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#69. The Substandard on Blade Runner 2049, Harvey Weinstein, and the Lost Episode
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Dudes Chatting — Blade Runner 2049, Harvey Weinstein, and the lost episode: The cold open explains the audio disaster of episode 067. JVL recounts being rejected as a brand ambassador by a surf shop — he applied, got turned down, and bought their hat anyway. The Harvey Weinstein sexual misconduct scandal had just broken, and JVL performs an elaborate satirical bit in the mode of Trump-era "anti-anti" political rhetoric — constructing the most absurd possible "defense" of Weinstein (anti-anti-Harvey) as a vehicle for mocking how that rhetorical form works. The joke is clearly satirical throughout. The main segment is a spoiler-heavy discussion of Blade Runner 2049, which all three hosts saw and loved. Vic voices his Gene Shalit impression to deliver a comic mini-review. The central debate: is Joy, K's holographic companion, capable of genuine free will or is she simply executing her programming? JVL argues yes — Joy makes choices that go beyond her design; Sonny argues no — she is incapable of acting against her core directives and every apparent act of will is still programmed behavior. The character Luv is held up as the film's most interesting figure — paradoxically the most "human" character in the movie. Director Denis Villeneuve is praised. Sonny notes the film can be read as having a pro-life dimension in its treatment of the miraculous child. JVL is dismayed that Blade Runner 2049 grossed about 40% less than Annabelle: Creation.
Box Office: Blade Runner 2049 opened at $32 million; The Mountain Between Us opened at $10 million; It placed third at $9.9 million.
Spirit of the Week: Old Forester Statesman bourbon.
Corrections segment included.
Full transcript
Vic00:00:00Hello, and welcome back to another edition of The Substandard, I'm Victor Matus along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Lastarettes. I'd like to remind you that TheSubstandard is available on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. Just look at a podcast and search for Substandard, you'll easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, leave a review. In addition, we'd also like to remind you that Substandard show notes just might be posted by Jonathan Last on Fridays at 11:00 a.m. at weeklystandard.com. Can you hear me now? I guess I should have asked that at the micro.
Sonny00:00:56Yeah. Can we... I should have explained to people what happened last week. Go for it, sir. There was a technical issue, the computer crashed, we subbed in a new computer, had to download all the software over again, and we could hear ourselves fine in the headphones, but the mixing board was not properly... The outputs and the inputs weren't changed on the computer, so it wasn't showing up for you guys. Sorry. Yes. Sorry. We got a really nice shout-out on NPR. Yeah. It was great. Thanks, Mike. The bootleg can't listen to you, can't hear you episode.
Vic00:01:30Our friend Michael Graham gave us a shout-out on NPR Weekend Edition, and so people were able to tune into the crappiest sounding episode ever. Yeah. Thanks, Mike. But, plus, NPR listeners probably really, if they decided to tune in, they would have really enjoyed JVL's hot take on Billie Jean King.
JVL00:01:47JVL, how are you? I'm fine. Just fine.
Vic00:01:51No other... That's it?
Sonny00:01:53That's it.
JVL00:01:54How's your week been? Went to the beach for the long weekend.
?00:01:57Oh.
JVL00:01:57Beach. Did not get my brand ambassadorship.
Vic00:02:01Postponed or rejected?
JVL00:02:05Not notified. They sent out... I got lost in the mail. No, no. They sent out the announcement for the people who were selected as their brand ambassadors, and I have to say, first of all, these people had much smaller social media footprints than me. Here's what they did have. Actual surfing talent?
Sonny00:02:23Very, very young. Oh, wow. And very attractive.
JVL00:02:27Are they on Instagram? They aren't, but very small Instagram presences.
Sonny00:02:30Right. But you're not on Instagram at all, right?
JVL00:02:32Not yet. But I will be. You gotta be on Instagram. That's where the kids are. I will say that my wife... Look, I'm not proud of this, but I went to the surf shop, and I bought myself one of their surf shop logoed hats, trucker hat, kind of cool-looking. What? Billabong. No. Jimmy Z. No, no. Logo for the... Sorry. Vic, you're real hot over there. I'm looking at the red. I'm recovering. And I bought one of these surf shop logoed hats, and walked outside, kind of pleased with myself, 'cause it's a little bit of a trucker hat. It's cool. It's what the kids wear. It's not. And my wife looks at me... You mean with the leggings like this? Yeah, that's right. And the mesh in the back. And she says, "You know they rejected you, and you went and bought their merchandise anyway?" She goes, "That's the saddest thing I've ever seen." She might be right.
Sonny00:03:23She is. Well, as one of our many fans on Twitter said, she is the funniest last. No one denies this. No one denies this. Same thing. It is actually kind of sad, though. You should... Yeah. I gotta take my hoodie off. Did you guys notice what I was wearing today? A black t-shirt and a hoodie? And a gray hoodie? I don't... Yeah, it's a hoodie.
JVL00:03:42I dressed up for Halloween.
Sonny00:03:43Are you... Sean Parker?
Vic00:03:45That game was Mark Zuckerberg. Oh!
JVL00:03:47Come on, boys! Very good. That was very good. Well, it's not Halloween for like three more weeks. Right, but if I had waited to do it on Halloween, then it would have been too obvious. I came dressed up. I don't want to say the brand's name, because I've stumbled upon a new brand that I really
Sonny00:04:04like. And... Is it American Giant?
?00:04:07What time is it, Beck?
Sonny00:04:08No, it's not. No, it's not. No. Listen, I'm too busy this week. I can't do any bleeping. Can't do any bleeping. We gotta keep it clean, because I cannot... No bleeping today? I don't have the time to bleep. Wait, who's... What brand is it? Whatever. What brand is it? Pull it up. No.
JVL00:04:23Pull it up. Is it American Giant? You can't see my brands. Pull it up. It's American Giant. It's American Giant. How did you know it was American Giant?
Sonny00:04:29Because American Giant makes great hoodies. My wife got me an American Giant hoodie.
JVL00:04:32It's amazing. I'm wearing an American Giant hoodie and an American Giant t-shirt right now.
Sonny00:04:36I like them a lot. I don't really like that particular model. I like the ones that are a little bit thinner, like the material's a little bit thinner. It's a little like... I don't know how to describe it. It's like a heather gray. It's great. Maybe I'll wear mine in next week.
JVL00:04:47We can compare hoodies. Oh, and wear your Prana Axioms, too. No. Then we can go tip-to-tip. Oh, God. Wow.
Sonny00:04:54Why aren't we bleeping that?
JVL00:04:55Yeah.
Vic00:04:56No kidding. Sonny, moving right along. How are you?
Sonny00:04:59I'm great. Oh, come on, boys.
JVL00:05:01The Facebook Live of this is awesome.
Sonny00:05:05I had a whole thing to talk about this week, and now I can't think about anything because all I'm imagining is tip-to-tip. Dreaming. God. Dreaming. Yeah.
JVL00:05:17It's the name of an episode of Silicon Valley. That's what that is. I'm literally...
Sonny00:05:21Vic, how was your weekend? I'm literally... You got to go on to Vic. All right.
?00:05:25I'm moving on.
JVL00:05:25You want to talk about the big news?
