BONUS The Friday Show - War is Hell
Guest:Your brain will give you a much better, more enriching time than this does.
Marc:I can't even imagine the activity you would be doing, like waiting for surgery.
Marc:No, I think you can just do anything.
Marc:You can just watch the needle go into your skin and it will be less painful.
Guest:If I was not getting surgery and I was watching this, I would get a needle and put it into my skin.
Guest:hey chris hey brendan a headline that you may find important oh all right ready yeah amc theaters looks to shorten pre-show following studios ire this was from deadline.com this is your your beloved amc theaters with its with your stubs membership uh it looks like it looks like they're gonna get you in there to the film sooner
Marc:Yeah, that's my church.
Marc:That's where I go.
Marc:I say the, you know, the Holy Spirit to Nicole Kidman there.
Marc:Yes, that is.
Marc:She's the blessed mother.
Marc:Yes, she is.
Marc:Listen, I don't care about, you know, it could be 45 minutes.
Marc:It can be an hour after the showtime.
Marc:What I care about is that it's consistent.
Marc:Because I, much like Mark, I have situational anxiety.
Marc:And if I'm going to a movie and I know that I have this padding, I know I can get there and swoop in right for the last trailer or Nicole Kidman or whatever.
Marc:But I need it to be consistent.
Marc:Because if it's not consistent, I'm fucked.
Guest:But apparently that's what the problem is from the studios.
Guest:The studios are angry that AMC is now telling you that the movie doesn't start until 25 to 30 minutes after the trailers and commercials.
Marc:Because they want me to see these trailers.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And so like, basically, I think what the studio is saying is you guys have fucked this by making it so long.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So now your customers are complaining and you're telling them, don't worry, you don't have to show up.
Guest:Plus now everybody has assigned seats.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So they don't get there in time.
Guest:Look, to me, there's a very easy solution.
Guest:And I say it's an easy solution because my local theater does it.
Guest:Make a real pre-show.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Like a fun thing that makes people want to go there first.
Guest:And they put commercials on the one that's by my theater.
Guest:The Alamo does this too.
Guest:Right.
Guest:They have a half hour pre-show beforehand, mostly because they want you there ordering food before the movie starts.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So these are dine in theaters and it works much better for them if they get to take your order before the movie starts rather than doing the thing where they come by and pick up the little piece of paper.
Guest:So I totally get why they're doing it.
Guest:But the way they do it is so much better.
Guest:I think it's like a classic case of like.
Guest:these companies want their cake and they want to eat it too.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like they're like, well, what if we had a really long pre-show where we made money off of it, but also it was garbage.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Marc:There used to be that, that Newton, what was it?
Marc:It was that lady with the new V or something where I think she still does it.
Marc:I'm never there for it, but if you get to the crap,
Guest:where they ask you like five trivia questions and stuff like that.
Guest:Or you can play a game.
Guest:It's like what's on the gas station pump.
Guest:Yes, that's exactly what it is.
Guest:That's not what I'm talking about.
Guest:I'm talking about actual creative content that is fun to watch.
Guest:We went to see, I mentioned last week, went to see The Running Man and it was all clips of action movies before The Running Man and fun interviews of Arnold on late night talk shows and stuff.
Marc:Do that.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:They should definitely do that.
Marc:But I will say, whatever they decide on, I'm perfectly fine with, as long as, because I can see down the road where I'm in a theater, the lights are dark, I'm watching the movie, great, it's great, 15 minutes in, oh, there's a Verizon ad that's coming in.
Guest:Oh, no, they'll never, they'll never.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I wouldn't put it past them.
Marc:Wouldn't put it past them.
Guest:I think there would be such a backlash.
Guest:That's one of those things where the theater wouldn't want it to happen because people would stop going to movies.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Well, you know, they started at AMC, especially for these big tentpoles that came out, like for Fantastic Four and Superman.
Marc:They've had, because they usually just do ads and then trailer, trailer, trailer, trailer, trailer, trailer, trailer.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right now they've broken it up to where it's like trailer, trailer, trailer ad and then two more trailers.
Marc:So it's like, hey, OK, sure.
Marc:I'll sit there and add if you put it there.
Marc:Why not?
Marc:I guess.
Marc:But like I don't want them to do anything with my theater going experience.
Marc:Do whatever pre-show you want.
Marc:I'll sit down when I want to sit down.
Guest:Yeah, you got to do the WTF thing where you don't touch the interview, right?
Guest:No ads in the movie.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:I will say this, though.
Guest:This is the most ridiculous part of this whole thing, that if you read the deadline piece, it says, after some major studios clutched their pearls over AMC Theater's decision to book more ads before each movie showtime, sources are telling us that the number one movie circuit is working to shorten its pre-show.
Guest:It's still early and specific details are unknown, but there's hope that a shave can be done by the end of the year.
Guest:What?
Guest:I'm sorry.
Guest:Is it locked?
Guest:Do they need to find the passcode?
Guest:They did the wrong CAPTCHA on it or something?
Marc:Sorry, guys.
Marc:These things are predefined.
Guest:I entered it three times and now I'm locked out until December.
Marc:That is horseshit.
Guest:I got an idea.
Guest:I'll change it tonight.
Guest:Just give me the stuff.
Guest:I'll cut it for you.
Guest:I'll send it back to you on a hard drive or whatever on the Dropbox.
Marc:Good to go.
Marc:Oh, you want me to shorten it by two?
Marc:Sorry, champ.
Marc:Not this year.
Marc:Maybe next year.
Marc:A lot of ins, a lot of outs, a lot of what have yous.
Marc:Let me talk to the union.
Marc:I'll see what I can do.
Marc:That's hilarious.
Marc:But maybe next year.
Guest:I also wanted to point out another hilarious story.
Guest:You actually sent this to me.
Guest:And the headline is Seth Rogen admits he was on mushrooms for Marc Maron podcast.
Guest:Did you know this?
Guest:I did.
Guest:I did not.
Guest:I mean, because as he says in the story, people tell him that they cannot tell.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:What I did not know until I clicked on it, though, was what podcast they were talking about.
Guest:Because at first, I thought it was the one that he did with us during COVID.
Guest:And I actually thought it might have been a bad story.
Guest:I thought I would have been disappointed.
Guest:Because that one they did over COVID is clipped quite a bit these days and has been for five years or whatever.
Marc:Because of the Israel-Palestine thing.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:Because Seth and Mark talk about how they were like fed a bunch of lies when they were kids going to Hebrew school.
Guest:Yeah, there were people there.
Marc:Right.
Guest:And I'm always like, hey, this like I remember thinking at the time, like this is so great.
Guest:Like having like two prominent Jewish entertainers speak openly and honestly about this.
Guest:And Seth took some shit for that.
Guest:Mark did not.
Guest:But Seth did.
Guest:And he didn't back down at the time.
Guest:I remember he had a meeting with the ADL because they were threatening him or whatever.
Guest:But he still said afterwards, I heard them out, but I don't change my beliefs on this or whatever.
Guest:So when I saw that headline, I was worried that finally...
Guest:the squeeze got too much for him.
Guest:And he was like, you know what?
Guest:I was really high when I did that interview.
Guest:Uh, but, um, but no, no, it was not that I could rest assured that he was not going back on his principles.
Guest:And in fact, it was the first time he was on with Evan Goldberg back in 2013 when they came on to promote.
Guest:This is the end.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Amazing.
Marc:Did you watch the clip or did you just read the article?
Marc:Oh, I watched the clip and I also went back and listened to the episode as well.
Marc:Oh, did you really?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Seth is on Fallon, I guess, Wednesday night.
Guest:And he says that the episode of the studio where they're supposed to microdose on shrooms and they take too much and then have to do a pitch was
Marc:While high on shrooms.
Marc:Which, by the way, this is my favorite part of this story.
Marc:Because I love that episode of the studio.
Marc:And to know now that it's related to WTF is amazing.
