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#91. The Substandard on 'Bright' and the Future of Netflix
Listen to this episode ↗on Substack, where the show lives now
Dudes Chatting — Bright and the Netflix business model: Vic's return after his absence in episode 089 is celebrated. Bright (David Ayer / Max Landis / Will Smith — "Training Day meets Lord of the Rings") gets a split verdict: Sonny liked it considerably, treating it as an entertaining cop movie first and a fantasy film second, and argues the genre mashup mostly works; JVL thought it was passable but notes it does not look like a $90 million production, and observes that on Netflix the bar simply feels different. The conversation then pivots to a much longer riff on Netflix's corporate situation: JVL lays out his bear case — market cap of $91B against GM's $62B, a price-to-earnings ratio of 222, the company losing money, and having run through three distinct business models in twelve years — and predicts Disney will eventually "crush Netflix like a bug" once its own streaming service launches. Sonny is more measured, pointing out Netflix has 117 million subscribers, costs only ten dollars a month, and benefits from pure inertia; his best-case analog is HBO. A coda covers the safety of Netflix for young children; Vic reveals his parents showed his kids Pan's Labyrinth.
Box Office: Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle leads at $36M, Insidious: The Last Key opens to $29M in second, The Last Jedi third at $23M; the hosts note Star Wars underperformed in China.
Spirit of the Week: Lagavulin 16 (Diageo).
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00It's a new day. Back to work. We will not be listening to no orcish music. That is one of the greatest love songs ever written. Yeah, well, I feel sorry for work lady.
Vic00:00:22Hello, and welcome back to another edition of The Substandard, sponsored by Tripping.com. I'm Victor Matus, along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. I'd like to remind you that The Substandard is available on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. Just look on our podcast and search for Substandard. You'll easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, and leave a review. By the way, we have now broken through 500 reviews. We are only about 1,000 behind some other podcasts, I think.
Sonny00:00:51Yeah, well, you know. We go for quality reviews, not quantity.
Vic00:00:54Jamie, how are you doing? That's why I only gave you a dram. You wanted to drink, and I said, are you sure? I wanted to celebrate us all being back together. This is straight from, this is very peaty. You are tasting, as our friend, this is a Lagavulin 16. I'm sort of jumping here, courtesy of our friends from Diageo. A 16-year-old Lagavulin. Mother of God. As Aaron McLean says, Aaron McLean only prefers to drink these kind of scotches, which are very smoky. Like, you could taste the Scottish bog. You literally can, right? Yes. It's a bog. You can taste the bog.
JVL00:01:27It tastes like you are dipping a ladle into fetid water that has been mixed with cough medicine.
Vic00:01:32What Aaron McLean says, he drinks it, and he's literally drinking his ancestors, as our friend says. It's horrifying.
Sonny00:01:41Look, thank you for giving us the very nice bottle of scotch. Yes. For those of us who enjoy... Diageo. This is actually really good stuff, and I'm not a scotch drinker, but I do...
JVL00:01:52It's disinfected. You don't need to worry.
Vic00:01:53I don't... Keep your... What a waste. Okay. How are we doing?
Sonny00:01:59How are you doing? How am I doing? You're the one who went to rehab. I mean, you went away for a week. You came back.
Vic00:02:06I'm much better. Did it take? And my friend Harvey, my new friend Harvey, says hi. Harvey. Oh. Does he listen to the show? Yes. That was kind of rehab. Wow. You're in Lucerne.
Sonny00:02:15We really shouldn't have done that Harvey Donald Trump bit. Sorry.
Vic00:02:18I brought back a plant. Okay. No. I had a very relaxing week. It was so stress-free. Didn't have to worry about things like transitions, script, order, or anything.
Sonny00:02:35Wow. You didn't have to read the same thing that you read every week.
Vic00:02:40With various little variations.
Sonny00:02:41You didn't have to call up the Uber to drive us over here.
Vic00:02:45You know what? That was the other great thing. I didn't have to ride an Uber with Sonny.
JVL00:02:48Can you grade us on our performance last week?
Vic00:02:50Yeah. Sure. How did we do? I'd give you a plus, like a D+. D+, that's fair. I might have said a B+, or I might have said a D+. I'm not sure. You purposely, I don't know why you didn't. You know what? I needed to get out of this. I really did try. This was not a... Kayfabe? No. Yeah, that's right. That's right. That's right. This was not some sort of promotional stunt or anything. It's not a work.
Sonny00:03:18Somebody was accusing us on Twitter of me downsizing. Own-selling the show on purpose in an effort to drive up listenership. No, it was just bad. It was bad. This week will be better.
Vic00:03:29But you know what? You did it on purpose, I think. I said bring a guest. You didn't want to bring a guest in. No guests. I think you purposely wanted to just destroy the show in order to guilt me back in.
JVL00:03:40Yeah, that's right.
Sonny00:03:40I don't understand. Oh, really? I don't understand what's your point. What's your point, Vic?
JVL00:03:45I just figured it out. Vic, there are consequences to everybody's actions, and it was good that you got to see yours.
Vic00:03:52I have to. Yes, well, that's one of the...
JVL00:03:53When you leave the show, you get that thing that happened in my office.
Vic00:03:57It's, you know, it's the only thing worse than dudes chatting is white dudes chatting. That's what I am saying.
Sonny00:04:01It's two white dudes chatting.
Vic00:04:03With Legos. And I have to say two things, two other things, which is one, I was very touched and flattered by all the responses on Twitter from many of our listeners who wanted me to come back. It was a really... Nice thing. It made you feel good?
JVL00:04:23It made me feel good. It made you feel like you're wanted?
Vic00:04:26Both good and bad. It made me feel good and bad. Not that I have to feel that way. I don't want to be... I don't care about being loved. You know, I've never spent my life ever wanting to be loved since, you know...
JVL00:04:34You are the most loved person on the show. You understand this, right?
Vic00:04:38That of the three of us, you're the people... You're the one that people love. One of my favorite comments was the FMK comment, you know, F, marry, kill. And I got the marry because early on in the show, it was FMK. FMK and I was the kill.
JVL00:04:53Yeah. It's very disturbing. So what am I now?
Vic00:04:55They're not sure. I think that was a toss-up.
JVL00:04:58Sonny is shaking his head. Clearly, Sonny is the kill.
Vic00:05:00So I want to thank everybody for... I'll take that. ...all their kind words.
Sonny00:05:04Trust me, I'd rather be killed than F any of our listeners. Oh. Oh. Take that. Take that, Substandard Expanded Universe.
Vic00:05:12Speak for yourself.
JVL00:05:14I love all of my listeners.
Vic00:05:16I'm open to new things. Yeah, me too.
JVL00:05:19That great line in... In Go, where Bill Fickner sits... Bill Fickner. Who is it? Oh, it's Bill Fickner. Is it Scott Wolf?
