,
I don't care. I like itin everything. I like it in wrestling,
(49:45):
I like it in boxing. Justtake two of the biggest heavyweights you
can and shove them against each otherfor whatever reason you want, and as
long as you make it fun,I'm gonna appreciate it. Just do it
it. Give us more. Iwant to see Kong the new Godzilla movie,
not just because I know one ofthem Suplex is the other one,
(50:05):
but because that's just so fun.It's a fun idea. Keep doing it.
But counterpoint, it can also bea really bad idea. There are
circumstances this movie being exhibit A.Right, there is something really sad about
watching, you know, because whenone when a sequel kind of the hurts
the image of a character you love, that's tough. Then to see them
(50:30):
do it two birds, one Stonein one film, that's that's really tough
to take. So the risk toreward is just kind of off for people.
I don't think. Yeah, Idon't think people hate the idea of
crossovers in general, though I seesome people, you know, kind of
try to accuse it of just beingcommercial and pandering. Maybe it is,
(50:52):
but I think it's really more thethreat of getting it wrong and what that
could mean for the legacy of thesecharacters. And then, you know,
I get it. You know,audiences have been burned by it before.
I mean, people don't love Theaudience at large doesn't love Freddy Versus Jason,
The audience at large doesn't like aVP. The audience at large doesn't
(51:12):
like this one. And that's whywe're able to cover the movies like that
on shows like this. Now.Why people don't like Freddy Versus Jason just
baffles me. There are I usedto I used to not like it.
I just think that there are somemoments that are a little out there.
If you I think this, ifif you're a snobby horror fan, then
(51:35):
you hate that movie. If youhate commercial movies, then you hate that
movie. Me if you if I'vesaid it on not that bad before,
if you market a movie to death, I will probably find a way to
defend it. And if you liketo see a pregnant mother being violated by
the predalien, you know, ifI mean genuinely, like, if you're
(51:59):
like into really gnarly stuff, Iguess, especially compared to the first movie,
this does have stuff to offer,absolutely, but this doesn't have the
finesse or the expertise, or thecharm or the wit of anything previous in
this franchise or in you know,the I think the type of movie they
(52:27):
wanted to make. You know,they were chasing after definite models, good
models, right, like, yeah, make the blob with Predator in the
in the Alien. I I'm notsure if I actually want to see them
in a small town setting. Butyou know, if you go that route,
you know you have a blueprint,you have a model of success,
(52:51):
right And they zigged where I thinkanybody else would have zagged. They set
the blueprint on fire. They doyou have actual thoughts or is it just
going to be that side I just, you know, I just I just
(53:13):
didn't really, I just am reallydisappointed by this movie. Man. Like
I'm not angry, I'm just disappointedat this point. I you know,
I think what you said earlier andwhat we've talked about a few times throughout
this just perfectly sums up how Ifeel about this. And it's that,
you know, to have an opportunityto make a movie like this and to
have a budget that, while itwasn't as high as the budget of the
(53:36):
last movie, there's still a lotof money to work with. Forty Don't
talk about this like this is asmall movie. I mean forty million dollars.
Forty million dollars, which would bewhich would be like a sixty million
dollar budget today a little over almostsixty one million. I said that weird.
Anyways, it's just to take itand to to have not only a
(54:01):
disrespect, I feel a disrespect forthe source material on both fronts, a
disrespect to to to you know,the genre in some ways, but also
like to the crew. You know, your own crew, who's not only
not only are they capable, butthey put together a damn you know,
(54:23):
a damn good effort to to dosomething here. And it's the side of
movie criticism that does bother me isthat, you know, it would bum
me out if if I made amovie and worked hard on a movie and
and people, you know, shitall over it. So sometimes it's hard
for me to say what I'm reallythinking. Uh, but I can.
(54:43):
I think I can say here.You know pretty confidently that either either the
directors of the studio or a combinationof the two absolutely failed the talented people
that were involved in this project.Maybe the actors, I don't I'm not
familiar enough with their work, SoI'm not gonna sit here and just ardently
defend them for their terrible dialet thatthey had to spew out of their mouth
through the entire movie, which it'sit's bad. I didn't talk a whole
(55:06):
lot about it because you know,I'm not stretching for things I didn't like,
like I have to do on thatbad sometimes. But what it's it's
awful, it's it. I can'thandle it. For most of the movie.
I'm laughing at how bad it is, and it's not a good laugh,
it's like a holy shit laugh.And so I'm not going to defend
(55:27):
them, you know, quite ashard but your cinematographer is proven that he
can do a great job. Youryour effects crew clearly can do a great
job, as seen by countless photographsand accounts and everything. And you failed
them all you newter them, andyou failed them because you either didn't know
(55:50):
what you were doing or didn't carewhat you were doing or both. Uh
So, yeah, I mean Iwould actually this is a case where I
would actually give it a worse rateit has on ONO point six. Like
this movie is an easy one starfor me. I know, it's just
a half a star difference, youknow, just a little over. But
oh my god, so disappointing,just so disappointing. All right, well,
(56:15):
I consider that a successful launch ofit's that bad, although I think
retro retroactively we have to make waterWorld technically our first episode because that is
the only time. It's the cattlewe've decided on. It's that it's that
bad together. But this show,this, this is the the launching point.
But that that was with water Worldwalked so that so that it's that
(56:40):
bad. Good run, Yeah,Kevin Consler swam so so the Strauss brothers
could you know, take flight,but like it, Chris, they just
got they got too close to thesun. Man, oh man, I
will I wish after watching this thatI could get too close to the sun
obliterated and have to watch something likethis again. Well, if people want
(57:04):
to watch more of our content,where can they find us? Oh?
Holy shit? You can find usall over the place. Yeah, of
course. If you're listening on Spotify. You can find us on YouTube as
well for video versions of the show. If you're listening if you're on YouTube.
Now, we're on all your favoritepodcasting platforms. So if you'd like
Not that Bad to join you onyour drive to work, or on your
(57:24):
drive home from work, or whereverthe hell else you're going. Road trips
would be fantastic. So you canhear all of our episodes, you can
definitely do that. We're on aton of platforms, and if you need
any help finding links, you canhead to our website Not that badpod dot
com, where we have links toevery platform that we post on with all
of our episodes, as well asan archive of the best place to listen
(57:45):
to every episode, whether some arejust audio only or a direct link to
our YouTube channel. We even havea section for when we go live on
our website, so you can watchdirectly from our site if you want to.
Why would you ever leave? Notthatod dot com. Always have your
tab open. However, if youdo want to leave the site, there's
another place you can go. Coincidentally, we also have a link on our
(58:07):
website for and that's Patreon dot com. Gabe, what can they do on
that website? Well, and thisis very important, so we'll listen up.
