March 14, 2025 • 31 mins
In this episode, we dive deep into the evolution of comedian Bill Burr's political views, exploring his violent lurch to the Left. We'll break down his recent rants, including an unhinged attack on DOGE kingpin Elon Musk and analyze how Burr's shift has impacted his comedy and public persona. But that's not all!
In a special interview, we sit down with legendary comic book scribe Chuck Dixon. Known for his iconic work on Batman, Catwoman, Nightwing and more, Dixon discusses the inspiration behind his Levon Cade novels, which have now been adapted into the highly anticipated action thriller A Working Man starring Jason Statham.
The film, set to hit theaters on March 28, has been co-written by a true Hollywood legend, and Chuck gives us an inside look into that starry partnership. Tune in for an exciting blend of comedy, politics, and Hollywood insider info in this must-listen episode!
Chuck Dixon: http://www.chuckdixon.net
https://rippaverse.com/chuck-dixon-joins-the-rippaverse/
Subscribe to HiT's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@HollywoodinToto
Read Hollywood in Toto - https://www.hollywoodintoto.com
Lend a hand: Leave a tip! https://hollywood-in-toto.ck.page/products/hollywood-in-toto-tip-jar
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HollywoodInToto
Read: "Virtue Bombs: How Hollywood Got Woke and Lost Its Soul" https://www.amazon.com/Virtue-Bombs-Hollywood-Woke-Lost/dp/1637580991
In a special interview, we sit down with legendary comic book scribe Chuck Dixon. Known for his iconic work on Batman, Catwoman, Nightwing and more, Dixon discusses the inspiration behind his Levon Cade novels, which have now been adapted into the highly anticipated action thriller A Working Man starring Jason Statham.
The film, set to hit theaters on March 28, has been co-written by a true Hollywood legend, and Chuck gives us an inside look into that starry partnership. Tune in for an exciting blend of comedy, politics, and Hollywood insider info in this must-listen episode!
Chuck Dixon: http://www.chuckdixon.net
https://rippaverse.com/chuck-dixon-joins-the-rippaverse/
Subscribe to HiT's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@HollywoodinToto
Read Hollywood in Toto - https://www.hollywoodintoto.com
Lend a hand: Leave a tip! https://hollywood-in-toto.ck.page/products/hollywood-in-toto-tip-jar
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HollywoodInToto
Read: "Virtue Bombs: How Hollywood Got Woke and Lost Its Soul" https://www.amazon.com/Virtue-Bombs-Hollywood-Woke-Lost/dp/1637580991
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This week on the Hollywood and Toto Podcast, What happened
to Bill Burr? No, really, what happened? Things are not
going well in Berlin, let me tell you. And we
talked to comic book legend Chuck Dixon. He's written some
of the biggest titles for DC Comics. But he's also
the mind behind a new movie called A Working Man
with Jason Statham. Oh and the film's co writer, well
(00:23):
you may have heard of him as well, Sylvester Stallone.
We'll get into that in a minute.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome to the Hollywood and Toto Podcast. Entertainment news and
reviews without the woke Hollywood narrative. Free speech, free expression.
Now that's entertainment, and here's your host. Oh Lord. Winning
film critic CORISTI Toto.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Comedian Bill Burr hit back against the woke mind virus
earlier than some of the peers, and he did it brilliantly.
It's one of many reasons why the conservative nation loves
him now. He's not a conservative at heart. He's not
a liberal either. Bill Burr is more a political than
anything else. He just is a keen observer of the
human condition. And he's very funny. When I was a
(01:17):
little Boy and told people I was going to be
a comedian.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Everyone laughed at me funny.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
But that particular Paper Tigo special that was on Netflix
really did crystallize how he's able to see through some
of the woke inconsistencies and hypocrisies and put him on
the map in a way. He's always been big, He's
even bigger than ever now.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Now.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Conservatives aren't into loyalty tests when it comes to comedians.
They loved Joe Rogan, and Joe was kind of left
of center on a lot of pretty big issues.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Love.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
They appreciate Bill Maher even though he is aggressively liberal
in most ways. So I don't think that the conservative
detachment from Bill Burr is about a particular issuer too.
It's just like, what's going on with this comedy mindset?
It is getting warped.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
You lost your mind.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
So how did Bill Burr seemingly lose his way? Well,
it started with the movie Old Dads that was a
Netflix original comedy he co wrote directed start in and
it was about a bunch of older dads spoiler alert,
and how they were conflicting with modern times. The way
they saw the world was different than today's younger generation.
So it was a culture clash and it poked fun
(02:28):
at some of the more woke sensibilities are in are
in parenting and elsewhere. What you're feeling now is what
you're feeling right, let it out.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
I don't think I don't need you to think right now. Connor,
you need to respect your son's autonomy.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
And it was pretty clever, and at least on paper,
I felt the film was rather lacking. It certainly wasn't
his best effort, but by the end of the film
he was essentially saying, Yeah, the woke mind'st the the
way that young people look at the world today. That's
they've got the right approach. And I was like, wow,
that's rather surprising. But more recently Bill Burr has talked
about Luigi Mangioni. Now he's the man accused of, of course,
(03:12):
killing that healthcare CEO in cold blood, and Bill Burr
has this odd predilection to keep saying free Luigi. And
I don't know how serious or kidding he quite is,
because he followed up with this rant, this absolute screed
against billionaires because they're ruining the world. Now, billionaires have
been around for quite some time in America and he
didn't seem to be concerned about them until recently. Huh,
(03:36):
that's not not suspicious at all, is it. So he's
ranting and raving about billionaires, the bane of society, they're
stealing from us, the little guy and oh yeah, free
Luigi not good. Bill not good. And you know, he
could take these unconventional positions and he could be running
against the conservative tide or just sort of the common
(03:57):
sense tide. But if he's funny, you know, well with it.
But he hasn't been funny lately either, and that's something noteworthy.
But again, it didn't end there. Now he's turned his
ire against Elon Musk specifically, and he keeps saying again
and again that Elon Musk is a Nazi hitler. Now,
(04:18):
if you believe Elon a Musk is a Nazi, you
just need to have your head examined. It's just not
logical thinking. It is partisanship to the nth degree. It
is not based on the facts on the ground. And
the fact that an awkward man who is on the
spectrum did this herky jerky motion at an event when
he was trying to declare his love for the people
in the crowd and you turn that into Adolf Hitler
(04:38):
two point zero. I got a problem with that. It's
just it just doesn't make sense. And again, Bill Barr,
who was supposedly this really smart, thoughtful comedian running with
that makes even less sense.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
He've gone crazy and.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
He's been doubling and tripling down on the Elon Musk
hate of late doing, you know, personal attacks about the
way he looks and his hair and this and that.
It's just beneath Bil Burr. It really is, or is it?
Maybe this is the real Bill Burr after all, But
I suspect something else in play. What's interesting is that
this new Bill Burr is simply getting some praise in
(05:15):
the press.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
I don't think the media has been against Bilburg per se.
They didn't like his woke attacks, for sure, But all
of a sudden GQ was calling him a voice of
the people. You think that's an accident. And also, is
this transformation based on living in la guy who's a Boston,
Boston bred and born. Maybe this whole new environment is
changing him in a way, or maybe he's looking at
(05:38):
Hollywood and thinking, you know what if I start leaning
aggressively to the left, I might get more gigs. You know,
no matter how famous you are, no matter how rich
you are in Hollywood, no matter how often you work,
you always aren't sure if the next gig will come
your way. I remember you usually go talking to William H.