Vic00:05:26Oh, who's JBL's friend, Bill? Yeah, Jay Moore and Scott Wolf. Jay Moore, and he's like...
JVL00:05:30When you're hanging out with... Guys, are you open to new things? And then he tells them Amway. That's Amway.
Sonny00:05:34That's so great. When you're hanging out with William Fickner, do you introduce him as Bill to your friends? Are you you and Bill?
JVL00:05:41In my life, I have never heard him referred to as anything except Bill Fickner. Was it like Bobby De Niro?
Sonny00:05:48Yeah, Bobby... Me and Bobby De Niro. We hang out. Yeah.
JVL00:05:51We hang out sometimes. The next time you hear somebody speak about him and refer to him as William, you let me know. Okay. Also, I... Do people call William Kristol, William Kristol?
Vic00:06:02I call him Doctor, Doctor Kristol, you know? As you know... You show him the respect. Careful. Careful. The first day you arrive in the office, make sure you call him Doctor. Just kidding.
JVL00:06:10Just... Oh, I know what you're going to say. Somebody else.
Vic00:06:12Pretty funny, JBL. Okay. So, really quickly...
Sonny00:06:16How was everybody's Christmas? Wonderful, because I guess you didn't discuss it that much in detail. We didn't discuss it. No, we didn't discuss it, because we wanted to wait for you. I just wanted to say this.
Vic00:06:22One of the things I got for Christmas is actually a gift that I'm passing along to you guys, and it was from my brother-in-law's wife. Does that make her my sister-in-law? Yeah. Okay, my sister-in-law, Erin Dwyer, who... There you go. Hey, nerds!
JVL00:06:38Oh, thank you, Erin. A box of nerds. Watermelon, apple, and cherry lemonade. What did you get?
Sonny00:06:45I got cherry and watermelon.
Vic00:06:48Ooh.
Sonny00:06:48Well, I win. Do you want... I'll trade you.
Vic00:06:50No, I win. And the captain himself, Bill Dwyer, got me a bottle of Basil Hayden's.
JVL00:06:57I thought he bought you a Black & Decker drill set.
Vic00:07:01In addition to... That was also from Erin Dwyer, the drill. Okay. Do you know how to use it? Yes, of course. Now I do. Did you read the manual? No. There's some YouTube instructional videos for you. I learned in shop class, as you know. Okay. There's a teacher badge. Yeah, I did. A certificate. Did they give you a certificate? Do you remember what I used to have on my office wall framed was the certificate of completing Adobe InDesign Level 4? You have completed... They used to do that. I don't think they do that anymore. They used to give you a certificate. Congratulations. You are now proficient.
JVL00:07:38And then you can eventually get to Adobe InDesign Level Clear.
Vic00:07:42At which point you can manipulate the weather. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, that's good. That's good. We were working with QuarkXPress for many years, and then we switched over. Very exciting. Very exciting. We, however, are in the midst of getting a bathroom renovation in our basement. So I get to go down and talk to... Because my wife says that she'd like at least one nice bathroom in our house. So we have a half bathroom in the main floor, which is just a powder room. And then we have a bathroom upstairs. So you're putting in a bathroom in the basement? Oh, no. It already exists, but it has better water. It always had better water pressure. Of course, my fear is that the new shower won't be quite the same, because they always tell you that. It's straight out of Seinfeld.
JVL00:08:24So what are you doing as a renovation? What are you doing? You're just ripping everything out?
Vic00:08:28Everything out.
JVL00:08:29You're putting everything new in? New everything. Are you expanding the space? Fancy everything.
Vic00:08:32Are you moving the walls? There were some weird things that previous owners had put when they renovated that bathroom or built that bathroom in. So the master carpenter comes in, and he looks, and he says, we don't need to do this. We could hire ceilings, so things like that. Very nice bathroom that should fit. Just enough room for a shower. Fit for the son of a doctor. It's a shower that fits one comfortably and two very comfortably. Just kidding. That's an old joke. That's an old joke.
JVL00:09:01Are the kids still up in Jersey?
Vic00:09:03No, they're back. They're back. And, of course, there's late openings, and there's early closures because of this weather. Yes? Back on Tuesday and Monday, there were, Victorino. Not on Thursday. Oh, no, no, no, no. The weather's lovely today. Everything is wonderful on Thursday. We've thought out here in the D.C. area. It's so warm. It's so warm. Okay, so.
JVL00:09:20Sonny, could you chew those nerds closer to the microphone, please? I can't hear it at all. I'm trying to step further away.
Vic00:09:24I don't know. I'm serious.
JVL00:09:25I would like to hear it.
Sonny00:09:26I'd like to have some texture to the audio. It sounds tasty. If you could hear what I was chewing, I apologize. So, everybody is doing fine? I just wanted to eat some of these nerds.
Vic00:09:35Everybody's doing fine? Yes? Anything else you want to add in before I move on?
JVL00:09:39You know what? I have a quick story. Do you have something, Sonny? Please.
Sonny00:09:41I just wanted to say the best thing I got for Christmas was a pair of socks, so I officially feel like an old person.
JVL00:09:47I got so many great pairs of socks for Christmas. I got a pair. You can never get enough socks.
Sonny00:09:51I got a pair of darn tough merino wool socks, and I'm wearing them right now. I told you. You're going to have to tweet that out.
JVL00:09:58I told you. My mother-in-law gave me socks with my name on them.
Sonny00:10:01I have to say, again, I feel like a very old person, but I love these socks so much. They make the work boots I have very comfortable. These are regular shoes. Work boots? But, yeah. Some women love the work boots, by the way. I've heard that. You know, if the people at Darn Tough are listening.
Vic00:10:24Good sponsor, Darn Tough. Wink, wink. We could do that. Wink, wink. That would work out. JVL, you had a story.
JVL00:10:29Yeah, so my elder daughter yesterday had a test in school on the book, Little Women. Oh, yeah. And she, through no fault of her own, neglected to read Little Women. My wife just sort of... Forgot to remind her over the course of the weekend that, like, hey, you have a test on Monday, and she didn't read it. And she pulled a 95. Wow. On the test. And then last night, so the test is on Monday, and then on Tuesday, they have the essay portion of the test. We have to write an essay about it. And so last night after school, my wife said to her, you know, so you should read the book tonight. And my daughter looked at her and goes, meh, I don't think so. I got a 95. I'm pretty sure I can handle the essay.
?00:11:17Wow.
JVL00:11:20Terrifying. Yes. It terrifies me. Maybe she can pull it off. Because, you know what? By her teen years, the ability to lie and just make things up as she goes is horrifying.
Vic00:11:31I did that through most of my four years at Georgetown. Yeah, well, you know. There were books. I bought a book twice. You were well lubricated. I bought a book twice because I forgot I bought it the first time because I never read it. Yeah. Anyway. Anyway.
JVL00:11:44It's terrifying. And yet, pardon me.
Vic00:11:46Yes.