They can give us their money.They can give us their money in
exchange for not only the feeling ofsupporting struggling artists like ourselves, but for
(58:30):
per such as Patreon Only specials,Patreon only episodes on a lity of films
across a wide range of genres andsome you might not have ever even heard
of. So if you're a fanof video game movies or Santa's Sligh,
(58:51):
you might want to check out ourPatreon. Yeah, and it's a it's
a place that you can definitely supportus if you want to go to that
next level of support. But ifyou don't want to go that far,
sharing, liking, commenting, subscribing, following, whatever across our social media
platforms and all the platforms that wepost, our show would be extremely helpful.
(59:13):
You know, word of mouth isextremely powerful still, especially in the
world of media and podcasting. Soit means the world to us when we
hear people are sharing the show andloving the show, even feedback. Hell,
you don't like something we're doing,put it in the comments. If
we feel like it's valid criticism,we're happy to change. We are not
said in our ways. So yeah, we just love the support that we
(59:36):
get. We would love some extrasupport if you guys want to give it.
It's incredible, But for now,I think that's all we have to
cover. I think we're done houringourselves out on this show now as well.
So, Gabe, anything else you'dlike to say before you take us
out? If not, I'd loveto hear you take us out. Pressure's
on, pressure is on. WHOAwhat's your message to the world. I
(01:00:00):
came out of nowhere all right?Uh my message to the world is love
and kindness. And if if Ihave anything to cancel befoard, please do
it after the release of this episode. Just give me one last one,
(01:00:22):
all right? And on that note, this is not that bad signing out
recording? Uh? Is it?No? Oh? It is. It's weird
Going into this, you know,you have to have a different mindset.
And for people who are obviously comingto a video like this for the first
time, we haven't really done anythinglike this before on purpose. Fans of
the show or followers of the showwill know that February ninth, twenty twenty
three is a day that lives onand not that bad infamy. That was
(00:38):
the day that we decided to divein and talk about a movie, little
movie called water World, and thatepisode just rocked this show to the core.
It made us question everything we wereabout, everything the show was about
to defend movies that people thought wereactually that bad, and we and do
(01:00):
it, and it rocked us sohard that eventually we just said fuck it.
And we found a way to avoidall of that, to avoid more
heartbreak, to avoid more issues,and we did so by just spinning off
the show and talking and just talkingshit about movies that we know are bad.
Now, we're still going to tryto keep it, you know,
civil enough. I'm not going totry to you know, ruin anybody's life
(01:23):
here. But today, as youcan see, we're talking AVP Requiem,
sequel to a movie we've already talkedabout on this show that got decently how
remarks from yourself. I think everybody, no matter what you felt about the
previous AVP movie, you can seea whole gap of quality, right,
Like anybody can see that, right. You can see a gap in a
(01:46):
lot of things, continuity, quality, lighting. There are things that I
do think are better in this movie, which I think we'll get to as
we as we you know, continuethe discussion as soon it came out.
I'm actually really intrigued to get tothose points. But I actually want to
start this show off by kind ofpointing out a huge reason why we're doing
(02:07):
and it's that bad series, becausethat, you know, kind of seems
to contradict our whole ethos of loveand positivity, defending movies, not joining
on the hate. But there isthis weird part of the culture, especially
online, that is very anti criticis very anti criticism, would lead you
(02:30):
to believe that there's no such thingas a bad movie, or at least
not one that you know is fairto criticize publicly. And it's been a
weird thing to see that unravel becauseit has really thrown a lot of the
discourse off. It's thrown it offits head. You know, Michael Bay.
We used to be pretty united inour hostility towards that guy. I'm
(02:54):
not going to go into my ownfeelings about Michael Bay, but that was
a pretty broadca sentence. Now,like you could be a fucking dork if
you shit on Michael Bay. Peoplewill be in your replies, people might
be in your dms, like youmight be in your home, might be
under your bed. Uh. It'sit's kind of crazy and and and in
(03:16):
addition to that, like there,you know, ultimately, in the pursuit
of honesty, sometimes we just haveto say a movie's that bad and that
goes against our show so much thatwe figured, why not just have a
way to go into an episode,uh, knowing you know, we already
know what we think about it.We already know what we think about the
(03:37):
movie. And if neither of ushave any anything all that good to say
about it, why not just dosomething different? And and you know that
helps diversify our channel, which isalways something that we're you know, looking
to do. So it's it alljust works out nicely in a nice it's
that bad flavored bo And personally,I felt like there was a there was
(03:57):
a gap in my online life.I didn't have a space to just vent
jointly about a piece of media thattruly offended me. So there would have
been no way to get a VPrequiem on our show, which would have
been a shame because I would havebottled that rage up until I, you
know, until I exercised my secondAmendment right somewhere tragically. Sole's oh my
(04:24):
god, oh shit. Well let'savoid that, and let's let's talk a
VP requiem. Now, two thousandand seven is the year this movie comes
out, a couple of years probablywhat four years after the original four years?
Yeah, so you know, goingback to this year, we're pretty
(04:46):
young. You know, we're nineyears old. I think I'm still in
grade school. Yeah, what doyou do have any memories of trailers or
hype around this movie? I'm curiousif you have any sort of real man
nice anything. It wasn't like thefirst movie where I saw the poster around
and didn't even know who either ofthose titular characters were. But it was
(05:12):
a poster that you know, madean impression on me. This movie just
came and went. Now, grantedthis is rated R. It wasn't targeted
to anyone thirteen or younger, asthe previous one was right. So that's
probably part of the reason I justmissed this. But I have a theory
that this movie didn't actually come outin two thousand and seven and doesn't actually
(05:34):
exist. I I just think thatthis is like something like they have like
slipped onto some collector's box editions andsnuck onto Hulu to be watched with the
first movie. But I don't thinkthat we can trust this as a real
(05:54):
movie made by real people. Well, sir, I'm happy to be one
to confirmed that this movie did comeout in two thousand and seven. Actually,
I'm kind of surprised because I almostforgot this movie existed, but not
in the traditional sense I remembered everythingI've Honestly, I kind of thought that
this was a Mandela effect. Ireally did, because I would think of
(06:15):
this movie and I'd be like man, I for years I didn't see it.
So, you know, two thousandand seven, I know it's coming
out. I'm aware of the firstmovie. I had seen a TV edit
of the first movie by this pointin time in two thousand and seven,
so I was aware of it,and I'm like, man, that would
be really cool to see that.And then I hear it's rated R and
I'm like, oh, my parentsare never gonna let me see that.
