Speaker 1: Hello the Internet, and welcome to Season two thirty six,
Speaker 1: Episode three of Joys Like Guys Day production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. This is a podcast where we take a
Speaker 1: deep dive into America's shared consciousness. It's Wednesday, May eleventh,
Speaker 1: which of course means that it is a National School
Speaker 1: Nurse Day. It is also National Twilight Zone Day. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're talking about the Ocean Zone? Are we talking about
Speaker 1: the TV proper words? I think we are talking about
Speaker 1: you have entered the twilight Zone, the TV show which
Speaker 1: I don't know why it's on May eleventh because it
Speaker 1: premiered in on October one, but hey as whatever knows. Yeah, wait,
Speaker 1: are you a big twilight Zone Him? Nope, that's just
Speaker 1: me reading the information about the holiday. I mean, you
Speaker 1: can just fake it, Like I feel like, even in
Speaker 1: my October one in the back of my mind, I'm
Speaker 1: not like I've like I just had a as a kid.
Speaker 1: I was like it's in black and white him, and
Speaker 1: then as I got older, they're like, no, the writing
Speaker 1: is really good. And then I watched him like, Okay,
Speaker 1: you had a point, right. So that's my relationship with
Speaker 1: twilight Zone. But I'm not gonna front like I'm a
Speaker 1: super fand I never watched it growing up. I watched
Speaker 1: Alfred Hitchcock Presents. I remember that that was also in
Speaker 1: black and white, but I remember it like being primetime
Speaker 1: viewing for something. Is that the one where he would
Speaker 1: walk into his like yeah, a little bit on the side, yeah,
Speaker 1: ut silhouette, Yeah yeah yeah. Well anyways, my name is
Speaker 1: Jack O'Brien, a k my Anaconda. Don't want none unless
Speaker 1: you're pro boer Sean. That is courtesy Ruthless Fudge at
Speaker 1: Ruthless Spudge on Twitter, and I'm through to be joined
Speaker 1: as always buy my co host, Mr Miles Gray, Miles
Speaker 1: Gray Gay, the Blaze and visual artist your boy ko
Speaker 1: Sama straight twisting Backwoods on Lankershon they called me Hideo NoHo,
Speaker 1: get out my way. I'm here, Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: Ippy to use something the kind of intro to I
Speaker 1: just wanted to feel. I've had a song in my heart.
Speaker 1: You know well, Miles, we are thrilled to be joined
Speaker 1: in our third and fourth seats. Former Marvel entertainment lawyer,
Speaker 1: current Big Law media attorney and an entertainment enthusiast who
Speaker 1: hosts the podcast Better Call Paul, It's Mesh La Khani
Speaker 1: and Paul Sarker. What's up? Hello, Hello, Hey guys, how
Speaker 1: are you doing? Hey guys, thanks for having us, Thanks
Speaker 1: for awesome to be here. We're taking tips on those intros.
Speaker 1: That's uh, that's quite an intro, you guys have there.
Speaker 1: You got any aks, you got any you got any
Speaker 1: sing song? Word play on your names? Not off the top.
Speaker 1: You can't put me on the spot like that. Ak
Speaker 1: a John Mesh like John Tesh. That was what I
Speaker 1: was gonna say. Yeah, well some people ak Mesh like
Speaker 1: the shorts. Yeah, there you go, like the shows me
Speaker 1: Marina like the Jamaicans wear that meshed tank top. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I like that. Also, I think that's kid kid Marrows Aku. No,
Speaker 1: he's the Mesh Marina with the cold miss meat or
Speaker 1: cool demeanor and a flat forget it's been so long
Speaker 1: since the art has come out. But anyway, another thing, subtle,
Speaker 1: subtle shade. We're not just fans. Where are you guys?
Speaker 1: Coming to us from NYC? And I heard of it
Speaker 1: right now? Yeah, sir, the big Old Apple, I think,
Speaker 1: h yeah, the Big Old Apple. Apple never sleeps well, actually,
Speaker 1: you know it does sleep. I was out last night
Speaker 1: with friends and we couldn't find anywhere to go to.
Speaker 1: It was completely dead. So it sleeps on Mondays. There
Speaker 1: you go, not in a good way. When I worked
Speaker 1: for Diane Sawyer, I had to stake out the clubs
Speaker 1: in the meatpacking district to interview young men about whether
Speaker 1: they were using viagra as a party drug. And and
Speaker 1: they they were like the clubs out until like four
Speaker 1: and it, Yeah, it got pretty sleepy there for a
Speaker 1: little while, and I was cold. But people were using
Speaker 1: viagra as a party drug. Wait, so Jack, We're just
Speaker 1: outside the club, like, hey, man, can I talk to
Speaker 1: you really quick there? Like yeah, I mean I like
Speaker 1: via a party What was the what was the answer
Speaker 1: you're getting? They're like, no, it's called something else. Mostly
Speaker 1: it was I would do you have some? And no,
Speaker 1: this isn't that kind of Yeah, No, I'm here for
Speaker 1: with ABC News. What bro leave me alone? Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know what the conceivable like what conceivable story
Speaker 1: they were after there, But it sounds like a thing
Speaker 1: older people would think of. It's like, man, imagine if
Speaker 1: it's doing this to me at fifty five, what are
Speaker 1: the young eyes doing? Are they just are they just
Speaker 1: blasting off to another planet, like Jack, go down there,
Speaker 1: give me three words on this. Mike Nichols was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you know what, Diane, the stuff could work for a
Speaker 1: lot of people. The I I do remember that, like
Speaker 1: one of the young people who like started with me,
Speaker 1: like I was five when I started there, and you know,
Speaker 1: she was around the same age, and she had all
Speaker 1: these scoops on like what the kids were up to
Speaker 1: that I'm pretty sure she was making up and like
Speaker 1: one of the I think I think the viagra thing
Speaker 1: might have been one of them. Another was called toothing,
Speaker 1: which was where like you use bluetooth to just like
Speaker 1: hit people up in randomly proposition the people around you
Speaker 1: to see if they want to have sex. That actually
Speaker 1: sounds like something that did exist. I think there was
Speaker 1: an app that works. Yeah, yeah, and that's why we
Speaker 1: spent a year looking into it and never never found anything.
Speaker 1: People do that with the AirPods. Now, they'll they'll try
Speaker 1: to connect to people's AirPods and and play some stuff
Speaker 1: on it and see if they can get some type
Speaker 1: of interaction. I don't know. Yeah, God, I can't think
Speaker 1: of an easier way for me to be like, oh cool,
Speaker 1: what you just completely invaded my earspace. Oh you want
Speaker 1: to have a cool, nice to meet you person who
Speaker 1: has no boundaries. Well, Mesh and Paul, we're going to
Speaker 1: get to know you guys a little bit better in
Speaker 1: a moment. First, we're gonna tell our listeners a couple
Speaker 1: of the things that we're talking about. We're gonna talk
Speaker 1: entertainment industry, since that is you guys specialty, specifically streaming fatigue,
Speaker 1: Is it real? Where where do we go from here?
Speaker 1: And then we are gonna talk about doctor Strange in
Speaker 1: the Multitude of Madness. Mesh, I think you called it
Speaker 1: a couple of times on your Most ras An episode.