JVL00:11:46Kind of proud of myself. Forever. Yes. Because it's a little bit awesome.
Sonny00:11:50You'll have to update us next week and see how she did on the test. Being able to BS your way through a work assignment is like the foundational trait of becoming an adult. An adult. Getting through life. It's like if you can fake your way through work or school, you're basically well on your way to being a functional adult.
Vic00:12:06It's also the stuff of nightmares. In human civilization. It's also the stuff of nightmares. I still, that's not like a recurring nightmare of mine is like a test or a paper that's due the next day and I hadn't read any books. I have. Up to, and I say, why did I do this again? Because I did this for real my sophomore year.
Sonny00:12:22It was very funny. Somebody on Twitter I saw describe college as an event that will give you PTSD for the rest of your life. Because you do have these weird dreams. Like I have one. I have one. It's a recurring one. I wake up and I'm like, oh my God, I never did that specific course. It's like, it's not even a real course requirement at UVA. It was like physical education or something. Like I didn't do my physical education course and now I can't graduate. I can't graduate from UVA and I'm totally screwed. And I have this dream, wake up in a cold sweat once every six months. It's like clockwork. It's bizarre.
JVL00:12:56Yeah, I don't want to hear from you guys about how your undergraduate years give you PTSD.
Vic00:13:00Yes, and suck it. Mine is econ. It's always an econ class. And JVL is medical. JVL is just all of it.
JVL00:13:07Medical related? All of it. All related. All related. Okay.
Vic00:13:10Well, anyway, good for her. Dude's chatting his back.
Guest00:13:13Dude's chatting his back. However.
Vic00:13:15But you have to. But, you know, learn how to work your way through the adult world. So it's good to learn these skills because it's a jungle out there. Speaking of jungles, Jumanji, Welcome to the Jungle, took the top spot at the box office with $36 million, followed by Insidious something. Insidious colon something. The Last Key. The Last Key?
Sonny00:13:35The Last Key, I think. Somehow missed the first key. I don't understand.
JVL00:13:38I haven't watched any of these Insidious movies.
Sonny00:13:4029 million. Yes, you haven't. As far as I can tell, this is a movie that is about a ghost whose fingers turn into keys and that's how it works. That's how he gets into your house to haunt you. As best as I can... I don't know. That's what I gather from the poster.
Vic00:13:52That's an interesting... I've often heard ghosts can't enter until you open the door and let them in, so this ghost has figured it out. Look at that.
Sonny00:13:58He solved the problem.
Vic00:14:00Now no one's safe. No one's safe. And it's a bad ghost, I assume. It's Insidious.
Sonny00:14:03Oh.
Vic00:14:04What is happening? Okay. Star Wars, The Last Jedi dropped to third place with $23 million.
Sonny00:14:10Wow. Big drop.
Vic00:14:11Apparently, it did not do well in China.
Sonny00:14:13No. I am totally fascinated by China's imperviousness. Imperviousness to the Star Wars charms? Yeah, because they love Fast and Furious. Because in Japan, it's very big. Is that the reason?
JVL00:14:25No, I'm just saying. It is one more where you have a cultural schism, where the Japanese have always been nuts for Star Wars. Vic, I'm sure you remember this. There were some amazing Japanese one-sheets for the original Star Wars movies. Yes. I had a book of them when I was a kid growing up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're great. They're fabulous.
Sonny00:14:43Was it the whole Kurosawa thing? I have no idea.
Vic00:14:47But we're actually not here to talk about those movies. We're actually here to talk about another movie called Bright, which was not in theaters. Not in theaters. It was on Netflix, and we could talk about Netflix in a little bit. Why are we talking about Bright? Because I do see it. It comes up on my emails from Variety, and you recommended we watch it, and I watched it. Sonny, what's going on here?
Sonny00:15:14Bright is the latest movie from David. David Ayer, who's a pretty well-known director. He made Fury. He wrote Training Day. He's pretty well-known in the business and was written by Max Landis, who is kind of, I think, unfairly hated by a lot of people. Why is he? Well, the reason he is unfairly hated is because he coined the whole Ray is a Mary Sue phrase. He was the originator of that, and that is one reason why he's hated.
JVL00:15:47He has a very strong personality. He has a very strong personality. Isn't he the son of?
Sonny00:15:50He's the son of John Landis. There's a whole, you know, kind of nepotism angle to disliking him, whatever. And it stars Will Smith. And this movie cost $90.
JVL00:15:59I'm sorry, before we move on, can we just clear Max Landis' name? The key here is unfairly hated. Unfairly hated. No, that's what I said. That's what I said. Unfairly hated. I just want to underscore that. No, I think he's totally. Because Landis is a, the truth is, you could only wish that most screenwriters were this accessible and this candid and this smart about the industry, and he's great.
Sonny00:16:16I think Max Landis. I mean, look. My favorite Max Landis stuff is the stuff he has total control over, and that's the stuff on YouTube. His YouTube, like the Wrestling Isn't Wrestling and The Death of Superman, which, you know, are totally entertaining and very, very accessible and, I think, good pieces of storytelling. And, you know, part of the knock on him is, you know, he makes, he's been attached to a bunch of movies that, like, had very high profiles and flopped badly, like Victor Frankenstein, I think, was at the. And, look, you can only blame the writer for so much. He writes the script, he turns it in, the director does his thing. So, I, like, I agree with JV. I think he's totally unfairly hated, and he is very amusing on Twitter and, you know, whatever. So, but this movie also stars Will Smith and Joel Edgerton, big names. Noomi Rapace is in this. I mean, it's got, like, a real top-of-the-line Hollywood cast. It costs $90 million to make. Wow. I only mentioned this. This is because it is a Netflix movie. This is not a movie that is going to be judged on its box office returns. It is not the sort of thing that you are looking at business-wise as a win or a fail in any sort of traditional manner of speaking. Now, the movie itself, I found pretty entertaining. I'm going to be honest. It is, so, if I was giving it an elevator pitch, it would be something like, it's training day meets Lord of the Rings.
Vic00:17:47I have that written down right on my script. I said Middle Kingdom meets training day.
Sonny00:17:51Lethal Weapon meets Dungeons and Dragons meets Zootopia. Okay, we can get into all this, but the point is, it is a cop movie with high fantasy elements. I got one more. I got one more. Jesus.
Vic00:18:04Colors meets Enemy Mine. Thank you.
Sonny00:18:09It is a high concept movie that mixes elements of police procedurals. And fantasy slash science fiction. Is that, are we good? Okay, yes. Are we, okay. So tell us about this movie. What's happening? So Will Smith plays a human cop who's paired up with the first orc cop in the history of the LAPD. Just like Zootopia. And would you stop with the Zootopia? Zootopia sucked. Can we talk about that? How about we talk about Zootopia sucking? And, good, I hope he starts chewing on those right in the... The roots are complicated to open.
JVL00:18:47They are shockingly complicated to open. They need to have something to take out the smell of this horrible liquid, which is... You are ridiculous. ...getting into the pores of the foam in here.