Vic00:05:27Oh, what's the big news?
JVL00:05:28You know, the big story that everybody's been talking about. Or do you want to tell us about your weekend? Oh, no, no. Tell us about your weekend first.
Vic00:05:34Tell us about your weekend. Did your week... I have been barely surviving because of allergies and the allergy season. We went through something like 25 days of no rain, and I get the CVS coupon email with the subject header, "Roslyn is blanketed in pollen." That's what they say, because they know I go to the Roslyn CVS to get antihistamines. Could you sit a little closer to your mic? Yeah, sure. I thought I was really hot. You were hot, and then I turned you down, and now you're...
Sonny00:06:01Oh, you did? And now you're quiet. Now I have to go back to regular me. My God.
Vic00:06:05Okay.
Sonny00:06:06He's super hot again. I know. It's... This is why we shouldn't have even bothered worrying about the sound last week. The sound is always trash on this show.
Vic00:06:11I was the only one they could hear.
Sonny00:06:13No, they could hear me just fine. I sounded normal. Did you? I sounded normal. And everyone thought you sounded like you were shouting, because you were, and JVL was like six rooms away. He was a whisper.
JVL00:06:22Great show.
Vic00:06:23He was. Great show. I was like, "I'm just breathing and coughing and huffing and puffing, and on an inhaler, I basically need Bane's mask. I think that would help me breathe better." Or that mask that Predator wears. Speaking of Predators, Harvey Weinstein has been in the news. It's a good transition.
JVL00:06:41It's a pretty good transition. I was going to ask you about Saul Guerrero's mask, but this is even-
Vic00:06:45Oh, I like that one too. The Hollywood establishment has been rocked this past week after a New York Times expose came out about Miramax head Harvey Weinstein, and is it Weinstein or Weinstein? Weinstein. Stein, I think. Stein, and all of his various depredations, predations, allegations, Ashley Judd Rose McGowan, et cetera, et cetera, more settlements are coming out. There was a big story in The New Yorker about just flat out rape now.
Sonny00:07:13The New Yorker story that dropped right before we came into the studio documents numerous rapes, numerous literal rapes.
Vic00:07:20But hey, here's a Broadway show ticket. Yeah. This is what he tried to do with that one woman, gave her a ticket to Finding Neverland. I know we have thoughts.
JVL00:07:29Finding Neverland? Or at least Book of Mormon. That's a tough ticket, right?
Vic00:07:32Isn't that crazy? Okay.
Sonny00:07:34JVL. Thoughts? No, what do you guys think? Were you surprised about this, Sonny? Not particularly. I mean, this is ... It has always been kind of a not-so-hidden joke in Hollywood movies. If you see an aggressively awful producer type character, like a Lev Grossman in Tropic Thunder, or who was the guy in Full Frontal, the Soderbergh movie?
Vic00:08:00Say what?
Sonny00:08:01Played by, I think, Jeff Garlin, maybe. The joke has always been like, "This is Harvey Weinstein. Oh God, they're really letting Harvey have it this time." I mean, even on Entourage, Harvey Weinstein basically played himself, right? Was there a Harvey Weinstein character? I can't remember. There might have been a character. But again, a Harvey Weinstein type character. Now look, the joke has always been like, "He's a bore." And a bore-ish type, not a bore as in boring. And he is kind of abusive, and he's violent, and whatever. I would say that even with all of the rumors about the casting couches and that sort of thing, I am still kind of surprised by the level of grotesqueness here. Just like the total ... I mean, again, like grabbing women's heads and forcing them onto his crotch and being like, "Give it a kiss."
Vic00:08:56Vic, you think this is bad, too? It's so weird because there's a story of him in the hallway with the anchor woman from Long Island, and he's trashy, has nowhere to go but to watch him pleasure himself for just a few moments, and then into a plant. That I thought was just ... It's bizarre. It's sick. It's bizarre. All I could think of was Frank Sinatra's line, "Oops, there goes another rubber tree plant." But anyway ... I don't even know what that means. It's from High Hope, Sonny. JVL, I knew about these allegations because you told them to me almost 20 years ago because you knew somebody out there.
JVL00:09:35Look, I'll just take the other side of this. You guys are going to believe the failing New York Times and their fake news? Oh, no. Look, everyone does it. You think Kathleen Kennedy didn't do this to Phil Lord and Christopher Miller? Okay, fine. Harvey is not there to be a moral exemplar. He is there to make Hollywood great again. You're not appointing Harvey to be your pastor. You are appointing him to run a Hollywood studio. And maybe you haven't noticed, but Hollywood is falling apart, Sonny. Transformers 5, Annabelle Creation, Paul Blart, Mall Cop, Boss Baby. This is a situation where, sure, maybe Harvey will destroy everything, but maybe he doesn't. Maybe he is exactly the guy to rescue American cinematic culture. Maybe because he's so piggish.
Sonny00:10:22So it's the Flight 93 of Hollywood executives.
JVL00:10:26Look, Sonny, it is a binary choice. You can have Tom Rothman and Kathleen Kennedy and The Force Awakens and The Dark Tower multi-platform synergistic crap fest, or you can have Harvey and independent cinema. It is one or the other. And you know what? Let me just... I'm getting a little worked up here. You guys should just be grateful, because he has already put The Grifters and Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction and The English Patient and Rounders. And Gangs of New York and The Aviator, movies that you all love, in the Pantheon, on the bench, for forever. And I am sick and tired of you Never Harvey elites just posturing about this stuff so that you can get invited to your Georgetown cocktail parties and not listening to the real voice of the people out there. There.
Sonny00:11:09I've said it. All right. Look, as a flagship member of Never Harvey, I have to say that I'm disgusted by all of this. Don't you understand how you're degrading the culture, how you're coarsening everything that we do here? Don't you understand what the kids are seeing? Don't you think about your children seeing the example being set by Harvey Weinstein and thinking, "Oh, well, maybe if he could get away with it, I can, too." I think that this is exactly what's wrong with America, and, frankly, I'm a little bit surprised that you would take this tack.
JVL00:11:37Look at all the people who hate Harvey Weinstein. They're the wrong people. They're the bad people. And if Harvey Weinstein makes them angry and upset, they're just losers. So you're going anti-anti-Harvey. Yeah. Is that what you're doing? That's right. You're anti-Harvey, which does not mean you're pro-Harvey. You're just anti-anti-Harvey. Those people are trying to destroy American culture, and Harvey's here to make it great again.
Vic00:11:57You know what's interesting about that? There's a logic, too, at JVL, because you might get some crazy, awful Harvey from time to time, but you get great movies. Exactly. Neil Gorsuch. I mean, Pulp Fiction. Pulp Fiction.
JVL00:12:10Pulp Fiction doesn't happen. Think about what your life is like without Pulp Fiction, without Quentin Tarantino. Quentin Tarantino's career doesn't exist without Harvey Weinstein. If you sit with that.
Sonny00:12:20How do you feel about the Kevin Smiths of the world, who now say that they're disgusted that they got their start with Weinstein money?
