#153. 'Puss in Boots: The Last Wish'
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The main event is Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, and JVL is thoroughly charmed, calling it a real movie about mortality and midlife crisis delivered with an incredibly light touch, comparing it favorably to Paddington 2 and singling out villain Jack Horner's unicorn-horn crossbow and a death-obsessed Jiminy Cricket as sensationally funny. Sonny liked it more than he expected but stops a notch short of JVL's ardor, praising the painterly, impressionist animation style (which he compares to both Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and The Bad Guys) and noting the film's surprisingly heavy theme that death is what gives life meaning. Guest third chair Sean — JVL's brother-in-law, sitting in for this episode — also enjoyed it, and both he and Sonny report their theater audiences laughing throughout, with JVL's crowd even breaking into applause at the end. The episode opens with a long stretch of holiday banter: Sonny's Christmas haul of Sony noise-canceling headphones and God of War Ragnarök, a miserable multi-week flea infestation battle with his dog, and the remarkable coincidence that JVL and Sean each independently gave the other a Lego Optimus Prime set, which spirals into an extended Transformers toy-quality and movie tangent (JVL watched three Michael Bay Transformers films over break with his son G-money) plus a discussion of Avatar: The Way of Water's runaway box office and shaky in-universe economics. They close out with a Shrek-nostalgia detour, including a hate-watch recommendation for the Shrek the Musical film on Netflix and a shared drubbing of Disney's Strange World.
From the show notes
Death gives meaning to life and other lessons all children must learn.
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00They found me. Goldilocks and the Three Bears crying funnily. Make a talk. Excuse me, my darling. We're looking for the legendary Puss in Boots. Have you perhaps seen him? What's a Puss in Boots? He is me! Normally, I have a sore. It's like a whole thing, you know? Okay. Get that cat. Dead or alive will be just right. Bounty hunters.
JVL00:00:42Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Sub-Beacon. I'm JVL here with Sonny Bunch and sitting in for us in the third chair today. We do have a surprise permanent host coming, but you people have to wait for it. It's my brother-in-law, Sean. Sean. Say hello to the people. Hello, people. It's a pleasure to be here with these two legends. So Sean is a regular listener of the show in addition to to the best brother-in-law ever. And he's here because he and I went to see together the movie which we are going to talk about later today, Puss in Boots. But, Sonny, I want I want to ask, how was your Christmas? Was it great? Was it glorious? Filled with commerce?
Sonny00:01:31Was it was a it was a happy Bezos Christmas. I will say that, you know, before Christmas, I had texted you. I asked what the the Sony wireless headphones you use are. I don't know. What are you what what are what on earth are you?
JVL00:01:47Oh, you like this?
Sonny00:01:49Don't first off, don't eat into the mic. That's oh, it's a bit whatever.
JVL00:01:53It's a bit on your fingers that you're doing. This is my second doing my second favorite Christmas present. Look at these. That's like finger look at these snack that they're like finger chopsticks. They're called snack tives and they all chopsticks or finger chopsticks.
Sonny00:02:08No, no, these are they they clip on to your fingers.
JVL00:02:11And so you can type I can type and work at my desk. And then if I would like to be snacking, I don't have to touch the food with my grubby little fingers, and I don't have to put down a fork. You pick up a fork and then put down a fork, pick up and put down. No, the chopsticks just live in my fingers. I live on my fingers and I work and I type and I write and I edit. And then when I want to eat, I these things are so great. I'm not taking them with me basically everywhere I go.
Sonny00:02:39So if you were to the movies, it's unhealthy. This is an unhealthy way to live. The whole point of of having meals is to have some time to get away from your computer and sit there and look at your phone like a civilized person. I feel like this would be a great idea if you stayed in your basement all day and played like World of Warcraft and all you did was eat like Cheetos or cheese puffs, so you don't have to worry about getting the cheese up all over your PS2, PS3 or whatever. It's up to these days. I don't know.
JVL00:03:04These are 100% the type of thing that would be on Silicon Valley. If Silicon Valley was still running episodes, it's like the the chair that straps to the back of your legs so that people can just walk around and always have a chair with them.
Sonny00:03:19If Silicon Valley hadn't been replaced by reality.
JVL00:03:22Yes. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. I didn't mean to interrupt. I didn't mean this was a whole bit.
Sonny00:03:27You were you were like, I want to show off my finger chopsticks and and I want to describe to people what these actually look like. It's like a cross between Wolverine and like a woman who has very long acrylic nails that she got done at the spa and like has to type, has to like spread her fingers out and type like very delicately. Like, this is how I type. It's too bad we don't have video because you could see me doing it, but like, it's that's what those look like to me. I hear they make a version for love play acrylic fingernails. I think that's a good description, Sonny. I also thought Edward Scissorhands, but like Edward Scissorhands, Jr.
JVL00:04:11when I saw those, you know, feels a little bit like that, to be honest. Anyway, I said that was my second best present from Christmas. I'll tell you about the first after you talk, Sonny.
Sonny00:04:22Well, I just I just wanted to let people know you. You had mentioned a pair having a pair of like wireless Sony noise canceling headphones and how they really are. They're cocoon like in their their noise cancellation. So I they Amazon was having a very good Black Friday sale. I asked I told my wife, I was like, this is what I would like for Christmas. Like, I don't really need noise canceling headphones, but the ones I have I don't love. They don't they're not great. And I would like something that that really worked well. And she got those for me. And let me tell you, it really it's it's a it is a sea change in the the noise canceling ecosystem in my house to the extent that like the the other thing, the other like big present, whatever that I got for Christmas was God of War Ragnarok. And now I sit on my couch and I play God of War Ragnarok with my noise canceling headphones on and I am dead to the world. Like people will bang on the door and then nothing that nobody I don't hear. I don't hear anything. Did they come in handy during Christmas break for your children? What do you mean?
JVL00:05:26Well, I just mean, I assume that when the children are not in school and you have to work and stuff might need a little bit more noise cancellation than normal.