Sonny00:18:58Good, I'm glad this is a show. I'm glad you're back, Vic. I'm so glad, too. This is not going off the rails at all. Please, Sonny, continue. Bright is about a human cop teamed up with the first orc cop. They find a magic wand. Their partners try to kill them. It's all about prejudice and, you know, racial strife in Los Angeles. I find it exceptionally entertaining. I'm a big fan of David Ayer, who, in addition to writing Training Day, was also the writer and director of Street Kings. He made Contraband, End of Watch. This is very much a David Ayer movie. It is a cop movie first. It's gritty. It is a fantasy, orc and elfin, human drama second, distant second.
Vic00:19:41The idea of combining that world and this world, right? Yes, it's basically... Current day.
Sonny00:19:48Modern day. Modern day.
Vic00:19:49This is all a creation of Max Landis. Is that right?
Sonny00:19:52Yes. I mean, this is all his basic idea. So, I like the world in which they've thrust us. I like the kind of... It is a very... It's the sort of world building I really like, where they just kind of toss you in and give you a little bit of background and the credit sequence, and then kind of let you go at it. And, you know, there are some underbakes. And, you know, I'm not entirely sure they pull off all the racial politics. It is a little bit cluttered there. But I respect what they're doing. I think it's interesting. I thought it was fun. Audiences seem to like it. Critics hate it. Critics hate it. And that's because critics are a bunch of snobs, like JVL.
JVL00:20:36Did you watch JVL? On the treadmill. Oh. Okay.
Sonny00:20:42On your phone? All in one go? Or over, like, three days? No, over two days. Okay.
JVL00:20:48That's a couple pretty good runs.
Vic00:20:49I liked it. But in landscape mode? I watched it on our regular TV. I liked it for the most part. I thought it was really good. I thought, and, you know, Will Smith is going to be Will Smith. There's going to always be elements of that. Even though he's going to be a darker Will Smith. Still good. Joel Edgerton, very funny. I thought that, you know, he played that role well. I guess we're all waiting for the arrival of the Dark Lord in the sequel or something to that. In fact, JVL, what did you think about Bright?
JVL00:21:23The idea is really neat. The characters are not especially interesting. The story that revolves around the idea is not super compelling. The real problem, I thought, was the execution. I didn't think it was a terrible movie, but it sure didn't look like a $90 million movie. I mean, even, granted, I'm watching it on my phone, but there's a difference. You can tell. And I thought the movie looked more like a Netflix movie. I mean, there is a house style to Netflix in the same way there is a house style to Marvel movies, I think.
Vic00:21:57That's interesting.
JVL00:21:58And this felt like a Netflix production, which is fine. You know what? I shouldn't complain about it. The idea is interesting. The idea was enough to keep me hooked on it. I was happy to take the ride. I would have been much less happy if I had paid $18.
?00:22:17Right.
Sonny00:22:17So here's, before we get into that. Which is the nub of all of this.
JVL00:22:21The expectations you have for something where you pay for a babysitter, go, drop $18 on a ticket, drive to the theater, pay $25 for popcorn and a soda. It's just different than what's something you pop on Netflix for the $9 a month or whatever you spend on it.
Sonny00:22:37So let me, I'm going to, we can get to that. I think we should get to that after the ad read. The one thing I will say is I. I totally disagree on this feeling like a house, a Netflix house style movie. And I don't think that that is actually true for their films as much as the TV shows. I mean, the Marvel TV shows all kind of look alike. Have you watched, you know, have you watched? So I, I mean, those, those all the, and I've stopped watching them. Just look like those to me. See, I don't think it looked like that at all. I think it looked very much like, again, Street Kings. I love Street Kings. Have you seen Street Kings? I have not. You should see it. It's, it stars Keanu Reeves. Our great thespians. And, and it, it does, again, it is very much in that kind of training day, you know, crooked cop or like almost crooked cop fighting against really crooked cops in a unjust system trying to, you know, make, make his way, way through the world. And that's the lens through which I view Brighton. That's, I think, the way it works. I mean, I do think that this is a, it's a, it is a cop movie. It is not a fantasy movie. And I think a lot of people got really hung up on like, oh, magic wands and orcs. This is dumb. No, I know.
Vic00:23:49I'm, I'm not saying that.
JVL00:23:50I, I, no, I know. But I think, believe me, that's my jam. I like that. I like mashups like this. And I think the idea of it is neat and the world is inhabited enough that it is interesting to take the ride with it. I think the story itself spun out of that world was not the most interesting story maybe that could have been told. And the characters were not especially compelling. But, but again, these are small quibbles and quibbles I would not make at all because I'm watching on Netflix. But I would. I have a very different set of standards. Right. For what I would want to get out of something if I was in a theater having paid money to watch it.
Vic00:24:26To go back, I forgot, there was another reason why I came back on the show. And that is, in the beginning of last, last season, for much of last season, we kind of chased our way around trying to find sponsors, if you remember that. And we didn't have any. If you go back to the early episodes. This episode brought to you by pencils. Right.
JVL00:24:45The number two pencil filling out. Scantron sheets around you for years.
Vic00:24:48We might have created a couple of fake sponsors, like as a joke, I think, in the beginning. And what happened was, and if that was the case now, if I were to leave the show, I wouldn't feel bad. And suddenly, you know, I mean, thanks to our friends, obviously, at Ricochet and Fred Hadra, you know, our producer, they've lined up sponsors for The Substandard. It started around the summertime, and then it went full bore, and then now, I'm looking at our Google. And we've got sponsors who are upping, and sponsors who are re-upping. So we have Casper Matches, for example, and we have Black Tux. And it wouldn't be right, and I felt somehow obligated, if I just left and leave the advertisers dry.
JVL00:25:31That could get complicated, possibly legally, I'm not sure. Leaving it in the hands of amateurs?
Vic00:25:36Well, or they say, this is not the product that you promised us on the show, when they listened to the show, and the reason why they went on for three days. They're here for you. No, I mean, so, you know, that's one of the reasons. That's why I came back, because of sort of an obligation to sponsors who decide they want to advertise with the substandard. This week's advertiser is Tripping.com. Did you know the average family visits five totally different websites before booking a vacation rental? You can spend less time planning your next trip and more time relaxing with Tripping.com, the world's number one site for vacation rentals. Tripping.com is trusted by millions of travelers and featured by the New York Times, Travel and Leisure, Forbes, and more. Whether you're looking for a cabin or a beachfront home to get to, Tripping.com is a great place to get away to this winter, or already looking ahead to vacations in the spring. Tripping.com can help you find the perfect place to stay. Vacation rentals offer flexibility, perks, and amenities that hotels don't, like multiple bedrooms, backyards, free Wi-Fi, hot tubs, and even fully stocked kitchens, so you can plan and cook your own meals. Great for families in large groups. With Tripping.com, one search lets you filter, compare, and sort over 10 million available properties on trusted sites, like VRBO. TripAdvisor, Booking.com, and more. Don't wonder if you're getting the best deal. You'll save an average of 18% per night by booking your vacation with Tripping.com. So don't forget, if you want to save time and money while booking the perfect vacation rental for your next trip, head to Tripping.com slash Substandard today. That's T-R-I-P-P-I-N-G dot com slash Substandard, Tripping.com slash Substandard. God, he's such a pro.
