#191. 'The Flash'
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The main topic is The Flash, which the hosts use as the centerpiece of a bleak summer-2023 box office autopsy — Sonny walks through how it, Elemental, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Fast X, and The Little Mermaid are all nine-figure bombs that "look like garbage" relative to their budgets, with only cheaper hits like Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and The Super Mario Bros. Movie actually profitable. On the film itself, Mike liked it in the theater (and brags about correctly predicting the new Bruce Wayne twist) but starts to doubt himself once JVL pushes back; JVL flatly hated it, calling it "the fifth best multiverse movie I've seen in the last 24 months," accusing it of pure nostalgia-bait with a thematically self-contradictory ending (Barry can't save his mom but somehow can exonerate his dad), and singling out the Polar Express–style CGI cameo sequence as an insult to the audience; Sonny lands in between, finding it moment-to-moment entertaining and even structurally clever as an inverted origin story, while agreeing the CGI and the wasted Supergirl/Zod subplot are dog-shit-looking failures — all three, though, love Michael Keaton's returning Batman. The long opening banter covers Sonny's flaky home AC unit and the accidental death of the backyard gecko he'd befriended and named "trash can lizard" (crushed under a tipped trash can, to his genuine devastation), JVL's son Flash getting an elbow MRI ahead of possible Tommy John surgery after a costly travel-baseball season, and Mike's debut in an adult softball league with his team the Chuggers, which spirals into a long, delighted tangent about the opposing team the Swingers and the "hobo code" meaning of their upside-down-pineapple uniform logo.
From the show notes
Remember the multiverse? It's back. In Flash form. Also, here's a visual aide that will make sense after you've listened:
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00So you're saying you could travel back in time. But Bruce, I can fix things. I can save people. I can save my mom. I can save your parents. You can also destroy everything.
Mike00:00:29Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I'm your co-host, Mike Warren. Joining me, as always, are my two co-hosts, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. You can join us at Sub-Beacon.com. Come subscribe. Join us. Listen up. Comment. Join the community of Sub-Beacon listeners at Sub-Beacon.com. We're going to be talking in a little bit about The Flash later in the show. But first, guys, how we doing? We're doing good. Sonny, tell us what's going on. You've got some activity going on at your house right now as we record. As we record.
Sonny00:01:06I may have to leave halfway through to go sign some checks or something. No, the air conditioning in my house, this has been an ongoing struggle in the three plus years we've lived here. The air conditioner works fine most of the time, except for when it gets really, really hot, which is obviously a problem.
JVL00:01:29Is that bad?
Sonny00:01:30With air conditioning in Texas. So this happened a couple of years ago where the air conditioner just shut off at the start of the worst heat wave in Texas history. It was like 105 degrees for 10 straight days or something. And this was back in, I don't know, 2021, maybe just like just like crapped out. And I had a guy come and he was like, well, you're an idiot. The. The circuit breaker right here, just behind the air conditioning unit tripped off. And I was like, I was like, oh, well, that sucks. He's like, look, here's the thing. That still shouldn't be happening. So let's let's figure out what's going on. Let's figure out what's going on. So he like he ran it through some tests. He was like, I don't know. I can't really figure it out, but I'm going to put a new I'm going to put like a new motor in or a new fan casing or something. It wasn't the compressor. It wasn't the compressor itself was fine. It was something air handler. It was. I don't look. I don't. You're talking.
Mike00:02:29You're throwing words out there. It was the doohickey.
Sonny00:02:32I don't understand. It was the flange. It was the Johnson rod. It was the flange.
JVL00:02:35I need a new Johnson rod there, Costanza.
Sonny00:02:38It was a it was a Phillips head flange that was all that. Anyway, so he replaced he replaced a couple of things. He put some more free on in it and it's been fine. It's been it's been basically fine for the for the. But since I since I learned the trick with the the the, you know, circuit breaker behind it, which I didn't even know was a thing. I like I actually checked the circuit breaker. The main circuit breaker. I went to the main circuit breaker at my house and was like, oh, it's still on. So it's not. So it's not the circuit breaker. I didn't realize there was a second circuit breaker that was tied directly to the air conditioner that was literally right behind the air conditioning. Anyway, it has tripped a couple of times in the in the ensuing years, but I reset it and it's fine afterwards. But this time it this time it went off pretty early in the year. It wasn't even the air conditioner wasn't even set that that that low. So I was. I was like, look, we got we got heat coming. Heat's coming. I'm getting a guy out here to figure it out. And it's all covered by I still have the we have the like home warranty thing, you know, so it's still it's still covered. So this this is covered under that. So in theory, if I have to replace the entire unit, like the first five thousand dollars will be covered. So we'll see.
JVL00:03:51Fingers crossed.
Sonny00:03:51You have to replace the unit fingers kind of fingers crossed here because I then you get a new unit for free before the home warranty goes up. Then I then I get then I get the the I get the the unit. Well, it probably won't be free, but it'll be like it'll be five thousand dollars. So anyway, long story short, guy is out here right now checking it. I may have to duck out in a minute to figure out precisely what's going on. I will update listeners next week with the whole the whole thing. But I I didn't actually want to talk about that today. This is just just happened. This kind of all happened. I want to talk about how I'm super depressed. Because I am. Oh, no, super depressed. So so some backstory here on my so in my you know, my trash cans are outdoors, right? They're they're in the like big receptacles that the trucks come and pick up trash and recycling their outdoors, which, you know, kind of standard thing. And a couple of weeks ago, maybe a month ago, I was putting my trash away and I noticed that there was a there there had been a there was some ants all over. And I hate ants. Don't don't care much for ants. So I'm like, I'm like, ah, this sucks. And I didn't do anything about it because question. I'm an idiot. Yes. Question. Yes.
Mike00:05:03Do you move your trash cans to the street or to an alley or what? So are they are they by your house? And then at once or rather, are they in the same place at all times?
Sonny00:05:16So they're in. So this is a funny story. So in the back of the house, they're in the back of the house, like right next to the driveway that goes into the garage in the back of the house. Right. And there's a little there's like a little cove set aside. There they they rest. And I for the first like six months we lived here, I was just putting my trash in there and my recycling in there and then leaving them there. And then they would get picked up on Thursday. And sometimes the trash cans would be kind of like out of the little cove area. When I come back, they'd be like half in the alley. And I'd be like, sons of bitches, put the put put the trash cans back. Right. Idiots. And then about six months into this, there was a there was like a an official ticket from the city. A warning for not moving the trash cans to the alley. Now, again, the alley is literally like three feet. It's I mean, I literally just I wheel it out and like it's literally like a three three foot move. But I under I actually I am actually with the city on this. I think the city was right to give me the warning because this is all about efficiency. These trash guys are just trying to bang, bang, bang. And anything that we can do, the people to make their life slightly more efficient. And better for better for everyone. So I was fine with that. I was I didn't realize I was ignorant. I did not know.
Mike00:06:33Question. Yes. Question. Did you do your trash? Does the city's truck have the automatic a little fork that comes out to pick up the trash can? Yes. And dump it in. So it so so it really does need to be. But the thing is. In the right.
Sonny00:06:51Well, yeah, but but the thing is, it still doesn't even really make it does. I don't think it actually they still have to, like, wheel it around to so it's. Facing the back. Does that make sense? Like, I so I have like the lid is facing the street, but they have to, like, wheel it around backwards and, like, get it. And that's what I still have to move it anyway, is the long and the short.
Mike00:07:08Because because my trash company now. Has one that comes out of the side of the truck, so it pulls up.
JVL00:07:15The side loader garbage truck.
Mike00:07:17Exactly. So anyway, that's I'm sorry. Continue.
Sonny00:07:20So now this is all good. I want everyone to understand this. This set up here because it's part of the story.
JVL00:07:25So I'm the image.
Sonny00:07:27I'm I'm. I walk out to my my trash can one day. There are some ants on it. I'm like, oh, that's gross. But then I don't do anything about it because I'm lazy. So a couple of days later, I come out again and I go to throw trash away. And there's a little list, like a little gecko. Like a little gecko has taken up residence in the lip of the in in like the lip of the trash can. You know how the trash can has like there's like a little crevice almost like a little that it can it can kind of hide under.
JVL00:07:56Is this an ant buffet? And it's.