Macy's one of these actors who's just constantly in demand,
constantly on screens large and small, and he sounded terrified
(06:02):
that the next role may never come.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
I'm unemployed.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
So I just think it's that insecurity of actors and
comedians just not knowing where the next paycheck is coming from.
And I get that it is a brutal business. So
maybe he's trying to put his thumb on the scale.
Maybe he's trying to say, you know, listen, if I
lean aggressively to the left, I might get a whole
bunch of new gigs. And who knows, he could be
the next late night show host. The format appears to
(06:25):
be dying, but maybe someone will throw him enough cash
give him a platform to say, well, the same things
that John Oliver says on a week two week basis.
So we'll have to wait and see where this new
bill bird goes. Will he continue to call out Elon
Musk the new Devil, the new Hitler. Is he Hitler
two point zer or three point zero? I think I'm
losing track. There's so many Hitler's running around, so many
(06:45):
Nazis right, But I think one thing is clear. If
he continues on this trajectory, someday, fingers crossed, he could
be as deeply unfunny as Jimmy Kimmel. Writer Chuck Dixon
(07:11):
is a comic book legend, The Punisher, Batman, Bain, night Wing, Robin.
I recently went to his DF comics page to look
at all the titles that he's worked on. It went
on and on and on. The guy is a literal legend, amazing,
and he's also an author. He's done a lot of
different work. He's working with the Ripper Verse right now,
which is part of Eric Terlized comic landscape, and one
(07:35):
of his stories is coming to the big screen and
it's about time. The new movie is a working Man,
and it stars Jason Statham as Levon Caid. He was
a former Black Ops soldier of now he's just trying
to live a normal life as a construction worker. Just
something very basic, very humdrum, just away from all the
chaos and danger of his old life, and then his
boss's daughter gets kidnapped, and of course Levon has to
(07:58):
use his particular skill set to help Savor and he
uncover something rather unsavory about the sex trafficking industry. Now,
the story is based on Levon Caid, Chuck Dixon's signature creation.
There are twelve novels in all so far in that series,
and this is based on the first one, Levon's Trade.
But that's not where the story ends. It turns out
(08:21):
that a major Hollywood figure was pretty darn interested in
Levon Caid for quite some time. His name Sylvester Stallone. Yes,
he's been trying to get Levon Caid to some kind
of screen for a while now, had some hiccups along
the way, including the pandemic, But now we finally get
to see Levon Caid on the big screen in the
form of Jason Stathum, and Sylvester Stallone is the co
(08:42):
writer of the movie, so we'll share more about how
that actually all came to be why Chuck Dixon decided
not to visit the set. Chuck also has some tough
love for the MCU. If you haven't noticed, it's been
struggling of late the glory days of that particular franchise
or seemingly long behind us. Can they recapture the old glory? Well,
Chuck has an idea how to do just that. Will they?
(09:04):
I don't know. So I hope you enjoyed my conversation
with the great Chuck Dixon talking Stallone, talking a Workingman,
Jason Statham, and of course comics in general. Who knows
it better than Chuck. I can't think of anyone but Jack.
Thanks for joining the show. Now, before we get into
a working man, I want to get into Sylvester Stallone.
It sounds like he's been connected to this character for
(09:26):
quite some time now. This is not a new thing.
Obviously there have been complications, the COVID pandemic and all.
But let's start at that beginning, because I mean, he's
such an icon. Who doesn't love Sylvester Stallone. I'm sure
you know just being associated with him as a thrill.
But how did this connection first happen? And maybe just
take it from there?
Speaker 4 (09:44):
Well, I did a Expendables comic. It was a prequel
to the first movie, and I was working off the screenplay.
Obviously the movie wasn't out yet, and you know, I
did it. The movie came out, months went by and
I got a phone call this him and says, will
you hold for a call from Sylvester Stallone. I'm like okay,
(10:05):
and he gets on and he talks about how much
he liked the comic, how I understood the characters, I
really got his sense of dialogue, as he had written
the screenplay, and would I be interested in helping him
do rewrite.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Some and expendables too. Well.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
The answer was an immediate yes. But we hit it
off right away. I mean we just were on the
same page from the very beginning about everything. And that
deal didn't work out, But unlike most Hollywood stories, he
didn't forget me once the deal fell apart. He stayed
in contact. He got me other work doing video game
(10:42):
dialogue and web content for lions Gate, and he just
stayed in touch. And I had sent him a bunch
of my books, and he really liked levon Cade and
he really liked my Bad Time series, and he immediately
started talking about, you know, prepping Levan for either a
feature film or a TV series, And you know, we
(11:02):
stayed in.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Contact through all of that.
Speaker 4 (11:04):
And of course, as you mentioned, the pandemic and all
the other usual complications that come along when you're trying
to bring anything into production, and you know, here we are,
like ten years later of the movie's coming out. So
but relationship, he's an unusual Hollywood personality in it.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
You know, he's really I don't know. I just felt
so confident.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
Yeah, I'm talking to a Hollywood legend, and yet within
five minutes it's like talking to an old friend.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
From a creative perspective, I think, you know, because he's
an action hero, because we have these all these iconic figures,
he's also a painter. He's a very smart fellow. I've
interviewed him twice in the past. What did you find
about him from as a as a fellow artist? What
what was interesting about him from that perspective, push away
the movie star glamour and the fact that he's seems
(11:51):
like a regular guy. What was it about him as
a creator that you found intriguing.
Speaker 4 (11:55):
Well, I mean we approach storytelling the same way. I
mean he I think he thin it's the same way.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
I do. You think of the big scenes and how
are you going to get to them? Always thinking visually.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
I mean that's my training from comics and and oh
and never putting anything in the story that slows the
story down. Yeah, and really, you know, you know, we
share that DNA, so it made it very easy to
work with him. When we went into the production meeting
on expendables too, we were finishing each other's sentences, so, uh,
(12:26):
that was kind of cool. But yeah, I mean I
just like talking to him about the story. I mean,
he talked to me about other things he was working
on and asked my opinion the different things, and I
just really dug the experience.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Wow, that's amazing. Now, you know, even more amazing, not
just that his significant involvement in A Working Man, but
you got David A. R. You've got Jason Statham as
the star. I mean, it's almost a pinch yourself kind
of moment.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
Talk about when this film first came to Fruition, were
there did you have any hesitations? Was there worried that
they made dramatically changed that the core of the story
because the Celtic stallone was very faithful.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
Yeah, I mean I wasn't worried because, you know, Slide
during COVID Slide wrote some episodes for the TV show,
you know, basically wrote three episodes it's like a pilot
kind of thing, and it was so faithful to the book.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
I was amazed.
Speaker 4 (13:20):
And then you know, then when he approached me with
you know, I was talking to Jason Statham. He's looking
for a new franchise. Would you be okay if we
pitched levon Ky to him? And I said, yeah, absolutely.
