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#145. The Substandard on The Predator and Captain Marvel
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Dudes Chatting — The Predator and the Captain Marvel trailer: JVL opens by declaring King Arthur: Legend of the Sword the best fantasy film since The Fellowship of the Ring after watching it twice on a plane; Sonny remains convinced it is garbage. The group then runs through full Predator franchise history: Predator 2 is worse than remembered, Alien vs. Predator is shockingly boring. They arrive at The Predator (2018): all three find it terrible. The plot is incoherent (an autistic child, a Super Predator vs. regular Predator subplot, a global-warming conceit), only the Shane Black-style banter among the soldier characters works, Sterling K. Brown is enjoyable but his motivations make no sense, Tom Jane is wasted and visibly sad to be there. JVL suspects the studio sabotaged it in the editing room. Sonny's core critique is that the Predator as a character has never been inherently interesting without a great hero to oppose. The Captain Marvel trailer is discussed at the close: Sonny calls it a Nick Fury movie in disguise — he argues the de-aged Fury is the only compelling figure in it and jokes the film should be titled "How Nick Fury Got His Groove Back." The group debates the MCU's impending transition away from Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America toward Doctor Strange, Ant-Man, Black Panther, and Captain Marvel, and whether the franchise's magic can survive that shift.
Reviews: The Predator — unanimous negative verdict. All three found it confusing, tonally inconsistent, and a disappointing waste of its cast.
Box Office: The Predator opened at #1 with $24 million — a historically bad opening for a film debuting on 4,000-plus screens. The Nun dropped to #2 with $18 million. A Simple Favor placed third with $16 million.
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00- Do you know what my job description is? I'm in acquisitions. I look up and I catch what falls out of the sky.
Sonny00:00:15- What's on the ship?
Vic00:00:30- Hello, and welcome to another edition of The Substandard sponsored by Casper Mattress and Calm, the number one app for sleep, meditation, and relaxation. I'm Victor Matus along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. I'd like to remind you TheSubstandard is available on iTunes, Google Play, and Stitcher. Just look at our podcast and search for Substandard. You'll easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, and leave a review. Gentlemen, how are we? JVL! - Hey, boys. - Welcome back to the East Coast. What's going on?
JVL00:00:58- Thank you. I, uh, I was in San Fransokyo over the weekend, and it was lovely. - What? That sounds racist. - Pretty sure that's a racist thing. - It's from Big Hero 6!
Vic00:01:09- Oh, wow. - It's the name of the fictional city in Big Hero 6. - I missed that. We'll have to look. I think we need to investigate that. Okay, go ahead.
JVL00:01:16- And it was, you know, it's great. As I said before, if I could go to San Francisco for a few days, once every two to three months, it would be perfect. I wouldn't want to live there. - Just to recharge your batteries. - I don't know about San Francisco. The future is actually happening there. I don't know if you know this. - I know that, but I'm not a fan of the city itself. - Well, I wasn't in the city. I was further out. It was great. But the best part of my trip was that I flew Alaska Airlines, which is not Alaska Airlines. It's actually Virgin. - Yes, I know, because I'm going to- - I did not know.
Vic00:01:47- They took it over, and I'm flying on Alaska for the first time in October.
JVL00:01:54- So you still have the purple rub-a-dub-dub in the club, uplighting inside the-
Sonny00:01:59- The outside is the Eskimo? - No, it says "Virgin" on the plane.
JVL00:02:02Inside, the branding has been changed to, like, it doesn't only say "Virgin," it now says "Alaska." - You know what's a shame is- - Do they still do the Virgin video? - No. - Yes. Oh. - That was the best part. - That's the best part.
Vic00:02:15- I believe it's still on YouTube. You can see it. - I know. That makes me sad. That makes me sad.
JVL00:02:18- But I was talking to the attendants, and they're still technically Virgin employees, even though they're wearing- like, their contracts and health insurance and all that stuff goes through Virgin. But the best part of it-
Vic00:02:29- Mm-hmm.
JVL00:02:30- Guess what was playing on the plane? - "Chav King Arthur"? - Yes!
Sonny00:02:36- I don't have to guess, 'cause you were tweeting about it like a- - You bet it. Throughout.
JVL00:02:38- Like an insane person. - So I watched it on the way out there. - This is- - It was so much better than I thought. You'll remember, my original verdict was that it was a pretty good movie. It was a solid B+ movie, right? - Mm-hmm. - B, B+. - Mm-hmm. - On second viewing, it's really, really good. And it was so good on second viewing that I decided to watch it just, like, 36 hours later,
Sonny00:02:59on my flight back. - This is something a psychopath would do. - And it's- - This is literally psychotic.
JVL00:03:03- It's even better. I am now prepared to say that it is the most underrated action-adventure movie that I can think of. One of the best, certainly the best fantasy movie that isn't Fellowship of the Ring. Better than all of the Lord of the Rings movies, except for Fellowship.
Vic00:03:20- You can stop trolling now. That's ridiculous. Oh, come on.
JVL00:03:23- I am 100% not trolling. - Are you looking forward-
Vic00:03:27- Have you watched it? Have you seen it? - No. I haven't. I don't have time. - I'm telling you, it's really- - And I didn't have time for the movie we're discussing today. - You didn't even see it once. - Really good. No.
Sonny00:03:33- You've never seen it once? - Mm-mm.
Vic00:03:34- It's really good. - Mm-mm. - You'd be surprised how many movies I only pretend to see.
Sonny00:03:39- Vic, I am not- - Somebody should go back and listen to that episode and see if you pretended to watch this one.
Vic00:03:43- Oh, I did it. That one, I did it. No. On this show, I always tell the truth. - I'm not kidding. - Yes. - Victorino, it's great. You and Kate should watch it. - Look at Sonny's face. - Why?
Sonny00:03:53- Your opinion has not changed, Sonny. - No, it's not changed. - I mean, I haven't rewatched it since seeing it in the movie theaters, 'cause I saw it in the movie theaters where it was bad, you know, it's been bad the whole time. It's so bad.
JVL00:04:04- So, Charlie Sykes texted me last night,
Vic00:04:07our colleague, host of The Daily Standard Podcast.
JVL00:04:09- I thought you were gonna say Charlie Hunnam. - Me too, actually. - Charlie Hunnam did text me, and you know what he said?
Sonny00:04:13He said, "I'm running!" - Thanks, bro!
JVL00:04:16I really appreciate you standing up for my trash movie. - "Hey, honey tits, you haven't had the porridge to say my movie's great?"
Sonny00:04:22- That was good. Stop saying lines from the movie like we know what they are. Nobody remembers that line. - But you see how we're playing along, even though I haven't seen the movie? I'm just like, "Yeah!" - It's not snatch.
JVL00:04:31- It's not what nobody remembers. It is, so this is what I don't understand. It is the Chav version of Sicario. Like, all of the sort of, this is a land of wolves, you don't have no place. That's all in the, it's, everything in this movie is great. The score, you're a big score guy, you love score. - Yeah. - This is a tremendous score. - The score was terrible. - It's, it's absolutely not.
Vic00:04:58- What about the Robin Hood movie coming up? Are you looking forward to that one, Robin Hood?
JVL00:05:02- Robin Hood. - Chav, Robin Hood. - Chav, Robin Hood. - Robin Chav. - Is that part of the King Arthur expanded universe? - I don't think so. - They should just do it. - No, 'cause the King Arthur
Sonny00:05:09expanded universe was gonna be all the round table guys. - Right. - But I think there was going to be a Robin Hood expanded universe with the same basic idea. We'll have a Friar Tuck movie.