Guest:Yeah, this is like the Bruce Springsteen story, too.
Guest:It's like, oh, we've made that happen.
Guest:That's great.
Guest:So, apparently, this was based on the night before Seth and Evan were supposed to be on the podcast.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was the premiere of This Is The End.
Guest:There were at least a party for This Is The End.
Guest:And they did shrooms at this party.
Guest:And I think they thought they were okay, but they woke up the next day and a car picked the both of them up, like in the same car.
Guest:And as they were on the way over, they were like...
Guest:I think I'm still high on shrooms.
Guest:And the other said, I think I am too.
Guest:So they decided to stop at the Starbucks near nearby.
Guest:I, that I remember, like, I remember getting the message, like they're on their way.
Guest:They're just stopping for coffee first.
Guest:So that's a hilarious thing to just this, this thing I briefly, you know, was told that like, why would you ever remember it?
Guest:And then all of a sudden it's, it's excavated from my brain because they're talking about how this was a last ditch effort and
Guest:on their part to try to salvage this interview that they thought they were going to walk into high as a kite.
Guest:So Seth says they start slamming coffee, just drinking as much as they can with hopes of like, kind of like energizing themselves.
Guest:And I don't know if this is possible.
Guest:But according to him, or at least his theory is that they basically like reactivated the mushrooms.
Guest:I, this sounds so cockamamie, but that's how he claims it went because he said they, they left the Starbucks after doing this coffee and they felt higher.
Guest:Now they felt worse than they did before they started drinking all the coffee.
Marc:I love the idea of the coffee acting like those things that you shock people for and say clear.
Marc:It's just like for the drugs.
Marc:Defibrillators.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Well, he said that he was hoping that it would do that to his brain like so he could function.
Guest:He even said, I think in those terms, like I thought it would make maybe shock my brain back in.
Guest:But instead, it just like made them higher.
Guest:It was like Mark's joke about turmeric and black pepper.
Guest:Like, oh, you need the black pepper to activate it.
Guest:So he said they're sitting there and across from Mark and he felt a hand on his hand and he was freaking out.
Guest:So he didn't even really know what hand it was.
Guest:And then he looked down and it was Evan.
Guest:Of course it was.
Guest:He was sitting right next to him.
Guest:And he said, because they've known each other for so long, they kind of just like made eye contact with each other.
Guest:And it was like a telepathic communication that it was like, are you still really fucking high?
Guest:And the other one being like, yeah, I'm really fucking high still.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then it was just like, Mark's like, so, all right, hey, you guys are here.
Guest:Let's do this interview.
Marc:You never know what's going through a person's brain.
Guest:Yeah, I do think, though, doesn't he open the interview saying something like, so were you guys out partying last night or something?
Marc:You know, they mentioned it like, yeah, yeah, we had we had the premiere party and everything.
Guest:Well, then please do tell after you have listened to the episode again.
Guest:Was there anything that would have tipped you off?
Marc:Not one single thing.
Marc:They were so smooth.
Marc:Like, they never once let up that they were high.
Marc:Professional drug users.
Marc:Yes, 100%.
Marc:That's what that is.
Guest:Which I think Seth pointed out on Fallon that, you know, people have told him, oh, I listened to that.
Guest:You sounded fine.
Guest:And he said, I think that's bad for me as a person.
Yeah.
Guest:It was impossible to know that I was out of my mind on drugs.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:Great episode.
Marc:I've never talked to you about it, actually.
Marc:The interview section starts and there's like a doo-wop acapella singing of what the fuck.
Guest:And that's John Montagna.
Guest:That's the guy who did our theme music.
Guest:You know, he made a bunch of bumpers, and that was one of them.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Amazing.
Marc:I don't remember that at all.
Marc:But a lot of great stuff.
Marc:Catholics versus Jews jerking off.
Marc:You know, a lot of Hebrew school stuff that they talked about.
Marc:You know what's funny?
Marc:Mark talks to them about James Franco being a little weird.
Marc:And I got to say, Mark called that one out real quick.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And they actually, Mark asks him, and like, since I've seen the movie, you and I have seen the movie, we love the movie.
Marc:But when Mark, when they tell Mark that Franco makes fun of himself and Mark says, oh, he actually says this.
Marc:He says, oh, so what?
Marc:He sucks a dick in this movie?
Marc:And they're like, well, you know, we, you know, kind of.
Marc:Like, it's basically he called out that Danny McBride joke in the movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That is the joke.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:It's the exact joke.
Marc:What, James Franco hasn't sucked a dick?
Marc:Now I know you're lying.
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:But yeah, great episode.
Marc:And it was, I could not tell that they were on drugs, high on mushrooms.
Guest:Did you happen to write down what the number of that episode is?
Guest:396.
Guest:Episode 396.
Guest:So yeah, if anybody wants to go back and listen to that in your full Marin archives, you can see if you pick up any telltale signs that Chris says are definitely not there.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Amazing.
Guest:This past week on the show, basically everything that you heard on the show this week and then part of next week, too, it was stuff that we recorded while Mark was in New York.
Guest:So that was the Questlove episode.
Guest:And then we aired the Jim Gaffigan live talk, which is really more like an interview of Mark.
Guest:And then the Bowen Yang one that's on Monday, which is really great.
Guest:I encourage you all to look forward to that one.
Guest:But they were all done within the span of like 24 hours, all three of those things.
Guest:It was a kind of whirlwind period while Mark was doing a lot of other press while he was there.
Guest:And I think, you know, you can kind of hear that in the Questlove episode, not because Mark was...
Guest:disinterested or anything it's quite the opposite he was you know pretty engaged especially because he had just watched that Sly Stone documentary but like Questlove like he can go he can talk he can talk for I was downstairs in the lobby with his representatives and they were like do you need us to put a
Guest:a hard time limit on this.
Guest:Cause he'll talk for a long time.
Guest:If he, if, if, uh, you know, if he's allowed to, so, and we didn't have to, they could talk for as long as they want.
Guest:But I think Mark like kind of took advantage of that in the sense that he had so much else going on that week that he was just kind of like, I will sit back and listen to this man.
Marc:Yeah, totally.
Guest:Uh, and, uh,
Guest:It was interesting, too, because he showed up and he was very nice and, like, appreciative of being there and was saying, like, you know, what a fan he was.
Guest:And then he says it in the show several times, like, in the interview, how much he used to listen to WTF, like, when he started working at 30 Rock and, you know, becoming part of the...
Guest:the universe over there and needing to know more about comedy and he's like he's like quoting back stuff from the show like that he's he's got like the robin williams episode memorized hey bobby like the hilarious thing is mark has no idea what he's talking about but like you and i are like oh that's one of our favorite moments in the history of the show and probably for other people too such as quest love
Guest:And he's like, you know, so thrilled with it.
Guest:And so I like, this is a little bit of like, you know, kind of backstage info behind the scenes stuff.
Guest:Normally I, I try to give my same amount of attention to every episode.
Guest:I try to make sure that I've done a thorough job to make sure that he's presenting the person the best way possible.
Guest:But I think if you've listened to this Friday show before, you've heard me say for certain episodes, I think Dwight Yoakam was one I was specific on this with, where I was like, I wish I had more days.
Guest:to have done this because uh i thought like i could have done a better job thinning out some of his tangents and digressions and it would have made it for a more thorough arc right a through line through the talk
Guest:And much with all the work that I've been doing lately, it's like, you know, I'm always kind of pressed on deadlines and that.
Guest:And this Questlove1, you know, I was doing it the normal time I do things.
Guest:I did not do it earlier.
Guest:I did not do it days in advance.
Guest:I did it, you know, the day before, the Sunday before it airs on a Monday.
Guest:And I got done with it and it was like, it took me the amount of time these things normally take me and I could have just published it and hit send.
Guest:And I was like, I want this to be good for this guy.
Guest:Like I, it was also, I think because of getting to the end of it and hearing like where his headspace was, like I was like,
Guest:I want him to be very happy with this episode for himself.
