← all The Sub-Beacon on Substack episodes
#1. 'The Odyssey'
Listen to this episode ↗on Substack, where the show lives now
The first episode of the Substack era, built around Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey, and the hosts split hard on it. Sonny, who has already seen it twice and will go a third time, calls it a flawed but very good film and "middle to lower tier Nolan" — the first two hours are repetitive and paced wrong, herky-jerky where Oppenheimer was the smoothest ride he's ever seen, but the cast is perfect top to bottom (Matt Damon as Odysseus, Anne Hathaway's Penelope, Charlize Theron as Calypso, Lupita Nyong'o doubling as Helen and Clytemnestra, Zendaya as Athena, Benny Safdie as Agamemnon) and the slaughter of the suitors lands so hard his audience openly cheered; he argues it's genuinely a movie of ideas, a companion piece to Oppenheimer about men who commit a world-breaking act — the atomic bomb there, the blasphemy of the Trojan horse here — and three hours of "you see what happens when you've got hubris." Mike reports the exact opposite reaction, preferring The Odyssey to an Oppenheimer he finds a little inscrutable and cold, marveling that Nolan can build a crowd-pleasing blockbuster and a movie about something with a capital S, and praising how the adaptation quietly borrows from the Iliad and the Aeneid; JVL hasn't seen it at all and spends the segment being lobbied, eventually just asking the two of them to rank Tenet, Interstellar and The Odyssey. On box office, Sonny reports it opened to $123.5 million — roughly 50% above Oppenheimer — with a plausible path to $490 million domestic, and vents that the 70mm print at his local AMC was already "scratched to shit" by projectionists who don't run film regularly; he also swats down the online furor over the casting by pointing out that Oppenheimer was the whitest film Nolan ever made and swept the Oscars under identical diversity rules. The episode opens with Mike's housekeeping about the move off Patreon to Sub-Beacon.com, and JVL explaining that he has processed his mother-in-law's death the way he processes everything — by buying things — since "money doesn't buy happiness" is the one saying he rejects outright: you can't purchase life satisfaction, but you can absolutely purchase happiness in micro-doses.
From the show notes
An adventure 2,800 years in the making! Or so! Give or take. (I mean the transition to Substack, not Homer’s poem.)
Full transcript
Mike00:00:00Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I'm your co-host, Mike Warren, and joining me, as always, are my two co-hosts who would never violate Zeus's law, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Join us over at Sub-Beacon.com. That's right, Sub-Beacon.com. You may notice Sub-Beacon.com looks a little different. If you are used to seeing our Patreon, we are now over at Substack. Go to Sub-Beacon.com to listen to episodes of this show, past and present. I have more housekeeping updates on that we can get into or not get into. We are going to be talking about The Odyssey later on in the show. But first, let's hear what is going on with the fellas. JVL, you want to start?
JVL00:00:58So, thank you guys for carrying over the last few weeks while we were dealing with my mother-in-law's passing. Been a very sad time in my house, and so I've reacted to it the way I always react to difficult times, which is buying things. Because I find that... You know what? Of all the things that people say, you know, like sayings about, you know, if you find a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life, like that sort of thing, the one that has never made any sense to me is money doesn't buy happiness. Because I can 100% purchase happiness in small doses using money. Sure. In micro-dose. Not lasting happiness, right? You can't purchase life satisfaction, but in terms of like, I'm feeling down and I would like a hit of something to lift my spirits. For a few hours. You can do that with money.
Mike00:01:50Just use that credit card. It's a, it's a magic happiness. Amazon sends you little presents.
Sonny00:01:55Amazon's like a little Christmas every day that you get for yourself. It's great.
JVL00:01:59So my, the form my grief has taken is, uh, you may remember that a couple years ago I came on this show and I said, guys, I just picked up a new comic book and I'm blown away by it. That comic book was absolute Batman. Yes.
Mike00:02:14This thing is like, wow.
JVL00:02:16And I, uh, I was so jazzed by it that I went out and I bought a bunch of variant copies and, uh, you know, never really thought too much about it again, except keep reading it. Obviously, like I've, you know, kept, kept, uh, I have a subscription to it, uh, at my local comic shop and I, you know, I keep buying them and I read them very, very carefully. And then I, I bag them. If there's a variant cover that I like, if there's a variant cover I like, I will, um, I don't, I don't wear gloves. I feel guilty about it. Um, I'll pick up the one in 25 or sometimes even I'll spring for the one in 50 variant. Um, anyway, and I just, uh, as things were spiraling apart in my personal life, I, my, my, our, our buddy, our mutual friend, father Harrison and I were talking about, he's like, you know, those absolute Batman comics have gotten really expensive. And so I went on and looked at, holy shit. Holy, what are we talking about here? Shit. Well, so like a raw copy of the first.
Mike00:03:16Printing of absolute Batman. Number one is now like 300 bucks if you can get it.
JVL00:03:22So it's non-graded. If you have any of the variant additions of number one, which I happen to have some of, um, it can be considerably more. Okay. 1500, 1900. Um, and so I took this as an invitation not to, not to cash out my earnings. Winning. Earnings to just go deeper. And so over the last three weeks I have acquired, I've gone on a real spree acquiring more absolute Batmans. And, uh, what I, what I bring to you gentlemen is the very, very strange scarcity economics that I have discovered within it. Okay. So for instance, they will. Put out a bunch of variant covers, uh, in, in different versions, right? So there's like first printing issue and there'll be sometimes first printing cover a cover B cover C cover D, um, which are all done in the same quantities, but then also a one in 25 incentive, which means that your comic shop only gets one copy of that cover for every 25 copies that they were, or one in 50 incentive, et cetera, et cetera. Okay.
Sonny00:04:45That's all very straightforward. Straightforward. I have a question. Wait, question, question. Yeah. I should know this, but I don't. If you order 50 copies, do you get two of the one in 25 and one of the one in 50? Yes. Okay. That is how it works.
JVL00:04:58Okay. So, uh, they then, however, are doing various games of incentive covers, even for second, third and fourth printings. So there will be like a third printing incentive cover. Okay. And some of these. Wind up being worth quite a lot. It's very interesting. Um, there are then I am convinced that they are playing editorial games on scarcity because what this series seems to do is when it is interesting, a introducing a new character. So you're getting a first appearance of in every single case, I believe they do a cameo appearance of the character in one issue. And then a full appearance of the character in another issue so that in the way that these things are thought of in the comics community, you then get two keys and then even a third key for the first cover of that. So, you know, you have first cameo of first appearance of Robin, first full appearance of Robin, first cover appearance of Robin.
Mike00:06:13And then it gets. Even crazier.
JVL00:06:16Let me stop you right there. Yeah.
Mike00:06:18Let me stop you right there. That's right. Obviously the cameo and the full appearance are going to be in separate issues, but, but is there ever a, a, a, a time when a full appearance and a cover appearance are the same or, or are they.
JVL00:06:31Sometimes, but mostly they're different. Okay. Mostly they're different. And, uh, and there then is a thing where, which I have discovered. So for instance, the ep, the issue that is the first cover. Of the Robins, because the Robins are a group of people, not just one person, an absolute Batman. I have a few copies of that. I have some of the cover a, which is the, the normal cover, the stock cover. And then I picked up some of the one in 25, one in fifties. But interestingly, the rare versions of that, those covers don't feature the Robins. And so those versions, even though that is. That is the issue in which the, the variants are not worth nearly as much as you would think. And in some cases are worth less than the stock cover, because those are, that is scarcity being plopped on top of something for which the cover itself was the key. Interesting. Yes.
Mike00:07:35Yes. Anybody interesting. I think I'm picking up what you're putting down.
JVL00:07:38And, uh, and then it turns out in a recent issue, I forget if it's 20 or 22. There was a printing error, not even really a printing error, a binding error in which about half of the print run had the staples jammed in the wrong way. So it created damage to the spine, meaning that for that issue, the true, you know, near mint version of the first printing of the issue is about half of what it was. And so those copies, if you can find them at your local comic shops. Or if you can drive to all of your local comic shops and just hunt through the copies they have on their racks, you can find some markers. Anyway, it's all of which is to say that I do feel like the people at D.C. are more sophisticated about the scarcity of their manufacturing than they were in the early 90s. Yeah. When they were just putting out hologram stickers on top of their 50 different Wolverine books that they were shipping every single month.