You know, obviously it's going to cause some changes in
the character, but overall, I mean, the book is the book,
the movie is the movie. They're different mediums, so they
(13:40):
have to make changes. I mean, Slide told me we're
gonna have to open up the ending because my book
did not have a movie ending. And he says, we're
gonna have to open I said, it's all understood. And
people say, well, you know they're going to take away
from the book. Now you can still read the book
and you can still see the movie. Then they're just
two different things. I mean, I think of La Confidential,
Love the Love the movie. They're very different. But yeah,
(14:03):
you know, it's still good stuff. So yeah, I'm happy
with it. And I was happy, you know, with the cast,
especially the casting of Mary, the young actress that got
to play or just blew me away.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So Michael Payne to too. I always one of our
most underrated actors. He's always good in area.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
I love Michael Pennon. I love Michael penny.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
I'll be looking at a movie, you know, I don't
know if, oh, he's in it.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Okay, I'll see you know, obviously stay them just did
The bee Keeper. I think there's a sequel on the way.
It does feel like a uniquely suitable time for vigilante films,
just given what's going on in the country right now.
You know, you always hate when a project like this
takes a while to get going. You wanted to you
wanted to happen yesterday. But is there sort of a
(14:46):
is there a fortuitous nature the fact that's coming out
in twenty twenty five?
Speaker 4 (14:50):
Yeah, I mean, we see a lot of frustration with
you know, the rule of law vanishing in our country,
and you know, people feel like there's you know, there's
crimes being committed, but nobody did them. You know, It's like,
you know, mistakes were made, but nobody made them. It's like,
you know, I think I share the feeling with a
(15:10):
lot of other Americans that we need to see some
people go to jail, you know, over you know, no
matter what your political stripe is, you got to know
there's some injustice going on. There's people getting away with stuff,
and the vigilante justice thing kind of feeds into that.
It's a cathartic kind of entertainment where you're like, yeah, yeah,
we we we stuck it to them, We got the
(15:31):
bad guys.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Can you talk a little bit about the movie as
far as I'm not giving anyway story spoilers, but how
it changed from the books, but but was interesting or
different or maybe proved more cinematic than a book can be.
I'm kind of curious about some of the tweaks that
were made along the way.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Well, I mean, I was pleased that a lot of
my action set pieces made it onto the screen pretty
much the way I wrote them. That was cool because
that's like the first thing to go, you know, action
set pieces like now we have a better idea, but
they stuck with a lot of my ideas, and uh,
you know, a lot of my dialogue shows.
Speaker 3 (16:06):
Up in it.
Speaker 4 (16:07):
Yeah, there's a significant plot change which I won't get
into from from the book, but you know, with those,
you know, these are done because movie audience is different
than a book audience.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
I mean my book.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
You know the levon K books are aren't. You know,
they're not feel good stories, so they have to bring
a little bit of a feel good element to the movie.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
To please, you know, movie going public.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Gotcha, Now, this is your baby, but it is a
Hollywood production. There are huge names here. Are you invited
on the set? Would you are you able to participate
or do you kind of just hand it off and
know that's in good hands.
Speaker 4 (16:44):
I probably could have gone on the set if I asked.
But if you ever see those like Blu Ray extras
where the writer business is set, it's always really comfortable.
They always look like nobody wants them there. And I've
got two Academy Award winning screenwriters working on this movie.
So I was like, yeah, not real worry that it
was going to go around and uh plus movie making
(17:05):
is boring if you're watching it, So I was like,
not no interest in doing that at all. It's like there,
you know, I signed the papers, it's theirs. You know,
it's like watching your kids go off with a new
step dad. I just gotta trust everything's going to be okay.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yeah, obviously you mentioned State that was potentially looking for
another franchise. Are there twelve books in the series right now?
Speaker 3 (17:27):
About twelve books?
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Yeah, okay, you have to think about it. The box
office registers start ringing if it's too old school a term,
but that there's more on the way. Is there is
there thinking along those lines? Is it too early to
even go there? What's the the what's the sort of
the atmosphere here behind it?
Speaker 4 (17:45):
Well? I signed a three picture deal, so okay, it's
you know, this is everybody's fingers crossed.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
This is gonna be a franchise.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
We're looking for the opening weekend and the international box office.
But things look good, they were telling me the other day.
Things look good for this movie. So we you know,
we're going to start thinking about sequels pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
You've been a writer for quite some time. You've done
just about everything in your field. This I think is
your first full fledged brush with Hollywood. What have you
learned from the experience. I mean, I'm sure you know
you're a wise guy. I understand movies are different. You know,
maybe they don't want you on this set just because
they're doing their thing. It's complicated. But what did you
(18:24):
learn about the process that maybe was intriguing to you well.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Early on in my comic writing career, I had a
brush with Hollywood.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
And it was pretty serious. It looked like something was
going to get made.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
I mean this is back in the nineties. And what
I learned from that was.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
To turn your heart to stone.
Speaker 4 (18:39):
It was like, don't get emotionally involved, don't start spending money,
don't start thinking you know things are going to happen,
because ninety nine percent of the time.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
They double that.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Yeah, and I've been.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Close and I dealt with some you know, pretty h
powered Hollywood people on different properties at different times. But
you know, you go in knowing this might not work out.
You know, it's not time to get Yeah, I understood that.
A lot of times they get upset if you're not
excited all through the process. But slow understood you you
don't get excited until that first check comes.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I have a friend who's a screenwriter and he's got
some projects that seem like they're this close to happening.
I said, well, aren't you excited. He said, oh, no,
not yet. I've learned way too much about this business.
Speaker 4 (19:22):
So you can't afford You'll you'll emotionally spend yourself. You're
just setting yourself up for disappointment.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah, there are very few people who get the mark
the comic scene quite like you. I mean obviously your
your experience with The Punisher, Dark Knight, all these different characters.
And we're in this weird phase, at least from a
cine panic in met point of view, where the films
are struggling. The magic seems to be gone, the box
office is lowering, there's lots of question mark even around
the Superman film coming out later this year. From your perspective,
(19:51):
it may sound like an obvious question, but what what's
going wrong here? And let's just push aside woke. Maybe
maybe we shouldn't push it aside. But what do you
see from a storytelling point of view that that's been missing?
Speaker 3 (20:02):
Well, I mean.
Speaker 4 (20:03):
Number one, Well, number one is every cycle ends, I mean,
can't go on forever. Audiences outgrow things, you know, they
move on to something else. But overall the quality has suffered,
and largely that's because at the beginning, I mean, the
big boom was the MCU. I mean, yeah, the Batman
movies did well, but Batman movies are always going to
(20:24):
do well. They're going to survive if the cycle dies
they're still They're gonna make Batman movies the rest of
our lives. The sixties spy craze ended in the sixties,
but James Bond's still around, so some things are going
to survive. But you know, when they stopped using the
original source material, and that's really was what made the
MCU boom, was they were loyal to the source material
(20:46):
in those first like eight movies. When they abandoned it,
you can immediately see the box office fall off. The
energy's gone, they're not they lost that Marvel mojo and
now they're running on their own ideas, which obviously weren't
as good as Jack Kirby and stan Lee and Steve
Ditko's ideas.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yeah, you know, that seems like such a simple thing,
go with your gut, go with the source if it
ain't broke, But obviously Hollywood is more complex than that.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Everybody's always.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Now you've been kind of branching off in recent years,
working more independently, and I know you've been in more
recently been working with the River Verse. Talk about that experience,
because you know, I spoke to Eric July a few
months ago for the show, and you know, he's such
an interesting character and be able to kind of create
this whole alternate franchise away from the mainstream and be successful.
(21:40):
It almost seems impossible, but obviously he's doing it. Well,
what's that been like for you as a creator?