Sonny00:27:16He's so good.
Vic00:27:18And you know what's funny? It was not like this last week. Oh, I don't know. You know, it's...
Sonny00:27:23Last week was bad.
Vic00:27:24You were talking about how Bright had a certain Netflix feel to it, and I had a question for you, Jonathan. Do you or did your wife, is she a fan of The Crown? Does she watch The Crown? We don't watch TV. Okay.
Sonny00:27:41Well, moving right along... This is why Shannon can watch or read 80 books a year. No TV.
Vic00:27:46Yeah. You did a conversation about how many books you finished in a year. Is that correct? Yes. In the Facebook Live episode. That was very... How many books did you say, Sonny?
Sonny00:27:56I got through 55 books this year.
Vic00:27:58Gosh. Last year. And you, JV, all about...
JVL00:28:01I don't like to keep... I'm like Chevy Chase in Caddyshack. I don't like to keep...
Sonny00:28:05The only reason I kept track this year was because I had set out to read a book a week. I was like, I'm going to...
Vic00:28:11That's very Jody Bottom of you.
Sonny00:28:13Yeah. It's also not a very good way to read, I don't think. I, frankly, this is a true story. I was trying to find a book that I had started. I put it down. I wasn't sure what had happened to it. I was like, I want to finish that book. And I found it in my red pile. And I had notes all the way through the end of the book. So I had finished it and read it all the way through. And I was like, oh, I can't even remember the last 100 pages or so.
Vic00:28:36That's why I limit myself to two or three a year.
Sonny00:28:39Two or three a year. A year. Yeah. Two or three every couple of years. That's me.
JVL00:28:45You know, if you only read one book... If you only read one a year, then you really remember.
Vic00:28:48No, I could rattle off statistics from Michael Ruhlman's Grocery, like the back of my hand.
JVL00:28:53If you really love books, then you make them precious, and you make it a real ceremony, and you read one a year, and you remember a lot about it.
Vic00:29:01I always try to tell myself, if I could just do a page a day, I'd be in good shape. I can't even do that. Anyway, I've gotten to the point where I'm only reading books I'm going to review now.
JVL00:29:11Yeah. You know what I'm saying? I was like that for a while. You've been at that point for like 20 years.
Vic00:29:16Remember the old journalist joke, right? Read it. I haven't even reviewed it. Okay.
JVL00:29:22So you only have to review it. You only have to read it if you're going to pan it. If you're going to be nice about the book. Yeah, that's true. You don't have to read it.
Vic00:29:29I have so much stories like this, but I'm not getting into it. I don't want to get in trouble. Sonny, you, for example, you and Beth watched The Crown. Yeah, we watched The Crown. Yeah. The production values are through the roof on that movie.
Sonny00:29:39Well, again, that show costs about $100 million to make, and this is, when you look at the prestige cable dramas, they are often very expensive. Game of Thrones costs $100 million for 10 episodes, $120 million for 10 episodes, like an obscene amount of money. And so, you know, we want to talk about the business model of Netflix a little bit here. It's something I find very fascinating. I know JBL has a lot of thoughts on it. My, you know, my whole thing about a movie like Bright is that it's one thing to spend $100 million on a show on HBO, where you're going to, you know, you parcel it out over three months or so, and you get all these people who signed up just for the show, because there will be some number of people who sign up just for the show, to stick around for three months, right? And it's one thing to spend, you know, $60, $70, $80, even up to $100 million on one of these shows for Netflix, where you've got 10 hours of content, and you've got people who have committed, I mean, they're obviously not going to watch it over three months, like they do on HBO, but, you know, they watch it, you have like a newscast. It's like a new thing, a new big, bright, shiny object every month or so that people stick around for. But a movie like Bright, I mean, I just, spending $100 million, you know, on a two-hour movie, even if it is seen by 11 million people, which is what Netflix says, that's, you know, Netflix and Nielsen. That's what Nielsen says? That's what Nielsen says. Netflix hints that it's more? Netflix says that it's the most viewed original movie over a three-day period that they've ever had. So who knows? Who knows what that means? Who knows what that actually means? You know, Stranger Things, Nielsen's had those numbers at like 15 million, I think, the second season of Stranger Things. So it's like, you can't say, you can't do a one-to-one ratio and say like, well, that's like grossing $110 million, you know, at $10 a ticket. That doesn't work because there's, you know, there's a giant, enormous difference between, you know, organizing a trip out to the theater and sitting down on your couch and be like, okay, what's on Netflix? Like, that just, that doesn't work. That's not a thing that makes any sense.
Vic00:31:51I have a question. For the networks like Netflix and HBO, and I remember we were early on HBO subscribers, you know, late 70s, early 80s, which was... And Cinemax subscribers, correct? No, no, no, no, that was always a fantasy.
JVL00:32:07No, no, every now and then there was a box with the buttons that you had to push and the flip at the three.
Vic00:32:13Yes, and there's also a smooth dial on the right, but a rigid dial. A rigid dial on the left, and then you can get channel 48, channel B. If you go between... Between, that's the Playboy channel. Right?
JVL00:32:26It's very blurry, grainy, but you had to... Chris Wershoven and I remember all about that.
Vic00:32:30You remember that? It was like the third level, and it was between B and something, which later on became like channel 31, supposedly.
JVL00:32:37And if you held it and jiggled it just a little bit, sometimes the picture would stay, because it was always moving. Right, right.
Vic00:32:43The trick of it is trying to only use one hand for that. Otherwise, what's the point? All right. So, anyway. God, I missed you. Oh, thank you. But I remember HBO, I remember watching, and suddenly they made a big thing about a first at HBO original picture. And I thought, this is crazy. Why are they going to waste their time on this? And the movie was called The Far Pavilion with Amy Irving, the original Mrs. Spielberg. And they just had so much hype about the show at the time. And I just wondered, I thought this was going to be a waste, and I hated HBO for many years. Because they said, you know, it would be like, you know, five years after, it felt like five years after certain movies would come out, finally coming on, you know, would be this show. And why would anyone want to watch this? And suddenly they kept on pushing original pictures and original shit. Next thing you know. Yeah. What was the first of those that really hit big? Was it R? Well, The Sopranos. Before that, though. What was in the, like, remember Arliss and, oh, the Larry Sanders show.