Sonny00:08:44Well, I was going to ask how many of these covers are chromium covers? How many chromium covers are there? How many hologram covers are there? Because I got a lot of those.
JVL00:08:54Zero holograms. There are a bunch of chromiums. They call them foil now. Foil variants. And you got the foil variants. I have a lot of questions about their long-term health. I'm currently bidding on one anyway.
Mike00:09:09But isn't your observation that D.C. is more sophisticated? This is a reflection of the information, right? They know more about the interests of collectors because the Internet and all that sort of thing. But also, the knowledge of collectors has helped create more interest in, you know, like, oh, where is that? How do I get that? And it sort of created this extra little. You know, this this heightened economy of of these special covers and editions. I don't I don't know the terminology. That's helped them. They have more information now.
Sonny00:09:55Well, I was going to say, JVL, isn't isn't the real issue here that the collectors got more sophisticated? So the dealers had to get like or the I guess the distributors, the publishers had to get like even more sophisticated. They're like, oh, you think you figured out the game? Guess what? The game's changed, motherfuckers. And we're. We're doing we're doing it. We're going to really get you. There's only there's only one percent of you, as many of you as there used to be. And we're going to soak every last one of you for everything you got. Well, that's what it is, right? They they.
JVL00:10:27So if you are the publisher, D.C., you don't reap any of the benefits of the secondary market. All of your gains come from just issue sales. And so what they're trying to do is they're trying to get people out in the world like myself to buy as many copies as possible, right? Not just buy the one to read and then be done with it. And so I think they've become pretty sophisticated at figuring out ways to to get us to do that. And I you know what? I am fine with that. I'm fine with it. It's OK. It does feel a little a little weird to manipulative to hit the way like I did originally. Right. Just purely based on like, oh, I read this thing. It's. It's brand new. And my collector brain says this is going to be hot. Right. That's a very sad. I mean, that. Well, it feels good. Right. You need a cigarette after that. And so you're then chasing that high with everything else. You're like, oh, this Felix art variant of number 20 with the Robins. I think because the Felix art variant of number one is incredibly rare. I think this one's going to be good, too. And so I'm all which says I'm chasing the dragon. And I understand that this is one step removed from degenerate gambling, but also it feels good. And I don't care.
Mike00:11:50Yeah. One step removed, I think, is the key. I mean, maybe it's not one step.
Sonny00:11:54A lot of things are one step removed from degenerate gambling that are perfectly fine. Exactly. Like, you know, for instance, collecting comic books. I would say, can I? This is something, again, I'm like so far removed from the world of comic book collecting. Like, I used to have a subscription drop box myself. Right. And I would get my 10 or 15.
JVL00:12:13You were 12, but sure.
Sonny00:12:16No, I was when I was in college still. It was like I was like 18 or 19. And like, I think I've told the story before, but like one, one, you know, one summer I or one year I went off to school and I told the guys like, hey, just let the things pile up and I'll pay for them all when I get back. Right. But the guy who I had worked with left the store, the guy who and the new guy came in and was like, what's all this stuff in this box? And like, clear that out and close my box. And I was like, I'm free. I'm free of this. I never I can't. I'm not. But but the my other thought was, man, fuck you. I was going to come here and pay you like 200 bucks for all these comic books. You just put anyway. So this is all a way of saying that I am vaguely familiar with how some of this works, but not all of it. Here's my question about the the. The variants that the stores themselves get. So the stores get, you know, they have you. They order 200 copies of. Absolute Batman number 20 or whatever. They get eight of the one in 25. So they get four of the one in 50s. They get one of the one in 200. Like whatever, whatever the breakdowns are. Are they then allowed to price those at any price they want? Like or do they have to sell them at cover price or how do they determine?
JVL00:13:34So there is a suggested retail price. MSRP. MSRP. And you're. Your good comic shops stay at the MSRP or maybe go a little bit above it. Your bad comic shops. Try to. Try to really gouge people. Right. And DC has recently begun an initiative to try to crack down on that. Like, you know, if the MSRP is $25 for a one in 25 and somebody's selling it for $27.50, that's fine. Right. If somebody's selling for $29, that's fine. But if somebody's. If somebody's selling the one in 25 for $50 and they're trying to get 90 for the one in 50, DC doesn't like that.
Sonny00:14:21How do they determine? How do they determine that? So I assume like that we're talking about first sale here, talking about the first sale of the thing. Correct. But I'm sure that they resell copies that other people have sold back to them.
JVL00:14:38I don't think anybody's. No, I don't think the reselling. The reselling is never going back to the. Oh, okay. So that's all on like eBay.
Mike00:14:45That's all happening on eBay, right? Okay. That's okay.
JVL00:14:48Yeah. And so what makes this nice for the comic book shop owners is that they are only paying cover price for those one in 25, one in 50. So they are paying $2.99 or whatever they pay wholesale for those and then selling it. Whereas they're selling, they pay $2.99 for a single issue normally and then sell that. For three 99 or 49, they're paying the same two 99 for the one in 25, but then selling that for $25. And so those variants are, think of them as the wine, the margins that you get on beverages and wine at a restaurant, right? They are what make everything else possible. Yeah. Does that make sense?
Sonny00:15:33Yeah. Yeah.
Mike00:15:34All right. So, uh, keep us posted on what, uh, what, what next purchase you make.
JVL00:15:39All right.
Mike00:15:41Um, or, or until the money runs out, um, whichever comes first. All right. Uh, Sonny, what is happening with you?
Sonny00:15:50Not much. Um, my, I, I, uh, I had, I had, we had an interesting, um, thing happen with our son yesterday at camp. So like my son is generally very well behaved, like not, not a problem at all. We, we never get like notes from his teachers at school. In fact, that they, they are often praising him because he, you know, well, pleasure to have in class. Pleasure to have in class. And he is friendly with all the other kids. And, you know, if somebody is having trouble, he helps them out. But so like, I'm always, I'm always very happy with, with, with my son in particular, but we, he's, he's been at a camp. Uh, he's been at one of his summer camps this week at a, at a museum. This camp is taking place at, and we got, we got a, we got, yeah, day camp. It's not, it's not sleep away camp or anything. And we got, we got, uh, a, a note from the camp that he, uh, was rough housing with his friends. And wasn't listening. He wasn't listening to the counselors and didn't stop rough housing rough. There were, and I know exactly. So I know exactly what happened. Cause he's, he's there with several of his friends from school. And when they are together playing soccer, for instance, they often get very grabby and, you know, tackly. Like there's a lot of like slide tackles. There's a lot, there's a lot of grab ass going on, you know? And I have no doubt that that has been, uh, that has been transferred to the confines of this, this, uh, museum. And. The result of this was, uh, like one of the very rare opportunities I have ever had to put the fear of God into my child. Just like I, like we've been doing a carpool and I showed up not in the regular carpool rotation. So that was a big surprise. And he could tell that things had gone horribly awry and just like read him the riot act in front of the counselor. And like, it was, and it was, and it was interesting. Cause. Again, I don't, I don't like having to do that. It's not my, you know, that's, that's not how I liked it. First of all, getting, getting downtown Dallas and rush hour. There's a reason we have the carpool. Like, I don't want to have to do that. Um, uh, and, and the, you know, second of all, it's just like, that's not, I don't want to be, I don't want to be feared. I want to be loved. I want to be beloved. Like, like Odysseus himself. Um, but the, uh, but the, but, uh. But it was, it was just kind of, it's one of these, like, I don't even know how to, how to describe it exactly. Except to say that, like, occasionally, occasionally it is, it is affirming to, like, remember that, like, children sometimes actually do need that sort of thing. I don't know. I don't know what I'm, I don't know what I'm trying to say here. Because I, like, again, I, like, this is totally, it's not my parenting style. I'm very laid back. I'm very laid back for the most part. And every once in a while, you just have to be like, I am actually the king of this castle. And I will, you know, put you in the dungeon forever if you don't stop doing what you're doing.
Mike00:18:56Don't stop your shit. It is, it is like, it is like having a tool in your toolbox that you never use, except for, like, the one thing once every five years in which it's, like, that's exactly what you're doing.
Sonny00:19:11And it's very gratifying to have.