(06:36):
But I really wanted to see it. I was excited. I saw the
poster. I thought the poster lookedawesome. I was so excited, and
then I never heard anything about itfor like I don't even know, probably
ten years. I didn't hear anything. I never watched it, and so
the movie was never released because itwasn't real because it didn't exist. Well,
(06:58):
dude, And here's what's crazy,right, is like one day I'm
sitting there and I'm just like,okay, I'm flipping through channels and sure
enough, TV editive AVP is onand I'm like, whoa, okay,
yeah, like that's you know,throwing it back. Because this is how
I first saw this movie. Thisis cool. And I was like,
wait a minute, there's a sequelthrough this, And I looked, I'm
(07:18):
like, I bet they're playing itafter this. Supposedly there is a sequel,
Like, I'm like, maybe they'replaying it after this. No,
it's you know, a completely differentmovie. Okay, that's weird. And
then I looked up the sequel andI'm like, oh, okay, I
saw the rotten Tomato score. Isaw, I saw the reaction, started
reading reviews on IMDb, speaking ofthe reaction. God, for me,
(07:41):
my exposure to this movie was fromonline reviewers like okay, people like the
nostalgia critic or that genre of intranetcritic. Right. I saw a couple
of reviews like that of this movie. And the thing is, those kinds
of reviews don't ever get to theheart of what the experience of watching this
(08:05):
movie would feel like. Because youcan joke about how impossibly hard it is
to see a movie, but yougot to actually stit down and watch the
screen for ninety minutes and see likeone or two images flick by and that
whole time. I'm talking like likeblink and you miss it. Or you
(08:28):
can just keep your eyes closed,same effect. Yeah, I honestly this
movie is sort of I honestly believethis. I think you could listen to
this movie as opposed to watching it, and it'd be just about the same
experience, if not a better experience, because you're not straining to see what's
happening. I think you could probablyfigure it out a little easier by show
(08:50):
then there's nothing to distract you fromthe Then there's nothing to distract you from
the dialogue, which is another nocalamity. It's like a you know,
poorly written audio book. You know, it's it's basically what this movie is.
It's just a poorly written audio versionof a terrible book. I think
that was probably the main line ofcriticism against the movie was that it was
(09:15):
so poorly lit. But the weirdthing is, actually, now the art
of cinematography has fallen off so hardto wear. Like HBO shows like season
eight of Game of Thrones, peopleare complaining they can't see a damn thing,
and the cinematographer says, well,maybe if you had an Imax CV
like I do, you could seefine. So that's the state of lighting
(09:39):
in Hollywood productions now. But thiswas weird back then. These are two
of the most iconic movie monsters.This is a sequel to a movie that
made hundreds of millions of dollars atthe box office. So why does it
look like this? How Come II don't recognize any of the actors.
How Come I've never heard of thesedirectors? Like there was this some kind
(10:01):
of conspiratorial essence to this movie.Of it was not supposed to happen,
I would believe that it was justI guess we should get into the plot
quote unquote, that this is justone of those monster attacks of small town
scripts that was dusted off and findand replace Predator and Alien into the script,
(10:26):
right, because there is nothing ofessence to this movie that has anything
to do with Predator or Alien.And it's kind of upsetting for me because
I'm gonna be honest, like,as far as the premise is concerned,
like just coming up with the ideaof a small you know, Colorado town
(10:48):
being the site at which the Aliensand the Predator will face off again,
right, and the pred aliens aswell, That in principle is really cool.
And when I was rewatching this movie, I realized I don't remember a
thing from this I had watched itfive or six years ago. At this
(11:11):
point, I don't remember. ThinkI even made a mistake by watching it
too early in the day today becauseI don't remember any of the character's names
right now. That's how memorable thismovie is to me. I remember one.
I remember Dallas because one of thefew references to the Alien franchise is
the character Dallas, you know fromthe original, played by Tom Scarrett.
(11:35):
So it skates by with some references. But here's the thing. Yes,
it's a fun premise for a movie. I know that because it's been done
in Gremlins, it was done inthe Blob, it was done in both
Blops. It's been done to death. I mean, it is actually probably
one of the staple kind of settingsfor a monster flick. Small town invaded
(11:58):
by ex terrestriels and they fumbled that. That's the tragedy of it. What
one thing I want to understand iswhy a movie that sounds like it should
be my thing on paper? Whichthis is why I just, I mean,
I really struggle to get through thisone man, Like there's really no
(12:18):
two ways of getting about it.No, I feel the same way,
especially after Like you, so Ialready established no memory of this except for
how dark it was obviously when itfirst started. And we're introduced to this
like hunter right and his son,and these two characters are in the woods
and you know whatever, they're outhunting. I'm like, ooh, what
(12:41):
a cool idea for a predator movie. Like a guy trying to keep his
son safe from the Predator. They'reboth hunters, the predator, you know,
hunts the alien. You know.That's a cool idea. It's kind
of like what they did in Pray, which I think is a great example
of how you do Predator. Andthen and then they just kill him and
they move on to the most insufferablegroup of ass hats. They kill him,
(13:05):
and they and then they fucking chestburst his little son, his son
to prove that this is an Rrated movie. Really gnarly stuff, man,
really cool stuff in my in myMonster v. Monster Flake to see
a child mutilation of a small child. Yeah, that's what the fans were
(13:28):
clamoring for. Now, let melet me ask you this. We talked
about how much the first one madeat the box office, which which ended
up coming out to one hundred andseventy seven point four million dollars at the
box office. Pretty successful on whatit was like sixty seventy million dollar budget.
It's actually lower than I would haveguessed. I would have thought it
broke the two hundred million. Iwould have thought so too. I'm a
little surprised. I guarantee you though, that that a lot of their money
(13:52):
came from home media sales, Ican just guarantee that that movie did great
once an Oh and actually that's agreat point. So if you have ever
seen a sequel that came out waylater than the original and you're wondering why
did they wait till long, it'sbecause finally they made enough money in DBD
or home media sales to justify asequel. That's the exact story of a
(14:13):
Punisher war Zone, which you know, is a prequel to a movie that
didn't do great at the box office, but they sold so many DVDs that
they figured, you know, theremust be a market for a sequel,
right, And in that case,it was a miscalculation. I don't know
what the box office stats are withAVP Requim, probably because it never came
(14:35):
out. Because it does, itdoes not exist. I was just about
to ask you what would you whatwould you gather? Now? Now,
mind you, budget was forty million, so they had less money to work
with. But still that forty milliontoday would be over sixty million. You
have offended me with that number.This was a forty million dollar production million
dollar movies, believe it or not. Forty million dollars. How much do
(14:56):
you think they made back at Idon't believe it. This is this is
what we call Hollywood account. Theydidn't have enough money for lighting with,
they didn't have enough money for aname actor. Do you know any of
the actors in this production? Ican't name a single one. No.
I I vaguely recognized the sheriff.I think he's a character actor who is
(15:18):
who has popped up here and there, but not not like a Jon Tuturo
character actor, like a famous one, like he's like, oh yeah,
I think I think I've seen him, Like I think, oh yeah,
I don't know a single person.I would guess that this made sixty million.
I don't know why I threw thatnumber out. Just no way.
(15:39):
It did as good as the firstNo where, no way. It even
sniffed that. So you said,you said about sixty double it that ten?
Really one hundred and thirty million dollars? This man really? Yeah?
Can you believe that? One hundredand thirty million dollars? And again we
have to talk about the significance ofthat, because some people don't know this
(16:02):
movie exists. I had a coworkera number of years ago. We were
talking about cool like, you know, like versus movies. You know,
like if Frankenzein versus Wolfman all thosethings, and he brought up Alien Versus
Predator and I was like, well, you know, it sucks they couldn't
make a worthy sequel that. He'slike, yeah, I would have killed
to see a sequel. And Iwas like, well, they made one.