Sonny00:07:57It's just it's just eating up ants. And I'm like, yes, this is a huge win. Huge win for me. This is a huge, huge win for me. And ever since then, ever since then, I've been a big fan of trash can lizard, as I call him. Just I go out there and I like I like I'm excited to see the trash can lizard. I'm like, is trash can lizard there? Is he doing his job?
JVL00:08:15Is he speaking a British accent to you about insurance?
Sonny00:08:17Half the time he's there just chowing down. Sometimes he's just there getting some sun, you know. So I love this little guy. And then.
JVL00:08:27Owned. No.
Sonny00:08:28And then today. Oh, today I go I go out there to I go out there to take the trash out. And I. I look for I look for trash can lizard and I don't see him. So I'm like, OK, that's fine, because a lot of time he's not there. He doesn't.
JVL00:08:47He went looking for him, didn't you? You felt a disturbance in the forest. You thought, no, look for that little guy.
Sonny00:08:52No, no. So, again, remember how I described the little cove where the trash cans. So there's like there it's like a cobblestone thing. So it's not it's not super steady. It's like it kind of wobbles a little bit, kind of wobbles a little bit. So I don't again, I don't see trash can lizard. So I just go over there and I open up the lid and I put in the trash can. And when I put the trash in the trash can and when I when I look down, I realize about a tenth of a second too late. The trash can lizard is under the trash can. And he is half in and half out of the trash can or half half. Under the trash can and half on like the cobblestones. And when I put the trash in the trash can, it is on the uneven cobblestones and it tilts forward and swishes his head entirely. Just fucking flattens it.
JVL00:09:43You murdered your friend.
Sonny00:09:44I murdered. I murdered the only thing in this world that I care about.
JVL00:09:49The only friend you have.
Sonny00:09:49The only the only friend I have in Dallas, Texas. I fucking I guillotined him. Just like the only. The only good thing about it was I don't think he suffered. Judging by the state of his head when I pulled the trash can back up.
JVL00:10:06I did you get down to him and like try to breathe? I literally held his little hand.
Sonny00:10:12I literally did get down on my knees to look at him, be like, maybe he's OK. He was not OK. He was not.
JVL00:10:19There's no guy.
Sonny00:10:19There's no.
JVL00:10:20It should have been me.
Sonny00:10:22Just just lizard lizard viscera. Everywhere. I you guys have no like the worst part is he was down there. He was eating ants. He was down there eating. There was like a little little group of ants down there. He was just down there just eating it.
Mike00:10:38Just I did what you told me to study. And I was eating the ants like you told me to. I I swear.
Sonny00:10:44Did I do good? I swear. I do good. I swear to God. I swear to God. I came into the house and and my like my daughter asked me a question about something. I just snapped at her because I was so. I was so I'm so upset. I'm so distraught by this track. I can't tell her about it because she also loves trash can lizard.
JVL00:11:05But I did trash can lizard go daddy. I don't know. He probably moved on a farm.
Sonny00:11:09He moved to another trash can upstate. Move to another trash can upstate. I I am. I you guys have no you guys have no idea how like I'm like genuinely distraught. Genuinely upset about this horrible.
JVL00:11:26What did you do to cover up? The evidence so that your daughter doesn't I threw it in the body through it in the bushes.
Sonny00:11:33Just got rid of it.
JVL00:11:34It's something it makes perfect sense to my boy.
Sonny00:11:38The ants the ants took out a hit on a little lizard boy. I'm sorry. I'm sorry daughter. The ants took out a hit on our little lizard friend.
Mike00:11:47I it's so fitting to me that that your friend is like a cold-blooded slimy little creature. I could just like it's not slimy at all.
Sonny00:11:56He's a he's. It's not a skink scaly. It's not a skink. He's a there are lizards everywhere in this. One of the great things about Dallas. They're just like little lizards everywhere. I love little lizards. They're fantastic. They're they're cool little guys and I I am it's like it's like you remember the Sopranos with a Tony and the ducks. That's exactly what it's like with me.
Mike00:12:18I'm just like I'm like you're wading through the pool chasing after the lizard.
Sonny00:12:26Anyway, I'm sorry.
Mike00:12:27Sorry for your loss.
Sonny00:12:28I I'm it's that that happened this morning to it. Like I'm still I'm still really processing it.
JVL00:12:34So if I'm maybe talking over with a priest, maybe this is the precipitating event, which finally brings you to Rome.
Sonny00:12:41I don't think he'd be able to help.
Mike00:12:43Yeah, the priest.
Sonny00:12:44The priest also going to what about what about what about like what about like a lizard alien? What about one of the lizard people? Can I find one of them to talk to?
Mike00:12:53Oh, yeah. You need special glasses.
Sonny00:12:55So anyway, that's that's been my morning. Air conditioner may be busted and I murdered my my best friend.
Mike00:13:02Well, we need we need a little more upbeat dudes chatting. So JVL, what you got for us?
Sonny00:13:06Oh, yeah. Let's go. Let's go to JVL.
Mike00:13:09Mr.
JVL00:13:10Sunshine JVL Flash has an MRI in his elbow tomorrow morning, and I guess we're going to find out whether or not insurance covers Tommy John surgery.
Sonny00:13:21I mean, if he needs it, he needs it, right?
JVL00:13:24I don't know. I literally I don't know if. Tommy John becomes something which is an elective because, you know, like he can do everything he wants in the life except for throw a baseball, right?
Sonny00:13:34Well, that's not everything you want all the time.
?00:13:36Exactly.
JVL00:13:37I don't know. I don't know that it's going to be Tommy John, but there's something going on. We saw the sports doc. We did an initial X-ray. There's. There's stuff happening in there. So great. Great, great, great.
Sonny00:13:50What is the other hand?
JVL00:13:51I don't have to travel to any more baseball tournaments this summer.
Sonny00:13:54That's a plus.
JVL00:13:55I've just set all that money on fire.
Sonny00:13:57So wait, did you already paid for the league and everything? It's it's all. Yeah. Oh, yeah.
JVL00:14:02You have to pay to start. So we got thirty one pitches for. Four thousand dollars.
Sonny00:14:09How much money do you pay per pitch? That's thirteen hundred dollars per pitch.
JVL00:14:14No, thirty.
Sonny00:14:16I'm sorry. One hundred thirty dollars. One hundred thirty dollars.
JVL00:14:18Oh, we'll see when you put it that way. It's not so bad.
Sonny00:14:20Yeah. No, right.
Mike00:14:22I mean, you get one hundred thirty dollars worth of enjoyment. Out of each of those pitches.
Sonny00:14:26Yes. How many dollars? How many dollars per pitch have the Rangers gotten out of Jacob de Grom?
JVL00:14:30That's a good question.
Sonny00:14:31Think about that.
JVL00:14:33Think about that. Michael, what do you got going on, buddy?
Sonny00:14:37Upbeat. Yeah. Well, it's it's it's upbeat.
Mike00:14:42So I joined a an adult softball league. And we had our first games, our doubleheader this past Sunday. Is this a fun softball league or an.
JVL00:14:57Angry softball league where middle-aged men are living out their fantasies and yelling at people.
Mike00:15:01No. So I would say so. First of all, I. I only have one other team to judge all of this by because we played this doubleheader on Sunday. And I really don't know very many of the guys on my team. So I was brought in by the head coach of our of the T-ball team that I was assistant coaching. He sent me a message saying, hey, would you be interested? It's a. A lot of guys who play. It's most of the little it mostly literally dads. It's the from our little league, the dads who coach lots of warning lights already. And so it's, you know, it's it's it's very casual. It's very casual because it's summer people going on vacations. But, you know, we're always just happy to have like as big a roster as we can and and see how that goes. So I said, yeah, that sounds great. I've not played softball.
JVL00:15:57Basically, ever throwing a softball is such a bizarre experience.
Mike00:16:03It's a weird experience. I mean, I've thrown. Yeah. So and hitting a softball is weird, too, as I found on Sunday. But I said, yes, I'd love to do it. And, you know, get me a little more exercise and and all of that. So go to the go to the game. The first game. So it's on Father's Day, actually. It's a nice little Father's Day gift to go go play some. Softball. And so our team is the Chuggers. That's the name of our team. It's a little more serious. So there's actually two tiers in this league. There's there's there's the actual casual softball and then there's competitive. And so we are in the competitive rank or whatever.
