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#111. The Substandard on Tomb Raider, Video Games, and Boneless Ribeyes
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Dudes Chatting — video game movies: The gang debates whether video game adaptations are structurally doomed. JVL argues that fictional video-game-inspired films (Tron, The Last Starfighter, the new Jumanji) work better than literal adaptations; Sonny counters that Edge of Tomorrow is the gold standard for gaming translated to cinema and offers his top-five adaptations (new Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Mortal Kombat, Hitman). JVL introduces game critic Tom Bissell's concept of "dynamical meaning" — the idea that games create meaning through player agency in ways film can't replicate — and argues Bioshock is the one game whose world could survive the translation. Sonny recounts the boneless ribeye incident that spawned a minor Twitter bender.
Reviews: Sonny reviews the 2018 Tomb Raider — competent, Alicia Vikander is fine, but the film frustratingly spoon-feeds exposition the audience doesn't need. JVL reviews the original 1993 Tomb Raider arcade game, which he declares terrible at every level.
Box Office: Pacific Rim Uprising holds at #1; Tomb Raider sits at #5 with a 56% drop in its second weekend.
Spirit/Wine of the Week is Rogue Admiral Cabernet Sauvignon. The episode closes with a Corrections segment clarifying the Hogan's Heroes POW camp setup.
Full transcript
Vic00:00:00Hi, Bill Kristol here. I hate video games. Not that I've ever seen one. Hello, and welcome to another edition of The Substandard, sponsored by Quip Electric Toothbrush and Wink Wine Club. I'm Victor Matus, along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. I'd like to remind you, The Substandard 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, and leave her a view. Gentlemen, how are we? JVL.
JVL00:00:34Big week. Big week. I had to go out to California last week to visit the Marines at Camp Pendleton.
Vic00:00:41You were addressing the troops. The officers. The officers. The commander of the base came to my little talk. Tell me what the officers learned from you.
JVL00:00:53I can tell you what I learned from them.
Vic00:00:54Strategic planning.
JVL00:00:55They are unbelievably young. I would say the average age of the Marines I saw was probably like 21, maybe 20. They're all impossibly young. They're in impossibly great shape. I'm a pretty good guy. I can handle myself. It is rare that every single person I see for every moment of every day can kick my ass with one hand tied behind their back.
Vic00:01:15And it's not necessarily like they're huge guys. It's all they're very lean guys. It's all about the pull-ups, right?
JVL00:01:20Most of them are pretty huge. The guys are just giants. Oh, really? And really young and really earnest. Like super-duper earnest. Good guys, really. It was great. And then, to a different sort of experience, had to take the family to a bat mitzvah, close family friends, over the weekend. Back on the East Coast. Back on the East Coast. Went to a bat mitzvah with a close family friend. The first of this type of party that my children had ever been to with the DJ and the dancing and the electric slide. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, no. I don't think my kids haven't been to a party. It's a funny thing to think about. It was insane. And it was like seeing, especially for my girls, it was like getting a, looking through a portal into the future of what they're going to be like. So, like, all these middle school girls are out on the dance floor, like, jumping around and screaming with Miley Cyrus music. And my little girls were out there with them, too. And they loved it. And I found it. They thought it was the greatest night of their lives. And it terrified me. But you know what? Jewish people, they've got to really, they've got to mate. Jewish weddings are great. Bat mitzvahs. Bat mitzvahs and bar mitzvahs are great. Shabbat is fantastic. I was doing a Shabbat last summer for the first time ever. Being Jewish looks pretty awesome. Thinking about switching teams? You know, I'm so old that I've missed all the good stuff. But if you came to the 10-year-old me and said, well, you know, you could have this commie pope from Argentina in a couple years. Path A and Path B. Or over here, door number two. I would probably go door number two.
Vic00:02:51Ancient laws that have stood the test of time. 5,000 years. Jewish weddings are great. They're great unless you are tasked with being part of the hora? The chair? Is it the chair?
Sonny00:03:04The chair duty? Yes. That's the best part. That depends on whose chair you got. Well, I mean, as long as you're not trying to lift up a terribly obese person.
Vic00:03:11No, no, no. But I believe when I, at Matt's wedding, there were only two people lifting him up, me and Gertrude Himmelfarb. Wow. It was a little hard.
JVL00:03:19I mean, that's not ideal. Did B, was she able to take your, carry your load for you?
Vic00:03:25A little bit, but you know what? It's like CrossFit.
Sonny00:03:28Did she just knee you in the crotch and lift the whole thing up?
Vic00:03:30Get out of the way, she said. Okay. Good for you. It was great. Very nice. It was great.
Sonny00:03:33Very nice.
JVL00:03:34Love Witzwe. Mazel tov, mazel tov to my friend Emmy.
Vic00:03:37Simitov and Mazel tov.
JVL00:03:39Is that what it is? Mazel tov and Simitov.
Sonny00:03:41Sonny, how are you? I'm great. I had a nice little weekend. We, I took, so Beth was out of the house for most of Sunday morning, so we- Where was she? She was at a little event. A little baby shower. Oh, was anybody else there? Yeah, all of our friends were there.
Vic00:04:03All of our wives were there. It was a very Goodfellas-esque event.
JVL00:04:07Were you guys there together? Like at your own guy party?
Vic00:04:10Sonny was not there. I wasn't there. I hosted some guys at my house.
JVL00:04:14Was I invited to that? I preemptively knew you would not make it. So you couldn't just invite me so that I could say-
Vic00:04:21I can't go.
JVL00:04:22I can't go. Because you like that, because that's why you wanted to get the invite.
Vic00:04:24I just want to know that I'm thought of and cherished. From now on, because I have the guys over every weekend, I just don't tell you. I'll start inviting- Do you really? This is not-
Sonny00:04:32He's actually not joking. Oh my God. He's actually not joking.
Vic00:04:35Oh, we go out. We hit the town. Sometimes we go traveling for a weekend. Saturday nights.
Sonny00:04:40Saturday nights are for the- Wait, is it Friday nights are for the wives? No, Friday- I can't remember.
Vic00:04:45I think it's Saturday nights are for the wives or Friday nights are for the- But it's actually for the boyfriends.
Sonny00:04:49It's just the guy friends. We just hang out together. I can't tell if you're joking or not. Smoke cigars. We go to the Copa.
Vic00:04:54We hang out at the Copa and listen to Jerry Vale. It's wonderful. Copa, Copa. Okay. So that was, yes.
Sonny00:05:00So my day was very nice though. I went to Home Depot and Barnes and Noble. Olive Garden. And I was able to get, I found time to get to Bed Bath & Beyond. What did you buy at Home Depot? I bought three light bulbs. Which kind? I bought three light bulbs, two LED for like recessed lighting. Which temperature? The floods. You got the 2700 Kelvin, I hope. No, I don't know what that means. I got the, I got 45 watt. Uh, LED floods in interior or exterior. Right. But I actually really. But the temperature of the lights, it's important. I don't know what that means. It means that you want a nice, warm, soft white, not a bright daylight. See, I like the white, bright daylight. That's what I want.
JVL00:05:41You're a, you're a GD monster.
Sonny00:05:42I, I put in the, I put in the, uh, I put in the, the new bulbs and one of them, uh, one of them stopped working immediately. So I don't know if I need to get like one of those LED dimmers. You know how you're supposed to get like special dimmers for the LEDs? Well, do you have a dimmer on that? I have a dimmer on it already, but I don't, I don't, I don't know if it's. It's not an LED dimmer. But it's not an LED. Those are expensive.