Speaker 1: I actually did it right before we were I was
Speaker 1: talking to Paul earlier and I did it again. So
Speaker 1: I'm now just convinced the name. It's a it's a mouthful,
Speaker 1: that title. Like in another mold, in another multiverse, there
Speaker 1: is a move movie called Multitude of Madness exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's there. There's many madnesses. I've I've specifically come out
Speaker 1: as anti this movie because the title is scary to me,
Speaker 1: but it does seem popular, uh, and the right is
Speaker 1: trying to claim it. So we'll we'll talk about the
Speaker 1: culture wars around that and trying not to fall asleep
Speaker 1: while doing that. All that plenty Moore, But first, Mesh
Speaker 1: and Paul, we do like to ask our guests, what
Speaker 1: is something from your search history that's revealing about who
Speaker 1: you are. So I'm kind of a nerd. I like
Speaker 1: to research a lot about like space and sort of
Speaker 1: like interplanetary societies, and you know what's going to happen
Speaker 1: if Earth like runs out of water or freshwater, or
Speaker 1: you know, asteroid comes too close or whatever. So I
Speaker 1: searched a lot about that. Um from Philly. I'm a
Speaker 1: big Eagles fan, so I've been searching a lot about
Speaker 1: our draft picks and like what they did in college
Speaker 1: and how they're going to translate to the pros. And
Speaker 1: I got a lot of business travel lined up, so
Speaker 1: I'm always kind of looking for flights and um hotels
Speaker 1: and stuff. So in your interplanetary searches, do you have
Speaker 1: these thoughts and then you're like, Okay, I need to
Speaker 1: see who's thinking about this also, or who's who's seemingly
Speaker 1: coming to an answer about like your question. That's something
Speaker 1: I think of living in California with the drought and
Speaker 1: you know, desertification of the West seeming to be in
Speaker 1: full effect here. What you know, what what kind of
Speaker 1: what kind of things have you learned in your search
Speaker 1: for these answers? Well, you know, so I don't want
Speaker 1: to say I'm like fatalistic about it, but I think
Speaker 1: there's a lot of optimism and hope out there that
Speaker 1: people think. You know, it's just you know, things are
Speaker 1: going to progress sort of like logarithmically. You know, we
Speaker 1: can get some critical massive people to travel really quickly too,
Speaker 1: you know, moons in the in the Solar System and
Speaker 1: sort of set up shop there and then you know
Speaker 1: kind of so perhaps fly business. Yeah, I think oh
Speaker 1: sky is falling. Yeah, you know, there's there's optimism out there,
Speaker 1: and it's so vast, right Like, that's the other thing
Speaker 1: we we don't really can't really comprehend how far things
Speaker 1: are away from us and how long it would take
Speaker 1: to get there. But it doesn't mean it's hopeless. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: space at like, the Solar System is the size of
Speaker 1: Ohio in most depictions of space, it's like and then
Speaker 1: a little bit out further you've got the asteroid belt,
Speaker 1: and the asteroid belt is looks like a lazy river
Speaker 1: full of you know, asteroids, like whereas reality everything so
Speaker 1: far apart. The asteroids themselves are far very far apart,
Speaker 1: and you from one planet, the other planets look like
Speaker 1: just little specs in the sky. They don't. They don't
Speaker 1: look like I don't know, I feel like I when
Speaker 1: I picture outer space in a movie, it's just like
Speaker 1: a classroom model. You know. Yeah, the maps are off master,
Speaker 1: your map are all all funked up, Hollywood. But to
Speaker 1: your point, there are a lot of oceans, even on
Speaker 1: like moons in our Solar system that have more water
Speaker 1: than Earth, and I think only the three of water
Speaker 1: on Earth is considered fresh water. That so, you know,
Speaker 1: may not be hopeless if if we can find out
Speaker 1: find a way sort of um treat ocean water and
Speaker 1: drink it or something. Has that not been the case.
Speaker 1: I thought that I've been able to do that. I
Speaker 1: thought they were. I think they doake aircraft amounts of energy,
Speaker 1: maybe cruise ships, well, aircraft carriers have nuclear reactors on
Speaker 1: them that power them, and they're able to like do
Speaker 1: tons and like create tons and tons of de salonization.
Speaker 1: But on a daily basis, I think the hard part
Speaker 1: that people say is like if you don't live near
Speaker 1: the coast, then getting the access to that desalonized waters,
Speaker 1: Like the next sort of problem that would have to
Speaker 1: be solved is like sure that can help things along
Speaker 1: the hosts, but like, where's the infrastructure to move massive amounts?
Speaker 1: How about you? Mesh? What what is uh? Something from
Speaker 1: your search history? Helping my sister find dinner for ten
Speaker 1: people in New York City at eight pm on a Wednesday,
Speaker 1: which is impossible, and you need a private dining room
Speaker 1: and I got some. I actually went. I was like
Speaker 1: helping her, and it couldn't find anything that was like,
Speaker 1: you know, you don't want to throw I don't want
Speaker 1: to throw her like a Buco to Beppo in Times Square, right,
Speaker 1: And so I'm trying to find her something. I'm like, look,
Speaker 1: I found this private room, like hopefully it will be legit.
Speaker 1: And then we did the search and then I emailed
Speaker 1: them and they came back. So it's a minimum for
Speaker 1: ten people plus five hundred dollars renting the room, plus
Speaker 1: that doesn't include tax and gratuity. And by the way,
Speaker 1: we can only fit ten people in the private dining room.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh my god, that's New York for you.
Speaker 1: So yeah, what do you do when you want to
Speaker 1: have like a big birthday kind of thing and eat
Speaker 1: with a bunch of people in New York? Like, is
Speaker 1: it just like what is the place that you're sort
Speaker 1: of reflectively would think, like you gotta you gotta like
Speaker 1: a bar, you gotta a bar dive, or you gotta
Speaker 1: like it does. Yeah, there's a check e cheese. You're
Speaker 1: basically going for like the C list of anything you wanted,
Speaker 1: so you basically get rid of all your friends are
Speaker 1: like mix them across like part of the week, like
Speaker 1: a ten person dinner. You gotta plan like and especially
Speaker 1: now in New York, reservations are just taking over our lives.
Speaker 1: You can't just walk in anymore. I don't know if
Speaker 1: l A have the same problem. No, I mean it depends,
Speaker 1: but I think New York has such a like people,
Speaker 1: it's a such a destination, and on top of it,
Speaker 1: there's like so many good restaurants popping up all the
Speaker 1: time that like I remember one of the times I
Speaker 1: was visiting in the fall, Someone's like, Oh, you gotta
Speaker 1: try this restaurant, but you gotta log on to like
Speaker 1: the reservation site at midnight. And I'm not joking. I
Speaker 1: felt like a bunch of bots, all the reservations, and
Speaker 1: I was like, how the fund did that happen? Like
Speaker 1: I I'm good at buying ship like when it drops
Speaker 1: like just from being a like you know, reformed hype beast.
Speaker 1: So I was like, oh, it's nothing to get a
Speaker 1: reservation cut to like literally within seconds, everything was vaporizing, like,
Speaker 1: I don't know what. Okay, I guess you're walking at
Speaker 1: five o'clock when it opens on a Monday and you
Speaker 1: pray right right right. I guess I'll go to Sta
Speaker 1: Bagel again. What's What's something you guys think is overrated?
Speaker 1: I think sparkling water is everrated? Okay, I'm a tap
Speaker 1: tap person. Oh I guess I get that some people
Speaker 1: I don't like tap or or can't drink like still water,
Speaker 1: but I don't personally understand it. Do you disagree on
Speaker 1: that then, poll? Okay, I didn't need to cause some
Speaker 1: tension here. Do you like sparkling at all? You're you're
Speaker 1: just you? You said, no, I don't need that. I'm
Speaker 1: I'm fine sparkling. No. I mean, so, I don't mind
Speaker 1: fizz like soda or like a red bull, but I
Speaker 1: just I don't I don't get the sparkling water thing.
Speaker 1: I think so, you know, I think it's a little
Speaker 1: hoity toity, like digging digging away. You're in your Philly.
Speaker 1: That's the thing. Maybe we should have it. I didn't
Speaker 1: realize that. I didn't realize you hate it sparkling water
Speaker 1: so much. We're trying to turn this on the crossfire
Speaker 1: where you guys are just going at each other. All right,
Speaker 1: sparkling water sucks, mash go, you're Abut I have a
Speaker 1: sot of stream in my house, so yeah, I just
Speaker 1: got one. They're great. I don't I I feel you
Speaker 1: on this, Paul. Like when I'm thirsty, I'm not thinking,
Speaker 1: oh I need a sparkling water. I'm like, I need
Speaker 1: water so I can down a bunch of like fluid
Speaker 1: before without my chest bursting because of like the intensity
Speaker 1: at which I drink things. I'm thirsty, you know what.
Speaker 1: You know what I'm talking about, Like when you start
Speaker 1: that and then your chest feels like like like alien
Speaker 1: davy is about to pop out. Yeah, so I don't
Speaker 1: like you for that, but like I like it to
Speaker 1: you know, I'm mixed drinks with sparkling water and things
Speaker 1: like that. He just likes to have, like to sip on,
Speaker 1: but like for pure hydration. There's no fucking way I
Speaker 1: could be like, I need a pellet rino. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: see someone with sparkling water in the gym. That wouldn't
Speaker 1: make sense, right what so well, I'd have something to say,
Speaker 1: or I wouldn't say something, but I would be judgment
Speaker 1: on my mind under my breath after I left. I
Speaker 1: went into an infrared sauna the other day, and you know,
Speaker 1: you get bottles of water and you go into it,
Speaker 1: and they were only stocked with sparkling water. I think
Speaker 1: someone made a mistake. So I'm in the sauna and
Speaker 1: I'm like chugging it and didn't don't realize it's sparkling
Speaker 1: water and they didn't have regular water in that case,
Speaker 1: sparkling water does not work when you're in a hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy five degree you know. And then I'm sure
Speaker 1: the burps are like criminal, you know, an environment stat Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: what's something that you think is underrated? Paul? Okay, I'm so.
Speaker 1: I'm I used to live in l A. I think
Speaker 1: in and out animal style fries are underrated. I think
Speaker 1: they're the best fry, and I've heard a lot of
Speaker 1: hate about in and out fries, and I think if
Speaker 1: you get them well done animal style, you can't go wrong.
Speaker 1: You know. It's so funny. I was in the and
Speaker 1: then you lost me because I'm the most despicable kind
Speaker 1: of in and out fry fan. I like them lightly fried.
Speaker 1: I like she sticks on my animals. It's like a
Speaker 1: loaded baked potato when you do it like that, that's
Speaker 1: in my mind was happening. Yeah, then you definitely need
Speaker 1: the fork. Oh yeah, yeah, you gotta have the fork.
