Episode Transcript
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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to aspecial presentation of Not That Bad a Movie
Podcast. Yes, this is aspecial, of course, this is one
of our monthly specials. But thisepisode is going to be a little bit
different, you see, because wehave a unique perspective. Before going into
this episode, we talked about ThePunisher from two thousand and four, and
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in that episode, my illustrious cohost sitting in front of us here telegraphed
his opinion on this film a littlebit. And so, ladies and gentlemen,
I would like to welcome you toNot That Bad war Zone. I
am one of your co hosts.My name is Connor, aka Jokester,
Vigilante, prank Castle, and Iam joined by said illustrious co host.
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No, that's not Jigsaw before thewhole glass accident. That's mister Gabe.
Tye Gabe, how you doing today? Buddy? Calling this movie a joke
is right. I want to givethe audience a little bit of a background
because this is not a movie thatif you know it, you probably don't
like it, and if you don'tknow it, you just don't know this.
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So this movie came out in twothousand and eight two point seven on
Letterbox, twenty nine percent on RottenTomatoes. This is the lowest grossing film
based on a Marvel property of alltime. Nobody knew about this thing when
it came out, Nobody cared.The people who did see it really didn't
like it. But there has beena cult status growing for this film for
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the last few years, and it'san interesting case study. I want to
know what background do you have withthis film before we kind of get into
the trenches with each other. Heremy background with Punish your war Zone?
Yeah, your background with Punish Yourwar Zone. Let me say this off
off the top, because you you'reyou're casting me as the villain of this
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I am hey, no, I'mlook, this is all thrown into the
grinder until I emerge as the deformedmobster known as Jigsaw. Hey man,
this is all about perspective, allright? What was is the villain for
whoever's coming in with a different perspective? Man, Let me tell my side
of the story, Okay, becausebecause this is not a battle of good
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versus evil here, it's no thereare there are no heroes when it comes
to Punish Your war Zone, truly, So let me properly set the stage.
Let me say this. You askedmy background of this movie. Okay,
my background is I have given thismovie too many chances. I have
given this movie so many watches inthe hopes that I will join this fandom,
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this ever growing fandom, because onpaper, this should be a movie
that I basically adore. This hasall of the ingredients of a guilty pleasure.
I want to get into the conversationabout some of the things in this
movie, but I'd like to throwit to you first here and just say,
what's something you want to bring upfirst? Bring up to the plate
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to see how it fares. Yeah, should we clarify that we're not doing
our typical good, bad, andugly. Everything's going out the window here,
just like the rule book to makinga good movie of our format is
being thrown out. Let's start withsome background on how this movie was made,
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how it came about. There isan interesting production history behind this.
So two thousand and Fourst Punisher comesout. Doesn't do great in theaters,
but there is a boost in salesfrom DVD. So there was talks of
a sequel with Thomas Jane returning asFrank Castle. The plan was always that
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The Punisher would move to New Yorkand you know, do battle with Jigsaw,
who is I believe the Punisher's mostfamous nemesis from the comics, to
my understanding, and yeah, yeah, I understand the same. And it
was going to continue that more groundedand gritty tone from two thousand and fours
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The Punisher, and then, forreasons I'm not entirely sure about, Thomas
Jane eventually exits. It sounds likehe was frustrated by the production delays and
he was frustrated by some of thenew directions they were talking about, going
let me get this out right now. It is very similar to Michael Keaton
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leaving Batman after hearing what Joel Schumacherhadn't planned, because this is basically what
if Joel Schumacher directed a Punisher movie. It is as wacky and zany and
without dignity as a Batman and RobinRight and Thomas Jane, I believe saw
the writing on the wall and said, you know what, I'm good,
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peace out. I do want tosay. Lexi Alexander was coming off of
a movie called Green Street Julians,which is often regarded as a very good
movie, features Elijah Wood and hasa well, it has a decent rating
three point three. But man,there's a lot. There's a lot that
goes into this. One thing Ido want to bring up for you as
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well. I don't know that youknow about this, but there is actually
an unofficial Punisher two thousand and foursequel, a short film with Thomas Jane
called Dirty Laundry, which is,truthfully, for me, the exact thing
that I would have wanted from himas the Punisher. I think he is
both the second best and third bestPunisher, and the second best is in
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that short film. So go watchthat if you haven't seen it. This
is what we got, though thisis not a sequel in any way.
This is they decided to scratch itstart from start fresh with Lexi Alexander,
who was not familiar with the Punishercomics before watching this or before getting the
job for this. Rather, shewas a fan of some German comic books.
She's a German director, and whenshe I do want to bring up
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one production note about this coming intothe movie, Marvel sent her a bunch
of copies of Punisher comics to gether caught up with the lore and the
characters. To know what direction totake, but they were so cheap during
this time period that they printed themwith only three colors. The colors were
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only red, white, and black. So she thought that this was like
a sin City type thing, youknow, where like there was the comics
were devoid of color. She wasgonna do that for her movie until she
brought it up to one of theMarvel Studios people and they said, no,
we just didn't send you the fullthing. We can show you what
it really looks like. And thenthe color was born in this movie,
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and she was determined to put colorinto every frame like you were looking at
a frame of a comic book.Times have changed in the world of Marvel
films since two thousand and eight.Did anybody care how this movie turned out?
Did anybody want to make a goodmovie? Do you know what's kind
of amazing? Marvel Comics could justsend her a crate of already published Punisher
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comics. Do you know what's amazingabout this is? Like, damn this
movie? Like the producers of thismovie were much We're mostly from the Lionsgate
side, right, Like that wasthe production staff, but the executive production
staff was all Marvel people. StanLee, Kevin Figy, what however you
pronounce his name. I think OgdenGavanski was. I think he was.
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He might have been Lionsgater, orhe might have been something other. But
this was under like a new windowof Marvel films that they were building at
this time, Marvel Knights, whichwas a comic books It was a comic
book bunch ye, Marvel Knights,it was a comic book blind that was
launch for Marvel's darker characters, theiranti heroes. I think ghost Writer was
also so. Yes, ghost Writerwas under the umbrella, and funnily enough,
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the only two movies that were underthe Marvel Knights umbrella, which was
an arm of their Marvel Film's productiongroup that they were building, was this
film and Ghostwriter Spirit of Vengeance,which I will strongly say I do not
like. I will never be bringingit to this program. But there was
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a lot, like you said,that that was going against this as far
as like just getting into the initialproduction. But one thing that was going
for it from the time that theystarted until the time that I finished watching
this movie was Ray Stevenson as thePunisher. I think you could not have
picked a more perfect looking actor forthe part. I think the direction that
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he was given personally was perfect forthe character. I think it was the
most comic accurate version of the characterfrom the comics I've read. I'm more
familiar with like the Max Comics versionsof the Punisher, but I have read
other stuff as well, and Ithink as far as a presence of bringing
what the Punisher does in the comicsto film, this is the closest we
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have ever gotten to what the comicbooks are trying to establish. I'm curious
what your thoughts are on Ray Stevenson, because it sounds like with much of
this film, of the things thatyou do not hate, you have a
complicated relationship with it. I'd liketo hear your thoughts on Ray Stevenson.
I agree with everything you said,and they couldn't have cast a better actor
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to waste in this movie than Race. Remember how I compared the previous Punisher
movie to a sitcom, Well,this is a card too, this is
a Saturday Morning cartoon. Just stickingto Ray Stephenson's performance what he is allowed
to do, I think he's pitchperfect. It's not as interesting of an
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interpretation as Thomas Jane for me,because it is so direct of a translation,
which is something that I like inmovies is when there is a filmmaker's
take, you know, a filmmaker'sspin on the character. You know,
that's sort of why a lot offan favorite casting. For me, I
acknowledge just how clean of a translationit is. But I do like the
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fact that Thomas Jane had his owntake with the character. So it's like
a Michael Keaton. You know,it's like Michael Keaton was again when people
were super upset about but then whenwhen you see the way that the director
put his touch on the character,it's like, you couldn't picture a guy
who was better for the role thanMichael Keaton. For those two movies,
I brought up Toby maguire as SpiderMansman. That was another thing that's still
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to this day. You know,there's eight about who's the best Spider Man.
Was he the right casting choice?But to me, everything that makes
him an unorthodox Spider Man makes himmy favorite Spider Man. Now there's sometimes
where you know you get the perfectguy for the role, and he really
is the perfect guy for the role. Christopher reeve, we won't have a
better Superman than him. If theywere to make another live action Punisher movie
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after Warzone, I would have wantedto see Ray Stevenson back, because,
in my opinion, you don't ifyou're a Punisher fan, right like you
established before that you're not an antiPunisher. You just don't think he's he's
particularly that interesting as a character inthe comic books, and he's a little
generic, and I think for me, I do appreciate some of those things
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about the character. So having adirect translation on film is something that I
would really want, And in myopinion, you could not have nailed it
any better than Ray Stevenson. Andevery time I've watched this that opinion has
been solidified more. I started thinkinglike, oh, yeah, I think
he's like the one. Maybe notperfect, but he's you know, he's
close. And then second time Iwatched it, I was like, yeah,
you know what, like he's prettydamn good. In the third time,
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I was like, oh no,like he's he's damn near perfect.
And now my fourth watch, whichwas this one, he's the perfect choice
to play the Punisher. So areyou going to disagree with me though?
That he's wasted, that he's notgiven a movie that matches his his caliber.
No, here's the thing. Okay, wait, no, I am
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going to disagree with you. Actually, yes, I am okay, I
am going to disagree, So letme Okay, great, let's really dive
into this because this is because RayStevenson tricked me into thinking that this might
be a good movie, because like, like it's just like you know,
the Punisher walks off the comic intothis movie. That's how good casting he
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is. He's a really skilled actor, He's British, yep, and he
I mean he's the only person andwithout a wacky ear grading accent. Dude,
I just want to I just wannajust like quick sidetrack as we talk
about Ray Stevenson. Whether you likeit or hate it, this movie is
has over the top wacky accents thatare very cartoonish and uh in a way,
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some of them are just bad.There are some characters like our our
our irish, our dreadlocked Irish parkourguy who just has one of the worst
accents I've ever seen on film.Julie Ben struggles to keep her her New
York accent throughout the movie. Uh, these are things that happened. But
Ray Stevenson was the only guy thatI was like, no, I buy
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everything he's saying. Maybe also andWayne Knight Night Wayne Knight as micro Chip
because he's just good in everything hedoes. Also great casting, I mean
also fantastic casting, better in myopinion, than the Netflix Microchip. I
will agree with that one hundred percent. Yeah. And I think in as
much as people love John Burnhal's emotionsas the Punisher, I would say,
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casting wise, this is the bestcasting for those two characters, whether separate
or together, this is the bestversion of them that I think they could
do. Until, you know,we get somebody that comes along that somehow
looks more like these two characters,that's gonna be difficult. That's gonna be
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a difficult challenge. I honestly thinkthat John Burnhal evokes more Thomas James Punisher
than he does a comic book punisher. It's a very weird thing for me
to see people call him the bestPunisher, which I'm not going to agree
or disagree with, But a lotof those same people are not happy with
Thomas Jane's version. And the funnything is, I think if we had
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seen Thomas Jane's Punisher in more movies, I think he would have they ended
up being really similar to John Brenthal'sPunisher. The only thing is we saw
his origin, not his kind oflike fully cemented Punisher persona. Anyways,
going back to this movie, andhere's something that I really realized was wrong
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with this movie. A movie thatis supposed to be just a gonzo again
grindhouse, shoot him up splatterhouse moviehas the Punisher out of commission for like
the entire middle act of this moviebecause he has to do some soul searching.