JVL00:05:17- Also, I think they may have been sold by the same, Akiva Goldsmith, maybe?
Sonny00:05:21- Yeah, no, I thought it was somebody else who did-- - Same screenwriter may have sold them both. - No, it was the Mummy, it was the Dark Universe guy who also did-- - Oh, who also sold the Robin Hood? - King Arthur, whatever. - Somebody got rich. - I think, I think, I don't know. - Somebody got rich. - Somebody got rich and it wasn't the studio.
JVL00:05:34- So let me say this. Of all of the many, many things which the movie gets right, the thing which I remain the most impressed with is the way they depict Arthur's progress as being totally believable. So because of the way they establish the character and bring him up, you actually believe the hero's journey he goes through. But also, you understand why everybody else is willing to die for him. 'Cause he's great. He's a little bit like Mike Goldfarb. He's just there to protect the people and to protect his boys. And you see why these guys have such great loyalty. I was ready to sign up and go fight for Charlie Hunnam.
Sonny00:06:16- Wow. - I will say that Charlie Hunnam does have a certain gravitas in the chavished sort of way that allows him to make sense in a lot of these roles, like Sons of Anarchy, which I know you didn't watch. But it is like he is playing the head of this biker gang. And it's a ridiculous role. And he's like the poet king of this band of outlaw bikers. And it's dumb, it's dumb. But it's also, he has actual screen presence and charisma. - He's great. - It's too bad that he's not a very good actor. - And Jude Law in this movie. Jude Law is fantastic. - Jude Law is definitely the best thing about the film. I think anyone, no one would deny it.
JVL00:06:58- I would go further. I would say this might be Jude Law's finest performance. Has Jude Law ever been better at anything else? - Literally everything else.
Sonny00:07:06- The talented Mr. Ripley? - He's AI. He's better in AI than this. - I just did. - Absolutely. - Gigolo Joe? - Gattaca. - Gigolo Joe. - No, I don't. - Gattaca's a trash movie. - I don't like Gattaca. - People often talk about Gattaca as this great movie. You know what Gattaca looks like? It looks like it was made for $12 in somebody's basement.
Vic00:07:25- Well, okay, there's that, but I'm fascinated by-- - The movie is trash. - Is that a Philip Dick story, or no? - No, it's a knock-off Philip Dick. - Oh, is that right? I'm fascinated by that because of the importance that everything has to be clean. Everybody's clean. Everything is extremely clean and perfect. Obviously, I would not be going up on that rocket ship. I'd be Jude Law.
JVL00:07:42- All I'm saying, we can leave this alone, but I would say that anybody who is interested should go and revisit Chav King Arthur, and I believe that you will wind up agreeing with me. - Vic, how was your weekend?
Sonny00:07:53- That it's the best fantasy film since Fellowship of the Ring. It's better than Two Towers, better than, better than, I think we'll probably not agree on that.
JVL00:08:02- I just watched Two Towers like two months ago. Have you been back to the Two Towers recently?
Sonny00:08:06- I watch those movies. I catch bits and pieces of them all the time on cable.
JVL00:08:10- How did The Ents strike you?
Sonny00:08:12- You loved The Ents. JVL, you loved The Ents. - No, I would say that Two Towers is the weakest of those movies because I think the effects work was not good at the time. - It doesn't, it doesn't look good now. But like the shot where the roquerum comes over the, has always looked terrible. That has always looked like a trash shot. And I thought a lot of the like crowd shots of the orcs at the Battle of Helm's Deep always looked bad. And The Ents I thought didn't look great, but I also thought they looked fine for what they were, which was.
Vic00:08:43- Do you remember when you staunchly defended that movie in John Podhoretz's reply to you? Do you remember this?
JVL00:08:51- I don't. - Remember what he said?
Vic00:08:52- It was funny. - It was just the last line that really got you, which was, "Oh yeah, and cute talking trees." - You know what?
JVL00:08:59Like everything else, it turns out. - Yeah, John's right. - John Podhoretz was right. - Yeah, John's right.
Sonny00:09:03- J-Pod was right. - John's always right. - John was right. - John's always right. - Sonny, how are you? - I'm great. - What's going on? - Things are fine in my world. Let me tell you, I'm wearing a different pair of headphones today for a variety of reasons. They came, it is, let me set the scene. I got a new computer for work. I got a new MacBook Pro. It's very big. - Yes, very nice. - You got it, or the Free Beacon got it for you? - Well, I bought it in the Free Beacon, I bought it with the Free Beacon's credit card.
JVL00:09:30- That's a, that's a thing that happens?
Sonny00:09:32- I was, I was given the credit card. - How about the spy software that the Free Beacon put on your computer? Did that happen? - No, that didn't, that didn't happen. - Question. - I hope it's not on my computer.
JVL00:09:42- Go ahead. - Does the Free Beacon require you to seek authorization any time you want to install a program, such as, for instance, Google Chrome? - No. - So if you wanted to use Google Chrome, would you have to take your computer over to the tech people in your office, and ask permission, and ask them to install it for you, because you are prohibited from installing Google Chrome? - That sounds insane, that sounds insane.
Sonny00:10:10- Question, what's a tech, what's a tech people?
JVL00:10:12What if you wanted to install a plug-in on Google Chrome?
Sonny00:10:15Like after, after asking them to install Google Chrome
JVL00:10:18for you, you then wanted to install a plug-in? Like, I don't know, that allowed it to read Adobe files, or podcasts, or something. Would you have to go back to the tech people to ask, and would they answer, you know, "Oh, do you have a business purpose for having this?"
Vic00:10:36- That was very Limp Bizkit of you! Sorry, that's an old reference.
JVL00:10:40- This is why this computer belongs to me.
Sonny00:10:45- No, the work paid for my computer. - I'm sorry, I got so upset about this.
Vic00:10:49- That's okay, that's okay, that's okay.
Sonny00:10:51- I don't know why, but go ahead, Sonny. - And I didn't do any price shopping or anything, 'cause it doesn't matter. It's just free money over there. We just spend it, spend it around. But one of the things, the place I ordered it from, threw in a pair of Beats by Dre in-ear headphones. - Which are, that's fancy! - They're the worst-- - You didn't buy it from Apple? - No. - Or from Amazon, rather? - No, I didn't buy it from Amazon. I bought it from, I think, B&H Photo and Video. - Not J&R? - Not J&R, B&H.
JVL00:11:21- So they threw in, it's a throw-in?
Sonny00:11:23- They threw it in. They were like, hey, if you buy this laptop, you'll get these great headphones. They're the biggest pieces of I've ever owned.
Vic00:11:30- Well, they look like they fit snugly.
Sonny00:11:34- Well, they're in-ear headphones, so they have little silicon things that you can put on 'em, and it'll fit perfectly in your ear. And there is something to be said for that. But I've owned other in-ear headphones before that have been--
Vic00:11:46- Better. - Vastly better, drastically better than this. - What do we sound like on this?
