#156. 'Andor,' Redux
Listen to this episode ↗on Substack, where the show lives now
This episode's entire mission is an intervention: guest host Chris Cillizza — filling the third chair, two months into life after CNN laid him off and newly launched on Substack — joins Sonny in trying to talk JVL back into Andor after he bailed three episodes in, calling it a slog that could have been an eight-minute prologue in the style of the opening of Fellowship of the Ring. JVL confesses he watched episode four in prep for the show and actually liked it, warming to the Mon Mothma/Stellan Skarsgård spy-ring thread and comparing the show's best instincts to a le Carré novel, even as he and Sonny agree the title character is the least interesting person in his own show, much like The Book of Boba Fett's title problem. Sonny defends the season's three-arc structure — origin story, heist, prison break — and singles out the Imperial Security Bureau intrigue as the strongest material, plus the odd chemistry between the ambitious corporate-security flunky and the icy ISB agent as the most convincing Star Wars romance since Han and Leia; Cillizza, watching with his wife and two sons, reports the family split on it (rapt for the heist and prison-break episodes, asleep during the lulls), which spins into a broader gripe about streaming bloat, a maligned Obi-Wan Kenobi, and the glacial Rings of Power. The long opening stretch covers Cillizza's two months since the CNN layoff, the economics of building a Substack, and a debate over whether journalists should comp each other subscriptions; all three note they've each now been laid off right before a Christmas, which prompts JVL to reveal for the first time that his severance from The Weekly Standard was zero dollars, killed by an NDA so broad it amounted to a two-year non-compete. Sonny tops that with a saga about waking up nearly paralyzed by a mystery neck injury and self-medicating with heat, Tylenol, and leftover muscle relaxers, and JVL recounts a passenger being removed from his flight after loudly informing a stewardess she had a "B-O-M-B" — spelled out, which she insisted was a legal loophole — which spirals into a tangent on whether cell-phone cameras shame people into behaving. Outtakes close things out with more masonry-planet lore-quibbling and Cillizza's story of his wife enduring a fellow passenger hocking loogies into a bag for three straight hours.
From the show notes
Can Sonny and special guest host Chris Cillizza convince JVL to re-start Andor ?
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00They're so proud of themselves, so fat and satisfied they can't imagine that someone like me would ever get inside their house. Cassian Heller, the Empire is choking us so slowly we're starting not to notice. What I'm asking is this, wouldn't you rather give it all to something real?
JVL00:00:40Hello everyone, welcome to the Sub-Beacon. I'm JVL here with Sonny Bunch and today we are joined by our old buddy, friend of the show, Chris Silliza. Chris. Been a stretch. Happy holidays. Oh my gosh. How are you doing, buddy?
Vic00:01:00It has been an interesting time. I'm good, actually. It's been two months since CNN no longer required my services.
JVL00:01:10Have you been missing work, Bob? I wouldn't say I've been missing it.
Vic00:01:13I wouldn't say I've been missing it. I mean, in some ways it's not that different in that I wasn't really going into the office all that much. I was doing some TV. But I wasn't going into the office like five days a week or anything like that. I was mostly writing from home. I'm continuing to write from home, not for CNN anymore. But the first couple of weeks were challenging. I think as I started to like actually do proactively start some new things, it's been -- I've realized what I really like about the jobs we have, which is the writing part. Right. Yeah. And that's the part that I always sort of return to because it's the thing that I care the most about. It's the thing that helps me understand the world best. It's the thing that I enjoy doing, like the actual process of writing. I enjoy that the most. And you're also a machine.
JVL00:02:13Which is so funny because the TV -- well, the TV people always are like, "Oh, I don't want to write. Writing is too hard." You're the only TV person who -- I mean, I guess because you're a writer first.
Vic00:02:21Yeah. I think I always wrote first. Yeah. I just -- I don't know. It's just -- I mean, you guys understand this, and I think a lot of people do. It's the thing that helps me navigate my days and think about stuff and puzzle stuff out and interact with people. I mean, it's the -- TV is very much a one-way medium. I mean, I know there are people shouting at the screen while you're talking, but you don't hear feedback, really. Right. I mean, other than like, "You're the worst," or like, "You're bald." Right. Or whatever. "Your toupee is showing." I don't have a toupee, by the way. If I did, it would look a lot better than my current hair. But you don't really get any back and forth, whereas with writing, you actually do get a little bit more of people engaging with the content. I'm taking Twitter out of this. Like, Twitter engagement obviously is a different thing. But I'm doing Substack now. I think like a lot of people who write --
Sonny00:03:19What's your Substack? Tell people the Substack.
Vic00:03:21Oh, yeah. Thank you for the promo. Chris, last name is C-I-L-L-I-Z-Z-A dot substack dot com. It's very easy to sign up. All the content is free right now and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Well, was I the first paid member?
JVL00:03:36I was hoping I would be the first paid member.
Vic00:03:38I think you might have been, actually.
Sonny00:03:40Sonny, real slap in the face. I was before Chris. No, I was before JVL. I signed up first.
JVL00:03:46I was paid before your first post. So was I. When you just had the placeholder, like -- Hey, I'm going to start a newsletter. I jumped in and slapped my Amex down.
Vic00:03:57It made me think that JVL was rolling in it because he was paying for it before there was even any posts. That's right. Which I like to see. The bulwark is paying off. That's right.
Sonny00:04:08Well, as I was explaining to Beth today at the dinner table, my weekly budget looks like that drill tweet about candles. You know, the one that's like -- the tweet is like, help me. My family is starving. Somebody teach me how to do a budget. And it's like, you know, $800 for rent, $200 for food, $3,600 for candles, $100 for car payment. Like, that's me with Substacks now. It's like I've got -- you know, it's just --
Vic00:04:33It is cool. Like, I mean, one thing that I'm a big fan of with it is that there's a built-in system where people are willing to pay for journalism. Like, coming from the world of where I came from, the Washington Post pre-subscription, like, basically every news article. Every news organization pre-subscription 15 years ago. Like, the idea that people would pay for journalism, I mean, people really balked at it. I mean, I think it's really come along. JVL, you may be able to speak to this better than me, but I do think it's come along. Like, in Substack, there's a model where there's an expectation from people that, like, oh, okay, I like this. I'm going to pay for it. I don't know if they have the Sonny Bunch budget for it. But, like, you know, I think that's a really good thing and a thing that's really changed in -- call it a decade in journalism where I really didn't think that people would pay. I mean, I still remember, like, writing at the Post and them talking about, like, we're going to go to a subscription and me thinking, like, oh, it might be time to head for the exits because, like, no one's going to pay to read journalism.
JVL00:05:39Yeah. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Sonny.
Sonny00:05:42Well, I was going to say it's interesting because, you know, I met Chris in 2004. Oh, yeah. I started working at Roll Call.