Guest:So I stayed up very late that night and went through it all over again, made sure that it was tightened and that it was, you know, it was in the spots that it's going to be, you know, you'll hear some outtakes that, that mostly got taken out at that point.
Guest:Um, because I was like, you know what, I'll, I'll, I'll get to this point quicker if we could do without this.
Guest:And, you know, I, I was, I was happy to do it.
Guest:for quest love he'll never know that like it's not like a thing like i had them like hey let him know yeah i made that better yeah right right but i just felt like it was almost like i had to return serve you know like he volleyed that to us like hey by the way the show was really important to me and i was like i gotta make sure this is good for this guy
Marc:100%.
Marc:And I was about to say, I'm like, man, I feel like you did a great job.
Marc:Like, like all of his stories were so, you know, together.
Guest:That was it.
Guest:That was what, that was what it was.
Guest:It was like, I knew they were there.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like after having listened to it once, I'm like, this is all there.
Yeah.
Guest:but I bet you it can be better.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like I bet you that I can tighten this up.
Guest:And it was like almost a little bit of a challenge to myself, but it was also just on the sense that like, I like hearing this guy so hard on himself at the end of this, I was like, I gotta make sure this is good for him.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, totally.
Marc:And like, you don't want to manna fuck his dream, you know?
Guest:That's a good term.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I really loved this episode.
Marc:I've been waiting for a rap legend to do like a Sonic playlist for.
Marc:Oh, great.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You got to run your business here.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:I love doing this.
Marc:And yeah, I did a Sonic playlist.
Marc:The only artist I omitted was Kanye West.
Marc:Oh, thanks.
Marc:No, that's good.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Fuck that Nazi.
Marc:And yeah,
Marc:Can I just tell you, the Sonic playlists, by the way, they play.
Marc:And I say that because, you know, James Gunn, the guy who wrote and directed Superman?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:He did a Sonic playlist for Superman.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:But he did it not as like, oh, you know, this is the, you know, the tracks.
Marc:He does an intro and is like, yeah, so these are songs that Clark Kent grew up on.
Marc:And like, these are songs that Lois Lane, you know, like identifies with.
Marc:And like all the characters have their own like mini playlists.
Guest:I mean, this is the guy who made the Guardians of the Galaxy movies.
Guest:So this is like his thinking all the time.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, but he did a Sonic playlist, this thing that like, if you now know, or if you watch the movie, then watch it again with the Sonic playlist in mind, you're like, oh, okay, I get it.
Marc:And like, it totally works.
Marc:Like Clark Kent in this universe is basically my age.
Marc:And he grew up on the music that I did, like New Radicals, you know?
Marc:Yeah, right.
Marc:you know, like Jimmy Eat World sort of thing, you know?
Marc:So it's like, oh, right.
Marc:Like that's just another layer of me like identifying with Superman.
Marc:But getting back to Questlove, love that he had a lap dance with a girl.
Marc:It's basically the fucking 30 Rock bit of Tracy Morgan.
Marc:You're all people's daughters.
Marc:like 100 that was just great holy shit uh the the story of him being eight years old and being like his first show is is a radio city musical oh yeah that was it you're right radio city musical yeah and like man he has some great stories and he's he knows his shit and it's just it was really fun to uh to listen to him tell stories
Marc:Also, really enjoyed the bonus episode of Jim Gaffigan.
Marc:Kind of bummed they didn't start off the Q&A at the 92nd Street Y with, so how many kids do you have now?
Marc:Because it kept on going up.
Marc:Yeah, he's got like six now, I think.
Marc:Does he?
Marc:Oh my God.
Guest:Well, the weirdest thing was that, you know, he's talking about his kids with Mark in that first clip and like the oldest one was five.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And it's like, that's 16 years ago.
Guest:That's a grown up now.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:They can drive now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They can live.
Guest:That's somebody who's probably graduating college.
Marc:And by the way, did I hear my voice or my laugh?
Marc:You totally did.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Because that's the same episode where it says Chris and Mad Men on it.
Marc:Oh, gotcha.
Marc:So I was just there.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, you were hanging out.
Marc:With his beautiful wife.
Guest:Yeah, with Jeannie.
Guest:And yeah, I'm in there.
Guest:It's actually, it's at the beginning of the talk.
Guest:I didn't include this in the bonus.
Guest:But like, yeah, Mark's like, are we ready?
Guest:And you hear me being like, yep, we're rolling.
Guest:We're good to go.
Guest:And then he says to Jim, like, okay, are you ready?
Guest:And that's what I put on the bonus.
Guest:But...
Guest:Yeah, that's back when, like I've mentioned this several times, if anybody has yet to listen to the early days of this show, if you listen to those first 11 episodes or so, they are all done in one location with me in the room, Mark in the room, all the guests in the room.
Guest:We brought other people in, Mark's friend Matthew and Sam Seder and everyone.
Guest:It was just radio.
Guest:It was radio done the way we did radio.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And I got to see Mark's special.
Marc:This is old news for you.
Marc:Oh, right.
Marc:This is my first time seeing it.
Guest:Yes, because on Friday you went to Bob Dylan, right?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:You went to listen to Bob Dylan, not see him.
Marc:No, I could not see him as he turned off the monitors.
Marc:So no one can see a closeup of Bob Dylan.
Marc:But I got to hear him and it sounded great.
Marc:You know, it sounded like Bobby D. So yeah, that was fine.
Marc:But yes, I saw Mark's special and I got to say,
Marc:awesome.
Marc:Like he just does this so well.
Marc:Like it is, I, I am not a comedy like aficionado.
Marc:So when I hear Mark talk about like these 30 minute specials and like him, him not enjoying these 30 minutes special, like, you know, just has disdain for it.
Marc:I take his word for it, but I don't really like know what he's talking about.
Marc:But when at the end of this special,
Marc:the first thing I thought of was that, oh, like I get where he's coming from.
Marc:Like this 70-minute special was like a meal.
Marc:And like the 30-minute specials are a meal.
Marc:They're just kind of like fast food, you know?
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:It's like kind of forgettable and like, you know, you might feel weird afterwards.
Marc:But like this special that Mark did –
Marc:It's one of these like chef tasting menus.
Marc:Like there's an hors d'oeuvres, there's an amuse-bouche, there's a soup, an appetizer, salad, you know, main course, you know, a palate cleanser.
Marc:Like there's all this stuff.
Marc:And it's this...
Marc:amazing, like amazingly crafted, beautiful, like beautifully designed piece of art.
Marc:Like, dude, I was thinking about what, what piece was it?
Marc:It was, um, the, the R word, uh, joke.
Marc:Like that was like a beautiful sandwich that he, like, like he created for us.
Marc:And he put like the little Marin pickle on top where, uh, you, I feel like you've been listening to too much Gaffigan with all your food references.
Marc:I was going to say the hot pocket guy was, um, but yeah,
Marc:But yeah, I guess I have.
Marc:But yeah, it was just such a well thought out joke beginning to end.
Marc:And then his fire story is like, I don't know if you ever watched Great British Bake Off, but they do a showstopper at the end of each episode.
Marc:And that's basically the showstopper where it's this
Marc:amazing like beau is afraid type of story that he's telling and it is just a perfectly executed joke man i mean it was just it was a meal it was just a full meal i love the part of that about uh trying to go into the hotel and uh and and trick the person that they that they don't have he doesn't have multiple cats with him and
Marc:here's the cat carrier this is my one cat this is all my other stuff and the kicker at the end was like you know this wasn't a mandatory evacuation i just did this on my own just just man he's he's just a phenomenal like comedian like he is like this is like the refined form man i am just so impressed
Guest:Well, I thought it was nice to hear Gaffigan say that to him too.
Guest:Like, you know, comics, I know them well enough.
Guest:They don't blow smoke up each other's asses.
Guest:If they, you know, if they're doing an event like that and you got to tell somebody, oh, great special, that's fine.