Sonny00:33:42Yeah, the Larry Sanders show. I mean, I would say the Larry Sanders show was like the first big critical hit. Yeah. And then The Sopranos was the first big, both critical and mainstream popular success. And what has happened? Okay, so the reason we have this is the networks like HBO and then FX and AMC and now Netflix have all realized that the way to make money and the way to ensure that you are needed by the people is to create original content. So it used to be that HBO would show mostly, like almost entirely, movies that other studios had produced. But studios can take away the rights to that. It's expensive to keep re-upping the rights, etc., etc. FX began life as a place where you went to watch syndicated reruns of M.A.S.H. or The X-Files or NYPD Blue. And when they started showing The Shield, they became a, again, critically acclaimed and vaguely popular show that necessitated them being on your dial. Same with AMC and Mad Men. Breaking Bad. And then, now, Netflix, of course. The reason Netflix is doing this is because it's extremely expensive to re-up the streaming rights of movies over and over and over again. And, frankly, it's not that big of a draw because you can get movies from other places. And what they need is they need a reason for people to maintain their Netflix subscriptions all the time. And the reason you maintain your Netflix subscription all the time now is because you... You don't want to talk about the new thing on Netflix with people. This is, like, this is the reason why they're making all these movies and TV shows is that the idea is to keep you in front of your TV, binge-watching TV shows, watching the new movies, so you can... They're creating cultural events once every six weeks to eight weeks or so. That's an extremely expensive thing to do. Now, you know, at this point, and JVL's going to get into this more, Netflix is losing money. They're losing money every year, losing a not-insubstantial amount of money every year, and they can't possibly maintain this pace without either radically increasing their costs or radically increasing their subscription fees or radically expanding their user base. But I don't think it's a terrible model, and the amount of revenue that they already generate is roughly equivalent to the entire U.S. domestic box office. Slightly, you know, better spending or slightly bigger, you know, revenue base, I feel like what they are doing is not unsustainable.
Vic00:36:25Well, that was my big question. What they're doing is totally unsustainable? Okay, yes. We're going to get to that in a second. My question was, where does the money come from? Like, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars is, you know.
JVL00:36:35JVL, do you want to talk about whether they're a publicly traded company? Yeah, right. Okay. And let me talk to you a little bit about Netflix, the business. Can you read numbers? JVL, I'm going to take my headphones off.
Vic00:36:46Can you read numbers?
JVL00:36:47So Netflix has a market capitalization, meaning the total worth of the company, of $91 billion. Costco. Costco is a pretty big company. They do a lot of interesting things. They have a total market capitalization of $83 billion. General Motors. Have you ever heard of General Motors? They make these things that people drive around in. They may take off. $62 billion market cap. So Netflix is 30% bigger than GM. The other important number is price-to-earnings ratio, which tells you... P&E. Right, P&E. The P&E ratio. So let me tell you about GM. GM's P&E ratio is 9. Disney. Disney's a pretty good company, right? Disney is, we think, is a very big player in the IP world. P&E ratio of 19. Facebook and Google. You've heard of those companies, right? P&E ratios of 34 and 36. Netflix's P&E ratio is 22. The only thing it's close to is Amazon, which has a price-to-earnings ratio of 300. Now, what this means, when your price-to-earnings ratio gets really high, all of a sudden you look like a highly speculative company, because you are asking for a whole lot more from investors than you are showing back in earnings. Now, Amazon can justify this, because Amazon could make a profit any time it wants to, but it spends all of its money creating infrastructure. I mean, one of these days, Amazon is simply going to push... Push UPS aside and be its own UPS. They will be everything. Do you think Netflix resembles Amazon as a financial concern? Because I sure don't. I think it's entirely possible that five years from now, Netflix doesn't exist. I mean, yeah, it's likely it will, but there is a one-in-five chance that five years from now, Netflix simply goes away, and that simply is not true about Amazon. This is a company that is on its third business model in 12 years. The original business model was mail-through DVDs. Then it was... They were going to stream content that we licensed the IP to, and then when they found out that that didn't work, they decided we're just going to become a supersized HBO, which is what they are. I don't think they are sustainable at the scale they are at.
Sonny00:39:01Yes. I think that... Oh, look, I agree with this. I agree with basically everything that you're saying right now, except for the idea that there's a one-in-five chance they won't be here in five years. I think that they're... One-in-ten chance. The point is, Amazon isn't going anywhere. It's not impossible to envision a world without Netflix. So, I mean, Netflix has pioneered a model of distribution that, if it had not moved into original content, would have been its own destruction. Because what is happening is all of the other studios have realized that licensing their stuff is a mug game. Correct.
JVL00:39:36The point is that they have done this out of weakness, not out of strength. But they've done it very well. They've done it out of necessity. They've done it very well.
Sonny00:39:41They've done it very well, is the thing. They've done it pretty well, but they're being squeezed on two ends. Yeah, I, look.
JVL00:39:46Right? You know, so Disney's rushing out their streaming service in the next year or two. So, you're going to have the creators coming out with their own stuff. At the same time, you have Amazon squeezing you from the other side with original content. Yeah, I mean. And I just think Netflix is in a very weak position.
Sonny00:40:01It's a tough marketplace. But, once again, they have 110 million subscribers or so, something like that. Each of those subscribers is paying now $11 a month. Yeah. And that comes out to about, I did the math, it comes out to like $13 billion. $13 billion or so a year in revenue. They don't have, I mean, you mentioned Costco and GE and stuff like that. You know what they don't have is a workforce. They don't have people they have to pay. They don't have legacy costs. They don't have plants, that sort of thing.
JVL00:40:27They have these projects. But they have these projects. Right, right. No, no.
Sonny00:40:29I mean, like, they have costs. I'm not saying they don't have costs. But I'm saying that they don't have a lot of legacy costs. They don't have a lot of, like. True, true. They don't have a bunch of people on payroll who they have to keep happy. And all of these deals, I assume, are done in kind of the traditional Hollywood way where you get, like, legendary to go out there and they make the movies and you're, you know, whatever.
JVL00:40:51Some are, some are not. Some are, they buy the project after the fact. Right, right, right. Some are, they give you the money to make it. Exactly.
Sonny00:40:57So, yeah. Like, Mudbound, for instance, was a Sundance pickup. Mudbound is a, you know, a drama about. I'm hearing a lot about Mudbound. Race, race in the early, in the mid-20th American century. It's boring. But they paid $12.5 million for the rights to that because it, not only is it, you know, going to be something people will watch on Netflix, but it was a Oscar season purchase. They are, they are, it will, it will get some award season buzz. Anyway, the, the, the point, the point I'm making, though, is that they have a very, very large revenue base. Again, they have a revenue base that is the size of the entire U.S. domestic box office. That's not nothing. And, and it is not.
JVL00:41:38Globally. And it is. It's the size of the U.S. Right, right, right. Domestic box office. Right, right, right.