Vic00:05:51You were living four hours away from our workplace, as I recall.
Sonny00:05:54I was living in Stafford, Virginia. I would get shit from everybody in the newsroom because I had to leave at, like, 5:00 to make my train. It's so true. To be home by 8:00.
Vic00:06:01He sat in a little cubby behind me and Paul Kane and Mark Preston.
Sonny00:06:05It was a real powerhouse there, you know? Yeah. The Saliza, Preston, Kane bunch. I mean, it was, you know, the -- but we worked at Roll Call at a time when people actually did pay for journalism. I mean, Roll Call was hugely profitable. Yeah. It was, like, the most -- it was literally the most profitable part of the, like, economist empire, right? Totally. Totally. It was owned by the economist at the time. It was hugely profitable. And then, like, the internet comes in and, like, Politico comes in and kind of destroys that, right? Kind of destroys that whole model of paying for subs and, you know, and the hefty ad rates that you can charge for print and all that sort of stuff. But now we're getting back to it. But it's based on personalities, right? I mean, it is, like, you are paying to support a person that you like more than your -- Yeah.
JVL00:06:54I mean, at the Substack level it is. Right. But, you know, not even that. Like, so, like, if you are subscribing to Platformer, it's because you are getting, like, really deep reporting on Silicon Valley, right? If you're subscribing to Cook Political Report, I mean, you like Amy Walter but you're really subscribing to get all their data. Their data and their numbers. Like, it varies by place, right? Yeah. I mean, that's true.
Vic00:07:22That's true. I think Substack is very -- I mean, obviously, I'm new to it. But I think it's interesting to see -- I mean, when you come from a place like CNN which just has a fire hose of traffic, right? Like, it's very interesting to see, like, who is reading it because they like you versus who is reading it because it's on a page that lots of people go to. You know, it's been an interesting -- I mean, the answer is the fire hose is the fire hose for a reason. Like, I don't have 14 million subscribers to my Substack or whatever the number of -- I don't even know the CNN traffic numbers anymore. But it is -- I like it in that it actually feels like an audience of people who want to engage with you in ways that are interesting and productive as opposed to negative and sort of counterproductive. Like, there's people who are like, "Hey, what about this thing?" or "What about that thing?" in which it's like a real conversation as opposed to, you know, my last 15 years in journalism, which is just basically like people finding comment sections to yell at you about.
JVL00:08:26Yeah, well, these people wouldn't show up to read you, right? Right. Once you're in a newsletter. I have a moral question for you guys. I have a journalistic acquaintance, not quite a friend, although we have many mutual real friends. And I like him. I like this guy a lot. We've known each other very casually for a decade. And last year he asked me if I would comp him a subscription to The Bulwark. And I just reflexively said, "Sure," because I comp anybody who – like literally anybody who is one of the secrets of The Bulwark. Anybody who writes in and says, "I'd really love to read this, but I just can't afford it," I just comp them because it doesn't cost us anything. It's not like magazine fulfillment where – if you're sending out a weekly magazine, it costs you $17 a year or something to fulfill. Anyway, and he – so he emailed me again and said, "Hey, my comp just ran out. Can you renew?" And I was like, "You know, I subscribe to your joint. Like I pay full freight to your publication. You want to support us over here?" And he's like, "Dude, I read for a living. I have so many subscriptions." And I said to him, "I do too." This is – Yeah, dude. You're kinder than me. I've never done the actual like totaling out. But I think I probably spend like two or three grand a year just on media subscriptions to – Sure. Because like my job is to read as much as I can and be well-informed and help other people understand that. And ultimately, like I just don't want to argue with him. And I like him and I value him as a writer. And so I just comped him. But I did think, "I don't know, man. Like we're all in the guild here together. We're all just writers trying to make a living. Like shouldn't we be helping to support each other?" Also, like if you have a bunch of subscriptions, like that suggests what you prioritize.
Vic00:10:26Yeah. You know what I mean? Like if he has a bunch of subscriptions, then he should prioritize making yours a subscription. I mean I just – My view is like, yeah, journalism costs money. It's not a nonprofit. And if we were asking $50,000 for a subscription to my substack, that's one thing. We're asking $5 a month. You know what I mean? Like it's –
JVL00:10:51This guy links to me at least once a week. He links to me at least once a week. So he gets like a lot of – he gets a lot of content out of what I do. So he's like –
Sonny00:11:01But think about all the exposure that you're getting, JB. Yeah, that doesn't actually work. Don't think the math on that one.
JVL00:11:07The math on that works out.
Vic00:11:09It doesn't. Exposure is hard to quantify. Hey, have all three of us now been laid off weeks before Christmas?
Sonny00:11:15Yeah.
JVL00:11:17Yes. Yes? Yeah. That's a fun thing. Journalism. Journalism. Why is it that every year, like December 12, December 10, media layoffs start happening? It is. What is it about December? Why does nobody decide to do this in June?
Vic00:11:33Is it – does it have to do with – So, I think that – does it have to do with like some corporate year or something? I mean, is it – Well, the fiscal year ends before that. It's October or whatever.
Sonny00:11:45That's right.
Vic00:11:46The fiscal year is – right. That's what I would understand.
JVL00:11:48And everybody's budgetary year is different, right? Your budgetary year is based on like when you start operation and stuff. These fuckers in management.
Sonny00:11:59Just trying to get a clear – you know, it's the rollover effect. You want to start the new year on a – Start the new year fresh. Start the new year solicitous.
JVL00:12:07You want to throw out the trash and you want to – no, I – yeah, I mean, I got laid
Sonny00:12:12off – God, I got laid off from the Washington Times like literally – it must have been like a week before Christmas or something. It was like – it was right before. And the best part was I'd only been there for like – I'd been there for less than two years. So, my severance package was like – Your severance was like a week. It was literally like one week of pay. Yeah. And I was like – I was like, "Oh, good.
JVL00:12:31This is great.
Sonny00:12:32This is fun."
Vic00:12:33Mine was November 30th. So, I got back from Thanksgiving and it was the first week back.
JVL00:12:39My severance – I've never talked about this publicly. My severance from the standard was zero dollars after having been there for 20 years because the severance was tied to signing an NDA which was essentially a non-compete in the way that it was worded. And I took it around to like three different lawyers and said, "Look at this. What do you think?" And every one of them said, "You cannot sign this because if you sign this, then you cannot take another job in journalism for two years because there is no way for you to work in journalism without somebody being able to allege that you're breaking this NDA." Because the wording on it was like, "You cannot even work with somebody who says anything disparaging about Phil Anschutz or any of his properties." So, like, you know, if I had gotten hired by the Washington Post and Greg Sargent had written a piece about Phil Anschutz, I would have been on the hook for it somehow. Yeah. Anyway, so I walked away with nothing from that fucking disaster. Yay! Yeah. Anyway, Santino, what are you doing, buddy?