Guest:You don't have to go overboard.
Guest:Like he, I've always believed when a comic is complimenting another comic, they're being genuine because they don't have to do that.
Guest:They can always be like, oh yeah, he's real funny, funny guy, you know, and it can stay right there.
Guest:But I will say it was very enjoyable being at that event and I was sitting behind Mark and Jim while they were watching the thing, the special.
Guest:And it was fun to watch what Gaffigan thought was funny.
Guest:Like, I mean, he was, you know, obviously I think he liked the whole special, but to watch him and he's seen the special or allegedly saw it.
Guest:Like, I think, you know, they sent it to him so that he could watch it before the event.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I think he did.
Guest:But so he's sitting there watching it, presumably for the second time.
Guest:And to watch the things that he was that was still busting him up.
Guest:The thing that got him the most was Mark talking about the guy coming over to treat the rat situation.
Guest:And now he's like, you know, they can fit through something the size of a pencil.
Guest:And I said, no, they can't.
Guest:say a nickel and i would believe it like that was like a knee slapper for gaffigan and same with the the mark's impression of an air traffic controller now how it's like just one guy being like there's too much i can't do it all
Guest:And I was thinking, I was like, that's very funny that those are the things like that, you know, Jim Gaffigan, who it's like his brain is very geared toward like everyday life stuff.
Marc:Right.
Guest:So it's like the things he might find funny, funnier than say like some take on politics, which, you know, if you listen to him in the, in the talk, he obviously appreciated that stuff.
Guest:But the like bust a gut stuff for him was like just recognizing that the idea of a rat crawling through something the size of a pencil is ridiculous.
Guest:ridiculous right totally and it really is for everyone that special is for everyone like well i think it is because i am looking right now at the home page of hbo max and it has been now all week it is in the top five of the top 10 it has been it hasn't moved it has moved between four and five i've seen the whole week sitting right there next to sinners and
Guest:And I've been watching this thing and it's a fluid thing.
Guest:It's not like a thing that just lasts for like the whole week.
Guest:I'm watching other things move up and down.
Guest:So people are finding this thing and watching it.
Guest:And, you know, as a producer on the thing, I can tell you 100 percent they give you no data, not a morsel, not anything.
Guest:They will not tell you a single thing about how it does.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Oh, no, not not.
Guest:Nobody can.
Guest:Michael B. Jordan and Ryan Coogler that can't find out.
Guest:You're not allowed to find out how this stuff does.
Guest:That's crazy.
Guest:But anyway, the fact that it's sitting there on this movable list of top tens and it's been there all week is good for Mark.
Marc:Man, that must be insufferable for, you know, comedians or anyone.
Marc:Anybody.
Guest:Think about Tony Khan at AEW.
Guest:How do you think?
Guest:Like he, that guy relies on the minute by minute ratings of his show to know which guys are popular and which women are popular and which ones are not.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And now they're just told like, nah, you don't, you can't ever find that out anymore.
Marc:That's, something's broken.
Marc:Like, we broke the whole system.
Guest:Well, that was something they were trying to straighten out in the strikes two years ago, and they did not get it agreed to, which goes to show you how important it is for these, for not only the streamers, but the studios, and a lot of the studios are tied into the streamers, but it's got to have to do with, you know, the residuals and everything, right?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:You know, I think I mentioned repeats and well, I mentioned to you last week about how the bad guys, you know, Mark made more money with the digital rentals, you know, and and purchases than he did with the you know, what he was paid for the theatrical release.
Guest:And that was the first bad guys.
Guest:So just think about that.
Guest:Remember when they moved everything to streaming during COVID and Scarlett Johansson sued Disney Plus because she was like, you cut into this Black Widow stuff.
Guest:Now just picture that with every single movie or TV show ever made because you're like, hey, you took money away from me.
Guest:I could make way more if it wasn't for this streaming service giving it away for the cost of your subscription, right?
Guest:So I just think to them, it's like,
Guest:And under no circumstances will they release the numbers.
Guest:They just play them entirely close to the vest.
Guest:And unless there's some other strike coming up in the future to force it, I don't imagine they ever will.
Marc:Kind of crazy.
Marc:Kind of really nuts.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Wild.
Marc:Well, speaking of streaming...
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So I was wondering how you would pivot.
Guest:That was a good pivot.
Guest:Well, yes, because, you know, the way we consume things has changed.
Guest:The way movies are watched.
Guest:A lot of times now things go direct to streaming.
Guest:This is the real shift that happened during COVID.
Guest:Because I feel like before COVID, there were some like, oh, that's a movie made just for Netflix, right?
Guest:Like Adam Sandler was early on that front of like...
Guest:He just made the movies that you just get them on Netflix and they wouldn't get like a theatrical release, right?
Guest:The Ridiculous Six or things like that.
Guest:And Noah Baumbach did a deal like that too, but it was smaller.
Guest:It was specific deals.
Guest:And now post COVID, it's like they would prefer to just do like streaming slop that people put on in the background and don't pay much attention to.
Guest:And to that point...
Guest:I can't think of the last time I watched a movie on Netflix, like a movie that was made just for Netflix.
Guest:Maybe it's the Irishman or, or I guess maybe the, the knives out sequel, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Glass onion.
Guest:Other than those, I, I've never put a Netflix movie on.
Guest:Like I see the trailers, they wash over me.
Guest:I couldn't even tell you what they're called.
Guest:What's the one with the rock called?
Guest:Oh, red one.
Guest:I want to say red one though, was the Santa one he made.
Guest:He made another red something with him and, and, and, and is it Ryan Reynolds or yeah.
Guest:Or Chris Evans.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:Same thing.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And it's read something.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It's a spy thing.
Guest:Then, then Chris Evans is in something else where he's running around on a train or Ryan Gosling is in like, these things are, they're ephemera.
Guest:They don't exist.
Guest:They just happen.
Guest:And you're like, they dissolve.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Yeah.
Guest:So it would take a lot for me to put on a streaming movie.
Guest:And something came to my attention this week, thanks to you.
Guest:I had already known about this, but it was the fact that you sent me something with it saying that it had a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So basically, it was like the scene in Django Unchained that is now a meme of DiCaprio, Mr. Candy, when he's meeting with Django and King Schultz.
Guest:And he says, gentlemen, you have my curiosity.
Guest:Now you have my attention.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The curiosity was when you sent me the trailer of Ice Cube in War of the Worlds, and then when I saw the Rotten Tomatoes score of zero, zero across the board.
Marc:Which is so hard to do.
Marc:So hard, right.
Guest:There's always one asshole who's like, I thought it was fun.
Yeah.
Guest:So zero, I was like, well, now you have my attention.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:So I recommended that we watch... I don't know if you did this on purpose.
Guest:Were you like, I think we should watch this?
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Because you didn't say anything.
Guest:You just sent me this trailer.
Marc:Yeah, Brendan, I do that a lot.
Marc:I do that for like Morbius and like all kinds of shit.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I'm like, hey, look at this weird bullshit.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So yeah.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well...
Guest:Here's the thing.
Guest:You took my bait.
Guest:You took the bait.
Guest:Not just me.
Guest:Because we were just talking about that HBO Max top 10.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:This thing is in the Prime Video top 10.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:It actually shares the Marc Maron Panic slot.
Guest:It is currently at number five.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:In the other platform of Amazon Prime Video.
Guest:And there is in the trailer, there is a title card.
Yeah.
Guest:It's almost basically like the tagline of the movie.
Guest:It says, it's worse than you think.
Guest:Truer words have never been said.
Guest:But I am convinced that the shittiness was a strategy.
Guest:yeah it's a feature not a bug that's right they knew this is so fucking bad yeah that the only way we're going to get people to watch it is if we communicate to them this might be the worst thing you've ever seen in your life and then you have to check it out out of curiosity like just to get to happen to what I what happened to me yeah like I don't watch these things I never put them on but I will watch this because it says it's the worst thing ever made uh and I will also say this
Guest:Even at 89 minutes, it's actually 82 minutes.