Speaker 4 (21:45):
Well, unlike most guys who start up a Commahoo company,
Eric's really smart and he understood what he was up
against and he understood all the because when I first
contacted him, I liked I liked what he did, I
liked what he was saying. And I contacted him and said, look,
I've been in this after a long time. If you
ever need any advice on what not to do contract
But he's never done any things, any of those things.
(22:07):
He's just a smart guy. And you know, he reached
out to me to do the creative stuff, and I'm like, yeah,
this seems like a fun universe to play with. And
he's given me free reign. You know, I got a
lot of you know, being that it's his sandbox. I mean,
he's he's giving me free rein to do whatever I want.
So and it's a great team the Saskas and Mike
Baron and top flight artists, and I love I'll work
(22:30):
with Joe Bennett the rest of my life. I mean,
that's my job at Ripper Versus to keep Joe Bennett busy,
so which is hard because guys.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
Are damn fast. But it's been a tremendous experience.
Speaker 4 (22:42):
You know, Eric's got a great company, He's got a
great crowd of people working for him. So it's been
a lot of fun and and and I think that
that enthusiasm has the readers are picking up on. It's
it's like it's like early Marvel, where you know, there's
this excitement about being a Marvel reader.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
You mentioned some of the mistakes that that could be made.
It's I think Eric has avoided most of not all
of them. What are some of them? And I mentioned
that in part because I want to kind of shine
a light to other creators who maybe are just starting out,
maybe the Tomorrow's Eric July in a sense, what are
some things that the people should not do?
Speaker 3 (23:16):
And too fast?
Speaker 4 (23:18):
Put it that too many titles too quickly. I mean
Eric's staged these titles so that you know, each one
supports the other, because if you put out too many titles,
you get into a trap of having to put out
even more to pay for the ones that didn't work before,
so he's been very carefully building this company. The other
thing is, you know, don't get in a pissing contest
(23:38):
with DC and Marvel because that's going to cost you. Yeah,
it's you know, it's going to cost you money to
try to keep up with their promotion machine and everything else.
Just do your own thing, cut your own path, find
your own readers. And Eric has done that. He has
a reader base that's not like the rest of comic
they've shown. He's done market research that's nobody's done in
(24:00):
comics ever. And he knows who his readers are. He
has demographics, and he knows what they want and he
wants to give them what they want. So that's really
encouraging for the future. But yeah, you're growing too fast
and spending money like water because you know you can
you can create your own Ponzi scheme where.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
You're the victim by doing a comic company.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
There's a famous saying that if you want to make
a million dollars in comics, you start with two million.
So but but you know, like I say, Eric's avoided
all those pitfalls and the company is really growing in
a substantial way.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
This is in a way. Maybe an oddly personal question
from a creative perspective, but you've been at this so
long it sounds like your creative fires are still burning
as bright as ever. What drives you these days? Do
you still find the love of the story. Do you
find like you haven't told certain tales. I'm just gonna
curious what fires up your engines, because you could just
(24:58):
rest on your laurels. They are significant.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Well.
Speaker 4 (25:02):
I think every writer when they start out on a career,
they wonder, am I going to be able to keep
doing this or I might kind of go back and
get a real job, or am I.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Going to burn out? And a long ago I realized
I'm not.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
I don't have promotion. I mean, I want to write.
I know a lot of writers who prefer having written
to writing, you know, but I like writing. I actually
like the writing. I like sitting here in this room
just making stuff up. And I, like you said or intimated,
I have more stories to tell. I have a lot
of stories I want to tell.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I want to get to Yeah. Now that's you reminds me.
You mentioned Mike Baron before. I've known him for a
while now. He lives in Colorado, like I do, and
he just seems like he must wake up just itching
to write, to get to the computer and to write
and write, because that's he's so prolific and so animated
and so lively.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
You know.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I want to circle back a little bit to Working Man.
One of the things I thought about as this whole
project was was evolving, is oh gosh, the fact that
you're right of saying or could that be an issue?
It sounds like it wasn't an issue during this whole
process that did that ever gum up the works at all?
Or has that been? Has that been okay? As far
as the flow of the Workingman movie?
Speaker 4 (26:11):
Well, seeing how you know Sly is like a frequent
visitor to mor A Lago, it wasn't. Now, it was
never a question with I don't think it was ever
a question with slo He's always been a conservative.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Yeah, so yeah, I mean.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
That stuff doesn't really matter in Hollywood. I mean, at
its heart, Hollywood is about earnings, and like so many corporations,
they caved into the woke and the dei because they
thought they had to do this to survive.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:40):
Really they did because they were being threatened, you know,
either cancelation or you know this problems, you know, from
this tiny, noisy minority of people who seem to be running.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
Things for the last ten years. But you know that's
over now.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
But but at the heart of it, it has to
get back to earnings because you see the companies. Yeah,
they'll put out a little bit of woke product, but
then they'll put out a little bit of red meat
to turn money. I mean, I look at Amazon with
you know, the Reacher series and Terminal Lists and you know,
you know, and things like Levon Kaid and other things
(27:16):
that you know, they're getting back to making sense to
doing you know, mid budget action films and a lot
of horror and things like that, trying to earn more money.
Instead of you know, pleasing whoever it is out there,
they're trying to please this imagine.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Yeah, I mean, I think you're hinted at. My next
question is that what's your snapshot of pop culture today?
You mentioned canceled culture and woke seems to be kind
of receiving DEI as well. Uh, there are more platforms
willing to take rescum. In Netflix, they can't stop hiring
these rebel comedians like Shane Gillis and Tim Dillon that
wasn't happening five years ago. Do you are you excited
(27:53):
where we are from a creator's perspective, Like the shackles
have been freed social media, let you do and promote
you want. I mean, you must be like a kid again.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
Well yeah, I mean at the heart of it, it's
freedom of speech. I mean, you know, because I mean
we've all said this all They could never make this
movie today, they could never make this TV show today.
I was like, well, I think that's over with and
we can get back to, you know, letting people choose
what they want to see, you know, and freedom of
speech is you know, it's at the heart of who
we are as Americans, and we've got to preserve it.
(28:26):
And we can't let anybody get in here and censor
or modify or make a second guess, I mean, the
nightmare of making people second guess what they say, second
guess what they I've never done that, but but people
do it, you know, and you know, and I've had
pushed back.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
From editors over time. You know, you can't do that,
you can't do this.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
It's like, okay, you, but you can't stop me thinking
what I think. You know, even if you won't let
me say what I think.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, I think one of the most pernicious trends we've
seen where you you can't make a bad character say
bad thing sometimes if it's the wrong bad thing, which
I always think is funny because they make about a
thousand hit Men movie where the hit men's are the
hitmen are the heroes. I'm thinking seemed like a little
more troubling than the fact that someone said the wrong joke.
(29:15):
I ran for another day before I let you go.
Other projects. You're working on, things you've got in the hopper,
things we can look forward to for twenty twenty five
and beyond from you.
Speaker 4 (29:24):
Yeah, I mean, I just completed a Joe Frankenstein new
episode of Joe Frankenstein with Graham Mullen and Anthony Gonzalez Clark.
I have today a new book from Ripper coming out
called Zaleen. It's our cosmic epic by men and Joe
Bennett and other stuff I.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
Can't talk about yet.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
But coming soon.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
I s soon, always coming soon.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yeah. Well, congratulations on levon Cade coming to the big screen.