Sonny00:05:36No, I don't. I don't really. I don't. I didn't need it so much then. Honestly, I was able to kind of work around their nap and sleep and other various schedules, which was which was nice, though. I do. You know, it's classic. I need a vacation from my vacation syndrome. Always truth. Like, why? Why would I? I just I'm so tired of not being alone for like forty five minutes. So it's but but, you know, things that the other thing that I don't know, are we going to do weekends later or is this all? Sure.
JVL00:06:15How was your weekend? How was your weekend?
Sonny00:06:18Well, the other thing that's been very annoying is that my dog, my dog, who I love a great deal, has been, you know, with us for 11 years now. Um, good dog, very happy, friendly, but she got fleas and it's it's been a nightmare. It's just been a it's been a constant cycle of like doing laundry, vacuuming the house, washing her, um, you know, giving her various topical treatments. And I don't know if you guys are aware of I don't know if you got you don't I know JVL you don't have a dog, Sean. I don't know if you guys know have dogs. But, uh, but like there's a there's when when your dog gets fleas, one thing that you can give them is this medicine called Capstar. It's the most it's the most metal treatment for fleas that there is. Because what Capstar is, it's like a little bit of poison that your dog ingests and the poison goes into the bloodstream and then the flea eats the eats their blood. You know, that's how fleas I like the fleas, the fleas eat, eat some, eat some of the some of the dog's blood and then the fleas die. From the poison in the end. So like on the one hand, I appreciate the various, you know, advances we have made in flea murdering technology. That's great. But the but it's just been a it's been a it's been now like a solid week of like. Now we're down at least to daily baths, but for a while I was I was watching her in the morning and in the afternoon. And you like we finally we figured out, I think, where most of them were kind of coming from. She you know, she's got a little dog bed and they were there, you know, I washed it once and then I took it out and then it things weren't getting better. And I looked and they were just it was infested with disgusting little bugs.
JVL00:08:12So we got rid of that poison treatment.
Sonny00:08:13Take to work. It's almost immediate. It's like it's it's 50. I think it says on the box that it's like 50 percent effective within 30 minutes and then 90 percent effective within four hours. But the problem is it only it only works for 20 minutes. Twenty four hours because again, it's not it's like a very small amount of poison. You can't you can't give the dog lots of poison because that would be bad for the dog. But the but so anyway, that that has been that has been that is like much more annoying than the kids being home has been like the the constant struggle with trying to keep my dog clean and like having to go outside with her every time she wants to go outside and make sure she doesn't roll around in the fucking ivy where the the rabbits and the armadillos and the squirrels. And everything else play in my backyard, which again, just just a vector of the road. Yeah, I don't know. Rogue bug infestation.
JVL00:09:09I thought it's been I thought that we had developed like a shot that was basically like a flea vaccine that you give to two dogs once a year, like a flea and to give it a shot once the same way they have like a shot for heartburns, right?
Sonny00:09:26No, no. No. Because it's all it's all topical. They they stay on. They go there on the fur. So like there are things that you know, like so, you know, the reason that my dog has not had fleas, you know, the entire time that we've had her basically is that we put on a thing called Frontline. It's it's like a little topical treatment. You put it right. It's a liquid topical treatment. You put it in between the shoulder blades up top and it like kind of spreads through all of the fur and in the oils and the fleas get in there and it kills the fleas and the flea eggs. Again, I've been using that for ten years now and it's been a. It's it's been a little miracle drug. But whatever whatever band of psychotically powerful fleas that she has come into contact with somehow over the over the last couple of weeks here has just been it's been a it has been a real pain in my ass, real pain in my personal ass, including also probably my dog's ass. But I care less about that, frankly, than my own.
JVL00:10:21I feel so good about not having pets.
Sonny00:10:25Having pets is great. I mean, she's she's she's fun to have around most of the time. But God damn, this is this has been a real this has been a real annoyance. I'm I'm vexed.
JVL00:10:38Shauna, what was the best gift you received for Christmas?
Sonny00:10:43You know, I would say that other than a gift of your company for several days after Christmas, I think it's appropriate, given the film that we're going to be talking about shortly, is that my favorite gift was, in fact, a child toy or a childhood toy. I would say of the transformable Optimus Prime Lego set. And oh, my goodness, it's wondrous. And I, I have spent probably more time than I should admit assembling it instead of doing other things around the house.
JVL00:11:15One thousand five hundred and two pieces.
Sonny00:11:17It's I believe two thousand five hundred and some odd moments all to myself, which is wonderful.
JVL00:11:24So so, Sonny, what is funny? What's funny about this is that last Christmas, Sean and I planned to each get each other the the Oculus Quest, the virtual reality thing. And we have had great fun with that. This Christmas, Sean and I got each other the Lego Optimus Prime with zero coordination. Whoa, I bought this thing for him like two months ago. It has been burning a hole in my pocket. I was dying to give it to him. And we sit down to exchange Christmas presents and he hands me a present first and I open it up and there is Lego Optimus Prime and Sean, have you completed yours?
Sonny00:12:07I haven't. I'm trying to savor it like a nice whiskey or wine. You know, it's the journey for me sometimes.
JVL00:12:13Well, the destination G G money was super into this thing. And so he and I blew through it in two days and it is one of the most remarkably designed Lego sets. Right. Cause it's a really large Optimus prime and it transforms into a truck and it's just really cool.
Sonny00:12:32Better than the original toy. I'd argue.
JVL00:12:34Uh, well this is so, so this, so, so G money wanted to start watching the Michael Bay movies and I said yes. And we have just as of this evening completed the third Michael Bay transformers movie. So we saw the original transformers, we saw transformers rise of the fallen. And then transformers dark of the moon. And I have to say that the first transformers movie is weirdly kind of a classic. The second is terrible. And the third is incomprehensible and also kind of cool. I mean, in the way the transformers movies can be cool, but here's, here's what I wanted to speak to you boys about, because I also went and bought G money, a couple of transformers, toys for the selfish reason of, I didn't want him taking my Lego optimus prime and trying to play with it. Of course.
Sonny00:13:34It's fair. It's smart.