Mike00:19:13And it's like, it's like, oh, I didn't have to borrow this from a neighbor. I didn't have to go to Home Depot. I've got it. It's right here and it's mine.
Sonny00:19:20I'd have to spend another $20 on that drain wrench, you know? Exactly. Question. Yeah.
JVL00:19:26Did you, did you go with volcanic anger or quiet rage or seething disappointment? What was your mode?
Sonny00:19:38It's, it's a lot of, it's mostly disappointment. It's mostly. It's mostly disappointment. It's the, it's the, I, I do, I do a lot of like, I do a lot of talking deliberately and not loudly, but firmly with very wide eyes. Like I can see that, you know, and like the head kind of down a little bit, the head, you know, the head down, wide eyes, not quiet, but not loud, just firm. While also do you feel in charge? While also, exactly. While, while. While also engaging with.
JVL00:20:12You put your hand on his shoulder.
Sonny00:20:14So the, the counselor was there and I was just like, I would like you to explain to me what happened. And I was staring directly at my son as, as the counselor was talking. And it was, it's just like. How old is the counselor? Is the counselor like a 15 year old? A counselor's like 16. Sorry. I don't know. I don't know anyone. He's, he's maybe, he's, he's certainly, he's certainly no older than like young college aged. But it was, but again, it like. And, and volcanic rage is a thing. I don't, I like, I actually don't really have that tool in my tool shed. I have rage. I have like, I have like, you have to stop doing that right now. You have simmering rage. If there's a, if there's a, if there's an element of danger involved, that's yeah.
JVL00:21:04So that's, I've used volcanic rage probably twice in both, both times were like. Life and death, physical endangerment of people. And one wasn't even against my own kid. Yeah. Somebody else's kid. It's like through a shot put in the direction of a bunch of fifth grade girls.
Sonny00:21:22Oh yeah. Now you can't, I like, I lost my mind. No, you, you, you can't do that, but it's like, it's like running out into the street without looking like that sort of, you know, that's the sort of, um, so anyway, that was, that was my, that was my yesterday. That was my, that was my, it was just like. It wasn't effective.
JVL00:21:41It was one of these.
Sonny00:21:42Yeah. So we got, we got the report back today from the carpool because they, they did the carpool again. And, and the mom who drove them in was like, they were silent the whole way. All of them. They were, they were incredibly well behaved. Did his buddies get, get knocked on? Oh yeah. Cause they all got, they all got notes back too. So they all, like the whole, the whole crew got, got, got reamed out. I don't know. I don't know how I went with the other parents and their kids, but, uh, the, the report back this morning was silence in the car. And my son. My son said, maybe we shouldn't listen to the banana song. I don't know what this is. I don't know what, but apparently there's a banana song that they've been listening to that drives them insane. Like they start like banging on the windows and they're like there. And I was like, and apparently today he said, maybe we shouldn't listen to the banana song today. Cause that gets us a little bit crazy. And I was like, very good. Smart, smart thinking.
JVL00:22:35This crew must feel like they all just did a stretch at Lompoc or something.
Sonny00:22:39They all got, they all just got out of the hole.
?00:22:41Right.
Mike00:22:43That's great. That's good. Well, uh, I have, I have similar, well, I don't have a similar story, but, but similarly, my, I have a son at camp this week and he's not just at camp. He's at sleepaway camp. Uh, so my oldest is at, uh, his first sleepaway camp. It is boy scout camp. And so he's with his troop. He's with, um, one of the larger troops at that's at this week of camp. Uh, and. In fact, at this particular camp, um, uh, there's something like 28 boys, which is like, oh, that's a lot. Um, and it, it, a big chunk of them, like six or seven of them, I think it's, it's, I think it's seven are of his age. The, the new scouts, like this is their first year in it and it's their first opportunity to go to boy scout camp. And so it's nice as it's almost, they're almost all like very good friends of my son. And so they're all there together. And, um, I had. Who I was among the volunteers who drove down to this camp, the camp is about five hours away from where we live. Um, and so it was, uh, it was an interesting experience because I got a good sense of how different people approach a five hour trip in which some of those people are staying. Like some of them were assistant scout masters that are staying the week with them and camping out. Uh, and. And the rest of us who were then turning around and driving home after that.
JVL00:24:16Five hours each way.
Mike00:24:17Exactly. Oh, and so, um, so we all get up in the morning on sun, on a Sunday morning, we meet at the school, uh, down the street from us. Uh, that's where the trailer is, you know, where everybody can put their, um, to put their, their foot lockers. Um, I have some room in the back of our minivan that I can put foot lockers. I can take. I can take my son and two others. He took two of his friends. Um, and you know, the instructions where I get there between seven 30 and eight o'clock, no later than eight o'clock. So we can make sure that everybody's signed in. All the drivers are signed in. Everybody's got everybody's phone number. Um, we'll take a picture. We'll do last minute. You know, the, the senior patrol leader does a thing with the kids to make sure that they're all, they all know what they're going to do. And then in the scout master have their own sort of talk with the kids. And then. Leave no later than eight 30 was the, was the, were the instructions. So, uh, and then it was like, there's no caravan, which is good. Like caravans are dangerous. Um, there's so, but everybody's going to drive on their own. And, uh, so it's about eight, 10, eight 15. We just pull out. It's like, all right, boys, we're ready to go. So we hit the road. Uh, no traffic at all. It was terrific.
JVL00:25:35Are you carrying people other than your own children? Yeah.
Mike00:25:37I'm carrying two other kids, kids, kids who I know. I mean, they're, they're. They're, they're his friends. I know them. Um, I know their parents very well.
JVL00:25:46And, um, and all the people in your car are being left there.
Mike00:25:51Yes. I'm the only one coming home.
JVL00:25:53Okay.
Mike00:25:53Correct. Uh, the other, the other three are scouts who are staying there. Um, so we're driving, we're having a good time and you know, I'm just, by the way, I will say this on the drive. So there were other cars that other kids were going in, you know, one of them was like, yeah, we've got like a couple movies to watch. On the way down. I was like, oh, we don't have anything like that. Um, we didn't bring like a Nintendo Switch. We had the license plate game. So we actually played the license plate game. It was, so we, we actually played, it was, we, we do the alphabet game and I let the, the boys figure out the rules for that. So their rules were, it had to, the letter had to start, uh, the word or be the first one on a license plate, uh, for it to count. So you couldn't just see a random B. Uh, Sonny, you're, you're muted. I can't hear your objection.
Sonny00:26:44You can't, you can't allow license plates in this game. I, like, I have played this game with my kids before. It's, it's, there's too many. It's, it's a cheat. Well, even, even on like Q's or X's or Z's, you gotta, you gotta, I am a pretty stickler on this. Like you gotta find it on a sign.
Mike00:27:00Well, the, again, the license plate is limited in, in the, in this rule system because it has to be the first letter on the license plate, uh, in the, in the license plate sequence. Um, we also did, uh, we allowed for Q and X to be, they could just, you're gonna hate this, Sonny. They could just be in the word. They didn't have to start the word. Otherwise, it had to start, start the word. Um, but interestingly, they did a thing where it was a competition.
JVL00:27:2630 miles. Huh? Oh, oh. A Q can buy you 30 miles of time.
Mike00:27:30But here's the other thing. Uh, the, uh, the Q's are, are, I, I realized the Q's are more prominent than you realize because there's a ton of things like quality.
JVL00:27:41I mean, there's just quality in, right.