Guest:Cause there's like seven minutes of credits.
Guest:It's interminable.
Guest:Torturous.
Guest:It is like, I'm like, it's still going.
Guest:I want, I want to say this to everyone listening, everyone in the, within the sound of my voice.
Guest:i do not recommend anyone to actually watch this do not like it's all you can turn the show off now if you're like okay recommendation corner done i do not recommend you watch this it is not worth anything in your life to put yourself through in fact
Guest:the next 20 minutes might be a drain on your life that we are going to talk to this and I'm going to try to make it entertaining, but it is not worth it.
Marc:It is so hard.
Marc:It is like, I, I thought I was like, okay, I can do 89 minutes.
Marc:No problem.
Guest:And there was like a point where I looked at the thing and it was like 22 minutes in and I was like, Oh,
Marc:There's there's like it just goes on for so long and so torturous amount of time where at one point, like the president is calling the guy Ice Cube over teams.
Marc:And by the way, the whole movie is taking place.
Marc:It's like if you've ever seen the movie Searching, where it's all just the computer screen.
Marc:Right.
Guest:It's the same guy produced this.
Guest:The guy who made Searching, Timur.
Guest:He goes by Timur a lot of the times because his last name is very long.
Guest:Bekma Betov.
Guest:I think I pronounced that right, but I might have pronounced it wrong.
Guest:Bekma Betov.
Guest:But anyway, he's the guy behind the movie Wanted, you know, with Angelina Jolie.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:The Nightwatch movie, which was what he made, was made in Russia.
Guest:And it was the thing that kind of really broke him out.
Guest:But yeah, searching with, who is it?
Guest:With the Harold and Kumar guy, right?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:And I've seen that.
Marc:And it was, it was affecting and it was good.
Yeah.
Guest:And this is a little bit of a genre now called the screen life genre.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like there was the movie Unfriended.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Which was another like a horror movie done just on screens.
Guest:I feel like there was the one with Lisa Kudrow to the web therapy.
Guest:It was called.
Guest:And it was a she was a therapist that did all her sessions over Zoom.
Guest:Huh.
Guest:So the concept of this movie is H.G.
Guest:Wells' War of the Worlds.
Guest:They don't shy away.
Guest:It's not like a loose adaptation of it.
Guest:It's H.G.
Guest:Wells' War of the Worlds, but set in present time.
Guest:And the idea is you are only seeing what happens now.
Guest:Over a screen.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There's actually no shot in the movie that is not a reflection of a screen.
Guest:If you consider the fact that the, the one or shots of ice cube are then, you know, like there are shots where it cuts to just a one shot of ice cube.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:right on like his phones, like he's not, he's just like, it's like the webcam of his computer, which then when you go back and see his screen, he's in the little square up at the top.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So everything in this is supposed to be a reflection of what's on the screen.
Guest:It's an alien.
Guest:Like I can see, like you, especially you watch the studio.
Guest:I can see that working as a pitch.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's going to be War of the Worlds, full-on War of the Worlds, but how do you consume your media these days, right?
Guest:In fact, this was the creator's pitch with the War of the Worlds, he said, was experienced on the radio, right?
Guest:That was how Orson Welles made this a sensation, was having people experience it on the radio, which is how they would have experienced an alien invasion at the time.
Guest:So how are people going to experience an alien invasion now?
Guest:They're going to be looking at their phones, right?
Guest:The flaw in that logic, I would say, is that yes, they are, but then they will put their phones down.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And most of the way they experience it will be like normal humans experience things, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So like the idea, the fact that nobody made that jump in however long it took to develop this and put this thing out and thought the whole time,
Guest:would just stick to the screen for this entire thing is mind-blowing that they kept at it.
Guest:The movie has the distinct feel of people knowing within seconds that it was a failure.
Guest:I can't imagine being on the sound design team.
Guest:You know how much sound design needed to go into this movie?
Guest:Everything.
Guest:Every little click or clack of a keyboard or beep or whatever.
Guest:Some person or team of people had to put those in there.
Guest:You know how many times they had to watch this footage and cycle through it over and over again and know what they were working on?
Guest:It must have been...
Guest:Just pain to work on this thing.
Marc:It doesn't help that the performances by the lead...
Marc:I'm going to say, just say Ice Cube's performance in this is one of the worst performances you'll ever see on your television screen or phone or however you watch this movie.
Marc:It is going to 100% win all the worst acting awards for the year.
Marc:Like it is like it actually feels, you know what it feels like?
Marc:When you're watching the movie, it looks or sounds like you're watching Ice Cube read the lines from the script with his pointy finger under each word.
Guest:Dude, there is a section where he is legit doing that.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:There is a point where he's on this Zoom call with all the president and all the members of the Department of Homeland Security.
Guest:And he is reading paragraphs of dialogue.
Guest:and you can tell he is because he says words differently when he's reading them than when he's just talking like if he's reading a thing and it says like you know what we have to do is get a device planted in this mainframe or whatever when he's reading it he says what we have to do is get a device planted into this mainframe like you're like he's talking differently because he's reading he's just straight up reading so yes uh
Guest:you speak the truth that the performances are terrible.
Guest:I would like to give them a little bit of a break.
Guest:No one could have made this work.
Guest:Not one human soul alive could have made this work because from the get go, it reminded me of something you brought up a couple of weeks ago, David Lynch's Dune.
Guest:You've seen David Lynch's Dune, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:that movie is sunk in two minutes, two minutes flat.
Guest:You're like, I can't do it.
Guest:This makes, it can't hold.
Guest:No, nothing holds here.
Guest:The way this is explaining something to me, you might as well, I might as well be watching a test pattern, right?
Guest:Like it's just, it just immediately communicates,
Guest:impenetrability.
Guest:And that was what this was like before any human open their mouths and you're just watching the way this movie's visual language of the screens are.
Guest:I'm like, I give tap out.
Guest:I'm out.
Guest:I have tapped out within seconds of you trying to establish the, the, the premise of this movie that this guy, you know, is running a surveillance thing out of an office at the department of Homeland security.
Marc:yeah he's also he's also god the the movie the thing is the movie makes it painfully obvious that he is like super protective of his family and he is watching them more than he's watching you know he's like he's multitasking like we all are but he is like oh that that bran muffin like i'm he's watching through a security camera what his daughter is eating he's like oh that bran muffin doesn't have any fiber in it and the premise is that
Guest:ice cube works for the department of homeland security in a job that is so important he's the only one that can do it no one else works in the entire building he's in it's completely empty other than ice cube and
Guest:His job is to monitor a surveillance system that can see every single human being on earth.
Marc:And like listening to calls.
Guest:What he chooses to do with his time is to henpeck his two kids who are adults, but...
Guest:Or at least the daughter is an adult.
Guest:The kid looks like, the son looks like he's a teenager at some level, but still a capable person.
Guest:And his wife is dead.
Guest:So he is very overprotective of these kids.
Guest:And that's what he's doing with most of his time with one of the most cherished weapons in the world.
Guest:Surveillance tool par excellence.
Guest:By the way, we should point out, this thing was developed in 2020.
Guest:So COVID era, everyone's on Zoom on screens.
Marc:Oh, this was probably a great idea back then.
Guest:Well, and it's totally fitting to like the kind of grasping at straws of that era of everyone like, what do we make?
Guest:How do we do things?
Guest:Right?
Marc:But it's 2025 now.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It comes out five years later.
Marc:How?
Marc:How?
Marc:Were they perfecting the drone?
Guest:Well, I'll tell you what, Chris, you might be surprised to know not a lot of people have talked about the making of this film.
Guest:There's no oral history yet of the Ice Cube War of the Worlds, directed by the vaunted Rich Lee.
Guest:Now, look, I don't want to take a shit on Rich Lee, probably a capable person in many ways, but he has directed no films.
Guest:He has only directed music videos and, you know, maybe a couple of episodes of television.