(16:22):
And he was like, what doyou mean they made one. I
was like, no, they did, they made one. He had no
idea it even came out one hundredand thirty million dollars at the box office.
And nobody knows this thing exists,or if they do, they it's
like it's like a Voldemort. Youknow, you can't talk about it.
It's crazy to me. I rememberdoing promotion for the Predator Key of Key
(16:45):
and Peel mentioned that he marathon allthe Predator movies, including and he turned
to the camera and he looked likea mob was about to stick on him
and he said even even Alien VersusPredator requiem. So the the stigma around
this movie is very real, andI think it has a chilling effect on
(17:07):
any possibility of a fandom or ayou know, just even a continued conversation.
This is probably an opening weekend.It probably made a lot opening weekend.
Maybe maybe made some on DVD sales, But if you do like it,
I think it's probably like too guiltyof a pleasure for you to own
(17:30):
or for you to express. Youknow, it's like probably being a communist
in the thirties. Well you knowwhat though, Like I want to say,
like you know, I've gone onrecord on our show as saying,
when I go into a movie,I want to like it, you know,
I want to have a good time. I'm never going into a movie
unless I hate the director, youknow, Like if somebody's making me watch
(17:52):
a Neuve Bowl movie for some reason, I'm not I'm not gonna try to
like it because I don't like theguy. I don't want to say anything
he does is good, and luckilyhe makes it for me not to do
that. But I wanted to likethis movie so bad. I think the
branding's pretty cool. Honestly, Ithink the AVP logo that they came up
with in the first movie, usedagain for this one, is a great
way to brand a movie. Theyhad a really cool cover that they made
(18:15):
for this Real Dark tried to pushthat horror edge, right, you know.
Pretty unique name of Requiem, likeoh, for the time. I'm
like, okay, you know,there's says a lot of stuff going for
it, and then it ruins everybit of it. It ruins every bit
of it throughout that time. Andyou did not mention the hook of having
a predalien, which is a reallycool idea, in a very cool idea.
(18:40):
It is the only real continuity fromthe original movie if you even want
to okay, if you even wantto say that, how long must they
have been above earth for for this? Like? How long does it take
a pre daim to grow up?Like, isn't this supposed to be like
right after the events of the firstmovie? It is right after the events
of the first movie. So howis the pre daily the predalien at the
end of the first movie is thelittle baby alien that pops out of the
(19:03):
predator's stomach. It's a full grownpred alien in this movie. Well,
these things grow up really fast?Is it that fast? It's pretty fast?
Wow, I did not know that. I figured it took a little
longer than like a day for thesethings decreased. Now that's actually that that
tracks? Okay, then then I'mthen I'm wrong here. I will I
(19:25):
will give the movie points for that. Then I will also give the movie
one point for one cool reference,which is that the predators sent to dispatch
of the surviving xenomorphs He's Wolf,which is obviously a reference to Harvey kai
Tell's character in pulp Fiction. Uh, which is one of those more cool
references. Not not not somebody sayingget to the chopper or any dumb shit
(19:48):
like that. So I give themovie one point, and on paper,
right, yeah, I would loveto see these characters go back to their
horror roots, right, the dangerousroots, the violence that shocked people.
But at the same time, itblows so hard. It's it's really difficult
(20:17):
to sum up a movie like AVPRequiem because you want to call it generic.
In some ways, it is likeour main group of characters and the
issues that they're dealing with are thingsthat you've seen in countless movies, right,
Like they're just stock characters that werenot meant to care about, and
moments in this movie are incredibly generic. But like you said, at the
(20:41):
time, it really wasn't the normfor a movie to be as like dark
as this sci fi unless the moviewas horror based first. It was like
a horror sci fi you didn't seea lot of sci fi horror around this
period of time, you know thatleans more of the sci fi route,
tries to go into this horror routeand fails. Miserb It's really hard to
sum up what this movie is supposedto be. I mean, it doesn't
(21:07):
accomplish anything. It's supposed to bea really mean throwback to eighties, a
you know, monster movie set ina small town I guess, But even
with that, it takes it tothis grand level where like now they're bringing
(21:29):
nukes into the situation and and youknow the nat Well, okay, like
before we before we get to that, let's address this this thing we've both
brought up. Okay, the charactersare are so generic that that calling them
generic kind of like degrades the wordgeneric, right, because they're not even
a generic version of a type.I mean, there is not even like
(21:52):
a recognizable archetype except maybe you know, the kind of the fugitive older brother,
although where he got the skill toyou know, battle aliens and predators
with whatever kind of small town primeoutfit he was running with. You know,
we don't know any details because we'renot supposed to care. And that's
(22:15):
the thing why are these characters soimpossible to care about? When you know,
you go back to these other examplesI've thrown out the Blob movies,
grumlins. You know, why dowe care about those characters and not these,
Like I'm asking why. I thinkit's just because they mean nothing.
(22:41):
I mean, like they I'll givethem enough credit for trying to set up
scenarios that would make us like generally, like, here's an idea that would
that that could make an audience careabout a character. Right. They introduced
this thing of like, oh,here's this guy trying to you know,
conflicted about turning his life around.But now his little brother is kind of
(23:02):
following in his footsteps, right,and his best friend is the cop.
Now, okay, right, okay, you got to go somewhere with that.
You got to make it mean something. You have to you have to
give us moments throughout that make uscare about it. Emotional moments between the
older brother who just got out ofjail and the younger brother, moments between
the cop, moments where he's beingtested. Right, you know, maybe
(23:22):
I should you know, go backto my criminal ways or whatever. It
doesn't fit in a movie like thisbecause it just doesn't feel Am I wrong?
Like it doesn't feel like in analien versus predator movie? What I
mean, I don't know if that'sthe case. What I think is that
the filmmakers did not care about thesecharacters. I can agree there. You
(23:45):
cannot watch the ending of this movieand come away thinking that any any above
the line person gave two fucks aboutabout the movie that they made about the
characters. Nobody's and nobody in theaudience is in tears know when they when
they dropped a nuke on the townor anything. I was in tears from
laughter. Oh god, No,it's it's kind of frustrating because, like
(24:14):
you know, like I mentioned earlier, the whole idea of this like and
and it's why I love the moviepraise so much, is they try to
take this character right and they tellyou enough of this of this character story
and who they are as a person. But they they also introduce a really
cool monster for this person to fight, and they connect this person with the
(24:34):
monster. They have similar things aboutthem, they do similar things, They
they fight in similar ways. There, they have a similar goal in mind.
They're both hunters, they're both tryingto make it they're both trying to
prove themselves. These are things thatmake you care about a character. And
again they they they lobbed it upand then they completely whiffed. And I
(24:55):
don't know how you whiff so bad. You could have just made this the
smallest movie ever. I know,forty million dollars a lot of money to
work with, but you didn't needany of these characters. Just give us
the dad and the kid throughout thewhole movie and we're good. That's all
you'd need to do. We havea reason to care, just just from
the dad trying to protect his son. We have a reason to care.