JVL00:06:01They're like 50 bucks.
Sonny00:06:02I, I looked them up. They're like 20. It's fine. I, I can, I can probably figure it out. Can you, can you install it? The worst, the worst would be installing it. I like would have to take out wires and ****.
JVL00:06:11I don't know how that works. Oh, it's impossible. That's like, that is hard.
Vic00:06:13I need to take a, I need to take a class on that.
JVL00:06:15It is, it is almost like putting an HDMI cable into a, uh, you know, I don't know, a Blu-ray player. I did that.
Sonny00:06:22First off, don't, don't even compare me to this monster to my left. I never made that mistake. I just didn't understand your terminology. Just because Vic. It's all HDMI. Just because Vic uses component video tape. No, I don't. I realize what it is now. Just because Vic uses an RF switch to run his Blu-ray player.
JVL00:06:38Should I have it switched to channel three or channel four?
Sonny00:06:40I, back in the day, that's what you did. Okay. And I also bought some super glue and glued the handle of my microwave back on, which had come off.
JVL00:06:46Crazy glue or gorilla glue?
Sonny00:06:48Gorilla glue, obviously. I'm not, I'm not some sort of, uh, some sort of heathen animal. Yeah, no. You go with the gorilla glue. Gorilla glue. I'd never used it before, and it really, it really is like, uh, cement.
Vic00:06:59Crazy glue, you could take your hard hat and stick it to an I-beam. Stick it to an I-beam, and you could float. And that guy was probably, they probably filmed that, and he was probably like 40 stories up. I, I always used to wonder when I saw that.
JVL00:07:09I'd be like, that's amazing. Did they ever show the legs? Did they ever show the legs? Well, he would kick his legs. He'd be like, you'd see him, like, kicking his legs out of Kimbo. And I always thought to myself, as a kid, I'd be like, I remember the first time I saw it,
Sonny00:07:18I'd be like, how could they allow him to do that?
JVL00:07:22I don't understand what you guys are talking about. It's an 80s television. Go to you, just put it in show notes, JVL. Oh, I'll put that video in show notes.
Vic00:07:28The crazy glue video from the 70s. It's like, oh, he's, you know, it's stuck there. Okay. How was your weekend, Vic?
JVL00:07:34Well, uh, weekend was fine, except, uh... What did you guys do at the party?
Vic00:07:38I made a pitcher of Bloody Marys. Strippers? And we finished that. Uh, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, you know? Uh, Continetti brought over, uh, some, uh... He played Settlers of Catan, didn't he?
JVL00:07:48Rockland Bar. Barbecue?
Vic00:07:49No, we sat around and chatted and drank. That's funny.
Sonny00:07:51I told Matt he should just bring barbecue over, because he was like... And he did. He was like, Vic said I had to bring food.
Vic00:07:56He volunteered it. He said, I'll bring the food in the email, and suddenly he says he has to?
Sonny00:08:00Vic, he said, he said that Vic was like, uh, you know, I just want to have drinks, and Matt was like, well, I have to eat something, because I'm a human, I'm a normal human. I was going to get food, but he said, I'll bring food. And then you were like, and then you said, all right, bring food then. You have to bring the food you're required to. That's it.
Vic00:08:13He explained it to you wrong. He misunderstood. When did this all fit with your gluttony? Sunday. That's one of your off days. Yes. And I had a box of donuts, and I was like the only one who ate it. A box of donuts. Yeah, they didn't want to eat it, because they were all watching. Question.
Sonny00:08:27Did you do a before and after test on your blood? Okay, speaking of which.
Vic00:08:33Oh, you got the results back. I got the results back. What did they say? Well, I went line by line. I was like, okay, good. The red blood cell count and the white blood cell is good. How are you triglycerides? Hold on, getting there. And then the, you know. Your good cholesterol? Billy Rubens are good. Billy Rubens is good. Bad cholesterol? Yes, okay. The overall cholesterol, of course, the good cholesterol is low, bad cholesterol is up, and the overall cholesterol number, which is awfully personal to share with our several hundred listeners, was 216. Is that good? It's above 200. It should be below 200. But it's only 16 above.
Sonny00:09:06I mean, there are people who have 300, 400 cholesterol.
Vic00:09:08So, you know.
Sonny00:09:09Yeah.
Vic00:09:09That was, again, and cholesterol no longer counts as a parameter.
JVL00:09:14No.
Vic00:09:14They don't count. They don't count. Cholesterol is the new guidelines, according to the new studies, laughing, according to the new guidelines. Okay. So, the triglycerides. Cholesterol is the new omega B. The triglycerides were off the charts. Oh, is that bad? Hard to tell. Studies have been inconclusive. What is good? What is bad? Okay. I mean, they were literally off the charts. Like, they were beyond the measuring. And so, what triglycerides are, for people wondering, is the amount of fat that flows through your veins, right? The amount of fat. But it's flowing. It's not stopped yet.
Sonny00:09:44It's like height and weight. It's like the height and weight charts they have for kids. That's Vic up here at the top.
Vic00:09:49I am so beyond. So, the doctor says, I don't like these numbers, but I'm not ready to prescribe statins or anything like that for you yet. Come back in six months. I can take this blood test again, like, next week, and I'll ace it. I guarantee it. Okay. So, here's what happened. Here's what happened, okay? If we have enough time. So, 36 hours. Got nothing but time, Vic. Got nothing but time. Keep going. I'm about to stroke out, apparently. Out. You've got to say out, otherwise it's weird. Out. What is this joke? Out. Okay. So, 36 hours prior to having my blood drawn, right? Which, at that point, was... Yeah. So, I had gone on an unexpected bender, not to be compared to an unexpected journey, which is The Hobbit. An unexpected bender. We had dinner with my in-laws at The Palm, okay? So, I start off a supper, as they call it.
JVL00:10:41John was taking care of you, right? At your normal table?
Vic00:10:43You know what? It was... It was 5-0, because John was off on Sundays. Oh, question. I think...
Sonny00:10:47Yes, Sonny? You say this is an unexpected bender, but you had reservations. Did you not? You didn't just...
Vic00:10:53Yeah, but I didn't expect to have as much as I had. You didn't just meet up... What I mean...
Sonny00:10:56You didn't just see your in-laws on the street next to The Palm. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's unexpected. Hey, let's go to Potbelly's.
Vic00:11:01Let's go get some dinner. It's unexpected, because I wasn't expecting to get really a steak. I was just going to get salad or something, you know?
Sonny00:11:07You were just going to get the blackened Caesar ribeye salad? Yeah.
Vic00:11:10Yeah, hold the salad. And so, I start with a martini, which is, of course, in the large cup. It's not a small martini. It's like a double. It's a big martini. It's a big martini, okay?
Sonny00:11:19It's like a Swinger-style martini. It's huge. Remember the movie Swingers, where they go to the martini bar, and the vodka glasses are like the size of fish bowls? That's basically the martini at The Palm still.
Vic00:11:31Great Heather Graham movie. And then, so I had that martini. No, a Plymouth up with olives. And then, I had some wine. And then, I had... I had a 35-day dry-aged boneless ribeye, but it came with broccolini on the side, and I ate all of the broccolini. And then... Question. Yes, Sonny? Was there butter on top of the broccoli? It's hard to tell. And although I do know, I do know my inside sources there at The Palm tell me everything is cooked in a jus, which is not butter. It's just juice. It's just steak juice. It's steak juice, which is what? It's cooked in meat. Meat and water, okay? That's all it is. There's nothing... Don't analyze the juice. Okay. So after that, then there was a dessert. I don't remember what the dessert was.