Speaker 1: So it's like more miles. What you order is more
Speaker 1: like Shepherd's pie basically something it's not potatoes stuck to
Speaker 1: the bottom of the chunk of cheese and yeah, melted
Speaker 1: American cheese and whatever they're fried, you know, Thousand Islands basically. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Are you missing it out there in New York or
Speaker 1: you do? I missed a lot. Whenever I'm in l A,
Speaker 1: I go like two days a week because it's I
Speaker 1: really like it that much, and we have. I've been
Speaker 1: there since end of February. So there's nothing like it
Speaker 1: out here. Okay, shake shacks nothing like it. I don't
Speaker 1: understand the shape shack is not. Yeah, the eye roll
Speaker 1: from Paul I just had when this man came through
Speaker 1: with the I'm personally I love shake check. I feel
Speaker 1: I feel in and Out was a little bit overrated,
Speaker 1: specifically because of the up to You know, they're just
Speaker 1: not my favorite kind of fries. But no, I hear
Speaker 1: you on the I hear you on the kind of
Speaker 1: like the mushiness of it. That's why I get them
Speaker 1: well done, and then I think they're They're really good.
Speaker 1: But the burgers are kind of the same though. Miles
Speaker 1: and I ordered together, and he always makes me order
Speaker 1: the medium rare. He says, can I get this as me?
Speaker 1: Get them? Get get them blue now? I say blue. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I want those blue, baby, like I want the natural
Speaker 1: cultures from the earth that the potato grew and still
Speaker 1: still alive. I mean they're really fresh. You watch them
Speaker 1: like slice the potato right right in front of you. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: like speaking of New York culture, cuisine culture, like the
Speaker 1: my roommate and I once like drove I think an
Speaker 1: hour and a half to go to like a Chick
Speaker 1: fil A on the Jersey Turnpike because like there was
Speaker 1: no Chick fil A at the time. Like you come
Speaker 1: to like really be into weird things that are available elsewhere,
Speaker 1: like the the Ikea. At the time, there wasn't an
Speaker 1: ike on Manhattan and people would like, there isn't anymore.
Speaker 1: They closed that. Yeah, it's trying to go closer to January. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's one of Red Hook and I think in Red
Speaker 1: Hook or something like that, like random like a kmart
Speaker 1: hidden in the middle of I think they closed that too.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, but like that I would go in
Speaker 1: there and then Dayton, Ohio again mess up about you
Speaker 1: with something that's underrated. Underrated, I would say that I'm
Speaker 1: quite disappointed. I don't know if you guys seen it,
Speaker 1: but Station Levin, the show on HBO Max that was
Speaker 1: based off the graphic novel, just didn't really get the
Speaker 1: attention I thought. I thought that was a fantastic show.
Speaker 1: Is one of my favorite of the of the of
Speaker 1: the year. So yeah, I I thought it was very effective,
Speaker 1: to the point that it was unsettling for me at
Speaker 1: the time that like I was like, we're kind of
Speaker 1: like like living a verse of this or yeah, and
Speaker 1: you are doing it so well, like really I think encapsulated,
Speaker 1: like just you know, from that first episode, like that
Speaker 1: transition from like order to chaos and then like what
Speaker 1: do we do next? So in that sense, I think
Speaker 1: it was absolutely great for me. But I think I
Speaker 1: say it was so good, it unsettled me to the
Speaker 1: point that I had to like put a lot of
Speaker 1: space in between episodes. I try to get people to
Speaker 1: watch it, and when I tell them the premise or like,
Speaker 1: why the hell would I watch that? Like that's our
Speaker 1: life right now, but it's not, And that's not really
Speaker 1: our life that we're living right now, but it could be.
Speaker 1: If you don't watch it, you would be prepared for
Speaker 1: life like that. If you watch and then everyone's like
Speaker 1: you gotta get Like he's like once you get, for
Speaker 1: your friends, like when you get deeper, it has more
Speaker 1: of a story rather than you just living in the
Speaker 1: panic of the earth is crumbling around us and be
Speaker 1: to hide in our house forever. Get to episode eight
Speaker 1: of ten and then you're you're right there. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: feel like it came out. It came out a man,
Speaker 1: I gotta start watching it. It's a good one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's really good. It came out around the same time
Speaker 1: as Yellow Jackets, which I feel like they split voters
Speaker 1: a little bit. Like it was it was kind of
Speaker 1: a They were both like sort of post apocalyptic wilderness
Speaker 1: type things. It is. I was on Yellow Jackets first,
Speaker 1: and then I was like, fine. It took me a
Speaker 1: while to get around to it because I don't I
Speaker 1: don't have time to just watch the same show twice
Speaker 1: in a row. But Station elevens. It's funny, you say,
Speaker 1: because I never haven't seen Yellow Jackets as much as
Speaker 1: people have been like, watch Yellow Jackets, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I can't do it. You know, I only had the
Speaker 1: mental capacity for one of them. You watched the better
Speaker 1: one already, so like, Yellow Jackets is fun, but you
Speaker 1: like Station leven more than Yellow Jackets. I did, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean not that I got through Yellow Jackets, but
Speaker 1: I remember how enthusiastic you were about Yellow Jackets. But
Speaker 1: I know in your back pocket you're like, but Station
Speaker 1: at least have that picture of Station of leven fold
Speaker 1: and look at it like it's still you. It's still you. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there is more buzz about Yellow Jackets. People weren't talking
Speaker 1: about Station leven like you have seen Station eleven. It'd
Speaker 1: be like me and then they'd all be talking about
Speaker 1: Yellow Jackets. So you're just the wrong, Yeah, because I
Speaker 1: think having like Christina Ricci and like Juliette Louis back
Speaker 1: and stuff people like like like a real like something
Speaker 1: awoke and people like yes, the nineties and odds. That's true. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I still have like quotes from Station eleven like popping
Speaker 1: my head. It added that old Tribe song to my playlists.
Speaker 1: Which yeah, it's just it's just a really really like
Speaker 1: all around great show. I highly recommend it. It was
Speaker 1: a good underrated. Man, all right, let's take a quick break.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. And we're back, and I mean
Speaker 1: we're just kind of talking about this streaming fatigue enough time.
Speaker 1: Too many shows, too many shows. There are currently three
Speaker 1: shows on that I would have like wished for in
Speaker 1: the past, like I would have like I would be
Speaker 1: you know, objectively, we run this city should be something
Speaker 1: that is like appointment viewing for me, and like I
Speaker 1: should have a text chain going with like all my
Speaker 1: friends who I who you know I watched The Wire
Speaker 1: with and and I haven't watched It's like out. The
Speaker 1: reviews are great. It's by the people who made The Wire.
Speaker 1: It's about Baltimore City police and corruption, updated for the
Speaker 1: realities of our modern world and what we've found out
Speaker 1: about police just in general, and I'm just like, I
Speaker 1: don't know it's right. You know, we've i think increasingly
Speaker 1: since the simplicity of just it being Netflix to then
Speaker 1: every other platform coming online, like with every single one,
Speaker 1: like I feel like my attention is split and fractured,
Speaker 1: and on a certain level it feels like everything's blending together,
Speaker 1: like there's no such thing as TV or film in
Speaker 1: a way. Like I think that's the sensation that's had
Speaker 1: on me. Like I used to be very like as
Speaker 1: a kid, it was like you watched HBO has fucking
Speaker 1: movies and then you watch TV shows here. But now
Speaker 1: with every coming online with streaming, like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's a good thing or a
Speaker 1: bad thing that I'm sort of viewing everything through this
Speaker 1: singular lens. But but yeah, I think the reason why
Speaker 1: we even bring up the fatigue and stuff is obviously,
Speaker 1: like when Netflix lost a bunch of those subscribers, Everyone's like,
Speaker 1: what the fos is going on? And so many, like
Speaker 1: the streaming world, felt like it was very Some were
Speaker 1: high fiving, others were panicked. Yeah, Wall Street ship themselves
Speaker 1: when they lost subscribers for the first time, and I
Speaker 1: think people there were a lot of think pieces about
Speaker 1: streaming fatigue, but it's definitely something I don't know. It
Speaker 1: seems like when the pandemic hit, there's too little, and
Speaker 1: then they overcompensated, and now there's too much, and I
Speaker 1: don't know, like will we just will there be too
Speaker 1: little again and then we'll all catch up on all
Speaker 1: the stations eleven that we missed and all all the
Speaker 1: great content that we missed her. But you guys, you
Speaker 1: guys talk about the business event entertainment. What what are
Speaker 1: your thoughts on on this kind of overall story. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think from a business perspective, this is
Speaker 1: sort of how things EBB and flow. I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: rewind you know to what you guys were talking about
Speaker 1: ten years ago when it was basically just Netflix and
Speaker 1: you know, people were watching a lot of linear television
Speaker 1: and appointment viewing or whatever, you know, one show a
Speaker 1: week and then you know, tune in at eight o'clock
Speaker 1: and watch you know, next week. And Netflix was just
Speaker 1: crushing everybody because they had a brand new business model.
Speaker 1: There were no ads, you could binge things and that instantly,
Speaker 1: you know, shifts every studio heads, every content executive focus
Speaker 1: too or right now, how do we win at their game?