(25:18):
But they okay, actually do something, they need something, they wanted another
Freddie versus Jason. I can seethat. I can certainly see that.
That's all you would get. Like, if you try to understand what the
filmmakers must know about alien and Predatorcharacters from this movie, you couldn't extrapolate
(25:44):
that they knew much of anything outsideof that they're monsters, right, and
the other the best Aliens movies andeven the Predator movies you know that aren't
aren't on par with the best,but but still, you know, have
been embraced by the fans are reallylike about the mythology of these characters.
(26:07):
Like it's like like Predators is likeliterally a trip throughout the whole world of
these creatures. So these are notcharacters that are like stand ins, right,
These are not things you can swapout. I've never seen two iconic
franchises denigrated this way so haphazardly.I mean, you have your hands on
(26:32):
the two most popular movie monsters nowlike bar None, and you get to
make a movie with them, youshould like, the excitement should thrill you.
And instead they were trying to figureout how to make them as indistinguishable
as possible, I mean quite literallyin some scenes. You know, I
(26:55):
had issues with how they shot thefight sequences between these these in the in
the first movie. Just didn't lovethe camera work and didn't love the way
that they went about shooting them,and and you know, but but I
acknowledge that it's it was cool tosee predators and aliens face off. You
I thought that was even tell sometimeswhich one is which I thought it was
ironic that you did not love thefights in the first movie because they were
(27:18):
w W E S fuck no.So there were Again, there are things
I like about them. And Ihave gone back and watched the movie since
then, and there are things,there are more things I appreciate about it,
uh than than the last time wetalked about, you know, aliens
facing off with predators, which isanother issue. The first movie was alien
versus predator. This is aliens versuspredator, which I guess is more uh,
(27:41):
you know, I guess that's itexplains more there are there are multiple
aliens, but it's just kind ofweird for a sequel to change up the
titling that much. But yeah,problems aside with the first movie, Like
there are scenes in this where thepredator is fighting the predalien or is fighting
(28:03):
an alien, and in like thecamera, the way the camera is cutting
and the way that the lighting isdone, you actually can't distinguish which one
is which at some points did thepredator just hit the alien or did the
alien just hit the predator? Actuallycan too, I don't. I can't
make a mental image of the predalienright now because I never got a good
look at the think, so Ionly can because I had the task of
(28:27):
creating at the task of having tocreate a thumbnail for this, and I
had to view an image of it, which which leads me to like I
want to say, if you dolook at behind the scenes things for this
movie and the few times we cansee these things, I actually think that
the design of the Predators, especially, it's better in this as compared to
(28:48):
the first one. For me,I think that the effects team with building
these creatures did a great job,even the Predalien, which you don't get
to see a whole lot of.And I know that justification of the filmmakers
which is so frustrating is that well, it hides the effects. It makes
them look more real. Not forme, it makes them look non existent
(29:10):
or lazy, but it bothers methat much more because when you see those
behind the scenes shots or when yousee you know, a few times we
get to see these creatures throughout this, they look really good. Yeah,
there's a really terrible trend of obscuredeffects work circa two thousand's early twenty ten.
(29:30):
I felt that this was a problemoutside of horror. Like Man of
Steel, it wasn't dim, butthe shaky cam was so egregious that you
couldn't make out the fantastic set designthat had been constructed. And there I
think that was like an earnest stylisticchoice from Zach's shaky camp. Snyder himself
(29:55):
this was this was I think justvery a fumbling attempt at maybe obscuring effects
that you just weren't. It's notthat they thought that the effects were bad,
but they didn't know how to filmthem. In addition to having competent
effects people, you the director,you need to do your job. You
(30:17):
need to photograph these things to bringout their full you know, to fully
realize them as characters. Right,we'll go back and watch again the best
movies of either of these entries.The camera work is as in table as
the effects design. And these guys, again I don't remember their names.
They have one other full feature motionpicture under their belt. For director.
(30:42):
It looks like their brothers, Colinand Greg Strauss. Their other movies,
Skyline from twenty ten has a onepoint eight and this has a one point
six. So and that's it forthem. They have one short film called
Mute. It only has been rateda total of nine times, with a
two and a half, a two, and a one three in each.
(31:07):
So they don't have a great trackrecord. But you know you said it
earlier, and you said something that'sreally important. You get the opportunity to
direct two of the most iconic charactersin science fiction. I mean these in
science fiction films. These are twoof the most important and well known monsters
(31:29):
in that world, especially the Xenomorphthe Aliens. Yes, and you were
so lucky to be able to directa movie with these two. I would,
man, I would do so manythings to be able to get the
opportunity to direct a movie or writea movie or both. If I was
able to do so for characters likethis, I would do so much preparation,
(31:55):
so much background, put so muchcare into it, because these are
characters that you can't help but loveif you love the genre, and if
you're bringing in directors that don't carejust because they're cheap, I can guarantee
you that maybe the movie wouldn't havebeen as technically proficient, but it wasn't
technically proficient with these guys. Justhire some fucking amateur off the street and
(32:15):
they could. I think if someif you hired a first time director who
did not know what they were doingbut love these characters, I am confident
they could have done a better jobthan these two schmucks did. And they
could be nice guys. I don'tknow. I'm usually very passive about that,
but I'm kind of angry about thismovie because you said it perfectly.
You are lucky to be able todirect these characters and to just give up
(32:37):
and not care and tell your DPwho. I don't know who the DP
was on this movie. I don'tknow if they if they're any good,
I'm gonna I'm gonna look at thatwhile I'm saying this. But but to
just tell them just just don't lightit. Just put one blue light above
these two monsters fighting and just letthe audience, you know, make up
the rest with their eyes, youknow, let let their let their mind
(33:00):
and just make up what else ishappening on screen. It's baffling to me.
This movie does serve the purpose ofreminding people that even the type of
genre fair that we think of asbeing the schlockiest still takes effort the end.
It can be done competently or incompetently. Right. This has basically the
(33:21):
same kind of of like your shitheel ensemble that you would see in the
Friday of the Thirteenth remake, right, and that movie gets flat for that.
But man, you cannot Compare thetwo of these, like, and
there's a perfect one to one example. Right. The bully in this like,
I don't I can't remember his name. Yeah, I can't remember anything
(33:42):
he said, and I certainly don'tremember his death scene. I remember that
he died, but there's nothing evenlike rewarding about it. Even though he's
like he's the guy you hate,the movie keeps reminding you. Right.
Compare that with Trent. I mean, Trent has now become one of the
most quoted characters in like in horrorfandom, you know, for the last
(34:02):
twenty five years, and his deathscene is like the stuff of legends.
And let me just say this foundthe cinematographer. And now I'm pissed.