JVL00:12:13I've only been told the juice is healthy.
Vic00:12:14The juice is... They say drink your juice. And then I had Calvados. I love Calvados, which is that... What are those? It's like a brandy that's fermented. It's from apples. It's like an apple brandy. It's delicious. It's fresh. It's wonderful.
Sonny00:12:25I had a Calvados. So then I said, oh... A Calvados. It's like a liqueur.
Vic00:12:28So he said, you know, the dinner was early. It was at five because of the kids. And then so it's seven o'clock. And he said, okay, we'll drop them off. And then they said, oh, come on. Because the kids were with you? Yes. At the Palm. Sunday dinner, yes. And then... Doctor's kids. Well, let's chill with doctors. Question. Dr. Bob Dwyer did pay for the dinner, so...
Sonny00:12:45Question. Did each of the kids have their own 35-day dry-aged ribeye?
Vic00:12:51They did not. I think one had a burger and the other one might have had pasta or something. And then just one martini each for each of them. Just one martini each.
Sonny00:13:00Well, I mean, you don't want to spoil it.
Vic00:13:03So I end up going... They said, oh, come upstairs because it's only 7 o'clock. I said, sure, we'll come up for a little bit. And then my father-in-law opens up his cabin and said, we only have a few things. Have a B&B, which is the Benedictine and brandy concoction. So I just said, well, it's like an after-dinner drink, so I'm drinking that now. Things are getting crazy, right? And I'm like, I can't even keep track of things. And after that, had a rusty nail. In front of your kids. All of this is in front of my kids. Your kids are not with a sitter at home. No, no.
Sonny00:13:31Who's Hayden? Wait, sorry. Did you go back to somebody's house? Yes. My...
Vic00:13:34My in-law's apartment. My in-law's apartment. Do they live here in the city? For half the year, they do. Oh, okay. They live not far from our offices. You can see them out the window. And then... Oh, do they live in that new building? That new... No, no, no, no, no, no, no. The Prospect House. Ah. On the hill. Oh, I love that place. Which is right... Yes, exactly. It's right next to where they filmed Charlie Wilson's War.
Sonny00:13:54Well, you can see... And you can see it looks... It's like overlooking Iwo Jima. I'm just going to want to paint a picture for our... No, that's it for our... For our terrorist listeners. Yeah, we have a friend whose mother used to have an apartment in Prospect House. Oh, yes, you know exactly. And we went there for 4th of July, one or two years, and it was... I mean, it's really the best view of the fireworks. It is, it is.
Vic00:14:13Like, looking... Even better, after that last storm we had, the tree that was blocking their view is finally down. Oh, good. So, it all worked out. So, and I had B&Bs, and then I switched over to Rusty Nails, which is the Drambuie and the Scotch and Dewars, and then went home. The kids accused me of being drunk. Kate is... Kate insisted on driving, and even my father-in-law said, you're... He said to my wife, you're driving.
Sonny00:14:38Is Daddy drunk again?
Vic00:14:39Well, I was, like, doing a little dance in the street. I thought it was funny.
Sonny00:14:42Why is Daddy taking his shirt off?
?00:14:44Right?
Vic00:14:44I was doing a dance in the street. There was a car waiting. I'm going streaking. There was a car waiting. I was blocking a car from going down the street because I was doing this dance. I was doing the Mick Jagger dance.
Sonny00:14:54Why did Daddy put his tie on his head?
Vic00:14:56In a lampshade. Come on, man. In a lampshade. So... Hey, we're going. Come on. Snoop-a-loop. Snoop-a-loop. Bring your funny hat. As our friend Larry Miller would say, we're going to Florida. And 36 hours later, I was getting my blood drawn. So that's my theory, and I'm sticking with it. Yeah, I'm sure that was it. Well, it's hard to... Yes, Sonny. Oh, yes, JVL. I... You had some...
JVL00:15:20I have so many questions. Okay, questions.
Vic00:15:23Go ahead.
JVL00:15:24What? Yes. I yield my time to you, Sonny. I'm still standing. I really am concerned. Are you concerned? Question number one.
Vic00:15:32But I have dropped weight since. I've dropped weight since eating that freaking salad bowl.
Sonny00:15:37But here's why I'm not concerned. It's because I have it written into my contract with The Weekly Standard that if Vic dies, I get his portion of the money. So I am actually... That's double that? My gosh.
JVL00:15:48I hope he keeps eating... Question. ...a boneless ribeye. Did your physician take into account your head size? Oh, yeah. That's a good point. In all of these calculations. Because all things are going on. Because you can't... Like, you're not a normal person. You're not a normal man. I'm not. And so me and Andre the Giant... Maybe triglycerides just happen to be really closely tied to cranial capacity.
Vic00:16:09Let me tell you something. I've been tested like four times for... What do you call it? Cataracts, right? Because they think I have a very large optic nerve. For cephalitis? No. Besides that. Gigantism. And for cataracts because I have a very large optic nerve. Yeah, you do. But it turns out it's because I have a large head. Proportional? So every organ in my body is large. Totally proportional. Above the neck, sadly. And I've aced all those tests.
JVL00:16:34Okay. How's the liver function?
Vic00:16:36Fine. See? That came out fine.
JVL00:16:38I had no issue on the blood test with the liver. So that's why I'm drinking more.
Vic00:16:42Anyway... Can I tell you one thing? Yes, please.
JVL00:16:45Because this relates to you. Oh, please, please. As I was on the Marine base, I had a moment where I was speaking with this nice lady in a store and she said to me, oh, so what brings you out here to Pendleton? Are you here to visit one of your children? And I looked at her in stunned silence and she said... I'm sorry. I mean, one of your grandchildren. And you know what I thought? I thought to myself, do I look like Vic? Yes, that's right. I'm not that old.
Vic00:17:11I get that. I'm not old man Mattis here. We responded. We responded. I responded to you on Twitter about this, about the time that Michelle Richard said to me, you know, five years ago, he's like, so what are you, like 50? I said, I just turned 40. And he looked at me and he goes, why do you look so old? He doesn't back out. I said, why do you look so big? And now he's dead. And now he's dead. I was looking back. I was looking back at those transcripts because I record everything word for word. And he was talking about how when he gets large and big and he looks very smooth. I said, you look like a baby, I said to him. Anyway, God bless him. You look like a baby. I said, he goes, you look like a baby, Michelle Richard. Were you guys drunk together? Probably. Drinking Montrachet. You look like a baby.
JVL00:17:52Drinking Montrachet.
Vic00:17:53And anyway, I have to tell you. No, you're the baby.
JVL00:17:56No, you are the baby. Baby, B-E-B-E, baby.
Vic00:18:00Anyway, I have to tell you. I have to tell you that that's a special at the Palm. I think it's its last day was yesterday. Anyway, it was a 35-day dry-aged boneless ribeye. It was so good. And I just, you know that feeling when you sink your teeth into a piece of meat that juicy. Speaking of teeth, JVL.