Of course. The movie is a working Man with Jason
Statham v Jason Stathum. You couldn't get a better action
here to play the role. It's coming out March twenty
eighth in theaters nationwide. Check it out, and of course
out read all the work that you're doing across the landscape,
whether it's pop culture, books, you name it, you've done it,
you've written it, and we appreciate your time and all
(30:09):
your great work.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
Well see the movie with someone you love. Thanks.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Your character actor of the week is Dale Dicky. Well,
let's say for the show this week, we missed last week.
I was on vacation. I just couldn't get it going.
I was going to get a quick episode up and running.
I thought I don't want to rush. I'd rather just
kind of do our regular schedule. So again, thank you
to Radio America having me as part of their great
podcast lineup. And if you want to find out more
about me, or if you're just tuning in after hearing
(30:37):
me on the Megan Kelly Show, please check out Hollywood
Intoto dot com. It is my website. It is now
over ten years old. We had a ten year anniversary
last year, and of course it is like this show,
the right take on entertainment, and it is updated seventies
a week because there is no rest for the weary
or the wicket. Now go out there and have the
best week possible. Doctor's orders
This week on the Hollywood and Toto Podcast, What happened
to Bill Burr? No, really, what happened? Things are not
going well in Berlin, let me tell you. And we
talked to comic book legend Chuck Dixon. He's written some
of the biggest titles for DC Comics. But he's also
the mind behind a new movie called A Working Man
with Jason Statham. Oh and the film's co writer, well
(00:23):
you may have heard of him as well, Sylvester Stallone.
We'll get into that in a minute.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Welcome to the Hollywood and Toto Podcast. Entertainment news and
reviews without the woke Hollywood narrative. Free speech, free expression.
Now that's entertainment, and here's your host. Oh Lord. Winning
film critic CORISTI Toto.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Comedian Bill Burr hit back against the woke mind virus
earlier than some of the peers, and he did it brilliantly.
It's one of many reasons why the conservative nation loves
him now. He's not a conservative at heart. He's not
a liberal either. Bill Burr is more a political than
anything else. He just is a keen observer of the
human condition. And he's very funny. When I was a
(01:17):
little Boy and told people I was going to be
a comedian.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Everyone laughed at me funny.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
But that particular Paper Tigo special that was on Netflix
really did crystallize how he's able to see through some
of the woke inconsistencies and hypocrisies and put him on
the map in a way. He's always been big, He's
even bigger than ever now.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Now.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Conservatives aren't into loyalty tests when it comes to comedians.
They loved Joe Rogan, and Joe was kind of left
of center on a lot of pretty big issues.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Love.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
They appreciate Bill Maher even though he is aggressively liberal
in most ways. So I don't think that the conservative
detachment from Bill Burr is about a particular issuer too.
It's just like, what's going on with this comedy mindset?
It is getting warped.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
You lost your mind.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
So how did Bill Burr seemingly lose his way? Well,
it started with the movie Old Dads that was a
Netflix original comedy he co wrote directed start in and
it was about a bunch of older dads spoiler alert,
and how they were conflicting with modern times. The way
they saw the world was different than today's younger generation.
So it was a culture clash and it poked fun
(02:28):
at some of the more woke sensibilities are in are
in parenting and elsewhere. What you're feeling now is what
you're feeling right, let it out.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
I don't think I don't need you to think right now. Connor,
you need to respect your son's autonomy.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
And it was pretty clever, and at least on paper,
I felt the film was rather lacking. It certainly wasn't
his best effort, but by the end of the film
he was essentially saying, Yeah, the woke mind'st the the
way that young people look at the world today. That's
they've got the right approach. And I was like, wow,
that's rather surprising. But more recently Bill Burr has talked
about Luigi Mangioni. Now he's the man accused of, of course,
(03:12):
killing that healthcare CEO in cold blood, and Bill Burr
has this odd predilection to keep saying free Luigi. And
I don't know how serious or kidding he quite is,
because he followed up with this rant, this absolute screed
against billionaires because they're ruining the world. Now, billionaires have
been around for quite some time in America and he
didn't seem to be concerned about them until recently. Huh,
(03:36):
that's not not suspicious at all, is it. So he's
ranting and raving about billionaires, the bane of society, they're
stealing from us, the little guy and oh yeah, free
Luigi not good. Bill not good. And you know, he
could take these unconventional positions and he could be running
against the conservative tide or just sort of the common
(03:57):
sense tide. But if he's funny, you know, well with it.
But he hasn't been funny lately either, and that's something noteworthy.
But again, it didn't end there. Now he's turned his
ire against Elon Musk specifically, and he keeps saying again
and again that Elon Musk is a Nazi hitler. Now,
(04:18):
if you believe Elon a Musk is a Nazi, you
just need to have your head examined. It's just not
logical thinking. It is partisanship to the nth degree. It
is not based on the facts on the ground. And
the fact that an awkward man who is on the
spectrum did this herky jerky motion at an event when
he was trying to declare his love for the people
in the crowd and you turn that into Adolf Hitler
(04:38):
two point zero. I got a problem with that. It's
just it just doesn't make sense. And again, Bill Barr,
who was supposedly this really smart, thoughtful comedian running with
that makes even less sense.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
He've gone crazy and.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
He's been doubling and tripling down on the Elon Musk
hate of late doing, you know, personal attacks about the
way he looks and his hair and this and that.
It's just beneath Bil Burr. It really is, or is it?
Maybe this is the real Bill Burr after all, But
I suspect something else in play. What's interesting is that
this new Bill Burr is simply getting some praise in
(05:15):
the press.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
I don't think the media has been against Bilburg per se.
They didn't like his woke attacks, for sure, But all
of a sudden GQ was calling him a voice of
the people. You think that's an accident. And also, is
this transformation based on living in la guy who's a Boston,
Boston bred and born. Maybe this whole new environment is
changing him in a way, or maybe he's looking at
(05:38):
Hollywood and thinking, you know what if I start leaning
aggressively to the left, I might get more gigs. You know,
no matter how famous you are, no matter how rich
you are in Hollywood, no matter how often you work,
you always aren't sure if the next gig will come
your way. I remember you usually go talking to William H.
Macy's one of these actors who's just constantly in demand,
constantly on screens large and small, and he sounded terrified
(06:02):
that the next role may never come.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
I'm unemployed.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
So I just think it's that insecurity of actors and
comedians just not knowing where the next paycheck is coming from.
And I get that it is a brutal business. So
maybe he's trying to put his thumb on the scale.
Maybe he's trying to say, you know, listen, if I
lean aggressively to the left, I might get a whole
bunch of new gigs. And who knows, he could be
the next late night show host. The format appears to
(06:25):
be dying, but maybe someone will throw him enough cash
give him a platform to say, well, the same things
that John Oliver says on a week two week basis.
So we'll have to wait and see where this new
bill bird goes. Will he continue to call out Elon
Musk the new Devil, the new Hitler. Is he Hitler
two point zer or three point zero? I think I'm
losing track. There's so many Hitler's running around, so many
(06:45):
Nazis right, But I think one thing is clear. If
he continues on this trajectory, someday, fingers crossed, he could
be as deeply unfunny as Jimmy Kimmel. Writer Chuck Dixon
(07:11):
is a comic book legend, The Punisher, Batman, Bain, night Wing, Robin.