This is the worst movie to tryand give the Punisher some sort of
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some sort of whatever you call it, like introspection or This is not a
movie equipped to deal with the ethicsof what the Punisher means. This is
not a movie that should be doingthe Spider Man two thing of Oh,
let's let's put the brakes on theon the action so that the main character
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can reflect and everything. I don'tknow what else to say. This is
a movie that fans defend, andI don't know if you're gonna if this
is your line of defense, butpeople say this is just a good time,
you know, leave your brain atthe door and just just like have
a fun time with this movie.I can't. The movie literally hits a
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brick wall from minute twenty to minutesixty of it's just mopiness with the Punisher.
So I'm sorry. I don't meanto like really go off on this
movie, but I can't think ofa movie that shot itself in the foot
harder with this than this movie we'retalking about right now, And it has
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always been something that has just boggledthe mind for me. It is really
one of those things where how doyou mess this up? Well, here's
what I'll say, Like, firstoff, I know you just sort of
tackled the defense of like turn yourbrain off for this movie and you'll have
a good time with it. I'mnot one of those people that will defend
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the movie in that way. Ido think that there is an aspect of
the movie that is a very likethere are things about this that are like
turn your brain off, have agood time. But I think there are
the reason this is a movie thatis not for everyone, and why it's
reaching a cult status and not astatus of like a film like there are
some movies that transcend a cult statusthat just eventually it breaks out from their
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little cult knit the tight knit groupof however, many people, and it
just breaks into modern pop culture ofpeople reevaluating a movie and getting behind it.
It doesn't happen very often, butthis is not a movie it's ever
going to happen with because it's justnot made for everybody in that way.
Not everybody really wants to go intoa movie and have to adjust the fact
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of whether or not they're turning theirbrain off. And I think it's it's
it comes down to the same reasonthat I have an appreciation for Batman Forever.
We talked about that movie on thisshow, and I think this movie
and that movie have a lot ofthings in common. First of all,
you have two insane characters dueling itout for who's more insane, one of
which has a messed up face.You have an over the top cartoonish nature
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with some dark themes in there.This is much much darker, obviously with
the ultra violence, but both ofthem feel like a comic book come to
life. The difference is this isthe suburban kid on Batman Forever side the
suburban kid who grew up with Batmanyou know animated series in the early nineties,
and the you know Tim Burton filmsand uses their imagination to make Batman
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come to life in Batman Forever.On this side is a kid who grew
up in like my neighborhood, whichis like half suburban, half strange.
Just you're exposed to violence a littlebit early in your films and your media,
and this is the thing that youwould come up with. The only
issue is it's also geared towards adultand that's where I think you run into
some issues that people have with this, like the one you highlighted there where
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there's a lot of action and carnagein this movie, but there is a
big chunk of the movie where thePunisher is really kind of questioning himself.
I personally don't have an issue withit. And I think the reason I
don't have an issue with it isbecause I was with it by that point.
I was with this character by thatpoint. I saw the reason that
he was looking into himself for whathe does. Meanwhile, the entire city,
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which pretends to like be anti Punisher, as soon as they come into
contact with him or see the workthat he's doing, they realize, in
a weird way, he's sort ofright in what he's doing. The reason
he's questioning himself is because he justbasically, for lack of a better comparison,
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he basically just kind of did tothis little girl and her mother what
ended up happening with him. Themost important people in his life were robbed
from him, and the same thinghappened to them, And he's the reason
that that happened. He set outto prevent something like this from happening,
and now he is the reason thatit's happened to somebody else. And while
I don't think that this is amovie that can tackle it with the I'll
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say, I'll say skilled, butI don't have a better word for it.
It doesn't have the skill to tackleit the same way that I think
a movie would where it has moreweight to it. But because I was
with the movie and with the charactersby that point in time, I was,
I was with it. I was, I was right there. I
was like, Okay, I getit, I'm with it. You know,
you've given me enough action and carnage. I mean, you open with
action and carnage, you know whatI mean. So I was like,
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I'm cool with where we are,and I know that that carnage is coming
back. Meanwhile, just give mesome cool visuals. Give me some bad
guys doing bad guys shit, andand and let's flow with it, so
that that would be my defense.I'm definitely not one of those people who's
just gonna be like your brain off. They know you can turn your brain
off at a few points in thismovie just to have fun. I mean
there are moments where there are momentswhere the this is basically like I watched
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a review on YouTube where they talkedabout this is almost like a comic book
movie smashes together with like a latestage Friday of the thirteenth film, and
like the Punisher is almost like aslasher in certain parts of this movie,
which he is. I mean heliterally contitute that's a great idea the first
five minutes of the movie. Ibasically enjoy the first ten minutes of this
movie. I want to ask yousomething if I could, I hate to
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interrupt you, but would you wouldyou say that the intro we get to
the Punisher, his first scene inthat little dining room is a great scene.
Would you do you like that scenewhere we're introduced to Ray Stevenson.
Is his massacre at the mansion.Yeah, his massacre at the You know
if you're gonna rip off Batman yearone. I guess they picked a good
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scene to do it. Yeah,it's fine, it is. I mean,
in the hands of somebody who reallyknows how to live in this kind
of material, up, who knowshow to put flair in and gravitas to
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mayhem like this, it would begood. I just we have to talk
about Dominic West. We have totalk about basically, I think all of
the actors besides Ray Stevenson, butspecifically we need to talk about Dominic West.
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I'm a big fan of The Wire. I mean, I don't want
to be a meme everybody. Everybodywho thinks that there's somebody loves The Wire.
I get it. It's a memeat this point. It could be
a T shirt. I'm a bigfan of Yeah, I'm a big fan
of Dominic West in The Wire.I saw this movie before The Wire,
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and I just thought that Dominic Westmust be a terrible actor. I just
this is like the worst first impressionfor an actor I've ever had. And
again, some people will defend thisperformance. I guess the same way I
defended John de Volta. Let melet me say this. We talked a
lot about John de volt in thelast movie we did, and how they
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committed to this very eccentric borderline goofyvillain for the Punisher. This movie thinks
that it's doing something cool and ita This movie thinks it's This movie thinks
it has the Joker on its hands, and it doesn't. This is this
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is an impotent movie every like noteverything they go for Flounders and Dominic West
from minute one to minute done kindof ruins any chance I have of getting
into the groove of this movie.You sort of alluded to this, you
know, with the Punisher being outof commission, it really becomes a show
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for the villains. And at thatpoint, you're betting on the villain that
you've created. You're betting on theperformance being that and Frawing, You're betting
that you've written such a compelling character. And these guys behind me here,
I'm supposed to watch these guys forlike for two hours. I was nearly
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as crazy as Luney Bingin. Bythe time this movie ended, I was
almost as as ravenously out for bloodas these two fellas behind me, because
they drove me to that point.Connor, this is a movie of true
depravity, and I want to bounceit back to you. Man. I
want to hear you talk now aboutmy least favorite thing about this movie,
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which is the Villains, because youdidn't like John Travolta and you he was
inappropriate for The Punisher, And nowI want to hear how you go from
disliking John Travolta and what he wasdoing to what these guys are doing.
So I think my opinion about JohnTravolta in that movie and then throwing it
to Jigsa on this movie, it'scomplicated. And the reason that it's complicated
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is because I think when you havea movie like The Punisher from two thousand
and four and you go with thistone that they're trying to set up,
which we said is a problem inthe movie. I mean, that's not
something that we're going to disagree on. There's some tonal issues in The Punisher
from two thousand and four, andthere's some tonal issues in this movie.
To a certain extent. What Ithink works better in this film that did
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not work for me with John Travolta, however, is that I felt they
committed more so to fitting this justinsane. Let's take this character from the
comic books and just throw him asthis lively, insane, fucking villain on
our screen. I don't think theythought they had a joker. I'm gonna
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disagree with you there. I thinkthey were like, let's just try to
make Jigsaw have the best chance ofpossible, best chance possible to make an
impression on the audience. I havea complaint with Looney Binjim. I just
do. I think he's laughably badat some points. I think he's laughably
good at some points. I thinkthere are moments in this where he just
makes me laugh. And sometimes Idon't know whether or not I'm laughing because
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he's being so awful or because he'sbeing so good at what he's doing.
But with Jigsaw, I'm gonna I'mgonna disagree with you on the fact that
he's disappointing in this or that itmade a bad impression. Do I think
it's a great performance. Maybe not. No, I don't think it's I
don't think and nobody's winning an Oscarfor this movie, North should that is?
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I hate it when people say thatthough, no, nobody's winning an
Oscar. But that doesn't give youthe excuse to not try, do you
see, I just don't think thatthat. I don't think that they're not
trying in this. I think similarto Batman Forever. I think this is
the perfect juxtaposition to two Face inBatman Forever. I think in that movie,
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what they tried to do was theytried to create this well, I
say they what Tommy Lee Jones triedto do was he tried to create this
cartoonish, over the top but scaryvillain, and he tried everything he could
to do that and to out crazyJim Carrey. And I think that's where
the out crazy and Jim Carrey partworked against the movie, whereas I feel
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like Dominic West and this other actorare consistently trying to out crazy each other.
But I'm entertained by it. Thisis an entertaining performance for me.
It doesn't have to be, youknow, a joker performance, because it's
not, and it's never going tobe. But what it's gonna be is
it's gonna be a lot of funif you get behind it. And by
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the way, I'm not criticizing anybodywho doesn't get behind it. You just
you either vibe with it or youdon't vibe with it. It's not a
problem either way. My issue withsome of the criticism falls in where I
feel like some people, I'm notcounting you in this, but some people
go into this and they do expecta gritty Joker esque villain. If you
have somebody that say over the topas Jigsaw, and I just think over
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the top comes in different forms,and this version that we got from Dominic
West is not fantastic. You're notgonna again and he's not winning an Oscar
for this. But what I dothink it accomplishes is it gives us a
creepy at some points villain. Imean, he's look at him. His
performance is obviously the guy's unhinged.You don't know where it's gonna go.
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The first time you watch this movie, you think you know, and you
know it ends up going that way, but they give you some misdirections here
and there, and I just thinkit's Is it the perfect thing they should
have done? Absolutely not, Butdoes it fit what they're trying to do
with the movie. I think so. I like what they went for and
I like what they ended up comingout with. I admire the fact that
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you defend this performance. I've I'vedefend. I mean this is reverse now
because I I was defending John derVolta. Yeah, and it's but I'm
on an island with that, andI imagine more people are on your side
here. I think I would runinto more people who enjoy this performance and
what John der Volta was doing inthat movie. But John de Volta is
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good at this kind of energy,man, Like he's a pro at it.
He knows people are gonna laugh atme. Maybe, but I think
he knows when to dial it back. I think I think there is an
understated Dare I say there's a levelof restraint that he knows, like he
knows when to not cross the line. I think now, and what I
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see in this performance, man,I see people who are not taking their
job seriously. I see an actorwho was doing Emmy Award winning material last
week and now he has to playsomebody called Jigsaw in a movie called Punisher
war Zone. He's just cutting,you know, he's letting loose. He's
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not taking it seriously. I'm notsaying he has to take it seriously seriously.
I'm not saying he's not the joker. Jigsaw, I guess says.