Sonny00:13:41How are you? I... Fun story. Fun story about getting old. You know, I'm much younger than you two. I'm... I was gonna say. Look at that head of hair. I'm a child compared to you two, but I'm still getting up there in years. And I know this because the other day, so it was Friday, it was a week ago. Friday, I woke up and my shoulder was kind of sore, like a weird kind of pain in my neck. I was like...
JVL00:14:07Oh, sleep injury.
Sonny00:14:08Heart attack. God, that's weird. I, you know, I must have slept on it funny. You know, it happens sometimes. Yeah, it happens every, you know, couple months. You wake up, you're like, "Oh, that hurts." And I didn't really think too much of it until the next morning, until Saturday morning when I woke up and I could not move my neck or shoulder at all. Literally, I was like... Not paralyzed, like I could move it. But anytime I moved in any direction, waves of nausea-inducing, agonizing pain just all around my neck and back area. So I'm like, I'm laying there in bed trying not to freak out because I'm like, I've slipped a disc in the night. I've done something horrible, horrifying to my body because I cannot move. So eventually, I kind of rolled out of the bed and like hung up. I'm like not like like with a self-imposed neck brace on like not moving my neck at all, like turning my body to move, wander over to like the medicine area where I get like a heating pad out. I get it in the microwave. I take I take two extra strength Tylenol immediately. And this is at like five in the morning. Beth Beth comes like running out. She's like, what's the matter? I'm like, I don't know. I'm dying. And my neck is my neck broke. I don't know. My neck exploded overnight.
JVL00:15:30I don't know what happened.
Sonny00:15:32And so I've got I've got like the heat on and I'm taking all this medicine and I'm I like lay back in the bed and I can like kind of prop my neck up to where it doesn't hurt at all, more or less. And I've got again, I've got the heat on. I've got various drugs start running through my system. I took a she had some muscle relaxers left over. I took one of those old muscle relaxer.
Vic00:15:56I'm sure that's fine. That's fine. Doctor's orders and such.
Sonny00:15:59It's fine. So I'm so I'm like laying there in the bed trying to trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my bedridden life, because this is where I'm going to be forever from now on. And eventually it like it kind of like starts loosening up a little bit and I'm able to like kind of, you know, get around. And I went to I went to the urgent care the next day. I couldn't get an appointment. Oh, that's a good place to go.
Vic00:16:21Those doctors are that's going to solve your problem right away.
Sonny00:16:24I go I go into the urgent care because I'm hoping that she'll give me like a steroid shot or something to, you know, because that's what I that's what I do. Do you have any horse tranquilizer back there? That's what I hear. That's what I hear the football players get when they're when they're injured. And I'm basically at that level of athletics. So I go in there and she like she like feels, you know, like kind of the trapezius area. And she's like, yeah, that's the tightest I've ever felt. Do you work out a lot? That's the tightest.
JVL00:16:54Boy, you're just ripped. Do you do a lot of lat pull downs? Yeah.
Sonny00:16:57You are you are you are you going to the Mr. Universe or are you just training for it? But no, like it's fine.
JVL00:17:06Would you mind taking your shirt off so I can get a better look at these? I feel comfortable.
Sonny00:17:11I can move my neck in in all directions, more or less. They're still like some tight. It was it was I got only knows what it was. But it was it was just it was like this. It was like clenched up as hard as it could. And I I threw a very strict drug regimen of possibly legal, possibly not muscle relaxers and over the counter medications I've recovered. But it was it was the first time I was like, you know, I always thought people were making it up when they're like, my body falls apart. My body fell apart when I turned 40. It was like every every day was this my body. My eyes don't work anymore. I've got like this rolling case of fucking pain. Guy I like I can't get rid of I got I got this shoulder thing going on. I walk around my ankle sound like somebody shooting off firecrackers in the hallway. But I literally woke my kid up walking in the hallway the other day because my knees and ankles were popping so much. I like I don't I don't understand. How do you people live like this? How do I have 40 more years like this?
JVL00:18:17What am I going to do folks home? This is right. It's only a matter of time to eat mushy peas through the roof.
Vic00:18:23Eat mushy peas through a straw.
Sonny00:18:26I tell you what guys I I I don't know what I'm I don't know what I'm doing.
Vic00:18:30Sleep injury is is I do think like you're sure a sign of aging. Yeah, 100%. It's either it's either that or like non-sport non-physical activity injury like you bend over and like you throw your back out. It's like right in that same space. Same space.
Sonny00:18:48Yeah. Even that I kind of understand because you're like, you know, if you reach awkwardly for something. Or you're moving, you know, you reach down to get a kid.
Vic00:18:55You were just stationary.
Sonny00:18:56But I was literally I literally just woke up and was like, I've paralyzed myself. What has happened?
Vic00:19:01What is the bad thing about that, too, is that I would I mean, if it were me, I'm such a nut. I would be worried every night that it would reoccur. Totally. And that would I would be so paranoid that I'd be waking up. I bought I bought all new pillows.
JVL00:19:14I bought you get a neck immobilizer should get a neck immobilizer. So like, you know, on the crash cart to make sure you can't move it at all.
Sonny00:19:21When you almost I I kind of wanted to just I wasn't sure where to get one. I guess at least one of those airplane neck pillows.
JVL00:19:29Right. You get the kid.
Vic00:19:30But I got I got a medical supplies guy I can hook you up with. Get it to you at cost.
Sonny00:19:36So anyway, that that was that was my week. That was like terrifying myself with a sleep injury. And then it was slowly recovering through the rest of the week has been has been how my week has gone. So how about you, JBL? How are you doing?
?00:19:50I think so.
Sonny00:19:50How are you doing?
JVL00:19:51I traveled last week for the first time in four years. And and I had something happen. I did four planes in four days, four planes in five days, I should say, and went from San Francisco to L.A. to Seattle, back to Newark.
Vic00:20:06Long plane flights, JBL. You're not going to you're not going for an hour.
JVL00:20:11But I had something that has never happened to me before, which is I had somebody thrown off of one of the flights. Really? So I got to be very careful because I would like to give you a an accurate rendition of of the scenario. But I don't want to get in trouble with like accents and all that. I'll just simply say it was a 30 ish woman who in the gate area was noticeably belligerent to other people. Like, you know, why are you looking at me?
?00:20:48That sort of thing.