I recently went to his DF comics page to look
at all the titles that he's worked on. It went
on and on and on. The guy is a literal legend, amazing,
and he's also an author. He's done a lot of
different work. He's working with the Ripper Verse right now,
which is part of Eric Terlized comic landscape, and one
(07:35):
of his stories is coming to the big screen and
it's about time. The new movie is a working Man,
and it stars Jason Statham as Levon Caid. He was
a former Black Ops soldier of now he's just trying
to live a normal life as a construction worker. Just
something very basic, very humdrum, just away from all the
chaos and danger of his old life, and then his
boss's daughter gets kidnapped, and of course Levon has to
(07:58):
use his particular skill set to help Savor and he
uncover something rather unsavory about the sex trafficking industry. Now,
the story is based on Levon Caid, Chuck Dixon's signature creation.
There are twelve novels in all so far in that series,
and this is based on the first one, Levon's Trade.
But that's not where the story ends. It turns out
(08:21):
that a major Hollywood figure was pretty darn interested in
Levon Caid for quite some time. His name Sylvester Stallone. Yes,
he's been trying to get Levon Caid to some kind
of screen for a while now, had some hiccups along
the way, including the pandemic, But now we finally get
to see Levon Caid on the big screen in the
form of Jason Stathum, and Sylvester Stallone is the co
(08:42):
writer of the movie, so we'll share more about how
that actually all came to be why Chuck Dixon decided
not to visit the set. Chuck also has some tough
love for the MCU. If you haven't noticed, it's been
struggling of late the glory days of that particular franchise
or seemingly long behind us. Can they recapture the old glory? Well,
Chuck has an idea how to do just that. Will they?
(09:04):
I don't know. So I hope you enjoyed my conversation
with the great Chuck Dixon talking Stallone, talking a Workingman,
Jason Statham, and of course comics in general. Who knows
it better than Chuck. I can't think of anyone but Jack.
Thanks for joining the show. Now, before we get into
a working man, I want to get into Sylvester Stallone.
It sounds like he's been connected to this character for
(09:26):
quite some time now. This is not a new thing.
Obviously there have been complications, the COVID pandemic and all.
But let's start at that beginning, because I mean, he's
such an icon. Who doesn't love Sylvester Stallone. I'm sure
you know just being associated with him as a thrill.
But how did this connection first happen? And maybe just
take it from there?
Speaker 4 (09:44):
Well, I did a Expendables comic. It was a prequel
to the first movie, and I was working off the screenplay.
Obviously the movie wasn't out yet, and you know, I
did it. The movie came out, months went by and
I got a phone call this him and says, will
you hold for a call from Sylvester Stallone. I'm like okay,
(10:05):
and he gets on and he talks about how much
he liked the comic, how I understood the characters, I
really got his sense of dialogue, as he had written
the screenplay, and would I be interested in helping him
do rewrite.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Some and expendables too. Well.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
The answer was an immediate yes. But we hit it
off right away. I mean we just were on the
same page from the very beginning about everything. And that
deal didn't work out, But unlike most Hollywood stories, he
didn't forget me once the deal fell apart. He stayed
in contact. He got me other work doing video game
(10:42):
dialogue and web content for lions Gate, and he just
stayed in touch. And I had sent him a bunch
of my books, and he really liked levon Cade and
he really liked my Bad Time series, and he immediately
started talking about, you know, prepping Levan for either a
feature film or a TV series, And you know, we
(11:02):
stayed in.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Contact through all of that.
Speaker 4 (11:04):
And of course, as you mentioned, the pandemic and all
the other usual complications that come along when you're trying
to bring anything into production, and you know, here we are,
like ten years later of the movie's coming out. So
but relationship, he's an unusual Hollywood personality in it.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
You know, he's really I don't know. I just felt
so confident.
Speaker 4 (11:24):
Yeah, I'm talking to a Hollywood legend, and yet within
five minutes it's like talking to an old friend.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
From a creative perspective, I think, you know, because he's
an action hero, because we have these all these iconic figures,
he's also a painter. He's a very smart fellow. I've
interviewed him twice in the past. What did you find
about him from as a as a fellow artist? What
what was interesting about him from that perspective, push away
the movie star glamour and the fact that he's seems
(11:51):
like a regular guy. What was it about him as
a creator that you found intriguing.
Speaker 4 (11:55):
Well, I mean we approach storytelling the same way. I
mean he I think he thin it's the same way.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
I do. You think of the big scenes and how
are you going to get to them? Always thinking visually.
Speaker 4 (12:05):
I mean that's my training from comics and and oh
and never putting anything in the story that slows the
story down. Yeah, and really, you know, you know, we
share that DNA, so it made it very easy to
work with him. When we went into the production meeting
on expendables too, we were finishing each other's sentences, so, uh,
(12:26):
that was kind of cool. But yeah, I mean I
just like talking to him about the story. I mean,
he talked to me about other things he was working
on and asked my opinion the different things, and I
just really dug the experience.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Wow, that's amazing. Now, you know, even more amazing, not
just that his significant involvement in A Working Man, but
you got David A. R. You've got Jason Statham as
the star. I mean, it's almost a pinch yourself kind
of moment.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
Talk about when this film first came to Fruition, were
there did you have any hesitations? Was there worried that
they made dramatically changed that the core of the story
because the Celtic stallone was very faithful.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
Yeah, I mean I wasn't worried because, you know, Slide
during COVID Slide wrote some episodes for the TV show,
you know, basically wrote three episodes it's like a pilot
kind of thing, and it was so faithful to the book.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
I was amazed.
Speaker 4 (13:20):
And then you know, then when he approached me with
you know, I was talking to Jason Statham. He's looking
for a new franchise. Would you be okay if we
pitched levon Ky to him? And I said, yeah, absolutely.
You know, obviously it's going to cause some changes in
the character, but overall, I mean, the book is the book,
the movie is the movie. They're different mediums, so they
(13:40):
have to make changes. I mean, Slide told me we're
gonna have to open up the ending because my book
did not have a movie ending. And he says, we're
gonna have to open I said, it's all understood. And
people say, well, you know they're going to take away
from the book. Now you can still read the book
and you can still see the movie. Then they're just
two different things. I mean, I think of La Confidential,
Love the Love the movie. They're very different. But yeah,
(14:03):
you know, it's still good stuff. So yeah, I'm happy
with it. And I was happy, you know, with the cast,
especially the casting of Mary, the young actress that got
to play or just blew me away.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So Michael Payne to too. I always one of our
most underrated actors. He's always good in area.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
I love Michael Pennon. I love Michael penny.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
I'll be looking at a movie, you know, I don't
know if, oh, he's in it.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Okay, I'll see you know, obviously stay them just did
The bee Keeper. I think there's a sequel on the way.
It does feel like a uniquely suitable time for vigilante films,
just given what's going on in the country right now.
You know, you always hate when a project like this
takes a while to get going. You wanted to you
wanted to happen yesterday. But is there sort of a
(14:46):
is there a fortuitous nature the fact that's coming out
in twenty twenty five?
Speaker 4 (14:50):
Yeah, I mean, we see a lot of frustration with
you know, the rule of law vanishing in our country,
and you know, people feel like there's you know, there's
crimes being committed, but nobody did them. You know, It's like,
you know, mistakes were made, but nobody made them. It's like,
you know, I think I share the feeling with a
(15:10):
lot of other Americans that we need to see some
people go to jail, you know, over you know, no
matter what your political stripe is, you got to know
there's some injustice going on. There's people getting away with stuff,
and the vigilante justice thing kind of feeds into that.