I don't know in the comics.Is he this goofy is? I thought
he was supposed to be an actualthreatening villain for The Punisher, I mean
he is, and I thought hewas in this movie. I mean I
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thought I thought he was a muchbetter villain for The Punisher than John Travolta's
character in the in the Hell No, hell no, Okay, we're going
to fight. Yeah, this isnot a war zone, buddy, this
is where we're going. Let methrow this at you. There's no more
laughable frame of a comic book moviethan the sight of these two goons and
there and the other two mooks thatthey got palin around with them walking through
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the backyard of Julie Bins's suburban home. And Looney bin Jim has his little
what do you call those things?Yeah, it's like I don't know what
they're called, but you know it'sa squeezy stress thing. Yeah, And
Dominic West is wearing a fur coatand a fedora. I And you can't
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tell me that this is like intentionallycamp. I think this is bad.
I think intentionally camp because it's it'sI mean, I'm supposed to laugh at
these characters, am I aren't Isupposed to think that this is a real
threat, that there are stakes attachedto these characters. Is the Green Goblin
a threat in Spider Man? TheGreen Goblin is notoriously the weakest thing about
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that for a Spider Man movie.I think, do you think he's a
threat to Spider Man? I thinkcertain scenes feel threatening. I don't think
he is a character is a threat. Okay, I would say that this
is handled the same way. Thereare certain scenes where this guy is a
real competent threat to the Punisher,just like the Green Goblin is in Spider
(32:07):
Man. But I'm gonna tell youthat this is camp. This movie is.
This is what surprises me about aboutyour opinion on this. This feels
like the camp from the Spider Manmovies was thrown into a pot with with
the ridiculous comic book cartoonish nature ofBatman Forever and the insane mind of Rob
(32:28):
Zombie and just stirred and then I'mthrowing it in there. Actually this is
like this. This has elements ofall three of those things. It has
elements of what Rob Zombie does onfilm. It has elements of what the
Spider Man movies did with their campy, over the top nature, and it
has elements of the cartoonish comic booknature of Batman Forever all in one film.
(32:52):
Don't you dare you smile? Loveof raps happy against Me? No,
I'm action. I'm glad that youbrought that up, because there's a
great there's a great counterpoint to this. So Hostile Thousand Corpses is the campiest
movie that Rob Zombie's ever done,probably ever will do. It's it's a
it's a wacky movie, a reallygood time. I actually I just saw
(33:14):
it for Sucfest and I got tosee Rob and Sherry and even got an
right here. I got an autographedcopy of It's on this movie. Oh
there you go. I can seeit now. It keeps going in and
out, but I can see it. I saw the picture already. We
follow each other, ladies and gentlemen. I'll let you know we are friends
(33:37):
outside of this. I did seethis ahead of time. But Saint Ciskel
and Ebert Man, we're not likelanding each other's. To my eyes,
when we leave here and I smokea cigarette and I say, God,
damn it, I don't know howmuch I can handle this guy. I
tell you, I mean maybe afterthis episode. Who knows who knows?
This is This is a true test. Let's see our friendship can survive punish
your war zone if it holds up. Yeah. No. The reason I
(33:59):
bring that movie up is because eventhough that movie is wildly CAMPI and wildly
zany Otis is still threatening. Heworks with the movies Tom because he isn't
over the top character, but hewas clearly directed to still take the material
seriously enough to intimidate the audience.I can take him seriously when he's on
(34:22):
screen, and I cannot, forthe life of me, do the same
with with pretty much any performance inthis movie outside Ray Stevenson, to be
honest and way night. But butyou know this matters. You know,
whether you can take the villain inthis movie seriously seriously or not matters.
And I think that's gonna be amatter of opinion, you know, because
I do I don't. I know. I'm with what they're going for,
(34:45):
and it's it's I'm not gonna beone of those people's like, oh,
just get it. No, that'sa dumb argument. I think that's such
a film bro thing to say.I you don't understand. But no,
this is like bo is afraid.This is like, be careful, dude,
I don't want our show to getburned down. This is a bo's
afraid. You can't say if youlike it, you can't say if you
(35:05):
don't like it. You just gotto pretend you've never seen it. And
I truthfully have never seen it.I have not seen it. I don't
plan on seeing it. But well, you don't want to partake in that
really productive discourse going on online.You're missing out, moving on, moving
on. Yes, I'm gonna actuallyagree with your counterpoint as far as the
House of a Thousand Corpses comparison,where I'm going to counterpoint back, I'm
(35:30):
gonna I'm gonna give you something tocounter what you said there. I don't
think there's a direct comparison with aRob Zombie work per se. What I
think this movie does is it bringsa Rob Zombie energy. It brings what
Rob Zombie brings to his movies.There's a lot of mean spirited shit in
this movie. I mean, lookat some of the insane levels of violence
that this that that takes place inthis If Rob Zombie would have directed a
(35:52):
Punisher movie, I think a lotof this stuff could have been in there,
the one place that I actually doreal quick though. I think he
actually was in talks to direct thisat some point very early on. He
liked the idea, but I thinksomething was happening where he couldn't direct it.
So he made an original song forthis movie called Warzone, which actually
plays in the movie, and itplayed before the movie I think in theaters,
(36:15):
and it plays in the end creditswhen I mean that makes a lot
of sense, right, He wasworking with Lionsgate at the time he was,
and I think, truthfully, Ithink if he would have directed this
movie more people would have reappraised it. By now, I don't know whether
it would have come out being betteror worse. I'm not gonna say whether
or not that would have been thecase. I would like to would have
(36:36):
been better or worse. Well see, because here's that thing, right,
Like I I've already said that I'min a position to defend this movie.
So you know, obviously, ifI'm in a position to defend this movie,
I don't I don't hate it.So it's hard for me to say
like Rob would have been able tonail it, because we've never seen him
try something like this that being said, I do think a lot of the
things that we see in this arethings he would have tried. I will
(36:59):
agree with you on the villas.I think Rob's villains, even in his
campier movies, are more defined asscary, competent threats. I think that
we see here well right and thefunny, but I do think that there
is a lot of funny on purposehere. There's literally a scene where he
and Luoney ben Jim are pitching toa group of gang members to join a
(37:20):
supergroup to take down the Punisher,and they're in front of this like projected
American flag giving a speech that,like the President would amazing. I actually
do enjoy that saying no, seelike That's how I feel the tone is
of this character from the first timewe meet him until the end of the
(37:40):
movie. The only time that hebreaks from that is is during his scenes
where they're holding the hostages. That'swhen he's like, he's he's done fucking
around, He's just ready to go. And that's like the last five minutes
that we see the character. Andhow do you know he's super duper scary
because he shoots the head off ateddy bear? How can the Punisher defeat
(38:04):
No Jim shot the head off ofa Teddy Bear, Jake Saw shot Wayne
Knight in the head, shot shotMicrochip in the head, which is a
moment that truthfully, the first timeI watched this, I was like,
they're not killing him like I thought. Literally, I thought this movie was
going to be a spiritual follow upto Batman Forever, because I was like,
(38:25):
he's gonna save him both. Imean, that's what it's that's what
the hero does. But he's justlike, no, I know he's gonna
shoot him in the head. ButI can say he doesn't seem that broken
up about it to me, ThePunisher really see. I want to throw
this at you because I saw thisa lot in reviews. I want to
ask you about this. I feltthat Ray Stevenson did a great job of
(38:45):
portraying any emotion that he felt throughoutthe movie in a very subtle manner.
That's what the Punisher, I feelis supposed to be. I mean,
there's only one part where I don'tthink he's very subtle, but it's when
he's completely alone, when he's visitingthe grave of his of his family.
Throughout the rest of the movie,I see everything he's feeling in every scene,
and you don't have to rely onjust the lighting. Like in the
(39:07):
scenes where he's talking to the littlegirl, you can see the sadness in
his eyes, and the scenes wherehe's fighting villains or on his way to
kill more people, you see thecalculated nature in his eyes. You see
everything through his face in the moviewithout him doing a whole lot, which
is why I like him so much. He's really good. I just feel
(39:28):
like the movie itself kind of forgotabout Microchip as soon as he was said.
I feel like he was very underused, underused. I wouldn't agree on
awkwardly, but I would agree thathe is underutilized in this movie. They
should have had more scenes. Ithink. I don't know, if they
just couldn't get him, Like maybehe was just like not doing a whole
(39:50):
lot of acting around this time andjust you couldn't get him very long.
I don't know. I think hewas the perfect choice. So if this
is all you could get from him, like power to you. But I
will agree with you, I thinkhe is underused. We should have had
more scenes of their dynamic together becauseI did really like that scene where,
like, you know, he tellsthe Punisher why he needs to keep doing
(40:12):
this and why this is different,and he can't go away, and the
Punisher still walks out, and thenhe does the three two one, and
he walks right back through the door. It shows they have a built relationship.
But it does do you wait alittle bit? Yea. It decreases
the wait a little bit of whenyou see him get shot because there was
less of it in the movie.Maybe it would have helped for the movie
(40:35):
to be a little bit longer tohave that in there, but I don't
think it would have reached I don'tthink it would have the potential to reach
as many people if it was aslong as Punisher two thousand and four,
which is a complaint that we hada little bit. I mean, it
goes on a little long. Thisdoes not overstay its welcome. This movie
is like an hour and forty minuteslong. Roger Ebert once said that no
good movie is too long and nobad movie is too short. Oh my
(40:59):
god, I'll say about that RogerEbert. I actually have something to say
about him a little bit later.But we'll we'll we'll talk about that later,
Okay, Cool, I'm about somethinghe said about this movie. By
the way, I'm not like gonnadrop a bottle. Okay, Yeah,
I was wondering as like, ohman, no, I have no ill
will towards Roger Ebert. I thinkhe's had some great opinions. I think
(41:19):
he's had some shitty opinions. Ithink he's what every critic is. He's
just a guy who writes about moviesand talks about his opinion. He's my
favorite critic. He and bodies everythingI love about film criticism, including the
the right and the clout to haveunbelievably bad tics. Oh no, he
I mean, look, we saidnobody else would get away with but Roger
(41:40):
Ebert, man Pulitzer Prize winning RogerRodger Ebert. He can. He can
shoot on reservoir dogs all he wants. He can, he can prop up
a cop and a half all hewants. He's a kink, He's a
goat. So no, moving on, Yeah, yeah, moving on.
Let's see if we can agree onthis. Let's see if we can patch
(42:00):
things up. Okay, so we'vetalked about we've talked about the villains enough
and we're just gonna have to agreeto disagree. Yeah, the rest of
the cast, particularly Martin Soap,a character from the comics, a character
(42:20):
who I didn't even like in thecomics, and now he's here. He's
here in this cartoony landscape that thismovie lives in, and they got the
most fecal actor in the world toplay this motherfucker. And there's this weird
thing that this movie is doing whereit thinks it's cute. This movie thinks
(42:45):
of itself as as being something likeI don't know. I mean, I
think they're trying to merge the violenceof a grindhouse movie with the humor and
charm of like those early Batman movies. I guess I think with this character
(43:06):
specifically, I would completely agree withyou, because I kept thinking of the
reporter from Batman nineteen eighty nine.I didn't know in the worst way,
and I didn't know that a poorman's Robert Woolf could exist, But here
he is. Dash Mehawk is theno. But like, seriously, I
mean, like you know, Idon't The character does not take away from
(43:28):
the movie for me. It justdoesn't. I think he's inconsequential. I
think he delivers a few funny moments, like when they're in the car,
and Frank's just like, let mego, and he's just like, oh,
you know, it's like you're lettingyou out. I could give you
tips, I could do all thisstuff, but letting you out of a
cop car like I can. Thenhe's just like all right, fine,
and he gives it to him.The last scene of the movie I think
(43:51):
is great with him, where he'sjust this weasly little guy that's like,
Frank, please hope me. Ithink that's funny. Everything else, though,
does not work. He is absolutelya carbon copy of the reporter from
Batman eighty nine, and the copymachine they were using was was out of
whack and just could not produce agood enough copy because it's it's it's degraded
(44:15):
in quality pretty heavily. That isone thing I will absolutely agree with you
on with his his character in particular. Okay, that scene you just brought
up, it's funny. We've beentalking about House of a Thousand Corpses.