JVL00:16:46Do you still drink beer during the game?
Mike00:16:48No. So it's not like that, which I was a little disappointed to learn.
JVL00:16:54I assume there's the casual level. I think. So somebody brings a keg.
Mike00:16:58Exactly. That's that's kind of my level of softball. There's an umpire. So it's that kind of, you know, level of seriousness.
Sonny00:17:08Wait, I'm sorry. Question. Yes. Can you bring alcohol to these games? Is that is that allowed?
Mike00:17:14I don't know.
Sonny00:17:16OK.
Mike00:17:16I'm just along for the ride. OK. And seeing how everybody is. I mean, so it's like a lot of the guys I recognize, you know, I've been I've been coaching or had a kid in this league now for several several years. Question in the in the Little League. Yes.
Sonny00:17:32How many of their names?
Mike00:17:34I know probably now having played two games with them, I probably know about half their names.
Sonny00:17:40OK, because because I will tell you, I know a lot. I know a lot of my kids, my kids, friends, parents. And I know about five of their names. I know I know about that. I know I know them by sight. I'm like, right. I do a lot. Hey, what's up, man? How's it going? Hey, Madison's dad. Great to see you. How's it going, buddy?
Mike00:18:04But but deep conversations with other dads.
Sonny00:18:06But like, oh, yeah, totally. I mean, I've been on camping trips and I know like four of their names.
Mike00:18:14Yeah.
Sonny00:18:14So well, but I hope none of them listen to this show.
Mike00:18:17So like a few of the guys on the team are sort of higher ups in the Little League. You know, they they're like on the board. So it's like their names that I've seen, you know. And emails and all that stuff. So those were very easy to know. Of course, I know the coach who recruited me. And so and there was like, I would say besides the one we had one ringer kid whose dad is on the team who played for. He's a teenager who played for us besides the ringer teenager. I was the youngest on the team. Definitely in no way the best in the best shape, not even close. Like there is a guy who's definitely like military. Like a very nice guy, but just like, you know, you know, big guns. And another guy who like clearly like played baseball through high school. So I would say there's varying levels of skill on this softball team. And of course, like a lot of a lot of the team is like old or. And, you know, chuggers is an apt name, like a lot of them are chugging around the bases as we get around.
Sonny00:19:25But it's chugging like a. Choo choo train, not chugging like guzzling.
Mike00:19:29I think it's I think it's supposed to be a double entendre, which we'll play into when we get to the other team.
JVL00:19:36So not a triple entendre because there's one other chugging metaphor.
Mike00:19:43Well, that is definitely. Yeah, not not not so much. Not so much. Mostly what I observed was the was the chugging as we were like. Breathing heavily halfway through the first game and everyone's going like, well, we have to play another game after this.
JVL00:20:03So it was fine. It was really. Where do they play you?
Mike00:20:07I play catcher. Oh, so it is a key position, but it also grants to your knees. Well, so like literally today. So this is Thursday's the first day since Sunday that like I haven't woken up and been like, oh, my legs. Oh, my knees. So that was a bit of a gut punch. The team we played. So we won the first game and we lost the second game. We won the first game. It was a close game. We lost the game. Second game. Like we were destroyed. Totally creamed. You know, I think they had, you know, two.
JVL00:20:43Chuggers got creamed. Yes.
Mike00:20:46Yeah. Yeah. Continue. The second game, I believe they had like two straight innings with like. With like 10 or 10 runs. You know, something ridiculous like that.
Sonny00:20:58So they were running a train on the Chuggers.
Mike00:21:01They were. The other team, by the way, their name, the Swingers.
Sonny00:21:08The Swingers are running a train on the Chuggers.
Mike00:21:11They were, you know, but here they invite you to join any other group.
JVL00:21:17I would pass on it.
Mike00:21:18Oh, oh, the Swingers, you know. Oh, like I'm going through the list before we show up, you know. Oh, OK. So we're playing tonight. The Swingers. Yeah, I get. I like bad swingers show up. Their uniforms. Have like the have like little little logos on them, you know, repeated logo pattern. Yeah, it's got two baseball bats like crossbones, you know, with an upside down pineapple.
JVL00:21:46I don't know what that means.
Mike00:21:48You don't know what the upside down pineapple is.
JVL00:21:49No, the pineapple itself is a symbol of welcome in many countries.
Mike00:21:55And when you turn it upside down, it's. It's a sign of. We're a couple that's really welcome.
JVL00:22:02Really? I did not know this. I'm going to be on the lookout for that. All of you didn't know this. I had no idea.
Mike00:22:08Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. This is like this is the.
Sonny00:22:12You're in an interesting circles.
Mike00:22:13I had no idea. So I'm like looking at them like what is on this shirt of this? And yeah, it's and believe me, the rest of the team, we were kind of like, did everybody else notice what their what their uniforms was? Open minded.
Sonny00:22:27Did everybody else on the team understand what that meant? Because I like if I saw that, I would have no idea. I would just be like, oh, well, you know, you guys are a little naive.
Mike00:22:37I'm a little more world.
Sonny00:22:39I would assume it's more like, you know, the street smarts, the the the like what's the purple plant emoji, the eggplant emoji. I would assume it's more like that then. No, this is like this is like if you if they're like hobo code for we we do.
Mike00:22:56We'll do it for you can fuck my wife. So I will tell you how I figured this out is is is doom scrolling on Instagram. And, you know, everybody's got like there's like this whole culture of of like camp camper living or van living and all this stuff. It's like there's like all of these like accounts. And at some point, you know, it was like there was like, here's what things you should know about living on the road. Here's how you camp at these places. And you got your van, you take this and it's like, OK, you're learning all this stuff. About the different pipes and the different things you got to know regulations. And one of the tips I saw them give was be aware of this symbol because it means a very specific thing. So, yeah, it is.
Sonny00:23:39It's hobo code. It's literally hobo code. Yeah, it's like from Mad Men.
Mike00:23:44So anyway, I also noticed that everybody on this team was like. The average age was much younger than our team, and that sort of started to fall into place. It's about why they were kicking our ass in the second game, especially, but we held our own in the first. And how'd you do it?
JVL00:24:02The dish.
Mike00:24:04Let's see. I think across two games I went. I think I went two or three for six, so it wasn't great. One time I popped up and the catcher caught it. It was just like a freak, a freak thing. But I got on base. I got on base twice. Um, and my problem was like, I'm a boy and I was playing among like men who were like, just like knocking near dingers, you know, into the outfield. Whereas like, I felt like I don't even really have a good sense of how to hit this softball.
Sonny00:24:44You swing as hard as you can. No, no swing as hard as you can.
Mike00:24:48Well, that's what I tried to do, but I'm not like connecting in the right place. So I'm like, I'm like actually getting the ball on the ground, you know, because the one thing about like. Softball like this is like you swing it as hard as you can. There's a lot of pop flies that make for easy outs and quick, quick turnaround. So, you know, I was never hitting balls like that, except for, except for the pop fly or the, the, the, the file, uh, ball. But, um, I was trying to lay down balls, like in the right position. I was able to get on base when I did that and did that well.
JVL00:25:15But, um, so a couple of things you should probably head out to the T work on the T work on staying inside, staying inside, right? Your, your bottom hand has got to drive. It's really driving the whole train.
Mike00:25:28Got it.
JVL00:25:29And you don't want to be throwing your hands out in front of you staying inside as much
Sonny00:25:33as you can. Compact.
JVL00:25:35You want a compact spike. That's right. That's right. The butt of the bat leads through the zone. And then the barrel comes whipping through as you go, right? Keep your weight back. Yep. Don't get too far out of that front foot. The other thing is you need to do a little bit of online research because, uh, every few years, a bat maker does something naughty. And creates a model of bat, which is way outside of the tolerances for what is allowed. And it gets certified anyway.
Mike00:26:05Okay.
JVL00:26:06And if you go to bat forums, you will find it. And some people are like, oh yeah, I know the 2017 de Marini Zen 2.7 is an insanely hot bat. And that bat is then discontinued because the bat maker realizes it was too hot, couldn't use it. And then people sell them on eBay. And it'd be worth going and spending a little money on eBay for a super hot bat that you can then come in and just launch balls with Jim Swift will tell you.