JVL00:13:36I Sonny, did you do transformers at all as a kid or is that just much too late for you?
Sonny00:13:41No, it, it just wasn't, wasn't really my thing. I was my generation of toy was like the Ghostbuster slash Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, uh, era of toy. Like I was, I was, I was really after. I mean like GI Joe's were obviously still around. Like, you know, I, I had some he bands, that sort of thing, but I was like my, my big action figures were, uh, Ninja Turtles mostly and, and, uh, Ghostbusters.
JVL00:14:12So I, I picked up G money, a bumblebee and a star scream, and I cannot believe how shitty these action figures are bad. They feel. Look like the kinds of things which McDonald's would shove into a happy meal every eight years. And I, I, I, as I was looking at them when I was, you know, he thought they were great. I was incredibly disappointed and thought to myself, am I misremembering this? Has my mind taken the original transformers toys and extrapolated them into some wondrous thing when the truth is that they were just the same. Pieces of, of plastic crap as this stuff is. And the answer is no, I went down the rabbit hole looking at the first generation transformers with star scream and, uh, Megatron, the original optimus prime. And these things had a lot of metal in them to go along with the plastic. Uh, they had decals, they had many colors, each, each thing. They had pieces that were, uh, dipped in and died, uh, in multiple colors since they were much more colorful. They had sort of Chrome stuff on them and they were heavier because again, they were, they were just more substantially made. And not only that, the transformations were more complicated. And so there was more detail on them. The original transformers toys were actually very cool and I don't know when we, we moved to this like Happy Meal bullshit transformers, but I was kind of angry, but not angry enough to spend $400 on a first generation Optimus Prime.
Sonny00:16:08I was going to ask what, what are the, what are the, what does it run you to get like an out of the box first gen Bumblebee or Optimus Prime or whatever?
JVL00:16:18So I believe you can touch those things for, uh, so long as you're not looking for the marquee players, uh, for about a hundred, $125, uh, they will be used. They will, they, you know, they'll not, you don't get them in the box. They aren't pristine. You couldn't get them graded, but you could get one to, to screw around with for 125 bucks, which to be honest is not bad. I could see that. I would not do that myself, but I could see it. You could see it. Uh, I did find in my travels, a robotics company that makes their own Optimus Prime, which is completely transformable by itself, by itself. You control Optimus Prime with, with a little app on your phone and you tell them to transform and the robot just like, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop.
Sonny00:17:13Does it make the noise truck? Yes, it makes the noise.
JVL00:17:17And then the truck is remote controlled. And when you want to go from truck to robot again, you just hit the button and the thing, you know, and stands up and he's like, I'm Optimus Prime. It's really something. I think we found next year's Christmas present, you know, that's $700. So maybe the next three, although we got each other, oh yeah, yeah, that is a partnership
Sonny00:17:41with whoever I assume it's Hasbro or whatever, whichever, whoever owns Hasbro now, it's probably like, uh, you know, a sub subsidiary of Paramount or something. I'm glad you mentioned the, uh, Sean, please. I'm glad you mentioned the, uh, the divergence in the quality because for the longest time, um, you know, I had one of the original Optimus Primes, I think it was like the one transformer that I had, um, you know, left home, whatever it's, it sat on my old bureau for years and my nephew who's 10, you know, he came up one time when I was visiting and he's like, uncle Sean, uncle Sean, look at this transformer I got. And I, I, I thought it was a go bot because go bots were always like the worst. Oh. Um, go bot for first.
JVL00:18:26Yeah. I was like, who is that?
Sonny00:18:28It's like, it's Optimus Prime. Like, no, no, no. Here, I, I have an Optimus Prime. I'll show you. And it was, it was night and day. Uh, it was funny. It was like, they're just getting cheated out of an experience of transformers, but I don't know.
JVL00:18:39Right? This is, it's absolutely crazy. And, uh, the history, the history of the transformers as a property is fascinating. They were a Japanese toy line that Hasbro bought the molds. Because they, they just thought they were interesting and they started making the toys and then they went to Marvel and they said, do you have somebody here who can just invent us a backstory for this? And there was a guy at Marvel who subcontracted to Hasbro, uh, to just write a, write a, uh, yeah, they come from Cybertron and, uh, and they, they're looking for Energon. And the Autobots were driven out by the Decepticons.
Sonny00:19:29I'm really, I mean, all this makes a lot of sense because all the names have like tossed off in a afternoon pitch session feel to them, you know, the Energon.
JVL00:19:41And that's why, uh, I will say the one thing that was funny, Flash had no interest in watching these movies, but, uh, he happened to walk past the TV while, uh, Megan Fox was leaning over the hood of Bumblebee in the first transform and he, he nearly, he damn near walked into a wall.
Sonny00:20:00He was like, what Fox has that effect on people, you know, uh, uh, Sonny, have you ever done these sort of like, I guess you could call them like higher end Lego sets, like these multi-thousand piece things, right? Like it's Lego ideas or Lego creations or something they, the instruction books are like this and it's essentially like, you know, 50 pages of the story behind whatever it is. Okay. It's like Optimus prime. And as you go through the assembly instructions, I'm not sure if you caught this, Jonathan, there was like little factoids about Optimus prime, like up in the corner of each page, it was like going back to the piece of how much time they spent making up all of this backstories, you know, it's impressive and I applaud them for it, but it was the first
JVL00:20:42appearance of his Energon acts like the Energon acts first appeared in season one, episode three of the transformers animated show. Yeah. Uh, it's, it's, it's fantastic.
Sonny00:20:57Fantastic. So you, you, did you watch, you watched the first three, uh, trans I have watched the
JVL00:21:03first three and I will, you haven't gotten a Mark Wahlberg yet. Ooh, no. And I think G money's gonna be confused. Shia LaBeouf is no longer there, Cade Yeager, Cade Yeager, uh, you know, I, so having just watched a Michael Bay movie ambulance, a couple. A couple weeks ago, I gotta say, I don't fully understand how the same guy could have directed both that and transformers two and three, because those things, I mean, if you just strip away all of the ridiculous transformers of it, they are visually incoherent by which I mean, there are large stretches where not only can you not tell what's happening, but you can't tell what is. Moving where like you don't like, you know, wait, is that where is this character physically? Where is this character? How did they get from there to here? What an ambulance is, you know, I didn't love it, but it's it's a taut, well-constructed giant set piece in which you always understand where everything is.