Mike00:27:44Um, and, uh, and, and because we did the, it didn't have to start. We did, we did BBQ. So that was actually what, what God, anyway, um, they did that game. We did the, um, we did the, uh, the category game, right. Where everybody just said, like somebody picks a category and then you go an alphabetical order and you have to say something that starts with that, your letter, uh, in that category. So animals, you know. Aardvark, uh, beaver, uh, cat, you know, dog, that sort of thing. And every, it's, uh, every, you know, if there, if the three of us were playing, I would start, I would say animal. I would say one that started with an A, then Sonny would say one with B, JVL would say C, and then I'd have D, E, F, G. And, uh, we just did that for like four rounds. And, uh, the, the, but the boys were having a great time. Like they, they were actually in like enjoying themselves doing all like these analog games. We are speeding down the highway. I mean, we're just doing. We're just making great time. We hit like a little rain. We get like over a mountain where there's been rain and we get down to the bottom, uh, and there's a rest area. And I had been asking at every rest area, Hey, does anybody need to pee? Like, and then finally they're like, yeah, I could do that. So, all right, let's pull off. We take our one break. Every, everybody pees. It's actually, I've never seen this at a, at a rest stop. Uh, it was like every single big rig had, had, had pulled over at this thing. And there was actually a line out the men's room door, which I'd never seen before. It was crazy. It was just, it was like, everybody had the same thought, which is once we get down to the bottom of the mountain, let's go to this rest area. So we did that. So I'm going, oh, we just lost 10 minutes of time, but that's fine. That's fine. We'll keep going. So we're on our way. We get there, we get to the camp and I pull in and I'm like, I got a feeling about this. And I said, you pull in and you got to tell them what troop you are, what council you are. Cause lots of different people from all over the area coming in. And I said, I don't know. Are we, we might be the first ones of our troop here. Granted, there's like nine cars coming from our troop. I'm like, yeah, you are. So that we go to our campsite where the kids are going to be camping and a couple parents show up a few minutes after us. Guys, I do not leave that campsite for two hours as we are waiting. Cause like nobody who has gotten there early is none of them are parents who are staying. We are waiting for the rest of them. And then I start looking at the text thread of what's, what's been going on. They made a stop at Bucky's on the way. And then they, and they go, and we'll be making a sex. I'm like a second stop. Second stop. Second stop. What are we doing here?
JVL00:30:27It just slows your whole timeline.
Mike00:30:27What is this? Totally. It was like, I was, I was like, okay, okay. We made it. Did they run into the Cyclops? I know. I was like, so it literally did feel like my way home was like my own. Personal odyssey. It was like, I'm never getting home. I'm like, you know, it was like waylaid by a storm here. And, uh, you know, there was, uh, there was an intriguing, uh, you know, uh, uh, restaurant to, to stop. I did stop at Bucky's on the way home. Cause I was like, well, I'm going to get something.
JVL00:30:57There was no, there was no Twin Peaks.
Mike00:30:58There was no, there was no Calypso's cafe. Um, anyway, but so it was just, but I, two hours of basically sitting around waiting. And then when they finally got there, it was like, they had to back the trailer. And I had to help them like navigate that and stuff. And it's fine. And it's been a great week so far. It's been a ton of rain and they like, I've just had to, like, they're sleeping in tents, you know, there's like, they're going to their classes.
JVL00:31:24Cause you're not there. What do you care?
Mike00:31:26100%. 100%. So that's, what's happening. And it's been, it's been like a totally different experience here at home. Having our oldest of three gone for a whole week. Like the, all of the family dynamics have changed. And like, I, my middle son, I have never seen him happier than he has been this week. Like he is like singing to himself. He's like got a skip in his step. He's more, it's just like.
Sonny00:31:53King of the castle. King of the castle. Totally. 100%.
JVL00:31:56Flash leaves in 14 days. Oh, so. Oh my gosh. For the longest sleep away camp ever. Exactly. So you've never done something that's totally new for us. And I'm terrified. It's going to be like, everything will be different.
Mike00:32:09Well, but it'll be, it'll be good for, good for all. And this is going to be good. So anyway, that's, what's going on my life. We should move on though. And we should talk about the box office. Yes.
?00:32:20Box office.
JVL00:32:20Tell me about the box office. Is there anything interesting in the box office? You go, bro. That's what I learned from the box office.
Sonny00:32:27I got to say, I've been, I've now done like three or four different podcasts talking about this and I can't get enough. I can't, I can't get enough. I had a feeling you couldn't get enough.
Mike00:32:35So, so let's, let's, let's go through, let's go through this first. Because, uh, yeah, obviously number one at the box office this week has been the odyssey at $123.5 million and it's opening weekend, uh, uh, uh, worldwide. It's, I mean, what is it over $240 million?
Sonny00:32:54It was, it, it got past a quarter billion and it's opening three days. Okay.
Mike00:32:57Two. So over $250 million. Um, it is, I mean, it's just blowing everything else out of the water. Moana, the live action sequel of a movie that wasn't animated movie that wasn't made that long ago in the first place, uh, limping in a, into second place, uh, at a total of $81 million toy story, five minions and monsters is number four and number five, evil dead burn. I mean, it's the, the story of the box office is the odyssey. So Sonny, let's hear it.
Sonny00:33:26So, uh, as, as prelude to this, of course, there was a lot of chatter on Twitter that, you know, the, the odyssey had Christopher Nolan had betrayed the tenets of the odyssey and, and really all of Western. Yeah. Civilization by casting a black Helen of Troy and Elliot page, a trans man as a soldier for a while. They were, people were saying he cast Elliot pages, Achilles, and this is ridiculous. Achilles, not in the movie. Achilles, not in the movie at all. Uh, and Elliot page plays a, a soldier named science sit, sign and Sinan, Sinan, Sinan, Sinan, um, who is actually not even actually in the odyssey. That's a, it's a character from the Aeneid. Um, but the, but the, um, Um, uh, so there was a lot of chatter like, Oh, Christopher Nolan is, is, is finally his hubris has gotten the best of him. He's doing all these things for Oscar diversity quotas and like every single one of these controversies as they were happening, I was like annoyed with and trying to shoot down like the, the quota thing in particular is grading because I don't know if you guys remember, uh, Christopher Nolan's previous film, which was Oppenheimer, which won, you know, a whole bunch of Oscars, won eight or 10 or 12 Oscars, however many at one, um, and had zero minorities in it. I'm like, it depends on how you want to Irish. What's that? Irish. Well, there are probably some Italians, but, uh, there were probably more Greeks. There are probably more Greeks in that than this. Uh, but, uh, but, uh, but it depends on how you want to define Rami Malek, I guess. But like the, like, it's like, it's like the whitest, the whitest film, like the Christopher Nolan has ever moved, which is saying. I mean, Christopher Nolan is not well known for having lots of minority characters. Um, and that one tons and tons of Oscars, and that was working under the same diversity rules. The diversity rules are, we can, we can discuss those on a separate time, but they're like functionally, they don't matter at all because any, literally every single film that has one best picture would have qualified under the rubric that the Academy created. It's, it's a stupid, it was a stupid thing made for show in the wake of Oscar. So white, it means nothing. Um, which is good reason. Not to make things like this because it, whatever. Yes. I'm not going to argue about that. Um, but the movie itself, you know, I figured it would probably do a little bit better than Oppenheimer because it was not going to have competition in the form of Barbie. Um, though there's some question as to like how much of that synergized, right? There was the Barbenheimer thing. You had people who were going to Barbie and the dads were going to Oppenheimer and it was like a fun, you know, kind of dual thing that, that people could do. Um, and. So I figured, yeah, I figured like this was going to do 85 to 95 million, something like that in its opening weekend. I thought it would be limited, frankly, by the amount of IMAX inventory. There's a, there's a limited amount of IMAX inventory. There's only so many, um, PLF screens in general. One thing I hadn't really counted on. Right. One, one thing I hadn't really counted on was, uh, the Odyssey having all of the premium large format because I remember Barbie took most of the like Dolby screens. Okay. And those, and those things were while Oppenheimer had the IMAX and, you know, kind of 70 millimeter stuff. So I, I, but I figured, I figured it would do a little bit better, not a ton better. Um, and it grossed 50% more than Oppenheimer did in its opening weekend. I mean, it blew, blew right past it. 123 million, 123.5 million instead of 81 point, whatever, or whatever, whatever Oppenheimer opened at 81, 82.
JVL00:37:03Um, where is this on the list of R rated openings all time? Is it close? It was close to the top. It was like, well, it was Wolverine.