Mike00:26:37Yeah. That's, that's more work. That's more, that's more, that's more work than I care to put into this. Like I'm already in over my head, I'm just gonna let it ride, frankly. Uh, but, but no, I'll, I'll consider it anyway. I had a good time. It was fun. Uh, again, I was a boy among men. And it really, uh, I really felt that, that way. So we'll see how this coming weekend goes with, uh, with the chuggers and softball. Hopefully. Oh, the last thing I learned is that apparently in the spring league, this, the, the team that we played, the swingers like won the whole thing.
JVL00:27:12So like, Oh, and you split with them and we split with them.
Mike00:27:16So we felt pretty good about that. And, um, you know, I had a couple, uh, even, even though I only got on base twice, I actually had an RBI, uh, uh, sacrifice out. So, um. You know, put that, put that in your pipe and smoke it swingers. Well, let's move on here and, uh, get into, I, I do think we're talking about the flash today. And I think we gotta spend some time, Sonny, am I right? Talking about box office, because this is this, the story of the flash is a story of the box office. So let's just start. The flash is, uh, this past weekend and it's debut weekend. The number one movie at the box office. Ooh. That sounds very good. Isn't that good? It's number one. I mean, like one is the best, right? Uh, $55 million, uh, behind it. Number two is elemental. The new Pixar movie making just under $30 million at the domestic box office behind that. Number three, Spider-Man across Spider-Verse, then transformers rise of the beasts and number five, rounding it out. Little mermaid. Look at that. Disney's got two in the top five. This is a good, this is a good summer for Disney at the box office, right?
JVL00:28:25Guys. Flash did way better than Shazam too. Yes. Yeah.
Mike00:28:32Uh, so what, what's going on here, Sonny?
Sonny00:28:35Uh, I, I, I think the story, the story of the summer box office so far is that there are a series of pretty enormous disasters out there. Uh, so the, the flash, yes, the flash came in first, but a $55 million three-day weekend is terrible on a movie like this. It cost somewhere between 200 and $250 million. They probably spent another hundred, $150 marketing it. It's it's the sort of movie that you have to gross 800 million worldwide just to break even more or less. And this movie is gonna gross like 250 million worldwide, something like maybe, maybe 300 million worldwide. But that, that would be a very big stretch goal.
Mike00:29:17And would that meet, would that meet its production budget even?
Sonny00:29:20No, I mean, no, because you, you, you split that with the theaters.
JVL00:29:24Yeah.
Sonny00:29:25They would take half. Yeah.
JVL00:29:27It's a disaster all over. It's it's. You don't get to four or 500 million with international. Won't it? No, no. Or the international number's terrible.
Sonny00:29:33God, no, no. I, I, I, I think there's a decent chance that this movie doesn't hit 300 million worldwide. I mean, I, I could, I wouldn't say that for sure. Uh, but I, I would say that it will struggle hardly at that point.
JVL00:29:44They should have bat-girled it.
Sonny00:29:46Basically. No, basically. Right. I mean like, so, so, but, but the flash is not alone here, right? Elemental grows $30 million since opening weekend. Now. They have legs. I think audiences liked it a little more than the flash. Um, and it's a, it's a kid's movie. There aren't a ton of kids movies out right now. So like audiences, you know, families will be going to see it. Um, uh, it could end up sneakily being the, the number one movie this weekend, this upcoming weekend, because I, I, uh, I, if I had to guess the flash will drop 67 to 70%. Um, even if Spider-Man across the spider verse holds very well, and I think it will, uh, L. Elemental drops like 30 or 40%, which again, I think it's possible. Um, you know, that, that could end up being the number one movie, but the elemental, like just looking at what, what elemental did $30 million opening weekend, um, let's say it does a multiple of five gets to 150, uh, does about the same amount overseas. That's 300 million. You think, oh, 300 million. That's not terrible. This movie costs $200 million to make 200 million, 200, $200 million plus Pixar movie. Uh, so that's another movie that's going to have to make. 600, uh, to $700 million to break even. Um, then let's look at transformers rise of the beast transformers rise of the beast, uh, number in the number four spot this weekend, um, uh, earn it dropped 66%. Uh, it has a total domestic gross of $101 million. It'll probably get to around 350 million worldwide, let's say, uh, 350 million. That movie costs $220 million. Some nonsensical numbers. Like that. Uh, so that's another movie that again, gonna have to gross probably in the 700, $800 million range to break even, not gonna get even close to that. So that's three, nine, that's three, nine figure bombs, nine figure bomb. We're talking movies that will lose more than a hundred million dollars at the box office. Now you, you argue, okay, well, transformers really expensive toy commercial. They make that up through toys. You argue elemental. Well, you know, that'll, that'll drop people to Disney plus. Maybe it will. Maybe it won't. Um, but like those are, those are just the big. Bombs. I mean, like you also have the little mermaid, which is gonna really struggle to, to, to get to its breakeven point. Um, you have guard, uh, guardians of the galaxy volume three, which is like the one extremely expensive movie of the year that is definitely gonna make its money back. You know, it is, uh, it's at a 800, 823 right now, uh, worldwide. So that, that'll be okay. Fast X fast X is another movie that costs the reported. You wanna know what the reported budget number on fast Xs. Here's the reported budget number on fast X, $340 million, 300, a third of a billion
JVL00:32:31dollars. It costs a lot of money to build a dam, 340. They had to build a dam and then blow it up $340 million for a movie where nobody is ever
Sonny00:32:42in the same room as anybody else. There's no money. There are no sets. It's just green screen. And then they composite it all together.
Mike00:32:49No, I, I'm sorry. That crane scene in front of the Vatican, that was, that was practical effects and that's expensive. It is expensive. You can see it all. You can see it all on the screen.
Sonny00:32:59So anyway, you know, a movie like fast X, they spend $340 million on it. That means that the, the, with marketing, they probably cost, it probably cost half a billion dollars, which means in theory, they need to grow some about a billion dollars worldwide to make, to make their money back on that. This it's, it's irresponsible. It's irresponsible to make a movie for that much money. So anyway look, here's, you know, the thing about the thing about the summer box office is that. Everyone is focused on the flash and all of the other studios are very happy for everybody else to be focused on flash because this is a, this is a cross. This is a, this is a problem across the, uh, the, the world of filmmaking right now that you have these huge expensive movies that are losing their shirts because they cost too much money. You know what, you know, what's gonna end up being the most profitable movie of the year. Probably is Spider-Man across the spider verse. Cause that movie only, only, only cost a hundred million dollars cost a hundred million dollars. It's gonna probably end up around. Yes. How much does super Mario? Well, I guess I super, super Mario. That's well, is that the summer? Does that count a summer? I thought you said year. Oh, no. Super Mario brothers. The super Mario brothers movie will end up being the, the, the biggest hit of the year. I mean, that, that is, that's a, that's a massive win all around. Um, but it's, it's a, it's a, I don't know, man, it's a disaster.
JVL00:34:16Isn't there another way of looking at this Sonny, which is that, uh, the good movies are doing well and the shitty movies are doing badly. And if you keep making shitty movies like transformers rise of the beasts, they're going to lose money. Yeah. If you may keep making movies like the flash and elemental, uh, they're going to lose money. And then if you make like semi okay movies, like the little Mermaid and guardians of the galaxy, they're going to be okay. Right. The one thing in all of this that freaks me out a little bit is fast X because fast X is better than its immediate predecessors and still is not doing well.
Sonny00:34:53Well, it's a bad, it's a bad movie. It, that is not doing well because it's, uh, following up several other bad movies. The little mermaid, I'm sorry. The little mermaid is not going to be okay. I like, I, I am, I'm shocked by how badly it's doing overseas, but the little mermaid is not at half a billion dollars yet. It's going to end up grossing $550 million, something like that. Maybe, maybe, maybe it gets to 600, but again, this movie costs $250 million to make spent, spent another hundred million dollars much money like there are no stars in it. There's no, there's a, and it looks like shit. It looks like absolute garbage. All of these movies that's, and that's the, that is the this. So this is what I think the actual unifying, uh, under underlying, um, thing here with all these movies is, is that all of these movies that I've discussed with the exception of Spider-Man across the Spider-Verse look like absolute trash. They look like garbage. They look cheap. Um, the money is not on the screen and audiences, uh, I think have grown tired of. Being given this garbage looking, uh, theatrical like product and told to go see it in theaters. And if that is, if that, if that comes to an end, if the, if the only time you are allowed to spend $300 million on a movie is when James Cameron is like, give me, cause I'll, you'll see it on the screen. I will pay those. I will pay those WIDA guys $10 an hour and I'll hire 5,000 of them and it's gonna look great.