Guest:Again, not to shit on his craft.
Guest:I don't believe anyone could have made this work.
Marc:I actually, when I was watching this, I was like, man, I wish we were in a theater watching this because it would be a riot.
Guest:If we were in a theater- It had to be a theater where they fully understand that you will be saying stuff at the screen the whole movie, right?
Marc:100%.
Marc:It can't be like an Alamo where they make you be quiet.
Marc:No, no.
Marc:But like, I can see in the future clips of this movie just playing before a movie.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Like, have a-
Marc:Just have like amazing Avatar 3 where like the blue people are dancing around.
Marc:And I'll just be like, wow, that's crazy.
Guest:Yeah, because that's Ice Cube's performance.
Guest:I saw somebody refer to this.
Guest:I'm not going to grok their line, even though I can't remember who the person was.
Guest:It was just in like a sea of comments I saw about this.
Guest:They said...
Guest:Ice Cube has two modes in this movie.
Guest:One is his general resting scowl and the other is nuclearly overreactive.
Guest:That's great.
Marc:I actually think like I read somewhere that someone like back in the day would have like, oh, no, no, no.
Marc:You only get three takes from me.
Marc:I wonder if Ice Cube has a three-take policy.
Guest:Oh, well, beyond three takes, it reminded me of, I have a friend named Phil.
Guest:And Phil is, he would not have a problem with me saying this, a preternaturally lazy man.
Guest:He's like a person who luxuriates in laziness.
Guest:He thinks it's a total virtue to like, I have the time to be lazy.
Guest:And he's been like that since we went to college.
Guest:And in fact, I was in a play with him in college, Harold Pinter's The Dumbwaiter.
Guest:And the guy directing the play, he didn't know me, but he cast me in the play.
Guest:And he said, the guy I want to cast opposite you, I know exactly who I want.
Guest:It's Phil, but Phil doesn't want to do it.
Guest:So we got to convince Phil to do this, to do the other part.
Guest:It's a two-hander.
Guest:And Phil finally agreed that,
Guest:On the conditions that for like 80% of the play, he'd just be allowed to sit and smoke.
Guest:That was a condition.
Guest:Was that he would just sit and smoke in a chair and he had a newspaper with him.
Guest:do his lines that way i feel like ice cube had a similar rider in making this film that it was like you know whether you're right about it being takes or whether it was like a certain amount of hours like he could only be like in for two hours at a time or whatever i also thought it's crazy that his beard is as fucked up as it is like because you are looking at his whole head
Guest:for a very long time.
Guest:And it is this completely unkempt, non-groomed beard that they know is bad because I'm looking, I'm staring right at the thumbnail right now and it has been Photoshopped.
Guest:So the beard is not as scraggly and is not, does not have all the white hairs sticking out of it.
Guest:But when you're watching this on the screen, you're like, it's either Ice Cube or it's a guy outside of a homeless center.
Guest:Like there's...
Guest:There is no differentiation.
Guest:And I feel like this was all a requirement for Ice Cube to do the movie.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And Ice Cube's character, like, so he's like kind of a shut in.
Marc:Like he, he.
Marc:I'll say.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She's not allowed to go anywhere.
Marc:But he also loves being there to the point where his kids are like, hey, why don't you get off the computer and come out and see us?
Marc:We have a baby shower and stuff.
Guest:Which, by the way, I was on his side for this.
Guest:He runs the entire surveillance apparatus of the United States.
Guest:Sorry, your dad's gone.
Marc:He just does that for now.
Marc:But he has a wife who passed away who he still goes to Facebook and plays an audio message.
Guest:He's got so much free time.
Guest:This guy, I make a podcast.
Guest:I don't have the free time this guy has.
Marc:he's got CNN on the background.
Marc:So many newscasts are just like popping up and you just know that shit was nowhere to be found.
Marc:It just added much later on.
Marc:But I will say this too.
Guest:The thing he's working on is completely implausible on every level as an interface like this, like this, as, as a surveillance thing is,
Guest:it feels like it was written by someone who like knows the very least amount about surveillance.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like, like a kid, like your son, but, but, but he didn't do the reading, right?
Guest:Like, it's like a kid who has to go do an oral exam without doing the homework.
Guest:And they just kind of are making it up as they go along by what they've absorbed.
Guest:They're not actually telling you facts.
Guest:They're just like, well, you know,
Guest:First, there's a window that you click on any person and it will tell you their birthday and who they are and their baby daddy.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Why was that in the software?
Marc:In the software.
Marc:Baby daddy.
Marc:Was it unknown?
Marc:Was that the unknown part?
Guest:Why are we calling people's partners that in surveillance speak?
Right.
Guest:But OK, so all right, listen, I am obviously not watching the streaming only War of the Worlds to get a, you know, detail oriented, specific version of what national surveillance looks like.
Guest:I'm fine if you yada yada the surveillance part.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:So, OK, if that's the case, why do they need to do everything else on this screen in such literal computer terms?
Guest:Like he needs to type everything into the screen.
Guest:Like I look at my own phone less in terms of typing.
Guest:I just I can't think of the last time I looked at more typing.
Guest:on a screen than in this movie for entertainment.
Guest:Or like, why does it have to keep showing me that he's being requested to add someone in to a FaceTime call, right?
Guest:It's like, just have them pop up.
Guest:You're showing me the magic surveillance system that shows the entire world.
Guest:I don't need to know that he's being requested to add a friend.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Also, so much.
Marc:This is like a big advertisement for teams, but mostly for Amazon.
Marc:Well, all right.
Marc:But wait, hang on one second.
Guest:What's that?
Guest:You said two very important things there.
Guest:that it is an advertisement for Amazon, which factors massively into the plot, right?
Guest:Somehow, yeah.
Guest:The end of this is basically the climax of, if you know War of the Worlds, you know, the machines and the aliens within the machines are felled by a virus.
Guest:Well, this is like, the virus doesn't necessarily work, so then they have to get a drone delivery from Amazon.
Guest:By Amazon, by name, because one of the characters works for Amazon.
Marc:I loved this character, by the way.
Marc:He was the Jesus of this movie.
Marc:He's like, oh, she's bleeding out.
Marc:You know what?
Marc:Don't worry.
Marc:I got my Amazon Prime packing tape.
Marc:I'm going to tape her up.
Guest:He knew how to do it.
Guest:Yeah, he's MacGyver.
Guest:At first blush, I think it's very clear to people that like, or I think people would not be at fault to come away from this and be like, what a bunch of product placement bullshit here.
Guest:This thing I'm watching on Amazon just turned into a, not just a commercial for Amazon, but an idea that Amazon will save the world, right?
Yeah.
Guest:It is not, however, anywhere in the film an Amazon-credited production.
Guest:Oh, really?
Guest:This is a Universal Pictures film.
Guest:It has no Amazon anywhere in the credits.
Guest:It's just the distributor?
Guest:Now, right.
Guest:I have a theory about this.
Guest:Because there is a lot of product placement in the movie.
Guest:You mentioned that they're always on these fucking Teams calls.
Guest:And you see Microsoft logos all the time.
Guest:You never see any Apple anywhere.
Marc:No one has an Apple.
Guest:And I mean, like you can assume that sometimes when they're on their phones, it's an iPhone, but they never show it to you like it's an iPhone.
Guest:there's a bunch of Tesla stuff.
Marc:Yes, there's Tesla.
Marc:There's like some heart rate thing, you know.
Marc:Right, and X. I noticed they put X stuff in there.
Guest:Well, if this thing was developed in 2020, there were no X. Right.
Guest:So I believe this thing has been being developed for five years or whatever.
Guest:My theory is that this is such a fucking dog that they were just going to take a bath on it, right?
Guest:And they went and put all this shit in the movie with hopes that it would result in distribution, right?
Guest:Like, oh, maybe Elon will buy this now and put it on his fucking ex, right?
Guest:or Amazon will be our partner in distributing it because we made Amazon the hero.