JVL00:12:26You know what? If those sorts of turncoats want to try to get whatever ... Now they're going to go golfing with Harvey and say that Harvey really did shoot a 63 or 73 or whatever. That's fine. I guess it's fine, but those of us who are really on the Harvey train, the Harvey Express, he could walk out in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and we're not going to
Sonny00:12:48... I'm just going to go full anti-anti-anti-Harvey here and say, for the record, that it is really disgusting what you're doing here. You're deflecting from the real issues out here, which is Harvey Weinstein himself. You're deflecting from true filmmaking. The true films that we love aren't made by perverts and disgusting, awful people. Those people are written out of the film movement years ago, all right? So just back it off with this. Exactly. No, it's way beyond me.
JVL00:13:20I can't even answer this.
Vic00:13:21It's overwhelming. This is probably really inappropriate. It's overwhelming, and people will either get it or not get it, and the people who get it might just not listen to us again. I'm ready to move on, as it were.
JVL00:13:34Are you ready to take a runner?
Vic00:13:36Oh, yes. Very good. Speaking of runners, over the weekend, Blade Runner 2049 did a less than stellar $32 million. The Mountain Between Us came second with $10 million, just edging out It, which did about $9.9 million. That went only 40%, and it's the fourth weekend, fifth weekend. Think about the inverse of the budgets between its budget, how much it's made, and then Blade Runner's budget and how much it will make.
Sonny00:14:07We should probably tell people what that is. It cost about $35 million to make and has grossed $310, something like that, and Blade Runner, meanwhile, cost ... The number that Box Office Mojo has is $150. I saw $185 at Deadline earlier in the week. I don't know what the actual number is, but it's a big one, and that's before advertising
Vic00:14:26and all that. They actually built the whole city.
Sonny00:14:28Exactly. They built all of Southern California. There's a lot of sand. And Nevada.
Vic00:14:32I was going to say, in fourth ... Oh, go ahead, Sonny.
Sonny00:14:36But anyway, that's a movie that cost ... That movie will have to gross something like $500 or $600 million to hit its break even, and it probably won't.
Vic00:14:46I was going to say, in fourth place, do you remember what came in fourth place?
Sonny00:14:50No. My Little Pony: The Movie, at $8 billion. I did not know that was coming out this week.
Vic00:14:55Yes. No, JVL.
Sonny00:14:57I'm going to assume ... Don't tell my girls. Did Matt Labash go? Don't tell my girls.
Vic00:15:00I was going to say, Sonny, your daughter's not yet ... She hasn't discovered it.
JVL00:15:05Your girls, are they ... Oh, my God. We have so much My Little Pony going on in my house. Did you know that there is a universe of My Little Pony shows in which the My Little Ponies have turned into normal teenage girls, but who aren't normal. They still have the weird coloring and stuff, but they're humanoids now, instead of human
Vic00:15:23looking ... It's like a Brony's dream ponies, and they're
Sonny00:15:27in high school doing ... Wait, wait, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, can we ... Do they transform into
JVL00:15:34ponies?
Vic00:15:35Unclear to me. There's a name for their species. It's like the My Little Pony. They're the same characters.
JVL00:15:39It's a whole other show. So, literally, they transport the My Little Pony characters, like Applejack and Rainbows, Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, and they all of a sudden become tween girls in some sort of high school
Vic00:15:53setting, and they're in a band, and they're singing. It's a stretch, but it works for them.
JVL00:15:58Obviously, for us, we think, okay ... The taste of seven-year-old girls, not high cinema. They'll swallow anything. They're willing to. They're willing to go that far. Look at the screen.
Vic00:16:10I'll watch it. Really quickly, favorite pony, go, JVL.
JVL00:16:15Applejack. There you go.
?00:16:17You know why?
JVL00:16:18Why? Tomboyish. Questionable sexuality.
Vic00:16:21Oh, okay. Well, on that case, Sunset Shimmer, because I think ... That sounds like a stripper name, Sunset Shimmer. Okay.
JVL00:16:28Cue Def Leppard. Thank you.
Vic00:16:30Who saw ... This is very inappropriate. Who saw Blade Runner here? I saw Blade Runner. Oh. You did JVL?
JVL00:16:35Did we all see Blade Runner?
Sonny00:16:36Yeah. I went to a late, late show last night after a long drive home. I saw Blade Runner. I saw Blade Runner.
JVL00:16:40You did JVL? Did we all see Blade Runner? Yeah. I went to a late, late show last night after a long drive home. Yeah. From the beach, just so we could all do it together.
Sonny00:16:47Did you see it on IMAX or Dolby Atmos, or just on a regular ...
JVL00:16:51I saw it on IMAX.
Sonny00:16:52Nice.
JVL00:16:53And then I came home, and I ordered up on the Amazon machine, the original, and I watched
Sonny00:16:58a little bit of it on my phone.
JVL00:16:59Oh, God. I saw that on Twitter. And I was only disappointed that I couldn't figure out a way to put it into portrait mode on my phone, because I wanted to have the true back-to-back experience of the sequel on IMAX ... Mm-hmm. ... original, final cut. As it's meant to be seen. Yes. As it's meant to be seen ... On your own.
Vic00:17:19... on my spanking new iPhone 8. Yes.
JVL00:17:21I should be said, on the iPhone speakers. Yes.
Vic00:17:26Thank you. Yes. Right. What time did you see that movie, then, when you were showing it? It was late. It was late. Yes. It was a late night. Okay. Well, I was thinking before we get into the deets of the movie, the breakdown ... I hate it when you say that. Believe me, there's a lot of things you say that drive me insane. IRL. IRL. Okay. Fabe. Amaze. It will amaze. Total amaze. Amazing. The word is amazing. Okay. You're destroying the English language. That's the angriest I've ever seen, Vic. When I see it on Twitter, I'm like, "These words are driving an editor crazy."
JVL00:18:00It's like over dinner one night, Vic slams his wine glass down. He's like, "Oh yeah? Will you drive me crazy, too?"
Vic00:18:06He storms out of the house and leaves me alone with the kids. I'm going to my sister's house. I've got to get myself together now. I'm all discombobulated. You're flustered. But I was going to say ... Actually, Gene saw.
JVL00:18:21Gene! Gene's back! It's been a while. It's been too long. It's been a while. I'm yelling at the microphone here. All right.
Vic00:18:28Can I just sit back? Hey, Mr. Shelley. Oh. Hey, hello. Welcome back to our studio. He's back from the Berkshires. Okay.
?00:18:35Here he comes.
Vic00:18:36Blade Runner 2049 is the fourth best movie I have ever seen. Never seen. With the word blade in the title. The others being Blade Runner, Sling Blade, Blade with Wesley Snipes, and Zorro and the Gay Blade. That starred George Hamilton. Be careful of his sword, he'll stab you in the back. Side. Harrison Ford reprises his role, but it's no solo act. He is joined by Ryan Gosling and Robin Wright. Who is the first lady to be Ryan's boss at the LAPD. And believe me, she's no buttercup. There's even a cameo by Edward James Almos, but he remains seated the entire time. I guess you could say he doesn't quite stand and deliver. Ana de Armas plays Gosling's computerized girlfriend. Boy, would I like to insert my memory stick into that slot and download over to the desktop. So what's this movie about? What's this movie about? Apparently a robot had a baby. If only this were real, you'd solve Japan's declining population problem. Think about it. Timely. Hashtag just saying. Anyway, I give Blade Runner 2049 four stars. And that's the Critics' Corner.