Sonny00:11:51- We sound, as I was saying before we started the show, you guys sound like, and I in particular, sound like I'm talking through a can that is tied to a string. That's what it sounds like. That's what the world sounds like wearing these headphones. They are the biggest pieces of crap I've ever had. And I've owned a fair number of different kinds of headphones before. I used to have a pair of Ultimate Ear in-ear earbuds that were very, very nice. And the only reason I don't wear them anymore is because the cord kept breaking, 'cause I didn't really take very good care of it. That's a me problem. That's not a Ultimate Ear earbuds problem. But compared to the Status Audio headphones that we use, we are not, Status Audio, not sponsors of this show in any way, but we all wear-- - Friends of the show. - Yes, we do. - They're friends of the show, but not, we don't get any free gear or anything like that. The closed back, the CB1s, a million times better than these headphones. I mean, just like, it is like listening to the show from, it's like if the show was broadcast on the radio in the 1940s. That's what it sounds like right now. - It sounds horrible. - Flash! Walter Winchell, Flash!
Vic00:13:01Okay. - Question.
JVL00:13:02- Yes.
Sonny00:13:03- What model are those? - I don't know, I'd have to look it up.
JVL00:13:07- Because I'm gonna look at these, I'm wondering what the street price on those puppies is.
Sonny00:13:11- I bet they're at least, I bet they're probably $100 headphones. - Wow! - Maybe like $80 headphones, but I bet they're insanely expensive. - That sounds, that's true.
JVL00:13:20- That's terrible. - Looking, looking, looking.
Sonny00:13:23- Anyway. - You guys keep talking. - So just, this is an object lesson in the fact that Beats headphones are trash. They've always been trash, they're overpriced garbage that are sold to stupid people by famous people in order to make them more famous and more rich. And they're really just awful headphones. They're bad headphones, they don't sound good. - That's amazing. You put a name on it, then you can jack up the price. - If you see somebody wearing Beats headphones, just know that they're a sucker. And if you're listening to this show right now on Beats headphones, I'm sorry, but you've been taken.
Vic00:13:58- But maybe they were received as part of a free deal. - Maybe, if you got them for free.
Sonny00:14:03And again, the only reason I'm wearing them is because they're small and I can wrap them up and put them in my pocket. I don't want to be carrying a bag around today. And I just, it's trash. They're trash headphones.
JVL00:14:16- These are, JVL, these are cheapy headphones. - Oh really, how expensive? - They sell these for 60 bucks. - Oh, 60 bucks.
Sonny00:14:25- So these are the entry level. - Entry level Dr. Dre. - But that's still, I think, $5 or $10 more than the CB1s. Or maybe $20.
JVL00:14:34- Or CB1s. - They're close to price.
Sonny00:14:36- Yeah. - If you're in the market for headphones, go to Status Audio.
JVL00:14:40- Dre would never wear these, the Status.
Sonny00:14:43- Dre, what does Dr. Dre know about good audio quality? Anyway. - So that's my weekend, I'm wearing trash headphones.
Vic00:14:53Sorry I can't hear that.
Sonny00:14:54- How was your weekend, Victorino?
Vic00:14:54- It was nice. I actually had an unexpected Sunday where my friend down the street asked if I was around and he had a bottle of scotch. So I said, "Sure, I'd love to see what that's all about." And so he came over with a bottle of Balvenie, and you've met him before, a friend of mine who works for the FBI, but he just retired. So we figured it was time to, I said, "Let's break open this bottle." I had another bottle and we spent pretty much the whole afternoon just toasting and drinking. And I congratulated him on 21 years working for the FBI. He started, he was like the youngest deputy sheriff of Portland, Oregon. And then from there he went to U.S. Marshals. And then from there he joined--
Sonny00:15:42- Did he catch Dr. Kimball?
Vic00:15:48- We thought he was guilty at first. And then he realized, "Wait a minute." And then he went down to, he joined the FBI, and was the L.A. office and worked on the Heidi Fleiss case, which he said was a lot of fun, 'cause he interviewed lots of interesting people. And then he did the Green River Killer, which was a serial killer case in Washington. That was awful, and the details for that were awful. - What are some of the details, Vic? - A lot of body parts, a lot of body parts. I think he, and the Green River Killer supposedly killed like 70 people. He was convicted on like 47 or 48 or something like that. Really, really dark stuff. Anyway, and he said, you know, after 21 years, and he's adjusting to, he's working the private sector, and he got into cyber terrorism. But before that, and he was doing things like busting prostitution rings. And in fact, he would do like, they would bust, you know, like places in D.C., but also Virginia. And it was the craziest story I ever heard, where he said a pimp managed to convince local Northern Virginia high school students, girls, to prostitute themselves, to make, hey, you wanna make a little extra? He'd like approach them on Metro Station, hey, you wanna make some extra money? And they're like, sure. And it became this big thing, until they finally, and thank God, they brought him down. I was so horrified by that. And I told him, that's the worst thing I ever heard, and I'd hate to be in that area. Where did this take place? And he said, you know, like in this area here in Arlington or wherever. I said, no, no, no, specifically, what are the cross streets? 'Cause I just don't wanna be in the cross, I just wanna make sure I'm not at the cross street where is it again?
Sonny00:17:18And so, anyway.
Vic00:17:19It's funny, after that, I feel like he's watching me now differently on the street.
JVL00:17:23- Was, is there anything that you could do yourself as a concerned citizen? - I could drive around, I should drive around.
Sonny00:17:31- What should you look out for, to, if you see on the streets, you know, what are the signs? - A high school girl
JVL00:17:36who might be being forced to project. Should you stop and try to pick her up and take her to safety? - Yes, like as a sting, like for sure.
Vic00:17:43I'll pretend, I'll pretend to be a John, right? I'll pretend to be a John, and I'll pull up if I see, like, some girls, like at a street, hey, hey, any of you, you know, interested in making some money? And if they say yes, then I know, oh, I gotta, you know.
JVL00:17:56- And you report them to the authorities.
Vic00:17:58- Do you remember that Arrested Development, the great Arrested Development, with Barry, you know, Henry Winkler's character? And he pulls in, he stops, he says, ask the prostitute, you're not one of these guys, are you? That is, you know, secretly dressed up as a woman. - No, I'm all woman. - And then he speeds away, and then he speeds away. No, so, and then he got into cyber terrorism and things like that. And so, anyway, 21 years, and I said, you know what, I just did 21 years at The Weekly Standard. - Did you retire? - Before going to The Beacon. - Oh, did you retire? - I retired, and I said, you know, and I feel like I have the same amount of accomplishment that he did after 21 years.
Sonny00:18:27- I mean, has he ever found a bold semicolon?
Vic00:18:30- That's what I'm saying. I'm catching these bold semicolons, and he's busy, I don't know, doing what, catching predators. But over the weekend, the predator took the top spot at the box office with $24 million, followed by the nun with 18 million, and in third place, a simple favor with 16 million, Sonny, what is a simple favor?
Sonny00:18:49- Is that the movie with Blake Lively?
Vic00:18:50- The fact that you're asking me, that's a bad sign.
Sonny00:18:53- By Paul Feig, no, I did not, that was not on my radar for some reason. Literally, I was like, wait, what is this movie?
Vic00:19:00- A Simple Plan, now that's a good movie. - Yes. - Okay, and I believe this is one of these special moments where all three of us have seen The Predator. Yes.
JVL00:19:11JVL, you can hold, hold back. - Three of us? - No, just three of us. - Oh. - There's nothing to say about this. - Come on.
Vic00:19:22- This is such a terrible movie. Okay, Sonny, how about a big boy review, as JVL says?