That's literally just a ripoff of theof the iconic opening from that movie.
Motherfucker, I got blood over mydamn clown suit. Just that moment.
(44:37):
It's just that beat. But insteadputting out the beginning they put it at
the end. I want to saythis though, that one of this might
be that that shot of the Punisherat the top of the stairs with the
Jesus Saves Neon sign behind him maybeone of the coolest shots I've ever seen
in a comic book movie. AndI think, well, yeah, I
(45:00):
think it was probably one of thecoolest shots I've ever seen in a comic
book movie, and I just wantto throw appreciation to that. I will
agree that that is a very similarbeat to House of a Thousand Corpses where
he says like what does he say, like, Oh, I've got brains
on my shoe or his brains areall over my shoe, something like that.
I don't know. I like thatmoment. Come on, Frank,
(45:21):
you've got brains all over them?Yeah, there you go again. I
don't like a lot that the charactergives us, But I think there were
two moments where I did enjoy thecharacter. It was in the car with
Frank when he's handcuffed, and thislast scene. Everything else did not work.
I completely agree with you one hundredpercent. It was a bad imitation
of Batman eighty nine, and Ithink with that character they tried too hard
(45:44):
to replicate that, and they justfailed. Yeah, so let's also kind
of touch on two things that Ithink are critical to understanding this movie.
One thing I appreciate about it,and another thing really doesn't work for me.
Okay, the visual style of thismovie that they were going for again,
on paper, this is something thatreally made me want to like this
(46:07):
movie. Look, there are somemoments where I do think they actually hit
the mark where I think this moviedoes really have style, where it really
does have swagger. I actually reallylike that scene in the church just in
general. I think that's you know, they give ray Ray Stevenson really a
chance to shine. I think itactually has the best dialogue, the best
(46:30):
exchange, the line I remember fromthis And that's the other thing. Just
the set design and the lighting.I don't know any church that likes itself
like a strip club, but hey, it works for the movie. I
do too. But the thing islike, wanting to look cool is different
(46:51):
than looking cool, and I'm justnot sure if this production was up to
par with the assignment that they hadgiven themselves. I don't think that this
movie is a polished product. Ithink the editing is awkward and Jenky.
I think they rely on things likeslow motion way too often, especially in
(47:15):
the action scenes, and the CGIblood is the awkward hand is awkward,
handily perfect is handled awkwardly. Totallyabout that, back to you, O'Connor,
why am I wrong? Well,I'm going to agree with you on
(47:36):
a few things, and then Iwant to sort of take it and transition
that into a complaint that I dohave about this movie. And I want
to say, first off, theCGI bad choice. I think they could
have easily accomplished everything they did withCGI well. To an extent, I
think like some of it doesn't lookterrible, like the head getting cut off
is okay, some of the otherstuff is there's there's okay instances of it.
(47:59):
But when it's bad, it's bad. And I can't really defend that
we don't usually like shit on CGI. I'm not gonna say that it's a
takeaway even some of the bad moments. Like there's this moment where this this
guy's parcouring from one building to anotherand mid flip he gets exploded by a
like a like a grenade launcher.Very funny moment, Very funny moment,
(48:19):
Very funny. I think the awkward. CGI kind of works for that moment,
but a lot of the other momentsit's supposed to work for it,
it works against it. I don'twant to spend too much time on that.
What I do want to spend timeon, though, is the visual
presence that this movie has, becauseon one hand, I agree with you,
I think it's very There's a lotof things, and this is sort
of where some of that rob Zombieenergy comes from. There's a lot of
(48:40):
like these neon lights, the useof this, like really it's it's a
dark lit scene, but our charactersare well lit and we have these bright
lights behind them that evoke color,and different scenes have different colors based on
the emotion that they're supposed to portray. Like you know, there's these dark
yellowish scenes every time something every timelike nothing's really happening. When it's supposed
(49:04):
to be a good scene, there'slike a blue lighting. When there's a
bad scene, it's got red lighting. I get what they were going for
in those senses, and I thinka lot of that, like the set
design and the lighting on set,really worked towards this movie to be visually
stunning. And there's moments in thisthat are visually stunning. The issue I
think comes in during the editing process, when they're doing some of the color
grading and when they're doing some ofthe things that put this movie together.
(49:27):
From an editing standpoint, this iswhere some of the movie does fail for
me. I mean, when youtake some of these shots that are just
beautiful and you just up the yellowand you sapia the screen, it's like
it doesn't work for the visual stylethat they were going for. And looking
at set photos, there were timeswhere they sort of put both of those
elements on screen, and I thinkthey did work when they were on screen
(49:49):
together, but when it was clearthat the editing room had a hand in
how the movie looked, it tookaway from the what I think was amazing
set design that was working for thevisual presence through most of the movie.
But it doesn't just fail it withhow it looks with the editing. I
mean, there are some scenes thatare just edited very sloppily. This movie
has an issue with passage of time. You just kind of realize at one
(50:14):
point that like days have gone byand it just feels like our characters are
just still on the same day.And it's because the editing doesn't do enough
to let you know that time ispassing, and it makes everything seem very
quick and rushed at certain parts.And while I do think that the it
doesn't completely take away from my experience. It's a problem I have that does
(50:35):
take the star rating down a littlebit. It's there's really no excuse for
it. They just didn't do well. I think the editors in the should
have reevalue. That's what the subtitleof this movie should have been. There's
no excuse for it. Oh Jesuscool. Now let's talk about something that
(50:59):
really riles me up. And thisis going to rile me up, not
just because of this movie, becauseof the Punisher character. I've alluded to
this before. The Punisher has beenco opted by a group of shitheads in
this country, and I'm not gonnaI'm not going to take that out as
(51:19):
a factor whenever I consume Punisher media. I think that is asinine. Cultural
context matters, connotation matters. I'mnot going to blame the people who created
the Punisher, It's just the factof the matter. If a guy approaches
me and he's wearing the Punisher skulllogo, I'm inclined to cross the Street,
(51:42):
you get me. And this moviereally embellishes and basically basically condones every
kind of nasty social value that goeswith the Punisher character. This is an
extremely anti civic rights movie. ThePunisher, you know, his greatest foe
isn't his evil mobsters, it's corruptbureaucracy. It's you know, and his
(52:09):
greatest aid, his allies are thepeople who think the justice system is weak
and are more than happy to havehim go around killing people without due process.
And it's a movie that really relishesin this. And that's not a
problem I had with the Thomas Janeversion, and it's actually something. But
(52:30):
I think the Dolph London version approachesquite well. You know, if you
want to hear our thoughts on that, you can go check out the previous
entry. So I don't want tobe that guy. I don't want to
be that LIPTRD that has to rainon people's paraded. You know, people
say, leave your brain at thedoor. But the fact of the matter
(52:52):
is every single movie has something tosay, whether or not they know it,
whether or not they realize it.And this is an ugly movie to
make. And that department, doyou care to comment on that, or
is this something that you know,Is this something that's in your opinion,
(53:13):
not even worth bringing up in adiscussion about this movie. I mean,
I think anytime, anytime you havea movie that that discussion evokes, I
think it's it's not wrong to bringthat up. I think it's one of
those things where it's it's a diceysubject for anybody, you know what I
mean, Like it's either going tobother you or it's not. And there
are times where I think there isa responsibility that you have as a filmmaker
(53:35):
when handling some material. I thinkI think it's all about how you handle
it. For me, I thinkthis movie handled it in a very over
the top, violent cartoonish way thatworked. I don't think it crossed the
line for me personally. I dothink that it's hard with modern knowledge about
what the symbols use for and whatit can represent in certain you know,
(53:59):
corners of the country or the world. But it's hard for me to put
my brain there when when consuming amovie that's just as outlandish as this one.
So I don't It does not absolvethe movie of a responsibility, but
it makes it more dicey. Forme to have an opinion in that way,
(54:21):
because honestly, it's not something thatbugged me in this case. But
I think it's a worthy conversation tohave any time that that's something that it
could be brought up. I thinkthere's an extreme, like you said,
there's there's a point like where youjust have to be like, guys,
it's a movie, like it's amovie, but there's also a responsibility that
comes with some of that. Soyou know, while I don't think you
should you know, be looking atFinding Nemos saying how irresponsible it is because
(54:44):
this that, and like you know, or Leelo and Stitch because she climbs
into a washing machine. You know, it's like there's a certain point where
you just have to realize, likemaybe we should leave that conversation at the
door. I don't think this isone of those movies, but it's something
that I personally don't have an opinionon for for this film. So yeah,
(55:07):
I worthy conversation for sure, butI don't I don't have much more
to contribute to it. Very wise, very wise, I'll take the hit
man. I'll take no. Andthat's not even something that like, you
know, if I had an opinionon it, I'd be happy to say
it too. I just you know, it's there are sometimes where it does
bug me. I think there aremovies that are gratuitous with it, or
(55:27):
that are that go over the topto give you a message that from either
side of the coin, I thinkis an irresponsible thing to do. It's
why I have a disconnection with alot of movies, maybe even even in
some franchises that I do enjoy,I know, I mean, I think
this is a weird case for me, where if this movie is going to
challenge the Punisher like his moral code, if it's going to ask if what
(55:52):
the Punisher is doing is right,you're asking me to take it seriously,
right. I mean again, thisisn't turn your brain off. I mean
the screenwriters for Better or for Worseare asking these questions, and by the
end of the movie, all Ican think of is they're saying, Yes,
what the Punisher is doing is right. We need a guy like the
(56:12):
Punisher. We need him more thanwe need you know, you know laws.
We He's better then then the youknow, inept and corrupt bureaucrats we
see in this movie, or theyou know incompetent cops we see in this
movie. It's just it's a weirdthing for me. Again, I feel
(56:35):
like they did invite this. You'llnotice I didn't really have anything to say
about this and the Thomas Jane version, because that felt like a very personal
story. There is some like nodto the idea that a guy like the
Punisher needs to exist because the justicismsystem is incompetent. I have a lot
of problems with the justice system myself, and I'm open to to what that
(57:00):
movie did. But what this moviedoes to me is take it a step
further, go out of its wayto validate the Punisher to the point where
it feels like a power fantasy forpeople who I don't want to have power.
I'll just leave it at that.Okay, you'll notice that I have
(57:22):
an Astros cap and not a Magaone, and that's all I have to
say about that. Well, I'lljust throw one thing in there, and
I will say I think that justlike if the one thing I will say
about you said that it wasn't reallyas present in the last movie. I
think part of that is because ofthe narrative of the story that they gave
you. In Punisher four. ButI think like the ending of The Punisher
four is very much what you whatyou described, because he's about to go
(57:44):
off and it's no longer a revengestory anymore. He's he's about to be
what Ray Stevenson is, you know, he's about to go out. It's
he's not getting revenge anymore. He'snot well, he's not punishing those who
who deserve it for what they didto him and his family anymore. After
that, he leaves to go killother people. Go and he says it
at the end of the movie abouthow he's gonna go kill other people who
are who are like this, soto be fair going to Tom one,
(58:07):
Ray Stevenson was let me I seeyour point, and let me let me
say this. I think Thomas Jane'sPunisher is much more methodical and displays a
lot more forethought about these things.I don't believe that Thomas Jane is a
man I mean, you know,to his version of Frank Castle Castle.