Guest:Because otherwise, there's no reason that Amazon should be featured so prominently in this thing and not have a production credit.
Guest:Amazon has its own movie studio.
Guest:Why would they not be partners in this if it was conceived of that way?
Marc:So they put out this bait, basically, for all these companies.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It is 100% my speculation on that, but I like, I really want to believe it's true.
Guest:I think I'll go to my deathbed.
Guest:They like catfished these companies into trying to distribute the film.
Marc:So that scene where, so the Amazon Prime driver, Hero, as I'll call him, he has to drive a drone through these alien spaceships.
Marc:And can I just say, I love this scene because...
Marc:He is yelling out to his wife, pregnant wife, who has like a bar in her leg.
Marc:Hey, hey guys, I need cover.
Marc:I need cover.
Marc:You're screaming at them.
Marc:Dude, what are you talking about?
Marc:They're not driving other drones.
Marc:They're just people.
Marc:They've never done this before.
Marc:Neither is he.
Guest:What does he need cover for?
Guest:That'd be like me walking into a hospital and be like, get me a 12 cc stack.
Guest:They're like, 12 cc's of what?
Guest:What the fuck are you talking about?
Marc:Security, please.
Marc:Oh, I love that scene so much.
Marc:And like the kid, Ice Cube's kid is a hacker, which is the big reveal, which is the big dolly zoom.
Marc:Do you see the dolly zoom?
Guest:Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Like out of Jaws.
Yes!
Marc:Which, how did they do that?
Marc:Like, was it, did they just shrink the Zoom screen, like background down?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Like, I can't make that happen right now on the Zoom talking to you.
Marc:Yeah, I'm fascinated by that Dolly Zoom.
Marc:Oh my God.
Marc:But yes, his son commandeers a drone that has missiles and is just firing missiles like it's a video game.
Marc:ah, this movie was a chore.
Guest:Well, I'll tell you this.
Guest:I didn't enjoy much of it, but I will say that when the attacks first started, like, you know, and this was like 20 minutes in, so it was already pretty grueling to get to that point.
Guest:But when the attacks first started, that was like the first good comedy in the movie because there's like these explosions out of nowhere.
Guest:Whoa.
Guest:Yeah, and Ice Cube's just like, damn.
Guest:Like, looking at the screen.
Guest:And he's like, his coffee goes flying at one point for no reason.
Guest:And, like, there's this shot of his son running.
Guest:And he's like, run, get out of there.
Guest:Get away from there.
Guest:And like his son is like, dad, you're not going to believe this.
Guest:He's running with the phone on him.
Guest:But you could see like aliens attacking from behind.
Guest:And there are these things that my kid watches all the time called, unfortunately, they're known as YTPs.
Guest:YTP is shortening of YouTube poop.
Oh.
Guest:Somebody invented this, you know, and now it's like a trend on YouTube where you take existing videos and you just like kind of absurdly in like Tim and Eric style edit these videos.
Guest:So like...
Guest:You know, it could just it could be anything.
Guest:It could be a video of a newscaster.
Guest:And then like you zoom real fast in on their face and freeze it.
Guest:So they're like, like with like a crooked face.
Guest:And then like, you know, like they might like take a drink of something and then repeat that over and over again.
Guest:It's just like I can't think of any way to talk about it other than to say it's like absurdist stuff.
Guest:dadaist treatment of like editing existing footage and kids love to do it they do with cartoons and they did they do all these things that scene of the kid running away was like straight out of some ytp because like the screen freezes up on him he's like and like
Guest:ice cubes screaming and it like is slowly zooming in and like digitally adjusting and i'm like those are the brief moments where i was like i guess someone was having fun with this yeah for the for a moment but then it was just right back to incompetence immediately after that
Marc:Everything happens so quickly.
Marc:He's able to suss out what they're doing to data centers.
Marc:It's almost like, oh, let me just draw on this building.
Marc:Oh, that's a data center.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:They're taking out all the data from the servers.
Marc:There's nothing that is available that could show you that.
Marc:No, no, no.
Marc:It's just full intuition by dint of one flashing red light.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And it was so bizarre how this movie was just kept on going this way.
Marc:One of my personal favorites was he finally figured out what's going on and that the guy from... I love when he talks to himself.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Those are the great things in this movie.
Marc:That's the juice right there.
Marc:But...
Marc:But when the guy from the Marvel movies, Agent Coulson, forgive me, I don't know.
Marc:Clark Gregg.
Marc:Clark Gregg.
Marc:Another poor bastard involved in this thing.
Marc:By the way, I'm happy you got a Saturday where you got to do this, because I feel like that's all it took.
Marc:But I love when he figures out that that guy is the bad guy, and he just calls him up.
Marc:And Clark Gregg...
Marc:He calls him up and Clark Gregg's response is, yep, you got me.
Marc:I'm the bad guy.
Marc:You didn't have to say shit.
Marc:You didn't even have to pick up the Zoom.
Marc:What are you talking about?
Marc:We'll talk about this on Monday or something.
Marc:No, no denying.
Marc:It's like, yep, yep, you got me, Mr. Bond.
Marc:And now I'm going to destroy the world.
Marc:Ha!
Guest:ha ha ha just totally evil in that well also the next stage he does is he he ices him out he ices ice out of the the the dhs like he killed you know kills all his access right yeah so you didn't have to tell him that yeah yeah exactly you could just kill his access and be like ah it was the aliens yes exactly like it was just so i mean i get why but man it was exhausting and
Guest:All right.
Guest:There was also something else that I have to point out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's again, like so fantastic, like definitely had to do with Ice Cube reading stuff off of a page.
Guest:He, and then it becomes contagious because other cast members can't do it either.
Guest:He cannot decide whether it's data or data.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:And it became like, for me, it became like when watching Madam Web and seeing if she would ever drink a can of soda.
Guest:I was then like, that became my only enjoyment in the film that I was waiting.
Guest:I was on like, you know, eggshells.
Guest:Like, oh God, is it going to be Data or Data this time?
Guest:Like...
Guest:And then, like, Ava Longoria starts saying it wrong.
Guest:Or it's not wrong.
Guest:It's just they can't figure out which one they want.
Guest:They'll change it within a sentence.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:Oh, man.
Marc:Dude, there's so many things that I loved.
Marc:Like, they were going to nuke Washington, D.C.
Marc:at one point.
Marc:And what's great is on the Zoom call, you see the fighter pilots.
Marc:Like, first of all, I'm pretty sure a fighter pilot is probably not on Zoom.
Marc:No.
Marc:Not on Zoom, no.
Guest:And they make it very explicit that it's Zoom.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:It's not like, you know, like, that's the other thing.
Guest:With these things, with these, you know, any movie that's using, like, military tech.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You just talk to another person.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like, in Top Gun, you don't, they're just talking to each other.
Guest:Right.
Marc:They're in, yeah.
Marc:Wait, wait, wait.
Marc:Let me bring Maverick into this meeting.
Marc:He's in the waiting room.
Marc:I gotta merge.
Marc:I gotta merge him in with Goose.
Marc:He's in a break room with Goose.
Marc:But what I love, though, is the square that the pilots are in, you can clearly see their background is like the Mojave Desert.
Marc:Like they are nowhere near Washington, D.C.
Marc:or anything.
Marc:It is very clearly that they are nowhere there.
Marc:But that was something.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Can I tell you what I honestly thought this movie was going to be?
Marc:Like I thought after the first 10 minutes after we see him, like his family, like kind of pleading with him, like, hey, come on, come on, be out in the real world.
Marc:I thought this was going to be like a riff on the War of the Worlds radio play that caused like this hysteria when it first aired.
Guest:Oh, that he'd come out and nothing happened?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I thought it was going to be.
Marc:That's like a way better movie.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:I thought all this would be AI.
Marc:You poor bastard.
Marc:You out thought the movie.
Marc:I was hoping that this would all be a ruse made up by these kids to get like surprise their dad, you know, to get off the computer.