Now, I'm really pissed off atthese fuckers. Let me read you a
couple of credits under this cinematographer's belt. Okay, the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre,
(34:23):
Daniel Pearl shot this, huh yep, Friday remake, Texas Massacre remake,
Invaders from Mars. This guy knowshow to shoot a movie. I'm
not even surprised though. I'm notsurprised though, because this does have I
think it's grasping at the Platinum Dunes. She is the Platinum Dunes, isn't
(34:49):
it? Is it it? Ithink so? I thought so. I
think they were involved in this.Well, that would make this the inbread
you know, know, the inbreddaughter of of I'm sorry, Session Entertainment
now rat Pack. Okay, yeah, my mistake, because if Platinum Dunes
(35:10):
released this, that would make thisthe worst thing they've ever done. It
would have had many more explosions andprobably would have been Honestly, and I
can't believe saying this probably would havebeen more enjoyable. It would have been
more enjoyable. Are you kidding me? I mean they did. They did
two other movies that this. Thiscinematographer is did the Friday remake and the
Texas Chainsaw remake. Both of thoseare Platinum Dunes, and both of them
(35:34):
looked better than this movie, wereshot better than this movie, had better
better than this movie, and bythe way, I think are both good
movies, very good. I can'tfathom what went into making this, and
the more I'm talking, you know, before we started shooting this, I
was like, man, I hopeI have enough to say about this,
and now like I've I've gotten sofrustrated about this movie? Help me out
(36:01):
here, Where can we go withthis? That? That that that kind
of leads away from anger, butyou can laugh at it. I'm gonna
ask you, do you think thisis the worst movie in either franchise?
Quality wise? I'd say yes.I think I would rather watch this than
Predators, though really I can't standAdrian Brody or that movie. So whoa,
(36:27):
whoa, whoa. Now we've nowwe've stumbled onto what will surely be
a riveting discussion. What's your problemwith Adrian Brody? I just don't like
him, man. I don't likehis face, I don't like the way
he acts. I don't like anythingabout him and I and I I think
it all started with Predators. Ihated Predators when I saw it. I've
heard a bunch of praise for itrecently, which baffles me because all me
(36:50):
and my friends used to do waswas ship on that movie. And I
don't know, I just every timeI see Adrian Brody it's like, no,
I'm not gonna see that movie.I just don't like the guy.
I'm sure he's pleasant, I don'tknow, I haven't read it. It's
probably not pleasant, especially if you'rehalle Berry presenting him with an oscar.
Yeah, yeah, I don't care. It's just very very cool because that's
(37:14):
not that's not one of the easyones to take shots at, right,
that's actually one of the one ofthe okay ones. Right, people like
are all right with Predators? Me? I put it on the show if
I could. Yeah? Me,I no, man. I So this
is definitely the worst Alien movie,but not the worst Predator movie. Do
(37:37):
you think Shane Black's Predators or Iwas about to say I was about to
say. I was about to say, this is not even the worst Predator
movie written by a Shane because Iget a kick out of Predator too.
I don't think it's a better movie, but that could be not that bad.
I've had it on my list sincethe show started, so I wouldn't
(37:59):
be surprised to see it jump onhere. I have a bit of an
exciting answer. I think for myfavorite and the Predator, because I pray
is actually my favorite. That's agood answer. That's a good answer,
really well done, a really uniqueway to do the character, and I
would love to see I've heard thatthey're going to do different versions of it,
like throughout history and in different environments. And I hope that they're able
(38:20):
to do that because I think itworked really well. Man. You love
it when people finally get the ideathat they should have gotten twenty five years
ago. Yeah, even for Predatortwo. Like Predator two, I'll give
credit for because, like, Ithink it's kind of cool of a cool
idea to like take the Predator andinstead of putting him in a jungle,
putting him in a concrete jungle,I think is like a cool carryover.
(38:44):
But the fact that it took himso long to think of, like,
oh, let's take Predator back intime to a different time period. Let's
you know, take him to let'shave him face off with you know,
an indigenous tribe or i'd I've heardit rumors of like a samurai or you
know things samurai the most people's choice. I wouldn't mind saying the Predator in
(39:06):
the wild West, I've heard,I've heard, think, dude, the
pitches I've heard are like so likeI've heard like Predator in World War One,
which would sound so cool, evenlike Predator, Like, you know,
another rumor I heard was, yeah, the samurai thing. Uh,
I think a medieval Night, Medieval, the Right facing off against a Night.
(39:30):
There's so many and you know what, like, all of those are
good ideas if they're executed in inyou know, as expertly as I feel
Prey was. There were issues withPrey. Don't get me wrong. It's
not a perfect movie, but it'sdefinitely my favorite in the in the Predator
verse. Unfortunately I can't be asas exciting in the Alien franchise. Aliens
is the best movie, though Ilike some that people don't like. I
(39:52):
like Alien three. Yeah, youlike Alien three? Okay, So I
like Alien Resurrection, so yeah,and I I don't. I don't know
if I like Alien Resurrection, butI'm glad it exists because it's a weird
movie. It's a weird one.Yeah, but it's got so much energy
and it's zany. It's free andliberated. I dig I will defend it's
(40:16):
right to exist. I will notdefend this movie's right to exist. Getting
us back on AVP R AVP R. Yeah, Oh well, let's let's
ask another prompt. Okay of theof the monster movie set in a small
(40:37):
town? Okay, what's your favoriteof that genre? Oh? Man,
I might have to take a moment. Do you have one? Off the
bat? I think I do.What do you got? I got The
Blob nineteen eighty eight? Real Ones? No, real Ones? No?
You know who wrote that movie?Man, Frank Darabond? Really yeah,
(41:01):
I didn't know that. How didI never know that? And that would
explain why there are at least threeWalking Dead actors in the cast of that
movie. Oh, I guess so. Oh man, I didn't even think
about that. Oh Man. Mastermovies set in a small town, and
(41:23):
I think the go to one isGremlins. Gremlins is I actually prefer Gremlins
too over Gremlins. But it's notset in a small town. It's not
set in a small town. NoPredators, small town, the Witch?
No, no, you you went, I went too far, a completely
(41:49):
different place. Yeah, I don't. I don't know that. I can
think of a favorite off the topof my head. Honestly, if I
had to say one right now,just off the bat, I'd probably say
Gremlin. It's it's the easiest answer. It's such a precious sub genre to
me. Unfortunately, you know,I I pitched one of my own monster
(42:09):
movie set in a small town,and I got pushback from execs because that's
too old fashioned. But what isStranger Things but five seasons of monsters invade
a small town? Yeah, that'svery true. Well I guess I guess
it would be my answer. Thendarry is a small town, so sure
I'm gonna go Yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah, okay, Yeah I
(42:35):
did. I mean Stephen King Ithink made his bones on those kind of
stories. Yeah, And I thinkI know it might be controversial that I
didn't pick the twenty seventeen version andI picked the nineteen ninety version, but
fuck you guys. Tim Curry's great. So Timurry is great. I love
it. I love it is great. So getting defensive about a totally acceptable
(42:58):
opinion, that's ex. Dude,I had, I had. I've had
people tell me I'm crazy for that, just like I would tell somebody they're
crazy if they said that they preferthis movie to h to the first one,
which I, by the way,like I called a v P.