JVL00:20:48When it was not clear that anybody was looking at her. So we were boarding the plane and she takes a seat in an empty row of seats like five rows ahead of me. And people are filtering in and a stewardess comes over and says, Ma'am, can I see your ticket? And she said, You're not in this row. You're in like two two rows over and down. And this woman starts saying, No, I can't be in that seat. I got to be in this one because I have a man. I got to be in this one because I have a medical condition. Starts like listing the number of conditions she has. And at first I think to myself, Oh, she thinks that she wants to be in the empty row of seats. And this sort of sentences to her like the flight is going to be full. Like you're going to have people sitting on either side of you no matter where you you set. And the woman starts then demanding to see the the the captain of the plane. I want to see the pilot.
Vic00:21:42I want to talk pilot definitely has. He has a lot of say over who sits where. Yeah. Everyone knows that's what the pilot is primarily. That's how airplanes work.
JVL00:21:51So it's like the captain of a ship, the Admiral, the Commodore. So she it's getting like increasingly heated. And she then begins declaring that she makes more money than everybody on this plane. And she says, you know, I make one hundred thousand dollars a year. I make more money than everybody on this plane. Even the pilot. I thought to myself, I am pretty sure that like starting salary for pilots. For a pilot on United is like one hundred fifty nine grand a year or something. I feel like I saw this and an article in the last couple of years.
Sonny00:22:24If you're if you're if you're the captain, if you're like the you know, if you're the head guy on a passenger flight for United or something like that, and you're flying like a domestic like this, you know, not you're you're making.
JVL00:22:40It's more than one hundred thousand dollars, more than one hundred thousand dollars as as you should be. You are holding your the palm of your hand. The lives of like two hundred people every time you fly. The point is, all of this, I present this as a data point to show how delusional this woman is. Because then we hit Sonny. I've prepped you for this a little bit because we discussed this on the slack. But Chris, I want to hit you cold with this. She then says to the stewardess. Well, I've got a BOMB. What are you going to do about that?
Vic00:23:09Oh, my gosh.
JVL00:23:10And then she holy moly. And she goes, because you can't. Because you can't do nothing about that. Because I didn't say the word. All I did was say some letters. You can't do anything about it. That's a loophole that does not exist. And I thought to myself, this woman thinks that she is like the greatest country lawyer in the history. Like, you know, like the Matlock turns around and she's like, I found the loophole. Like, if you say you have a BOMB. If you say you have a BOMB, but you spell it out, they can't kick you off the plane.
Vic00:23:48Just a bunch of letters.
Sonny00:23:50It's like, it's like if you're talking to a dog or a small child.
Vic00:23:54Yup. Yup.
JVL00:23:56So, Chris, as a, I don't know where you are. I don't know if you're as libertarian as Sonny is. What would the people at Reason and Kato say about that? Would they be on her side and say, all she did was say some letters. What are the jackbooted thugs gonna... What's the federal government gonna do to her? This fine young woman who just wants to fly to, just wants to fly to Seattle.
Sonny00:24:20Yeah, I think there, you might be able to find one or two Reasonites who would, you know, say it's fine. But I think most of them are cognizant of the, you know, the situation.
Vic00:24:33Anyway, the popo showed up. Does it go downhill from there? No, in a weird way, that's kind of the end of it.
JVL00:24:40So the stewardess walks away. And like ten minutes later, the airplane cops come on board. And they, you know, I should say, I'm not a big fan of the police. With a surplus of professionalism, they very quietly and politely say, ma'am, you can't be on this plane. Come on, let's go. And she goes. And she goes with, and suddenly it is, I would say, like a totally normal, you know, with no scene whatsoever. In fact, this is like the least seen that she has been since we were in the gate area. And so I don't mean to make fun because this is, look, somebody who's like this, they cannot be like that without there being some sort of like real mental health problem, I think. Like I don't think this is like just somebody who's like, do you know who I am? This is somebody who, you know, has difficulty navigating the world. And so I don't mean to make light of any of that. But I did find the idea. I did find the idea that she had found the loophole to be able to make a bomb threat without being pinned for making a bomb threat to be hysterically funny.
Vic00:25:49Now, JBL, I have a question. You are an anxious flyer. Is that fair to say?
JVL00:25:55B.A. Baracus levels.
Vic00:25:57Yes. Okay. Does a situation like that make you more, less, or neutral in terms of your anxiety? Because I find, I'm not a terribly nervous flyer. But I will say I've seen a number of confrontations, though never a removal out of flight. And it makes me very panicky. Like it raises my anxiety level for unknown reasons. Because I don't know why, because I'm not really afraid of flying. But like the conflict makes me stressed out. Does that have an impact on your flying or not?
JVL00:26:27Well, I take Xanax to fly. Okay. Provided I take it at the appropriate, you got to time the Xanax like perfectly. And I timed this down to the fucking minute. So I was just sitting there with total ironic detachment to everything. But I like to think that this particular situation would have made me less nervous simply because of the ridiculousness of it. Right. Like an actual in a weird way, like a dumber, lower stakes confrontation. Like, you know, somebody saying he's pushing into my seat or, you know, two people jabbering back and forth. That would probably make me, you know. Just sort of raise the general stress level.
Sonny00:27:09Well, but it also it helps that she was also removed from the plane. There's no there's no story that there's going to be right there.
JVL00:27:15Right.
Sonny00:27:16You know, shenanigans. Yeah.
JVL00:27:18Yeah. For Tom's. Yeah. Oh, it. But I mean, you see you see like crazy videos. And of course, like everybody had their phones out and recording it, which I have to say, I find that kind of grotesque. Like somebody is having a very bad day. And your reaction is I'm going to take some video of this in case I can upload it to TikTok later.
Vic00:27:44But it's even more it's what I think it's even more than that. It's not just a bad day. It's like you said, this is someone who clearly like at least in this situation and maybe more broadly has some difficulty navigating the world. And that the first reaction of many people is I'm going to film. This is. Is ugly. Can I?
Sonny00:28:06Can I? I want to push back on this ever so slightly because I agree with you guys in the main. I agree with you in the main. But I do think that there is now we have now reached the like phone saturation world star hip hop TikTok saturation level where if you are in a situation like this and you are instigating it and you turn around and you see all these cameras out pointed at you. You're like maybe I fucked up here. Like maybe maybe I pull it back just slightly. Maybe I pull it back just so just a little bit so I don't become, you know, the main character on all of the networks and everything else. And I've actually I have I've seen this happen in in person where like somebody had a camera out and somebody else yelled like this. This person is going to be famous and like it like the thing stopped immediately. Like the person just stopped freaking out and like kind of like got off the train at the next stop. I remember correctly. I mean, like I, I do think that there is a minor like a shame, a shame, shaming or like in a positive role. Yeah. I mean, not not, you know, again, it obviously doesn't work all the time because we still get videos like this every every, you know, every week or so. But I do think that there are there there is a there's a social clue that is evolving pretty rapidly here, which is like if you see a bunch of fucking cell phones out pointed at you, you've done something very you've you've messed up badly and you're you got to you got to get it together because, like you said, JBL, she got off the plane.