Speaker 1: How do we compete in that arena? And there's a
Speaker 1: couple of year leg when you sort of build out
Speaker 1: your infrastructure, you get your talent team, you raise the capitol,
Speaker 1: you start developing shows and and getting on intellectual property
Speaker 1: to make a competitive offering. And then it usually overcorrect,
Speaker 1: right because it's not like you just find the ideal
Speaker 1: amount of content. It's like everyone jumps in and tries
Speaker 1: to start competing, and then at a certain point the
Speaker 1: pendulum swings back the other way, and then you have
Speaker 1: content overload and then you know, as we saw with
Speaker 1: CNN Plus, and you know, there's other streaming services that
Speaker 1: are not going to be here, you know, a year
Speaker 1: from now or two years from now, because that the
Speaker 1: money isn't there, Like people can't have ten or fifteen
Speaker 1: streaming services, and so it's gonna go back into some
Speaker 1: form of consolidation at least that's what I think. But
Speaker 1: I think it's this is just the process. Like everyone
Speaker 1: sees the dollars and thinks, I wanna, you know, get
Speaker 1: into this space, and then they commit a certain amount
Speaker 1: of money. They probably overspend and um, they're chasing something
Speaker 1: and hoping that they can get a piece of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean you can. You can also compare it to
Speaker 1: like not just streaming in the sense of content like
Speaker 1: movies and TV pandemic. We have two years growth and
Speaker 1: just generally a lot of places ran up like five
Speaker 1: x more than it would run up and in a
Speaker 1: two year span it would it was like the equivalent
Speaker 1: of like five six seven years of growth in like
Speaker 1: a twenty four months span. Obviously, like the zooms of
Speaker 1: the world, the pelotons of the world, we've seen all
Speaker 1: of those come come come down. Everything's correcting itself. So
Speaker 1: I think there it's all just coming down to a
Speaker 1: point of Look, this was a weird time. People were
Speaker 1: doing more stuff. We're going back to almost regular life.
Speaker 1: I mean, look at gym memberships. There was a point
Speaker 1: in time when nobody wants to go to the gym.
Speaker 1: We have Peloton. Now gym memberships are back up again.
Speaker 1: People are like leaving their Peloton subscriptions, like I want
Speaker 1: to go to a gym again. And so I think,
Speaker 1: you know, to Paul's point, you're just seeing a general
Speaker 1: correction of these things. And what's like I mean when
Speaker 1: I would always look at just the amount of content
Speaker 1: coming out because on some level, like it's somewhat sustainable
Speaker 1: based on their subscriber growth and things like that, But
Speaker 1: on another level, like I think the fatigue part. Do
Speaker 1: you think that's anything that networks consider right, because on
Speaker 1: some level, you see, like with Netflix, they have so
Speaker 1: many shows, they'll put out a couple are the ones
Speaker 1: that like really move the needle, and then like you
Speaker 1: see like constantly then like a wave of cancelations. I'm
Speaker 1: always looking at that. I'm like, is that good business
Speaker 1: for them? Because we see we've heard about like you know,
Speaker 1: the ups and downs of you know, the way they
Speaker 1: spend money, And I'm always curious, I'm like, what is
Speaker 1: the long term goal here? Because it's very it's from
Speaker 1: I'm looking at purely as a consumer with a little
Speaker 1: bit of like industry no how, but I'm I'm always
Speaker 1: like thinking, like how do you keep doing this like
Speaker 1: spending tons of money then being like, okay, we have
Speaker 1: that was a bad investment, but then this thing we
Speaker 1: spent a little bit of money ended up taking off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like how lucrative is it when a show like Squid
Speaker 1: Game or the first season Stranger Things are like should
Speaker 1: like that like just takes over the zeitgeist? Like is
Speaker 1: that and like does that pay itself back? I'm like
Speaker 1: they're like, all right, that covers all those other shows
Speaker 1: that we made that nobody watched. It's it's a great question.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the question. I think it comes
Speaker 1: down to stickiness, right, because if you were subscribing to
Speaker 1: a service just for a show and then you cancel
Speaker 1: when it's over and you wait till the next season
Speaker 1: comes out to rejoin, then I don't know that it's
Speaker 1: as lucrative. If you're someone that's sort of like, you know,
Speaker 1: I just want to turn on Netflix. They've had a
Speaker 1: show that I really liked a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to cancel it and I'll just turn on,
Speaker 1: turn it on and browse when I want to watch something.
Speaker 1: Then that's great. Like if if you if a show
Speaker 1: brings a lasting customer, then then it's awesome, especially if
Speaker 1: it brings a ton of them. But I think one
Speaker 1: of the things that you see in the in film
Speaker 1: now is the proliferation of franchises, right, And so it's
Speaker 1: like Fast and the Furious ten and thoor four and
Speaker 1: thour or five, and and that's because you're basically like
Speaker 1: you're starting You're not starting over from scratch, like you've
Speaker 1: invested all this time building a fan base, telling about
Speaker 1: you know, creating characters, making them familiar. You have merch
Speaker 1: out there, and and so you just you don't want
Speaker 1: lose that investment, so you keep going with the franchise.
Speaker 1: And I don't think, at least to this point, like
Speaker 1: Netflix is quick to cut debait on things and sort
Speaker 1: of going in a a different direction. I guess they have
Speaker 1: a lot of analytics that say, justify it from their perspective,
Speaker 1: but I think you're right, like they haven't. And yes
Speaker 1: they're stranger things and and maybe who knows what the
Speaker 1: second season of squid Game is going to be like,
Speaker 1: but there they are sort of like they put everything
Speaker 1: behind their brands. It's all about Netflix, right, that was
Speaker 1: the primary thing they were selling. And the shows we're
Speaker 1: supposed to be kind of fungible, and it's in a
Speaker 1: more competitive competitive environment. I don't know if that strategy
Speaker 1: is gonna, you know, proved to be ultimately successful. And
Speaker 1: fungible a word that I know the meaning of. But
Speaker 1: maybe our listeners don't, So why don't you explain what
Speaker 1: that is? So it's it's more it's it's fungible, meaning
Speaker 1: like interchangeable, right, So totally that's what I'm total it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I also wonder if this is a compounding problem,
Speaker 1: right because now even if even if they bring it
Speaker 1: back to like, okay, we're making a manageable amount of content,
Speaker 1: like it feels like there's still like more places to
Speaker 1: like see the content. There's like squid Game was not
Speaker 1: the result of them having like a great farm system,
Speaker 1: where like they're the Netflix writers hit this one out
Speaker 1: of the park. They like found this show, like you know,
Speaker 1: didn't pay that much for it. The creatives involved seemed
Speaker 1: like kind of pissy like once once the media started
Speaker 1: paying attention, they were like they didn't paying ship like
Speaker 1: it was it was fine and it right that the case.
Speaker 1: It took a long time. So I don't know, and
Speaker 1: now now they're the other like kind of concerned I
Speaker 1: would have with Netflix is that they do seem to
Speaker 1: be like saying we are. But I think this is
Speaker 1: a direct quote. Actually Red Hastings was like trying to
Speaker 1: reassure everyone that Netflix had been through tough times before,
Speaker 1: and that it would solve its problems. He said the
Speaker 1: company was now super focused on getting back into our
Speaker 1: investors good graces, and I feel like that's maybe not
Speaker 1: the I don't like the This was around the time
Speaker 1: that they started talking about and introducing an advertising model
Speaker 1: and like cutting password sharing, and I don't I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's gonna that's gonna do. It's like I
Speaker 1: think just the unfortunate thing about public markets though, is
Speaker 1: that they probably have a ten year plan of the
Speaker 1: type of content they're gonna be making. You know, shows
Speaker 1: that can be made really quickly, like selling Sunset that
Speaker 1: a lot of people watch, two and Ozarks that takes
Speaker 1: a long time to make, and that just concluded. At
Speaker 1: the same time, they have to please investors on a
Speaker 1: quarterly basis, and investors are not happy, especially in the
Speaker 1: market like this. I think he just has to say
Speaker 1: things that where it looked like, obviously, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, we're just going to continuously make great content.
Speaker 1: It's very competitive right now. Um as the market corrects,
Speaker 1: we'll see what happens, but it is generally like pretty competitive.