Sonny00:19:28- Boy, this is a hard one to do a big boy review for because it's such a mess. The Predator is essentially a sequel to the 1990 film Predator 2. It is about a guy who is a sniper in the military. He's doing some work down in Central America, and he-- - With kidnapping drug victims. - There's a kidnapping-- - Which is what the army does. - Drug victim. I--
Vic00:20:00- Is it really the army?
Sonny00:20:01- It is not really clear why he is about to assassinate this drug lord, but he starts killing people, and then a Predator ship crashes, which we had seen,
JVL00:20:13I think, earlier, had gone through some sort
Sonny00:20:15of time warp, some sort of space field-- - Yes, I saw, and I thought-- - Being pursued. - Being pursued.
Vic00:20:20- It looked like a scene from The Last Starfighter. It was that good.
Sonny00:20:23- And the Predator shows up, and he kills a bunch of guys, kills his guys, kills some other guys, and he steals, the sniper steals the Predator's gear and sends it to his kid, who is on the spectrum. He's got super powers. He's on the spectrum. - Oh, he's on the spectrum. - And the-- the kid figures out how, basically, how the other Predator ship works, and like, de-cloaks it and stuff, and there's... God, I am trying to remember the plot of this movie, and it is such a mess. Then we cut to Olivia Munn, who is a scientist. - Of course. - Just the-- - Thank God. - She's definitely a scientist. She knows the science. - Anatomy. - And she brings, she brings, she comes to a base where Sterling K. Brown has, has kidnapped the Predator, and they're gonna dissect it or something, they're studying it, and then the thing escapes. But guys, I don't know if you know this, there's another Predator. There's another Predator hunting the Predator. And the first Predator is bringing us a thing to fight global warming, maybe? But nobody really knows what he's bringing. And then the--
JVL00:21:39- He's here to help humanity, which is why he slaughters every human he finds. - Exactly. - Except for naked Olivia Munn.
Vic00:21:44Kugel just explained that part of the plot to me, which I didn't get. And I said, "Well, if he's good, he killed so many people."
Sonny00:21:50- He killed so many people. He's here to help us, but he's also a killer. So then, anyway, the Sniper gets set up with a team of crazy people. And the team of crazy people, they've got some good repartee, and they gotta go find the Sniper's family, and save him from the Predator, and also Sterling K. Brown. And this movie is bad. It's bad. There are a couple of very, there are two things I like about this movie. I liked the Shane Black style dialogue, where people are talking like real people, and having actual conversations. - Sure, that was funny. - Kind of snappy, the bit where they're talking about why they decided to call it the Predator, instead of the trophy hunter-killer, or whatever, is funny, and entertaining, and enjoyable. And Sterling K. Brown is also very good in this movie, except for the fact that I have no idea what his actual motivation is. I have no idea what-- - No, are we supposed to like him?
Vic00:22:43- Are we supposed to like him, or are we supposed to hate him? 'Cause I like him, by nature, I like Sterling Brown.
Sonny00:22:47- We're clearly supposed to hate him, except he's right about trying to figure out what these Predators are doing here, and you know.
Vic00:22:54- If you watch the trailer, it's also unclear. In the trailer, I'm like, oh, hey, Sterling K. Brown's in this, and I like him, and he seems funny in the trailer. He's laughing and doing things.
Sonny00:23:01- And there are a couple of pretty good, clever shots. Like, there's this one, there's a shot where the Predator, who is cloaked, has killed a guy, and the blood is dripping down on the cloaked thing, and you see it kind of reveal, and I'm like, oh, that's like an interesting way to demonstrate what is going on. The problem with this movie is that it is bad, first off. It's clearly, like, it was clearly hacked apart and put back together by somebody in the editing room. Supposedly, there was like a whole 30-minute subplot involving Edward James Olmos that was stripped out of the film entirely, and on top of that, it is trying to set up this sequel and this, of this world. The real problem with this movie, and we'll talk about this a little more, maybe, is that it is obsessed with the Predator technology, which is the least interesting thing about the Predator. It is obsessed with, like, trying to figure out how their ships work and how their weapons work and how they're, and like-- - Versus alien motivation. - Versus, versus just like, versus just trying to, to win your freedom. I mean, the reason the first film works, the reason the Predator works is because it is basically the highest concept, high concept movie that you, that you could predict. What if Arnold Schwarzenegger was a deer being hunted by a hunter? Like, that is the movie. And it is, and it is, it works on every level because it is very stripped down to its simplest, basic idea. And this doesn't work because there's a billion different things going on. I mean, again, there's this, like, weird subplot about global warming that goes nowhere, that they don't really do anything with. There's this whole, there's this coda at the end, spoilers, but there's this coda at the end where they get more Predator gear that's like Super Predator gear and the Super Predator gear can kill all the other Predators. And it's just like, why, this is, none of this is interesting or good. Well, that's for the sequel. That's never gonna get made, 'cause this movie's gonna, I can't.
Vic00:24:58I saw this movie yesterday. I must have missed certain, I had to use the bathroom, so, I actually felt like, I could see. It's an hour forty. You had to use the bathroom for an hour forty movies? Yes, I had to go. I had to go.
JVL00:25:12It just makes me concerned.
Vic00:25:15Well, I go like, what, you know, forty, fifty times a day, that's normal, isn't it? Anyway, it was one of those days. And I just, I gotta get, and I go up, and I just didn't care, and I came back, and I guess they got captured by Sterling Brown's, the humans got captured, and so I'm like, we're trying to figure it out.
Sonny00:25:32This is a real problem in the movie, is that there's no sense of location or direction in this. People just go off in different ways and show up all at the same place, and there's no sense of how they got there or why they got there or where they're going. I mean, there's just, there's no spatial definition.
JVL00:25:49The best part of this is the climactic fight when the bad Predator takes off in his spaceship, taking three of the crazy people with him, leaving Olivia Munn behind. The spaceship, after flying around for like 10 minutes, crashes. There ensues a fist fight between the lead character and the Predator. Yeah, super Predator. And all of a sudden, Olivia Munn just sort of jumps down onto, the ship has gone, what, 30 miles? 50 miles?
Sonny00:26:17She's fast! It's not clear if it did a big loop.
Vic00:26:19It must have done a loop. She's right there. It must have done a loop. The one thing that this movie was not short on was a lot of sort of gore and violence, and I think that's why I had problems last night falling asleep. If there was only a way I could calm myself down, JVL.
JVL00:26:37So, Calm.com has brought to my attention last week that it was a little bit difficult to tell what I was saying. Calm.com, what is Calm.com? Calm, C-A-L-M.com.
Sonny00:26:49As in, if you're feeling calm.
JVL00:26:52And what this is, is it's an app that you get on your phone and you subscribe to it, and they have all sorts of stuff on there. Meditations and body scans and relaxation talks, which I'm sure are very useful, and many people seem to use them and like them. What we use it for in The Last Family is for getting our children to sleep. As I said last week, the Calm.com corporate motto should be better than Benadryl, because it's like magic. It makes your children sleep. And so they have this whole collection of sleep stories, and they have these fantastic readers who will read adaptations of "Cinderella" or the "Butterfly Net." I would like to, because I feel like nobody believes me, I want to play for you the first couple seconds of the one that we fell asleep listening to last night, which is by our second favorite reader, who is a fellow named Eric Braugh. So listen to this.
Guest00:27:50- Good evening. My name's Eric Braugh. And tonight, I'll be reading you a very special sleep story that some might call "The Lost Grimm Fairy Tale."