JVL00:18:20Sorry, I need a cigarette, the way you were talking about that. Speaking of teeth, when it comes to your health, brushing your teeth is one of the most important parts of your day. Quip knows that. They've combined teeth. Dentistry and design to make a better electric toothbrush. Just to go off script for a moment. Entirely true. You should be brushing your teeth two to three times a day. You should do it for two minutes at a time. It's very, like, this actually is tied to all sorts of other health outcomes. It's very important, and that's one of the reasons Quip is so great. Quip is the new electric toothbrush that packs just the right amount of vibrations into a slimmer design at a fraction of the cost of bulkier traditional electric brushes. And guiding pulses alert. You when to switch sides, making brushing the right amount of effortless. Quip also comes with a mount that suctions right onto your mirror and unsticks to use as a cover for hygienic travel anywhere, whether it's going in your gym bag or carry-on. I actually used this when I was at the Marine Base, because when you're in a hotel room and you want to, like, you have your toothbrush, what do you do with it while you're in the hotel room? Do you put it in a cup? Do you tuck it back into your bag? No, no.
Vic00:19:26You don't know what the cleaning people do with the toothbrush either. You have no idea.
JVL00:19:29Until you get the film developed. I just... I popped my little Quip thing right onto the mirror, left it there while I was there, and then pulled it right off. It was amazing. Anyway, because the thing that cleans your mouth should also be clean, Quip's subscription plan refreshes your brush on a dentist-recommended schedule, delivering new brush heads every three months for just $5, including free shipping worldwide. Quip is backed by a network of over 10,000 dental professionals, including dentists, hygienists, and dental students. Most toothbrushes don't get named one of Time Magazine's best-selling, inventions of the year, but Quip did. Find out for yourself why. Quip starts at just $25, and if you go to getquip.com slash substandard right now, you'll get your first refill pack free with a Quip electric toothbrush. That's your first refill pack free at getquip.com slash substandard. Spelled G-E-T-Q-U-I-P dot com slash substandard.
Vic00:20:27Thank you for that, JVL.
JVL00:20:28I'm getting better at these. You are, and while we're on the subject of teeth...
Vic00:20:31Good read. Good read. Great read. And while we're on the subject of teeth, Pacific Rim Uprising took a bite out of the box office this past weekend with $28 million, followed by Black Panther with $16.6 million, and I can only imagine that, as we now know, the Christian contemporary flick with $13.8 million. That is, by the way, $38 million now on a $7 million budget. On the other hand, down in fifth place, that would be below Sherlock Noon down in fifth place was Tomb Raider. What? With $10.4 million in its second week, a 56% drop. Its total is $42 million, supposedly a $94 million budget. Let's talk about Tomb Raider, the reboot, and video game movies in general. Sonny, I think you're the only person here who saw the new movie. How about a review?
Sonny00:21:24You didn't go see Tomb Raider?
Vic00:21:26I'm so done with CGI. You didn't go see Tomb Raider?
Sonny00:21:28I'm done with CGI until Ready Player One. I can't say. You didn't go see Tomb Raider? Great. Could you not find parking this time? No, believe me, it's showing everywhere. You just didn't even try. It's showing everywhere.
Vic00:21:38Nobody wants to see it, so why should I see it, too? Nobody wants to see it.
Sonny00:21:41Well, Tomb Raider stars Alicia Vikander as the titular raider of tombs.
Vic00:21:48I see what you did there. We'll get to that in a second.
Sonny00:21:52We'll get to that in a second. It is a totally competent action adventure movie. I have no regrets. I have no real complaints about this film. It is designed to move from set piece to set piece, and that is what it does. Alicia Vikander starts off the film as a bicycle messenger. She's a courier, and she is trying to avoid signing the papers announcing her father's death. He left for Japan seven years before the movie starts. She's no longer British royalty. She is British royalty. It's the Croft family. They're a family of British royalties. And the father, who has a multinational corporation, whatever, he is a...
Vic00:22:37I thought he was a Baltimore detective.
Sonny00:22:39Yes, right. Well, what's Dominic West... I prefer him as the traitorous Spartan from 300. Oh, wow. Okay. But the... Anyway, so she, Lara Croft, wants to go find her father, Daddy Croft, and it's all about getting to this island in Japan. It is a more or less competent film. If I had one big complaint, and this is a small one that nobody except me will really care about, is that it starts... The movie starts with a voiceover by Dominic West explaining the mystery of Himiko, which is the kind of MacGuffin that gets the film going. And it's this legend of a Japanese empress who was a sorceress, and everyone who she touched died, and her generals had to kidnap her and take her to some island and bury her away. And you get this in... You get this kind of animation, you see the old Japanese art. Oh, okay. And then we get that same exact story like 40 minutes later, and it's this weird tick that movies like this have that they don't quite trust us to understand where the thing is going. And you don't even... I was just imagining while the film was playing out other ways that this could have been done better, right? If you want to establish that Dominic West's character has disappeared, you can do that in any number of ways. And if you want to establish that he's on some sort of quest that she is going to have to pick up, you can do that any number of ways. But this rote description of the central mystery of the film, only to have it repeated later, is so frustratingly lazy that it makes me angry. Question.
JVL00:24:18Yes. Would you trust the intelligence of somebody who had paid $20 to go see this movie of their own volition? No. Okay.
Sonny00:24:27But the point is you don't need it. They're already in the movie. They're already in the movie theater. It's not like you need to convince them to stay there. Got to get that CineScore. They got your money. Just let it ring out. Got to get that CineScore up. Well, they didn't get it anyway, so maybe the audience felt frustratingly talked down to by this movie. Yeah, I'm sure that's what it was. But look, this movie totally-
JVL00:24:48No, what they thought is, wait a minute, she doesn't have big yabos. This is supposed to be Lara Croft.
Sonny00:24:53Can we discuss this for a second? This has become a meme. Please, Sonny. This has become a meme where it kind of progresses. All these aggressive guys are like, finally, we have a Tomb Raider that's like- Small-breasted Tomb Raider. Thank God. That's like, she looks like a normal woman. She's not like a cartoon giant boobs. And can we just discuss for a second the fact that they have replaced Angelina Jolie, kind of a sex pot, right, with Alicia Vikander, who literally played a perfect woman designed to ensnare- A man with her sexual wiles in Ex Machina. This is like her big on-screen breakthrough was like, I'm going to play a sex robot, and you're going to want to f*** me so bad that you're going to let me out of here, and I'm going to leave you here to die. That is like the whole point of that movie. So like, pretending that this is some sort of giant leap forward for the average woman, like, oh, we can have this amazingly attractive- Totally, totally unobtainable woman. That is like our new ideal for like the normal woman. What we really need is a Lena Dunham Tomb Raider. I find it offensive as a male feminist that this is supposed to be the- Yeah.
JVL00:26:15Where is there room for normal-looking women in Tomb Raider? Yeah, exactly. Right? Exactly.
Sonny00:26:21So anyway, that's my big thought on this, is like the idea that this is some sort of giant leap forward for women is nonsense.
JVL00:26:28What was funny is that Tomb Raider itself was a giant leap forward. For women. How did that movie do? Because it was $135 million in 2001 dollars. Tomb Raider itself was a giant leap forward because it was like, look, it's a video game movie, but the protagonist is female, and she's butt kicking, and we can have female action heroes. And so the scale is always sliding. Like now, people look back on Tomb Raider, oh, sexist and terrible, and Angelina Jolie had a push-up bra, and wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. Although, I would say, having watched the original Tomb Raider last night in preparation for this- It's bad. We could talk about how bad it is in a moment, if you'd like, because it's-
Vic00:27:04It's crazy bad. 2001? 2001?