Speaker 1: But I would say that Netflix then comes back in
Speaker 1: and you got boom boom boom, show after show after show,
Speaker 1: and I think just like without all the networks that
Speaker 1: you find a little bit of the fatigue is really more,
Speaker 1: it seems like on their side where it's like there's
Speaker 1: a bit where Okay, my favorite show is not running,
Speaker 1: like HBO, Max doesn't have Euphoria just finished, and you
Speaker 1: know some of the other shows just finished, and now
Speaker 1: we're kind of waiting for you know, what's the next
Speaker 1: big show to pop up on there, and in the meantime,
Speaker 1: you watch something on another network and another network and
Speaker 1: another network. I also feel like their main strength is
Speaker 1: supposed to be all the data they have on us
Speaker 1: and like their ability to like dig into that figure
Speaker 1: out like what people want, and then you know, create create,
Speaker 1: like Phil flood the Zone with that and like now
Speaker 1: there's a meme about doom scrolling Netflix and just you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not being able to find the thing that you
Speaker 1: want or anything that's interesting to you. And I saw
Speaker 1: a specific like complaint from somebody who's like, I'm a
Speaker 1: horror fan and the things that they recommend to me
Speaker 1: are always the conjuring and like, you know, the most
Speaker 1: popular horror movies and like that I know that that
Speaker 1: like wasn't initially what they were supposed to have, like
Speaker 1: such a there was supposed to be able to like
Speaker 1: flex their algorithm, and like you know, he was like
Speaker 1: Netflix has deep cut horror movies like the old ways,
Speaker 1: but those don't ever get recommended to me. I'm just
Speaker 1: wondering if they could use some human curation, like a
Speaker 1: maybe we've hit the like fail point of the Turing
Speaker 1: test of Netflix is like algorithmic algorithmically generated like content
Speaker 1: suggestion model, And like they why wouldn't you, I know,
Speaker 1: they just like fired all of their editors who they were,
Speaker 1: who they had hired, But like, why wouldn't you try
Speaker 1: to build up you know the way that like Peloton
Speaker 1: instructors had like a following and like people, you know,
Speaker 1: there were memes about them and they were like, oh
Speaker 1: this is the one that I love. Then you know
Speaker 1: you should have like these people curating channels on Netflix
Speaker 1: and you know, like like give give some humanity to
Speaker 1: it rather than just a wall of fucking content. Good idea, right,
Speaker 1: and they should hired me to do it. I like
Speaker 1: the mix. I like the mix of algorithm and curated
Speaker 1: I would I like your idea I think it's a
Speaker 1: great idea. I think maybe should have um not given
Speaker 1: it to them for free. Yeah, you know that's what
Speaker 1: we do. We just give up brilliant stuff. We came
Speaker 1: up with an old distressed malls that we take over
Speaker 1: and we make them like nineties retro experiences. We've got
Speaker 1: a lot of business ideas, Paul, like, you know we
Speaker 1: give out for but yeah, that was one of the
Speaker 1: better ones. The curated thing, and the curated thing I
Speaker 1: think works. It's like I'm I'm always looking for like
Speaker 1: there's a handful of people that like, oh you're like, hey,
Speaker 1: someone recommended me, you know a show I trust their
Speaker 1: judgment and shows I want to watch that. Ship. I
Speaker 1: generally don't find the algorithm does anything for me, although
Speaker 1: for my sister and my mom who are like obsessed
Speaker 1: with k dramas for like now and my whole Netflix
Speaker 1: now is just like they used my profile and so
Speaker 1: it only recommends me. We're gonna give you an opportunity
Speaker 1: to take that again. We don't want Netflix to hear
Speaker 1: about that that you guys are sharing a past where
Speaker 1: they're gonna come from you. I don't know. We have
Speaker 1: a family and ship down the outside of his family account,
Speaker 1: multiple profiles, they just choose to use my profile each
Speaker 1: that that is very frustrating. And now it's just it like,
Speaker 1: you know, Kate, look nothing against K dramas. I've just
Speaker 1: you know, I've never watched one. I've watched it in
Speaker 1: passing with them, but now I need Curate. Now I
Speaker 1: have no choice. K dramas are Korean dramas, like the
Speaker 1: Korean soap Yeah, my wife that that is my wife,
Speaker 1: like my wife's big guilty pleasure on her. They're popular,
Speaker 1: They're very popular, Yeah, they are. We don't have the
Speaker 1: thing that is like just right in between, you know,
Speaker 1: like primetime you know dramas actually like almost HBO dramas,
Speaker 1: and then like fucking soap operas, like just the lowest
Speaker 1: of the low soap operas, and they are just churning
Speaker 1: that ship out right at that level. It's like fifty
Speaker 1: of each and they're they're crushing it. Well, I think
Speaker 1: what also not on the Apple TV, but I've seen
Speaker 1: on like the Samsung TVs they put like the top
Speaker 1: ten and AND's some different regions or whatever. I actually
Speaker 1: find that to be the most useful, like you know,
Speaker 1: not their recommendations like, just tell me what the top
Speaker 1: ten is. I'll probably watch something within that. What are
Speaker 1: the most popular shows that everybody else is watching, which
Speaker 1: is kind of curated to some degree, Like okay, like
Speaker 1: I'll go I'll watch that, you know, I'll take a
Speaker 1: look at it. I don't know why that is, Poppa.
Speaker 1: I mean they know about the idea of like the curation.
Speaker 1: Xbox game passes apparently very good at this. Like gamers
Speaker 1: say that they have like a curated selection of games,
Speaker 1: and they're like pulling hidden gems out that people really value,
Speaker 1: Like people are like, oh ship, Like you guys are
Speaker 1: really nailing this. So it makes it easy to interact
Speaker 1: with new stuff when it's put in front of you
Speaker 1: in like limited quantities, not like your seven hundred free games.
Speaker 1: This one. It's like here the fucking five we think
Speaker 1: are good. And I think like even to what you're saying, Imatine,
Speaker 1: like even Jack, like we we all kind of say
Speaker 1: the same thing, and I'm probably saying for you, Paul's
Speaker 1: like you kind of need like these three or four
Speaker 1: friends to tell you to watch something, and then that
Speaker 1: you hit the tipping point, you're like, Okay, now I'll
Speaker 1: do it because We're already an environment where it's like
Speaker 1: there's already a few shows I don't need prompting or
Speaker 1: encouragement to go see, Like seldom is like oh when
Speaker 1: that's out, I'm watching it, And if it is, it's
Speaker 1: usually trash reality TV. But other than that, like good
Speaker 1: stuff I need like Anna, I need Jack, I need
Speaker 1: my other couple other friends of people to suggest something,
Speaker 1: and then I'm like, oh, okay, that's the We've reached
Speaker 1: the suggestion typic. I think, you know, I think Euphoria
Speaker 1: was a good example of this where I know Euphoria
Speaker 1: most people started that I you started watching and started
Speaker 1: watching it in season two and started telling people about it,
Speaker 1: and I started paying attention to it on TikTok because
Speaker 1: it was like all these scenes that would pop up
Speaker 1: on TikTok. I had no idea what the show was.
Speaker 1: It just looked kind of like, you know, dark and
Speaker 1: fucked up, and then you would hear the soundtrack with
Speaker 1: like Labyrinth constantly, and then over this period of time,
Speaker 1: like season two comes out, boom, everyone I know is
Speaker 1: watching it. It's just like it's like the word of
Speaker 1: mouth phenomenon, especially with social um and I think Euporia
Speaker 1: was like, now what, it's like one of the biggest
Speaker 1: shows um in the US or I don't know about
Speaker 1: the world, but it's definitely one of the biggest shows
Speaker 1: in the US. There was another, uh strategically questionable decision
Speaker 1: Netflix made where they like turned off the ability of
Speaker 1: screen capit and it was like they like, all right,
Speaker 1: you know what our issue is. I know people are
Speaker 1: concerned about the subscriber numbers, but I think our problem
Speaker 1: is that we're too cool, and we're like we need
Speaker 1: to be just like way less cool and let let
Speaker 1: fewer people share pass where it's fewer memes about our content.
Speaker 1: So if you trend screen capital or just be a
Speaker 1: black screen and yeah, just drilled down on those things.
Speaker 1: Posts and well everybody loves ads though, that's the thing
Speaker 1: you have to understand. I'd pay more for ads the
Speaker 1: but with like as we as we are like hitting
Speaker 1: this like peak content world, I just feel like there's
Speaker 1: I I am so reliant on recommendations, like Miles was saying,
Speaker 1: and there's we're split between so many different things. I
Speaker 1: feel like it's going to be harder and harder to
Speaker 1: generate those Like I guess Severance was the last one
Speaker 1: that like really seemed to I think my thresholds like
Speaker 1: five six people recommending it. I think people want I
Speaker 1: think there's need for more. I think there's a supply
Speaker 1: issue here. Like I think we just want more good ship.
Speaker 1: It takes us a while to get into it. Once
Speaker 1: we're into it. It's like I keep hearing about slow Horses.
Speaker 1: One more person tells me about slow Horses, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: watch it, you know. One more person tells me about Severance.
Speaker 1: I will watch it. Those are two shows I haven't
Speaker 1: seen yet, but now more and more people recommend it.
Speaker 1: Slow Horses the very first thing committed to film where
Speaker 1: the guys riding a horse and whether whether his feet
Speaker 1: leave the ground. Even when you said that, I'm like, slow,
Speaker 1: Like maybe I guess maybe I get the name rock.