Sonny00:22:12There's there's always been a huge difference between Michael Bay, the guy who made like, you know, Pain and Gain. Pain or The Rock or Con Air or not Con Air, The Rock or Armageddon, right? And the Michael Bay who made the Transformers movies, the Transformers movies, even the first one, you're giving the first one a pass. And I understand that people, you know, people like it a little more, whatever. But the but all of those movies are incredibly poorly constructed pieces of filmmaking. Like I don't I do not I am a I am a total Michael Bay mark. I will apologize for him until the end of time. But those those movies, I just don't I don't they don't they do nothing for me, really, except as pure, overwhelming spectacle. I will say the one place that they do work is in a giant IMAX theater where you are like held prisoner and forced to endure all of it in. I mean, I remember watching I remember what I wrote about this in my review. View of Transformers The Last Knight, which I think is the last one he directed. And it's the one with Anthony Hopkins has it has a bit part in it. And it was it was genuinely I like I went and I watched I sat and watched it in a giant, you know, IMAX screen and I came out of the theater and I was like woozy on my feet. I was literally like kind of stumbling because it is it is an assault on the senses. And that's like the only way really to experience these sorts of pictures, I guess, compared to Ambulance, which played as not maybe not as well at home as it did in theaters, but like was at least like kind of a comparable experience. But like the the Transformer movies have always been incoherent and and like pretty much bad. Did you guys ever see do you ever watch South Park much? They did a three part series that they sort of dubbed Imagination Land. And there's this big terrorists attack our imaginations and their sequence where they're trying to like figure out how to get into Imagination Land. So they decided to bring in like movie directors like for ideas. And there's like a little bit of a montage and one of them is Michael Bay. And he's sitting at the table, all these Pentagon guys, and they're like basically for his ideas. And he like grabs a bunch of paper and pencils and he's like smashing them together and making explosion sounds like blah, blah, blah, blah, like, no, those are special effects. That's not plot. He's like, I don't understand the difference. Anyway. I always think of that when I think of Michael Bay. That's what they, that's what they, it's like, we know, we know, um, that's very, it's funny. God, the best part of that was like, uh, uh, there's, there's a, there, there's a, there is a similar vignette with Mel Gibson and Mel Gibson like lays out like a proper three act structure for how, how the, the final fight should go. They're like, yeah, he's crazy, but son of a bitch, no structure.
JVL00:25:20Exactly. Speaking of spectacle. Over the weekend, avatar to the way of water, which has no cultural impact and no cultural footprint at all, zero ticked up 6% at the box office, Sonny, I'm Ron Burgundy.
Sonny00:25:40Yeah. Uh, I mean, I, you know, it had kind of a soft open at 135 million domestic, 400 something worldwide. Um, and it has just done what James Cameron. Movies do just like racked up money, um, uh, through the whole Christmas break period, you know, it, it was making 20 million a day, 18 million a day, 24 million a day. Um, to the extent that I think that it had by, by the end, uh, at the end of the year, it had the highest, uh, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday grosses, uh, of any, of any movie, um, released in 2022. Uh, so, you know, that's, that's it. That's, that's not nothing. Um, it's gonna end up grossing 2.2, $2.4 billion, somewhere in there, probably, um, unless something crazy happens and it gets to three or four. I don't know. There's not a whole lot of competition, um, in, in the weeks ahead, we, we got a, we got a ways to go before there's another blockbuster coming out. Uh, and folks, folks want to go see this in play.
JVL00:26:47So if you want to see it in IMAX 3d or Dolby, I don't know.
Sonny00:26:51No, I don't. I don't know.
JVL00:26:53I don't know what you have.
Sonny00:26:54I don't know.
JVL00:26:55I don't know what it is. It's more than like four more weeks. Right.
Sonny00:26:58I mean, you, uh, I don't know.
JVL00:27:00I mean, I feel like there's something clear.
Sonny00:27:03There's there's something that's coming out at the end of January. I think that is like the next thing that would be an IMAX style film, but it's gonna, it's just, it's, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a monster. It, you know, it's already at a 3.3 multiple off its opening weekend. Um, it, it. It's gonna, again, it's gonna get to 2.2 to 2.4 billion, somewhere in there without doing $800 million in China, which everyone kind of assumed it would, it'll probably only end up doing 200 maybe in China and it's only at like one 30 or one 40 now. Um, so it's, it's an enormous, it's an enormous, enormous hit. It's huge. People, people have been waiting 13 years. They've been on tenterhooks waiting to return to the adventures of Jake Sully.
JVL00:27:51Uh, to see what happened with the unobtainium.
Sonny00:27:54They're gonna, there isn't even any unobtainium in this movie. It's crazy. It's crazy. They got, they got whale brain juice now that makes them immortal. I mean, I like, I can't wait to learn more about that, frankly.
JVL00:28:06Um, but the, uh, one thing as I've started nitpicking this in my head, the one thing that bugs me about it is the economic incoherence of the story, right? I mean, just the idea. That you can move, uh, that much weight out of earth through the atmosphere across the galaxy and that it's worthwhile, right? I mean, like the economics of it don't, don't work at all in, well, but, but we don't, we
Sonny00:28:42don't understand, we don't, we don't understand anything about, I mean, this is, this is the thing that again is so frustrating about the movie to me as a person. Who cares about humanity and wants to see the knobby wiped out. So humanity can thrive. Um, I don't understand anything about the actual economics of how the earth of this time works. So, I mean, like is, is Pandora the only place that we can go to? Is it, is it because it doesn't, that doesn't seem right.
JVL00:29:11It seems like they don't have a breathable atmosphere. How are we gonna, how are we gonna set up there without a breathable atmosphere?