Marc:But no.
Marc:Oh my God.
Marc:It was, it was, and it just goes on for a very long time.
Marc:Like every time Eva Longoria is calling back, I'm like, oh boy, this is, this is bad.
Guest:Well, I mean, I have to imagine that this just was it was so quickly a turkey.
Guest:And and the last five years have been spent trying to figure out how to get this into releasable form.
Guest:Although I don't know why they didn't just do it.
Guest:All studios seem to do these days and just kill things and say it's a tax write-off.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:It probably didn't cost enough for that to make sense.
Marc:Can I just go – a couple other things I took note of.
Marc:So he's like preparing to die, Ice Cube is.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And he is writing a goodbye, a farewell email using Google.
Marc:And he's writing his email, and he writes, just remember, I love you both, comma, dad.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you see his response and he's nodding his head at the linguistic creativity.
Marc:Like, oh, I mean, Shakespeare, eat your heart out.
Guest:Yeah, I've been waiting to spill that prose since they were in the crib.
Guest:My life lesson to impart to them.
Marc:My last words are just what you would send in a regular email.
Marc:TTFN.
Marc:Just his... Man, the reaction shots are really funny.
Guest:I would actually... Oh, there's also one point, I don't even remember what he was reacting to, but there's literally one point where he just goes, Fuck!
Marc:also he uses the staples like uh that was easy button like that's right right that's another another product placement thing another bait like hey staples maybe you can get into this movie business but all but also he he's like at the end of the movie he becomes like the face of the hacker movement and like the end is him being like hey
Marc:Screw you guys.
Marc:What?
Marc:The president wants me to create a program to spy on people?
Guest:Well, they're saying, no, nobody's personal data this time.
Guest:You won't spy on people's privacy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he says, no.
Marc:Yeah, no, I'm going to spy on you now.
Marc:It's like, dude, you work for the government.
Marc:Guess what, everyone?
Marc:You're fired, sir.
Yeah.
Guest:I guess I think that's what you're supposed to get is that he's like a rogue guy now.
Guest:Like he is the underground.
Guest:I don't know how he finances that in this destroyed civilization that just got leveled by robot aliens.
Marc:Also, the internet he has is so crisp.
Marc:Like he must be on one of those probably Tesla, you know, space link thing.
Marc:Yes, right.
Marc:They never, like buildings are getting destroyed.
Marc:Never does the internet ever go out, like ever, which is quite a thing since I lived through 9-11 and know that that does not happen.
Guest:It definitely seems like as we speak about this, that it is absolute poison and no one should ever watch it.
Guest:And in fact, I started this off by saying, do not watch this film.
Guest:However, I'm going to say something that you're probably going to think is crazy.
Marc:What's that?
Guest:But I stand by it.
Guest:I think, and this comes in light of the whole reason we found out about this is because people are making fun of this film.
Guest:It has 0% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Guest:People are screen grabbing it and doing memes of Ice Cube's face.
Guest:And it's getting ridiculed.
Guest:It's breaking through to like Sharknado.
Marc:Yes, that's exactly what I thought.
Marc:Sharknado for sure.
Guest:If this had come out during COVID, it would have gone over fine.
Guest:I'm not saying it would have been a hit or people would have talked about how great it was, but no one would have been ridiculing it.
Guest:I think about it all the time.
Guest:things that were happening during COVID, we like, I like want it out of my brain.
Guest:Like it was like, I get like, remember like they did SNL, like from their houses and they, you know, and like, you know, wrestling was in empty arenas and then the baseball stadiums had the, the cutouts of people.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like,
Guest:everybody did these things to like get by and I never want to think about it ever again.
Guest:I don't want to go back there.
Guest:I don't want anything to do with these things.
Guest:So now it is quite possibly the worst time to have a movie like this for one reason, because it reminds you of the shitty time that everybody spent making these screen things.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But also,
Guest:for the last five years, these streaming services have told you that the content doesn't matter.
Guest:They have spent five years curating material that does not require you to pay close attention to it.
Guest:It is quite literally, they call it the second screen now.
Guest:And that's the whole thing.
Guest:Oh, you know, yeah, we make this junkie, you know, Russo brothers movie.
Guest:People put it on in the background while they're folding the laundry and that's fine.
Guest:This fucking thing is,
Guest:As stupid as it is, it's one of the dumbest things you could ever watch.
Guest:If you look away from the screen for five seconds, you're fucked.
Guest:You miss 20 things to happen.
Guest:You have to be watching it the whole time to know what's going on.
Guest:So it's this crazy time capsule of a movie that was made for only one period of time, and they missed that shot by five years.
Yes.
Marc:It is very much like Michael Scarn, like the movie that Michael Scott makes in The Office.
Marc:Threat Level Midnight.
Marc:Yes, Threat Level Midnight.
Marc:It is Threat Level Midnight adjacent, like 100%.
Marc:It is a fascinating time capsule that, I don't know, it's like that meme, does not work, fun to fix.
Marc:Does that work, kind of fun to watch?
Yeah.
Guest:I would not say I had fun watching it.
Guest:I definitely enjoyed the fact that I knew I would at least get to talk about it.
Guest:So maybe if that's your thing, if you got a bunch of friends that you talk about movies with, or you want to just like watch something and write a funny letterboxd, go nuts.
Guest:but please do not put that shit on me ricky bobby i am not recommending that you watch this and spend 90 precious minutes of your life that will not come back they will be gone forever yeah if you watch this if you're folding laundry just stare at the wall like don't don't don't your brain will give you a much better more enriching time than this does
Marc:I can't even imagine the activity you would be doing, like waiting for surgery.
Marc:No, I think you can just do anything.
Marc:You can just watch the needle go into your skin and it'll be less painful.
Guest:If I was not getting surgery and I was watching this, I would get a needle and put it into my skin.
Marc:Yes, like I don't – like if it's on at the gas station, I think that's acceptable.
Marc:I think – Yes, if there's like a wino outside that like you could watch it with, great.
Marc:Like there's – like I would actually say if it's on at a bar with the mute, like I think –
Guest:Yeah, I think that would work.
Guest:I would say bar late at night, tell them to turn the sound up and the seven or eight people left can watch this.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Great.
Marc:Yeah, there's so, I don't know when else you would ever want to watch this.
Marc:Like when you're waiting for like the exterminator to come, maybe?
Marc:Like, I don't know.
Marc:There's no reason for this movie.
Guest:That's it.
Guest:You've circled it right there.
Guest:There's no reason to watch it.
Guest:Okay, because of that I feel like we're owed A little bit of a reprieve For next week And I have not told you this But I have a plan Because next week
Guest:August 13th of next week is the anniversary of the release date of Tropic Thunder.
Guest:Oh, hell yeah.
Guest:And then the following week on WTF is Ben Stiller.
Guest:Yes!
Guest:So I think in Tribute...
Guest:A movie that both of us ranked as what we considered one of the top 10 movies of the 21st century.
Guest:I think we should watch Tropic Thunder.
Guest:And I would like to go through it granularly.
Guest:I would like to do it almost minute by minute.
Guest:Awesome.
Guest:Because not only is it one of our favorite movies and one of the greatest movies.
Guest:it has so many fantastic little stories now that stem from it since we're 17 years removed from it coming out in the theaters.
Guest:So I think next week, which will probably go across two weeks if I, if I know myself and you, uh,
Guest:We will do a Tropic Thunder Bonanza in honor of our guest, Ben Stiller, who is our guest on the August 18th episode of WTF.
Guest:That's great.
Guest:And so if you would like to get a head start, go ahead and watch some Tropic Thunder.
Guest:The opposite.
Guest:of War of the Worlds in that there is never a bad time to watch Tropic Thunder.
Guest:Please go ahead and do that and then we will join you with our special look at it as well as everything that happened in the week that was WTF.
Guest:And until then, I'm Brendan and that's Chris.
Guest:Peace!