Sonny00:37:11It was, it was fourth of all time. Yeah. The three above it are all Deadpool movies. Yeah. Deadpool, Deadpool two and Deadpool and Wolverine, the three highest grossing, uh, R rated opening weekends of all time, which is just kind of a funny, kind of a real funny state statement of where the world is. Um, but this, uh, but this, so this movie is, it's an enormous, enormous hit that, like I said, it did 50%. It did 50% more in its opening weekend. Its first Monday was 50% more. Its first Tuesday was about 70% more. Um, uh, so it's, it's, or 67% more, something like that. It's doing, it's doing enormous, enormous business. It will probably end up grossing somewhere between 450 and $500 million. I think probably closer to 500 and that's domestic. That's just the domestic number worldwide. We're looking at probably a billion at this point, 1.2 billion. Something like that, I think is not, is not an unreasonable, um, estimate for this film. Uh, which of course makes it an enormous, enormous hit. It's a, and like, again, you know, it's a three hour R-rated sword and sandal picture. Like this is not a movie that should be grossing this kind of money. It's doing it all. It's doing it all because of Christopher Nolan. It's, it's really amazing. It's there. There's one, there is one director now who has his kind of name. Name brand cachet and it's Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino Spielberg was in like 92, 96, right? But I think, I think even beyond that though, I think even beyond that though, because Spielberg puts out hook, it's not like hook did that sort of business. He, he, the, you know, he, he kind of reclaimed his mojo with Jurassic Park, right? It was Jurassic Park.
Mike00:39:00Spielberg was more prolific than Nolan, right?
Sonny00:39:02I mean, well, that's, that's also true. Spielberg was making, you know, a year, a movie a year, or sometimes two movies a year for, for a long stretch. Christopher Nolan makes one movie every three years. Right.
Mike00:39:14And it's the, and it's the best movie that he can make. You know, it's like, there's no, he, he's not leaving things up to sort of, ah, well, I'm making two, you know, and, and, and splitting his attention and all that sort of thing. It is like, he's all in on that one movie. I mean, I don't want to get too much into this, Sonny, but like you, you started this conversation about the sort of. Online conversation. Oh, this is going to be a disaster because they, because Nolan went woke and all this stuff. I mean, it seems like we should not even be talking about that conversation anymore from here on out because it is so, it is so denied by reality that the conversation itself is what should never have gotten any attention in the first place.
Sonny00:40:03So what happened was there were several movies that came out. That this similar, similar kind of freak outs happened out like Lightyear with the lesbian mom kiss, right? Or Strange World with the gay son or the Snow White, live action Snow White with Rachel Zegler, you know, who was talking about, you know, how much she hated the original and like, and, and, and, and is Hispanic. We can't possibly have a Hispanic as a, as a Snow White. And so. It's right in their name.
JVL00:40:36I mean, it's not, it's not like.
Sonny00:40:38There's, it's not like there's a white Hispanic versus non-white Hispanic categorization on the census or anything. Anyway, neither here nor there. Point is, there were several of these movies came out that did in fact flop that did very, very well or did very, very poorly. That did not, that did not do well. And I think what happened was the proponents of these kinds of outrage campaigns saw those and thought that they were successes and got a little drunk on their own power and were like, we're going to look at what we did. We're going to take down Christopher. Nolan next. And, and what these people failed to understand was that it's not, those movies didn't fail because they were because of outrage campaigns on Twitter. They failed because they weren't good. They failed. They failed because nobody wanted them. Right. Failed because nobody want nobody. Like if you tried, I could, I don't know that I could right now explain to you the concept of light year in one sentence. And that, that failure movie that Andy saw, it's the movie that Andy watched, which in inspired him to buy the toy, but yeah, whatever. It's fucking stupid is what it is. Nobody wanted it. Nobody wanted it. And the movie failed as a result. It didn't fail because of the lesbian mom kiss. Um, anyway, so, uh, I don't know. Uh, like I think, I think some movies can be impacted by social media outrage campaigns for the most part though. Twitter is not real life and you should ignore a hundred, almost a hundred percent of these
Mike00:42:06things, I guess. Because Elon Musk himself was sort of involved in that conversation. It made it into something that it made it into something real, quote unquote, real in a way that if it were just a bunch of anonymous chuds, I still just think it's like, so now we don't have to listen to any of that anymore. Right. Because like, it's just, it's not real and it's so not real and it's proven not real.
JVL00:42:34Would that it were so simple.
Sonny00:42:36Yeah. The problem. The problem is that it makes for good content.
Mike00:42:41It does it though.
Sonny00:42:43I mean, I, I find it so like, this is, this is, this is the problem. This is, there's always been a, there's always been a, um, vicious circle sort of cycle sort of thing, a self-reinforcing cycle where like, oh, the chuds are mad. Let's write about the chuds being mad. Oh, they're madder. Let's write more. Like it just, it, it, it, it feeds into itself in ways that are not great.
Mike00:43:02It bores me.
Sonny00:43:03It bores me. So same, but this is the world in which we live. The problem is, you know, everybody, well, it doesn't matter. Long story short is, uh, Odyssey made a ton of money. It will continue to make a ton of money. If it has normal Christopher Nolan legs, it will gross at least, again, I like a four X multiple puts it at one, uh, puts it at like four 90 something, uh, domestic, which is like, it is an unfathomably large number for this type of movie is just the only way to describe it.
Mike00:43:38Question. What is the outlook for it's continued, uh, uh, displaying, continue to display in the big IMAX 70 millimeter and in even the other PLF, uh, screens, like how long are they going to be screening it there?
Sonny00:43:55So Nolan, Nolan has a special deal with IMAX because he shoots with IMAX cameras. He gets four weeks of exclusivity or the first four weekends. I can't remember if it's first four weekends, the first four weeks, first four, four weeks, but he gets four. Weeks of, uh, IMAX exclusivity. And he also had two full weeks of the other premium large format, uh, exclusivity. So Spider-Man brand new day comes out, uh, July 27th or whatever that weekend is July 25th. Um, and, uh, it will then take over like the Dolby, uh, screens and like the, you know, Cinemark XD or whatever, whatever their, uh, their screens. Are, but Nolan will continue to have IMAX for the next two weeks. I think then Spider-Man gets IMAX. Actually, no, Spider-Man doesn't get the IMAX screen. Spider, there will be no Spider-Man IMAX screens. And this is, so this is like, I, I, I, we need to get to the movie here. Uh, but like, this is a thing that Marvel has been dealing with. It's why they have this new ridiculous infinity vision standard. I don't know if you guys have seen this, the infinity vision, because the, um, because the doomsday, the Avengers doomsday. Film is going up against Dune three, Denis Villeneuve, of course, kind of famously also is like Nolan, a guy who shoots in IMAX, um, and shoots in the 70 millimeter IMAX format. And I believe he has exclusivity for at least two weeks and maybe for four weeks as well for Dune three. Um, and that is coming out the same weekend.
JVL00:45:28So what is infinity vision?
Sonny00:45:30So infinity vision is Marvel and Disney have decided to create a new standard that is supposed to rival the IMAX standards and involve different projectors. It's, it's fake news is what it is. It's fake branding news.
JVL00:45:46Is this, is this just like, you know, late? Cause I don't even notice, but AMC has rebranded just normal movies as laser vision. Right.
Sonny00:45:54Well, they, well, so they, well, they, they highlight the laser projectors, but they do the AMC has the AMC XLs now, which are just the big, just, which are just the bigger auditorium.
JVL00:46:04They have one large normal auditorium. That's not, and that's now as XL, XL, AMC XL.
Sonny00:46:12It's, it is, it's interesting. Um, the, the games that are being played here. I will say that if, if the infinity vision leads to Disney sending somebody to every theater in the country that wants this designation, making sure they have, making sure they have the right bulbs and they're projecting at the right lumens.
JVL00:46:33Mask the screen.
Sonny00:46:35And that, well, masking is a loss. That war was been lost, you know, years ago.
JVL00:46:39All I care about mask, the fucking screens properly, please. No, it doesn't. Good luck.
Mike00:46:46Never happening again. I guess what the reason I ask about all this is just, it seems like the demand and I'm speaking anecdotally for myself, but also just in conversations I've had conversations, Sonny, I know you've had with, uh, friends like non, non movie geek people. Um, the demand that seems to be out. There to like, well, I couldn't see it in the IMAX 70 millimeter, uh, now, but I want to see it in it eventually. It's like, that seems like that could really give this movie even more legs than, than we think.
JVL00:47:22I mean, it's like every five years you can re-release it during a fallow period for IMAX 70 and make $12 million on a weekend.