Sonny00:20:09So wait, this is the fourth best movie with a blade in the title? You listed four other movies. That would make this the fifth.
Vic00:20:16He's gone. He can't answer.
Sonny00:20:18I'm sorry. He left already. Okay, sorry. He can't answer. It is what it is.
Vic00:20:23I don't mean to fact check you. It is what it is. I don't mean to fact check Gene. Sorrow and the Gay Blade.
JVL00:20:27I saw that movie. That's a deep pull.
Vic00:20:29You like that? You saw that movie last week, didn't you? It was early '80s. And it's George Hamilton at his best.
JVL00:20:33Okay.
Vic00:20:34Which wasn't very good.
JVL00:20:35What was the vampire one he did?
Vic00:20:38Love at First Bite. Love at First Bite. With Richard Benjamin.
JVL00:20:41Fantastic. That's a top 30 all-time movie, right?
Vic00:20:44Yes. And I believe the... Right, Jon? I don't... The direct... No. The director was not Jon Badham. He did the actual Dracula movie. But I forget who did that one. Okay. Blade Runner 2049, which is also, by the way, the cost of a popcorn and two sodas. That's actually probably low. Frankly. It's low? Yeah. It's low. What did we... Sonny, you reviewed it. Did you go with the kids? No, I went alone. Oh, okay. Yeah. There was a fair amount of boobage, as they say.
?00:21:11Yeah.
Vic00:21:11It's nudity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So... And I did think that the... Yeah.
JVL00:21:18That you don't want Michael to see. And people getting their heads cut off. That's fine. That's okay. That's okay. But we don't want to see any stray breasts.
Vic00:21:24No. There was...
JVL00:21:26It's really quite something. But it's asexual. The one sex scene is totally tame. It's weird. And in fact... And it's also weird. No, it's not weird. It is the... It's sad. This is... I'm going to say this and you're going to think this is strict, but it really is not. That is, to me, the most emotionally touching sex scene I have ever seen in a movie. The most relevant to the characters and the story development. It was beautiful, and I found myself deeply touched by it.
Vic00:21:49And people who haven't seen the movie will think this is pervy, but it's not.
JVL00:21:52It is incredibly... What's the word I'm looking for? It's almost Victorian. Touching. No, no. Almost Victorian in its depiction. You see almost nothing. Prudish.
Sonny00:22:01It is kind of prudish. Well, no. It is... And it's sad.
JVL00:22:05And it's very interesting to...
Sonny00:22:06So, first off, if you're still listening, this is going to be a full-on spoiler discussion of Blade Runner 21. Turn it off. 2049. So, if you haven't seen the movie and you plan on seeing the movie, please go see it and then come back and download us again. I think we get two downloads.
JVL00:22:19On the new iTunes, it's almost impossible to find and redownload an old show, as I found this morning when I was trying to listen to the... Oh, good. Really? Yeah. One of the old episodes. Yeah. Oh, it's concerning.
Sonny00:22:33Sonny. iOS 11 blows. So, the... But what's interesting about the sex scene is that you have that kind of, again, as you say, Victorian, kind of prudish... Prudish sex scene that's very much about her trying to give him something that he can't really experience just with her, and then how that all works compared to the advertisement for Joy. Right? Yes. Later in the movie where she's fully nude and kind of leering over issues. Yeah. No, it's beautiful. She's playing like a neon... Isn't it? Kind of a AI robot, AI program advertisement. I don't even know how to describe it exactly. Exactly. But the most interesting touch of that is the advertisement has these like dark blank eyes. Yes. Like these soulless... Soulless. Black holes of eyes that just kind of drive home the absurdity and the kind of sadness of that relationship. And there's also a very interesting point I think with the... So the scene in question, the robot, the AI program. Right. Who can kind of project herself onto the bodies of other people. She's a hologram. She's a hologram. She's a hologram. Right. She's a hologram. She's a hologram. She projects herself onto the body of a hooker from the street who is also a replicant. So she can actually touch her boyfriend. So she can actually touch Ryan Gosling. Right. Who plays Kay. And there's a very interesting line there where the replicant hooker, who we don't really know at all and hasn't really... We haven't really gotten much out of yet, says to the hologram. Right. In the morning. On the morning after. This is the morning after. Don't think too much of yourself. There's less there than you think. Which I think is also true. Right? No. See, I think this is... But I think the whole point of that scene is that...
Vic00:24:24At the end of the day.
Sonny00:24:25At the end of the day, Joy is just a program who has been designed to give Kay pleasure. She has no free will of her own. She has no choice. She has nothing like that. As opposed to the replicants who are trying to create this new... So anyway.
JVL00:24:41Well, I was going to say that... Disagree entirely. I think this is a total misreading of the film. Hold on. Before you...
Vic00:24:46But please, go ahead. I'm sorry. Two things. One, I was reminded of the movie Her by Spike Jonze. Right. And he develops, Joaquin Phoenix has a relationship with his computer, and then he tries to simulate sex with... And they bring a woman in and tries to do it just with audio and things like that. And again, a lot of it is sad. It reminded me, not to get churchy here, but over the weekend, the priest is talking about the sermon about the correlation between loneliness and mental illness. You go to church? Yeah. Believe it or not. And it's a sad correlation between mental illness and loneliness, and we're becoming more and more this lonely society, right? We're more connected, like social media and everything else, but in fact, the way we relate is less so. And that whole movie, it was just lonely. It was a whole...
Sonny00:25:31It was desolation, loneliness. It's about trying to find a connection in the world.
Vic00:25:34Yeah. And it was very sad. It reminded me of other dystopias in the... The Lives of Others. The agent, Gerd Wiesler, is trying to have this relationship with a prostitute, and again, it's soulless, and she doesn't care, and it's this thing. There's nothing there.
JVL00:25:49So I disagree entirely with your reading on joy. So I believe what the film is trying to say is that humanity is more than humans. It is more even than replicants, and that is why joy is the key here. There's a conversation where she is accompanying him while Kay is looking through a DNA database. And they have a conversation where he says, you know, look at this, we're all just made of these four symbols, you know, G-A-T-C. And she says, I'm only made of two, zeroes and ones. And he says, well, it's the same thing. And she exercises free will. She is the one who says to him, I want to go with you, but you're going to have to take me, you're going to have to delete me from the database and take me with you, because otherwise they'll be able to use me to get to you. And he says, but if you do that and this copy of you gets destroyed, you won't be here anymore. And she says, I choose this. Yes. She chooses mortality. She says, because I want to be a real girl.
Sonny00:26:42But she does not. She does not have a choice because her only programming function is to make him happy. That's the whole point of the scene with the soulless, black eyed advertisement version of her. They're all the same. They're just trying to they're trying to appeal to his they're trying to make him happy. That's the only reason they have to exist.
JVL00:27:00I believe that this is untrue. I believe that what the those advertisements are pitching the versions like joy to replicants in the same way. That replicants have been pitched to humans. And so when the replicant hooker says to joy, there's less of you than you think. This is just sort of speciesist looking down on joy in the way that humans look down on replicants. And I believe that what the movie is trying to tell us is that there is deep there are deep pockets of humanity in all three of these categories of being and that we are we are wrong to overlook them in any of the three.