JVL00:29:40Without without issue, right, without issue, totally that incident in which to be honest, in fairness, I give all credit to the cops in this situation because they they handled it perfectly. Like it was just it was de-escalatory. It was calm. It was professional. It was not like we're going to show her. We're going to show her who's in charge. Like it was just, you know, they were just doing the job and, you know, I don't know. All right. That's a lot of a lot of that. We are here to have, I guess, an intervention with you guys trying to have an intervention with me about and or a show that we talked about once before. Months ago, months, months ago. And I watched the first three episodes of it. And the basic takeaway was, I guess, you know, like this is I guess it's grown up Star Wars. There's world building. We like that. There's a hot girl. People have sex. They let you see your nipples sort of through the shirt like it's it's adult Star Wars. We find they say bastard. It's got it's got good actors in it, but also like, oh, my God, it's such a slog. This is why are we flashing back to these children with their aboriginal tribe? Why? Why? Why are we still on this planet if we're going to leave this planet and never come back? Well, why isn't all of this the first three episodes, which is not hundred minutes of content? Why isn't this like the eight minute prologue? Think about think about the opening 12 minutes of the Fellowship of the Ring. Right. Which give the entire history of Middle Earth and the rings in 12 minutes. And if you handed that story to to Amazon today, they would turn it into like ten seasons worth of content.
Sonny00:31:31That's what they're doing. That's what they're currently doing. I was going to say. With Rings of Power.
Vic00:31:34The Rings of Power. Not that much happens in Rings of Power if you've watched that baby.
Sonny00:31:38It's it's it's literally that it's literally the first five minutes of Lord of the Rings. We've gotten through like one shot of that sequence in the first 10 hours. So, you know, that's what that's what we got.
JVL00:31:51No, I and while we were while I was in Seattle, our friend of the show, Catherine Lowe, was on me again about Andor. Haven't you? Did you like the way it ended? I said, I haven't seen the way it ended. I didn't watch a blessed minute after the first three episodes. I can't do it. And she was like, you're crazy. It's the best. It's great.
Vic00:32:10So do you find it boring? Is that is that the issue or do you slow? Right. Too slow. Too much running in place. The episode you reference could have been significantly shorter.
Sonny00:32:25Sonny, do you agree with that? Well, so the way the show is structured, it's the first season is ten episodes and you basically have three overlapping arcs. The first three. The first three are like Andor's childhood, how he got to this, you know, masonry planet or whatever the fuck it is. And and how he masonry planet. Yeah, whatever. Whatever they're doing there. They turn you into a brick when you die. Exactly. I mean, it's it's weird. But whatever. Like so they and how he gets hooked up with the rebellion, how he gets hooked up with Stellan Skarsgård. Skarsgård. Skarsgård. How he gets hooked up with with with that whole crew. The second the second arc is basically a heist. It's basically a three episode heist flick where they go and they steal a bunch of money and they got to get away and they're funding whatever. Stick it to the man. And then the the the last arc, the the third arc is essentially a prison break movie. It's it's it's the he gets sent to a prison and he's got a leader leader revolt and get everybody out. And then under all of this, you have a lot of you have a lot of empire politics stuff, which is, I think, the best stuff in the show, which is the everything that's said in the ISB, the, you know, Imperial Security Bureau or whatever. Right. I want an entire show about that.
JVL00:33:52Well, I mean, that that's the best part of the show.
Sonny00:33:55That's the best part of the show is that kind of under undercurrent that the weird thing about the show is that and or is the least interesting thing in it. The title character is the absolute least interesting thing in the show. And that was also true in Boba Fett. Remember, I mean, like the problem with Boba Fett was that Boba Fett himself is just like a very boring character on that show. And you have that kind of problem here. So I like I am. I, I, I understand your your hesitance to get back into it. Understand that. Understand two things. Thing. The first is that the show does get better and it is structured in a way that makes sense. Once you have kind of gotten into it and are and are watching the whole thing. The second thing is that it's a perfect workout show. I watched the whole thing on my phone. I watched the whole thing. I watched every episode on my phone because it is perfectly time for my workouts. I do 40, 47 minutes of cardio five times a day. Or four times a week. And and golly, you get why you as trapezius. Well, because all my my exercising. But I haven't done that for like whatever the the the. But this the show is perfectly is absolutely 100 percent perfectly designed for my specific workout regimen. So if you do exactly what I do, you'll you'll you'll knock it out in like, I don't know, 10, 10 minutes. I don't know, 10, 10 sessions, 10 lat pull down sessions.
Vic00:35:22Exactly. I. So I liked it. I watched it with my family. So my my boys are 13 and 10 and are not like. Building the ad at level of Star Wars, you know, they're they've seen it, but they're not like going as that for Halloween or anything like that, but they like it. My wife, I think, tolerates it. Generally speaking, and likes the newer stuff more than the old stuff. I thought that it was. I'm sorry.
JVL00:35:58When you say the old stuff, do you mean the original trilogy or more than like the Phantom Menace?
Vic00:36:04No, I mean the original trilogy. I basically memory hold the memory.
JVL00:36:09That's a dagger. She right now. She likes the Book of Boba Fett better than the New Hope.
Vic00:36:15I think maybe.
Sonny00:36:17Okay.
Vic00:36:18I'm sorry. I know we're still married. Sit with that. So everything I say now, I think, is colored by that. I just thought I thought that there were episodes that were amazing. The heist episode when it actually goes down is like a little movie. The Narkeena five prison break episode is amazing. The episodes in between, like my wife fell asleep in each of them. You know. Like it's definitely there's definitely like it could have been Sonny. I don't know if you agree with this. You're more of an expert on it. I think it could have been a British like six episode show as opposed to a ten episode show.
Sonny00:37:03I think you could have you could have done the whole first the whole first arc could have been an hour long premiere without any trouble. I don't I don't think that I like they. And again, all the stuff that they they just. It's such a it's such a weird show because the whole first three episodes, it's like he's looking for his sister, right? He's, you know, the the aboriginal tribe, and he's trying to figure out what happened with them. And all the stuff with the sister just disappears. Like it just goes totally away. Just just never comes up again after that. So I assume it'll come back in season two. Maybe they'll come back to it, but like whatever. But you could do that. You could do that whole first three episodes in about an hour in a one hour premiere episode that closes with him and Stellan Sarsgaard going off into going on. To the, you know, to to to rob the payroll, which is, you know, kind of a funny. It's like such such weird small stakes like we're going to rob the payroll of a fort. It's like a stagecoach. That's what we're doing. Yeah, right. And then that that the next that could be like two episodes and then the prison go into prison and the prison break could be two episodes. And then you have an episode at the end kind of tying everything together. Now, like, I think they would have to be longer episodes. I think they'd have to be an hour. Each instead of forty five minutes, which, you know, negates some of the the the time savings there.