I said it was that bad whenwe covered it. And I have to
say, after rewatching a VP R, like I would revisit a VP now
(43:20):
and I think I'd have a differentopinion because I appreciate it more knowing what
came after it. I actually rememberyou agreeing with me on a VP I
don't remember us coming on down ondifferent verdicts. So that's interesting. So
tell me we should have We shouldhave gotten around to this earlier. But
what are the things that you dolike more about a VP R than a
(43:44):
VP blank. Yes, some ofthem are are more in concept. You
know. I'm one of those peoplelike if you if you have a good
idea, I'm not going to shyaway from it and you know, and
not celebrate it. The idea ofmaking it more of like a like a
horror showdown as opposed to like theaction adventure sort of tone that the first
(44:05):
one took I think was a reallycool idea. Creature design is absolutely something
that I think they did better.Unfortunately you don't get to see as much
of it as you should, butI absolutely think it was better. One
of my problems with the first onewas how the predators looked. I didn't
think they looked great at all.I thought they looked it was one of
the worst looks of predators had inmy opinion. They completely turned it around
(44:30):
in this movie. For me,I think they absolutely did better. The
Xenomorphs I think it's hard to getwrong. So you know, I'm not
gonna say that they did it better. I mean, I didn't think they
did a good job at it inthis movie, so I'm not gonna shit
on it. And I do likethis the idea of this setting a little
bit more than the Arctic setting.I think the Arctic setting is really cool,
(44:53):
but I don't know that it didas much for the alien and predator.
I like the idea of, like, here's like the woods, small
town setting, you know, aplace where something like this could feasibly happen
and the United States government would justdecide to wipe it off the face of
the planet instead of dealing with itproperly. There's a bit of a like
(45:16):
a Branch Davidian vibe going on here, man, Like I didn't I didn't
dig that, man, I comeon, I think somebody would notice if
we'd knew an American town off themap. I'll say this, I was
kind of surprised that they didn't golike full board with the bummer ending,
you know, like they knew thetown right, and then the survivors get
(45:38):
away, and then there comes apoint and correct me if I'm wrong.
Because again, this movie is veryforgettable for me. But there's a moment
where like the military kind of surroundsour survivors, right, and I'm surprised
they didn't just kill me. Ithink I think they flinched. I mean,
which you show mutilation. That couldhave been a studio note and you
(46:04):
know, hey, maybe there couldhave been a sequel and our favorite characters
in the franchise could have returned forthat. I mean, can you imagine
can you imagine the rematch with can'tthink of a single name, the Pizza
Guy? Yeah, dude, ifthe Pizza Guy got a rematch with the
Predator, it would have move overInfinity War, move move over Batman,
(46:30):
be Superman. Now. I wantto ask you this though, Like you
know, obviously a big thing todayis you know, the idea of like
a legacy sequel or something like that. Not saying that a legacy sequel will
not for this. No, wouldyou want to see them take another attempt
at an alien versus Predator showdown,whether it's connecting to the first movie or
(46:50):
not. No, I think Imean that's we're in a free for all
state with that. I mean,we we really don't need to connect it
to the to the pre entries.I guess I wouldn't have a problem if
if there was a legacy, alegacy sequel to the first a VP and
not even but how do you evenbuild off of a VP reckquam they knuke
(47:14):
that whole town? Yeah you can't. I mean, well, you know,
I honestly would would would like tosee them attempt this whole concept.
I like, just forget the othertwo happened. Do a VP again,
Just just redo it. Give somebodywho appreciates the franchise the rains to do
it. I know the way thattwentieth century pictures now, I think it's
(47:37):
twentieth century pictures, right, nottwentieth century studios. Studios. I know
they're not huge on doing like massivebudgets for movies like these, but why
can't we get a straight to HuluAlien Versus Predator movie? I think they
could do it. They're expensive,man, I mean yeah, but you
(47:58):
know, I mean Prey was successfuland Pray was even successful. When they
they they were pretty much forced todo a home media release when everybody was
like, hey, let us buythis movie. So they said, okay,
we'll take We'll you know, keepit on Hulu, but you can
buy it now, and it didcrazy numbers like the just bump it up
a little bit, okay, andand let a filmmaker who cares about it
(48:20):
go in there. Even unknown actorsI'm cool with, Like, you know,
you some actors that we don't know, pray. I didn't know any
of the actors in Prey. Idon't think that really worked to the advantage.
That really worked to the advantage.And we did know the director.
Okay, there was a Yeah themarket I love to see that. I
(48:40):
think people have turned on the crossovermovie to some extent. Uh. I
know, a New Kong, aNew Kong VI Goddilla just came out,
and I see some mild enthusiasm.But people say it's fun. It's fun,
but nobody wants more. I'm nothearing demands for more, right,
(49:01):
I love crossover, but give meas many as you can. I don't
care how shitty they are. Imean total Freddy versus Jason apologist mane oh
yeah, and you know, likethere are some that I just wouldn't want
to see, you know, likemake it make sense. I am a
big opponent of the Michael versus Pinheadidea that people keep pushing. But like
Friday the Thirteenth is pushing this wholeJason universe bullshit right now, right,
(49:23):
And so they're just doing everything theycan to not make a movie. But
I see an opportunity with that.Fuck you want to put Jason everywhere crossover?
Give us another crossover. I don'tcare who it is. Throw anybody
against Jason. I don't care.Give me something. I'd like to see
two icons face off against each other. I'm a box office horror man,
I don't care. I like itin everything. I like it in wrestling,
(49:45):
I like it in boxing. Justtake two of the biggest heavyweights you
can and shove them against each otherfor whatever reason you want, and as
long as you make it fun,I'm gonna appreciate it. Just do it
it. Give us more. Iwant to see Kong the new Godzilla movie,
not just because I know one ofthem Suplex is the other one,
(50:05):
but because that's just so fun.It's a fun idea. Keep doing it.
But counterpoint, it can also bea really bad idea. There are
circumstances this movie being exhibit A.Right, there is something really sad about
watching, you know, because whenone when a sequel kind of the hurts
the image of a character you love, that's tough. Then to see them
(50:30):
do it two birds, one Stonein one film, that's that's really tough
to take. So the risk toreward is just kind of off for people.
I don't think. Yeah, Idon't think people hate the idea of
crossovers in general, though I seesome people, you know, kind of
try to accuse it of just beingcommercial and pandering. Maybe it is,
(50:52):
but I think it's really more thethreat of getting it wrong and what that
could mean for the legacy of thesecharacters. And then, you know,
I get it. You know,audiences have been burned by it before.
I mean, people don't love Theaudience at large doesn't love Freddy Versus Jason,
The audience at large doesn't like aVP. The audience at large doesn't
(51:12):
like this one. And that's whywe're able to cover the movies like that
on shows like this. Now.Why people don't like Freddy Versus Jason just
baffles me. There are I usedto I used to not like it.