Vic00:27:37It's a very. It's a bioethical nightmare because he is quite beautiful. Well, Kay is himself is obsessed with the idea of soul or not soul. Right. And what is right. Robin writes as well. You've gotten along with that one.
Sonny00:27:50Well, and there's also a very so the two to back up a bit, I guess, and do an actual discussion of what the movie is about. We open on Kay, who's played by Ron Ryan Gosling. He is a replicant who is, you know, supposedly totally in control, totally controlled by people. They you know, he's out there hunting. There are older versions of the replicants Nexus eights now that had no built in lifespan and revolted. And we're we're you know, that that revolt was kind of put down, but there are still pockets of them out there. The movie opens with him catching Bautista tracks, who's great, who's great, who is who's fantastic. I had no idea that Dave Bautista had this in him. Dave Bautista plays a kind of a big hulking, but also very fragile. Emotionally involved replicant who says to Kay, you've never seen a miracle. And we're kind of wondering what this miracle is turns out. The a replicant, should we go just do the whole?
JVL00:28:53Sure. Let's go. So they should if you care about spoilers, pause and come back.
Sonny00:28:57Yeah. So essentially, what has happened is Rachel from the first film, and Deckard had a child, Sean Young had a child. And the movie involves trying to discover the fate of that child. Batista is is kind of defending or is protecting the the the, you know, location of that child, we find a we find Rachel's bones buried underneath a tree outside his house. And there from there, the mystery goes, I I kind of love this movie, and I also am curious to see how it holds up as the years go on. It is a visually stunning film. This is a movie. So first off, this is a two hour and 45 minutes or so, it was a sci fi action movie that cost $185 million and is a sequel to a movie that grossed like 14 million, 16 million, something like that in its initial run, and has like found a found a shelf life as a kind of cult film, but it is still very much a cult film as we've seen by the the kind of relative lack of interest this year, there, everything about this movie kind of screams act of artistic hubris, that will incur giant losses on whichever company backed it. And I kind of love that it exists. Anyway, it is a visually entrancing movie it is it is long but I was never bored. I was never driven to look at my phone or, or watch I don't wear a watch. Obviously, I was never driven to look at my phone and see what time it was I was just like I was totally into the movie and it kind of we spread out from the original setting of Blade Runner we go from Los Angeles to San Diego, which has kind of been amusingly reconfigured as a giant dump. And then out to Las Vegas, which is was hit by a dirty bomb apparently and is is where Deckard is living. And and it is in it and it's just it's everything about the set design everything about the photography, the bright colors, the kind of silhouetted backgrounds are is is fantastic and amazing and otherwise mostly dark and raining and yeah, but but but it kind of it kind of shifts away from that dark rainy motif from the first one you get a lot of like dirty snow for instance, which I thought was very interesting I like the references that snow
JVL00:31:26in Southern California.
Sonny00:31:27Yeah, right.
Vic00:31:28Right. What are the what are the references I keep on missing to the the other the other the other worlds? What are they talking about? There are nine other other worlds, the colonies. The colonies.
JVL00:31:36It seems like the colonies are where all the action is at. So like, right.
Vic00:31:40I'm assuming happy humans and happy families are in these other places. Yes.
Sonny00:31:45Well, in theory leftover just couldn't get off. It's kind of hard to tell honestly, because these don't sound like terribly pleasant places to live. You need these like superhuman robot slaves to go out there and, and, and mine. I don't know, terraform, I guess. I don't know. I don't know what they're doing exactly. So I really like a lot of things about this movie. There are some there are some threads that don't get fully explored. And are like, clearly kind of setups for sequels, like the replicant underground army. That is that is clearly forming and the idea kind of, again, of these off world areas where Jared Leto who should we should, is the Jared Leto character really the hero of this of this movie?
JVL00:32:28No, the real hero is love, who is the replicant who played by German actress Sylvia Hooks, who is Jared Leto's. Sort of prime bodyguard bodyguards. Yeah. Love is the real here. And I'll explain that to you later.
Sonny00:32:42No, but I but I but I do think we need to give a give a moment, give a moment's thought to to Jared Leto's character here, who is, let's be honest, just trying to improve the fate of humanity. He needs the world for humanity to survive and thrive. They need to expand beyond our ruined world, they need to go to the off world colonies. And in order for the off world colonies to be decent places to live, they need this, this robot slave labor. And if you're, if your belief is that a replicant cannot have a soul, if it is not a creature born of God, then what really is the issue here?
JVL00:33:23JVL, the whole movie is sort of Django in space, is a movie about slavery as much as anything else, much more so than the original Blade Runner, I think. Wallace... Well, it's more on the nose about it.
Sonny00:33:39It's more, it's more, it is, I, it really, this movie holds your hand in a way that the original movie does not, I think, like, like Ryan Gosling's line, you know, I've never retired anyone who was born before I, you know, the, there are whole discourses on like what the actual ethical implications are of these, his actions.
JVL00:33:59Wallace is a God, right? He is an angry Olympian style vengeful God. Who views the world as his playthings and is molding things of lumps of clay.
Sonny00:34:10I think he's more detached than angry.
JVL00:34:12Tells his vision, which I think is one of, in a movie that is filled with interesting ideas and lived in worlds, what they do with Wallace's vision is the most interesting thing, I think. So Wallace is clearly blind. Right. The character's blind. And he sees by using an array of moving cameras of which there are like, what, 10, 12, 15, who knows how many of them. Which means- But they're not always on. Well, it suggests though that his brain is processing things in many more dimensions than we see visually normally, which is almost the definition of a God's eye view of the world, right? Being able to behold something from multiple angles all at once. And this is, I mean, he talks about, you know, I have colonized nine planets, I've, and this is all Zeus stuff, right? You know, I've given fire to, Zeus didn't give fire, but you know what I'm saying. Right. I've given myself as above humanity. It's much more about him. Everything about this is great, right? I mean, this is, I am more, I like this movie at least as much as you do, Sonny. I think, I want to spend more time with it. I want to go back and see it again. But my real, what really depressed me, it was this morning when I looked at the box office numbers and I saw this made 40% less money than Annabelle Creation, and I just thought, this culture is broken. Hollywood is broken. If you can't find an audience to see a movie like this, which is not, it's high art, but it is accessible art. It is extremely accessible. This is a popular movie for a mass audience.
Vic00:35:48If you wanted to gauge where the culture is, you should just go to your show notes and that link to the Steve Harvey Family Feud video.
JVL00:35:55Farts.
Vic00:35:56It feels good.