Sonny00:29:16Right. But, but I mean, but this is the question, like, is, is there a thriving space? Colonize colonization, exploitation regime throughout the galaxy. Are we going to multiple planets and multiple places or is Pandora the only one it's, is it the only one that we found that is, uh, that is, you know, useful to humanity. Um, but like on top of that, as you say, like the, the, the atmosphere isn't breathable and there's just a tossed off line in this most recent one.
JVL00:29:43That's like earth is dying. We're gonna bring everybody to Pandora.
Sonny00:29:46What? That doesn't, that doesn't make no sense. That doesn't. We're gonna bring them to this point and which, to the extent that I thought that they were setting up some sort of like terraforming plot, I thought they were going to be like, we, uh, the, the Navi are in a struggle to the death because they have to stop the planet's
JVL00:30:02atmosphere from being changed, that would make Pandora and put up a parking lot.
Sonny00:30:07It would, it, that would make more sense from a, just from a plot mechanic standpoint. Uh, but instead it's this whales and their brain juices and the baby whales. So I haven't seen this one. The one pregnant, the one whale had fertility issues and they, you know, it was very sad when that whale died. You're missing out on all sorts of hot whale sounds fantastic. And my only question is why didn't they just get one of those like terraforming machines from the man of steel to change the atmosphere to whatever works a Kryptonian terraforming machine would have been helpful. I mean, I like, again, I, I don't, I just want to know more about what's happening on earth. I want to know more about my people and, and their, and their struggle to survive.
JVL00:30:55Because if this is Sean, I want to go see this with you so bad. I really need to go see it.
Sonny00:30:58Because look, if this is, I'm not done, I'm not, hold on. I'm not done yet because look, there's the calculus changes on who you root for in this. If it's a question of like greedy corporation comes to Pandora and tries to trade, uh, the Navi beads for their unobtainium, right? Like, okay. Then it's like simple colonialism, bad exploitation, bad. Being one with nature, good story. That's fine. I, I like, I can, I can get on board with that. And if it's just, we're coming to Pandora to steal the whale brain juice that makes the rich people immortal. Fine. I can, I can be on board with stopping that. That's, you know, again, resource exploitation, colonialism, whatever. But if it's like earth is dying. And the only place humans can go is this like literally unbreathable planets, uh, full of things and people and creatures that want to kill them. Well, then all of a sudden humans become the underdog by an enormous margin. Like I, like I, they are the actual underdog heroes of this story. If it's a fight for survival, if it's, they are, if this is the only way for humanity to go on, I don't see how you can, you know, make this a very clear cut, like, well, obviously the Navi are right. I, I, you know, coexistence can, could be a thing, but this is why Zod, this is why Zod was always actually a very interesting villain in man of steel speaking of man of steel, because like, all right, the Kryptonians need to come to earth and start over again. And they don't want to live on a planet that is like poison to them. So they're going to remake it in the form of Krypton fucked up a little bit, but at least it's understandable. I can, I like, I get it. That's a reasonable motivation.
JVL00:32:40Um, and honestly, that's the plot of transformers dark side of the moon, right?
Sonny00:32:45Yeah. They got to get the Energon. That's right. Right.
JVL00:32:49That's right. They are using, uh, Leonard Nimoy, Leonard Nimoy's, uh, Sentinel prime has decided that, uh, he's going to bring Cybertron to earth so they can repopulate the earth with, with they're going to make it Cybertron.
Sonny00:33:04I don't think I ever, I don't think I ever actually saw the third one. I, I, I, all I remember about the third one is the ads where Chicago gets destroyed. Right? That's like, yeah.
JVL00:33:14That's pretty great. You know, this is a funny thing. I'm fine. I can't believe I'm going to say this. Shia LaBeouf is the best thing about the third movie. He gives a weirdly manic and funny performance where he is constantly like fed up with everything. And it's funny.
Sonny00:33:30This is one where he like, he can't get a job. Right? Like, but he's like, but I saved the world.
?00:33:33Yeah.
JVL00:33:34Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny. Uh, all right. Listen, we're not going to talk about any of those movies. We're here to talk about Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, which is one of the only, that's not true. It is one of only like three movies. It is the only movie you can take children to. To right now. Uh, your choices are avatar, uh, horror movies, like the creepy as fuck looking like girl doll.
Sonny00:34:00Megan. Megan. Yeah.
JVL00:34:03Yeah. Comes out on Friday. Yeah. Which, uh, I just want to Nope the fuck out of that. And, uh, and if you would like to take your children to a movie theater, Puss in Boots is it. Sonny, would you care to give a big boy review?
Sonny00:34:18Well, Why don't you take the kids to go see Babylon, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, the debauchery of 1920s Hollywood. No, I, well, I, I saw Babylon. I can't imagine we're going to do an episode on Babylon. Uh, but I will say that my, my big takeaway from Babylon was like, I guess the NC 17 rating isn't a thing anymore. It's just like, because it's just like the whole first 25 minutes of this movie are like, it's a naked debauched Hollywood orgy party. There's like nudity and sex everywhere. Drugs. There was a midget with a, like a penis puppet statue thing. That's just, I, uh, doing sounds like a great quadrant that, that thing I, it would, it would have been, it would have been a relatively high quadrant movie. Um, but, uh, yeah, don't take your kids to see Babylon. That was a joke. You should not take your kids to see Babylon. If you do, I will not be held responsible for the therapy bills. Um, uh, yeah, puss in boots, the last wish. Antonio Banderas returns as puss in boots, uh, which I had forgotten that this is part of the Shrek universe. This is a Shrek expanded universe, uh, movie, which means that everything has to do with fairy tales, um, which, uh, I think they're really starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel with this since the villain in this one is little Jack Horner, except he's big Jack Horner. Now he's, he's big, big Jack Horner. Um, but, uh, the, the, the plot such as it is, is that, uh, uh, puss in boots has used eight of his nine lives. He needs to steal, uh, a map that will take him to a fallen star that will grant, uh, a wish and the wish he wants is to have his nine lives back so he can, uh, he can continue doing his adventures and being the famous, uh, puss in boots, um, because right now he's afraid of death who shows up in the form of a werewolf, or I guess just a wolf, just a, just a wolf. No, it's the big bad wolf.
