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#149. The Substandard on First Man and Concierge Bee Keepers!
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Dudes Chatting — First Man, NASA movie rankings, and concierge beekeeping: JVL had the weekend "dealer's choice" topics: Flash's baseball progress, the dishwasher decibel dispute with his wife, and concierge beekeeping. The group picks beekeeping. JVL visited friends Ulf and Christiane Gartsky, whose family maintains a backyard beehive as a German cultural tradition — a starter queen plus 600 bees, tended by a professional beekeeper named Larry who makes monthly visits and yells at the family for stressing the bees. Sonny threatens to burn any neighboring hive down. The First Man review follows, all three having seen it in IMAX. Sonny's verdict is broadly positive: Damien Chazelle uses IMAX cinematically rather than just spectacularly (the moon-surface sequence expands to fill the full screen, thematically mirroring Armstrong's talk about expanding mankind's horizons), the cockpit sequences convey what spaceflight physically feels like, and Ryan Gosling's stoic portrayal of Armstrong is effective. Vic liked it with reservations — some scenes are slow and the pervasive handheld camera made him queasy. JVL hated it: the shaky cam is indefensible even in domestic scenes; Ryan Gosling's Armstrong borders on Office Space's Milton in affect; the film has no ideas about what made Armstrong tick beyond his dead daughter; and every supporting NASA character (Ed White, Elliot See, Deke Slayton, Buzz Aldrin as played by Corey Stoll) is more interesting than the lead. JVL pronounces it number ten on his ten-film NASA rankings (below Space Camp and Armageddon). The group reaches consensus that Apollo 13 remains the greatest NASA film ever made. A sidebar addresses the flag-on-the-moon controversy: Sonny is emphatic that the criticism is based on misinformation, that the film is not unpatriotic, and that Ryan Gosling's "world hero" answer was simply a dumb quote that got weaponized.
Reviews: First Man — divided. Sonny: mostly successful. Vic: good with reservations. JVL: one of the worst films of the year.
Box Office: Venom held at #1 with $35.7 million. A Star is Born fell to #2 with $28 million. First Man opened at #3 with $16.5 million. Sonny announces his wife is eight and a half months pregnant.
Full transcript
JVL00:00:00- First man to walk on the moon, that'd be something. - We've chosen a job so difficult, requiring so many technological developments. We're gonna have to start from scratch.
?00:00:30- Hello, and welcome to another edition of The Substandard, sponsored by Calm and Audible.
Vic00:00:36I'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 will easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, and leave a review. Gentlemen, how are we? - We're good. - We're good. - Hello, boys. - JVL. - How are ya? - I'm okay.
Sonny00:01:05- That's very subdued. - I don't know, you've got a joker face on right now, I'm not sure what's going on.
JVL00:01:10- You wanna see magic trick? - Alright, here we go. - So I have come to play today. There are weeks when we have very little, and there are weeks where we are stuffed, just two fists full of...
Sonny00:01:24- Double fisting? - Stuff. - Oh my god. - And so I would like to play Dealer's Choice.
JVL00:01:29- I'm terrified. - Three things to talk about, you guys may choose one. We may talk about one, Flash's continuing journey as a baseball player. Two, the flashpoint that we have now reached in my marriage and in my house, about the dishwasher. Three, concierge beekeeping. And our friends, the Gartskis. - Wow, really? - How do you pick?
Sonny00:01:58- How do you pick? - I don't even know who the Gartskis are. - Ulf and Christiane. - But doesn't the phrase "concierge beekeeping" make you think, "Wah, wah, wah"? - Is it Uber but for bees?
Vic00:02:09- All right, we might as well go work our way backwards. Go ahead. - We don't do all of them. We have to pick one.
Sonny00:02:15- You can skip me this week. I don't really have anything to talk about.
Vic00:02:18- I thought I had an opinion about which one and then you threw me for a loop with the beekeeping. Ulf is a friend of ours. I assume you saw him recently. - We went over the weekend to our friend Ulf and Christiane's house.
JVL00:02:35Between the Gartskis and the last family, we have eight children under the age of 11. - Oh, boy. - Which is a lot of kids. And when we got there, their second oldest, Max, who was a contemporary of Flash, said, "Would you like to see our bees? We have bees." So I didn't quite understand what he meant by this. And what he meant is that they have a gigantic beehive on the side of their house. - Wait.
Vic00:03:01- Intentional, non-intentional. - Intentional. - Okay, yes. My wife's neighbors, they do this up in Connecticut.
JVL00:03:09- In Deutschland, this evidently is a big thing, that every family has their own hive to make their own...
Vic00:03:15- Honig. - Miel?
JVL00:03:17- Honig. H-O-N-I-G. Oh, they could call it Miel, too. - Yeah, sure. - And so I had so many questions about this. And I said, "Question. How does one get bees?" And the answer is, you purchase a queen and a starter set of 600 bees. - Oh, sorry. How many? Starter set of how many? - 600 bees. And you put them in the hive, and you go out and you feed them sugar water every 48 hours. And for the first... Yeah, and then you have to check on the queen, because the hive can be under attack. The Gartsky hive was attacked by... - By what? - Hornets.
Vic00:03:53Hornets, again. The rats of the insect world. - They're terrible. - Over the summer. - And what about yellow jackets?
JVL00:03:58To defend against them, they then had to go and install essentially a doggy door on the hive, which is so tiny that bees can get in and hornets can't. - So these are defensive fortifications. - It's a very small door.
Vic00:04:14And it's just honeybees. Do other bees try to get in on the action, like yellow jackets? - "Hey, what's going on here?" - "I belong here. I'm just working here. I'm a drone."
JVL00:04:24No. So the hive repels them. They now have tens of thousands of bees in this hive, which is located, so far as I can tell, about 20 feet away from their neighbor's house. - Is there some sort of a... - If I lived next to somebody who was keeping a beehive 20 feet away from my house, I don't think I would be happy.
Sonny00:04:43- No, I wouldn't mind... - I would murder. I would murder all of those bees.
Vic00:04:47I wouldn't mind as long as you share, A, you share the honey, you know what I mean? - So to speak. - And also, is it, you know, how is it fenced in, shall we say? - Is it free-flowing? - See, bees fly. - Bees fly. You can't really fence them in, then, can you? - But there's... So there's no stopping the bees from going to the neighbors? Is that what you're telling me?
JVL00:05:07- Actually, they have a force field. - Swarm?
Vic00:05:10- An anti-bee force field. - No, the bees go everywhere, is the answer.
Sonny00:05:15- I would spray that hive with kerosene. - But, as I would say to...
Vic00:05:20As I would say to Ulfgaardsky, that's just a little problematic.
JVL00:05:24So they... I imagine they may not have the best relationship with their neighbors. - Maybe they need some Lebensraum. - I don't know. - Wow. Wow, he went there. - So, with the bees, they're flying around and flying around. I said, "So how much honey do you get?" And they said, "Well, you can't have any honey the first year." Because the beekeeper wouldn't allow them to. And I said, "I'm sorry, you have a beekeeper?" He said, "Well, it's a concierge beekeeper."