Sonny00:35:57Tallywhacker. Yeah. I laugh out loud every time I watch that video. I cry. I sweat and I cry. It's really funny. I think you're right. Well, I do think that part of the problem with this movie is that it was horribly advertised. Max Landis went on a Twitter rant about this yesterday or the day before. I didn't see it. Just about how they sold this movie as ... If you haven't seen the original, you won't have any idea what it's about. You won't know that it's about a robot cop or a replicant cop hunting other replicants. You won't know ... That there's a mystery to be solved. You won't know. Instead, it just gives you a bunch of visual images, and it's like, "Well, you can sell me on that. You can sell me on that, but you can't sell it to an audience." And part of the problem is the studio was terrified of spoilers. At the press screening, they read us a statement from director Denis Benioff, who had implored us ... There were actually two statements. There were two statements. There was one at the beginning that said, "As you embark on this journey, hopefully you don't know anything about the movie, and we ask that you not tell anyone in your reviews." And then after the movie, they read a whole list of demands of things not to mention. Don't say that Kay is a replicant. Don't talk about ... Don't say anything about the opening scene with Batista's character. Don't mention the actress ... If anyone asks you about the actress who plays the girl who creates the memories, don't say anything about her. Just say that we meet ... They actually gave us a suggested line to put in the piece that says, "We meet many people on this amazing journey through the world that Denis Villeneuve has created." They want to write it for you? They're writing it for you? I was offended on a certain level as a critic.
JVL00:37:48No wonder you see this as an act of artistic hubris, because that's frickin' redonkulous.
Sonny00:37:52I mean, it's something. It's something else. And I am actually ... Look, I am firmly in favor of keeping things from audiences before they see movies. I do think spoilers, in a movie like this in particular, have a real impact on how the world unfolds. Like, there's that great scene where we're introduced to Joy, and we just kind of hear her in the background, and we don't ... And like, I could tell something was going on, but not what exactly. And then when you see her as the hologram kind of shifting into like, to figure out again exactly what he wants, because her only purpose in life is to make him happy. It's great. It's a great little reveal. It's a nice little character moment, and I do think that it's something that doesn't work as well if you know what she is ahead of time. Now, that being said, you have to put some faith in your reviewers and your critics to understand what is needed and what isn't needed to be told. Also, you need to have some faith in audiences that if they want to go into a movie like this cold, they will avoid the reviews. This is one place where Rotten Tomatoes is actually very useful, because you can look at a score, and you can see, "Okay, this is good or it isn't good," without actually having to read a review and put yourself at the risk of seeing the spoilers.
Vic00:39:03I'm on Rotten Tomatoes.
Sonny00:39:06I'm a Rotten Tomatoes-certified critic.
JVL00:39:08You should have opened your review with, "The Memory Girl is Harrison Ford's daughter, bitches." That should have been the first line of your review, because that is an offensive thing for a studio to do. No, it is. It is. If you don't want people to spoil it, don't screen it for critics.
Vic00:39:23Or the suggestion of, "Here's what you could write."
Sonny00:39:25Right. Oh, it was ...
JVL00:39:27I'm surprised there wasn't a revolt about this.
Sonny00:39:28There were in certain quarters. Some people ... Again, all of this is kind of confined to film Twitter. It's cordoned off from the rest of the population.
Vic00:39:36Did you notice Gene? He didn't abide by those rules.
Sonny00:39:38I know. I almost stopped him. He just went out and said ...
JVL00:39:41I almost stopped him. The studio said ... He's a rebel.
Sonny00:39:44The studio said not to tell anyone. Come on, guys. Robot baby. Anyway, that being said, all this aside, I really loved it. I very strongly agree with Jon Podhortz's review, who wrote for The Weekly Standard, that this is a great movie. It's probably actually better than Blade Runner as a piece of filmmaking, as a piece of storytelling, as a narrative device. But I do wonder if it will hold up on repeat viewings, because I do think that there is a kind of ... The storyline is superficially complicated and is actually not really that complex once you get through the whole thing. It's very easy to follow, very straightforward. And again, I think the philosophical implications of it all, we are kind of walked through step by step. I'm not ... What about the ambiguity that there was from the first film? It was ... There was a little bit of ambiguity. Is there? Well, do we know if Deckard is human or a replicant still? I think that's still very much up in the air, right?
Vic00:40:42That's right. That was my big question, because of course, were there alternative endings in Blade Runner? One was much more explicit than the other about his ... What was it? It was the ... The final cut. Yeah.
Sonny00:40:54The unicorn scene in the final cut makes it very clear that the intention, supposedly ... What do you call those Japanese ...
JVL00:40:58The origami. Origami. I was going to say Tamagotchi. Wait. Is that the literal pronunciation of that word? Origami?
?00:41:04Sorry.
JVL00:41:05I thought we might get a good ... Oh, no. When you pronounce Japanese ... Origami? It is often hilarity.
Vic00:41:10I was going to say Tamagotchi. I was going to say Tamagotchi. Sorry. Go ahead. No. This is ...
Sonny00:41:16Yeah. In the final cut of Blade Runner, the so-called final cut, it seems very clear that the message of the combination of the unicorn dream sequence with the unicorn scene and the origami figurine left in his apartment is meant to suggest that Gaff, the Edward James Olmos character, knows that he is a replicant. If you remember the movie, he's been kind of tagging along behind Deckard this whole time, keeping tabs on him, and if he needed to retire him, say. So I do think that if you just look at that reading of the film, I think it is very clear that he is meant to be a replicant. To kind of set that aside, it is still very, it is very unclear if he is a human or a replicant, and there's actually a scene in the movie where he talks about how it doesn't matter. He's real.
JVL00:42:13Yeah.
Vic00:42:14No, this is entirely, am I missing some sort of hidden message, not so hidden messages or symbolism, with the snow on Kay, and the snow landing on his hand, and in the ending in the snow.
Sonny00:42:27Well, I assume this is, I assume this is, again, this is more of a environmentalist comment, about global cooling, possibly, or some, snow in, snow in Los Angeles is weird, and it's, it's, what, what, we used to be worried about acid rain, now we're worried about global warming/cooling.
Vic00:42:42I, I, yeah, either way.
JVL00:42:43No, I thought it was snowflakes, we're all different, no, I thought it was literally a sort of a comment on humanity, that we are seeing the snowflakes, and the individuality of snowflakes, and that even the replicants are distinct from one another, I, but, can we talk a little bit about love?
Vic00:42:59Yes.
JVL00:43:00Yeah, sure. I thought it was spelled L-U-V, right? L-U-V, who is the fixer for Wallace.
Vic00:43:06I thought it was Lisa Loeb, she looked like Lisa Loeb, the actress singer, sorry. A little bit, but a little German. But it was, turns out, she's much more masculine.
JVL00:43:14I kept watching her, and I thought, boy, she is right up the fix alley.
Vic00:43:15No, she was, she was very serious, uh, no nonsense.
JVL00:43:19So she's the real hero of this movie, obviously, and the key to the movie, I believe, may come in the scene where she is with Wallace, and a replicant is being born. And she cries. Why is she crying? Because she knows what he's going to do to her? I don't know. This is, I mean, there are a bunch of possibilities. She could be crying because she's jealous, because she is in awe of the beauty of birth, because there is sadness, because she knows the new replicant is about to die. But there's something going on with her, and we see that she is vain later on in the movie when she's getting her nails done. We see that she is proud when her final line comes. The final line to Kay. What does she say? She thinks she's killing him. She says, "I'm the best one." It is important to her to be the best. We know that she's able to lie, as she tells Madame right before she kills Robin Wright. In many ways, I would say that Love is the most human character in the entire film, and can be read then as such to be the lynchpin of the movie itself. There. Did I just blow your minds?