Speaker 1: It's the some detective show, spy fiction. Slow Horses. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean this is a real show. But again, I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm so overwhelmed by the amount of thing that's so
Speaker 1: I'm like, I guess, like what you're saying is there's
Speaker 1: if there isn't a demand issue, there's a supply issue.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I don't know. Maybe because I don't have
Speaker 1: the same like blocks of space to like consistently consume
Speaker 1: many shows. Um or I don't know. I think I
Speaker 1: want to say it's many. I think it's like that
Speaker 1: one show. It's not like multiple shows. It's like, what
Speaker 1: is the show you want to spend your time on? Now? Okay,
Speaker 1: it hasn't hit me yet. I'm just gonna wait for
Speaker 1: the next one. So I saw a headline about slow
Speaker 1: horses and then I just heard you mention it. Now
Speaker 1: it's just gonna take nine more people to mention. But
Speaker 1: I am at the point. And this is how I
Speaker 1: know content fatigua is real. For me that when you
Speaker 1: just said that, I got a little bit mad at you.
Speaker 1: Come the fuck on slow horses? It was like, the
Speaker 1: fuck got a great cast. It's got a great cast. Yeah, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: of course we should do group doing together and make
Speaker 1: a judgment. I don't know what you guys think that.
Speaker 1: There's also, like, you know, people can do social events
Speaker 1: again where they couldn't really do that for a year
Speaker 1: a year and a half. Like there's concerts and you
Speaker 1: can go to live sporting events, and I've been doing
Speaker 1: a lot more of that the past couple of months.
Speaker 1: So that also adds to it, like March, April, June. Whatever.
Speaker 1: All you can do is stream, right, and now you
Speaker 1: can do more stuff. The movies that are coming out
Speaker 1: are great, like the Top Gun movies coming out. I
Speaker 1: don't know for some reason, the top of the fact
Speaker 1: of the Top Gun movies finally coming out. I'm like, WHOA,
Speaker 1: movies are back, baby, and it's advertised I'll over the NBA.
Speaker 1: So that might be is that trailer must like that
Speaker 1: trailer was like originally pre COVID. I think that came
Speaker 1: out right. All right, let's take a quick break. We'll
Speaker 1: come back and talk about the Multiverse of Madness and
Speaker 1: we're back. Did you guys see Doctor Strange too? That?
Speaker 1: Do we have the number? Right? It is to Yeah,
Speaker 1: I went and saw it, Paul, Did you see it yet?
Speaker 1: I have not seen it yet. Definitely see it. You
Speaker 1: used to you. I know you're a lawyer at Marvel.
Speaker 1: What what was sort of what what kind of things
Speaker 1: are you doing over there? I was doing a lot
Speaker 1: of different things. I was doing business affairs, so actor, writer,
Speaker 1: director deals for the films and television shows. I was
Speaker 1: doing all the production legal on the film. So like
Speaker 1: basically from pre production, production, post production, all those different
Speaker 1: agreements like location agreements, equipment, um VFX, everything like anything
Speaker 1: to think of travel, even booking the private jets for
Speaker 1: the talent that didn't want to fly first class or whatever.
Speaker 1: So there's like a separate group at Disney that did that.
Speaker 1: I did corporate stuff, real estate, random stuff, merchandise license,
Speaker 1: thousands of license agreements for you know, putting Spider Man
Speaker 1: on backpacks and T shirts and stuff like that. So
Speaker 1: really I was there for it was six years. I
Speaker 1: did a ton of different things. So you yeah, you
Speaker 1: were there. It's heaviest period. Yeah, I was there from
Speaker 1: if you want to Iron Man Too coming out being
Speaker 1: released to uh cap Civil War going into pre production.
Speaker 1: Basically like that's great. So what this movie is significant
Speaker 1: from a like licensing perspective, right, because isn't there like
Speaker 1: X Men crossovers happening in this one? Yeah? So this
Speaker 1: is the first. Uh So Kevin five you for those
Speaker 1: that don't know, is the kind of the creative head
Speaker 1: of the Marvel Cinematic universe, and he actually got his
Speaker 1: start working on Superman and I think X Men films
Speaker 1: which were licensed out. So for a long time, the
Speaker 1: film rights to the X Men characters, who who are
Speaker 1: Marvel comic characters were controlled by Fox, and Disney bought
Speaker 1: Fox a cup years ago, so now Disney, who owns Marvel,
Speaker 1: and Fox are under the same corporate umbrella. So now
Speaker 1: the Marvel creative team can use the X Men and
Speaker 1: Doctor Strange too. Is the first movie where they're able
Speaker 1: to sort of freely incorporate them, right that makes sense? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: So mash what what What are your thoughts how they do?
Speaker 1: From a fan perspective, I thought it was a fun movie.
Speaker 1: I thought it was a blast. I went in there
Speaker 1: didn't have much expect I tried not to watch many
Speaker 1: of the trailers because I didn't want spoilers because, honestly, man,
Speaker 1: of these trailers, now I get it, you're trying to
Speaker 1: get people in theaters, but they just give you all
Speaker 1: the surprises and it ruins the whole movie. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: I heard Patrick Stewart's voice in a trailer and I
Speaker 1: was like what, yeah, and it's like and then you know,
Speaker 1: and like I won't say with you any other spoilers,
Speaker 1: but you know, especially with like fandom now, like people
Speaker 1: are like leaking stuff and it's like just go and
Speaker 1: enjoy the movie, have some fun. This is the first
Speaker 1: time I went to normal we go to an Imax
Speaker 1: in Midtown, but we went to our local man. Buddy
Speaker 1: and I went to our local Williamsburg cinema, which was
Speaker 1: a lot of fun because people were like yelling at
Speaker 1: the screen and it was clapping. Honestly fun movie. I
Speaker 1: thought the interesting thing about the movie besides um, you know,
Speaker 1: some interesting character developments, was that it really shows Disney
Speaker 1: and Paul and I talked about this recently on our
Speaker 1: show where we talked about the like the the master
Speaker 1: planning of Disney Plus and how if you haven't watched
Speaker 1: Wan Division or what if going into the movie, you're
Speaker 1: watching it after because you need context one way or
Speaker 1: the other. You need to watch the Disney Plus context
Speaker 1: at the content that gives you context for the movies.
Speaker 1: And it's I mean to design it in a way
Speaker 1: like that. Just from a business perspective and a content perspective.
Speaker 1: I just think it's pretty cool, right. It makes sense
Speaker 1: that you have like it's truly all many people consume.
Speaker 1: It's like I can get all of my like Marvel
Speaker 1: Jolly's like, yeah, pretty much here. But the flip side
Speaker 1: of that though, is like, and this is my wife's issue,
Speaker 1: is like I can't watch fifteen hours worth of stuff
Speaker 1: to go see a movie with you anything, right, Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I only really watched the movies occasionally, and I feel
Speaker 1: like I can pick up on what's happening most of
Speaker 1: the time, and that's not really necessarily like I can
Speaker 1: kind of intuit it. But yeah, I think that's my
Speaker 1: design too, though. I think it's like they just give
Speaker 1: you enough where if you're new, they still want like
Speaker 1: a new person to come in and be able to
Speaker 1: watch it. But to Paul's point, um, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it is a lot you have to just kind of
Speaker 1: watch it, like I watch it when it comes out,
Speaker 1: so I'm not catching up right before the movie. Like, hey, Paul,
Speaker 1: have you watched like thirty hours of these shows so
Speaker 1: you can go to the movie? You have to go
Speaker 1: to the YouTube. Yeah, he's got you know, four in
Speaker 1: the morning, he's still doing contract negotiations and stuff, and
Speaker 1: I'm sitting there telling about how Great Moon Night is. Alright,
Speaker 1: So I don't want spoilers. I don't want to ask
Speaker 1: you like how strange is doctor or how madness the
Speaker 1: multiverse is. But um, so on. One thing that's happening
Speaker 1: in the discourse just constantly, like now with everything, is
Speaker 1: that the I guess the right is claiming this movie
Speaker 1: is like, uh, this one has a woman who's bad
Speaker 1: and we are the party of misogyny. I think they're
Speaker 1: just like openly like that's us now. Um so yeah,
Speaker 1: there we go, We're team this movie. Also, Sam Ramy
Speaker 1: apparently like donated to George W. Bush and may have
Speaker 1: been a Trump supporter, but we don't know the details
Speaker 1: of that. But some of the arguments around this actually
Speaker 1: like bring up interesting stuff. I don't I don't think
Speaker 1: it's interesting to be like this movie is wholly bad
Speaker 1: or wholly good, or that it is this movie it's dangerous.
Speaker 1: Like it's a movie. It needs to have interesting ideas
Speaker 1: in it for me to like watch it and then
Speaker 1: think about it later. And it does seem like there's
Speaker 1: a trend of the bad guys in Marvel movies having
Speaker 1: compelling points of view that are like I remember that
Speaker 1: from the First Avengers when like Loki came through and
Speaker 1: like you know, he like ultimately he's about like fascism
Speaker 1: and authoritarianism, but like he put it in a way
Speaker 1: that I was like, that was like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: are they trying to get people on board with with
Speaker 1: what he's saying? Like they did. They did a good
Speaker 1: job writing him in a way that like I feel
Speaker 1: like other past previous superhero movies might not have done.