(58:28):
I don't know if the Tomas truethink about any of this, but his
version of Frank Castle is not aman who gets carried away by the power
of being a vigilante. There's somethingabout that movie that I liked and I
wanted to bring it up last time, but are much like that movie.
Our podcast was running way too long. But he very notably gives the law
(58:49):
enforcement a chance to to you know, do what they're supposed to do to
bring his you know, his wouldbe killers to justice. He gives them
like six months, and then heconfronts them publicly, and when they don't
have anything to tell him, youknow, when it's clear that they they
(59:10):
can't or won't do anything, that'swhen he takes matters into his own hands.
I mean, this is a punisherwho feels like anointed to do a
one man war against crime. Andwhen you're doing a war, you don't
have to follow rules or social rulesthe same way. You know, he
(59:32):
kills indiscriminately. He has completely losttouch with regular people, and we see
it in this movie. His approachgets innocent people killed, and I don't
know how that experience next to him. Well, no, I guess too,
Okay, I mean, I mean, if you want to count Newman's
(59:52):
mom Newman sorry, Wayne Knight's mom, let's call Newman. I like that
Newman's mom, but I think Ithink well, but see I would argue
on the other side of that that, like, even though this is not
a follow up to Thomas Jane's movie, I think if we if we would
have seen The Punisher that Got theRevenge on the people Ray Stevenson's version who
(01:00:14):
Got the Revenge, because let's bereal, they talk about it being punishment,
it's revenge. He's getting revenge.It's a revenge movie. If we
would have gotten to see that side, I think we would be having a
different discussion about the movie. ButI think the point that we're at in
this story is like, this isa guy who's been doing this for a
long time. I mean, wesee that there's a there's a point in
time where he asks, like,you know, I'm gonna get started,
(01:00:34):
which one of these has the Punisherfiles in it for the Punisher murders.
And he's like look around and there'slike hundreds of boxes of these things.
So the guys, the guy's beenat it for a minute. So we're
at a different point in his story. I think if we if we would
have gotten a sequel for Thomas Jane, I don't see how they could have
given us something that wasn't this becausethat's how they ended off. They ended
(01:00:55):
off with him going out to tosort of become this He no longer has
trust in the law that he had. There is a point in this movie
where I can appreciate it because hedoes welcome the help of officers. But
I can see your point where hedoes say like, Okay, well,
you know, I'm accepting your helpbecause we're doing this my way. And
then at the end of the dayhe knocks the dude out so he can
(01:01:15):
do it on his own. Idon't know how much of that is telling
the story of this guy feels responsiblefor so he's going to be the one
to finish it, and how muchof it is this macho man bravado of
I'm the vigilante. But I dothink there are there's an argument for both
of those cases. And I dothink there's an argument for the case of
(01:01:36):
if you would have continued Thomas Jane'sstory past his initial revenge point, it'd
be hard to then do another revengestory without doing something similar to what we
see here. His vengeance is onlyfor the fact that he is trying to
protect people, even though he goesabout it in a way that has two
sides of an argument of how he'sdoing it, you know what I mean.
(01:01:57):
So I don't know I would agreewith you, though I do think
the Punisher two thousand and four,up until the point of literally the last
seconds of the movie, it doesit doesn't have the same energy. And
you're and you're absolutely correct on that. Yeah, it's hard for me to
imagine Thomas James Punisher evolving into RayStevenson's Punisher, right, well, it
was. It was hard to picturea sequel for me, Like when you
(01:02:19):
were talking about wanting to see himagain, I just I couldn't picture it
because it's a very different version ofthat character. He has different motivations than
the Punisher has, which is abig issue that the comic book fans really
have with it. It's hard tothink about when they could have done with
that. I think there would havebeen a way I really imagined, and
something like you know A Man withNo Name trilogy sort of vibe where he
(01:02:42):
goes from town to town, hesees what the problem is, and he
doesn't just you know, shoot first, ask questions later. He plans and
he makes allegiances and I don't know, I just see him. That's another
problem with the movie. Where arethe land mines? The Punisher's most iconic
weapon is nowhere? Sure, WarZone has a deep lack of land mines.
(01:03:07):
No, Yeah, I mean okay, land mines are to the Punisher
what the machete is to Jason.Okay, Well, well, well,
you know, let's talk about somethingthat that our conversation just sort of brought
up. Though, I want toask you about the action and the carnage
in this movie, not so muchthe story side of it, just the
what we see from an action side, Like if you watch a John Wick
(01:03:28):
movie, you know you're gonna seesome kick ass fight scenes. You're gonna
see some cool shootouts. You're gonnasee some probably car chases or riding horses
through the city, whatever it isin this movie. I expected more carnage
and action than I got in twothousand and four. Even though I was
I was not disappointed with how muchwe got. I liked it. I
said that in our in our discussion, I like to think in this one
(01:03:49):
that they just took it to awhole new level. And I'm curious your
thoughts on it. Do you thinkthey took it too far? Do you
think it's it works? For themovie. What are your thoughts on the
carnagen action that we get in Punisher. Nothing is memorable to me as the
fight scene with the Russian from twothousand and four. There's nothing that even
tries to be as memorable. It'ssort of what I alluded to that,
(01:04:14):
you know, if it's really justa sequence after a sequence of the Punisher
getting into a shootout, For me, it starts to feel tedious, especially
when I don't think the choreography orthe construction of these sequences or anything to
write home about. I think itborder aligns on cheese a lot. This
seems to be an iconic moment forsome. I think him getting on that
(01:04:36):
chandelier and spinning around looks silly.I like that moment. I like that
one. It it seems very impracticalto me. I mean, I mean,
look, there are things in allof these movies I think that are
impractical, But I don't know.I thought it was a cool looking moment.
I thought that was pretty iconic.I thought the rocket launcher to the
(01:04:56):
guy jumping over the building was iconic. I thought the last shootout was pretty
cool man like honestly, like whenhe's going through the building, clearing these
people out. I think the waythey went about getting that started was pretty
creative, Like, hey, let'sfind the guy who you know has a
reason to want revenge against these gangstersto help us out. Let's let's go
to the other side of this thingand like play their game. They want
to recruit all these other gangs totake out the punisher. Well, the
(01:05:19):
punisher can then get well he thepunisher doesn't really do it, but his
side can have have something like thatas well. And then he gets into
the building and he's just he's justcold and calculated. He's taking these people
out. He's he's hearing them,he's coming up with a plan. I
love definitely he approaches it like amarine, for sure, and he does.
Yeah. I think they say hewas a Special Forces trainer or something
(01:05:42):
special Forces combat trainer or something likethat. That's truly fine. I don't
have any I do, I guesshave something negative to say about the action,
which I'm shocked at how scaled downsome of it felt. In the
middle act, like that whole sequencein the house, it seems like that's
where some kind of major action beachshould go. But all we get is
(01:06:08):
is the Punisher very easily taking outthese two moops. Right he punches the
one kid in the face, whichis a funny moment. D That's a
great moment. I love that somuch. He punches right through that fucker's
face. Is this amazing? It'slike a horror movie kill it is.
(01:06:30):
But by that point, you haven'tseen a major action scene with this character
in a really long time, andI felt starved for something more spectacular like
the opening promised. I don't thinkthe opening set the right tone for this
movie. I mean this, youknow, other than that fight scene at
the mansion and a little bit atthat mill, I feel like this movie
(01:06:54):
is like really a mimic when itcomes to to shootouts. I actually kind
of like the way that they structuredit. I like the fact, well,
first of all, I like thefact that this isn't just shootout after
shootout, you know what I mean. I like the fact that they have
the story beats in there, whetheror not you connect with them. I
like the fact that this isn't just, oh, the Punisher gets in a
shootout here, and then he goesover here and gets in a shootout here.
(01:07:16):
But the shootouts are the only thingto me, that feel like very
well thought out, like everything elseyou know, to me like he very
easily dispatches of people and very lackingintention for me. And that's a fair
discussion. I think that also kindof comes down to your feelings on the
(01:07:38):
Punisher character, because that's very muchkind of what he is that you don't
see it as commonly in the comicbooks, where the Punisher is real down
and out a lot of his turmoiland this is decisions that he has to
make, and it's really just kindof one major decision. I mean,
you know, he has the issueswith his way of doing things after an
innocent person gets killed, that's notwhat he's about, and the fact that
(01:07:59):
he did is something that he questionsnow. And also the fact that he
now is in a situation where hehas this person who's the closest person in
the world to him and on theother side innocent people, and technically they're
both innocent, but the innocence ofthe child kind of prevails and he has
to make that difficult choice. Butwhen you talk about the action, I
(01:08:21):
will agree with you. I thinkthere's an issue where nothing in this movie
is as well done as the fightscene with the Russian. But I think
this movie delivers more on the typeof action that the Punisher would want to
give us. I said in thetwo thousand and four video that we talked
about, I said that I thinkthe perfect Punisher movie is similar to Dread,
(01:08:44):
the movie Dread, and I thinkthis was a step towards that.
I just think there was too muchof the cartoonist stuff to say definitively like,
oh yeah, this went like theDread route. I do think there
is a perfect Punisher film in goingthat route. Hey, let me let
me do it. Come on,let me do it. Just let me
make a Punisher movie. I'll makea great punisherr movie. I'll pick a
(01:09:06):
great actor. I'll do everything youwant to. I'll make you some money,
but I'm sure you'll do much betterthan Lexi Alexander. Give me fifteen
million dollars. I oh man,oh man. See, I'm not gonna
shit on like se Alexander. Iwatched interviews of her talking about her intentions
with the movie uh, and Iactually appreciated whether or not she should be
going on Twitter and answering people whodon't like her work. I will,
(01:09:29):
I will point to my thoughts inthe last video. But I'm not gonna
shit on her her direction in this. Honestly, I think you know,
I got what she was trying todo. She used a lot of the
same language, and I don't knowif it was by design, I don't
know if it was by accident,but a lot of the same language that
Joel Schumacher used when talking about BatmanForever, like this is a comic book
movie. We're making a It's almostlike she was referring to it as taking
(01:09:54):
a comic book and throwing it onthe screen. And I cannot definitively say
that she didn't accomplish that. Ijust can't say it, because that's what
she did. There's doing that right, and there's doing that well. Look,
okay, Sam raimid did the exactsame thing with Spider Man. Big
hit, huge hit. You won'tget me to say a bad word about
(01:10:16):
what Sam Raimi did there. Youdon't have a Spider Man tattoo, the
same ray spider Man tattoos. Idon't get tattoos. If I did get
tattoos, that'd probably be right upthere, you know, Spider Man two
across the top of your back.I'll pay for that. If you get
that, really, I'll get atram stamp. Yes, oh my god,
I will pay for it. Iswear to God, please spend your
(01:10:40):
money more wisely. So look whenyou when you see somebody do it with
such precision, and I mean whenyou see somebody do it as well as
that, it's very hard for meto year like the Joel Schumacher thing and
(01:11:00):
like give that a pass because doingthe comic book movie approach of let's put
a comic book on screen that canbe done well, and that can be
done badly, and Joel Schumacher isa guy who did it pretty badly.