JVL00:28:03- Those are pipes. - Is that supposed-- - Those are pipes. - Am I supposed to be aroused? Is that the effect of this? Oh, no, no, I'm supposed to be falling asleep. Sorry, I get confused. - So this is what we do in our-- - Is that Braugh, B-R-A-S? - B-R-A-E, I believe.
Vic00:28:16Let me look.
JVL00:28:17No, I'm sorry, B-R-A-A. - Oh, okay. - Eric Braugh. And so we fall asleep listening to my two girls who are horrible sleepers. My girls are the worst sleepers in the world. And we literally could not exist and live without Calm.com. Any parent who has a bad sleeper, which I get the sense is more than half of all parents, 'cause if you have two kids, at least one of them will be a lousy sleeper. It's amazing. This should be essential gear the way a white noise machine is essential gear. Or a baby jogger. So we love it, we use it all the time. I listen to it. I listen to it even when I'm alone. When I was in my hotel room, I fell asleep to my Calm.com sleep stories. - Very nice. - It is no fooling true that I have probably listened to 40 different one of these and I think I've made it to the end of one of them.
Vic00:29:13- Are the stories, if I can ask a question in the middle of your ad read, sorry, are they different for like adults and children? - Yeah, they have whole separate categories.
JVL00:29:22There are adult ones, there's one about the Yellowstone National Park, which sort of has this very soothing voice talking about Yellowstone and the history of Yellowstone National Park. I, of course, only listen to the children's stories, even when I'm on my own. I don't listen to it growing up.
Vic00:29:34- You don't want nightmares, you don't want nightmares.
JVL00:29:36- It's just great, we love all of our sponsors equally, but I, just the same way, I love all of my children equally.
Sonny00:29:46- Wow.
JVL00:29:47- I will only say that Calm.com is my favorite, and I will be giving Calm.com my money long after they stop giving this podcast their money. They're great, everybody should have them. So, for a limited time, Weekly Standard listeners can get 25% off of a Calm premium subscription, which is a really good deal. Again, we pay full freight, we don't get 25% off. Calm.com, which is C-A-L-M.com/substandard. You get unlimited access to all their stuff, including all the great sleep stories, which are, as I said, the best part of it. So go to Calm.com/substandard, they'll give you 25% off. That is, one more time, Calm.com/substandard.
Sonny00:30:28- I want a website that's Calm.com, and it's just Calmini reading your stories. And he's angry. It's like in his layer cake.
JVL00:30:34Layer cake, layer cake, Calm. - That's good. - Let me explain joint venture to you.
Vic00:30:39- That'd be great. I have thoughts on The Predator. First off, JVL, was that, did they really film on Johns Hopkins campus?
JVL00:30:51- I don't believe that was Hopkins. Certainly not. No, I have not been to Hopkins since the day I walked out. - Yes. - And I will never return there. You couldn't pay me enough to go back to that hellhole.
Vic00:31:01- Does that count for the hospital? Like, God forbid you're, you know, you need to go to a hospital, and you're near there, and they're gonna send you there. Are you gonna say, "Oh." - Well, the hospital's,
JVL00:31:08like, half a world away from the campus.
Vic00:31:10- But because it has the same name and affiliation, would you choose a different hospital? - No, I'd go to a different hospital. Believe me. - I'll take Baltimore County.
JVL00:31:15- Having worked at the Baltimore County Hospital a little bit while I was there in my undergraduate years, I would take Hopkins Hospital.
Vic00:31:21- Okay, okay, fair enough. Okay, what were your thoughts on the casting? Because, you know, it took me, I'm not gonna say-- - Tom Jane.
JVL00:31:31- Thank you, you knew where I was going with this. - It's the saddest thing I've ever seen.
Sonny00:31:35- I felt sad, I felt sad. - While I was watching, I was like, God, that guy looks a lot like Tom Jane. He kind of acts like Tom Jane, but that can't be Tom Jane because he looks like a leather Muppet version of Tom Jane. - But he was great.
Vic00:31:48- But he was great, no, he was. - He was because he's Tom--
Sonny00:31:50- I just want my kids back.
Vic00:31:51- Because he's Thomas Jane, and so you're like--
JVL00:31:53- He plays, for people who haven't seen the movie, which is everybody, he plays a former, a veteran with Tourette's Syndrome, and he's fantastic.
Vic00:32:03- I spent maybe like 20, 30 minutes thinking, God, he looks familiar. Why do I? And then I think to myself, he looks like Thomas Jane. I'm like-- - He looks like Thomas Jane. - Oh, but I, what would he be doing in this movie? And I'm like, oh my God, he is in this movie. And that's why people, in the audience, people are laughing at all his lines, and it's because he is overqualified.
Sonny00:32:21- He should have been the lead. - Well, no, the thing is-- - He deserves better than this. - I actually thought Boyd Holbrook was fine in this movie. - He was fine, he wasn't bad. - But this is a movie that 10 years ago, Thomas Jane would have been the lead in, and the question is, like, what, what happened? - He could have been the lead in it right now.
Vic00:32:35- No, there's no reason he couldn't have been the lead in this. - Instead of being a very minor character, you know. - Because, what is the guy's name? - But why?
JVL00:32:43- Boyd Holbrook, he's not a star. He doesn't bring you anything in terms of opening. - But why?
Sonny00:32:47- But why has Thomas Jane not had the career that he should? - I don't know, it probably has nothing to do
JVL00:32:52with the obsession of youth in Hollywood, right?
Vic00:32:55- I spent part of the movie thinking the same thing, and no wonder feeling like I feel kind of sad at the end of the movie, because, oh, by the way, that's how-- - He's a working actor, God bless, no, no. - I assume he's-- - Tom Jane, he's a character. - Keeping busy, but-- - The guy who always wanted to be a character actor.
JVL00:33:07I don't think he ever wanted to be a leading man.
Vic00:33:10- I used to confuse-- - Well, he got his wish. - He was a great Mickey Mantle. I used to, remember we used to joke about confusing him and Aaron Eckhart? - Totally. - Yeah. - 100%. - It's funny how-- - Still do.
Sonny00:33:21- A different arc. - Aaron Eckhart, meanwhile, is starring in I, Frankenstein. He's really, he's just-- - Aaron Eckhart is another guy.
JVL00:33:26Well, but Aaron Eckhart is another guy who really, he has the lantern jaw of a leading man, but the soul of a character actor.
Vic00:33:32- Yeah. - I don't think there's anything bad about that. - JVL, you don't watch Game of Thrones. Did you notice Reek? - Yes. - Why does he have an English accent? - That's another guy who--
Sonny00:33:42- No, but it's not English, it's Irish. - Oh, it's Irish. - It's Irish, and it was like, ugh, I don't like this. - I didn't either.
JVL00:33:48- He's the guy with the Irish accent who can fly helicopters, apparently.
Sonny00:33:52He was in Explosives. - Explosives. - But also flies helicopters.
Vic00:33:55- He was like Murdoch in the '18, I guess.
Sonny00:33:57- Every character choice in this movie is terrible.
Vic00:34:00- There are times where I think to myself, oh, he shouldn't have to speak with the American accent. Let him be him, like in the Star Wars movies. - Wait, who are we talking about? - Don't put me on the spot. - Reek? - Yeah, but the actor who plays, who's the former stormtrooper in Force Awakens. - Oh, John Boyega? - Yeah, John Boyega. I think he would be perfect as an English actor because all the other members of the empire had English accents. In this one, it's more confusing, 'cause you're in the heartland of America. - Why was that guy-- - This guy's in prison, and he has a really thick accent. - In a military prison. - In a military prison.