JVL00:27:07Yeah. Crazy bad. We're talking like acting, special effects, writing. All. All of the above. All of the above. I mean, even the Foley work on it is bad. There's a moment where she's opening a book, and upon opening it, there's a sound effect of thunder rumbling in the back. Why? Why? She's inside a house. There's no rain going on. Just everything about this thing is incompetent. To the point where, this is going to sound stupid and froofy, but have you noticed that actors in recent years have gotten better about how they hold guns?
Vic00:27:41Okay.
JVL00:27:42Right? So now, in almost every movie you see, if there's a gun, the actor holding the gun understands to keep your pointer finger up above the trigger, right? Not on the trigger. Right. That's exactly right. This is not to say that they are now all unbelievable marksmen, but they have gone to take the minimal steps required to achieve some superficial value. A version of reality on top of the unreality of what they are portraying. In this, there is a lot of, I wish we had the Facebook Live here, a lot of Angelina Jolie firing guns like this. Oh, that works. Holding her hands up with her wrists cocked and shooting with her wrists as she goes. So this is what I'm saying. I mean, the type of thing which is the bare minimum basics of competence at every level from her job as an actress. She is a terrible, terrible actress in this movie. Oh, yeah. You would not believe. This is not her. Not her life.
Vic00:28:34Is it because she just had to work with what she, she didn't have much to work with or she's...
JVL00:28:38I don't know. I mean, so this movie was so bad. Was it a big name director? So this is Simon West. Simon West had directed, this was his third movie. His first movie was Con Air, kind of a cult classic. Oh, yeah, sure, huge. Yeah. His second movie is The General's Daughter, which is a big budget. Oh, that's Travolta, right? Travolta adaptation, which was slotted in the summer and which did okay, not great. His third movie was Tomb Raider. Again, it grossed $135 million. Not a bomb. And he then went to movie jail. And he has not been out of movie jail since then.
Vic00:29:05Even though it made a lot of money.
JVL00:29:06Even though it made a lot of money. It did okay. Even though it did okay. $135 is not like, wow. It was good enough that they made a sequel two years later.
Sonny00:29:13It's not crapping the bed like this movie.
JVL00:29:14Which grossed half.
Sonny00:29:16Yeah. Yeah.
Vic00:29:16How much did it cost? Half. Half.
JVL00:29:19So that's how bad. Not with Angelina Jolie. Also with Angelina Jolie, yeah. Oh, gosh. But that's how bad this was, that he got sent to movie jail and never came out of it.
Vic00:29:28By the way, really quickly, you know... Where you can see really great handling, gun handling in a movie is Tom Cruise in Collateral. Oh, yeah. And he trained with Blackwater. Yeah. I mean, it's fast. In the alley scene. The alley scene is one of the best special effects. Rewind, and you watch it, and it's like because there's almost no special effect.
JVL00:29:47I don't think, I think it's, I mean, it's... You know what they always say. Yeah, it's amazing. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. And that's what he does in that movie. He's moving slowly and smoothly. It's amazing. So, yeah, the original Tomb Raider is horrible at every level. But here's... I have some questions for you, because the original Tomb Raider is full of fan service to the video game world, like everything from how she twirls her guns to the... So she strikes poses that are video game poses, and even her costumes, throughout they are... Yeah, yeah. In a way, her costumes are special effects, trying to make Angelina, who has a lovely body, but make her very nice, you know, athletic, sexual body look like the video game version, which is unreality. I mean, so if you look carefully at this, like the way her... Like tank tops are cut. They're not cut like a normal tank top that you would see anywhere would be cut. It's cut in a way to make her arms look really, really long. Anyway, does the new version pay any attention to the video game legacy, or is it just, this is all intellectual property? We don't even need to tell you what this has to do with anymore.
Sonny00:30:51I do think that there's... So you definitely get a sense of the... So Tomb Raider was rebooted recently, the video game. And they have reimagined Lara Croft as kind of like a more athletic, like...
JVL00:31:08She looks very much...
Sonny00:31:10Right. But also with like a six pack. Like Alicia Vikander. Exactly. So like Alicia Vikander is like, she looks like the new Tomb Raider. Down to kind of the costume, which is, you know, like a slightly more realistic, I guess, but it's still like a blue tank top and like khaki shorts. Yeah. In the middle of the Japanese desert island, a jungle island that they're on. I don't know. But there's definitely some fan service-y type stuff. I mean, there's like obvious video game type stuff, like they have to solve puzzles. Or like the scenes where she like jumps on a crane and swings around to like a different thing, you know? It's funner. It's like trying to figure out how to do the next thing to get to the next level. Right. And like all that stuff is totally fine. It's like, it's the sort of thing that actually looks totally in place in... In any reasonable action movie, more or less. Like except for, there's literally a line where she says, This is a color puzzle. When she's trying to figure out one of the... She's trying to figure out how to make the wall open when they're on the floor and all the tiles are dropping out. I hope she got paid. This is a color puzzle. I was like, oh God, this is... I hope she got paid. This is awkward. But like frankly, again, none of this is totally objectionable. It just feels like a kind of... There is one real fan service-y moment toward the end of the films where she gets her guns. And that is like, oh, people are like, oh, look, it's Tomb Raider.
JVL00:32:42Now she's the Tomb Raider. Boom. So is this clearly... This is how you raid the tombs. Clearly a franchise play, which has failed.
Vic00:32:49Yes, but it's failed.
Sonny00:32:51Because it is not doing well.
Vic00:32:52How'd the Asian guy do in the movie? They get it on? No. Oh, how dare they? Come on. Still waiting for my justice.
Sonny00:32:58She's not here to have sex with anyone. She's not here to have sex with any man who wanders across her. She's not a sex object, Vic. No. She's a woman. She's empowered. She's an empowered woman who has goals and ideals. And she's just not... She's not here to be eye candy for all... Do they do side boob?
JVL00:33:18The sex robot is not a... The original has like a third of a second of side boob. And you could... No side boob. You can tell that this is, I would say, this was real 13-year-old service because the two 2001 before there's like total internet access for every 14-year-old in America. So it's kind of like in Hackers when they do the same thing? Oh.
Sonny00:33:39With Angelina Jolie. With Angelina Jolie.
JVL00:33:40But with Angelina Jolie. But with Angelina Jolie in Hackers.
Sonny00:33:44Is it? There's like a side boob scene in Hackers.
JVL00:33:46She's the queen of the side boob at one point.
Sonny00:33:4915-year-old Sonny was very aware of that. Remembers?
JVL00:33:51You're on the... Is it in the bank? Very aware of that. In the bank? That hacker scene. So a side boob with Alicia Vikander or no?
Vic00:33:56No. No. Good. Good.
JVL00:33:59I'm glad.
Vic00:34:01Did you ever play Tomb Raider? Yeah. Loved it. I played it like once in 1996. She was very pointy. The graphics. Remember that? It was very much like, you know... Trying.
JVL00:34:15It was like a lot of polygons. Yes. A lot of polygons.
Vic00:34:18She was polygonish.
JVL00:34:19It was the first world that you could... So this is the original PlayStation, right? And it was the first time that we had polygon worlds. And it was a first person... But it's not a shooter. It's a... It's not first... I'm sorry. It's a third person puzzler. Yes. You could travel through and...
Vic00:34:32Yeah, and it was a fun game, I thought, right?
JVL00:34:33It was interesting, and there's been many iterations since. They'll do anything with video games. Do you want to talk about video game movies? No, let's talk about video game movies. Or do you want to do other things first?