I thought, and I mean BatmanForever is a mixed bag, but I
(01:11:20):
mean his approach I think proved tobe disastrous. I mean, and I
think Lexi Alexander learned the worst thingsfrom from those Joel Schumacher movies. I'm
gonna I'm gonna have to disagree withthat. There. Here's here's why,
though, And I guess I'm gonnapose a question, and I'm gonna pose
(01:11:44):
the question by first bringing up somethingthat Roger Ebert said about this movie.
I was gonna wait till my finalverdict to bring it up because I just
had something I wanted to throw inabout it, but I think this is
a good time for me to sayit. Uh. He A direct quote
from him when talking about The Punisherwar Zone was he called this one one
of the best made bad movies I'veever seen. That's what he That's what
he said, direct quote. Ithink it's just I've seen, but whatever
(01:12:08):
it may be, that's something thathe said about this movie. I think
on a technical level, there's alot of things that were really well done
about the making of this movie.So I want to ask you, as
somebody who usually like in these reviews, if you watch reviews, in these
videos, podcasts, whatever you wantto call it, there's a lot of
things that normally I think you wouldappreciate that was done in this movie that
(01:12:30):
you don't appreciate as much with thematerial that we're given. And I'm curious
if that's due to the execution oryour feelings on the Punisher character. In
directing it in that way, takinga character and literally pasting him onto the
screen, how much of that doesn'twork from a perspective of that being done
as opposed to what Lexi Alexander wasable to do with the movie itself.
(01:12:53):
Oh, it's about execution for mehere, Okay, I'm on record saying
I really wanted to like this moviebecause I thought the directionally went it was
so cool on paper. No,it's all about execution, man, And
that's sort of why I am pittingit on like see Alexander, because your
job as the director isn't just tohave cool ideas. It's to know how
to bring that to life, toknow how to direct other people to bring
(01:13:15):
your vision to the screen. AndI think she had a cool idea,
and maybe if she had done acouple more movies, if this was later
in their career, she could havebeen seasoned enough to do it. But
for whatever the reason are there,it wasn't a good match for her,
or because I've never seen any othermovie that she's done. There wasn't a
good match for her. But shewasn't there. Like she was talented enough
(01:13:42):
to have the idea, you knowwhat I mean, but she wasn't seasoned
enough to do it. You know. They're like Sam Raimi had been working
as a director for over twenty yearsby the time he did Spider Man,
and he had worked with all differentkinds of budgets. He'd worked with high
profile actors, he'd been around theblock. You know, it was not
I think Punish Your Warzone is Lexi'ssecond movie. It's her second major film.
(01:14:08):
Yeah, like a major film,Yeah, because she's been doing television
work ever since. Yes, yeah, The Green Street Huiggins was her first
major film. She hasn't done amajor movie afterwards. She only has one
other film on her letterbox that's likea full movie from what I can tell,
uh, And it's a movie calledLifted, which has a three point
(01:14:30):
zer rating. It doesn't look likemany people have seen. It came out
in twenty ten, so that washer follow up too, this one.
And hey, I mean Jill,I say that Patrol Schumacher had also been
a season director. He had doneThe Lost Boys, he did Saying Almost
Fire, a couple other notable movies. Falling Down I think would have been
(01:14:51):
his most critically acclaimed for sure.And you know, I think sometimes a
project can bring out the worst qualitiesof a director, and that might be
the case here. Again, I'mnot familiar with her work. I can't
speculate too much. But when Isay it's all about execution, I mean
(01:15:12):
it. I think there's a Ithink there's a kick ass version of this
movie out there, and I wishedI got to see it. But that
movie would not have this, thisperformance by Dominic West. It wouldn't have
a second act that goes nowhere inNeanders It would have it would be it
(01:15:38):
would have the editing and cinematography thatyou would hope for from a major production
like this. And I don't meanto sound mean it's hard making the movie.
I've never done anything to this caliberand I would be very intimidated if
somebody handed me, like what,twenty million dollars to make a Punisher movie.
But the reality is is what wehave on screen, what we have
(01:16:01):
on screen just isn't there. Andthat's fair, and that's why I wanted
to make sure I got that distinctionfrom you, and you know, and
that's fair. And some of thosethings will agree to disagree on for sure.
I mean, you know, theexecution is either going to work for
you or it's not. And that'sthe case in every movie. And you
know, some people, the thingsthat you think, maybe you know well
(01:16:23):
done, something that I might takeand say, yeah, I think that
was really awesome. That might bethe worst thing you've ever seen on on
your television screen. I don't knowif that's the case here, but I
do want to ask you about twothings that the audience considers two of the
worst things. We touched on oneof them a little bit, and I
want to just sort of bring itback up here because there are characters we
haven't touched on with this complaint,and I just want to see kind of
(01:16:46):
the direction that that conversation goes.We don't have to necessarily call anybody out
for this, but I think anoverall complaint is that everybody in the movie
on the cast, with the exceptionof maybe Ray Stevenson and Wayne Knight,
are not up to par for theacting. Every one of them. Yes,
you would you you agree with thatcriticism across the board, Okay,
(01:17:06):
I do. I like the guyplaying body Yansky. Okay, see,
I wanted to ask you about thatbecause he is a common complaint about his
terrible American accent in this, whichI will agree with. It's not a
good American accent, but I thinkhe brings a good presence to the movie.
But worse, I wish they hadgotten Lance Reddicks so we could have
had been cool, a real theWire reunion that would have been Yeah,
(01:17:30):
I will agree with that. LanceReddick ri Ip is a gym is a
fucking gem. I think that.I mean, it's interesting because when you
when I think of Colin Salmon,who's in this movie, by the way,
his second appearance on the show.He was in an Alien Versus Predator
as well. When I think abouthim, I think of like the early
two thousands, you know what Imean, Like that seemed to be his
(01:17:50):
point in time to shine. Hewas in Resident Evil, he was in
Alien Versus Predator. He was ina couple of movies around that time that
did very well, and he playedthe same character based and he kind of
plays the same character in this Hehe's given a little bit more with,
like his range of emotions. There'sthis really funny scene where he's going to
arrest one of one of Jigsaw's goonsand uh and the Punisher just explodes his
(01:18:15):
head with a shotgun and he kindof just yells, God, damn it,
Castle and it's he's able to kindof play into that funny nature of
of that just grotesque moment. He'sgiven a little bit more to play with.
But one of the people that Iwant to ask you about who I
think I have like a very lovehate relationship with overall. I think she's
in a terrible movie that I boughtjust because Daniel Harris was in it,
(01:18:36):
called Havenhurst. Uh. I spentmoney on that thing, and I'm you
know, I hope some of itwent to Daniel Harris because I wasted it
if not. But here's what I'llsay. Julie Ben's plays our mother in
this movie, the mother of thelittle girl. That certainly does and I
(01:18:59):
don't I don't want to say thatshe's a bad actress because I don't think
she is a bad actress. Ithink she's like I mean, she's like
a she's a good crier. Ithink her emotions are pretty good. But
it feels like she just doesn't there'ssomething missing about her. Am I crazy
about that? Like? There feelslike there's something missing in her performance and
I can't just I can't pinpoint.I mean, obviously the accent is is
(01:19:23):
is grotesque, But what else amI missing with her that that's causing it
to knock nothing to her performance andto her character other than the constant crying
face that she makes that's the onlything she's asked to do. I mean,
this is a sausage fest of theof a movie more so than two
thousand and four. Who I thought, you know, I thought mystique brought
(01:19:46):
something really valuable to that movie intothat cast. That cast soul, oh
cast sol. I think that's theworst one ever done on this and it
won't be the worst one by thetime we're done. Oh man. Any
(01:20:09):
by the way, any of theseI am constantly looking for an opportunity to
put on a T shirt, Sobe careful what you say, because I
will put it on a shirt.If you want to put frank cast dot
dot dot O. Nobody's buying thatthing. I'll make it. Just send
you one. Yeah, I'll makeit. Just to send you one.
That'll be a good Christmas present.There's really nothing though to Julie Benz's performance.
(01:20:31):
She's a fine actress. She wasfine and saw five. Yeah,
I mean, that's the thing,man, Like. That's why I was
kind of confused about this is becauseshe's been in things before where she's not
awful, like Rambo. She wasin Rambo that came out I'm pretty sure
the same year as this, right, two thousand and eight. Yeah,
she was in Rambo, and Idon't think she's terrible in Rambo. It's
(01:20:57):
just I don't know, man,I like, I wanted to feel more
for her character other than the circumstance, you know. I think that's what
really makes a great performance in amovie for a sympathetic character, is that
you don't just feel bad because ofwhat happened to them. You feel bad
because they're You feel what they're feeling. And I don't know that I felt
what she was feeling throughout this.It could be up to the editing.
(01:21:17):
I mean, her scenes are choppedup a little bit, you don't.
You know, she doesn't have awhole lot to do, so maybe that's
where some of that comes from.But I certainly don't think she's a bad
actress. I don't think her performanceis that awful in this. I don't
think it's amazing. But that's whatI guess I want to ask you is.
(01:21:38):
But we talked about how you feelabout Dominic West and how you feel
I don't know the actor's name andplays luny Bin Jim Doug Hutchinson. There
we go and we talked about theirperformances and dash Me Hawk who plays Martin
Soap. But was there anybody elsethat stood out to you as a as
a bad actor in this movie thatwould that would put the acting in a
terrible category. Who's the guy whoplays who plays the ex con that that
(01:22:06):
kind of partners up? Yeah,mister vo. His his name is Carlos
Gonzales Vio and he plays a characternamed Carlos. Okay, he's also in
Max Pain. If you needed toknow that, I don't think you know?
(01:22:28):
Do you do? I need that? I Max Pain is one of
the most you must avoid this moviemovies. I don't. I will not.
No, I will not do MaxPain. I can't. I can't
go there. But no, Idon't think he's great. Do you think
he's like awful or do you think? I guess I don't think he's awful.
I think he just doesn't leave animpression. I mean, it's a
(01:22:51):
it's such a weird non character andit's one of those things where, oh
cool, the punisher is working withan ex con? What what where is
this gonna go? Nowhere? Iwill agree with you that one goes kind
of nowhere. I do. Ido actually appreciate his acting after he gets
like acts to death and then hekind of the punisher shows up and he's
like, please don't let me dielike this, Please don't let me die
(01:23:12):
like this. I was like,oh, like I can. This is
what I'm talking about. What Ididn't get from Julie Ben's I feel what
this character is feeling, and that'smaking me feel bad for them. It's
not just the fact that they werebeaten with an axe. Well. Look,
we've been talking about this movie forover an hour and a half and
I just remembered that he was,that he was a character. I mean,
no, he does nothing. Imean besides that moment, he has
nothing to take his Another case ofa terrible accent in this movie from this
(01:23:36):
guy. That's one thing that Iwill absolutely agree with the audience on.
I grouped it in with the actingcomplaint, But the accents are if they're
not over the top, they're bad, and if they're some of and the
bad ones are also over the top. I don't think Dominic West is terrible.
His accent's very over the top,but I don't think it's bad.
(01:23:58):
Almost everybody else though a very bad. His name's Jimmy, not looney.