JVL00:36:16It's the big bad wolf.
Sonny00:36:18Yeah. Is that, is that what's going on here? He's the big bad wolf. Yes. He is the big bad wolf. Correct Sean? Technically I think the big bad wolf was a character in one of the other Shrek movies, but I, but the, yeah, I don't think, I don't think that's the big bad wolf. I think it's just, he's just a wolf who is the manifestation of death.
JVL00:36:34Okay.
Sonny00:36:36But either way. All right. It doesn't matter. It's a big bad wolf. Whether it's capital or lowercase.
JVL00:36:41It's a wolf. The wolf is the grim reaper.
Sonny00:36:44The wolf is the grim reaper literally has a scythe and everything. It's great. Uh, and there's also, I don't know, there's love interest, blah, blah, I'm, I'm less interested in the plot of this movie, um, uh, and you know, whether it works for kids, it worked for my kids. I don't know about you. My kids, my kids had a, had a fine time. Um, and more in the animation style. Did you guys find the animation of this thing? Very, very interesting. Cause I did, um, it, it, it, it, it, it eschews the sort of standard dream works, universal um, uh, computer generated, uh, thing that has kind of dominated for so long and instead does something like, um, uh, something like a mix of what we got with Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse with, uh, the bad guys. You remember the, the bad guys that came out a couple, uh, like six months ago. Yeah. Um, I, I don't, I don't even know exactly how to describe it, um, but it has this, it has this very comic strip on this is when it, it, no, much more like impressionist tactile. It's it's like tactile it, like it, it, it looks like there's a, you, when you say painting, it looks like you could almost see the brush strokes in it. Um, but it, but it's also, it's, it's doing interesting things with motion. Like the, the animation style changes when the action scenes kick in and it, it goes to a kind of more kinetic, uh, version of the same thing. I liked it. I mean, I liked it. I liked the look of this thing more than anything else. It was really fascinating. It was something I don't think I've ever. Exactly seen before. I liked it more than even Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse, which is another like kind of very interesting and unique Lee animated, uh, uh, movie, but it, it has my, my beef with Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse is that it does weird things with focus in the foreground and background. Like some things are like blurry, which I just didn't, it like kind of mimics the look of a 19. Seventies dot matrix printed comic book. Um, which I like, I don't love, I get what they're doing, but I don't, I don't love it. Um, but this, I did kind of love a lot. I just, I really liked the look and the feel of it. It was, it was always interesting to look at. Um, I mean the, the story, again, the story such as it is, is like kind of clever, kind of touching. Everybody learns about a important lesson about family and love and life and whatever. But, uh, again, just, just looking at it was a, was a very interesting. Experience.
JVL00:39:18I am interested in your audience reaction, Sonny, because at the show, Sean and I went to, we went to a 3:00 PM show, fairly fall, but not, not packed, but, but at least two thirds full and the audience was so into it. And there were even a couple people there who were there without kids. I would say it was mostly families, but there were, you know, there are people behind us who were like just 20 something couples who were there. Um, and the audience was absolutely there for the entire thing. And at the end, the audience applauded, which is not something I have seen in a children's movie since Finding Nemo.
Sonny00:40:01Yeah, no, I, I, I wouldn't say that my audience was that into it. I went to a three 30 showing that was probably like 80% full. It was, it was the, the entire stadium seating portion was full. The like front, the, the front rows were not. Um, but most of the stadium seating portion was, was full. So I, I would say it's probably 80% full. Um, and one of the things I thought about Jonathan, and the audience was very into it, but there was, I'm sorry, the, the audience was very into it, but it was not like a, was not like a rousing, a round of applause at the end or anything, Sean, what'd you think? I liked it. I didn't think I was gonna like it. I thought I was just gonna go, you know, parent a little bit, let the girls watch the movie, have a good time. But you know, I think I liked it. I think that Sunday's point, I think the animation sort of struck me. Is more enjoyable than maybe the, the product as a whole, but about the applause, I'd love to get your thoughts on this one. It's like when the applause happened, it happened at the very end. Right. And so I was like, are they applauding because I thought the movie really was really good or are they applauding? Cause they see him sailing off too far, far away to like reunite with these Shrek universe. Right. Like, is that teasing another movie? I mean, I think people in our theater really enjoyed it cause there was laughing along the way. Like our kids were in stitches when things were happening and people were getting like bonked with pans and stuff like that. I don't know. I, I'd be curious to, to see if there's something coming down the pipeline.
JVL00:41:23So I'm an anti Shrekite. I do not like the Shrek movies. I found them crass and cloying. Uh, I, I did not like the original, the first Puss in Boots movie, which I believe is the first spinoff of Shrek. Uh, I have been forced to sit through the Puss in Boots, I guess it's Netflix. Yeah. It's a whole series. I don't know what there's an animated Puss in Boots. Is that on Netflix?
Sonny00:41:51Yeah. I think so. And I think it has like Kitty soft pauses in it.
JVL00:41:54Maybe.
?00:41:55Yeah.