Vic00:05:47Wait a minute. Are you telling me they're not doing their own beekeeping?
JVL00:05:50They do a certain low-level maintenance, but the high-level beekeeping is done by a professional beekeeper named Larry. And Larry comes once a month and evidently yells at the Garzki family. - For? - For stressing out the bees. How can you be doing this? Why do you let your children play in the backyard near the bees? You're going to stress the bees out. Max got stung by the bees. - Okay, there's a shocker. - And Larry was very cross with him.
Vic00:06:17- For being stung? - Yeah.
JVL00:06:19Why did you get in the way of the bees? It sounds to me like Larry might one day come and murder the entire family in order to keep the bees. For the love of the bees?
Sonny00:06:28This is like the Seinfeld episode where, was it Brad Garrett who's the Audi mechanic? - Yes, Brad Garrett. - A little bit. And he like kidnaps Jerry's car. - It's a little bit. - That's exactly what it's like.
JVL00:06:39But we live in a country where there is a thing called a concierge beekeeping service that anybody can acquire.
Vic00:06:47How expensive is a concierge beekeeper?
JVL00:06:49So that's the one question I didn't ask.
Sonny00:06:51- This is why you need me. - I was dying to ask. This is why you need me on these missions.
Vic00:06:54You would not be afraid to ask, yes.
Sonny00:06:56No, I would ask and then I would laugh at them.
Vic00:06:58But it's an amazing question.
JVL00:07:00They're going to make it up. Once you amortize the honey out, starting in year two, I'm sure it pays for itself. I love that Arlington honey.
Sonny00:07:08How much does like one queen bee and 600 starter bees cost?
JVL00:07:11I was curious about that, but also didn't ask. I guess you could find out. And I was also curious, so do they come frozen? Like do they, you know, deep freeze them and then you thaw them out? - What, the bees? - They come alive. Like an alien covenant? So like you lift out the thing and there's like dry ice, you know, spills out.
Vic00:07:28And then slowly like the bees are coming out.
JVL00:07:31Bees have come from Ireland.
Sonny00:07:35Do they come from Ireland?
JVL00:07:37I have no idea. Because you know there's a honey bee shortage in this country. Did you smuggle them in from Germany?
Sonny00:07:44Well, I thought all the bees went to China. Remember there was like the big bee disappearing panic and it turns out like all the bees went to China. Well, that's because the labor laws are more relaxed over there. And the bees know they can make their honey cheaper in China. The bees can't say anything if they want to leave.
Vic00:07:59The Chinese are hoarding the honey.
Sonny00:08:01They've got nice little bee cots.
Vic00:08:03They're hoarding the honey for their general sows. Bee keeping.
JVL00:08:08I'm sorry, are you not entertained?
Vic00:08:10I'm fascinated because it's not, it doesn't sound like it's traditional bee keeping. Your friend sounds like a bad person.
Sonny00:08:16No, I'm just kidding. No, but I would say that I would say that if somebody did that next to me, if I owned a house, and like I assume that what you're describing is kind of like You know the house is in Arlington. an inner suburb It's Arlington.
JVL00:08:31It's like being at the Ferguson house in Andy's neighborhood.
Sonny00:08:34Yeah, so if that, if that, if I were his neighbor, I would be deeply cross.
JVL00:08:38I would set it on fire. I would be vexed.
Sonny00:08:42I would throw a Molotov cocktail at it. I mean, I don't know that I would set it on fire, but I would definitely like, I would definitely get like a hose and spray insecticides on it.
Vic00:08:49You'd be like, oh my gosh, these people have, there's a honey, there's, I got to take it down.
JVL00:08:54Larry, Larry evidently yelled at them for putting down like weed and feed on their lawn. Oh, also bad. He's like, you can't, you can't put down chemicals on your, on your lawn. This is, this is the, this is the plant matter that your bees are using.
Vic00:09:08Question.
JVL00:09:10He sounds like an insane person. Anyway, we can, we can have this entire conversation. He sounds insane. We can have this entire conversation in safety because Ulf tried listening to The Substandard a few times early on and couldn't tell Sonny and I about it. So he dropped out.
Sonny00:09:22So he is not listening to the show. Is he the guy who left the two star review that we got? No. Somebody, this is, if you go and look at our iTunes, somebody left a very long, a very long two star review in which they listed all of the things we talked about before we talked about Dunkirk. It was the Dunkirk episode. And I, he really captured the spirit of the show. Really, because it's just us talking nonsense. For half the show and then half the show with Dunkirk. And he did not, he did not care for that. And I look, you know, I'm just sad that somebody could. Get us so innately and still give us a bad review. It strikes me, that's a him problem. That's not a us problem.
Vic00:09:57I have to look at that. I've told you my Ulf story where after we had lunch in the city, we were walking back to his car and the pigeon that had been partially sideswiped by a car, so it was flopping around on the intersection of 14th and F. And so Ulf goes, oh my gosh, that's terrible. Look at that pigeon. And so, you know, I feel sorry for it. And we're driving up and he says, you know, I should probably put it out of its misery. And I said, you're probably right, like a mercy killing. And I said, OK, let's do it. And so I'm running the windows down. By this point, a whole bunch of people are standing at intersection across the street and they're all staring at this flopping pigeon. And then Ulf just floors it. And all of a sudden, boom, you hear this boom. And you hear these women scream outside of the street. And I said, just keep driving. I said, don't worry, just keep driving. Ignore what just happened. I told you you did the right thing, but it was horrific.
JVL00:10:52It was horrific.
Sonny00:10:54How was your weekend? Did you get any bees? I didn't get any bees. I didn't get any bees. My weekend was fine.
JVL00:11:04Nothing interesting happened. You have any big life changes coming? Anything you want to talk about? Not really.
Sonny00:11:12Thank you, Sonny. How are your shoes? We had a good like eight minutes on bees. I usually keep track of mine.
Vic00:11:20Thank you very much.
Sonny00:11:22It takes pretty good time.
Vic00:11:24Wait, you don't have any watch news from the home front? No watch update.
JVL00:11:28Everything's fine. Reactions? There has been studied lack of reaction.
Vic00:11:34In the intelligence community, you would look at this and, you know, the very lack of reaction.
JVL00:11:38The SIGINT says that the very lack of reaction is itself a reaction.
Sonny00:11:42But it's okay. I'm sure it's fine. And what about the dishwasher? I'm much more interested in the dishwasher than those dumb bees.
JVL00:11:50Is that for another show or outtakes or something? Victorino, I want to hear how things are on the home front.