Sonny00:47:29Well, they've been doing, they've been doing that with interstellar and, uh, you know, like I actually think so, like there, there are, there are technical limitations. To this, like they literally cannot build the projectors anymore. They don't have the parts to make new IMAX 70 millimeter projectors. It's like, it's, it's what's the meme. Like we couldn't build it even if we wanted to, like we, like we, we literally cannot make more of these. You would, the, the engineers who built them are all dead and gone and the factories, you know, the, the, the manufacturers that made these projectors don't exist anymore. Like it's all, you would have to make each one. I wrote about this for the standard. Do you remember that?
Mike00:48:09To remember the, the thing. Fog Bank.
Sonny00:48:12Yeah.
JVL00:48:13Yeah. There was a, there was like a component of a nuclear warhead called code name Fog Bank. It was so classified that like all the records pertaining to it were destroyed. And when the, uh, US, uh, atomic energy like was refurbishing a bunch of our nuclear missiles and try, they found this shit and they couldn't figure out how to make it again. And all the people who made it were dead and all the facilities. Were made, was made, were decommissioned. And so they had to reverse engineer and took them years.
Sonny00:48:42Yeah, that's exactly. So like theoretically what they could do is they could take one of the last remaining IMAX 70 millimeter projectors apart, 3d print all of the things and put it back together again. And maybe that would work. Uh, but like, I, I honestly think so. Like there was, there's a big interview with one of the IMAX heads who was like, we, we can't make any more of these. So we're just maintaining the ones we've got. And it's like, that's your job. That's, you need to figure out how to make more of these. Decline is a choice. It is. Well, so like, look, I'll talk, we'll talk about this in a second here, but you know, uh, I've seen, I've now seen the Odyssey twice. And the first time I saw it, I saw it in digital IMAX, like the regular, you know, multiplex digital IMAX. And it looked good. I mean, it looked, it looked good. I saw it again in IMAX or not IMAX 70. I saw it again in just 70 millimeter, just regular 70 millimeter, a 70 millimeter film print. And it sucked. It sucked because the people who are running the 70 millimeter projectors at AMC or, you know, at, at most of the places that don't actually run film all the time still, and there, there are theaters that still run film all the time. Like you can go to them, but if you have these guys who kind of parachute in and they're doing film, the, the, the 70 millimeter print of the Odyssey at the AMC near me, it's scratched to shit already. Like, it's not like, not like it has, like, not like it has like little imperfections, or like pieces of dirt or whatever. Like, it has long streaks running through it where it had been, it had been put on the reels incorrectly and had gotten scratches all up and down it. And I was just like, this is unacceptable. It's unacceptable that this is...
JVL00:50:24Did you ask to see the manager?
Sonny00:50:26I did not. I did not. I, but it, but it's a real, it's a real bummer, man. It's like, you know, we don't, we, we've, we've, we have chosen not to be able to do nice things anymore.
Mike00:50:37And I just, you know, well, uh, we should move on to talk about this movie properly because we, we've gone on for quite a while and there's a lot to talk about with this. So Sonny, will you give us, can I, can I hold on the table here? Yes. Set the table for this. I just want to put my cards on the table.
JVL00:50:59I didn't see it and I didn't see it for two reasons. The first of which was, uh, the time commitment to it. Like I... I was backing up how much of a day it would eat up for me to go to see this fucking movie. And I was like, that's four hours of my life. Yeah. That is four hours of my life. I can't give it to that. But the second thing was Sonny's review. Sonny's review of this movie when Sonny Bunch, who loves Christopher Nolan even more than his beloved Zack Snyder, is like, yeah, I don't know. It feels kind of long. Like, I like it with reservations. I was like, dude, the alarm bells were blaring. And so what I ask is, you gentlemen, convince me to go. Okay. If you think that I should. Okay. Otherwise, I'm happy to wait and watch it on my phone in six weeks when it comes out, as it meant to be. If I watch it really close on my phone. Six months. Yeah. If I watch it really close on my phone, it'll be like being at IMAX. That's right.
Mike00:52:07Make sure you hold the phone vertically like this. Well, obviously. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Sonny, give us a big board review of The Odyssey.
Sonny00:52:16The Odyssey, written by Homer 2,800 years ago or so. Rewritten by Christopher Nolan, directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Matt Damon as Odysseus, Mr. Odyssey himself. So I don't know. I don't know how recently you guys have read The Odyssey. I don't know when the last time you guys actually read.
JVL00:52:45Yeah, three weeks ago.
Sonny00:52:47Was it actually? Did you? No. Okay. I don't know.
Mike00:52:50I started listening to an audio version of it in anticipation of seeing the film, and I got through probably two-thirds of it. Yeah.
Sonny00:53:01So The Odyssey itself is the original Homer 2. The Homeric epic poem is an interesting film or interesting tome in the sense that Odysseus doesn't show up until six books into the 24-book Odyssey. He does not show up really until a quarter of the way through the thing. And then once he does show up, his story is told. The actual Odyssey part of Odysseus' story is told in flashbacks, told in this kind of fractured flashback. He's traveling to different islands to get home, and he's telling bits and pieces of the story as he goes. And this is my so this is my big complaint about the Odyssey, and I'll get to the things I like in a minute. But I do I do think that this movie. It is it is in some ways very much built for the Christopher Nolan cinematic treatment in the sense that like Christopher Nolan himself is often like hopping timelines and hopping memory, and he is going back and forth and and it's fractured in that sense. And sometimes people get confused. About this, they can't follow what what is happening there. They're not sure exactly where we are or how much time has transpired or whatever. I've never really had a problem with that, but I kind of understand it. This is not complicated, really, at all. It's just herky jerky. It's just like like the flashbacks and the the the very episodic nature of the Odyssey itself, like Odysseus and his men go to an island and they fuck things up and then they run away while some of them get killed. This happens over and over again in the in the story. And this happens over and over in the movie. And again, it's it is it is repetitive to watch for three hours like that is it's like it's just it's not a smooth ride. Oppenheimer is one of the smoothest rides I have ever seen in a movie of that sort, despite the fact that it is hopping between not just two like that movie is hopping between like three or four different timelines. And part of the trick to help you with it is the color changes, black and white, versus color. But also, it just is really well done. It's really seamlessly edited together. And it is propulsive because the secret trick to Oppenheimer is that it's a very funny and B is edited like a comic book movie. It like moves, it zips. And that's that's why I think it's I think Oppenheimer is a much better film than this. I think Oppenheimer is like a real masterpiece. I think this is a flawed but still very, very good movie. Uh, so that is that's my big problem with the film. I, I, I, I'm going to just lay that out on the table. I find it repetitive. Um, I find it, uh, it is, it is paced wrong. It is, it is an incorrect pacing. It's like there, it just stops and starts too much. And it doesn't, it does not have the flow of his other big epic films. And that's a problem. Um, that said, that said, um, it is, it is this movie that is just like kind of perfectly cast from the top to the bottom with one, I get the best cast in a motion picture since Oppenheimer, right? Like it's not just Matt Damon as Odysseus, um, and, and Hathaway as Penelope, uh, and you know, Tom Holland and Robert Pattinson, you start running like Charlize Theron is Calypso, uh, who is, I don't know. I like, again, I don't know how much you guys remember about the Odyssey, but like Charlize Theron is the like kind of witchy enchantress. Who keeps him happily on an Island for seven years. I buy it. I buy it. I buy it. When I see Charlize Theron in that role, uh, Lupita Nyong'o as Helen and Clyman Estra, uh, as the, the twin sisters, um, uh, like they have this kind of perfect sorrow and feralness to them. Uh, the, the, uh, John Leguizamo, John Leguizamo, who plays the sheep herd, um, Eumanias, Eumanias, I think I'm, I'm, I'm terrible with these names. Um, is like, again, he's like funny, but also kind of sad and wise. Uh, the, the guy who plays mentor, who was from sons of anarchy of all places, I believe, uh, is just really, really good. Um, as kind of, as Tom, Tom, as, uh, Tom Holland's, uh, uh, Telemachus, Telemachus. Thank you. Jesus Christ. Uh, as Telemachus is, yeah, he's literally, his name is literally mentor. He's where we get the word mentor. It's from Zendaya as Athena. It's like, I could go on and on. Like every role in this movie is, is like pretty, pretty much spot on perfectly cast. Um, the, uh, and as much as I bitch about the kind of herky jerky nature of that first two hours, when you get to the slaughter of the suitors, when you get to Odysseus's return to home and the revenge against everybody. It is very effective. He has this moment where he plucks the string in the bow and it resonates perfectly with the score by Ludwig Göransson, which is great. The score is like kind of perfectly old. It feels ancient, but also modern. Um, uh, the first audience I saw it with fucking cheered like it was like they were ready. They were ready for some, for some brutal, brutal, brutal violence. And it is also, it is a profound movie. It is a, it is. It is a movie of ideas. And this would be my argument to you, JVL. This would be my argument to you to see it, which is that it is, it's a movie. Um, it is a movie about ideas and ideals and what it means for society, a society and a civilization to jettison the things that have made them successful and to, and to sounds
JVL00:58:59like a lot of cultural relevance right now and to embrace intentionally.