Vic00:34:43No, let's talk about video game movies, unless you have any more thoughts specifically on... No. Oh, I went to that great source of knowledge, a font of knowledge, Wikipedia, and supposedly there are 35 movies made from video games, but that includes spinoffs and direct-to-video. And the first... The first movie made about a video game is, in 1993... Super Mario Brothers.
Sonny00:35:06Very good. I didn't even look that up. I don't... Bob Hoskins. Is that actually right? I don't...
Vic00:35:12That's what they say. That's what Wikipedia says. Bob Hoskins, and who was the other guy? Do you remember this? It was Luigi and whatever.
Sonny00:35:17There was John Leguizamo.
Vic00:35:18Very good. John Leguizamo. Okay. So, I guess that was... I didn't see it. It's a deep bowl. However, the following year was Double Dragon. Now, who...
Sonny00:35:28I don't remember the one guy... I don't remember being in it.
Vic00:35:32That's so funny, because I remember Scott Wolfe.
Sonny00:35:36See, sometimes people want to know how they can tell the difference between Vic and Sonny on the show. And that's how you tell the difference.
Vic00:35:44I saw that guy. I said, you know what? This guy's got a future in Hollywood, Scott Wolfe, I said. And he ought to be in a movie about a family, and they run a restaurant without parents. And the next thing you know, he's on Party of Five.
JVL00:35:57You should have been the showrunner there.
Vic00:35:59Bailey. That's really funny. That's really good. And, but I was not a, oh, didn't you see Scott Wolfe once in person? Yeah, I did. When was that?
JVL00:36:09He was seated behind me in an experimental theater. I think I've told this story before in Los Angeles. It was back in my L.A. days, because I used to go out to L.A. all the time. Yes, we did talk about that on a previous show. And I was with, because I had a lot of friends in the industry, and a friend of mine. The biz. The biz. And she was like, you know, oh, we've got to go. I have a friend who's in this experimental theater troupe. We've got to go watch them tonight and support them. So I was like. I was like, okay, whatever. What do I know? So I go, and it is the old guy from Party of Five who is the lead. Matthew Fox. Matthew Fox. So this is post-Party of Five, pre-Lost. So when he was in his wilderness years.
Vic00:36:46Okay, yeah.
JVL00:36:46And they were doing a one-act version of Macbeth set in the Stone Age.
Vic00:36:56So it was a lot of grunting?
JVL00:36:57So there are cavemen and cavewomen all wearing, like, Fred Flintstones. And Matthew Fox was playing Macbeth, the Scottish play. Oh, okay, yes, the Scottish. And so I sat there thinking to myself, I can't, like, this is the Christopher Guest version of this scene. This is like a parody. And you were living a parody. I was living a parody. And there were 12 people in the audience, my friend Heather and I, and Scott Wolfe. The director was Corky. Scott Wolfe was behind us. And Matthew Fox, I'll tell you what, he shouted the hell out of that play. Every line, just, rah! Okay, but the lines were not actually grunts. They were like, it was still Shakespeare.
Vic00:37:37But grunting Shakespeare.
JVL00:37:38Yeah, grunting Shakespeare. Prehistoric-ish Shakespeare. It was amazing in its own way. We have fatal vision. And Scott Wolfe was there, dressed as he would have been on any episode of Party of Five. And, like, so, like, the 12 of us, who were vastly outnumbered by the people in this experimental theater troupe, all, like, went backstage afterwards and had beers. And were like, hey. I would have talked to him about Jennifer. I would want to talk to him about Jennifer Love.
Vic00:38:01Hewitt, who played Sarah Reeves. Oh, fell in love with her.
JVL00:38:05But I believe the restraining order prohibits you from doing that. Of mentioning her name? I can't even mention her name? Is that what you're saying? I'm saying going to Scott Wolfe and the co-stars and asking about. Oh, and asking about. I believe that that's not.
Vic00:38:15So tell me about, tell me about Love. Okay. So I, you know, were you a Double Dragon player? Video game player? No. Love the Double Dragon. Really? No. Love the Double Dragon. I'll tell you what I was. Love Street Fighter. Exactly. So the same year.
JVL00:38:29Street Fighter's different. Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. Van Damme. And Raul Julia. And the wait, great. Hold on. Your favorite Street Fighter character to play as? Go, Sonny.
Vic00:38:37Ryu. Me too. Sam Watson. Really? Yeah. I looked into it. I went back into my past, and I said, yep, it was that guy. Yeah. You were both Ryu. I didn't do, I didn't do that. Not Ken.
Sonny00:38:47Not Ken, that knockoff Ryu for the American market. Ryu.
JVL00:38:52Ken, Ken is no good, but I would have thought. What, the claws? No, you would have gone, oh, Bakura. That's Vega. You're thinking of Vega. Yeah, Vega. Who's the beast? The guy, the Brazilian. From Brazil. Blanca. Blanca. Chun-Li, who I believe. Excuse me? I believe. Why would I want to be Chun-Li? Because when you go into all of the Street Fighter lore, she is overpowered relative to the other characters.
Sonny00:39:18Oh, oh. I think that, well, yes. I believe she is.
JVL00:39:22So everything is, I mean, it's all algorithm about speed versus strength and damage. So that's kind of a. I believe she is overpowered. The guy I used to like to play was the dog. Dalsim. Because I thought we could stay away. You could stay away from him. Is that Indian or voodoo? Indian. Indian. Indian. So you could like throw your fists out and this way you could, I could stay away from you.
Sonny00:39:41See, I liked fighting, I liked fighting him. I liked fighting Dalsim because you could sneak in behind his long punches and kicks. I mean, he was a, he was a total sucker.
Vic00:39:49And he was all, and he was all skin and bones. Yeah. He was all skin and bones. That guy sucked.
JVL00:39:52But he, like he, like he, the way he, he sort of sat back on his heels with his hands up. He had a very interesting stance. It was a little scary, but you know. Very interesting stance. But Chun-Li.
Vic00:40:01I, no.
Sonny00:40:03And I always hated fighting Chun-Li because she had that like super kick. Yeah. Like, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah.
Vic00:40:09Is that how it sounded like? I guess. No, that's pretty good. I remember this is, when it came out, I was in Georgetown the summer of 92 interning at the Justice Department and they had a game room in the Levy Center and they had, so I remember everyone was watching the Olympics because that was going on. And the games were free because it was Georgetown. Because it was Georgetown. If you're a student. If you're a student, you know, it's free. No, just kidding. But I would play Street Fighter there and I just got, you know, you could get really sucked into that game. I mean, you know, I'll get to the part where I can wreck the car for bonus points or whatever and then just keep on playing. The Lexus. The Lexus, yes. It's a Lexus LS400 that you blow up. Loved Street, that was great. I loved Street Fighter and I thought it was just a matter of, you know, punch to it. The movie you mentioned was Jean-Claude, so he headlined, of course, that was the last movie, I believe.
Sonny00:40:56For Raoul Julien. Major Bison. He literally killed him. Major Bison, right?
Vic00:41:02Yes. Was he wearing anything or did he work out and that was his body?
JVL00:41:07I don't, yeah. What is your favorite of all the fighting arcade games? Okay. I like that one. What was your favorite? I didn't like Tekken. Oh, hey. Tekken, Soul Calibur, which was my favorite. I love me some Soul Calibur.