Vic00:38:24You don't work out your workout regimen.
Sonny00:38:26Exactly what I would have to. I would have to stretch it out over. You know, I'd basically have to watch three episodes every.
Vic00:38:33You could just do like another two sets of bench, another two sets of bench, three, three workouts for every two episodes.
Sonny00:38:40That's how it would work for me, I think. But but the I've lost my train of thought. But the but but but you don't want to. You don't want to. You don't want to lose. You don't want to lose the stuff that's actually really good, which, again, is the ISB stuff. And to a lesser extent, the you know, the the stuff that takes place on Coruscant, where they're like politics. Right. Sarsgaard's running this antique shop as a front for his for his for his various crimes against the state, which is which is very amusing and funny. I don't know. I like again, I do not think what what what I found kind of silly. We're all the people who are like, oh, it's the best thing since Empire. Best thing since Empire is the best thing since Empire. One hundred percent the best thing since Empire. Because everybody says that about every Star Wars thing. Everybody every said that about Mandalorian. Every Star Wars thing is the best thing since Empire. The Mandalorian or return or Revenge of the Sith. Right. Best thing since Empire. Best thing since Empire.
JVL00:39:38The only thing that's the actual best thing since Empire is Rogue One.
Sonny00:39:42Yeah, I mean, that that's probably about right. Last Jedi. Best thing since Empire. Last Jedi. Best thing since Empire. Best thing since Empire. But, you know, I like that. That is such a it's such a ridiculous overreaction to every new Star Wars thing that I like. I understand being annoyed by it and kind of dismissing it out of hand. This is just very it's it's solid. It's just solid episodic TV that kind of takes place in the Star Wars world. There's some great Imperial intrigue. I don't think it's not. It's not a show that is. Again, it's overrated by people who like really want Star Wars to be great again. But it's still it's fine. It's it's it's entertaining.
Vic00:40:25Yeah. See, that's I and I do JBL as someone who likes this world. Doesn't the world building appeal to you?
JVL00:40:33I guess. I mean, I've come to sort of realize that I don't like the world. There were certain characters. I mean, the world is fine, but I don't like get off whenever I see a. A bit of graphic design. I'm like, oh, that's the symbol that eventually you get on the X-Wing helmets. You know, that doesn't I don't know. It doesn't it doesn't jazz me. So here I'll make a confession.
Sonny00:40:58I do think I well, I feel like you've you've definitely softened on Star Wars as a piece of entertainment just in general. Like I know you didn't you didn't like the Mandalorian either season.
JVL00:41:10No, no, but I still didn't like Boba Fett. No, Boba Fett. But but again, every time I go back to both A New Hope and Empire, I am struck by how good they are as pieces of filmmaking. So, you know, it's not that I've fallen off the Star Wars bandwagon. I just, you know, and the truth is, I never even really liked I never liked anything after Empire.
Vic00:41:35You're like an REM fan. You like the old. Yes, I guess.
JVL00:41:38So here's here's my confession. I went and I watched episode four today. In advance of this. And I really liked it. Ha ha. Except that there were things I didn't care about in it still and things which are totally extraneous. So, you know, I'm getting the good looking corporate security guy who's an ambitious prick shoved. Oh, yes. Like what? This character should not exist. Right.
Vic00:42:06And and weirdly, weirdly, he's throughout, which I never totally understood.
Sonny00:42:11Well, it's he's but he's he's great, though, because he ends up, you know, he and the the big boss lady is not the boss lady like have some sort of weird forbidden love, which is just fascinating to me.
JVL00:42:26I find that so I I came out of the episode for thinking that it has the potential to be essentially a look array novel set in the Star Wars universe. And but with the proviso that like for it to be true like array and to be a spotlight, you need nothing to happen for most of it. Right. Ninety eight percent of it has to be nothing happening and where the intrigue and the danger is all bureaucratic. Right. And so when we get inside the whatever this imperial intelligence agent, the imperial NSA, or is it the imperial version of the CIA? What what is the American? I would say like to see.
Vic00:43:09I would say like the CIA. That was my read.
Sonny00:43:12So, you know, but it's more of an internal it's more like the KGB, really, I would say, is more of a cage because it's an internal focused.
JVL00:43:19Yeah, fine. But, you know, and I thought to myself, all right, I could do a full show about this, which is all which is not a Star Wars show, but is really like an intelligence service political backbiting show where, you know, you have a bunch of operators all over the place. All trying to to climb the greasy pole here. And that would be a show. I'd like that. I kind of like Mon Mon Mothma. Do we why do we know Mon Mothma? Was she in like Revenge of the Sith or something?
Sonny00:43:56She was she's in Rogue One. She shows up in Rogue One.
JVL00:43:59Does she show up in Rogue One? Is that where she is? Yeah. Yeah. You know, I kind of like her and Stellan Skarsgård running their clandestine spy ring. That's kind of cool. It feels a little bit, honestly, like the structure of the Honorable Schoolboy where you have both things happening at the George Smiley level, things happening at the level of what's his name? Is it Tommy, the guy who's the journalist, who's the spy? Yeah. And and then things also happening at the level of the, you know, the bad guys. Yeah. And anyway, so I thought. OK, but again, the first three episodes could have been a 15 minute prologue. And we could have just gotten here. Yeah. But even here, we got to take one third of the plot strands out. And for I think what Catherine is saying right now, she's listening to this and screaming at the her car radio is no, but those characters are going to use them down the line. And you know what? That's great. Introduce them when you're going to use them down the line. Like we just make it. We complain, Sonny, when a movie. Is 20 minutes too long, right? It gets us really, really aggravated. If a movie is 30 minutes too long, we get really pissy about it. Why is it that everybody's willing to overlook a streaming series that is like five hours too long?
Sonny00:45:23I don't disagree with any of this. I mean, I'm I'm totally on your side on this.
JVL00:45:28Time is the most valuable commodity in the universe.
Sonny00:45:32Should be should be should have been six hour long episodes instead of 10, you know, 40 minutes, whatever.
Vic00:45:38What is the calculation on is it just the artist being the artist, the director pushing for what he or she wants that these things become? I mean, because I do think not to talk too much about Rings of Power, but my gosh, I mean, that thing is like, yeah, I thought ponderous beyond belief. And I love, love, love that world. Yeah. Like, why does it keep you know, is it like 10 is the mark that you have to meet?