Sonny00:41:41That's right. And, and that sort of revenue base is the sort of, you know, the sort of thing that you can build on to make, to make, I mean, like, when, when Richard Rushfeld, who we love and does a very good newsletter, everyone should subscribe to it, when, you know, when he, when he talks about, like, the kind of extravagance of making a movie a week, making 50 movies a year, making, you know, 20 TV shows a year, like, I, you know, I look at a $13 billion revenue stream and I'm like, is that really that extravagant? I mean, it's big. It's not extravagant, but you gotta be good at it.
JVL00:42:16Good at it is the problem. And Netflix, so this is the other...
Sonny00:42:19No, but, but, but do they have to be good at it? Do they have to be good at it? It's like you said, Bright is not a movie that you would, you would be annoyed if you had paid to go and see Bright. But you watch it at home and you're like, oh, that's an okay night.
JVL00:42:28So I think that in the long term, as they are squeezed from Amazon at one end and then, and so Amazon and HBO on one end and then the movie studios with their own streaming services on the other, Netflix will have to be better. Because right now it's essentially a collection of B-movies and crappy TV. TV shows. Right. I mean, this is a fair thing to say. You look at the Netflix original... You mean their original? Their original stuff is B-movies? Yes. The Netflix original stuff looks like, like Roger Corman resurrected type stuff. No. No, it doesn't. It doesn't. It doesn't.
Sonny00:42:58No, but it looks like...
JVL00:42:59For every crown, there's 15... No. There's so many other ones. No, no, no.
Sonny00:43:02What it looks like is, what it looks like is February, March, August, late August, early September, Hollywood Fair. That's what it looks like.
JVL00:43:10I, I would, I would disagree with that. And Netflix is, when you sort of... When you sit and click around on it, you have a couple prestige marquee things, which are almost all Disney titles. Like, right now, the, the marquee titles on Netflix are Captain America Civil War, Rogue One, Zootopia, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Beauty and the Beast, National Treasure, Pirates of the Caribbean. That's their marquee list. And those are going away. All those are Disney properties. They will all go away. And then you have a bunch of Netflix original stuff. The Netflix Marvel stuff will all go away. And the, the... So, so Netflix has always said... We have secret sauce and it's data. And we know what people want.
Sonny00:43:49Can I, can I just, I, I'm sorry, can I interrupt? Is the Netflix Marvel TV partnership dissolving as part of the streaming service?
JVL00:43:56It will have to at some point. Okay. I mean, there's just no way that Disney, Disney is there to kill Netflix. Disney, Disney wants to kill Netflix. And so they probably will. So the Netflix has always said, we have all this data. We know what people want. There is no evidence that their success to failure rate here. Is anything better than what generic Hollywood and generic TV is? And in fact, it actually looks kind of worse. There's, it looks like they simply are throwing a lot of stuff against the wall and hoping that they get a Stranger Things every once in a while. I mean, that, and so this leads me to believe that they are not actually sophisticated producers. And so if you say we've got $13 billion to spend and we've got to do, you know, 55 major productions and you aren't very good at it, then you're likely to, you know, you're going to, again, over time, wind up in trouble. Their, their big advantage is that they've got, have a lot of people's credit card numbers on file. That's their single advantage. And over time, that advantage diminishes because it's much, much easier to subscribe to things now. There are a lot of one-click subscription services through Amazon or for whatever, and you have Apple Pay, your browser store your credit card information. So their, their one comparative advantage is shrinking over time. They have competitors emerging from both ends of the marketplace. I think. So, ultimately, Netflix is, is not a particularly robust concern.
Sonny00:45:21Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't invest in Netflix. I'm not, I, I, like, I wouldn't sink my life savings into it or anything. But I do think that Netflix will basically end up being HBO Plus. Maybe. But that's the best-case scenario. Yeah, yeah. Is what I'm saying. But that's not nothing.
Vic00:45:35I mean, the best-case scenario is the family.
Sonny00:45:36How about HBO Family?
JVL00:45:37How about HBO Latino?
Sonny00:45:38No, it's HBO Signature. That's what.
JVL00:45:40I mean, the one thing we haven't talked about is how Netflix is kind of like Twitter, different things to different people. There are. There's comedy Netflix, which has changed the economics of the stand-up world. There's kids Netflix, which is the only reason we subscribe to it. And once my kids are no longer in kids television, which it'll be awesome and we'll just kill it then. There's porny Netflix, which I believe if you are a 13-year-old boy in today's America, is pretty awesome because there's all sorts of, like, you know, Swiss erotica and stuff like that.
Sonny00:46:08Yeah, don't, don't, don't they just have laptops for that? I mean.
JVL00:46:13What, what can you find? There's, there's ghetto Netflix. There's ghetto Netflix for people who just want to watch, like, old reality shows, like Sister Wives and Ultimate Beaster. And then there's the hipster Netflix, which is the Netflix that we all assume is Netflix. I mean, everybody, when you talk about it, and everybody thinks that, like, Netflix is Stranger Things and Bright, but it's, it's not. There's a whole other world out there.
Vic00:46:31There are different spheres. The, the old, the old Netflix, which we used to subscribe to, is the one by mail because you can get any old movie you wanted. Any. Yeah. Which is the dream. Not the new ones. This was always the dream of the movie. Not that you had, you had to wait for years for the new ones.
Sonny00:46:43Matt, Matt Labash, Matt Labash is always complaining about it. Matt Labash, who, I will remind people, once wrote a piece about how DVD is a million times worse than VHS.
JVL00:46:52And how Netflix was killing Blockbuster, which was the best.
Sonny00:46:55And now lambasts me because I don't have the DVD subscription anymore, I just have the streaming. Yes. Because I don't watch old documentaries, which is apparently the only thing you watch. Labash will, Labash will send me an email and be like, hey, have you watched this obscure documentary from 10 years ago? I'm like, no, I haven't watched it.
Vic00:47:11Right. That still goes, that still exists.
Sonny00:47:13The only thing you watch is old documentaries.
Vic00:47:14But that still exists, right? Yeah. Are they going to, are they going to buy them on Amazon? Is Netflix going to say, finally, they're going to do it?
Sonny00:47:21Well, they tried to phase it out. They tried to phase out the DVD service a few years back, and then they brought it back because there was a, there was a big outrage.
JVL00:47:28But this is, again, this is where Amazon is such an enormous comparative advantage. Because in Amazon, you can take the transparent Amazon, they're standing up their own Amazon version of HBO, or you could just buy the stuff that you don't want to spend. So again, Netflix just gets crushed in this. But not right now.
Vic00:47:49Do you have any other thoughts? Yeah, close enough.
JVL00:47:51It's 500 channels, nothing to watch. Netflix is now.
Vic00:47:53I do spend a lot of time going through, looking for something, and skipping most of it. It is very true.
JVL00:47:58The same complaint everybody used to make about cable 10 years ago is true right now of Netflix. It is, it is 20,000 titles, and you don't want to watch any of them. Yeah. And all of this type of data, like, oh, Netflix, they know what you're thinking, they know what you like, they have no effing idea what it is that you're watching.