Sonny00:59:02So in, to embrace a form of barbarism. Um, that, that, uh, leads to their own downfall and that would be so I like you, the Oppenheimer and Odyssey are kind of flip sides of a coin. I also would loop tenant into this because tenant has a lot of the same kind of themes of ideas of annihilation and apocalypse, but the, but, but really Oppenheimer and the Odyssey are flip sides of the same coin about men who did a bad thing that destroyed or could potentially destroy the world. Um, in the case of Oppenheimer, it's the creation of the atomic bomb in, in the case of the Odyssey, it is the trick of the Trojan horse. And this is the thing. So this is, there's a question of, you know, how, oh, it's a revisionist retelling of the, I have always like taken functionally the Roman view of the Trojan horse, which is that it is, it is a terrible, it was a terrible crime. Um, it was, it was, it was, you know what it was? It wasn't fair play. It wasn't. And like, I understand there's no rules in love and war. I get it. But, but it was, it wasn't just not fair play. It was literally blasphemous. I mean, it was literally like, I don't believe in the Greek gods, but if I did believe in the Greek gods and these people all believe in the Greek gods, I would not use an offering to a God as a trick to slaughter all the people inside, uh, uh, uh, big, big, you know, city. Um, I wouldn't do that. That's not, that's not, that's not how I would do it. That's not how I would do it. Cause I wouldn't want to be punished for my hubris. Um, this movie is about, it's three hours of, you see what happens when you got hubris? You see what happens? Do you see what happens? So that would be my argument to you is that it is a, it is a movie of ideas. Um, it's a, it's a film about something. And, uh, and you know, again, I have, I, for me, this is very much like middle to lower tier Nolan, honestly, that still makes it better than nothing. 99.8% of things in theaters. Like it's probably, I've seen it twice. I will go see it a third time, despite the fact that I don't love it. Do, do me this favor.
JVL01:01:19Tenet, Interstellar, Odyssey, rank them.
Sonny01:01:27Interstellar, number one, by far, um, by like a, by, by a fairly wide margin. I, I, I will, I am happy to acknowledge that. Tenet has a lot of flaws, but I actually, I kind of love that movie. That movie has very much grown on me over the years. It's a movie I will just throw in if I've had a few drinks and I need like something to kind of distract myself with at the end of the night. Uh, I will, I will watch like the first hour or the last hour of Tenet and just like kind of zone out when, when I'm trying to figure out precisely what is happening.
JVL01:02:00Feel it.
Sonny01:02:01Right. I mean, I literally, that line of dialogue, I have embraced that line of dialogue. So I would, I like, if we're talking, I think the Odyssey is probably a better film than Tenet. It's a better, more profound film than Tenet. It's better acted film than Tenet. Um, I probably enjoy watching Tenet more. I put it that way.
Mike01:02:28Interesting. Okay. Michael. Um, all right. I had, I had the exact, what, what? In the relation with Odyssey and Oppenheimer, I had the exact opposite reaction that Sonny did. I much prefer the Odyssey to Oppenheimer. I appreciate Oppenheimer. And yet for me, I find it a little inscrutable. Um, and the movie left me a little cold. Um, maybe that's the intention, you know? So I, what am I complaining about? I still, I still loved Oppenheimer. I, I loved the Odyssey. And I think it is an achievement, um, for, in, in many ways, and we could talk about the, the, the, its relationship to that source material in a minute, but just as we've been talking about Nolan and his, just his, the, the unique place that he has in Hollywood and in, in, in filmmaking and the art of filmmaking right now, I can't think of a better example of the way that he is able to. Both create a crowd-pleasing money-making blockbuster and a movie about, about something with a capital S, you know, these are, uh, or about ideas with a capital I like who else is doing this? Maybe Denis Villeneuve is sort of like up to the challenge, uh, but like nobody else is doing it right now. And I don't know who, who has in the, you know, maybe, you know, you guys who, who've seen more movies. Um, okay. Okay. That's a, that's a good example.
Sonny01:04:11Um, but I like no one's doing it the best and no, no dispute there. Yeah.
Mike01:04:18And, and, and he does it so well here because it sneaks up on you in many ways. Is it, the movie is more conventional than, than I was trying to think of, like maybe Batman begins is the, is, is like the, is the most conventional movie no one's made in until this one. Like I found it's, it's interesting, uh, because I had been reading the, the Odyssey like, and, and, and appreciating the time jumping of it. The story as presented in, uh, the, in Nolan's, the Odyssey felt very straightforward to me. Um, I felt like, oh, like I get what they're, what they're doing and what he's doing in the, in the, in media's rest stuff was just very, it felt very conventional to me. And yet the way it builds to. Those last, what, 45 minutes of the, of the movie. Like I did not appreciate until we got into that last 45 minutes, what the previous two hours had done, uh, in building me, building, not just me, but my audience around me, like same experience that you had Sonny in terms of like the, the, the almost visceral reactions to what happens in those last, in the, in that last act of the film, like people were just like. W put their hands up and like cheering and like, yes. And all that sort of stuff. And like, they're doing that all while this, like all while this like big idea about, about as you say, civilizational annihilation and barbarism and, uh, and the violation of your own rules under the, uh, under the delusion that it's, you are saving your civilization and your. What you're actually doing is undoing it. Like that's all there and it's in the text too. And I just think that's such an achievement and accomplishment. And it surprised me, even though I knew what I was going into, oh, this is a Christopher Nolan movie. I, I should be, I should expect this. I was still sort of like knocked over by, by that experience. Um, so, so that was my like initial big picture reaction. Um, I love the way that he adapted this, um, because it's not just the odyssey. He also pulls things from the narrative of the Iliad and things, uh, characters and things from the Aeneid as well. Um, which is written hundreds of years after the odyssey and the Iliad were written.
Sonny01:06:50Um, and this, this is very much, this is the story from the perspective of people who read the Aeneid. Like this is the, the Romans, the Romans all thought, uh, Odysseus was a terrible person. He's in like, he's in like the eighth circle of, of. Dante is hell. Like he's, you know, he's, uh, um, he is like a watchword for deceit and betrayal.
Mike01:07:13Um, and the other thing that occurred to me as I was watching it and then thinking about it afterward is Nolan threaded this needle where like other directors just could not have accomplished it. On the one hand, you could, what you could have had was like, sort of like Troy in the Brad Pitt movie. A very surface level, like sword and sandal, like war movie and where everybody's talking in British accents and it's like, you know, it's, it's very, in that way, very conventional. Um, and it would have been like either dumbed down, uh, and missing some of the big, you know, uh, not, you know, some of the big themes of the Iliad and that sort of thing. Or, you know, it, it would have, um, it would have sort of modernized. The story in ways that were unsatisfying. And I could see that on the other side too, where like this movie in, in, in worse hands could have like, could have made Penelope, like somebody who actually kills the suitors at the end, you know, like would have been like a girl power kind of thing that would also kind of lose the whole kind of lose the plot of it. And instead what Nolan did was like, he is a modern man making a story for modern audiences and using this very old story that was told to people in the time that it was written to tell them about their own world and like telling us about our world through it. And it's like, it's like makes my mind melt to think about like how he accomplished this. I mean, there are, there are things like, you know, everybody's talked about like the dialogue, right. Where, where Tom Holland says dad, you know, instead of father. I think it accomplishes a way of like, it's like, it makes it more accessible to us so that we can see what he's trying to say about our time or about our relationship with civilization right now through this very old story, which is the point of it is not that, that, that it's interesting to go back to the controversy. The point of it is not that Helen of Troy, you know, could she be, could she be black skinned? Could she? Could she not be white? Should she? All that stuff. It's like, this is, this is the origin story of like our, of our culture. And like his point, I think in many ways is like, it still has something to tell us right now. And the point is not what happened in the historical accuracy for something that didn't actually happen. But like, like what is it like, this is the foundational story and it is a story that we are still like telling in a slightly different way. Uh, we can lob off things like the, the, the island of the Lotus eaters or, uh, Helios and the bag of wind that, that that's not in the, in this movie. And like still tell the story. And I just, I think he did it brilliantly and I can't stop thinking about it.