It's a cathartic kind of entertainment where you're like, yeah, yeah,
we we we stuck it to them, We got the
(15:31):
bad guys.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Can you talk a little bit about the movie as
far as I'm not giving anyway story spoilers, but how
it changed from the books, but but was interesting or
different or maybe proved more cinematic than a book can be.
I'm kind of curious about some of the tweaks that
were made along the way.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Well, I mean, I was pleased that a lot of
my action set pieces made it onto the screen pretty
much the way I wrote them. That was cool because
that's like the first thing to go, you know, action
set pieces like now we have a better idea, but
they stuck with a lot of my ideas, and uh,
you know, a lot of my dialogue shows.
Speaker 3 (16:06):
Up in it.
Speaker 4 (16:07):
Yeah, there's a significant plot change which I won't get
into from from the book, but you know, with those,
you know, these are done because movie audience is different
than a book audience.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
I mean my book.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
You know the levon K books are aren't. You know,
they're not feel good stories, so they have to bring
a little bit of a feel good element to the movie.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
To please, you know, movie going public.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Gotcha, Now, this is your baby, but it is a
Hollywood production. There are huge names here. Are you invited
on the set? Would you are you able to participate
or do you kind of just hand it off and
know that's in good hands.
Speaker 4 (16:44):
I probably could have gone on the set if I asked.
But if you ever see those like Blu Ray extras
where the writer business is set, it's always really comfortable.
They always look like nobody wants them there. And I've
got two Academy Award winning screenwriters working on this movie.
So I was like, yeah, not real worry that it
was going to go around and uh plus movie making
(17:05):
is boring if you're watching it, So I was like,
not no interest in doing that at all. It's like there,
you know, I signed the papers, it's theirs. You know,
it's like watching your kids go off with a new
step dad. I just gotta trust everything's going to be okay.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yeah, obviously you mentioned State that was potentially looking for
another franchise. Are there twelve books in the series right now?
Speaker 3 (17:27):
About twelve books?
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Yeah, okay, you have to think about it. The box
office registers start ringing if it's too old school a term,
but that there's more on the way. Is there is
there thinking along those lines? Is it too early to
even go there? What's the the what's the sort of
the atmosphere here behind it?
Speaker 4 (17:45):
Well? I signed a three picture deal, so okay, it's
you know, this is everybody's fingers crossed.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
This is gonna be a franchise.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
We're looking for the opening weekend and the international box office.
But things look good, they were telling me the other day.
Things look good for this movie. So we you know,
we're going to start thinking about sequels pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
You've been a writer for quite some time. You've done
just about everything in your field. This I think is
your first full fledged brush with Hollywood. What have you
learned from the experience. I mean, I'm sure you know
you're a wise guy. I understand movies are different. You know,
maybe they don't want you on this set just because
they're doing their thing. It's complicated. But what did you
(18:24):
learn about the process that maybe was intriguing to you well.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
Early on in my comic writing career, I had a
brush with Hollywood.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
And it was pretty serious. It looked like something was
going to get made.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
I mean this is back in the nineties. And what
I learned from that was.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
To turn your heart to stone.
Speaker 4 (18:39):
It was like, don't get emotionally involved, don't start spending money,
don't start thinking you know things are going to happen,
because ninety nine percent of the time.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
They double that.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Yeah, and I've been.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Close and I dealt with some you know, pretty h
powered Hollywood people on different properties at different times. But
you know, you go in knowing this might not work out.
You know, it's not time to get Yeah, I understood that.
A lot of times they get upset if you're not
excited all through the process. But slow understood you you
don't get excited until that first check comes.
Speaker 3 (19:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I have a friend who's a screenwriter and he's got
some projects that seem like they're this close to happening.
I said, well, aren't you excited. He said, oh, no,
not yet. I've learned way too much about this business.
Speaker 4 (19:22):
So you can't afford You'll you'll emotionally spend yourself. You're
just setting yourself up for disappointment.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
Yeah, there are very few people who get the mark
the comic scene quite like you. I mean obviously your
your experience with The Punisher, Dark Knight, all these different characters.
And we're in this weird phase, at least from a
cine panic in met point of view, where the films
are struggling. The magic seems to be gone, the box
office is lowering, there's lots of question mark even around
the Superman film coming out later this year. From your perspective,
(19:51):
it may sound like an obvious question, but what what's
going wrong here? And let's just push aside woke. Maybe
maybe we shouldn't push it aside. But what do you
see from a storytelling point of view that that's been missing?
Speaker 3 (20:02):
Well, I mean.
Speaker 4 (20:03):
Number one, Well, number one is every cycle ends, I mean,
can't go on forever. Audiences outgrow things, you know, they
move on to something else. But overall the quality has suffered,
and largely that's because at the beginning, I mean, the
big boom was the MCU. I mean, yeah, the Batman
movies did well, but Batman movies are always going to
(20:24):
do well. They're going to survive if the cycle dies
they're still They're gonna make Batman movies the rest of
our lives. The sixties spy craze ended in the sixties,
but James Bond's still around, so some things are going
to survive. But you know, when they stopped using the
original source material, and that's really was what made the
MCU boom, was they were loyal to the source material
(20:46):
in those first like eight movies. When they abandoned it,
you can immediately see the box office fall off. The
energy's gone, they're not they lost that Marvel mojo and
now they're running on their own ideas, which obviously weren't
as good as Jack Kirby and stan Lee and Steve
Ditko's ideas.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Yeah, you know, that seems like such a simple thing,
go with your gut, go with the source if it
ain't broke, But obviously Hollywood is more complex than that.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
Everybody's always.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Now you've been kind of branching off in recent years,
working more independently, and I know you've been in more
recently been working with the River Verse. Talk about that experience,
because you know, I spoke to Eric July a few
months ago for the show, and you know, he's such
an interesting character and be able to kind of create
this whole alternate franchise away from the mainstream and be successful.
(21:40):
It almost seems impossible, but obviously he's doing it. Well,
what's that been like for you as a creator?
Speaker 4 (21:45):
Well, unlike most guys who start up a Commahoo company,
Eric's really smart and he understood what he was up
against and he understood all the because when I first
contacted him, I liked I liked what he did, I
liked what he was saying. And I contacted him and said, look,
I've been in this after a long time. If you
ever need any advice on what not to do contract
But he's never done any things, any of those things.
(22:07):
He's just a smart guy. And you know, he reached
out to me to do the creative stuff, and I'm like, yeah,
this seems like a fun universe to play with. And
he's given me free reign. You know, I got a
lot of you know, being that it's his sandbox. I mean,
he's he's giving me free rein to do whatever I want.
So and it's a great team the Saskas and Mike
Baron and top flight artists, and I love I'll work
(22:30):
with Joe Bennett the rest of my life. I mean,
that's my job at Ripper Versus to keep Joe Bennett busy,
so which is hard because guys.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
Are damn fast. But it's been a tremendous experience.
Speaker 4 (22:42):
You know, Eric's got a great company, He's got a
great crowd of people working for him. So it's been
a lot of fun and and and I think that
that enthusiasm has the readers are picking up on. It's
it's like it's like early Marvel, where you know, there's
this excitement about being a Marvel reader.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
You mentioned some of the mistakes that that could be made.