Mike00:36:21Um, then like every dollar fine.
Sonny00:36:24Fine. But like, uh, but everybody else, I mean, I, like if I'm, if I'm Disney and I'm looking at this and I'm looking at the reactions just to the trailers of Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny, and I'm looking at the, again, that movie is going to die $400 million spend probably between production and marketing. I'm, I'm, I'm my pants. I'm just, I'm just crapping right in them.
Mike00:36:51Um, can I, can I just say, by the way? Elemental. I've seen this trailer now multiple times, like if you were going to make up a parody
Sonny00:37:02of a Pixar movie, yeah, yeah, like that's like, but here's the thing, everything from
Mike00:37:07the title to the, like the premise is like, what if elements had emotions? Yeah. And it's, and we'll call it elemental. Yeah. It's like one word.
Sonny00:37:16It's fine. It's it's honestly, it's better than anything else that Disney has released in the last three years. Okay. Um, it's, it's with the exception maybe of soul, which I liked a lot. Uh, I would say it's the best animated thing that they, they put out like two years, two
JVL00:37:30years ago.
Sonny00:37:31Yeah. But well, I, I like it more than in Canto, the movie I have in Canto is not a good movie. It's a bad movie. Um, but the, the songs are pretty good. Songs are pretty good, but the, the, the, anyway, the, uh, the, the state of the box office right now is bad. Now theater owners are doing okay because there's so much stuff out that lots of people are still going. Like I went, I went, you know, my local draft house, my local draft house. As any indication, you know, theaters are okay because still lots of people are showing up. But I do think, I do think that, uh, the flash is going to be, I mean, I, I like, it is not going to be the number two movie or the number one movie next week or next week.
JVL00:38:08It's going to be bad. You, you literally predicted this though. You had a show on, uh, Bulwer goes to Hollywood now four months ago, I think, and I forget who your guest was, but you were going through box office and this was at a moment when things looked really good and everybody, we were in the cycle of like, Hey, theatrical. It was back and you and your guests both said, yeah, things look really great right now, but they're going to look horrible this summer. And he went through the, the titles and the numbers and production costs. And he said that by mid summer, it's going to look like theatrical is in a place of absolute disaster.
Sonny00:38:42Yeah. Well, I mean, again, it's not even theatrical, it's the studios. And like, then you get into like, uh, well, the studios aren't going to spend that sort of money, which isn't going to bring the audiences out. I don't know. I like the whole thing is bad. I like the whole thing is bad because, uh, you, you, you know, audiences are not blameless here. Audiences, audiences, they've rewarded this shit for far too long. Um, and, uh, you know, I, the, the studios, the studios got, got very accustomed to being like, well, we can spend $300 million on a movie and it'll, but, but, but, but, but can
Mike00:39:17I do stand up for the audiences a bit here? No, you wouldn't let me do it. Sonny. You wouldn't let me do this. I mean that the quality for that $250, $300 million movie has gone down.
Sonny00:39:30I think it has.
Mike00:39:31Yeah. From, from where it, I mean, so, so that's a choice, right? Audiences. Yes. But my point is audiences have been, have been expecting higher quality because that's what they were getting. And now they're just getting lower quality and they're being given, it's like they're being given less.
JVL00:39:46A million bucks, right? Yeah. Maverick looks amazing. And, uh, you know, that's in the same cost budget as these, the mission impossible. It looks amazing. And by the way, dead reckoning is going to be a giant fucking hit. Like that thing is going to blow up like crazy because it's going to have both Maverick momentum and momentum from fallout, which everybody loved. Like just make good movies. Just make good movies. Just make good movies. Yeah. Stop making shit.
Sonny00:40:12They can make it up on volume. I, I think, I think, I think Mike, Mike is Mike is right that the movies do, I think look objectively and markedly worse now than they did, uh, before COVID. And I don't know if this is, I don't know if it's a function of. So like part of the reason these movies cost more is they're spending 10% of the budget on COVID stuff, constant testing, you know, that is not true anymore. I think SAG finally lifted the COVID restrictions, but like, but for the, for these movies that were made now, they were essentially made during the, the tail end of COVID lots of testing, uh, expenses, et cetera. So like a lot of the money that they spent on it is not seen on the screen. Um, and, and also a lot of the money is just spent on pass. I mean, like you, if you spend $340 million on fast X. You're, you're given Vin diesel, 20 million, you're given Jason Statham, 4 million for two days of work. You're, you're giving, you know, Brie Larson $3 million for us five days of supporting work. You're giving, uh, uh, you're giving John Cena $5 million for his subplot Jason, it all adds up. It all adds up. So like, anyway, long story short, this, this is shaping up to be a disastrous summer. And uh, if the lesson taken from it is we need to make movies that look. Better. Uh, then that's good. If the lesson that is taken from it is, I mean, I don't even know what the lesson, I, I don't know what the lesson could be. I don't know what the bad lesson. There's no bad lesson you could take from this unless it's like, well, we gotta get out of theatrical entirely. Cause it doesn't work anymore.
JVL00:41:38I mean, that, that would be blue beetles coming and blue beetles gonna save something that saves DC, save the DCEU.
Mike00:41:48All right. So do we want to say, Hey, yeah, let's, let's actually now talk about this movie that is 45 minutes bombing. Yes. That is bombing in the box.
JVL00:41:57This is gonna be a long show. Cause I want to fucking dig into this piece of shit movie.
Sonny00:42:01So give us this review, huh? The flash stars Ezra Miller as the flash. He's got a, he's, he's, it picks up basically where justice league left off. He's part of the justice league. He's saving some people and, uh, in the, in the opening sequence, Batman's there played by Ben Affleck. And Gal Gadot shows up for 30 seconds to burn off one of her, you know, last four movies on her contract. Uh, and she, she gives him the wink and the gun and he's off and he's sad. He's sad because his dad is not gonna be able to get out of jail because the videotape that, uh, Bruce Wayne cleaned up for him does not exonerate him like he hoped it would. Um, uh, and to write, uh, the wrongs that, uh, Barry Allen has been subjected to, he, he decides to go back in time. He enters the speed force and creates a Corona bubble. And goes, runs back and runs backwards through the chrono bubble, runs backwards through the chrono bubble, uh, and then realizes he can, he can change the future. And Batman says, don't do it. Don't you do it. You're gonna, you're gonna mess things up. He's like, no, it's fine.
Mike00:43:10No, it's fine.
Sonny00:43:11So it goes back. He changes the past. Uh, so his mother isn't murdered, which, you know, we, we would all, none of us would want our mothers to be murdered. None of us would want that. Um, and he, he stops it. And well, okay. Okay. And, uh, you know, um, uh, it turns out, oh yeah, I fucked everything up, fucked, fucked up the whole multiverse, uh, everything. Everything's broken.
Mike00:43:31Now.
Sonny00:43:32Uh, I've seen that coming. Uh, not only did it, not only did, does Barry Barry Allen's mom live. And so he, he doesn't become the flash, um, but also, uh, turns out that, uh, uh, messed up all of Superman stuff. And now instead of Batman being Ben Affleck, it's Michael Keaton and he's retired. And so when Zod shows up, he runs back in time to win. So when Zod shows up for some reason, it coincides perfectly. The flash and Zod meet in the, I don't know, in the, the multiverse, um, uh, there's no Superman to save, save earth. So earth's gonna die all because, you know, Ezra Miller didn't want his mommy to die. So, all right. So that, that's the basic plot here. I don't, I don't, I'm not interested in any of the metaphysics of the multiverse stuff. Cause none of it makes sense. They don't even bother explaining it as bowl of spaghetti. That's I like it. I, I like, uh, it's a, it's such an interesting FU to the audience. Like we're not gonna really bother you. Here's a big mess. This is what it is now. I appreciate that. Um, the, the, this is, it's an interesting, it, I actually liked this movie more than I'm letting on because I find it to be a very interesting movie. Um, in that it is essentially the same exact movie as across the spider verse. You have across the spider verse and the flash that come out like Dante's peak and volcano. This is what I wrote in my review. Um, uh.