Vic00:11:55Home front's fine. I had a lovely lunch last week with Chris Caldwell. Yeah. So he came out here. We went to Ambar, which is the Balkan restaurant in Clarendon. I think it's really Serbian, but I think they get more customers by saying it's Balkan than, like, unless you're on a cleansing diet or something, you know? Sorry. And I say that, and I'm sorry. I know I got you on that, JVL. I wrote it down. Cleansing. I wrote cleansing. I said, oh, I can get one joke out of this. Maybe. But I have to. Okay. Jokes aside, and that was a bad joke, it really is good food. So I show up there, and they have a lunch express menu, so it's $20 per person, all the small plates you can eat. So it's small plates, which is annoying, but it's unlimited. So by the time I got there, Chris was -- How is that an express menu? Yeah. Well, interesting. So they're trying to annoy you into not getting your money's worth. Oh, this is what's interesting. You have to do this, all you can eat. Because I've been on many culinary adventures with Chris for the last, like, 20 years, eating live sea urchin with him. So I said, we can do a lot of damage. And I think that was -- I shouldn't have said that out loud in front of the waitress, because I think that got her nervous. So we order four, five, six plates. They start coming. And I'm just putting it down. And after a while, this is how it works for them. If they actually gave you everything you wanted, they'd be out of business. I'd go there every day, and then they'd be out of business. You see the servers less and less. You know, you're waiting, like, where'd they go? Where'd she go? She's not here. And then after that, when you order it, it takes longer for the plates to come out, you know? So by the time -- It's a war of attrition. It is a war of attrition. They think -- I think in their minds, lunch express means, oh, you know, these people, the customers, you know, express lunch. I've got to go in and out. All you can eat for 30 minutes. Yes, right, exactly. But of course, it was a Friday. It was no -- it was a no rush. So we finally -- I think at some point, Chris finally threw in the towel. That was it for him. And then, you know, like cookies and espresso. And by then, it was like, you know, two hours or something like that. So that was it. But it's -- for me, the big problem is, even after I was, like, we were technically done, my body -- I'm still hungry because my body hasn't told my brain, you know, hasn't showed it with the apostat, whatever they call it, hasn't told it to signal it that your body is now full. And it was probably about a 15-minute lag, which is the toughest 15 minutes of my life.
JVL00:14:17But I could just -- You could just fit in with the RG diet.
Vic00:14:21I don't know. We're working -- the scientists are studying it right now. Well, there were small plates, so it's reduced, you know. Oh. If it was a buffet, if it was, like, you walked up -- That would have just been gluttony. Yeah, no, that would have been gluttony. If Ambar just had, like, you go up with your plate, that would be terrible for me. I mean, because that would be destructive. But it was one of these weird things where -- I don't know. I mean, it's because for most of the week -- I mean, Sonny knows this -- I do eat a lot of salad and things like that. And I'm getting better at that. Salad, a lot of kava.
Sonny00:14:51A lot of kava.
Vic00:14:53Kava's really not that healthy, though.
Sonny00:14:55What is kava?
Vic00:14:57Kava's, like, Mediterranean. I mean, it depends on what you get. You know what, though? It's all -- it's not -- none of it is processed, which is important. How about kombucha? How much kombucha would you say you drank a week? Not enough. Not enough. I could use some kombucha. I'm not scared of kombucha. Speaking of cleansing diets. I don't know. I had some sort of parasite in me. Or a symbiote. Speaking of which -- Over the weekend, Venom. Venom. Venom. Oh, I like Venom. You like Venom? Maintain the top spot. That's how Ulf pronounces it. The B-Venom. Yes. Maintain the top spot at the box office with $35.7 million, followed by A Star is Born at $28 million, and down in third place, First Man with $16.5 million. Venom thoughts.
Sonny00:15:51First. Last week, Vic, you had asked how much we thought it was going to drop. Did we get it on the nose? I said 60% or 55% to 60%. Those were the two answers I gave in short succession. And it was funny. When the initial numbers came out, it looked like it was going to be a 60% drop. It looked like it was going to be about $30 million. And then that kind of ticked up over the weekend to $55 million. So both of our answers were actually correct, as it happens.
Vic00:16:17Just think how much better it could have been, actually. I would have embraced the whole, if they had a better relationship with MCU and stuff.
Sonny00:16:23Yeah, it would be so much better if it was... I mean, the problem is you would have to have a... To truly do the Venom character, you have to have a movie where Venom is the villain. And then you have to have the movie where he's the hero. And I don't think... I mean, then you're looking at about a four-year process. And if there's anything we've seen, it's rushing these cinematic universes is actually the best way to do it. So it's not surprising.
Vic00:16:49It bothers me, after we talked about and you guys explained this further in last week's episode, that it's sort of... They're trying, they did as much as they could to make him, make Venom not look like Spider-Man. You know, so they could have a separate universe, unrelated, because it's Sony. And then maybe they can have a sequel, but the entire thing will be completely... As a matter of fact, and I forgot to mention this, there was a reference to Eddie's journalistic past.
Sonny00:17:18But they didn't call it The Daily Post?
Vic00:17:20Exactly, they called it something else. It was like The Daily Globe or something.
Sonny00:17:24Yeah, I did notice that, I did notice that. I just shook my head. But there are other things that translated, like the astronaut who comes back on the ship is John Jameson. Yes. Says it on his uniform, it says John Jameson. And it's like, okay, well, that's J. Jonah Jameson's son. That's right. And it's just like, it's like looking into like a... What was that show, Fringe or Sliders? It's like you're looking into a universe that's slightly off, that like one thing has changed. And in this universe, there's no Peter Parker. Those were very Fox shows, weren't they? Sliders was the best. I love Sliders.
JVL00:18:04Is that Jerry O'Connell?
Sonny00:18:06Yes. It was Jerry O'Connell and also, what's his name, from Indiana Jones and the Lord of the Rings movies.
Vic00:18:16Oh, no, John Rhys-Davies? John Rhys-Davies was like the scientist. And Fringe was the guy from Lord of the Rings, I think, the old fellow. Yeah, Peter, Peter. Oh, very good. So we all saw.
JVL00:18:27The other box office star was born with a 33% drop, which is good. It's actually worse than I thought it would be. I thought it would be like 20%. So, 200 million is now a stretch and depends on awards.
Sonny00:18:43I think it'll probably make it to 200 million.
JVL00:18:46Good, but to cross over that, it's going to take a while. We're going to need to win Best Picture and a bunch of other things. We're going to have a re-release. I'd say whoever's sitting on Star is Born in their Oscar fantasy draft is in pretty good shape.
Vic00:18:59That's a good one. He who picked first. I think I would have picked, even I would have picked Star, but you would have picked The Star is Born, I assume.
JVL00:19:06Okay. Yeah. No, I think it was the best available choice on the board.
Sonny00:19:11Lady Gaga. I'm pretty excited. Pretty excited to see.
Vic00:19:14You're Gaga for. You know what I would not have picked? I'm not Gaga. I know what you would not have picked. I would not have picked First Man. We'll get into that later on.
Sonny00:19:21I think First Man's a solid pick. I still think, thank you.
JVL00:19:23I bet First Man gets more. As the number two overall slot.
Sonny00:19:25I bet you First Man gets more. Noms. Nominations than On the Basis of Sex.