Sonny00:41:20I hated playing fighting games in the arcade because I would always, like, wait and put my quarter in and then lose immediately to somebody who was really good. Oh, the other game. Because I never got to play it. But Samurai Shodown, though, was the best.
JVL00:41:33I don't know that I remember Samurai Shodown.
Sonny00:41:37It's like the only reason anyone ever bought a Neo Geo.
JVL00:41:40Oh, was this, I played this once when I rented a Neo Geo to see, this is the game where it's so hyper-realistic that you get cut once and you die?
?00:41:48No, no, no. It's not like that.
Vic00:41:49Do you know what I like playing on the-
JVL00:41:51Because it was a Samurai game like that. Okay, no. Well, no, that's not true. That's terrible.
Vic00:41:55What I like playing on the Apple IIe was- Hard Hat Harry. No, ready? Karateka.
Sonny00:42:00Oregon Trail.
JVL00:42:00Karateka.
Vic00:42:01No, you can't like that. Karateka. Spell that, because I'm going to look it up. Like karate, but K-A at the end, and you had to rescue the princess. It was so fantastic. And it was only like dark. It was like green and the neon. Hold on.
JVL00:42:17Hold on. Is this what you're talking about?
Vic00:42:20Yes, that's the one I'm talking about. There you go. It was so fantastic, and you had to kill like a vulture bird and different samurai. I love that Mount Fuji in the background. Yes, and it was very straightforward. That's the kind of games. That's the kind of games that I like. And you know who else liked that game? Our friend, Mike Goldfarb, and he corrected my pronunciation, because I used to call it Karateka. And he goes, I think they're thinking of erotica.
Sonny00:42:39Are you not just thinking of an Amazon subgenre?
JVL00:42:45That was a different game altogether.
Sonny00:42:47Joan is into the Bigfoot erotica. You're into the Karateka.
Vic00:42:49It's just Karateka.
Sonny00:42:50It's a little bit of both. All right. So are we going to talk about video game movies? Yeah, yeah, sure, sure, sure. Please. We've got plenty of time. Sonny, go. So my friend, Alan Zilberman, who writes reviews for a bunch of places, Washington Post, Washington City Paper, has a theory that you cannot make a good video game movie.
Vic00:43:06No.
Sonny00:43:07So far, that theory's faulty. So far, that theory has mostly worked out. I like Tomb Raider more than he did, but I think it's a fair... But I think this is... I don't think this is correct. I mean, I think a video game is just like anything else, and a video game like Tomb Raider, which is kind of based on this Indiana Jones adventuring, you know, traipsing through whatever, would be just fine. Or, straight up, first of all, I think Tomb Raider first-person shooters, like Resident Evil or something like that, would be totally fine. Question.
Vic00:43:35Yes. Do you mean, or does he mean good commercially or good critically?
Sonny00:43:40Well, good... I mean, he means as art. Like, a video game cannot be made in... And I think this is wrong in theory, but it's been mostly right in practice. And here are... Look, but if you... But there are movies like these that are totally acceptable, I think. Okay, go for it. Here would be my five best video game movies. Boom. Countdown. Okay. Number five, Hitman. The Timothy Oliphant Hitman.
Vic00:44:04Oh, okay. Yeah, I forget that it would count. Fun game.
Sonny00:44:07Or a fun movie. It's not great, and it has some of the same weird framing problems, but... Mortal Kombat. I actually really like Mortal Kombat. Paul W.S. Anderson. Paul W.S. Anderson. Like, if you're going to make a fighting movie, there's no reason why a Bruce Lee-style fighting movie can't work in the Mortal Kombat formula. There just isn't.
Vic00:44:28I was bothered by the Asian dude's hair in that. I was bothered by that movie, because I thought if I let my hair grow out, it would be that big. Continue.
Sonny00:44:35Number three, Silent Hill. Silent Hill is actually... Horror, right? It's actually really creepy, and it is well-shot, and it is, like, it looks scary as hell. I mean, it just, like, is... It's not a fun movie, but I think it's actually pretty successful for what it's trying to do. Number two would be The New Tomb Raider. I actually think this is probably... Number two! I think this is actually a pretty competently made film, and it, like, it is... It's not going to win any awards or anything, but I enjoy it. And number one would be the original Resident Evil. Now, the original Resident Evil, again, I don't know that it's... It's disturbing. I don't know that it's a great film. It's not a great movie, but it is a totally acceptable zombie action movie.
Vic00:45:13And that came out before 28 Days Later, right? It's pre-Danny Boyle, or no?
Sonny00:45:17I think it might have been, yeah. I mean, it's in that same... It's interesting, but it's the same idea. But it's in that same kind of idea, or same time...
Vic00:45:24That genre freaks me out.
Sonny00:45:25Time frame. But, like, there's no reason why a zombie movie or a zombie video game can't be turned into a total zombie movie. It's a totally acceptable zombie movie. And I thought that one actually works really well with Mia Jovovich, of course. Yeah, she's great. And James Prufoy, who was... He was in Rome. He was...
Vic00:45:41Oh, yeah, sure.
Sonny00:45:42He was Mark Anthony. So, there are things about that movie that I really like. Again, it's not like high art or anything, but it's as far as action, adventure-type movies go.
Vic00:45:53You can go back to that movie and you can go on YouTube, the corridor scene in Resident Evil. The corridor where they get locked in the... I mean, the computer locks them out and then... With the lasers?
JVL00:46:06Yes. It's so horrifying. I still find it horrifying.
Vic00:46:09I still have nightmares about that. You wake up... When it goes into the... You know, because you think that, okay, I'm going to get out of this. Yes, and then they get cubed. They're like beef cubes. It's terrible. Is it possible...
JVL00:46:21JVL. ...that you could make a great movie about a video game so long as it's not a real video game? Because here I'd throw at you three things. Okay. Tron, The Last Starfighter, and Jumanji, the new Jumanji, which are all video game movies about fictional video games.
Sonny00:46:39Yeah. I mean, I could see that. That makes... I would also say Edge of Tomorrow
JVL00:46:44is the best video game movie.
Sonny00:46:46It is a video game. Because it is a movie that kind of uses the tropes of video games, like mindlessly kind of learning how to get through a scene with the female character with the giant blunt instrument, the giant melee weapon. There are video game tropes that are used very well in that movie, and it is successful on its own as a movie. So I would probably agree with your friend Alan,
JVL00:47:17because... So have you read, by any chance, the Tom Bissell book? Tom Bissell? Bissell? Bissell. Tom Bissell book, Extra Lives. Yeah. It's great. And it's his... I'd say the best serious book written about video games, because it's not that serious, but it's serious enough. And he talks about, you know, the question of why video games can't be art. And he says it's because they lack dynamical meaning. Which is that, to say that in a video game, the thing you do in the game is not connected in any philosophical or meaningful way to the idea of the game. And so if you're in Mario Brothers, and you jump onto... You know, you jump and run, and you're jumping, and you're jumping and running is not connected to the meaning of the story that Mario Brothers is trying to tell you. When you grab a hammer in Donkey Kong, the hammer blowing up the barrels doesn't tell you anything about the story that Donkey Kong is trying to tell. And the only game where this is not true is Braid, which is the classic Jonathan Blow micro artsy game, which, if you've ever played, is about... The story it's telling is about a man who has mastered time travel and is trying to go back in time to rescue his girlfriend. And what you do, in Braid, is you control time. You literally, like... The game rewinds forwards and backwards. That's how you move around and do things and accomplish things. And so that solves dynamical meaning. But without it, you're sort of left with... You might be able to make a great movie out of one of these things, but all you're going to be doing is borrowing the intellectual property name. You're not going to be getting any... There are no themes to be mined from these games that could make great art.