Mike00:44:54Or deep blue sea and uh, uh, what was the other or deep impact in Armageddon or deep
Sonny00:44:58blue sea and Lake Placid, Lake Placid. Oh, sure. Whatever. Um, I don't think that that's quite, whatever it does, whatever point is, point is you, you have these two movies that are essentially saying the same thing, uh, or, or asking the same question. Are we defined by our trauma? Are superheroes defined by their trauma is, can you have super heroics without the traumatic backstory that gives them reason to be. And to what happens when you mess with these canonical events, what can you, can you still survive? And, and like I said, it's kind of like volcano and Dante's peak. But if the flash is like volcano volcano was like for the good of the universe, we got to wipe out Los Angeles from the face of the planet, because the end of this movie is a flash going back in time and essentially murdering his mother, right? Like that is the, he literally has to, he takes the can. He doesn't pull the trigger, but he takes the can out of the car. The cart, which will lead to her being murdered and, um, and, and her and the universe writing itself. Okay. All of I, again, I find this interesting. I find it interesting. Um, the problem, I don't love this movie cause it looks like shit. It looks like bleak garbage throughout the whole thing. The CGI is terrible. Uh, there are a bunch of, um, it builds to this big sequence where we see a bunch of different multiversal Superman and it's like CGI, Christopher Reeve ghost CGI.
JVL00:46:22Uh, Nick Cage, CGI, Nick Cage with the spider plot from the abandoned Kevin Smith script
Sonny00:46:33as somebody, as somebody argued, I forget who, uh, is this is the only, this is the only, um, this is the only movie you'll ever see where you have to watch a six hour YouTube video documentary to understand what's going on in certain moments. Uh, so, uh, I, anyway, it looks terrible. It looks awful. Um, and then. Again, the whole thing closes in the most frustrating way possible for me, which is as it's a replay of the Shazam fury of the gods, uh, uh, closing it. If anybody listened to that episode, you'll remember the rant I went on there. But once again, all of this is happening in service of a totally dead universe. There there's a post credit scene here with Aquaman and the flash and they're hanging out. He's like, well, Batman looks different now, but like, why do you have that there? Just let all of this, let it end. Let all of this end. And go on, go on with your lives. Just let this fucking universe die already. Instead of like trying to save little bits and pieces of it instead of trying, like they, they want Ezra Miller to keep being the flash. They want Jason Momoa to keep being Aquaman. There's a whole nother Aquaman movie coming out. It costs $250 million. It's gotta make a lot of money. So like, I don't, I don't know, man, all of this is very frustrating to me. Um, and yet I still, and yet I still, I still kind of liked it because I think Ezra Miller is very good in the, as in this role. I think he's. He's like kind of goofy, almost Spider-Man like qualities appeal to me. Um, I don't know. I, uh, the, the whole thing is very frustrating.
Mike00:48:04All right. Let's hear a count. Let's hear a counter. Or do you want to hear? I want to hear what you think, Michael. Uh, I feel like, I feel like I'm back on the softball field and like, I am just out of my element here because. Walked out of the theater and I was like, I kind of liked that. I think I actually texted you guys and said, I kind of liked the flash and everything that I have learned since is that like, nobody likes this movie and it's supposedly terrible, but it almost lost me at the very beginning. The very first sequence with the bad CGI terrible, like tasteless joke thing, where he's got to save a bunch of babies. Falling out of the maternity ward at the hospital, like the whole thing, it looked bad. It was, I thought pretty tasteless and like trying to go for a baby and a microwave. I was like, Oh my, uh, all of it was like, I was like, I do not like this. So I went in with low expectations and I began the first 15 minutes of this movie with like, like basically with my arms crossed, like I do not want this movie.
JVL00:49:21I've never seen any of that. You didn't need that sequence. No. That sequence has nothing to do with the rest of the movie. Get rid of it.
Mike00:49:30The movie is too long as it is. Totally. So, and yet I I'm with Sonny in the sense, I thought the, okay, let me start with this. First of all, I found the explanation or lack thereof of the whole multiverse, like the different universes. So like I found all of that very straightforward, very easy to follow. I got it in a way that I felt bombarded with information I didn't understand with across the spider. Like it was like, it was night and day for me. So I maybe because I'm a dumb dumb and I didn't read the comic books, but it was all just like, it was like, oh, okay, I get it. He went back in time, but by going back in time and changing something, he, he, he got himself onto another strand of spaghetti. And that makes sense to me. So I like that.
Sonny00:50:22It makes no sense. None of that makes any sense. It's all nonsense. Well, none of it makes sense. It's all nonsense.
Mike00:50:27It's nonsense. It's nonsense. But it was at least, at least it took itself about as seriously as it should, which is like, eh, it's nonsense. He's in a different place. He's in a different universe. I love that. I loved Michael Keaton, loved Michael Keaton. I thought it was so great and so much fun to see him again, even though he had two cheesy throwback lines that were like, just designed to be like member, Barry, you know, squeeze the member berries to get the juice out.
JVL00:50:58But I just didn't want to get nuts. Let's get nuts. I said that in the movie, you remember, remember that?
Mike00:51:06But Michael Keaton is also just fantastic. Like he's just so, he's such a great actor and a fun to watch on screen, like even late era Michael Keaton, like in that, in that McDonald's movie that he did where he played Ray Kroc. Um, like, so like, I just enjoyed that. I love hearing the, the old Danny Elfman theme and all of that. And like, I guess I'm a sucker for the nostalgia.
Sonny00:51:27Um, I will say that putting, uh, putting the Tim Burton Batman in the middle of the desert in the middle of the day and having him just do rubbery CGI stuff might violate the spirit of that character a little bit.
Mike00:51:39Yeah. But I don't, that's like a separate thing to me. Like I'm talking about when his, when the cowl is off and we're just, you just see Michael
Sonny00:51:48Keaton. Yeah.
Mike00:51:50That's Keaton's face. So sue me. So sue me. Um, and the theme, I, I actually, I like this approach to multiverse mixing and going back in time mix, like all of the, the, the theme and the sort of point of view of this movie. I liked so much more than Spider-Man across the Spider-Verse, like what, like he sh he should, he should have to. He should have to kill his mother at the end. Like that's exactly like the lesson there. We are in fact defined by our traumas, not just in fact defined by our traumas, but we cannot change the past. You know, it is who we are. It, it, it makes us who we are, the good and the bad. And rather than try to play God, we've got to learn how to cope, learn how to move forward. Um, and that was essentially the, the message of this movie. And I liked that and I was enjoying Ezra Miller. I had no idea about all of his crap, like all the stuff that he's in trouble for, like
Sonny00:52:59his multi-state crime spree.
Mike00:53:01Exactly. Like I learned about that after the fact and I find it to be like a detestable human being, but uh, based on what we know, but like, I thought he was fine here. He was fine. But I, I, who is like, is Ian other movies? Like I've never seen him, but before he's in the Harry Potter prequel movies, he's in
Sonny00:53:18the, he's in the Harry Potter. All those movies. He's in, he's in, he's in, uh, justice league.
Mike00:53:23Uh, I mean, yeah, besides, besides his role as the flesh, his, his big, his big, uh, his
Sonny00:53:28big breakout role was, we need to talk about Kevin in which he plays, uh, a sociopathic, uh, kid who, uh, essentially shoots up a school, um, good casting and, and I there's like a, there's like a method, method, method, well, this, this is the thing is that like, um, it's very funny. Uh, on a, on a, on a, and I think it's the mall rats, uh, audio commentary with Kevin Smith. They have like the whole cast, their whole cast and crew, right. And like Ben Affleck is there, uh, and Kevin Smith is there. And Kevin was like, yeah, you know, I read once that like the, the breakout role that, uh, that an actor has that a star actor has is usually the role that is closest to their personality. So it makes a lot of sense that, you know, Ben, you were the, uh, the asshole bully in, uh, days and confused and the, and the anal race. You know, rapist here. And Ben, I was like, yeah, that's, that's so, but like, that's exactly how I feel about, uh, Ezra Miller. Is it like, oh yeah, no, that all, that actually makes sense that that makes his sociopathy makes sense in, in light of, we need to talk about Kevin anyway.