Ben Jim, j Jim, butfantastic brother. I love that. I
love that line, honestly, Ilove it. It's it's I'm going to
get my ample sauce back. Well, that leads me to the next huge
(01:24:20):
complaint I saw in every single negativereview I read that had more than five
words in it, and that wasthe dialogue. Now, yummy, yummy,
yummy in my tummy, Tommy.I think I might, from this
point on just quote these motherfuckers forthe review. Honestly, you know what's
(01:24:42):
funny is like is the dialogue likethe greatest that I've ever heard in the
movie? No? Is it theworst? No? But if fuck man,
if it ain't memorable, I don'tknow what is good or bad,
I don't care. I remember thismovie. I remember some of the things
that were said. I remember thefact that that Dominic West said things with
the most outlandish accent, just mostNew York mobster accent I've ever heard in
(01:25:08):
a movie. It's just it's it'sit's a non factor for me when I'm
talking about my issues and my andmy good things about this movie, because
I know some of that dialogue isjust bad. But I will give it
credit for one thing. Nothing mademe cringe as much as I cringed at
the love scenes in Punisher for wherethey're on the beach and they're like,
(01:25:31):
oh, you know, I loveyou so much baby. All that stuff
that was awful. Nothing was thatbad in this But nothing was as good
as some of the best lines ofdialogue from Punisher for. That's my take
on the dialogue. Where do youland stop thinking of a quote to but
here? Oh man, you can'tkeep it God, Okay, I just
(01:26:03):
disagree. Man, Yes, thisis absolutely cringier than than The Punisher.
Oh no, I wouldn't say thatat all. I'm sorry, man,
I I can't cope. I knowthat there's something about cringey love scenes that
does tend to really give me goosebumps, Like it does really elicit like a
(01:26:23):
very kind of allergic reaction from me. But but I can't imagine writing down
this dialogue and turning the sin Yes, this is your script, you pay
me now for for my good work. Oh man, I don't know.
I wouldn't go that far. Iwouldn't. I wouldn't do it, I
(01:26:45):
think. But that's the thing,right, Like, I think this movie's
dialogue is just it's just fine.Okay, it's it's just fine. I
think he's fine. No, becauseI don't consider the worst dialogue in this
to be the worst dialog in ain a comic book movie. I don't
consider it to be the worst dialogueeven in the Punisher series. I don't
consider it to be the worst.I do think that the best dialogue in
(01:27:09):
this is is not better than thebest dialogue in even the other two movies.
But I don't think that the worstis worse than what Punisher four gives
us. I think it's just II never had a moment where I cringed
in this where I didn't get whatthey were trying to do. But I
(01:27:30):
did have those moments in Punisher ohfour. We talked about it. I
mean, the the the voodoo guycoming up and talking about like let God
be with you, God, God'sgonna sit this one out, and fucking
the love stuff at the beginning likethat. That stuff was cringe worthy because
of the way that they were doingit. But I don't know, man,
I just I don't agree. Idon't have It's not great. I'm
(01:27:51):
not gonna I'm not gonna sit herelook you in the eyes and seriously tell
you that the dialogue in this movieis good, great, or amazing,
because it's not. But I don'tthink it's nearly as bad as as the
way that you described it, theway that the audio the audience who doesn't
like this movie describes it. Idon't think it's that bad. It's not
that bad. It's not that bad. We are stretching our credibility right now.
(01:28:15):
Connor, Dude, we defended HalloweenResurrection, man, We said that
had the best dialogue in You agreedwith me that the dialogue in that movie
was better than most of the otherHalloween movies and that, Yes, did
I just say it wasn't the worst, No, you said it was.
It was. You agreed that itwas. It was one of the better
(01:28:35):
written movies of the Halloween franchise.When it comes to dialogue, Man,
I think I blacked out. Idon't remember that. Look, man,
that this is what the show isall about. Man. We find movies
that are that are that are thatare hated to me. We say things
that we believe about them, andthis is something I do believe. Okay.
I think the best way I canput it is the dialogue in this
(01:28:58):
is like that cringey die dialogue thatWill Patten is given in in that torture
scene from the two thousand and fourversion, stretched to an entire movie.
I think everybody talks like that.I think everybody talks with and that's that's
why I'm having a really hard timegetting in the mindset that this is just
camp that we're supposed to laugh alongwith this. I think I think it's
(01:29:20):
trying to be edgy. I don'tthink it's trying to be campy. I
don't know, man, because it'sit's so cartoonish and outlandish. Some of
the ship that they say in thislike it fits the tone that they're going
for. That the tone of Punisheroh four, Those lines of dialogue do
not fit. We talked about WillPatton sticking out like a sore thumb in
that movie. But when you're makinga movie that's meant to be this,
(01:29:42):
this this campy, insane cartoon ofa movie, it's okay to have those
lines, man, Like, itfits the tone of the movie. If
you're if you're trying to make ayou know, a serious film like The
Punisher O. Four was, Yeah, it's gonna stand out, but nothing
stands out in this is like,like this choice did not make sense with
(01:30:03):
what they were going for. Idisagree that. I'm not gonna blanketly call
that movie a serious movie. It'sa more it takes itself serious to an
extent that this movie. It's avery similar thing to me where the Punisher
plays like a straight man in thesemovies in two thousand and four, and
(01:30:25):
in this movie he definitely seems likethe straight man in a world that's a
little heightened with the two thousand andfour they still try to make it look
more or less like our world,But the behaviors of the character surrounding the
Punisher, especially the villains, Idon't think they're asking us to take it
seriously and crank that. I don'tknow, man, I don't think they're
(01:30:48):
telling us that we have to takeeverything seriously with them. And I think
that's where your point about you appreciatingJohn Travolta comes in, And what I
didn't appreciate about him is that Ido think the movie does have moments where
are they are asking us to takethem more seriously than the movie is letting
us take them where In this case, I think when they're trying to I
(01:31:11):
think there's a lot of moments wherethey're telling you, like, Okay,
don't take this seriously, but themoments where we're supposed to take it seriously.
This dialogue doesn't knock it out ofthe park. I'm not saying it
does, and I'm ever gonna sayit does, but they tone it down
with the over the top nature ofwhat they're trying to say for those scenes,
and that's why it's why I thinkthe dialogue for this movie goes perfectly
(01:31:32):
with the tone that they're trying toput. Even if it's not the best.
Could it have been better written?I'm not gonna dispute that at all.
It could have absolutely had better dialogue. It should have had better dialogue.
It would take this movie to awhole nother level for me if it
had better dialogue, and it doesn'thave it. But I am gonna contend
that it's not that bad. Idon't think it's as bad as people say
that it is because of how wellit does fit what they're doing. And
(01:31:58):
you can disagree that's fine, uhit. You know, we talk about
dialogue a lot on this show.It's just surprising because it seems like dialogue
is really I mean, how howmuch do we expect from movies like this
in terms of their dialogue. Youknow, it used to be that we
like like movies, like genre movies, weren't really expected to have what Quinn
(01:32:24):
Tarantino esque dialogue, like something ofthat caliber. I mean, honestly,
it's just I think it got normalizedafter the prequels and then and then the
standard was raised, I suppose.Yeah. I'm just surprised that dialogue continues
to come up in these discussions becauseI didn't expect good dialogue from either of
(01:32:47):
these movies. I agree, yeah, I yeah, Well that's the thing.
I expected it to be passable,and in both movies it was.
Let me put this way, ifI'm writing a review for this movie,
the dialogue doesn't come up, notbecause I like it, but because it's
not one of the things that theyneeded to get right and didn't. I
(01:33:12):
think there this dialogue could be puton a movie that has much more excellent
visuals and a much let's say,a better not a better cast, but
a cast directed better, and everyonereally wouldn't stand out to me. And
that's fair. And there's things thatwe're going to agree to disagree. I
(01:33:34):
will agree with you there as faras like perception, for sure, I
think if they if what you justdescribed there would have been the case for
this movie. I don't think wewould be having this discussion. I just
don't. I don't think we'd beable to have it. I think so.
I think so it's just going tohave to land with you. And
if you're listening to this and youhaven't seen it, it's just gonna have
to land with you, or it'snot going to And that conversation was a
(01:33:57):
perfect thing there. So I wantto ask you if there's anything else wanted
to bring up before we delivered afinal verdict on this movie. Man,
We've been talking about this for solong, and I the the rant meter
I think is on low now.I think I've I've said my piece and
I've made my case. I don'tat this point. I think it just
(01:34:17):
be mean to you know, towhat nitpick all of the uh little things.
I mean, the fact that thePunisher doesn't have a character arc.
Nobody does really in this movie,you know, in what to pick up
our the shots that are so obviouslyyou know, either they have bad CGI
(01:34:40):
or bad screen screen. I justdon't see much of a point and continuing
down that road. So unless wehave something more compelling to talk about,
I think we can move on toour final verdicts. Let's do it up.
Let's do it up, and let'sstart with you say, I know
your rant meter is low, butlet's use what you got left to give
us your final thoughts on this movie. And I was cast as the villain
(01:35:09):
and I played that part with relish. It's a movie that I used to
have tolerance for because I was ata stage where I was really excited to
be old enough to be watching movieslike this. Frankly, you know,
when I was fifteen, this wassuch a cool thing for me to be
(01:35:33):
watching movies like Punisher war Zone afterhaving been watching you know, Spider Man
and Batman, Like the hardest movieI had been able to see was The
Dark Night. So I think thisis something of a gateway drug for harder
stuff right in the comic book world, just like I think The Punisher is
(01:35:55):
a gateway drug as a character foranti heroes. You know, The Punisher
really is going to be your introductionto that as a kid. I bet
he's probably going to be the firstcharacter that you read about that's a true
anti hero and in the spirit ofthat, you know, I think fourteen
(01:36:17):
year olds will get a kick outof this movie. I'm too old for
that, man. I just turnedtwenty five, So it's just not a
movie that has anything to offer meanymore. I've seen this exact thing done
better in so many different formats,in so many different ways, and I
(01:36:38):
just can't honestly recommend it to anybodywho's graduated high school, you know,
love the punish your character or not. Maybe you can watch it for Ray
Stevenson, but I think you willlament the fact that such a good casting
choice was done for such a poorlymade movie. That's why I'm gonna have
(01:37:01):
to be honest. I think thisrating is a The rating for this movie
is above a two. I gaveit a one and a half out of
five on Letterboxed, So I'd belying if I said anything other than that
this movie is that bad. Ifwe had a rating lower then it's that
bad. Would you would you giveit? Like if we had a rating
(01:37:24):
that said, like it's the worst, would you give it to this the
worst? As you know that's mean, I mean the fact, because like
I would have full, full disclosure. I would have given an it's the
worst to water World. So whatwould you? Would you have put this
movie in that category for you?Or would you just would you say that
that your your feelings on this movie, despite being rantworthy, don't give that
(01:37:47):
same response. I mean, theworst is pretty hyperbolic, like literally the
worst I've I mean, I don'tthink it's as bad as Batman and Robin
or Catwoman or the the true bottomof the barrel comic book movies. Right,
So there's a there's a line thatthis movie hasn't crossed for me.
(01:38:10):
I've ranted about it enough. There'sthere's I rant because it could have been
really cool and it floundered. That'sthat's the source of the ranching. It's
not the fact that I think thisis objectively the worst movie I've ever seen
or anything. And that's that's veryfair. That's very very fair, And
I guess I guess that would betime for me to give my final verdict
(01:38:31):
here and for for people who haven'tseen this movie, who are maybe comic
book fans or or I actually Iwould like to speak to comic book fans
who maybe want to give this moviea second chance, or maybe, uh
maybe haven't seen this and are opento giving it a first chance. Imagine
Chaos Comics collaborated with Marvel for anew Punisher Warzone comic book series. Then
(01:38:55):
imagine it coming to life right infront of your eyes. This movie's brutal,
it's violent as all hell. Thereis no shortage of blood and gore
and violence. There is no shortageof over the top accents, over the
top moments, over the top characters. We are given the perfect picture of
(01:39:17):
what the Punisher should be on screenwith Ray Stevenson. We are given a
cast of characters who, when theyare not making you laugh, are just
giving you some of the most ridiculousmoments you've ever seen in a comic book
movie. In my opinion, thisis a perfect mashup of some of the
things that make campy movies and funmovies and violent movies in the comic book
(01:39:43):
space great. But where it fallsshort is in some areas that really could
have made this movie much more wellexecuted or much more well received, like
in areas of dialogue or areas ofediting, which is a big one for
me. And so there are thingsabout this movie that I think most people
will not appreciate even if you appreciateother things about it. That being said,
(01:40:08):
all of the things that I saidthat we're good about this movie completely
outweigh the rest of the things thatI have issues with. Before this rewatch
that I just did the night beforewe recorded this episode, I would have
happily said that this movie is notthat bad. But after watching it again
for the fourth time, fourth timeis the charm. I'm going to take
(01:40:29):
a step up here and I'm gonnasay that Punisher war Zone is actually good.