JVL00:19:32I, well, The Basis of Sex was my second pick. What was your first pick? My first was Black Panther. Really? And it, it ought to because, again. It might get more than Black Panther. First, First Man was the number two overall pick. First Man, First Man might get more than both.
?00:19:50Put together. Yeah.
JVL00:19:51I doubt that very much. I would think Beale Street would get more than Black Panther. Very possibly. Beale Street's a great pick. I love it. But Sonny, you got, you got your bases covered.
Sonny00:20:01I got, I got, I got my number one and number two picks with the number one and number six picks, so I'm very happy with mine.
Vic00:20:08Okay, Sonny, review.
?00:20:10Review First Man.
JVL00:20:11Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Yeah. Did all three of us see it? Yes, three. Did all four of us see it?
?00:20:18No, no, not all of us.
Vic00:20:19That would be a lunacy. Okay. That's all I had. I had nothing else.
?00:20:23Come on.
Vic00:20:24I had nothing else. I had nothing else. Okay.
?00:20:26Lunarcy.
Vic00:20:27Yeah, lunarcy.
?00:20:29Lunarcy.
Sonny00:20:30Going to the moon is lunarcy.
?00:20:32Yeah, that's about it.
Vic00:20:34That's it. That's it.
Sonny00:20:36Armstrong. More like Will Strong. Strong Will. No. First Man. First Man is about the fictional idea that we went to the moon. That didn't happen. It was all shot on a sound stage in Burbank.
?00:20:52We all know that.
Sonny00:20:53Yes. But for the purposes of propaganda, we have convinced the world that we did this. So, First Man is ... I don't feel the need really to provide a plot summary. What happens in the movie, Sonny? Well, thank you for not telling me the ending until I saw it. That's amazing. I can't believe it happened. It's a historical drama about the space race. Don't spoil it. And I feel like that's enough to say. First Man is trying to do, I think, two or three separate things, and I think more or less does them. The first is to kind of put you in the head of Neil Armstrong. Now, the question of whether or not that is the real Neil Armstrong or whether it is a travesty of Neil Armstrong is kind of up for debate. I don't have strong opinions on this either way. I did not know Neil Armstrong, and I have not read extensively about Neil Armstrong, so I don't know if he was actually a character. I was extremely stoic and sad about his two-year-old daughter who died. As the father of a three-year-old daughter, I was deeply moved by his emotional plight and the stoic way that he handled it. And one of the things this movie does very well, I think, is personalizing this massive, bureaucratic, technologically amazing operation into this one person. I mean, the show. The shots on the moon. I don't know if you guys saw it in IMAX. I saw it in IMAX. I saw it in IMAX on the big air and space IMAX here in town. It was very impressive. And what happens is, when Armstrong steps out of the lunar landing module and onto the surface of the moon, the horizons of the screen expand. And this kind of mirrors, early on in the film, he had talked about how, you know, going to the moon will expand man's horizons. It's actually a very... What Chazelle does here is he uses IMAX. Not just for spectacle, as so many filmmakers do, but to drive home a thematic point of the film. I thought it was very well done. And in addition to kind of expanding and bringing a brightness and a stillness to the picture, the IMAX helps us both focus on him and on what's going on in the background. Because there's just so much screen there to kind of see. So, I liked that. It is... He is also trying to, I think, demonstrate cinematically what it is like to be in one of these rocket ships, basically. How well this works for you kind of depends on how much you can tolerate shaky cam and cramped close-up shots. It doesn't bother me that much, but I can understand why people didn't particularly like it. But I think it all basically works. I mean, again, I think it is a cinematically successful method of demonstrating how spaceflight would feel from the inside.
Vic00:23:58Thank you. You were saying, in fact, Sonny, that after watching the movie, you sort of sparked your interest in wanting to even possibly read the memoir by James Hansen. Yeah, that was one thing. I was thinking about it, too, but if I don't have time to read the book, would it be possible to, I don't know? Listen to it in the car or something? How would that work?
Sonny00:24:20Well, there's a great program called Audible. Tell us more. What would it look like if we all listened more? Listening to audiobooks motivates us, inspires us, even brings us closer together. There's no better place to listen than Audible, because now Audible members get even more. Exclusive audio fitness programs, audiobooks, Audible Originals, and more. Audible has the largest selection of audiobooks on the planet. And now, with Audible Originals, the selection has gotten even more custom, with content made for members. Now, JVL has hinted at this several times on the show now. I have a child on the way. My wife is about eight and a half months pregnant. We're basically done. And so I'm going to have a lot of sitting around time. I'm going to have a lot of sitting around, holding small baby time. Which I have been told is a great time to listen to audiobooks. It's because you can just do it. You don't have to use your hands. So I was hoping that our great listeners, our valued, exceptional listeners could recommend some audiobooks to me. I am now a subscriber to Audible. I'm going to take advantage of the many things that they are going to offer us. But I want you, the listeners, who I know a bunch of you are audiobook files, audio-biblio files. Give me what I should be listening to. Give me some recommendations. That's what I want to hear from you guys.
Vic00:25:50Can I throw one out there? I heard a good one. JVL, I'm sure, has already listened to this. World War Z. I hear it's excellent as an audiobook.
Sonny00:25:58I've already read it, though.
Vic00:26:00I've actually read it. I've read the actual physical codex.
Sonny00:26:03Anyway, I need recommendations from people. Send me your picks. I will be glad to listen to them. Every month, Audible members get one credit good for any audiobook they choose. Plus two Audible originals from a changing selection that they can't get anywhere else. They also get access to audio fitness and health workouts created exclusively for Audible. I'm probably not going to take advantage of those because I'm a fat person. But for the rest of you who actually like to work out, this is a great thing. Plus, your books are yours to keep. With Audible, you can go back and re-listen any time, even if you cancel your membership. Don't like Audible book? If you don't like the Audible book you pick, you can exchange it. No questions asked. Start a 30-day trial and your first audiobook is free. Go to audible.com/substandard or text "substandard" to 500-500. That's 500-500. You can do it with audiobooks. That's audible.com/substandard or text "substandard" to 500-500 to get started.
Vic00:27:02Thank you, Sonny. Do you remember the audiobook in The Simpsons, the audiobook of the Bible that Homer listens to? Yes, the Bible as an audiobook narrated by? Walden Heston? No, Larry King. That's the one where he thinks he's dying. Yes, that's the one where he thinks he's dying, the fugu, yeah, the fugu. Okay. All right. Let's open the floor now to discuss The First Man.
Sonny00:27:23Oh, sorry. I don't think First Man is an entirely successful picture. I think it's a little bit boring at times. There's a lot of time spent with the family that I was like, eh, we can kind of move it along. But I think it's a mostly successful picture and quite enjoyed it.
JVL00:27:45JVL, go for it. This is such a bad movie. I will grant you the dynamical meaning of his use of IMAX, which I think is the only successful thing in it, but that is not enough to justify this picture. Not enough to justify this picture as an artistic enterprise. So the shaky cam stuff is absurd. I do not mind shaking the camera, shaking the camera.