Mike00:54:35The last thing I'll say about this before I let JVL rip this movie apart is I called the little twist at the end with who the new Batman, who the new Bruce Wayne was going to be. Like, oh, I bet it's, and it was so for the first time in my entire life, I was two steps ahead of the movie. And I just want to brag about that.
?00:55:01Good job.
Mike00:55:02Thank you.
JVL00:55:03JVL. What did you think? This is absolutely the fifth best multiverse movie I've seen in the last 24 months. Uh, I, I disliked it in the theater, but then I hated it on. In further reflection and I mean, I could pick it apart, but I don't want to do that. That's not, I don't think that's useful.
Sonny00:55:27You don't want to nitpick it.
JVL00:55:28I don't want to, well, not even nitpick, I don't want to pick apart the, the problems with it. I want to pick apart the things that, uh, I find insulting, which is that this is a pure exercise in nostalgia and not narrative, uh, work. Mm. So, and, and honestly, I think the, the best comp for this is actually no way home, not spider verse, uh, you know, so in, in no way home, we are given beloved actors from the same role, uh, and in, in unskillful hands that would have just been member berries. It would have been like fan service. Hey, look, you remember Andrew Garfield was Spider-Man once too, but in fact, all of the actors who were brought back to us were integral to the story being told. They were integral to the theme of the movie itself. And then they all had their own arcs and journeys, right? This is, you know, Toby McGuire, Spider-Man has a journey over the course of the movie. Um, doc Oc has a journey over the course of Andrew Garfield has attorney growth. There's no real journey happening here in this, this movie, to the extent that it resurrects George Clooney and Michael Keaton, who I agree I look, Michael Keaton's the best presence in the movie. And the extent that the movie is enjoyable to watch, it's most enjoyable when Michael Keaton is on screen. Um, but also he's just an accoutrement. I mean, he's, he's just sort of there for the ride. He's not integral to what's happening. He's not integral really to the, the journey that Barry Allen is on. Uh, and then the movie goes and tries to have it all. Both ways anyway, where, you know, you can't go back and save your mom, but you can save your dad. Right. And this is like, I'm sorry, pick one pick one. Yeah. And, uh, I, I, I disliked that because it seemed to, even if you wanted to give the, the story being told all the benefits of the doubt along the way, that then invalidates everything. Because in the end of the movie, we find that Barry Allen has to take the can of tomatoes out of his mother's shopping carts that she will die, but he can put a can of tomatoes up on the high shelf. So when his dad reaches up to get them, we see his face that he can be exonerated and brought out of jail. And so which is it right? Which, and the, the answer of the movie winds of giving you is like, yeah, it can be a little bit of both. Right. Yeah. But, but why, what are the reasons behind that? No reasons just because like, you know, we have it here
Sonny00:58:14Because we need, we need to send the audience out on a, on a podcast. On a positive feeling because otherwise, no, I mean, that's literally it because otherwise it's just like, well, he killed his mom.
JVL00:58:24It's a it's gay Perry being alive. And then Abraham Lincoln coming into the room to write it is, it is like the end of kiss, kiss, bang, bang. Where all of these people who are clearly dead characters come back to life as a nod to the, and I, I found all of that cheap and manipulative, uh, in ways which really rankled me. Uh, and honestly, the, that scene where they go showing us all of the other pieces of the, with these characters that are done in the animation style of the polar express, basically they, they look like they were animated using 25 year old technology or the, the burly brawl
Sonny00:59:08in matrix reloaded the fight, the fight between Neo and all the agent Smiths.
JVL00:59:13Yeah. Uh, I just, again, what? You are giving these things out and they will have no, no resonance whatsoever to anybody unless they are in, unless they were reading, ain't it cool news between 1995 and 2005. Right. And I, I'm sorry, but fuck you. Fuck you for that, for this piece of shit movie, and you know what? Nothing else has done well in it anyway. And if you, if you don't like what's going on in across the spider verse, uh, as a narrative matter, well, as an artistic matter, you can look at the screen and see like beautiful, beautiful artwork being done. And in this, it's just everything in the movie looks like shit from top to bottom.
Sonny00:59:59As you say, like I just, I mean, it's so it, like the, the thing I resented most about this movie was the, the bringing back Zod and having the big Zod fight with super girl, uh, and Zod, except instead of taking place in metropolis where there's like a weight and a sense of like urgency and whatever, it just takes place on this broad open Sandy desert scape, which they never explained, right? There's no weight. Okay. There's no weight to it. There's no, well, because of the spaghetti we're on a different, you know, but yeah,
Mike01:00:30but they had showed it earlier being above metropolis anyway, sorry, continue, continue.
Sonny01:00:37It's well, but that was, so what you saw was the, the, so what you, what we saw was Barry Allen, remembering, going to metropolis as the flash and trying to save somebody during the initial fight between man, between Superman and Zod and man of steel. So like, that's a flashback to what, what, you know, quote unquote really happened. And then we see this, this play out and it just, it looks like such an immense plate of dog shit. Just like it's, it just like, it looks so bad. It looks so flat and the, the speed effect looks terrible. And, um, you know, I, like I wanted to care, I wanted to care about super girl. Girl and Zod, because I like that, that, like that storyline is actually very interesting to me.
JVL01:01:21It is like a super interesting character and then they do not pay that off at all at all at all. And her turn from her turn to, uh, accepting humanity is totally unearned, right? It sets up this interesting question about her, about her, like there's a little bit of red sun thrown in to this right too, which is like, well, what happens if Superman had landed in the Soviet union? Uh, totally unearned. And at that point, why bother fucking having it? And you know, the other thing is when you, to take the aesthetic of man of steel, the visual aesthetic of man of steel, which was gritty and very realistic, right? I mean, it, you know, man of steel, whatever you wanna say about it, you, it did look kind of like, oh yeah, that's what a, uh, flying saucer hovering over Manhattan would kind of look like. Yeah. Right. And then do it in this cartoonish. Like the same thing, but in this cartoonish way, it just felt like a bastardization.
Sonny01:02:20I mean, like getting, getting worked up about the internal logic of any of this stuff is a fool's game. You'll, it will drive you to madness, but like, you know, in man of steel, Superman is like getting tossed around by the Kryptonians, like getting, getting like grabbed by the legs and thrown through buildings. Right. And like in this one, you've got 70 year old Michael Keaton doing acrobatics. Yes. Around the giant Kryptonian and like taking him down for a minute and like, it's just like, this is dumb. This is, I'm sorry. This is dumb. Um, this is a dumb thing to watch and have happen. It's, he doesn't even have a kryptonite spear. It's not like he's, you know, it's not like he's fashioned the weapons to take down Kryptonians. He's just like, I got some bombs, I'm gonna put some bombs, this, these guys are getting shot by missiles out of, uh, out of jets and, and, and Michael Keaton's just like, here's a bomb on his head. Boop. Boop.
JVL01:03:19And again, that's what I'm saying. I didn't want to nitpick stuff like that. I, I wanted to stay at the, and it's just, I dunno, the whole thing could have been pared down to like an hour 40 and it would have been tighter. Uh, there's, there's both bloat and not enough actual storytelling happening. And then the storytelling that does happen is bad and thematically contradictory. Yeah. That's why I fucking hated this movie. And you know what? I like the flash. I'm sorry, but I've always liked the flash as a character.
Sonny01:03:49Uh, what do you think about Miller's portrayal of Barry Allen? What do you, what do you think about that?
JVL01:03:54That here's another, right? So Miller is clearly portraying Barry Allen as a spectrum kid, right? I mean, this is a, you know, when he walks in the whole point of establishing when he walks into the coffee shop at the beginning of the, of the movie is that he is semi-autistic and then we are. Led to believe that actually his autism is a result of the trauma of his parents dying when he was 10. That's not how I'm sorry. That's not how autism works. Right? Like this is not. Yeah. Right. You get it from Bill Gates's, uh, microchips in your, in your COVID vaccines. That's how autism happened. But you know what I'm saying? Like those are the two Barry Allen's are played as like biologically different characters, not environmentally different characters. And that I think is a really baffling choice. I don't understand it. Right. They should be slated as environmentally different.
Mike01:04:53Right. I, I guess I thought, I guess I misread that initial, that first scene because I thought he was acting that way because he had low blood sugar because he has to consume lots
JVL01:05:05of calories.