There's a lot of fun to behad with this movie. Do I
think it's a great movie. Iwill never tell you that because it's not
true. I'm not gonna tell youthat you're gonna get the best comic book
movie out of this because it's nottrue. I'm not gonna tell you that
you're gonna have fun watching this asmuch as I did, because it's probably
not true. What I can tellyou definitively is that if you let yourself
(01:40:54):
and if it's something that does getyou to the point where you are with
it like I was with it it, you will agree that this movie is
actually good. And that's where I'llleave it. There's something nice I can
say about this movie. It isIt is definitely the third best Punisher movie.
It's in the top five. Thisis the last episode of our of
(01:41:18):
our of Our Punisher series. Itis the best Punisher movie for me.
It is the best Punisher movie forI really wasn't expecting this. If you
see, it's so funny because thereare times where I really do expect us
to come out on different ends,just you know, knowing our taste.
Yeah, on paper, I reallywould have thought that this is a movie
(01:41:39):
that we would have agreed on.I really thought that we would have agreed
up until this point. But we'reactually on polar opposites. I think Thomas
Jane is the best one. Idon't know if you consider that the worst
one. No, no, Idon't consider it the worst one. No.
Yeah, that would have been hard. That would no. No,
no no. And I want tosay too, like I said, I
(01:42:00):
said that that movie was not thatbad, and I don't mean that like
what I what I want our audienceto remember as one of the main talking
points is that not that bad isa good rating on the show, Like
not that bad means that this movie, like we we we have things we
appreciate about it enough to say thatit's not as bad as people say that
it is. It's basically a recommendation, right, It's a recommendation that you
(01:42:21):
check the movie out. Yes,not that bad as saying we recommend this,
we give it a thumbs up.It's two thumbs up for actually good
and actually great. Just transcends allof that, And that's why it's not
something that comes up a lot onthe show. It's not something that's supposed
to come up a lot on thisshow. Look, sometimes critics get it
right water World, but sometimes tous, they get it wrong. And
(01:42:43):
it's funny that you said that,because going into this, if I hadn't
seen your rating, I would havethought that you would have given this probably
a two and a half, justabout where it would come out to.
I know you had some things tosay about it in our last episode,
but when I was going through readingreviews for this one, getting the notes
ready, getting you know, theaudience complaints ready, and I saw your
(01:43:04):
one and a half rating. Isaw it by accident. I was just
you know, you see it onletterbox, you know what I mean.
You see the people you follow andthen I saw your picture there and I
saw One and a Half, andI went and told my wife and we
both had a very good chuckle aboutthe fact that I was raising my rating
for the movie after this viewing.I don't want to say it anymore.
I'm a little embarrassed with what yougave it. I don't want to say
(01:43:27):
what I'm giving it, but whatI will say is I was on the
opposite side of what you thought.I was like, there's no way that
he like hates this movie, Likethis is like this is like a rob
zombie movie in the comic book world. There's no way this guy doesn't like
this thing. And then you didn't. So we were both on the opposite
sides of this, thinking like wewere going into this on a similar page.
I thought you'd like it a littleless than I did, but it
(01:43:49):
would be not that bad. ButI knew as soon as I saw that
One and a half, I waslike, we're going to war. And
I think it was a very respectfulwar that we that we had on the
show. But we we definitely hadour disagreements. I think, yeah,
this means, honestly, the mostwe've ever disagreed on an episode. I
think it. Yeah, and it'sprobably gonna be interesting for our viewers to
(01:44:15):
see an actual disagreement. Yeah.Yeah, we don't do that a lot.
We disagree a lot on the show, don't get me wrong, but
it's mostly like very metered, likeit's it's not like we very rarely are
like, oh, this is likeawful and one of us is like,
no, it's amazing. The closestthing we have to this is I remember
that I really did like the Wolfmanremake and you give it a not that
(01:44:38):
bad. I think that was themost opposite end that we have been on
the podcast until now. But thenagain, this is probably the most polarizing
Punisher movie. Yeah, I thinkone of the most polarizing comic book movies.
I would say so, Yeah,definitely. Even though I think it
(01:44:59):
was just kind of universally derided whenit came out, there is that growing
cult fan base. And let metell you something, the people who like
it like especially hearing your arguments,they like it for reasons that I can
agree with. Like I again,the way people talk about this movie makes
me want to go back and rewatchit because it sounds fun. It sounds
(01:45:21):
like a movie that I would enjoy. Yeah, it's not a case where
I just kind of scoff and say, why would you like a movie like
this? It's definitely not the thing. Like, I hope nobody thinks that
I'm a snob or I think I'mtoo good for this movie. I mean,
as much as I came down hardon some things about it, I
(01:45:43):
appreciate the core mission of it.I want my wacky, zany movies,
but I think I want it tobe done with skill and technique. Well,
no, I think truthfully, whereit comes down to is just how
we see the execution of the material. And that's that's gonna be. That's
gonna be the difference of whether youlike this movie or whether you don't.
(01:46:05):
I can see this movie being polarizingin the fact that even though there are
more people who dislike it than likeit, I think the people that like
it really appreciate it and really appreciatethose things that they do like like I
do. I think this is amovie that I really do appreciate. I
think it's awesome. I think it'sit's not great. I mean, I
wouldn't go to anybody and tell youthis is a fantastic movie. But I
(01:46:26):
would I would tell you that ifyou like violence and over the top ship,
watch this. But I'm going togive everybody a disclaimer that this movie
is not going to be for everybody. You're either going to see the execution
the way that I do, seeingit as this campy, over the top
cartoon that was executed exactly the waythat they were trying to do it,
or you're going to see it theway that that Gabe does and and the
(01:46:48):
way that Gabe sees it is itwasn't executed well, none of it was
executed well, well not none ofit, but most of it was not
executed. Well, it doesn't work. The word I would use to describe
this movie is impotent, Like Isee it trying and failing to do a
lot of things, and right,yeah, and tried fit and succeeded to
do a lot of things for you. So yeah, I mean this was
(01:47:13):
You told me that this was goingto be a fun episode, and it
was, but not for the reasonsthat I was expecting. No, it's
funny, Like I'm glad I hadthe inclination for anybody who who I'll give
you one more peek behind the curtainhere this was not the plan for this
episode. We were going to gointo this. We never go into anything
wanting to do the same thing overand over again. But we have a
(01:47:33):
formula for a reason. It worksand we have fun with it. And
to say that this episode, tosay that both Gabe and I were on
the same page about this episode beinga not that bad war zone before we
started recording would be a complete lie. We did not have that in mind
before we started recording collectively. So, yeah, this was interesting. Man.
(01:47:56):
I think this is the most oneof the more interesting episodes we've done.
Interesting case study. I'd be I'dbe really excited if something like this
came up again, because I thinkwe just proved it to I mean,
besides, besides you calling me afourteen year old whoa No, I'm kidding,
I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'mjoking. I'm joking. I'm completely
joking. I think we've proven though, that when we have a disagreement,
(01:48:17):
we have very civil discourse with thatdisagreement, and both of us present our
sides of that argument in a waythat either side of the audience, whether
you agree with what you're saying orwhat you agree with what I'm saying,
you can see the other side's pointof view in the way that we say
things, and so we're masters ofa cred No, we're not. Hey
(01:48:38):
man, I'm the guy who gaveI'm the guy who gave five stars to
Leprechaun. Tu. I'm not inthe position to judge anybody that's hey,
now, what this is about?Now? What this is about? Hey
man, I applaud the restraint thatyou had and not throwing that back in
me at any point during Oh dude, I would never. And that's the
thing, right, Like, Ijust want people to appreciate eight movies,
(01:49:00):
even if I don't. If somebodycame on this show, and I'm telling
you this right now as a preview, if somebody comes on the show and
they're like, Hey, I'm gonnabe a guest on your show, I
would really like to talk about thismovie that doesn't get a lot of love.
It's a great horror movie. Ilove it so much. It's called
Mama, and I just really wantto talk about it. I would say,
you know what, come on over, and I would do my absolute
best to try not to insult theirintelligence, to try not to make sure
(01:49:24):
that they're awful, and I thinkthat's something that we do on the show
with as much decorum as possible whentalking about movies that are as divisive as
this one or as contested as someof the ones that we've covered in the
past. And I'm glad that wewere able to keep that consistent, even
in an episode that we are mislabelingas a war zone. By the way,
the graphics will say, such asthose who are seeing out and you
(01:49:45):
know what, to extend goodwill topeople who again probably think I sounded snobby
during this discussion. I would ratherwatch the Punisher war Zone than Bose Afraid.
Well, folks, the Man,the myth, the legend has said
it before. If you don't wantcontroversy, don't come to the King.
(01:50:09):
Thank you, Thank you everybody forwatching this very unique episode of Not That
Bad. I hope we get theopportunity to do this again someday, but
if we don't, this is agreat This is a great one off,
and I think it was. Itwas a fun conversation. Thanks for having
that conversation with me, man,but uh, and thank you everybody for
watching on our Patreon. You knowthat means a lot to us. That
(01:50:32):
you're here. If you're watching thisafter we release it to the general public,
head on over to Patreon dot com, slash not that Bad. Uh,
you can subscribe it any tier.You can give us the least amount
of money as you possibly want togive us, and you still get our
monthly specials. We wanted to makesure everybody was in on that, you
know, if we were going totry to do this as a monetized,
a monetized effort, we wanted tomake sure that people were actually getting shit
(01:50:54):
out of it. So, uh, subscribe to any tier, give us
your the lowest amount of money youcan. You can if you want to
give us anything. If not,just have fun with our episodes if you
can, head on over to ourwebsite, Not that badpod dot com.
And that's all I really have tosay from our side, anything you want
to throw in before you take usout, just that we really appreciate the
(01:51:15):
continued support, whether you're listening tothis on our Patreon or later on when
we make this public. Any supportany way that you guys can can show
us that you enjoy this content andall of that. It just means the
world to us, because absolutely thisis a huge escape for me and Connor.
(01:51:39):
You know, whenever I have badnews, I always look forward to
recording an episode because it really liftsmy spirits and I hope it can provide
something similar to anybody, which youknow, if then includes me shitting on
Punisher war Zone or Connor defending it, then hey, man, like that's
where we're here for. So withthat being said, I can't wait to
(01:52:01):
you know, bring you guys moreof this stuff, whether it be on
the public channel or on our Patreon. And with that being said, I
think it's time to call it today. I think that right. Okay,
well, I'm Gabe, I'm Connor, and this is not that bad
(01:52:21):
saying. If he killed one ofyour men, then all you Krispy Kerr
mothers would be knocking every door downin the city. You see you later, see everyth