Vic00:28:25You should see that, by the way. You should just see how he made those sound effects.
JVL00:28:29When we are in the Gemini 8 or in the X-55, X-15, that's fine.
Sonny00:28:37When he and Ed White are going for a quiet walk. For a quiet walk through the suburban neighborhood at night.
JVL00:28:41I felt the same thing. Why is the camera like we're in a Jason Bourne fight? When his child jumps into the swimming pool, why does the camera shake? When he goes to shake hands with his son, why is the camera shaking? There is a scene inside the Armstrong house where the camera pulls back through a door threshold to allow the sort of establishing shot of another room through a door threshold. And the camera is jittering. Yeah, it's too handheld. Sonny, I'm sorry, can you write down the time? Damien Chazelle, lock your f***ing camera down. It is absurd. And to do it on an IMAX screen.
Vic00:29:22So it's not a steadicam, it's like a handheld. And I'm actually picturing Damien Chazelle with the camera.
JVL00:29:28And I think part of this is done to, as he does with the color palette, to sort of ape the idea of Super 8 handheld home movies. Because that sort of puts us in a situation. That puts us a little bit in the period of what's happened. It is entirely unsuccessful as a device. And that is the smallest of my criticisms.
Sonny00:29:49Wow. One thing I would say about this, and I think what you're getting at here is correct. The kind of jitteriness of it and the graininess of it. I don't know what kind of screen you saw it on JBL. IMAX. So if you see it on the IMAX, it's very grainy. I think that's on purpose. Again, to drive home the stillness and the clarity of the moon shots. Later on. So again, I think there is a cinematic purpose here. I think it works. My big question is, I wonder if any of that, not the shakiness, but the grain was added in post. If the picture was intentionally deteriorated slightly to again make that transition more stark.
Vic00:30:36Maybe. The handheld stuff, and I agree because the opening scene I thought was fantastic, and the Gemini 8 things are intense, and obviously Apollo 11. Watching the conversations like, again, as you were saying, Ed White and Neil Armstrong walking down the street. In IMAX, I felt queasy. It was like Blair Witchy. What the hell was happening there? They used to have these explanations for... Do you remember the explanations for Downton Abbey? Remember Downton Abbey? Not that I've ever watched that show. The handheld, whenever they were filming downstairs, it was always handheld. So the camera's always moving. Upstairs was always steady, fixed, and there was no bumps in the motions. It's very still, and that was to emphasize the difference between upstairs and downstairs. I was trying to think why he was doing that, but I think he was just... Anyway, go ahead.
Sonny00:31:34I think I've explained why. I think that the whole point is to drive up. Later on. This does not justify that.
Vic00:31:42But you said you had bigger problems.
JVL00:31:44No, the bigger problem.
Sonny00:31:46The flag. The flag wasn't planted on the moon. The most boring possible rendition of the Neil Armstrong story.
JVL00:31:55Do you know what is more boring than dealing and watching Neil Armstrong and his shrewish wife bickering? Nothing. No, no, I'm sorry. What's more interesting is watching Neil Armstrong's bratty kids bickering. This is the man who's the first man on the moon, and we're spending minute after minute after minute after minute with his horrible home life? What the hell is that? Why are we doing this? Literally, literally every single person from NASA that we meet, from Deke to Ed White to Elliot, is more interesting as a character than the Neil Armstrong they give us in this movie. Now, I know nothing about Neil Armstrong, the man. I do not argue with this as a sort of weirdo. Well, this isn't true to the character. He was a recluse. If they want to present him as a basically Asperger-ish kind of guy, that's fine, although Ryan Gosling's portrayal sort of borders on Milton from Office Space. That's fine, but let's stay with him and let's stay with NASA. The whole idea that we have this, this is the movie that tells us what made Neil Armstrong tick, except that the movie has no idea what made Neil Armstrong tick. Other than his dead baby girl. It has nothing else to say about him. It has no other ideas for why he was like the way he was. And every, it is as if they were, it's like Rian Johnson directed this movie with the whole idea being to subvert audience expectation. You know, you know, audiences really like these space movies because the rocket launches are so exciting. So what we're going to do is we're going to do a rocket launch where we stay inside a cockpit the whole time. The Gemini 8 rocket launch, it is like shooting a porno movie. But then deciding to focus your camera on the mini fridge in the side of the hotel room. It's a rocket launch. Do you know what's exciting about rocket launches? The rockets launching. The whole, everything about this. We're going to make it boring on purpose to subvert people's expectation. How you can make a boring movie about the first mission to land on the moon is an amazing challenge. And Damien Chazelle was up to it.
Sonny00:34:06The rocket sequence is all, I think, work. And our successes artistically and as a viewer, I found them pretty effective. Because, again, I don't actually need to see rockets launch. I've seen rockets launch a bunch of times. I've seen a lot of rockets go up. You know what's interesting is being in the cockpit and knowing what it feels like to be. And you don't have that same view. Right. There's the, in the rocket, I guess, is it the Gemini 8? Where you actually, like, feel. The bursts of power out of the IMAX speakers. It felt like being kind of on top of a series of bombs going off and lifting you into space. That all worked for me. I thought that was very well done.
Vic00:34:53I liked it. And I loved the cast. The cast is great. Patrick Fugit is great. I was so excited to see him. I know he's done other things. I know he's done other things between Almost Famous and he did that movie Saved or whatever it was. But it was great to see. And he's old. He steals the first house. It reminds you that we're old, by the way. Because remember, he was a kid in Almost Famous.
JVL00:35:14He's great in this. I wanted more time with Elliott C. I wanted more time with Dee Slater.
Vic00:35:20There's not much time with Elliott C. All of these guys I wanted more time with and less time with Neil Armstrong.
JVL00:35:26Every time Ryan Gosling's Armstrong was on screen, I wanted him to go away and let me spend time with somebody else. Anybody else from NASA.
Vic00:35:35What did you think about Corey Stahl as Buzz Aldrin?
JVL00:35:37I thought he was great.
Vic00:35:39Even Buzz Aldrin is a more interesting character than this. I could see why if I were Buzz Aldrin, because he said he didn't like the movie. Sure, he's portrayed as a dick. He comes across as a real dick.
JVL00:35:55Which in fairness is all he seems to be in life.
Vic00:35:58Whenever you write your memoir, you're anything but what everyone else could say you are. By other people's accounts. But I still thought that worked and he seemed still humbled. When they got to the point together, the two of them are there on the moon. And Lucas Haas. I forgot about Lucas Haas, who plays Mike Collins. Yes. But again, I agree that I could have done a lot, I could have had a lot more. I love these guys. And Lucas Haas, not many lines as Mike Collins, but he does the thing right before they get on the expansion module. And he says, "Okay, you need this, you want that, you want this." Come back, don't leave me alone out here. Yeah, and he said, and they were like, "Mike, you know." And I was like, "It's okay." And he just goes, "Come back, guys." And he does it so well. And I've liked Lucas Haas since Witness, but anyway, it was nice to see him. And Jason Clarke as Ed White. I didn't know they were that good friends, that Neil Armstrong was good friends with Ed White. And Jason Clarke is great at that. Jason Clarke is great. The Apollo 1 plugs test I thought was horrific. I've read about that.