JVL00:41:56It's terrible. Yeah. It's absolutely terrible. The first, the first Puss in Boots movie is awful. Uh, like makes your eyes hurt. It's so, so, uh, coked up and meaningless. There's nothing interesting in it. This thing is a real movie. Not only in how. How beautifully it is conceived, uh, and executed just as a piece of animation. But it has a story and a, it's a mid, it's a midlife crisis movie. It's literally, this is, it is a, you know, this is what happens when you turn 50. That's that's the movie that is Puss in Boots, the last wish. And you realize that you cannot be the immortal guy who you were in your twenties. Uh, what if you could, what if you could somehow get all that back, uh, which is what his pursuit of the wishes, right? This is everybody's business. Why people buy Porsches, right? When they turn 50, cuz they're having a midlife crisis and they're, they're facing mortality and, uh, and all of this is done with an incredibly light touch, like a really, really light touch. And it is very funny. The, the main villain, Jack Horner. His motivations are sensational. Uh, he is angry, uh, a, because he does not have any magic. Like all these people in the fairy tales are imbued with magic and he's not, he's just like an actual human kid, but B because he wasn't even a fairy tale. He's just a nursery rhyme. I hadn't even thought about that, which is great, which is like a fourth class version of fiction. And so he has a complex about that in the weird inventive. This. So he has a collection of unicorn horns and he, and he makes, he's like, yes, they're from baby unicorns and he uses them as weapons. He fires them out of a crossbow. And when somebody is struck with a unicorn horn, they explode in like streamers and confetti. It's I, it's sensationally funny. Uh, and you know, Jiminy cricket pops up and Jiminy cricket, the Jiminy cricket character is doing the, I'm your, I'm your conscience. Oh my God, Jimmy Stewart and, uh, and by the end, the Jiminy cricket is conscience like just, just thinks that Jack Horner needs to die. I mean, I don't know, like it's laugh out loud, funny. And this is one of the things that I, it is not as good as Paddington too, but it strikes me as it very much in the same category of Paddington too, which is to say a sequel to an absolute nothing of a movie, which approaches like middle brow art and is going to be intensely rewatchable, uh, and is both touching and funny and just sort of a joy to sit with for 85 minutes or however long it is. Um, and so I was caught totally surprised by it and was utterly charmed by it.
Sonny00:45:12Yeah, I will say, yeah, I didn't, I didn't like it quite that much. I didn't, I didn't like it quite that much, but I do, I did, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. And like, it is, it does have a, it does have a bit of depth to it. I mean, it is, it is a movie about, uh, the fact that the only thing that really gives our life meaning is death in a very, in a very real way. The end of the end of life is the only thing that gives life meaning. Um, you know, so use that, use that time properly, which is a little intense for a kid's movie. Um, I was, I, my, I will say that my youngest son. Uh, my younger son, my younger child, my son, um, he, uh, he was a little bit scared of the wolf, which makes sense since again, it's the grim reaper, uh, so that's scary guy. Um, but, uh, you know, the kids, the kids dug it and it was a, it was a perfectly fine time at the theaters. It was nice to have something to be able to take them to cause it's been a real waste. I mean, I took them to see strange world. That's how desperate I was. You know, in November or whatever, um, we went to go see strange world terrible, terrible. Have you watched it?
JVL00:46:23Uh, on Disney plus it's terrible.
Sonny00:46:29It's so bad. I actually hate that. I actually kind of hate it and it's, and not for, I mean, what, like there, there were, there was a big dumb fight about identity politics stuff and like, uh, whatever. I don't want to get wrapped up in any of that, but like the movie actually did. Annoy me on an ideological level because it's like the anti, uh, interstellar, you know, in a weird way. It's like, it's a movie about how like exploration is bad and you should just accept mediocrity and you should stay at home and not try to explore and find new things and just be happy with your little plot of dirt that you scratch a living out of. Fuck that. Send, send people to space.
JVL00:47:07Did we lose a war, Sean? We didn't even talk about Goldilocks and the three. Yeah. It was reimagined as a crime family, a crime family, which is fantastic.
Sonny00:47:18But also the, I was going to say that I, I probably spent a hundred percent more time thinking about this than I probably should have like said a long drive back from New Jersey. And I was like, man, what am I going to do? And think about this movie. But yeah, the, the Goldilocks and the three bears crime family was hilarious. But also I think on the flip side, it was a very interesting story that I appreciate as a parent about this notion that, you know, families can all look like different things. Right. Which is something that my first grade are certainly learning about. And like, I thought that was a very interesting. Yeah. Deeper message to Sonny Deer point. Like it was probably more deep than it needed to be for a kid's movie. But yeah, I thought that was really interesting.
JVL00:47:55And where are you? I mean, there was movies. Are you a Shrek person or now? I forget this about you guys. You know what? I think my sister liked Shrek.
Sonny00:48:02Yeah. I think I liked the first one when it came out, but I, you know, it was, I was much younger. I was like, ah, it's Mike Myers. It was kind of at the height maybe of like the Austin power stuff, which I found interesting. And I was like, oh, that's interesting to see a guy like him doing a. Animated character. And it just seemed different, but I couldn't tell you, but I don't think I ever really rewatched it. And I don't know if I, if I did, it wasn't more than once or so. So it didn't really have staying power for me. I don't think, but, um, it's like full of fart. Yeah, pretty much. I mean, donkey was funny. Like I think I've, I think I've only seen the first one and I hated it so much that I, I don't, I don't think I, I watched the rest of them. I like, I, it was, it's the lowest common denominator, animated humor. Like referencey, like, yeah, here's the thing you will recognize parents. Um, but on top of that, it also just like has this deeply annoying Eddie Murphy performance. It's Eddie Murphy and like his worst mode, which is just like kind of shouty, like sub Chris Tucker, like, I hate that. I hate that. Uh, I hate that mode of Eddie Murphy. Um, uh, and I, I always was vaguely annoyed by Mike Myers and like, or I was vaguely annoyed by what? What Mike Myers was doing in that movie. Just like, I don't, I didn't, I didn't care for his Scottish. I never liked any of his Scottish characters. I don't like he should stop playing Scots. I agree.
JVL00:49:23But you know, the funny thing is it's also, it was so self calming. So Shrek comes out at a time when Disney is the only game in town and animation, and it is self-consciously positioned as a, we'll do things that they'd never do in a Disney. Nobody ever farts in a Disney movie.
Sonny00:49:44You know?