Sonny00:46:05Well, no, because a lot of these shows don't like a lot. A lot of the, for instance, Disney plus Marvel shows, almost none of those are 10 episodes long. I don't think those are all like six to eight episodes. So I, you know, I don't know. I don't know if Tony Gilroy had like, I want to do this very specific thing. I want to have this arc and this arc and this arc and then tie it up. You know, I don't know if I don't know if that's what he wanted. I think I do think he had a lot of latitude to kind of do whatever, whatever he wanted. But I mean, like the Book of Boba Fett, I think was only six episodes. Or eight episodes, something like that. Again, I like I can't say I mean, look, I can say if you're looking at something like Netflix, all of those shows are 40 percent too long because Netflix wants long shows. Every Netflix wants things that are they want. They are, you know, they're fighting. They were trying to win the war against sleep. Right. That's the that was our old mantra there. They have stuff that's too long that they want you to just sit there and watch and kind of passively consume. And that is why every every single Netflix film. But also. Television series is is way too long. I don't think that that is as much of a problem. It's certainly not as much of a problem with HBO Max. I don't think it is as much of a problem with Disney Plus. This just happened to be way too long for for what it was.
Vic00:47:25But I would say, JBL, there are enough episode fours built in the next six episodes that it's well, I was going to say worth. I mean, again, I do think it's like super uneven. I think it's a multi-tasked show. Right. There are episodes that are great. The prison break episode is great. It's it's really coolly shot. It's well acted. It's just like from an entertainment perspective, really exciting. The 45 minutes moves really fast. But then the episode after that is kind of ponderous and not much happens. And it's kind of like they're back on the masonry planet. Yeah. And, you know, it's like, oh, the Imperial Guard is here.
JVL00:48:10You know, I mean, it's like is definitely.
Vic00:48:13Yeah. Not every episode is a banger.
JVL00:48:17Are we going to get another season of Andor or are these things meant to be one offs in the way that I know this is She-Hulk, I think, was just like a one off maxi series. I don't think we're going to get a season two of She-Hulk. Maybe I'm wrong in the same way that WandaVision, right, was a one off. And I think the Book of Boba Fett was a one off.
Vic00:48:38You're just hoping.
JVL00:48:39Or the the the terrible Obi-Wan, the Ben Kenobi was a I think we'll never get another one of those. It was just so is this just we have a discreet story to tell about this character who everybody knows is already dead or now?
Sonny00:48:53The Obi-Wan shows a perfect example of a thing that should have been a two hour movie and it should have been about something else and not him fighting Darth Vader again. I mean, like there was like that. That that is a show that like is very frustrating. On a number of levels, because, A, there's great stuff in it. I like Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan Kenobi. I think that is that's a great part for him. I think he's very good in it. I like I like that whole thing. But my God, I like it. They've already done it. They've already done Obi-Wan versus Darth Vader.
JVL00:49:31Do something.
Sonny00:49:32I have him do something.
JVL00:49:33We've done it twice. Sonny twice.
Sonny00:49:35Twice.
JVL00:49:36We've done it. Yeah.
?00:49:37Yeah.
Vic00:49:38So wait, there is an Andor season two, Sonny?
Sonny00:49:41Yes. Yeah, there's an Andor season two.
Vic00:49:43OK.
Sonny00:49:44I'm pretty sure I'm like 90% sure it's been great.
Vic00:49:46Maybe that's when the sister arc actually comes to realization, since it literally disappears, even though there's a whole episode of her saying, Casa, Casa.
JVL00:49:55So I'm sure you guys saw the Mandalorian season three trailer. I have tapped out of Mandalorian after season one. I never went back. But my understanding is that in season two, after the entire arc of season one is to get Baby Yoda, who you have to refer to as either Grogu or the Child.
Vic00:50:13Please, Grogu.
JVL00:50:13Grogu or the Child. Baby Yoda. In all the official Disney merch, it says the Child. B-Y. The whole idea is to get Baby Yoda to Luke. And then we get into season two, and they're like, no, never mind. People really just want to see the Mandalorian running around with Baby Yoda. No, no, no, no.
Sonny00:50:30That's not what happened. In the Mandalorian season two, he goes off with Luke. The season ends. It was in the book of Boba Fett, the book of Boba Fett, which turns into season 2.5 of the Mandalorian. There are three episodes that take place where Boba Fett isn't really in it at all, and it's just the Mandalorian going to visit the kid, and then he's like, you're with me again. We're more adventures with us.
Vic00:51:03That was in Boba Fett? Yeah. I totally alighted that. I did not remember that at all.
JVL00:51:08Why not just invalidate two seasons of storytelling? It means all of which is to say it makes it into a soap opera. It means that this thing isn't a series. It's a soap opera. And so because soap operas are not designed to tell a story. They're just designed to be perpetual motion machines. And this is a soap opera with amazing merch there. All right.
Sonny00:51:32Yeah, that's about right. That's about right.
JVL00:51:34I think we've spent all the time we're going to spend on Andor. I think I will try watching season five, watching episode five, right?
Vic00:51:44Momentum.
JVL00:51:45Are we in favor of the blonde lady who is fighting within the Imperial KGB? Whatever her name is.
Vic00:51:52The ISB lady?
JVL00:51:54Yeah.
Vic00:51:54She's terrifying in a good way. I think she's good.
JVL00:51:57Yeah? Yeah, she's great. Yeah, I think she's really good.
Vic00:51:59So we're rooting for her to win her bureaucratic night fight. Expert player of the bureaucracy. Yes.
Sonny00:52:05I want her. And I want her to get together with the guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vic00:52:11The dorky guy who gets in trouble.
Sonny00:52:13Whose Jewish space mom is trying to get him to get back out there and get to work.
JVL00:52:18So thank you for saying that. Because in that scene when the door opens and I looked at her, I thought to myself, is this a Daily Stormer cartoon?
Sonny00:52:28No, no. I mean, I would say it's not a Daily Stormer cartoon because it has been embraced by the Jewish community in a very real way. She's a Jewish space mom. But it's totally like a stereotype.
JVL00:52:45I mean, I guess a loving stereotype, not a...
Sonny00:52:47A loving stereotype.
JVL00:52:48Okay, I'm so glad that you had the same reaction to that as I did because my head snapped back and I was like, what? Yeah, yeah.
Sonny00:52:59But anyway, those two getting together toward the end of the season. Spoiler. You like that? I liked it. I liked it. It's like the most believable romantic relationship that Star Wars has had since Han and Leia in Empire.
Vic00:53:13The most convincing love story of our time, Sonny Bunch. Do they go to bed?
JVL00:53:16Do we get more sexual hijinks?
Vic00:53:20They're trapped in a confined space. Oh, okay.
Sonny00:53:24They share a look.
Vic00:53:25Yeah, there's a look.
JVL00:53:25They share a look.
Vic00:53:26There's a look.
JVL00:53:27Bedroom eyes. Chris, did you notice that in the first... I think it's the first episode we get for the very first time in the history of Star Wars, like, clear evidence that a man and a woman have just had sex?