Sonny01:05:06Maybe he's just hangry.
JVL01:05:07Yeah. Maybe, maybe he's hangry. Maybe that's what it all is.
Sonny01:05:11He wanted to see Iris hangry.
JVL01:05:14Gal Gadot cameo, again, just another thing that just drove me crazy.
Sonny01:05:22Once again, once again, this is like with Shazam Fury of the Gods where they bring Shazam back to life. They have Gal Gadot shows up for some reason at the end of that movie and brings him back to life instead of letting that mini franchise die.
Mike01:05:33She also shows up at the end of, uh, at the end of, uh, fast X.
JVL01:05:37Yes. This is all she does. Gal Gadot. Is it a point in her career where she only works for 30 seconds per movie?
Sonny01:05:43She. She probably has a green screen in her house. She just goes to like her, she just goes to like Haim and is like, uh, put down the green screen. We're gonna, we're gonna shoot the, we're gonna shoot the, we're gonna shoot my, my role for the year in the, in this 30 seconds.
Mike01:05:59Let me get, let me get the wonder, is it, is this a wonder woman one? Let me get the wonder woman costume out. Um, okay. Well, so am I, and, and please answer this, uh, as truthfully as possible. Like, am I a moron for liking this movie? Like you've made me feel a bit like I'm just like the most manipulated.
Sonny01:06:18No, no, no, no, but here's, here's the thing. Here's the thing. And that may be true. And this is, and this is how I tried to review the movie when I was writing my review. Um, because I've, it's, it's a movie that I think is very, very easy to take apart because it's bad in a lot of ways and it doesn't make sense in a lot of ways. However, I will say that in the theater, in the moment, moment to moment, while I was watching it, I was, I was almost always entertained. I occasionally laughed out loud. It's, it's, it's a funny movie. I think I, again, I think Miller's performance here is actually pretty good. Um, and it, and it like, and it doesn't, I thought he plays off of himself and it does
Mike01:06:55speak very well.
Sonny01:06:56It does a really interesting thing structurally too, that I didn't really, I didn't really write about cause I wasn't sure how to do it, but the, you know, this is a pretty straightforward bog standard origin story. If you think about it, it's, it's a movie about flash getting his powers and figuring out how to use them. It's just structured in a way that upends our expectations. Yeah. Because we already know the character, we already know what he could do, but having the time travel aspect to it sends him back there and teaches him how to do the things. And so it's like, it is a, it is, it is teaching us about the character without being like, here is the origin story of the flash, which is interesting. Like, I don't know that entirely works, but it like it, it keeps it from being a much more, it could have been a much more boring film. Um, and you know, uh, again, I like. I don't, I don't, I don't love this movie and I resent a lot about it as a Snyder Zack Snyder die hard, who feels that he has been betrayed by Ezra Miller continuing this bastardization of the Snyder verse. Like I set all that aside, it's like, it's a fairly entertaining film, uh, that I enjoyed moment to moment, even when in some of those individual moments, I was like, I hate this.
Mike01:08:10Yup. Yup. Fair. I'd agree.
Sonny01:08:14So like, I don't, this is why I don't, I, I, I can't fault you Mike for liking the movie and giving him a thumbs up. I gave it a thumbs up as well on rotten tomatoes. I have a fresh tomato right next to my name on this movie that I will probably regret 10 years from now. But the, but the, but the simple fact of the matter is that like judging the movie on its own merits in the movie theater, while I was watching it moment to moment, I was like, yeah, this is all right.
JVL01:08:36I told you I liked it better in the theater than I did after I only really started to hate it on the drive home.
Sonny01:08:41Once you start thinking about it. It all falls apart.
Mike01:08:44Yeah. But who thinks about who thinks about a space mountain, you know, after they get off it, you know, it's a, it's a ride. It's fun. And then you get off and you move on. All right. When we should move on, uh, no more thoughts here about the flash. All right. Um, JVL, you look like you want to run backwards and stop us from ever having seen this movie. That's all the time we're going to give to this episode. Remember sub beacon.com you can come follow us there. Listen to us. Uh, get our bonus episodes when we do them.
Sonny01:09:15Uh, I don't think we're going to have on this way because we're, it's an hour and 12 minutes,
Mike01:09:20but maybe in the future, uh, thanks for listening.
JVL01:09:28And yeah, I wouldn't try to think if I have any, I mean, I guess my only outtake is, uh, is blue beetle in this universe.
Sonny01:09:42Yes.
JVL01:09:43So, so this is, this is what, what is, what is, what is the James gun? Well, this is, this is what I don't understand.
Sonny01:09:51This is what I don't understand about any of this and, and, and I don't, uh, I don't, I don't fault James gun for this exactly because a lot of decisions were made before he gets there and they, they, and Zasloff, you know, they've got hundreds of millions of dollars tied up in these movies, but you have, you have the flash, you have blue beetle and you have Aquaman two, all of which are supposed to come out this year. And you, you are then stuck with a situation in which you either a tell the audiences, none of these movies are gonna matter going forward. So maybe you don't need to see 'em or you say, no, these characters are definitely gonna still be around. And that's why look, Aquaman and flash hanging out at the end of flash in the post-credit scene. Uh, we got this blue beetle movie coming, James guns out there saying, oh, blue, beetle's gonna be in my, my universe, you know, Shazam fury of the gods. Again, they like save, they save him, they bring him back and they have. James guns, wife hanging out with him in the post-credit scene, uh, from peacemaker and they're gonna bring peacemaker back. And like they, they're trying to keep all of these little pieces instead of just resetting the whole thing and being like, all right, we're get, we're gonna recast Batman. We're gonna recast Superman. We're gonna start over again. Here we go. Uh, and I, I, this is again, I may be the biggest mark in the world. I may be the biggest mark in the world because I actually believe Warner brothers when they say they had great testing on this movie. That it was, you know, people were super excited for it. Um, uh, they thought it was gonna be an enormous hit. That's why they showed it at cinema con. That's why they were, they were really out there, you know, pounding, pounding the pavement, getting people, trying to get people excited for it. Um, because otherwise what's the point? Like if you, if they didn't think this was an actual hit, why not just go the Batgirl route and take the right off on this, take the right off on this, take the right off on Aquaman, take the right off on blue beetle.
JVL01:11:41You can't do that. You, you can only, no, you can't do that. Right. Cause nobody will ever work for you again. The talent disaster that that would represent in a movie with Ben. I mean, look, uh, back girls, whatever back girl, but a movie that has Ben Affleck and Michael Keaton in it and Gal Gadot and people who have shown up and filmed roles and God forbid you do that. Super Bowl commercial. Yeah. The job. I think they were pot committed to this and once you're pot committed, then you have to just push it to the moon, no matter what you think about it. Like you can't bury it. You, you know, you can't, you just gotta, it is what it is and you roll it out. Uh, but I do worry that the James gun era is going to be very bad.
Sonny01:12:29I mean, the only thing that they can do at this point is just have all of these movies be separate movies. You got your Joker movies, you got your Robert Pattinson, Batman movies. You make you, maybe you got some other, maybe you got some brave and the bold. Batman movies, you got James guns, Superman movies, and that's it. Like just do, just do everything separately. No more connected universes. I would, I do wonder if we are, I think, I think audiences may actually be at the breaking point with connected universe. One shots I'm watching. I watched the first episode of secret invasion, which is the new MCU show that is based. That is, I swear to God, this is true. It's entirely focused on the secondary villains from like the 18th best Marvel movie. Yeah. And I'm watching this and I'm like, who the fuck are any of these characters? I don't understand. I don't understand what I've watched all this shit. I've watched all this and, and eventually it came back to me. I was like, oh yeah, that's right. Ben Mendelsohn is a scroll. Yeah.
JVL01:13:24The scrolls are actually, instead of in the comics where the scrolls are villains here,
Sonny01:13:29they're actually like they're victims and they're, but in this show, they're actually trying to take over the earth. And I was like, what is, I don't, I don't have time for any of this nonsense. I don't. I like, this is too much homework, too much homework for me. Yeah. And I, again, I've watched all of it, watched all I've watched all this stuff and I'm, I've gotten to the point where I'm just like, I can't do this anymore, but I bet the marvels
JVL01:13:52will be great.
?01:13:53Oh yeah.
Sonny01:13:54I'm sure that'll be fun.
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