Sonny00:37:03Kieran Hines, great. Kieran Hines is great. Shay Wiggum is great. But again, not a lot, but yeah.
JVL00:37:11No, this movie fails. Kyle Chandler.
Vic00:37:16Kyle Chandler. He does everything. He can do anything. Zero Dark Thirty. He's great. So did you like this, Victorino? I did, but there were parts of it that I thought were slow. I agree. And the dialogue parts, as you were saying with the handheld, made me uneasy, but I still liked it. I mean, you know, Peter Lowes, my friend Peter Lowes, physics teacher in high school, was a Neil Armstrong obsessive. So he always talked about Armstrong. And so Peter used to tell me stuff when back in college about what he was like. You know, he stopped signing autographs because there were too many forgeries out there. Then he just started, you know, I mean, just closing in on his world, you know. I mean, so he was not, I mean, he's very different from Buzz Aldrin.
Sonny00:37:54He was a privative person. He was stoic, I think. I think the scene with the press conference where, you know, people keep asking him what he feels like. And he's like, it doesn't really matter. And then Buzz Aldrin takes over. I think it's like, I understand the, you're not the first person who has described the Armstrong character as like Asperger-y or neurotic. But that is, it's really not the sense I took away from the character. I just thought that he was quiet and private. And I think there's a difference between being quiet and private than being weird and neurotic.
JVL00:38:37The way he answers that. He answers his kids question about like the percentage chance of him coming home is an Asperger-y sort of like the way to sort of when you're sitting in your own kitchen table with your family and you take things so literally. That is not a normal emotional. It's interesting. It's fine. I'm not complaining about this, but I'm saying if this is the true Neil Armstrong, then he is not an interesting enough figure to merit something like this. Or focusing on his inner person is not the most interesting thing about him.
Sonny00:39:07Well, he is. Because he is the first man to step on the moon.
JVL00:39:11I mean, that is. But what's interesting then is that he's the first man to step on the moon, not the interior life of Neil Armstrong.
Sonny00:39:17But that is. It is the most boring possible.
JVL00:39:21I think other people will find that.
Vic00:39:23I think people did not find it interesting. Some people find it compelling. They were married for 38 years before they got divorced. It's just kind of a thing.
JVL00:39:31But you saw it coming, I guess, particularly in the end. Well, again, I have no idea if this is the real Janet Armstrong. But if it isn't.
Vic00:39:37He met with her before she died.
JVL00:39:39If it isn't, then they did a horrible disservice to her because they paint her as a monster. She is like the mirror image of the Lauren Holly from any given Sunday. And if she was like this, then it is unkind to have portrayed her like this on screen.
Vic00:39:54Look, I mean, there's a lot of stress dealing with family that she takes that burden. I didn't view her negatively.
Sonny00:40:02I didn't view her negatively at all. She seemed like a pretty straightforward military wife to me.
JVL00:40:06She was a horrible human being. And a terrible partner to be married to. But you thought to yourself, yeah, I could be married to her.
Sonny00:40:14That would be a ball of laughs. That would be fun. She's a good time girl. We could really be troopers together.
JVL00:40:22Life isn't really always fun.
Vic00:40:24We could have all sorts of adventures together.
JVL00:40:26Did something happen to you in the theater? No, I hated everything about this movie. I really...
Vic00:40:32God, it was so bad.
JVL00:40:34I'm surprised that you liked it, Victorino. I would have thought that you would have been born into it. No, I mean...
Vic00:40:40I'm still interested in... I mean, the parts that were really interesting, I thought were great. And they were obviously... It definitely could have been 15% shorter.
JVL00:40:48Yeah, absolutely.
Sonny00:40:50Could have been 15% shorter. Almost every movie can be 15% shorter. And basically every movie over 2 hours and 10 minutes can be 15% shorter. And this could have been 15% shorter. But, like, that's alright. I don't mind that too much. At least you hate it for honest and truthful reasons.
Vic00:41:06As opposed to the...
Sonny00:41:08I don't want to... You've written now twice about this. You have written about this twice. I've written about a thousand tweets. Not counting tweets.
JVL00:41:18Twitter stories. This movie was first criticized as being a right-wing wet dream? No. And then criticized from the right as being a left-wing... No, no, no.
Sonny00:41:30I would say first it was criticized from the right. I thought the left hated it first. It was first criticized from... There was a Telegraph piece that came out when the movie premiered at Venice in which the author of the piece talked about how they don't show the planting of the flag on the moon, which was then misinterpreted by many on the right as to say that the flag was erased totally from the moon. No flag on the moon, no flags in the movie. It's about... But part of the reason this happened is because Ryan Gosling gave the worst answer that he possibly could have given to a question about was Neil Armstrong an American hero. He said, "I'm a Canadian, so maybe this is my bias, but I think of him as a world hero." He thought of himself as like a world historical figure, not an American hero. Exclusively. Now, this is dumb. This is a dumb thing to say. Everything... Again, I'm not like a Neil Armstrong expert, but from what I have heard and what I've read, this is not how Neil Armstrong thought of himself. So it played into kind of all of the... It triggered the right in all of the ways that it possibly could have. You can trigger the right?
JVL00:42:34Are they such little special snowflakes that they can get all triggered and upset?
Sonny00:42:37They melt a little bit. But it played into all of the ideas that Hollywood hates patriotism, Hollywood hates America, Hollywood is marketing movies to the international market, not the American market anymore. And it just kind of snowballed from there. Now, look, I mean, you've seen the movie. You don't like it. Would you say that this is an unpatriotic film?
?00:42:59No.
JVL00:43:00In any way? No. In fact, to the extent that there's any politics in it, as you say in your review, it comes down on the side against the radical left wing, which was left at the time, which viewed the space program as skepticism. The resounding verdict of this movie is that the space program was worth it. Was worth it and was... I mean, that is not like left-right politics today, but that is the full extent of the politics of this movie.
Sonny00:43:23And it is specifically about America winning the space race against the Russians, right? I mean, that is like... There's even a montage at the end of the film where foreign people talk about how they... Yeah. The French lady says that. It is like... So it is... I have found it very frustrating to deal with the know-nothing right who hop into my Twitter mentions and tell me that the flag is not in the movie and the movie hates America and it erases the American accomplishment. And I am even more frustrated with the hucksters on the right who have fed their grievance on this. And it is a... I think it is a very useful proxy for the terrible way our politics... work right now and the very real and fundamental way that the right is broken. That is all I will say about that. Wow! That was like a little bitty...
Vic00:44:16That is all I will say about that. Op-ed. That was very op-eddy of you. Okay. How are we doing on time?
JVL00:44:22This is... No, I am not wrong about this.
Vic00:44:25What? JVL.