Vic00:53:38Well, yes, because I was watching with my children. So, yes, I was intimately, intimately aware. Did you have to explain to them?
JVL00:53:44Your 13-year-old was like, oh.
Vic00:53:47I believe in the way that I was parented, which is to ignore it and never pretend it didn't happen. Let them learn on the playground the way God intended. I think that is by far correct. I think that is by far the proven way to parent. JBL, I'm right about that, right? A hundred percent. Yeah. A hundred percent. Let their friends provide misinformation in the way that we all learned about everything.
Sonny00:54:08The internet will teach them soon enough. It's fine. Just go ahead and look on your phone. Google, Google, just Google sex.
JVL00:54:16It's fine. ChatGPT will teach them everything they need to know.
Vic00:54:20Did you see ChatGPT related that a guy from Massachusetts, a member of Congress, gave a speech that was ChatGPT created on the House floor?
Sonny00:54:31No. Yeah. Was it good? Like, intentionally?
Vic00:54:35Yes, intentionally.
Sonny00:54:36Okay.
Vic00:54:36It was fine. I mean, I think like a lot of it, we don't have to go down this rabbit hole, but I think like a lot of this stuff, it was like not as bad as you might think it would be. But I think it was, he was trying to make a point. What that point was, I'm not like entirely sure that I guess he could do it. But yeah, Jake Auchincloss from Massachusetts. That's interesting.
JVL00:54:58I had a reader of mine sent me a query that he had given to ChatGPT, which was, explain to me how you're going, how ChatGPT is going to destroy Google's ad business, but in the style of a Lovecraftian horror story. And it did it. And it was good. Yeah. We're all fucked.
Sonny00:55:25Sure. Sure.
JVL00:55:27All right. Bye journalism.
Sonny00:55:29It was fun while it lasted. Personalities, again, you'll never get a ChatGPT that can.
JVL00:55:34No, that's not true. Have you seen that? Have you seen the one? No, there is a ChatGPT that is personalities. Have you not seen this?
Vic00:55:40It's called Character AI or something like that. But does ChatGPT have a sub stack?
JVL00:55:47Not yet. You know, take that. Somebody's got to ask. Ah, here's the thing. ChatGPT can't ask itself the questions. Right? Just like with the Dali and the Midjourney art. Somebody's got to give them the prompts. They can't come up with the prompts themselves.
Sonny00:56:04Why can't you? Program an AI to ask questions.
JVL00:56:08Tough but fair. All right. That's all the time we're giving to this episode. Chris Eliza, thanks for being with us. Thank you, gents.
Sonny00:56:22Anything for outtakes?
JVL00:56:23What do we have for outtakes? Tell me more, Chris. You know, I was very sad that that girl from the Mason planet doesn't show up again because she was.
Sonny00:56:34Well, she does.
JVL00:56:35She does show up. Oh, she does.
Sonny00:56:37There's more of her.
JVL00:56:38It doesn't end well for her. Let's just leave it at that. Oh. Oh, does she get thrown into the pit of Sarlacc?
Sonny00:56:45No, that's the sand planet, not the masonry planet.
JVL00:56:48Oh, does the masonry planet have like.
Sonny00:56:50It's not the ice planet.
JVL00:56:52The brick oven of Sarlacc?
Sonny00:56:53It's not the salt planet from The Last Jedi.
Vic00:56:56Sonny, is the masonry planet like. Is everyone who works there like a union? Like, what do they do? Do they dig in the ground? Do they gather things? Like, there's that one scene with the big guy where he's like. They're like breaking down an old machine or something. Like, it was never clear to me what the industry was that supported that.
Sonny00:57:17They're sending cinder blocks throughout the galaxy, you know. They're making the bricks. You got to make the bricks somewhere and you send them off to the rest of the world.
Vic00:57:27It never. And all the gloves like hanging on the wall. It was like never clear to me why they needed those gloves. Like, are they miners?
JVL00:57:35Are the gloves special? Like, could they not take the. Because I have to say, if I had a job like that, I would not leave my gloves. I would want my gloves with me all the time. No, you're not going to leave your gloves in a public place. So nobody else would wear them. Like an animal? Steal them.
Sonny00:57:47Could you imagine JBL wearing the gloves that somebody else has sweated into? Oh, my God. All those. Just like the ringworm and the, you know. The fleas. Other horrible things.
Vic00:58:00So I have your your plane story made me think JBL when we were. We flew to Dallas, I snubbed Sonny. I was in Dallas for a week and didn't see Sonny, but I was a bitch. Yeah, yeah, I was like, I tell you who I'm not looking up. So I get that a lot. Directly, directly behind me on what is a three hour flight, like right from the start, one row behind me, I hear. And I think, like, what is that? You know, but but it's but it's like, you know, the plane and I have my headphones on and I'm like, not entirely clear. And my wife and one of my kids is sitting one row behind us, but on the other side. So they're there on the same row with them. So I hear throughout this flight, I hear that noise. And my wife tells me when we get off that it's a woman who has been hocking loogies into a bag the entire flight and left the bag for the flight attendants to clean up afterward. Is that is the grossest. And it was like every every five minutes and it was repeated. It wasn't just like it was like like she was really digging deep.
Sonny00:59:12She's really getting getting it out there.
Vic00:59:14Yeah. Clearing out. How gross is that?
Sonny00:59:17Well, that's disgusting. People are savages. That that's but most important question, though, Chris, do you do you have like noise canceling headphones that you just put on? Yes. Which ones do you put on?
JVL00:59:28Yes. Which do you put on?
Vic00:59:30I have I have Bose ones that I just put on and even if I don't listen to anything, I just have them on to cut like it's from it's from flying by myself where I don't want to talk to anyone. Yeah.
JVL00:59:42So this is I did this for the first time ever. I have the Sony like, you know, WXR three hundreds or whatever. What's it?
Sonny00:59:49There's like a cult of these headphones and the UBP X three hundred or five hundred. Something X wings. I have the same ones.
JVL00:59:57And I put it on a plane for the first time and it was life changing. Not only because it prevented anybody from talking to me, but because I hadn't realized before this how much stress I had just from the constant, very loud ambient noise of the plane. Yes, it's loud, really loud. And you put these things on and it's like turning off a switch. You just can't hear any of it anymore.
Vic01:00:19Totally agree.
JVL01:00:20Oh, it was it was awesome. And plus, nobody spoke to me.
Vic01:00:25Yeah, that's the key. You it's a very clear sign to people that you are not interested in engaging in conversation.
Sonny01:00:31No, that's the best part. Yeah, that's the best part. People are the worst. The one the 1000 XM four or five, something like that.
JVL01:00:40Oh, I'm sure it's fine.
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