Speaker 1: But now people are pointing out that like Thanos quotes
Speaker 1: a bunch of like environmentalism like talking points, kill Monger
Speaker 1: like is explicitly associated with the like militant American Black
Speaker 1: Panther Party, and people are like it is Marvel like
Speaker 1: trying to send an overall message that, like, you know,
Speaker 1: the the Avengers are here to like bring things back
Speaker 1: to a safe status quo. I don't think that means.
Speaker 1: I think that's an interesting conversation without saying like, so
Speaker 1: don't see these movies. You know, Miles, did you you
Speaker 1: you objected to my my take the Loki had some
Speaker 1: interesting things to say. No, it's just it's I think
Speaker 1: it's like, you know, partially like writing right old superhero
Speaker 1: films was always like here's good guy and here's bad guy.
Speaker 1: Don't fucking worry about this full backstory. He's fucking bad,
Speaker 1: and don't worry, Superman is gonna beat the ship. Out
Speaker 1: of him. For you, it was like kind of like
Speaker 1: the energy we took into it, and then over time
Speaker 1: like there was this you know, there's more nuance to
Speaker 1: writing like characters we think are bad or evil, you know,
Speaker 1: and giving them a little more depth or texture. And
Speaker 1: I think part of that does end up being like
Speaker 1: how do we this guy who has some really problematic
Speaker 1: ideas about the world more relatable because then we're kind
Speaker 1: of pulling out that there that this isn't just like
Speaker 1: a very one dimensional evil character. But I think on
Speaker 1: the other side of that coin is someone who is
Speaker 1: like not really thinking very critically will be like, yep,
Speaker 1: exactly that part, dude, and therefore funk everybody who believes
Speaker 1: the environmental talking points or that like eternal growth is unsustainable.
Speaker 1: I think was one of the things Stan has talked about.
Speaker 1: But also think of how many how many memes from
Speaker 1: conservatism far right wing figures involve the m c U.
Speaker 1: You know, like this is very popular stuff that everyone
Speaker 1: is watching and for whatever, I mean, I think it's
Speaker 1: like when it's just I don't know, maybe if it's
Speaker 1: like a Rorschach test that like any of these people
Speaker 1: just look at it like and this is how I
Speaker 1: can make it a thing to reinforce my world. But
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't, I don't. I'm necessarily I
Speaker 1: don't think there's a concerted effort, but who knows. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, more sinister things have happened, so you know
Speaker 1: whether the comparison of social commentary political categories, like everybody
Speaker 1: wants to claim something or get creative with it. I
Speaker 1: mean ship when I was in college. First year in college,
Speaker 1: we had like writing classes on you know how X
Speaker 1: TV show is compared to like this historical event and
Speaker 1: you have to write about it and almost come up
Speaker 1: with creative ways to like compare the two. I'm sure
Speaker 1: there's some like old school, there's you know, inspiration and right,
Speaker 1: certain characters. I think the interesting thing that we see
Speaker 1: now that either people want to claim something politically, but
Speaker 1: in the case of these characters, I think one it
Speaker 1: seems that there's a conscious effort to be like, Okay,
Speaker 1: the world we live in now is to be more
Speaker 1: inclusive too. By the way, there's multiple like you know,
Speaker 1: they introduced this whole concept of variants, like there's different
Speaker 1: versions of the same person. So the one villain could
Speaker 1: actually be a good version in a different world. And
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's actually being pushed to cover
Speaker 1: all these potential like historic tracts of writing. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think if you want, anyone could watch
Speaker 1: these movies and these characters and claim it in however
Speaker 1: way they would want. Would be my opinion on it.
Speaker 1: You could flip it either way. Paul, you were at Marvel,
Speaker 1: was there? Did you ever have to like do a
Speaker 1: licensing deal with like Green Peace to be like, you
Speaker 1: guys are gonna be our bad guys in this next movie. No,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's an interesting question. We uh, I think listen,
Speaker 1: there are there are relationships you don't want to uh
Speaker 1: influence negatively, right, So for example, you know, it's a
Speaker 1: business at the end of the day. I think people
Speaker 1: have to read like they're not trying to necessarily make
Speaker 1: a cultural statement. If they can, great, but like the
Speaker 1: objective is to maximize revenue, maximize merchandise sales. Uh. And
Speaker 1: so you know there's a time and I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: say whether it was Marvel, but there are studios right
Speaker 1: that before they finalize the script, they'll have a pre
Speaker 1: screening where executives from Walmart or Target or whoever will
Speaker 1: come in and watch and say, Okay, well maybe I
Speaker 1: could fit this many toys in my in my aisle,
Speaker 1: right or I like this part of it. And so
Speaker 1: you know, there's there's a commercial element, I think, which
Speaker 1: which drives a lot of this. Uh. And I think
Speaker 1: the ror check test, uh that that that that idea
Speaker 1: that you know, people will make of it what they will, right,
Speaker 1: they'll they'll they'll take cues because I think the idea
Speaker 1: is to sort of hit it close to the middle,
Speaker 1: not really offend anyone, maximize revenue, make a statement if
Speaker 1: you can, but that's not really the objective. And on
Speaker 1: the black Panther side, I mean I thought I left
Speaker 1: that movie Rest in Peace Chad with Boseman thinking kill
Speaker 1: Monger was the best character, right, Like he not that
Speaker 1: I necessarily resonated with him, but he was like an
Speaker 1: awesome guy and I didn't. I mean, his politics, as
Speaker 1: his vendetta, his anger were kind of all justified given
Speaker 1: the background and what he sort of went through growing up.
Speaker 1: So um, yeah, I think you could look at it
Speaker 1: and say that he was glorified in a lot of ways. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess I guess it's that that's a really good point.
Speaker 1: And like the reading of this that I disagree with.
Speaker 1: That's like Marvel is bad because they're the good guys
Speaker 1: in that are you know, conservative is like, well, they're
Speaker 1: making movies with like interesting ideas in them being played
Speaker 1: by our most charismatic actors, you know, like Michael B.
Speaker 1: Jordan's and then yeah, like the bad guys are like
Speaker 1: where where to put the fun stuff? Like Keith Ledger's
Speaker 1: Joker Hans Gruber to my favorite. Yeah, well, I root
Speaker 1: for them to be on on screen more. And like,
Speaker 1: you know, part they don't have to make sense, Like
Speaker 1: the fact that they're on screen only to like pop
Speaker 1: up say something badass and then like kill someone makes
Speaker 1: it a much easier character to write and be awesome
Speaker 1: and be cool, and and like the fact as long
Speaker 1: as they're you know, philosophy sounds badass, Like it doesn't
Speaker 1: need to hold together. Like the fact that the Joker
Speaker 1: is an agent of chaos and also has the most
Speaker 1: meticulously planned like just forty parts schemes you know, constantly
Speaker 1: swirling around him. It doesn't make sense, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: have to because it's just like how antagonists work in movies.
Speaker 1: But vergence of the anti hero, right, Like we just
Speaker 1: generally like those weird characters that are like the dead
Speaker 1: Pools through Wolverines, like a Don Draper, Like they're likable
Speaker 1: but not likable Bain. We like like these characters. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he made really high pitched voices. Fucking awesome. Man. You man,
Speaker 1: that's so interesting about the movies having to go through
Speaker 1: like a a focus group of executives, because anytime I've
Speaker 1: been involved with the creative project that needs to be
Speaker 1: focus grouped by a brand, it's not good for the ye.
Speaker 1: The notes are usually pretty pretty wild. So I don't
Speaker 1: know that that explains something. Well, what'd you say, like
Speaker 1: that is the benefit of Marvel is just Kevin Figi
Speaker 1: is it can he's an executive, but he's also like
Speaker 1: the creative vision behind it also, like he can make
Speaker 1: both decisions. Yeah, exactly. Like And I'm not suggesting that
Speaker 1: it was Marvel or that there would be like a
Speaker 1: complete rewrite at the you know, behest of a corporate
Speaker 1: executive for Walmart. I'm just saying that, you know, on
Speaker 1: the margins, maybe there's a thumb on the scale. Maybe
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, if you could fit this this, you know,
Speaker 1: this gun or this toy gun, whatever would sell really well.
Speaker 1: Or oh, it's get another shot of this hammer in
Speaker 1: here a little bit longer because we're gonna make this
Speaker 1: plush hammer or that whatever that has growth or hammer
Speaker 1: that was sold out forever. I mean, I'm just saying,
Speaker 1: like on in the margins, that could that could be
Speaker 1: a part of it, but it's not. I don't I
Speaker 1: gets driving anyone's like creatively. And I also don't think
Speaker 1: that you know, if if Kevin are a creative exactly
Speaker 1: we're like, no, I don't want to you know, focus
Speaker 1: on this or feature this this piece of merchandise, then
Speaker 1: they wouldn't do it. But ultimately, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: cooks in the kitchen. The creative head is going to
Speaker 1: have final say. But it's and to to Miles point
Speaker 1: that these stories are a lot more nuanced than they
Speaker 1: were twenty years ago because you're making three of them
Speaker 1: a year or four of them a year, and there
Speaker 1: you know, two hundred million dollar budgets, so they can't
Speaker 1: just be uh, you know, very plain vanilla anymore. Right, Yeah, yeah, me,
Speaker 1: because they were so formulate, and I think that maybe
Speaker 1: the reason why people even began to crave an anti
Speaker 1: heroo more is because I felt like our the good
Speaker 1: guy bad guy buying arey became so formulaic. They're like,
Speaker 1: here we go, inciting incident. The bad guy came to town.