JVL00:44:27The New Yorker Review says the first man is worthy of enduring as a right-wing fetish object.
Sonny00:44:32Yes, but when was that review published?
JVL00:44:35A week ago.
Sonny00:44:37Yeah, so the... I guess stories were like at the end of September.
?00:44:41Oh, okay.
Vic00:44:42Too bad the New Yorker's fake news will never... New Yorker's fake news.
Sonny00:44:46No, but this is... It is like it never happened. I have been trying... I have taken a series of different hacks on Twitter. People are idiots and you are ignorant. You do not know what you are talking about. But like, do not take my word for it. Trigger the libs by going to see this movie. Like, you know, it just... But whatever. People want to believe what they want to believe.
JVL00:45:03And they are idiots. Do we believe that the $16.5 million opening really hobbles its Oscar chances? Because a movie like this has to be successful, I think.
Sonny00:45:12I think a movie like this has to be successful to win. I think it will still probably do okay. I think it will definitely still get a Best Picture nomination.
?00:45:22Best Picture nomination. Best Director.
Sonny00:45:24I think it will probably get a Best Actor. Best Actor, maybe. We will see. Best Actor might be tight this year. There is going to be a lot of...
Vic00:45:30You know what we left out, by the way, in terms of Best Actor? It was a movie and we were talking about movies that came out. It is The Old Man and the Gun.
?00:45:37Because...
Vic00:45:38Isn't that supposed to be his last movie? You know what I am talking about? Merits aside, oh, this is the last time we will ever see Robert Redford.
?00:45:46Here you go.
Sonny00:45:47I don't think Robert Redford has that much pull anymore in Hollywood. Warren Beatty wasn't able to get...
Vic00:45:52Yeah, I remember.
Sonny00:45:54Remember his terrible Howard Hughes movie?
JVL00:45:56That never happened, right? Did it ever happen?
Sonny00:45:58That lost tens of millions of dollars. That didn't get any award buzz. I think Warren Beatty and Robert Redford are kind of... Is anybody seeing this movie? Has anybody seen The Old Man and the Gun?
Vic00:46:09It's kind of out.
Sonny00:46:11Do you know what day it is today? Oh my gosh! Where have I been? Today is October 17th.
Vic00:46:22No, you are kidding me. You know what? I actually looked it on IMDB. When is this movie coming out? And I saw September 18th. I go, oh, okay, there is still time. Man, who are you?
Sonny00:46:30Would you boys like to rank the NASA movies? Oh, okay. I haven't put any thought into this, but if you want to go first, I will go ahead.
Vic00:46:38Am I wrong to think there is only three? You are wrong.
?00:46:42I have ten.
Vic00:46:44What?
?00:46:46Okay.
Sonny00:46:48Okay.
Vic00:46:50Does this include Capricorn One? Yeah, I was going to say, does this include Space Camp? Is Space Camp on there?
Sonny00:46:55Yes. Okay, go on. Do it. Go ahead. You rank it.
JVL00:47:01I have no strong opinion. No, from one to ten. Number one, Apollo 13.
Sonny00:47:05Number one the best? Number one the best. Why would you start with the best? You want to count down to the best?
JVL00:47:11No, because I know what number ten is. I know what number ten is. Number two, The Right Stuff. Number three, The Martian. Number four, Contact. Number five, Gravity. So you're talking about sci-fi. You're not talking about space.
Vic00:47:21No, space. Space. But NASA-centric. Is Contact really a NASA-centric movie?
Sonny00:47:27I would say it is.
Vic00:47:29I would say Contact is more SETI-centric. I would say Contact is more Japanese achievement.
Sonny00:47:33Yeah, it's really about how Japanese were the first to build a rocket to see the aliens. Number five, Gravity.
JVL00:47:39Number six, Space Camp. Number seven, Red Planet. Number eight, Mission to Mars. Number nine, Armageddon. Number ten, First Man.
Sonny00:47:45Oh, so mean. Done. So mean. I have no strong opinions.
JVL00:47:53Well, could we all at least agree that Apollo 13 is, was, and will forever be the greatest NASA movie ever made?
Sonny00:48:00Probably.
JVL00:48:02I don't know how often you watch it. It's an amazing movie.
Vic00:48:04It was certainly happier. In terms of technical, I haven't heard many people have... technical complaints yet about First Man. I should go back and watch it. I haven't seen it. In Apollo 13, I believe the only technical complaint was... The color of the Corvette. Jim Lovell's Corvette. It was blue and not red or whatever. So, yeah.
JVL00:48:20I mean, that is, I watched that within the last three years and it's astonishing. I like it much more now even than I did when it first came out and I saw it in theaters. Everything about that movie is really good. The pacing, the ideas behind it. I mean, it's just a great... It's a great piece of storytelling.
Vic00:48:40Pablo Schreiber. Are you a fan of his, the actor Pablo Schreiber? Do you know him at all? I know Liev Schreiber. Yeah. I don't know if they're related. I don't know. Pablo Schreiber, he played Jim Lovell in First Man. There's so many other people there.
Sonny00:48:52I gotta see Apollo 13 again. I haven't seen that movie in a long time.
?00:48:55It's good. It's good.
JVL00:48:56Since it came out, by the way. Man, it's awesome. Really, I liked it when it came out and I now love it.
Vic00:49:02The weird thing, to go back really quickly to Neil Armstrong, is after he landed... on the moon, he went back to being an engineering professor at Purdue. It's just kind of strange if you're a student and your professor's Neil Armstrong, whereas Buzz Aldrin, you know, he would show up on sitcoms, you know, and things like that. Radio shows.
?00:49:24Yeah, everything. Comic-Con.
Vic00:49:26Yeah, everything. He just wants to be famous. It's different, but I'm a big fan of Corey Stahl. One of the things that I... one of my takeaways from Apollo 13 and from First Man is also the reminder that we... we are not men anymore.
Sonny00:49:41Sort of the...
Vic00:49:43Well, the people in this room. Yeah, the people in this room, we're not very soft. There are men out there.
JVL00:49:49There are men. I guess so, you're right, you're right. Captain Bill Dwyer is a real man.
Vic00:49:55Chris Anderson is a real man. Aaron McClain. Aaron McClain is a real man.
?00:50:01Yeah, yeah, that's true, that's true, but we are not.
Vic00:50:03We've sort of transitioned into little babies. Speaking of transitioning, JV... I'm just kidding. You didn't put 2001: Space Odyssey on your list.
Sonny00:50:12Not really a NASA movie, certainly.
JVL00:50:15No, but I did think to myself that 2001 is a much better paced movie than First Man is. It's got a lot more going on in it, and it's more interesting and more exciting than First Man.
Sonny00:50:28Considering that you just spent a whole episode complaining about the pacing of 2001.
Vic00:50:32In 2001, you've got a complete 180 here. No, no, I'm just saying that's how... Stinging criticism. That's how bad First Man is. I'm going with your first take on 2001, that there are certain sequences that would just put you to sleep at being put to sleep, JVL.