Sonny00:34:30- He was a US soldier who's clearly Irish.
Vic00:34:32- Well, they didn't-- - I assume they exist. - Part of the movie that was cut out was when he was in the IRA, and then he defected. - Well, that's right. He's a bomber.
Sonny00:34:40- He's a bomber, and they needed him for his skills. - Anyway, basically everything about this movie.
JVL00:34:46- It's so bad.
Sonny00:34:47- There's a stark contrast between the original Predator, which had a group of guys who you got to know pretty well, very quickly. - And you liked them. - And you liked them, and they were all super competent. And this movie is like, it would be like if Bill Duke in the original one had done like a song and dance number before getting killed by the Predator. I mean, there's like weird levels of schtick here
JVL00:35:12that don't quite work. - But no, see, I disagree. I think the only things in the movie that work are the crazy guys.
Sonny00:35:18- I think it's definitely the best part of the movie. - The only thing that works-- - The other guy, I can't remember his name, but the other guy-- - Is the crazy guys all talking together,
JVL00:35:24and then talking with Olivia Munn in the hotel room.
Sonny00:35:28Nothing else works. - It is the most Shane Black part of the movie, where it's just like, the dude's talking. Which is, shockingly, the Dude's Chatting podcast
JVL00:35:37loves the dude's talking. - So here's what I, this is a very bad movie, and I don't mean that it's a movie that we don't like, or a movie that we think operates on too puerile a level. I mean, just qua movie, like thing that is stitched together. - As a piece of storytelling on celluloid. - Yes. - No, but even as a piece of editing on celluloid. Like, I can't--
Sonny00:36:00- Well, that's what I mean, that's what I mean.
JVL00:36:01- How did this get, how did this get released in this format?
Sonny00:36:05- Yup, gotta go with it.
JVL00:36:06Nope, that's fine. - Does somebody have a vendetta against Shane? So look, it's not like they were struggling to meet an important release date. This is where you dump your trash anyway.
Vic00:36:16- And what does Shane Black think?
JVL00:36:18- So I couldn't tell if this is that Shane Black has sort of, in the intervening years, imploded, and no longer competent to make a movie, which I have difficulty believing.
Sonny00:36:29- But The Nice Guys was perfectly good.
JVL00:36:32- This is a studio which has come in and basically sabotaged a film. - Ooh. - Because, again, it is impossible to watch this and think that it is fit for release. That doesn't mean that it would have grossed anymore, it doesn't mean that it would be a good movie or something, but you could have made this a competent-looking movie. I mean, things like, the continuity errors, where there's a scene where it's night, and then all of a sudden, it's day. What has just happened? Like, how can that happen? You can't do that.
Sonny00:37:04- I, uh... I wanna be careful with what I say here, because people will correct me on the internet. I do not think Shane Black is competent to handle an action movie of this size on his own. I think that you look at the action scenes in this movie, and they're all chaotic, and none of the actual camera movements make sense. As I said, there's no sense of spatial awareness. He's not done any favors by a cinematographer who has lit everything so poorly, you can barely tell what's going on. And if you compare it to, say, Iron Man 3, which is a big action movie, it's very clear what sort of role Marvel's style and the second-unit directors that Marvel has employed on these films, it's very clear what sort of role they play. Because the role they play is to make the action scenes good and intelligible and credible. And without that sort of hand-holding here, it seems very lost.
JVL00:38:03- So here's my question.
Sonny00:38:06Why does this movie exist?
JVL00:38:08The Predator is not a viable, important piece of intellectual property. It was not crying out for a reboot. It has not been a source of significant revenue in a long time. The only reason for it to exist is because you want to make a Shane Black movie. And so if the studio decides they want to screw up the movie, well then why were you doing it in the first place, right? I mean, if you're not doing it to have a Shane Black movie, then why go in and chop it up?
Sonny00:38:40- I think you're wrong in terms of how the studio sees the property. I think The Predator has been seen as a property that will appeal to many people, especially teenage boys, for years. This is why we have an Alien vs. Predator.
JVL00:38:56- Which is the most insane IP mashup ever. We're just gonna take these two things that have nothing to do with it, and I believe it comes from a video game first, right? So they mashed them up first within the video game, and then decided to make a movie out of the video game.
Sonny00:39:13- I think it was a comic book for many years. I think there were a lot of Alien vs. Dark Horse Alien. But also, but remember at the end of Predator 2, everyone got real excited 'cause there was the alien head in the ship of Predator, and so for years this has been a thing that people have, no, the most insane genre mashup of all time, it's not a movie, it was just a video game, was, do you remember Terminator vs. Robocop? That was a thing. That was a thing. - X-Men vs. Street Fighter. - X-Men vs. Street Fighter, but at least that makes sense within the universe of a fighting game. Anyway, but I think the studio has always thought of the Predator as a thing that people really love and looks really cool, so we can just do anything with it. And they're obviously, with this film, trying to create some sort of Predator franchise, the end of the film the ridiculous Predator-killer gear thing. And again, it's just like, there's a very basic level of incompetence in this film. At the end of it, I actually couldn't understand Boyd Holbrook's last line. I had to ask somebody afterwards.
JVL00:40:15- Yeah, I hope this comes in a 42 long.
Sonny00:40:17- And all I heard was, I heard the, "It's my new suit." That's all I heard at the end of the film. I was like, "Okay," and then it cuts to credits. I'm like, "That's great, good job, guys."
Vic00:40:30- You said you recently, you know what I was hoping, by the way, when the thing opens up? I was hoping that it would be an alien that comes out of there. Oh yeah, 'cause this is the thing that kills the Predator.
Sonny00:40:39- There are literally a million things it could have been that would have been better than that. An alien, a cryo-frozen Arnold Schwarzenegger. - Yeah, that would have been great, that would have been great. - How about a cryo-frozen Danny Glover? - Cryo-frozen Danny Glover, Abraham Lincoln. - Whoa! - Literally, yeah, Abraham Lincoln, Predator Hunter. You know, literally, there are a billion things that would have been better than Predator suit for teens.
Vic00:41:03- That was so disappointing. I didn't stay to the end, end, end, at the end of the credits. Did I miss anything? - There were no, I looked it up. - Okay, thank God. - 'Cause I didn't stay either. - Thank God my meter was up. Sonny, you recently saw Predator 2 again, and you said how terrible it was.