Sonny00:48:55My counter to this, and I can't remember if Bissell mentions this in the book or in this essay particularly, is Bioshock. Now, Bioshock is a... It is a video game that kind of apes this... I don't want to get into the whole thing. But the central tenet of the game has to do with free will and... It's the Ayn Rand game. It's the Ayn Rand game, right. And why are you doing what you are doing? And the central kind of turning point in the game comes when the guy who has been... narrating you and leading you through this underworld... this underwater city that you've been traveling through tells you that you have only been doing the things that you do in the game because he has told you to do them. There's like a subtle... There's like a code that he has implanted into your head when he says, you know... I can't remember what the phrase is. But when he says a phrase, you know... And then you do the thing. And you just kind of have assumed that you've been doing this because these are the mechanics of the video game. But in the video game world, it's saying you're doing this because he's telling you to. And it's like... It's a subtle mind... blowing sort of thing that, like... I... It's very clever for a video game. I'm not sure that it's that clever in the grand scheme of art. But I do think it's the sort of thing that would translate pretty well into a movie where you have been... The camera puts you in a place where you are cheering for people and cheering for things to happen. And you never really examine why you're doing that. And maybe a clever filmmaker could... Monkey with that in a sort of way that would make you think about why you were... Like the guy who directed Hardcore Henry. Yeah, well, exactly. I mean, no, I like it. That movie's terrible, but it's terrible for reasons that have nothing to do with theme. It's terrible. It's just a poorly crafted, created...
Vic00:50:48Speaking of monkeying, do you have high hopes for Rampage? I was just... Hey, boss. Oh, hi. Look, it's Steve Hayes is here. It's a cameo... Well, it's funny. Steve, why do you think it smells in here? That's because it's one of our substandard sponsors, Wink. Thank you. With online ordering, quick shipping, and personalized recommendations, the only way Wink could make discovering wine you love easier is if they drank it for you. Introducing Wink, spelled W-I-N-C, Wink makes it easy to discover great wine, because Wink's wine experts select wines matched to your taste, personalized for you, shipped right to your door, and starting at just $13. There's a bottle. There's nothing like coming home to a delivery box of delicious Wink wine, not to be confused with box wine, but a delivery box of delicious Wink wine selected just for you. It's the best day of your month. Just fill out Wink's palette profile quiz. Answer simple questions that your average store clerk wouldn't ask or translate into a recommendation. Questions like, how do you take your coffee? Do you like blueberries? Then Wink sends wines curated to your taste. The more wines you rate, the more personalized your monthly selections. Each month, there are new delicious wines. Like the insanely popular Summer Water Rosé. No membership fees. Skip any month. Cancel any time. Shipping is covered. And if you don't like a bottle they send you, they'll replace it with a bottle you'll love, no questions asked. And so that is our Spear of the Week. It's actually a Wine of the Week. And it is a Rogue Admiral Cabernet Sauvignon. Steve, did you have any?
JVL00:52:24I did not have a sip, but that's pretty impressive.
Vic00:52:26You need, it's actually, I got four bottles, the other three are in my house. The Rogue Admiral's Cab, I thought was really good. I got one bottle, I had to bring it in to share.
Sonny00:52:36Sonny, what did you think about the bottle? This is actually really, really good. Very drinkable. The Rogue Admiral's, I, if it weren't, you know, noon on Thursday, Thursday when we're taping this, I would drink the rest of this bottle.
Vic00:52:53I would, on your own, on your own, I could drink that. You know what? Yes, on my own. I would like to drink that with a 35-day dry-aged, boneless, rib-eye, why is my arm, my left arm is feeling numb. So, discover great wine today. Go to trywink.com slash substandard. You get $20 off your first shipment. That's spelled T-R-Y-W-I-N-C dot com slash substandard for $20 off. Trywink.com slash substandard. There you go.
JVL00:53:19I didn't even know the substandard was still a going concern.
Vic00:53:22I'm just really happy to see that. Yes, no, we're still around. We're still around. We're still around. We're on, yes. Borrow time.
JVL00:53:29It's borrow time. And you have real, like... Like, established sponsors.
?00:53:32This is really impressive.
Vic00:53:33He didn't know. He didn't know until now. Two ads a show now. Two ads a show. Two ads a show.
Sonny00:53:37Almost revenue neutral. Almost revenue neutral.
JVL00:53:40The substandard. That's our new substandard. Okay. Before we go off of video games, I'm a little disappointed nobody mentioned Prince of Persia.
Vic00:53:48Oh, I was... That's on my list.
JVL00:53:50Which, do you remember when Prince of Persia as a game became a thing?
Sonny00:53:55No. When did it become a thing?
JVL00:53:56That was the Mac. That was one of the early Mac games. Yes, it was. You're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. I played that. The thing about it, what made it so special, this is circa 1991, was that he moved almost like a normal person. So when he jumped, he could grab onto a thing, and he would shimmy a little bit, and then as he pulled himself up...
Vic00:54:16He almost felt a little motion in there. Almost. Almost.
JVL00:54:19Like he's a real man. And from that to somebody deciding, hey, hey, let's spend $150 million on this and put Jake Gyllenhaal into it and make him into an actor. Wasn't there also like a PlayStation Prince of Persia that like... Probably. Yeah, but I'm saying this is where it started. It started with this little black and white video game.
Sonny00:54:37I don't see any reason why video games can't make good movies, and all sorts of other media can. I mean, like, comic books are... Board games can make great movies. Inherently, storytelling classes. Hungry Hungry Hippos is fantastic. Toys. Shoot some letters. Transformers. Connect Four. Okay.
JVL00:54:58Do you guys know there's a Bob Ross board game out now? I saw this at Target the other night. I believe there's no actual painting involved, but you earn chill points. It all seems like it's basically... I think there's a lot going on there. Stoner game? It's a stoner game, I think, but they sell it at Target now. Really mellow to him.
Sonny00:55:15Well, they also sell... What's the card game? Cards Against Humanity. Cards Against Humanity. They sell that at Target. It's not like Target's a family-friendly store anymore, folks.
JVL00:55:25Hasn't been for a while. I can't do politics.
Vic00:55:29Don't do politics. Okay. Okay. Corrections or additions. Substandard friend M.K. Newsom reminds us Hogan's Heroes took place in a POW camp, not a concentration camp. We knew that, by the way. It was just a slip of the tongue, and speaking of slip of the tongue, this happens to be main episode number 69. Nice. Okay, that's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us at Victorino Matus, at Sonny Bunch. At JV Last. Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes or Google Play. Just type in... We're there. Leave a review. Tell your friends. Until next time.
JVL00:56:301, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 executive producers on Blackhawk Down. So he must have had a lot to do with making that movie what it was. I assume that basically he was shadow directing Ridley Scott. That sounds about right. Yeah? Yeah. So how does something like that happen? You look at that and you're like, that must be a development thing where he, at the moment he was hottest, got his name attached to an option and with the sort of, you know, if I don't direct, whoever does, I have to get listed as a producer credit. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And this, I didn't realize that this means that that script must have bounced around a while before Scott made it to have nine credited producers.
Sonny00:57:10Well, I'm sure that everyone looked at the finished product and was like, I'm sure it's fine.
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