Sonny00:44:27No, I think this is a total ... Well, I don't know that that necessarily makes her the hero of the movie. The hero is the most human. This is a movie about humanity. That's not necessary. I don't think that's true. I don't think it's true that the hero is the most human. But it does make her ... Look, I think she's a very interesting character. I don't think she is necessarily the ... Again, I think if you're going on this route, I think that Wallace has to be the hero of the film, because she's just an underling of Wallace.
JVL00:44:56She's doing his bidding. Wallace is the least human of all the people. He has moved ... He is godlike. He is no longer like a human. He is more like a god. He's transcended. He is transcended. Yeah. In ways which we think are not good. He's more human than the human. I was fascinated ...
Sonny00:45:13No.
JVL00:45:14He's more creator. Right? That's what this movie is about. It's about the distinctions between the creator and the created and the questions about what humanity is.
Sonny00:45:22And there is also a very ... Have you guys seen Arrival? Have you seen Arrival? Yes. You've seen Arrival? Yeah. We did a show on it. Don't worry, because I saw it, and I still didn't get it.
JVL00:45:33I was going to say, have you figured out the end of it yet?
Vic00:45:35Yes. I think my son explained it to me.
Sonny00:45:38You should see Arrival. I would be curious to get your take on it, because I do think that there is something to be said for the idea of Denis Villeneuve as a great ... I hate using terms like this, because it's very reductive and wrong, and I don't actually agree with it. But I do think he is ... He has an interesting kind of pro-life sense. Pro-life sensibility. The idea of ... The idea ... So the fundamental issue in Blade Runner 2049 is there is a difference between a race that is created and a race that propagates itself, right? Yes. So the idea is the thing that separates the ... The thing that allows the replicants to transcend their natural state of slavery is the ability to create the miracle of birth. And is it ... It is fundamentally immoral to create a race of people that can do that with the intention of enslaving them.
JVL00:46:39Yes?
Sonny00:46:40Yes. Yes. And that ... If that is the idea, then that creates a real sense of importance about the idea of childbirth, right?
JVL00:46:51If you want to turn people against this movie ... You go rushing out onto Twitter and say that, "Boy, Blade Runner 2049 is the most pro-life
Sonny00:46:59movie I've ever seen, and watch what happens."
Vic00:47:02Of 2017.
Sonny00:47:03Stay tuned to WashingtonPost.com. We might ...
Vic00:47:06Oh! They'll love it there.
JVL00:47:08It is ... I will say ... That'll be great. I will say that it is going to be hysterical when watching the fanboy heads explode when Wonder Woman is nominated for Best Picture and Blade Runner is not. Because count on it. That's going to happen. I was ... This movie is born to be overlooked by everybody for at least five years.
Sonny00:47:27This movie is a million times better than ...
Vic00:47:29I had no expectations. I didn't want to see this movie. I actually ... That's what Harvey Weinstein would say. Oh, boy. Here we go. Oh! Oh! Oh! As we said many days ago, this was a conversation we had many days ago on the micro, I had no expectations, so I didn't want to see this movie. I didn't think I'd like it, and I really came out really, really enjoying this movie. I thought it was just ... It's very rich. It's a rich experience.
Sonny00:47:53Sad. Once again, it's visually ... It is visually stunning in a way that we throw around the phrase visually stunning a lot, and it really is just entrancing to watch. If you are willing to give yourself over to the movie, and I know some people aren't because it is long, and it can be a little bit talky and ponderous at times, but if you're willing to give yourself over to the visual experience of the film, you will be taken away.
Vic00:48:15For two hours and 45 minutes, sit and just relax. That's exactly ...
Sonny00:48:20Were you checking your Rolex?
Vic00:48:21Once, and that was to see what time Harrison Ford would appear, and I believe it was an hour and 40 in. I thought, "Well, he's going to be here. He's going to be here just for the last ... Oh, no, it's a whole other half that he's there
JVL00:48:34for." I do want to make sure people understand, because I think you might be selling it a tiny bit short by saying it's visually ... Yes, it is visually stunning, but it's also a movie based on ... It's wonderfully plotted. It is densely ... It's packed with narrative, and it has ideas behind it, and is a character story too. I mean, this really is, I think, a truly great movie. No? Yes? Sonny, would you agree that this is a five star movie?
Sonny00:49:03I would say it's ... I don't know that it's a five star movie, but I do think it is a ... It's certainly one of the three best movies I've seen so far this year. It's this and Dunkirk, and I'm not sure what else, honestly.
Vic00:49:17Yeah. No, and I was surprised that there was a real storyline that I personally was able to follow. "Ah, they're trying to figure out this baby, and I can see what's happening now, a baby is born. It's his birthday. Hmm. It might be him. What?" You know, so it was ... You want to go through my brain as Blade Runner, as a sort of director's
Sonny00:49:38commentary? I actually want that version of the Jeans Charlotte review.
Vic00:49:41You want that? What? Oh my God. A girl? And so, you know, I was like, "Wait a minute. You mean it's her?" So it's ... JV, I broke him. I broke him. I think we're ready to ... It's your WAP. Yeah, I think we can. What? It really was. Yeah. I don't think so. Okay.
Sonny00:50:01It's ... All right.
Vic00:50:02Good job. Good job. Okay.
JVL00:50:05I think we could move on. Yeah.
Vic00:50:07I don't know. Maybe we'll talk more. This movie's great.
JVL00:50:10Yeah. Unless you had Sicario thoughts. No. We can talk about it. Tell us how great this movie is, Sonny. It's the best form of the Substandard. The three of us sitting around saying, "This movie is so good." That is so good.
Vic00:50:18That's my more comfortable platform. All right. Sonny. No, I got it. No. You're okay. We'll move on. Corrections, additions. I have two. Please. Oh. Okay. Last episode, if anyone heard it, I was talking about Match Game and the time that Carol Burdette and friends walked onto the set. I remember Tim Conway and Jim Neighbors, but I forgot the other actress. Thank you to listeners Brian Faughton and Ben O'Connell and others for reminding me. It was Vicki Lawrence, later of Mama's Family. Also, a shout out to listener Walton Chaney, new to the area, who says, "He spotted me at the St. Anne's Fall Festival, and I thought this would have been really funny. While I was talking to another dad, if he just came up and said, 'Excuse me, are you Vic Matus of The Substandard?' That would have been really funny." And I said, "How did you recognize me? Was it my head from across the parking lot that he was able to recognize me?" Did he say yes? He said, "No, Twitter. Twitter. Photo. Twitter." So I said, "Yeah." But he actually ... I got an email, or it was sent to The Standard, saying, "This doesn't sound too weird, but were you at ... That's our parish in Arlington. They have a fall festival with beer and rocks and stuff like that." If you want to know where to kill Vic ... Yeah. So I was there with ... I was just waiting for the kids to get done rock climbing ... They have a rock climbing thing. Let's just get the rock climbing done, and let's go home.
Sonny00:51:35An aggro crag?