Sonny00:41:17Are you telling me that's worse than this? - I was gonna watch, I was actually gonna watch all of the Predator-- - Including AVP. - So I watched Predator, then I watched Predator 2, and Alien vs. Predator, and after watching Alien vs. Predator, I just couldn't do it anymore. Because Predator 2 is worse than I remembered it being. - Sure, it's great when you're young, when you're a kid. - It is a bad movie, and it is actually more interesting to think of as the genre of early '90s films that posited a slightly futuristic urban America that was just a hellscape of violence and criminal activity. Like, you also have Strange Days, which kind of fits into that. - Grunge. - What's that? - This is grunge. I mean, this is like, we're the birth of grunge. - Right, or like RoboCop, there's like a whole kind of mini-genre of these movies, and it is more interesting to think of that way than as a Predator movie, 'cause as a Predator movie, it's terrible. It's just, it is the opposite of everything that is done well in the first film. There are too many characters, there's too much going on, there are too many villains, like all these sub-gangs that aren't interesting in any way, and are vaguely racist, and it's just, all of it is terrible. And then I watched Alien vs. Predator, and that movie is just boring. It's like, it's actually shocking how boring it is. You have a movie with aliens and Predators, and nothing happens for the first 50 minutes of the movie. Just nothing happens. They go to Antarctica and they find this ship, and there's nothing to propel the action, like it violates every rule of action screenwriting. Like there are no action beats until like 50 minutes into the movie. It's amazing. I'm actually like kind of impressed by how bad it is. And I just couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't watch Alien vs. Predator Requiem. I couldn't rewatch Predators. I just, I was like, I'm done with this. This is, and this is the problem with the Predator. The Predator is not an interesting character. It has interesting design. - It's a boring character. - It's a boring character. It's just a hunter. - It's a really boring character. - He's just a hunter. That's all he is. He's a silent killer who hunts extraordinary human beings. And you can't really build a franchise around that. - Especially when he's-- - Especially when he keeps losing.
JVL00:43:30- Especially when he keeps losing. - I mean, this is the other thing. Like, the only thing interesting about it is that he's actually unstoppable, but when it turns out he's stopped in every movie, well then, what is? - He's actually not that good a hunter.
Sonny00:43:40I'm watching Alien vs. Predator, and again, nothing happens for the first 50 minutes. And then, like, the Xenomorphs show up, and they immediately kill two of the Predators who were, like, hunting everything in this.
JVL00:43:49I'm just like, well, that's, okay.
Vic00:43:52- They got a lot of blades.
JVL00:43:53They got a lot of blades and lasers, okay. - This was the lowest opening weekend gross ever for a movie on more than 4,000 screens. - Ever? - Ever. - Ever. - Really? - Ever. Well, so says Box Office Mojo.
Sonny00:44:09I trust them.
JVL00:44:10If you wanna argue with Box Office Mojo, that's fine. Lowest ever, and breaking the record that was just set by The Mummy, I think. - Wow, okay. - So this is gonna finish south of 50 million domestically. Maybe it'll do that much internationally. On a budget of 88 million, I mean this is-- - It's a disaster.
Sonny00:44:31- It's a disaster. - It's not good.
Vic00:44:33- Do we wanna move on right to Captain Marvel?
Sonny00:44:36Discuss the trailer for that. JBL, did you have more Predator thoughts? - Yeah, I feel like-- - I just don't know who--
Vic00:44:41- Oh, wait a minute, I did have a question for you. You said it cost you a lot of money, explain. - Oh my god, it cost me so much money.
JVL00:44:47So there was no movie theater near my hotel, so I had to Uber out to the movie. Then it was only playing on the super deluxe magic special screen, which was like $22, and then-- - Was it like a Dolby Atmos, or what was that? - No, it was off-brand. - Was it like the 4DX? - Yeah, it was like off-brand Cinemark, or something like that. - Oh, yeah.
Sonny00:45:13What, did it have the seats that rumble?
JVL00:45:16- No, in fact, the seats in it were like... It was not good. It's not the Alamo, all right? I'm spoiled by the Alamo. And then I had to Uber back, and the whole time I-- It was-- The sunken cost fallacy, where I-- For five or six different moments of the movie, I almost just got up and went back and thought, "Why am I spending my time here? I'm just gonna go back and get an extra 45 minutes of sleep." And I fought through, only because I was hoping that all four of us would have seen it. Thanks.
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JVL00:47:15That was an A-plus transition.
Vic00:47:17Well, that was -- you gave me -- it was like an alley-oop. You threw it up, and then I just put it in there. We have time, I think, to discuss Captain Marvel, the trailer. I first noticed it because I saw your tweet about it, Sonny, and you said it was fine, and then I went to see it. And then, of course, I got home, and my son was talking about it as well, very excited.
JVL00:47:36Your son? What about your daughter?
Vic00:47:38Oh, yes. Oh, she was very excited. Discover what makes -- does she finally remember? Oh, hero -- her hero -- whoa, wait a minute.
Sonny00:47:46I actually thought that was okay. I thought that was an okay transition in the title card.
Vic00:47:50Okay. So, I hope this is -- I'm looking forward --
Sonny00:47:53It was the most "We Can Be Patty Jenkins"
JVL00:47:56to I've ever seen. Yeah, I know.
Vic00:47:58Oh, yeah. And they don't have to be. They don't have to do this. But I hope the second trailer is better.
Sonny00:48:03Sonny? I actually -- The thing I liked most about the first trailer is that it's actually a Nick Fury trailer.
Vic00:48:09Oh, kind of. Yeah, sure.
Sonny00:48:10It's actually about Nick Fury and how he got into being into S.H.I.E.L.D. and how he got his groove back. This movie should be called "Captain Marvel: How Nick Fury Got His Groove Back."
JVL00:48:20Question. Yes.
Sonny00:48:21Who do I have to around here to get my Nick Fury movie? This is it. This is the Nick Fury movie. This is it.
Vic00:48:27It just happens to be called "Captain Marvel."
JVL00:48:28I have been jonesing for Nick Fury, agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., or Nick Fury and his howling commandos for years, and we're running out of time.
Sonny00:48:38This is it. Let's be honest. With the de-aging, he looks so good in this, they can just do it. He looks great. He looks like Jurassic Park-era Nick Fury.
JVL00:48:46He does. He does. Hold onto your butts. With his hairline.
Sonny00:48:51His hairline is -- I mean, this movie is -- But I'm dying for a Nick Fury movie. Sure. This is -- I think this is a Nick Fury movie. Is he a straight --
Vic00:48:57That's what the first -- that's what I -- When we see the shot of his back, is he in a straight jacket?
Sonny00:49:01I don't know. I don't know. It's -- it is -- it's a Nick Fury movie that rips off the line from "Batman Begins" about why -- why we fall down. Why do we fall down, Captain Marvel? So we can get back up again.
Vic00:49:15I hope Captain Marvel doesn't come out at the same time as Shazam, Captain Marvel.
JVL00:49:18Also, do you have a Captain Marvel greater sign, lesser sign Captain Marvel? -Captain -- -Rank the Captain Marvels.
Sonny00:49:27-Wait, wait. -Do it! Do it! Jim Starlin, Captain Marvel number one, Shazam, then Lady Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel. What? Am I allowed to call her Ms. Marvel? -Wasn't she Ms. Marvel? -Well, no. So -- -Is that different? I don't know. -Well, that's what we're in. I don't know -- I don't know anything about -- -No, so Carol Danvers -- -Captain Marvel as a character.
JVL00:49:44I have to mansplain this to you. Carol Danvers was Ms. Marvel, and Carol Danvers has ceased being Ms. Marvel and is now Captain Marvel, but there were other Captain Marvels. This movie, we believe, is the Carol Danvers version of Captain Marvel, which essentially posits that Ms. Marvel, at some point, was in an explosion with the original Captain Marvel, who was a Kree soldier, and their bodies and thoughts are kind of maybe merged. -Is Jude Law Marvel? -He might be. -Okay. We don't know who Jude Law is. -He might be. We don't know. He's clearly a Kree soldier of some sort.