Sonny00:48:16Well, they may know what we want, but they just don't have it. They don't have a license to it, is the problem. And this is one reason why I think Amazon, if I had to choose, if, gun to my head, someone was like, you can either have Amazon or Netflix, I would pick Amazon because I would miss the Netflix original programming, but I like the fact that A, Amazon Prime has a bunch of stuff for free, basically all the same stuff that Netflix has for free, but also B, I can pay two or three bucks to stream all the other movies. I find the same. I don't have that option on Netflix.
JVL00:48:47Would you pay for individual Netflix shows, either of you? So, Vic, if The Crown was not, or Stranger Things were not on Netflix, if you had to go to Amazon and pay $2 an episode or something, would you watch them?
Vic00:49:00Yes. Because I'm invested in those particular shows. Like, I want to see how this ends.
Sonny00:49:05I don't know that I would start any shows, though, is the thing.
Vic00:49:08But now that I know about the show, I would.
Sonny00:49:10If I wasn't, then maybe I wouldn't. I mean, look, I think, again, I think Netflix has a very solid HBO Plus model. Where they're like, here, we're going to give you new shows, and you'll have some movies that if you want to just turn it on and flip around. The kid stuff, I think, is not to be sneezed at. I mean, they do have, like, a very solid kid stuff.
JVL00:49:26Kid stuff is awesome.
Sonny00:49:28But, yeah, I mean, I, like, I, you know.
JVL00:49:30Because it gets you away from the creepy YouTube stuff. Well, that's, I mean. Did you read that piece? Yeah, yeah, I read that, yeah. So, you know, you don't have to worry about, like, the Joker. Oh, right. Suddenly in the middle of it. Yeah. It's something awful. Knifing and torturing Catwoman or something. A bizarre YouTube thing. Because Netflix, you know. We should put that in show notes. Yeah, no, I'll do that tomorrow.
Sonny00:49:47Put that in show notes.
JVL00:49:49But with Netflix, you really can, like, just turn your children over to it. And it's awesome. There are no commercials. And, you know, everything is basically fine.
Vic00:49:56It's safe. Yeah. Okay. Wait, so I turn around. I'm sorry. Netflix is awesome. Please. Yeah, I'm reversing field. I'd forgotten about that part. Spirit of the Week is Lagavulin 16 from our friends at Diageo. They sent us several bottles of their, of many of their fine products. Lagavulin. It's not for everybody, the smoky peaty scotch. Some people like the blend. Some people like more of that sort of a sweeter kind of a scotch. No, I like it. It's good. Other people prefer strictly peaty. I like it. I like both, but particularly when it's cold. So this is good weather for that kind of a scotch. So thank you very much to our friends at Diageo. Corrections, additions, anything? Corrections, additions, shout outs.
Sonny00:50:37The only correction, again, is everybody on Twitter was like, oh, it's not Seth Green in that commercial. It's Justin Worrying. I don't care.
Vic00:50:44Whatever. But it's definitely supposed to be Prince. Okay.
Sonny00:50:48No, it's Vince Neal.
Vic00:50:50From Poison. That's all the time.
Guest00:50:52Yeah, killing me.
Vic00:50:54That's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us at Victorino Matus at Sonny Bunch.
Sonny00:51:02At JV Last.
Vic00:51:03Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes, Google Play, or Stitcher. Just type in Substandard under Podcasts. We're there. Leave a review. Tell your friends. Until next time. So, we were talking about this earlier. My kids, we left them up in New Jersey for several days. After we went up there, we go back down.
JVL00:51:36Yeah, you did.
Vic00:51:37We did a lot of cleaning around the house. We did a lot of house cleaning. Mopping the floors with your knees. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. It's so great to be back. They come back, I say, and my parents bring them there, and we're having this lovely sort of, oh, we haven't seen you in a while. How's everything going? And asking how the kids are doing. And I said, so, did you watch anything when you were at the grandparents' house? And Michael says, yeah. He said, my father, the Filipino term for grandfather's Lolo, goes, yeah, Lolo let us watch a movie called Pan's Labyrinth. Right. The eyes. Is that bad? I haven't seen it. I don't know how. It's awful.
Sonny00:52:17I mean, it's very, very scary. Scary. But it's not like sexually explicit.
Vic00:52:23No, no, no. There's nothing sexual. There's nothing sexual. That's all Vic cares about. There's no boobies in it. Close your eyes. There's kissing.
Sonny00:52:30There's violence, like the general getting shot through the face. Yeah, the face. Yes, exactly.
Vic00:52:34And so, I mean, it takes place in the Spanish, well, just after the Spanish Civil War, like in 44.
Sonny00:52:40When the disgusting communists were getting wiped out.
Vic00:52:42Well, this is what was happening. And the rebels hiding. In the forest. And the whole deal. And, of course, it has a terrible, sad ending. And there's blood. And there's stabbing. And Michael's like. There's a happy ending. Happy ending. She becomes a princess. She becomes. I don't understand.
Sonny00:52:53You see it. You see it on the screen. She does. Princess Moana?
Vic00:52:58Yeah. Yeah, that was a happy ending. And Michael goes, yeah, there was a guy who got stabbed. There was a lot of blood. And I said, that's good. I turned to my dad. I go, really? Pan's Labyrinth. Which is rated R. And my dad goes, oh, you know, it's fantasy. It's fantasy. That's what he said.
Sonny00:53:12At least they didn't take him to go see The Shape of Water. Fishman. Fishman's sex.
Vic00:53:18Really? Okay, well, we'll skip that.
Sonny00:53:20It was funny. JVL, Vic comes up to me in the office and he says, hey, is it okay if I show Michael Bright?
JVL00:53:27And I was like, no, Vic.
Sonny00:53:29It's not okay if you show your child the R-rated orc sex movie with the strippers.
JVL00:53:35There's some nudity and language. You may not have noticed it on your phone. I didn't notice any nudity on the phone.
Sonny00:53:39There was some nudity because it was very small. To go to a club. Yeah. They go to a strip club. Did you actually watch the movie?
JVL00:53:45I remember. I just didn't see any nudity on the phone. But there's a lot of language.
Vic00:53:49Yeah, well, that's the thing. So I'm glad that I did it. Well, I took Sonny's advice and I told Michael, no, anytime he hears the word aliens, he's got to watch it. I want to watch this movie. I said, no, I can't watch it.
JVL00:53:57So your approach to this is, if it's R-rated, I have to ask first. I can't just show him an R-rated movie. I have to check with someone first.
Vic00:54:05I'm not an animal. Anyway, so I did chide my parents. And I told my mother, oh, I can't. My mother's trying to blame it on saying that Michael wanted to watch it. And Michael says, it's my dad who wanted to watch Pan's Labyrinth. And my mother goes, you know what I wanted to watch with them was Schindler's List.
Sonny00:54:27Yeah, I'm sure that would have been fine.
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