Vic00:51:36Something like that. Did you go rock climbing with your children, Victorino? It's just for the kids. There were no adults. Or the bouncy house, I stayed out of there. Or the thing where it's like the bungee, where you just ... I can't explain it. You're strapped. It's really weird. Okay. Not for me. Anyway, that's it. Do you have any other things? Thanks.
JVL00:51:58JVL. Sonny. I was trying to re-listen to the bootleg episode to find out what we had done wrong in it, and I couldn't get to it because of the new iTunes interface. So no, I'll just assume that we got everything right, and you couldn't hear me anyway, so.
Vic00:52:13Yep.
?00:52:14Okay.
JVL00:52:15What are you boys drinking today?
Vic00:52:16All right.
JVL00:52:17Spirit of the Week. Oh, wait. I'm sorry. Can we, for those of us who don't follow the show on Twitter, can you talk about the big news from Substandard Fan?
Sonny00:52:27That he has acquired a bottle of the Kingsman Scotch, the $900 Kingsman Scotch. Oh! Sorry. I had to blow out the speaker. Vic is so excited about this. He just made you all deaf. That was Glendronach. The Glendronach. Glendronach. Yes! I can't believe he did this. We'll see.
JVL00:52:45I mean, he says it's coming. Explain to people listening what has happened here.
Sonny00:52:47This is amazing. We have a fan account on Twitter, Substandard Fan, who has- Probably not run by Kate Mattis. As best as we can tell. No. We don't want to spoil the mystery. But he sent, he put an email out on Twitter saying that he has a bottle of the Kingsman Limited Edition, the $900 bottle of Glendronach Kingsman Scotch. So if- We saw a receipt of sale. We saw the receipt. We saw the email confirmation. If he wants to do a review, we're happy to have him Skype in or we'll figure out how to make that work. I don't know.
JVL00:53:27We have to. I mean, have you guys ever sampled a $900 bottle of ... Is this Scotch or bourbon? What is this? Scotch. Scotch. Have you ever had a $900 bottle of Scotch? Not 900 retail.
Vic00:53:37Right. I might have had small samples of a very expensive cognac in the $400 or $500 range.
Sonny00:53:45There was like a Johnny Walker variant, Johnny Walker blue-y something. Oh, the lenticular Johnny Walker? Yeah, it was the chromium cover. The chromium Johnny Walker.
JVL00:53:52Johnny Walker. That version of it.
Vic00:53:54Johnny Walker chromium. Yes. The equivalent, the equivalent of that.
JVL00:53:58So what is it? Can you taste the difference? Like when you have a $500 glass of Scotch ...
Sonny00:54:03For the record, we're drinking the Old Forester Statesman, again, which is still really smooth and great, and you should buy some.
JVL00:54:09Is it very drinkable? Extremely.
Sonny00:54:11Send a tweet to us showing that the Freebeacon Moves product, because you'll notice that we don't have any of the Blade Runner 2049 Scotch. Is there a Blade Runner 2049? There is a Blade Runner Scotch, the Johnny Walker black director's cut.
Vic00:54:25So I assume that's what he's ... That's what he's drinking at the Casino Hotel? Is that what he pours in the Scotch? Yes. But you don't actually see the ...
Sonny00:54:31You see the bottle. You see it? Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. It is very clearly framed on the end of ... There's also, very amusingly, a Diageo advertisement. There's a Diageo neon ad in the Los Angeles skyline. I was like, "Oh, I get it." Oh, that's good.
JVL00:54:46I get references. Oh, wow. I saw that. I myself was glad to see that somehow in the future, in the dystopian future, Peugeot survives. Yes. Yes. That's the car of the future, Peugeot. Yes. Yes. No, but this is my question. When you have a glass of a super Scotch- Yes. ... or a cognac or something, do you really ... Are your socks blown off? Do you ... If I were to put a glass in front of you with a $500 Scotch in it and not tell you, and you were to take a sip of it, would you say to yourself, "Oh, wow, wait a minute." Yes.
Sonny00:55:17No. Yes. It's like the wine shock thing all over again.
Vic00:55:20No. Sonny, I was going to make a comparison to drinking Blue Label, but we all know how you
JVL00:55:25feel about Blue Label. You know what, then? Maybe we got to do a little taste test with Substandard Fan. We got to have his wife put out two glasses in front of him, one with the $900 bottle of Kingsman and one with- A glass of Chivis. ... just something else. I don't want to ... I wouldn't want to- But there's certain Scotches I would know on the- Let him do it live on air.
Vic00:55:43Chivis is unmistakable. You can taste that. It just has a certain taste to it, but okay. I think that's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments. Please tweet us @VictorinoMatus, @SonnyBunch. @JV.
Sonny00:55:58Last. @JV.
JVL00:56:00Hey, Vic, you're over 2,000 followers now, aren't you?
Vic00:56:03I'm almost up to 2,200. Look at that.
JVL00:56:05Very exciting. Let's keep this going, guys. Let's keep this going.
Vic00:56:08Including ... Well, anyway, we'll have to get into my personal Twitter life. Again, be sure to- No, come on. No, wait. Is it? Daryl Hammond's following me, and I love Daryl Hammond.
JVL00:56:17What? Yeah. And Jeff Edgers. I'm a big fan of Jeff Edgers.
Vic00:56:21Daryl Hammond?
Sonny00:56:22Yeah. You know what's funny? Daryl Hammond. The profile of Daryl Hammond is really, really good. We should put that in show notes, by the way. Oh, my gosh.
Vic00:56:28It was really something. That's awesome.
Sonny00:56:30Okay.
Vic00:56:31I wish I was on. Thanks. Well, you had Norm Macdonald, Sonny, on and off, or on again? Norm Macdonald follows me on Twitter. Yeah, of course. Well, he's one of 30-something thousand, I guess. Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes or Google Play. Just type in Substandard on the podcasts, and we're there. Leave a review. Tell your friends. And don't forget, the Substandard show notes will be up on Friday at 11:00 AM, maybe. Until next time.
JVL00:56:57Five, four, three. You know, guys, watches give me feelings I don't entirely understand.
Sonny00:57:09I like Germans. Food trucks? Garbage. Ling Cuisine is where it's at. It even has cuisine in the name. More people buy it than gourmet food.
JVL00:57:18In the movies you like, the bad guys are actually the good guys, and the good guys are actually
Vic00:57:24the bad guys. I have soft hands. I cut myself refilling the stapler.
Sonny00:57:30I don't like the outdoors. I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating, and it gets everywhere. Mulch is fun.
Vic00:57:38I love only one of my daughters. Who should I mention and thus doom to a swift death this week? Aren't you an editor?
JVL00:57:48Do you mean whom? That's science. I have a toy I want to show you.
Sonny00:57:54This is a great medium for showing Vic and me stuff. I wish Hermione had shown a little something. Oh, jeez. What time is it? For F's sake, Vic, you're going to get us all kicked off the air. I love surfing. Blue Crush was based on my life story.
Vic00:58:09Who wants to hit up a Chinese buffet?
Sonny00:58:11Zach Braff is actually underrated as a director, and white chocolate is better than chocolates that taste good. Today's spirit of the week is bullet bourbon.
JVL00:58:20I'm drinking NyQuil instead because it tastes better than real beer. That's ridiculous. I'm sure it's fine.
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