JVL00:50:47Did you just do a second transition on the fly?
Vic00:50:50I'm so exhausted. I'm done. I'm done.
JVL00:50:53You're going to go back to the corner. The corner man's going to be like, "Cut me! Cut me, Rock!"
Vic00:50:57I'm going to put the quarter. I'm going to put the silver dollar on Mike.
JVL00:51:00So I am here to talk about our friends at Calm.com, C-A-L-M.com. It's an app for meditation and sleep stories on your phone, and it is amazing. We are Calm.com users in my family. We have been for a couple of years now. We pay full freight, all of it by ourselves because it's so great. Let me tell you a story that happened last night, Tuesday night. So I am downstairs with Flash watching the mighty Milwaukee Brewers take on the Los Angeles Dodgers when my favorite child peeks her head over the banister. And says, "Daddy, I can't get to sleep." And so I said, "Oh, dear favorite, I will come right up. Don't worry." And I said, "Go hop into dad's bed. I'll be right there." So I went and I tucked into bed with her, and I put her little head on my chest, and I took out my phone, and I opened up Calm, and I played her this.
Guest00:51:58My name is Clark Peters, and tonight I'll be reading you a sleep story called The Butterfly Sanctuary.
JVL00:52:08And to God, seven minutes later, she's snoring. This is the magic of Calm.com. This is what we do. Again, no fooling. Every single night of my life for the last two years, we have leaned on Calm.com. I say this all the time because it's true. Their corporate motto should be better than Benadryl. It is astonishing. I actually have used some of the sleep stories myself. When I'm traveling for work and I'm in a hotel, I will put one of the sleep stories on and listen to them. They have them for kids. They have them for adults. They have guided meditations if you're into that sort of thing. I've never actually gotten to that. I keep telling myself someday I'm going to do it. They have a new one every single day called The Daily Calm. It's a tremendous, tremendous tool, especially for parents. You pop this on for your kids, it will just knock them the F out. It's so great. So we have a special offer with them. If you go to Calm.com/substandard, they will give you 25% off. 25% off of a premium subscription, which is a great deal. It's a great deal even if you don't get the discount because, again, this is a product that if they doubled the price, we would still pay them at the last family. It's so great. It gives you unlimited access to all of their content. You can get started today. Calm.com/substandard. That's Calm.com/substandard. They'll give you 25% off a premium subscription. If you have kids, you should do it. And in fact, I was thinking of getting Sonny again. Since he's in a family way again. Because your oldest is rapidly reaching the point where it would be nice to be able to give her sleep stories. Sure. Because I would say you really have to be at two and a half.
Sonny00:53:53Yeah, she's older.
JVL00:53:55Three. So three is a good age to start on this because now they can listen and engage. And so I think maybe my baby moon present to you guys will be a subscription to Calm.com.
Sonny00:54:07Thank you. That would be very lovely.
Vic00:54:09Thank you, JVL. That Clark Peters voice?
JVL00:54:13Yeah. It was amazing. Yeah, I know. It wouldn't put Vic to sleep. Well, it would like five minutes later, you know.
Vic00:54:22Do you remember the Seinfeld episode with the concierge and Elaine? You know, she'd get the wake up call. And who was the voice? It wasn't supposed to be. I think it was Peter Dinklage or something like that. It was something really interesting, but we'll have to look that up. Okay. Do we have any other? Sonny, I think. Are we good on time? I've lost track. Yeah, we're good. All right, then. Okay. Hey, that's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us @VictorinoMatus @SonnyBunch.
Sonny00:54:47@JVLast.
Vic00:54:49Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes or Google Play. Just type in Substandard on a podcast. We're there. Leave a review. Tell your friends. Until next time.
Sonny00:55:08I have just one thing, but you have other things.
Vic00:55:11No, I have things too. No, I'm telling your thing. I want to hear your thing. So, did you see the trailer for The Best of Enemies, which is coming out in the spring? No. That is with Sam Rockwell and Taraji Henson. It's where the Klan leader and the leader of the African-American community have to come together because they're desegregating. There's a school situation where, you know, they have to put kids in a school. Where are they going to go? And it's this big thing so that both sides have to work together, this whole thing.
JVL00:55:36It takes place, obviously, in the '60s.
Vic00:55:38No, no, no. Well, no, but there are moments. There are clearly moments, right? Fish-out-of-water buddy comedy. Kind of in a weird way. He's a Black Panther. And he's the Grand Wizard of the KKK. Yeah, basically. Is it true? Together, they're the unlikeliest of friends. Is it true? I don't know. But after the trailer ended, like a couple of rows back, I hear a woman say out loud, she goes, "Ugh, it makes me sad because schools are still segregated."
JVL00:56:06She just threw that out there. Interesting. Just to the audience. Just wants the audience to know, in case you forgot.
?00:56:13Interesting.
JVL00:56:14Yeah, it is. It is. JVL. So, can we talk about the dishwasher?
?00:56:19Sure.
Vic00:56:20Yes. Oh, by the way, really quickly, these are not even outtakes. What were we told? These are stingers. This is a stinger. Stingers. These are post-credit stingers.
JVL00:56:27Thank you. Thank you. Go ahead. So, my wife has been complaining since day one about the decibel level of our dishwasher. This is your new dishwasher.
Vic00:56:37The new dishwasher.
JVL00:56:39Yes. I agree that I do not believe it is as quiet as the last one. I would not disagree with that. I would accept that. But on the other hand, the other one wasn't available for purchase. If I could have replaced like for like, I would have. Instead, I bought the quietest dishwasher on offer. Sonny, you will see from the evidence I am showing you that, in fact, the dishwasher even says on it… 39 decibels.
?00:57:07Right?
Sonny00:57:0839. Did you buy a decibel measuring device?
JVL00:57:13The other night… Just to do this? Really? As I was lying in bed, upstairs, listening to the dishwasher, which is a thing that should not happen, I decided to open up my magic iPhone and look and see if there are… I mean, I figured why couldn't there be an app that turns your phone into a decibel meter, and it turns out there's like 70 of them.
Sonny00:57:35Of course. Makes sense. Impressive.
JVL00:57:37Now, I did not do a full test. I merely went down and shoved my iPhone next to it and turned on the decibel meter. Okay. And? Sixty-seven ****ing decibels. Sixty-seven.
Vic00:57:53I love…
JVL00:57:56This is unacceptable, and the only thing to do is that I'm going to have to spend a week sleeping on the floor of the kitchen in front of the dishwasher, with the decibel meter recording, so that I can get a full baseline and then send the data off to the people at Bosch Global and ask them what the fork is up with their product that promises, right on the dishwasher, thirty-nine decibels.
Sonny00:58:22I think that's a totally fair thing to do. I think they should, frankly, with the amount of free advertising we've given them on this program, they should be giving you a new dishwasher for free that actually falls within the range that actually falls within the correct decibel parameters. That's the only thing that would make this right, I think. Yeah, I'm sure it's fine.
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