Vic00:50:22-So that was Jude Law as a Kree soldier? -Yeah, right. That was Jude Law, right. -Because Ben Mendelsohn's in this movie, and I just hope that... -Who loves Civ. -Yes! Get to that. Yeah, absolutely. That is the best thing I've ever read. But, you know, if you put him in a trailer, that's another reason to say, "Oh, I want to see this movie." But I didn't recognize that that was Jude Law, but my son did recon-- Ronan. Ronan. -The Accuser? Ronan the Accuser? -Yes. Ronan the Accuser.
Sonny00:50:49Not Ronan who accuses. -Not Ronan Farrow.
JVL00:50:52-Destroyer of... -Or Ronan, who is... Clinton Barton. Clinton Barton's... -You don't... -Isn't that Keanu Reeves as Ronan?
Sonny00:51:01-No, that's 47 Ronan. -47 Ronan? -Clinton Barton has a brief thing... -Robert De Niro Ronan?
JVL00:51:06...where he becomes... Very good. He becomes another character called Ronan, and anyway, it doesn't... Does he have a samurai sword instead of a hawk instead of a bow?
Vic00:51:14-No, he's got these two sticks. -Is it going to be good? Is Captain-- Because all the Marvel movies so far -have been decent to great, and... -Oh, sure, it's gonna be fun. -It'll be fun. -Okay. All right. That's not the question.
JVL00:51:24I agree with Sonny. It will be decent to great. -What's the question, JVL? -The question is the future of the MCU. Right. So we've talked about this a little bit in the past. They are going to lose their three mainstay franchise poles, which are Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man, because they can't afford the actors anymore. Right. What did Robert Downey Jr. make for The Last Avengers?
Sonny00:51:47Robert Downey Jr. made, I believe... Well, I can't remember. It was some ungodly sum, but he made... But he made like $50 million for Spider-Man Homecoming. -Yeah. I mean, it just... -Wow. -Unbelievable amounts of money. -He could actually create Stark Industries if he wanted to now.
Vic00:52:01Okay.
JVL00:52:01So the mainstay characters who are carrying their own franchises are going to go away. And instead, we are going to get Doctor Strange, Ant-Man, Black Panther, and Captain Marvel. And these are going to be the mainstay franchises of the next phase of Marvel before we... -And they'll keep then... -Then they have to start over again
Vic00:52:21-because the other ones are such great properties. -Right. Well, this is... Well, but...
JVL00:52:24But they will by then have, hopefully, Spider-Man and all of the X-Men titles spun up. And then, eight years after that is done, you just start over again with another Thor, another Captain America, another Iron Man, right? So this is... And you can see how this could... You can see how this could work. But the question is, will it? You know, and does the transition to these really third-tier characters, which is what Doctor Strange, Ant-Man, Black Panther, and Captain Marvel are. -They are third-tier heroes. -Yeah. Sure. Can the Marvel magic survive that? Is Marvel the same thing in this? Do they elevate... Which is to say, does the MCU elevate those third-tier characters into the first tier or not? And nobody knows. It's a huge gamble. So Captain Marvel is next, and then Avengers after that. Do we have another... We don't have another one in between?
Vic00:53:15I don't think so. I gotta find out what happened. -I don't think so. -Yeah. I mean...
Sonny00:53:18Sonny. It's worth noting also that the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise is kind of up in the air. -Yeah, right? Dave Bautista is walked. -Considering they're... Dave Bautista is like, "I don't really want to make it without James." It's... I don't think he's, like, officially walked. -Right. -But he is, like, making noise about how he doesn't want to do it without James Gunn. -Mm. -Um... Uh... I mean, they seem to be okay with Black Panther. -Black Panther seems to be legit. -Black Panther is legit, yeah. Ant-Man seems to be kind of stuck on the lower shelf. We'll see what happens with Doc Strange. Doc Strange 2, I don't know, but I... I mean, even the lesser Marvel movies make $600, $700, $800 million.
JVL00:54:01-Well, and the, you know, in fairness, the Thor and Captain America movies didn't make all the money. I mean, they did very, very well, but they, you know, Thor 2 did not make an insane amount of money. Iron Man 3 did not make an insane amount of money. -Made a billion dollars.
Sonny00:54:18-So, yeah, but that's, well, I mean, fair enough.
JVL00:54:21The Iron Man was the strongest of those, those original $310 million.
Sonny00:54:24-I mean, I think Thor Ragnarok made close to a billion dollars if it didn't make a billion dollars. -I'll effort that while you guys talk. -Um, yeah, it's, it's, it is worth considering that the, uh, Captain America and Thor movie started slowly and grew into much larger, uh, properties.
JVL00:54:42-Um, Lifetime Domestic, $315, uh, Worldwide Total, $850. -Oh, $850, I mean, yeah. -It's not nothing. -It's a lot of money. -It's not nothing. -Mm-hmm.
Vic00:54:54-Okay, that is all the time we're giving to this episode.
JVL00:54:58-Well, you didn't tell us what you, what you thought about it. -Oh, Captain Marvel? -You loved it?
Vic00:55:01-Yeah, are you into it? -No, I'll, I'll watch it, obviously, but I hope the second trailer's better than the first. I didn't really get anything out of that first one, except for she was, maybe she's from Earth, maybe she's not. She has memories about a girl where she got knocked over at the plate, playing baseball or softball or something, hard to tell.
JVL00:55:20-Just, I hope not softball, I hope she was playing baseball.
Vic00:55:22-I don't know what to say. So, again, I see what's going on here. She has powers, I, this is somebody who doesn't, I've not followed any of these 'cause I don't read those, you know, comics. -But you have a daughter, don't you want her to have good role models, Vic? -She was very excited about this trailer. Okay, there'll be a lot of Captain Marvels for Halloween. That's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us @VictorinoManus, @SonnyBunch, @JBLast. Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes or Google Play, just type in "Substandard" on a podcast so we're there. Leave a review, tell your friends. Until next time. So, you mentioned Ben Mendelsohn liking Civilization. That was an interesting interview in Vice where he talks about another game that he's big on. I wasn't sure 'cause I just scanned it if he is a voice in the video game or he just likes playing the other game. He seems to just like playing games. That's amazing. And he was really like, "This other thing is really the great game." But he said, traditionally, he's a-- Well, was it Fortnite?
Sonny00:56:28No, he said he would never play Fortnite, I think. But he said it was The Last of Us.
Vic00:56:34I don't know. But he said, traditionally, he's a Civ guy, he says. And it's the whole strategy and turn-based thing. He's drawn by the turn-based thing. And along those lines, Grant Addison, one of our other listeners and friends, he blamed me for now being a Civ addict as well. And I am now playing since Amazon Prime Day, when I got Civilization Complete for like $12. It was an amazing sale, like $12 or $15. Thanks for letting me know.
JVL00:57:03I really appreciate you texting me at the time to tell me that I could get it all.
Vic00:57:06And it's the complete edition, gods and kings, all combined in one.
Sonny00:57:09Well, you wouldn't be able to upload it to your computer anyway.
Vic00:57:13But it's so much more complicated because you have to take into account religion and ideology. And I was playing this. And I chose an ideology. And everybody went into uproar. Suddenly, it's like minus 20 unhappiness because they demanded I choose freedom. I happened to choose fascism. And for some reason, they didn't like it.
JVL00:57:33Did you like the nationalism or the socialism? It's not really called fascism. Or did you like sort of a fusion?
Vic00:57:38They call it, I think it's called autocracy.
Guest00:57:44What's wrong with that?
JVL00:57:45Yeah, I'm sure it's fine.
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