Speaker 1: Now the good guys got to figure it out. And
Speaker 1: then in the final battle, he's gonna lose real bad
Speaker 1: in the beginning, and then he's gonna pull it out
Speaker 1: at the end. And I think the ebb and flow
Speaker 1: of that may have gotten a little bit stale. And
Speaker 1: I think why even like, even like James Bond, when
Speaker 1: Daniel Craig started playing James Bond, like they were even like,
Speaker 1: this guy's kind of fucked up, you know. Yeah, But
Speaker 1: I was like, no, I like this. As a younger viewer,
Speaker 1: I was like, this is dope, because this this, this
Speaker 1: is what exactly I don't like to see these people
Speaker 1: is just like I feel nothing. I do everything the
Speaker 1: same every day. I kill people. Plenty of women's lives
Speaker 1: are lost because of my actions, and I'm fine the
Speaker 1: narial disease, right, but I am blonde hair, now what
Speaker 1: the fuck? Yeah? But I mean I think all those
Speaker 1: things kind of come together and begin to sort of
Speaker 1: shape all those things, and I think to the what
Speaker 1: you're saying about brands coming in and looking at things
Speaker 1: of course, like these are all these are all revenue
Speaker 1: generating endeavors. And even like we've talked about in the past,
Speaker 1: Jack about how the Pentagon can even get involved with
Speaker 1: things when you equipment that like, yeah, sometimes they will
Speaker 1: have real notes um to to weigh in because of
Speaker 1: you know, there there's a there's a relationship there. But
Speaker 1: I think, uh yeah, looking at all of those things together,
Speaker 1: it's you kind of get a better understanding of like, well,
Speaker 1: is it so sinister? Is it more just like no,
Speaker 1: we kind of got to make it sort of nebulous,
Speaker 1: so the most amount of people come and say they
Speaker 1: like it and continue to like it. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: up until very recently, like the Pentagon was still like
Speaker 1: top Gun is still our best recruiting tool, like has
Speaker 1: has been, continues to be is and now they have
Speaker 1: a sequel coming out and war were they fighting? They weren't.
Speaker 1: It was just it was like unnamed bad guy, this
Speaker 1: is this is a hot Yeah. Yeah, well yeah, this
Speaker 1: has been. It's been really fun having you on Paul
Speaker 1: Paul where you can people find you, follow you, hear
Speaker 1: you all that good stuff, so better called Paul. The
Speaker 1: podcast is Instagram. Uh, and then it's PAULA say hi,
Speaker 1: Lola is my email and the podcast is better called Paul.
Speaker 1: So I don't know where you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, Stitcher,
Speaker 1: you name it. We've never had anyone give their email
Speaker 1: or people just able to hit you up. We have
Speaker 1: we have an email so they can hit Paul's specific
Speaker 1: got it? Okay, damn? All right, you have some curious,
Speaker 1: curious listeners about your time there. Uh, Mesh, how about you? Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: check out the podcast better called Paul. I'm at Mesh
Speaker 1: Lakhani on Twitter and uh, always happy to engage with
Speaker 1: folks and really appreciate you guys having a son. This
Speaker 1: is a lot of fun. Yes, fun. Conversations are great,
Speaker 1: very very informed. And is there a tweet or some
Speaker 1: of the work of social media you guys have been enjoying.
Speaker 1: I actually had a couple here um that I took
Speaker 1: down that I found a good one today. Did not notice.
Speaker 1: I felt like an idiot when I read this, but
Speaker 1: someone wrote, I've been on Twitter since two thousand nine.
Speaker 1: I'm just now realizing the home button is a birdhouse.
Speaker 1: I laughed out loud because that did not occur to
Speaker 1: me until today. Um. And then uh, yeah, I know
Speaker 1: there's another one of someone said there will never be
Speaker 1: another product that inspires me so much, that inspires so
Speaker 1: much envy and me as the original iPod did back
Speaker 1: in two thousand one, and it was just like a
Speaker 1: picture of it, and I thought that was actually cool
Speaker 1: because it was so innovative. And since then, you know,
Speaker 1: like things have gotten a little boring. But yeah, man,
Speaker 1: those are two tweets that I found today that the
Speaker 1: other one is really about bear markets and stuff. But
Speaker 1: I won't bore everybody with that ship. And they they
Speaker 1: just discontinue the iPod, right, that was the big, big
Speaker 1: news that what happened. Oh, I didn't even realize that.
Speaker 1: I didn't even know they sold iPods anymore. So I
Speaker 1: just thought I thought it all became an iPod touch
Speaker 1: at a certain point. Yeah, exactly, and they just can't
Speaker 1: didn't discontinue to touch. Yeah, I think they're discontinuing all
Speaker 1: you were not allowed to say the word iPod anymore,
Speaker 1: but please Yeah, now you have to buy a new
Speaker 1: phone that has a head foot jack headphone jack from
Speaker 1: your old headphones that just did not work. And then
Speaker 1: now we have to buy another that their real troll movies.
Speaker 1: It's going to have the headphone jack from the first
Speaker 1: iPod that had a remote on the thing. So it
Speaker 1: was like that like three and a half million being
Speaker 1: plus like a circular thing to send the data for
Speaker 1: the remote. That's how they're gonna suck us. That's it.
Speaker 1: That's it. But I got mine on deck. Miles, where
Speaker 1: can people find you? What's a tweet you've been enjoying?
Speaker 1: Man find me on Twitter and Instagram at Miles of Gray.
Speaker 1: That's great with an A. And also, if you like basketball,
Speaker 1: check out the basketball show Miles and Jack Got Mad Boosties.
Speaker 1: It's an NBA podcast official. You know they decided to
Speaker 1: get in get involved with two rapscallions like us. And
Speaker 1: also if you like a trash reality check out my
Speaker 1: other show for twenty day Fiance. Uh. Some tweets that
Speaker 1: I like. First one is from a m E Chopper
Speaker 1: at Melick tom Is tweeted this buzz light your this
Speaker 1: buzz light. You're moving going to be good until you
Speaker 1: got to do an origin story for Woody and we
Speaker 1: find out he was a slave overseer at a cotton
Speaker 1: plantation in Antebellum, Texas. Uh. And this one another one
Speaker 1: is from g cush Baby tweeted a party, but everyone
Speaker 1: brings potatoes prepared a different way. Yeah. I like that. Well,
Speaker 1: we we know that what the difference between the fries
Speaker 1: between Miles and Paul are gonna be yea rare the
Speaker 1: other is gonna be or like I'll take an old
Speaker 1: Plato thing, like the old McDonald's plato potatoes in it
Speaker 1: and just be like, here're the fries. You can find
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Jack Underscore Brian to tweet up and
Speaker 1: enjoying Paris at so hilarious. Hilton tweeted me having remembered
Speaker 1: girls like it when you asked them questions what's your problem?
Speaker 1: And uh and then just gotta give it up, Mariam
Speaker 1: Posner giving it up for footnotes, reading a book with
Speaker 1: footnotes instead of and notes and sorry, haters, it's so
Speaker 1: much better, It's true. Yeah. So from now on, we
Speaker 1: will be just doing the citations in the episode right
Speaker 1: right when we read from an article, well, I will
Speaker 1: be reading off the U R L. Yes, the text
Speaker 1: http dot com and then what the fell tweeted on
Speaker 1: a lot of things, But first and foremost, I'm a
Speaker 1: Taco Bell customer. And oh and Skyler Higley tweeted, the
Speaker 1: star spangled banner sounds like it was made up on
Speaker 1: the spot and oh say can you see it? Sounds
Speaker 1: like yeah, put on the spot real early in the morning. Yeah,
Speaker 1: by the uh. You can find us on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Daily's like guys were at the Daily's like guys on Instagram.
Speaker 1: We have Facebook fan page and a website, Daily zi
Speaker 1: guys dot com, where we post our episodes. On our
Speaker 1: foot notes, we link off to the information that we
Speaker 1: talked about in today's episode, as well as a song
Speaker 1: that we think you might enjoy. Myles, what song do
Speaker 1: we think people might enjoy? Oh, let's go out on
Speaker 1: one of my favorite producers from Australia, Taku And this
Speaker 1: is a track called make You Want To And it's
Speaker 1: just good dancy sample based beats. Uh. You should like them.
Speaker 1: They're good and a taco in general check if you're
Speaker 1: not familiar with tacu. Uh. Really great artists can't recommend
Speaker 1: him enough? All right? Well, The Daily Zey Guys is
Speaker 1: a production of my Heart Radio. From more podcasts from
Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app. Apple
Speaker 1: Podcast or wherever you listen your favorite shows. That is
Speaker 1: going to do it for us this morning. We're back
Speaker 1: this afternoon to tell you what is trending and we
Speaker 1: will talk to you all then by