Sonny01:10:21Um, the, the dad, the dad thing is interesting because it's, it's not about accessibility so much as it is about trying to frame the, um, this, the. Telemachus himself as like kind of young and callow and, and, or naive. Yeah. Um, not, not, not wise to the ways of the world, but it also allows the suitors to really like get his goat, you know, like, Oh daddy, daddy. Right. Right. Like that, that stuff. Um, I, you know, there, there's a version of this movie that is made by Robert Eggers. Uh, it was the guy who made, you know, the witch or, uh, Nosferatu, uh, you know, who, or the Northman who like. Like embodies this idea of like, we are going back to the mindset of this age and we are going to make a movie from that mindset. And this is not that movie. If you want that movie, you're watching the wrong movie. This is not that movie, but it's also, and it has a lot to say about modernity, obviously, and, and kind of where we are. Um, and, and I, that is, I think, as you say, Mike, it's, that is to the movie's benefits. It is to the thematic strength. Of the film. Um, you know, do you know what Nolan knows?
Mike01:11:39Nolan knows that if this were told from the perspective of the Achaeans of the late bronze age Greeks for which this story originates, that, and I'm not just talking about wokeness, like our modern sensibilities, it, it would offend us. Like it would be because Odysseus is by our own cultural standards, a terrible person and, and like bad. And so for us to. Understand this story, we can't watch him be this glorious, you know, the, the Greek words, right? It's like, he's like, he's just, he's like, he can do anything and he's clever and all this stuff and, and like, watch him do the things that he does and like, not really care that he loses his man. Like we can't watch that movie and have it be make $1.2 billion at the end of the day. Um, that's, that's just the, that's the long and short of it.
Sonny01:12:33Yeah.
Mike01:12:34Tell me, I don't know. I, I, I loved it. I love the things that they lopped off. I love the things that they include. Like there, there's a whole thing. I, a couple of other things that I loved. I love John Bernthal as Menelaus. Yes.
Sonny01:12:47Like I forgot, I forgot John, but he's one of my favorite parts of the movie.
Mike01:12:50He's perfect. He's terrific because he is, uh, he is not somebody that any like would fit in a normal sword and sandal movie because he's like, he feels too modern, but like he, he works in that, in that role so well. He is, he is like your bro-ish uncle. He is Telemachus' bro-ish uncle. Who's like, Hey, this is, this is what you need to know. Kind of thing. I love that. I love, I love the shot of the opening of the gates of Troy and to see like Agamemnon standing there in his ridiculous and badass uniform, like, and then to see the rest of the group, like, it's like, I wouldn't stand up and cheer that moment. Like, this is awesome. And then it's brilliant that they, that they cast Benny Safdie, who I didn't realize who I didn't realize who they had cast. Like until I saw it after I was like, who is that? Um, and you only see his face in, in, in Hades and you don't even see his face in Hades
Sonny01:13:52really though.
Mike01:13:52I guess you don't, it's in the flashback and the flashback, like it's, it's, it's a brilliant, like, if you know the story of like who Agamemnon is in the Odyssey is a different character than who Agamemnon is in the Iliad. And in the Odyssey, he's like, he's, he's, he's kind of, he's just different. And he's, and he's meant to tell us a different thing than he was in the, in the Iliad. And I just like casting Benny Safdie, like that is like ridiculous to think about him as like a, as Agamemnon, like it's kind of a brilliant, uh, it's a, it was, no one knows the source material very well. And so he knows how to depart from it or how to play around with it in fun and interesting ways. Sorry, I'll stop. I just, I'm, I love this movie.
JVL01:14:35JVL, you convinced? Turns out it's important to, uh, have filmmakers who have really solid classical educations.
?01:14:44Yeah.
Sonny01:14:44It's nice.
JVL01:14:45It's nice.
Sonny01:14:46Got to send these guys to British private schools.
JVL01:14:48Instead of Michael Bay learning everything he needs to know from MTV. And I'm, I'm just saying, you know,
Mike01:14:56It's a different kind of education, JVL.
Sonny01:14:58Different. They're different modes. They're different modes. See, I want my movie to go, and then there'd be like a,
JVL01:15:05I guess I have two questions. First is, should I see it on Dolby screen? Like the Dolby cinema screen or an IMAX screen? Understanding that it's an AMC IMAX screen, not a true IMAX screen.
Mike01:15:18I saw it on a boring IMAX screen, like a, a, a regular, not 70 millimeter IMAX screen. Um, and I didn't, I felt like I didn't lose anything.
Sonny01:15:28I, I've not seen it on the Dolby, uh, screen. So I, I don't, I couldn't, I couldn't say for sure. Uh, but I would, I would guess you'll have an easier time getting better seats in the Dolby theater than the IMAX theater. Okay. I would, that's kind of how I would prioritize it, frankly, because you don't want to be right in the front row. Like, you know. Right. If you can even get IMAX.
JVL01:15:50And when you are at a fake IMAX theater, a LIMAX theater, as we used to call them, Sonny, um, is it the same aspect ratio that you're getting a true IMAX?
Sonny01:16:00So this is, so the, the 70 millimeter IMAX is boxier. It's like higher framed. The, the, the LIMAX theaters are, are more letter. I mean, there's still there. They are taller than regular, uh, you know, widescreen screens. So there, you can do like 1.6, six to one or something like that. Um, but it's not, uh, it's not the full 1.3, three, one, four, four, three, whatever it is. Yeah. Um, so.
Mike01:16:33All right. Well, well, you have your marching orders.
JVL01:16:35I will try to do that before next week.
Mike01:16:38You should, you should, um, maybe I'll save this for outtakes. I just had one more thought on, on the movie. Um, save it for outtakes. Okay. All right. Well, that is all the time then we are going to give to this episode. Uh, remember to join us at subbeacon.com, uh, tell your friends and family, and we will talk to you next time. Uh, so we didn't talk about Samantha Morton as Circe, who like when she showed up, I was like, Hmm, not how I envisioned Circe. Like they, they, they, you know, she's, she's kind of, you know, disheveled and dowdy looking, but that whole sequence, Sonny, like pure horror. Yeah. Absolute, like visceral, pure horror. And I was like, this is amazing.
Sonny01:17:25JVL, you described something we watched recently as having body horror in it. I forget what it was.
Mike01:17:31Oh, that's, this certainly has body horror.
Sonny01:17:33And it, and it, and it wasn't quite right. But this. This is, this is a, this is like a real, like, uh, like, like textbook body horror sequence where she makes, she turns the men into, she turns the men into pigs. It's the sequence in the Odyssey where they, the men, the men go to Circe's island and they want food. And she, um, she is afraid because she has been attacked before by men from the sea. And so she enchants them and turns.
JVL01:17:57So it's not fun in like Disney turned into pigs. It's not like fairy godmother.
Mike01:18:03It is like brothers. Grimm turned into pigs. Um, yeah.
Sonny01:18:07Or like the, yeah. What was the, what was the Jim Henson, uh, like, uh, storybook hour like that? You know, the, the, I can't remember what that was.
Mike01:18:17God, it's, it's, it's horrifying and in a, you know, in a satisfying way, but in a way where I was just like, like I was kind of like in my seat, like, and, uh, and then I was like, okay, I'm totally like Samantha Morton brings the right amount of like insane. Energy to, to that scene. And I was, I was on board after that.
Sonny01:18:38All right. Um, yeah, you should, you should go, you should go see it. You should go see it. Cause I would like to get your, I'd like to get your take on the, the, the ideas of it, the idea of it all. But you know, I know we're all, we're all very busy. You, you've had a lot going on these last, uh, few weeks, you know? Yeah. I understand. It's okay.
Mike01:19:01Yeah. I'm sure it's fine.
?01:19:04Thank you.
Spot something wrong in this episode? Suggest a correction →
Comments
Loading…