JVL00:49:45And I just like, ugh, black, uh, if you guys want to treat yourself to something that is truly terrible, uh, on Netflix, they have Shrek live, which is the, a filmed version of the musical, like the stage musical, the actual stage musical in the way that like Broadway, Disney plus the Broadway musical. Yes. Okay. And, uh, the, the, the girl who is with Hugh Jackman. In, in Music Man right now, whose name I'm forgetting and, uh, and she was the lead in bun heads. She's like a Broadway legend. She plays princess Fiona and it's, it is everything that I have always hated about Broadway and musicals. So it is worth a hate watch. If you are, if you are an anti-Broadway person and an anti-musical person as I basically am. You know, I go there all the time now because they're like in a mini golden age. Uh, this is what bad Broadway looks like. And it's, uh, just, you know, even like a 10 minute hate watch would be enough to give you the flavor of what's going on. You're shaking your head, Sonny, but it would make you feel very superior.
Sonny00:51:01Yeah. But I, I don't need to watch something to know that Broadway sucks and musicals. I went, I had to go, I had to go see frozen live in person. Uh, the touring Broadway version of frozen. Oof. Uh, so I've, I've had my fill of that. I had, I had no idea that Shrek became a musical. So my, my one thought in this is if Shrek became a musical, then there's no reason that Rogers the musical cannot happen. I mean, that, that needs to be a thing.
JVL00:51:34So Rogers, the musical, I have to imagine will happen at some point, the Disney property Disney basically owns Broadway. Uh, But no, Sonny, I feel, I feel like that would, I feel like that, I don't know if it would
Sonny00:51:48be a Broadway thing, but I feel like that's a thing that you could do on the cruise lines.
?00:51:52Yeah.
JVL00:51:53Yeah. You could do it on the cruise lines, but I think it needs to be staged.
Sonny00:51:59So Jonathan, back to, uh, one, one more thing I wanna, I wanna leave you guys with this as a, as an overthought piece for this kind of movie. So your point about the, the Shrek, other, the other Shrek movies, I, I don't know if I saw any of the middle ones. Right. I'll go ahead and refresh my memory about what happened and then kind of point the thread a little bit about this midlife crisis plot in Puss in Boots. As I was reading the, the, the synopsis of the previous movies, it kind of stood out that whoever makes these has some interest in male psyche because humor me for a minute. So Shrek one, you could basically argue is, you know, a solitary dude kind of set in his ways, kind of reluctantly engages in a relationship, eventually gets married. Right. Shrek two honeymoon period, kind of like doing what he can to, you know, defend the marriage from outsiders, goes for a love potion, something like that. You know, good, good Shrek three, fear of adult responsibility, right? Doesn't want to really rule the kingdom. It's terrified of becoming a father, so on and so forth. Shrek four domesticated ogre, right? Kind of getting antsy, kind of yearning for his youth, wants to go back to his other life, like trades just for a day to be his old self. And almost loses everything. Is that analogous to a fair? I don't know. Rumpelstiltskin. I don't know. And then this movie, midlife crisis. I don't know. I'll leave you with that. Facing death.
JVL00:53:25Right? Yeah. It's a story of us. That's very funny. Uh, Sonny, before we get out, Puss in Boots only opens to like what, $12 million or something. How? Yeah. Look at this. Yeah. Like, you know, the minion, the last minions movie, whatever that was, which is it's just not very good. Open to what? 90 million, 70 million, 150 million.
Sonny00:53:49I don't know. It's, it's different. It's a different market. It's a different market. So, I mean, I like Puss in Boots is a family movie. It's a movie that kids are going to go see that you take, you take the kids to go see. And that entire class of movie has been relegated to streaming that, that stuff is like, so was minions. That is right. This is the Providence. No, but it's not, but it's not minions, minions, the, the folks who are into minions were into this 12 years ago, those, those people are all like 16 to 24 now, like it's an entirely different age group. Like that, that, that group has aged up into, into a, a older thing. Like I took my kids to go see minions rise of grew because like I, any, I like to take my kids to the movies. It's one of the only things that I know how to do, uh, as, as a, as a parent. Um, so like, but I, but like, I think the, I think the core audience. For that is actually older. I think it's, I think it's like 16 to, to, you know, early twenties. Um, uh, so, but no, I mean the problem, the problem for puss in boots, which is actually held on pretty well, it's, it's gonna, you know, it'll probably end up doing a hundred and some million dollars, um, or so 80, 80 to 90, I don't know, whatever. Um, the problem is that like everybody now sees that sort of movie as like, well, I'm going to watch that. But at home on streaming, I'm going to watch, I'm going to watch the Disney plus stuff. I'm not taking the kids to the movies anymore. Um, the, the pandemic and the streaming, uh, one, two punch has just like absolutely destroyed that window for kids, which I mean, I like, you know, uh, you know, the movie business better hope that something changes there because if you train an entire generation of kids that there's no point in going to the movies. Where does your next generation of movie goers come from? Yeah. Um, so.
JVL00:55:47Well, that's too bad. All right. That's all the time we're given to show this week. I have been drinking Hardy woods, gingerbread stout. It's delicious. And I've been using my snack, div personal finger chopsticks. Yeah. Sean. Oh, thank you for joining us, buddy. It's been fun to have. Thanks for having me. This was fun. We'll see you next time.
?00:56:12Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Sonny00:56:16Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
JVL00:56:21Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Sonny00:56:27Bye. Bye. Bye. Oh, gosh. Uh, sure. We have something, Sean. Do you have something for the class? Uh, funny story for you. It's Christmas was great. Like we're packing up, getting ready to leave. And my sister comes over and says, let me just take the girls out. So you can just pack the car, get out, get down to New Jersey. Thank you. That's that sweet. She brings them to some dollar store. They come back. They had picked out a few gifts and my oldest has picked out this mask, which looks like one of those masquerade masks looks more like one of the masks from eyes wide shut somehow. And she's been walking around the house with it. That was going to be her new year's mass, which I conveniently forgot. And I come home and she's wearing it and they're playing some weird monster game. And I think to myself, I am living. In some weird movie that was never made by Stanley Kubrick, like, and that's just been by life for the first three days this week. That's that's, I mean, that's what, that's what like the first, I'm sorry. That's what like the first half hour of Babylon is like, it's like 1920s. Maybe I should bring them to go see it. I mean, they're already there. That's fine. All right. I'm sure it's fine.
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