I just think that there are somemoments that are a little out there.
If you I think this, ifif you're a snobby horror fan, then
(51:35):
you hate that movie. If youhate commercial movies, then you hate that
movie. Me if you if I'vesaid it on not that bad before,
if you market a movie to death, I will probably find a way to
defend it. And if you liketo see a pregnant mother being violated by
the predalien, you know, ifI mean genuinely, like, if you're
(51:59):
like into really gnarly stuff, Iguess, especially compared to the first movie,
this does have stuff to offer,absolutely, but this doesn't have the
finesse or the expertise, or thecharm or the wit of anything previous in
this franchise or in you know,the I think the type of movie they
(52:27):
wanted to make. You know,they were chasing after definite models, good
models, right, like, yeah, make the blob with Predator in the
in the Alien. I I'm notsure if I actually want to see them
in a small town setting. Butyou know, if you go that route,
you know you have a blueprint,you have a model of success,
(52:51):
right And they zigged where I thinkanybody else would have zagged. They set
the blueprint on fire. They doyou have actual thoughts or is it just
going to be that side I just, you know, I just I just
(53:13):
didn't really, I just am reallydisappointed by this movie. Man. Like
I'm not angry, I'm just disappointedat this point. I you know,
I think what you said earlier andwhat we've talked about a few times throughout
this just perfectly sums up how Ifeel about this. And it's that,
you know, to have an opportunityto make a movie like this and to
have a budget that, while itwasn't as high as the budget of the
(53:36):
last movie, there's still a lotof money to work with. Forty Don't
talk about this like this is asmall movie. I mean forty million dollars.
Forty million dollars, which would bewhich would be like a sixty million
dollar budget today a little over almostsixty one million. I said that weird.
Anyways, it's just to take itand to to have not only a
(54:01):
disrespect, I feel a disrespect forthe source material on both fronts, a
disrespect to to to you know,the genre in some ways, but also
like to the crew. You know, your own crew, who's not only
not only are they capable, butthey put together a damn you know,
(54:23):
a damn good effort to to dosomething here. And it's the side of
movie criticism that does bother me isthat, you know, it would bum
me out if if I made amovie and worked hard on a movie and
and people, you know, shitall over it. So sometimes it's hard
for me to say what I'm reallythinking. Uh, but I can.
(54:43):
I think I can say here.You know pretty confidently that either either the
directors of the studio or a combinationof the two absolutely failed the talented people
that were involved in this project.Maybe the actors, I don't I'm not
familiar enough with their work, SoI'm not gonna sit here and just ardently
defend them for their terrible dialet thatthey had to spew out of their mouth
through the entire movie, which it'sit's bad. I didn't talk a whole
(55:06):
lot about it because you know,I'm not stretching for things I didn't like,
like I have to do on thatbad sometimes. But what it's it's
awful, it's it. I can'thandle it. For most of the movie.
I'm laughing at how bad it is, and it's not a good laugh,
it's like a holy shit laugh.And so I'm not going to defend
(55:27):
them, you know, quite ashard but your cinematographer is proven that he
can do a great job. Youryour effects crew clearly can do a great
job, as seen by countless photographsand accounts and everything. And you failed
them all you newter them, andyou failed them because you either didn't know
(55:50):
what you were doing or didn't carewhat you were doing or both. Uh
So, yeah, I mean Iwould actually this is a case where I
would actually give it a worse rateit has on ONO point six. Like
this movie is an easy one starfor me. I know, it's just
a half a star difference, youknow, just a little over. But
oh my god, so disappointing,just so disappointing. All right, well,
(56:15):
I consider that a successful launch ofit's that bad, although I think
retro retroactively we have to make waterWorld technically our first episode because that is
the only time. It's the cattlewe've decided on. It's that it's that
bad together. But this show,this, this is the the launching point.
But that that was with water Worldwalked so that so that it's that
(56:40):
bad. Good run, Yeah,Kevin Consler swam so so the Strauss brothers
could you know, take flight,but like it, Chris, they just
got they got too close to thesun. Man, oh man, I
will I wish after watching this thatI could get too close to the sun
obliterated and have to watch something likethis again. Well, if people want
(57:04):
to watch more of our content,where can they find us? Oh?
Holy shit? You can find usall over the place. Yeah, of
course. If you're listening on Spotify. You can find us on YouTube as
well for video versions of the show. If you're listening if you're on YouTube.
Now, we're on all your favoritepodcasting platforms. So if you'd like
Not that Bad to join you onyour drive to work, or on your
(57:24):
drive home from work, or whereverthe hell else you're going. Road trips
would be fantastic. So you canhear all of our episodes, you can
definitely do that. We're on aton of platforms, and if you need
any help finding links, you canhead to our website Not that badpod dot
com, where we have links toevery platform that we post on with all
of our episodes, as well asan archive of the best place to listen
(57:45):
to every episode, whether some arejust audio only or a direct link to
our YouTube channel. We even havea section for when we go live on
our website, so you can watchdirectly from our site if you want to.
Why would you ever leave? Notthatod dot com. Always have your
tab open. However, if youdo want to leave the site, there's
another place you can go. Coincidentally, we also have a link on our
(58:07):
website for and that's Patreon dot com. Gabe, what can they do on
that website? Well, and thisis very important, so we'll listen up.
They can give us their money.They can give us their money in
exchange for not only the feeling ofsupporting struggling artists like ourselves, but for
(58:30):
per such as Patreon Only specials,Patreon only episodes on a lity of films
across a wide range of genres andsome you might not have ever even heard
of. So if you're a fanof video game movies or Santa's Sligh,
(58:51):
you might want to check out ourPatreon. Yeah, and it's a it's
a place that you can definitely supportus if you want to go to that
next level of support. But ifyou don't want to go that far,
sharing, liking, commenting, subscribing, following, whatever across our social media
platforms and all the platforms that wepost, our show would be extremely helpful.
(59:13):
You know, word of mouth isextremely powerful still, especially in the
world of media and podcasting. Soit means the world to us when we
hear people are sharing the show andloving the show, even feedback. Hell,
you don't like something we're doing,put it in the comments. If
we feel like it's valid criticism,we're happy to change. We are not
said in our ways. So yeah, we just love the support that we
(59:36):
get. We would love some extrasupport if you guys want to give it.
It's incredible, But for now,I think that's all we have to
cover. I think we're done houringourselves out on this show now as well.
So, Gabe, anything else you'dlike to say before you take us
out? If not, I'd loveto hear you take us out. Pressure's
on, pressure is on. WHOAwhat's your message to the world. I
(01:00:00):
came out of nowhere all right?Uh my message to the world is love
and kindness. And if if Ihave anything to cancel befoard, please do
it after the release of this episode. Just give me one last one,
(01:00:22):
all right? And on that note, this is not that bad signing out
recording? Uh? Is it?No? Oh? It is. It's weird
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