It's I think Eric has avoided most of not all
of them. What are some of them? And I mentioned
that in part because I want to kind of shine
a light to other creators who maybe are just starting out,
maybe the Tomorrow's Eric July in a sense, what are
some things that the people should not do?
Speaker 3 (23:16):
And too fast?
Speaker 4 (23:18):
Put it that too many titles too quickly. I mean
Eric's staged these titles so that you know, each one
supports the other, because if you put out too many titles,
you get into a trap of having to put out
even more to pay for the ones that didn't work before,
so he's been very carefully building this company. The other
thing is, you know, don't get in a pissing contest
(23:38):
with DC and Marvel because that's going to cost you. Yeah,
it's you know, it's going to cost you money to
try to keep up with their promotion machine and everything else.
Just do your own thing, cut your own path, find
your own readers. And Eric has done that. He has
a reader base that's not like the rest of comic
they've shown. He's done market research that's nobody's done in
(24:00):
comics ever. And he knows who his readers are. He
has demographics, and he knows what they want and he
wants to give them what they want. So that's really
encouraging for the future. But yeah, you're growing too fast
and spending money like water because you know you can
you can create your own Ponzi scheme where.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
You're the victim by doing a comic company.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
There's a famous saying that if you want to make
a million dollars in comics, you start with two million.
So but but you know, like I say, Eric's avoided
all those pitfalls and the company is really growing in
a substantial way.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
This is in a way. Maybe an oddly personal question
from a creative perspective, but you've been at this so
long it sounds like your creative fires are still burning
as bright as ever. What drives you these days? Do
you still find the love of the story. Do you
find like you haven't told certain tales. I'm just gonna
curious what fires up your engines, because you could just
(24:58):
rest on your laurels. They are significant.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Well.
Speaker 4 (25:02):
I think every writer when they start out on a career,
they wonder, am I going to be able to keep
doing this or I might kind of go back and
get a real job, or am I.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Going to burn out? And a long ago I realized
I'm not.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
I don't have promotion. I mean, I want to write.
I know a lot of writers who prefer having written
to writing, you know, but I like writing. I actually
like the writing. I like sitting here in this room
just making stuff up. And I, like you said or intimated,
I have more stories to tell. I have a lot
of stories I want to tell.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I want to get to Yeah. Now that's you reminds me.
You mentioned Mike Baron before. I've known him for a
while now. He lives in Colorado, like I do, and
he just seems like he must wake up just itching
to write, to get to the computer and to write
and write, because that's he's so prolific and so animated
and so lively.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
You know.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I want to circle back a little bit to Working Man.
One of the things I thought about as this whole
project was was evolving, is oh gosh, the fact that
you're right of saying or could that be an issue?
It sounds like it wasn't an issue during this whole
process that did that ever gum up the works at all?
Or has that been? Has that been okay? As far
as the flow of the Workingman movie?
Speaker 4 (26:11):
Well, seeing how you know Sly is like a frequent
visitor to mor A Lago, it wasn't. Now, it was
never a question with I don't think it was ever
a question with slo He's always been a conservative.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
Yeah, so yeah, I mean.
Speaker 4 (26:26):
That stuff doesn't really matter in Hollywood. I mean, at
its heart, Hollywood is about earnings, and like so many corporations,
they caved into the woke and the dei because they
thought they had to do this to survive.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:40):
Really they did because they were being threatened, you know,
either cancelation or you know this problems, you know, from
this tiny, noisy minority of people who seem to be running.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
Things for the last ten years. But you know that's
over now.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
But but at the heart of it, it has to
get back to earnings because you see the companies. Yeah,
they'll put out a little bit of woke product, but
then they'll put out a little bit of red meat
to turn money. I mean, I look at Amazon with
you know, the Reacher series and Terminal Lists and you know,
you know, and things like Levon Kaid and other things
(27:16):
that you know, they're getting back to making sense to
doing you know, mid budget action films and a lot
of horror and things like that, trying to earn more money.
Instead of you know, pleasing whoever it is out there,
they're trying to please this imagine.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
Yeah, I mean, I think you're hinted at. My next
question is that what's your snapshot of pop culture today?
You mentioned canceled culture and woke seems to be kind
of receiving DEI as well. Uh, there are more platforms
willing to take rescum. In Netflix, they can't stop hiring
these rebel comedians like Shane Gillis and Tim Dillon that
wasn't happening five years ago. Do you are you excited
(27:53):
where we are from a creator's perspective, Like the shackles
have been freed social media, let you do and promote
you want. I mean, you must be like a kid again.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
Well yeah, I mean at the heart of it, it's
freedom of speech. I mean, you know, because I mean
we've all said this all They could never make this
movie today, they could never make this TV show today.
I was like, well, I think that's over with and
we can get back to, you know, letting people choose
what they want to see, you know, and freedom of
speech is you know, it's at the heart of who
we are as Americans, and we've got to preserve it.
(28:26):
And we can't let anybody get in here and censor
or modify or make a second guess, I mean, the
nightmare of making people second guess what they say, second
guess what they I've never done that, but but people
do it, you know, and you know, and I've had
pushed back.
Speaker 3 (28:42):
From editors over time. You know, you can't do that,
you can't do this.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
It's like, okay, you, but you can't stop me thinking
what I think. You know, even if you won't let
me say what I think.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, I think one of the most pernicious trends we've
seen where you you can't make a bad character say
bad thing sometimes if it's the wrong bad thing, which
I always think is funny because they make about a
thousand hit Men movie where the hit men's are the
hitmen are the heroes. I'm thinking seemed like a little
more troubling than the fact that someone said the wrong joke.
(29:15):
I ran for another day before I let you go.
Other projects. You're working on, things you've got in the hopper,
things we can look forward to for twenty twenty five
and beyond from you.
Speaker 4 (29:24):
Yeah, I mean, I just completed a Joe Frankenstein new
episode of Joe Frankenstein with Graham Mullen and Anthony Gonzalez Clark.
I have today a new book from Ripper coming out
called Zaleen. It's our cosmic epic by men and Joe
Bennett and other stuff I.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
Can't talk about yet.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
But coming soon.
Speaker 3 (29:46):
I s soon, always coming soon.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Yeah. Well, congratulations on levon Cade coming to the big screen.
Of course. The movie is a working Man with Jason
Statham v Jason Stathum. You couldn't get a better action
here to play the role. It's coming out March twenty
eighth in theaters nationwide. Check it out, and of course
out read all the work that you're doing across the landscape,
whether it's pop culture, books, you name it, you've done it,
you've written it, and we appreciate your time and all
(30:09):
your great work.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
Well see the movie with someone you love. Thanks.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Your character actor of the week is Dale Dicky. Well,
let's say for the show this week, we missed last week.
I was on vacation. I just couldn't get it going.
I was going to get a quick episode up and running.
I thought I don't want to rush. I'd rather just
kind of do our regular schedule. So again, thank you
to Radio America having me as part of their great
podcast lineup. And if you want to find out more
about me, or if you're just tuning in after hearing
(30:37):
me on the Megan Kelly Show, please check out Hollywood
Intoto dot com. It is my website. It is now
over ten years old. We had a ten year anniversary
last year, and of course it is like this show,
the right take on entertainment, and it is updated seventies
a week because there is no rest for the weary
or the wicket. Now go out there and have the
best week possible. Doctor's orders
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