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Stephen: [00:00:00] So, but for reasons, you know, Wakanda forever I couldn't get it, I couldn't get it in gear.
But I realized that it was still playing at the movie theater a week or two ago, so I went to see it. Now there's a death in that movie that I wasn't expecting because I figured I was surprised. Yeah. Okay. So that was, nice. It was nice. It's nice when you get a nice death that you weren't expecting.
It wasn't that nice.
Scott: And an Oscar nod to boot. Yeah, and that was the other thing. I was
Stephen: like, yeah, there
Jason: you
Stephen: go. So, now I have tried my, my esteemed colleague to the right of me, Mr. Scott made a comment off air about Phase Four, and I don't think it's any surprise to anyone that there has been a little bit of a turning regarding Phase Four.
Now whether that's, whether you are in the camp of being Willing to forgive [00:01:00] because yeah, there was a pandemic and there was, there's a lot of things that kind of messed things up and things that were supposed to come out earlier ended up coming out later. And there's a, there's been this sort of disjointed feel or whether you're in the camp that's finally they're falling and I'm just going to jump on that because that's what I like to do.
You know who you are. I've liked a lot of phase four. But. Thor, Love and Thunder. There's some definite strong aspects of that movie that I found quite disappointing. And also found the movie to be too long. And boy, Wakanda forever. Was too long.
I think was it? Yeah, I really struggled. I look I'm not getting any younger and If the movie's got me so engaged that I don't notice the growing ache in my backside As I'm sitting in a movie theater chair for so long. That's how you like Avengers Endgame. I saw that movie twice my Arse is [00:02:00] killing me.
Didn't care. Totally into the film. Ha. After about an hour, once we hit the hour and a half hour 45 minute, I became very conscious of the fact that, God, I'm just so uncomfortable in this seat. And that's the barometer for me. The ass rating. The ass rating. Ass ache. On an ass ache, I give this a 5.
On a scale of 1 to, ow! But yeah, that movie was 2 hours and 40, I think 47 minutes long. They could have chopped an hour out of that, and I would have been delighted with the results. There were some subplots in there that were unnecessary. The whole thing with Ironheart, wasted opportunity for that character.
It felt just like, well, let's just shove this in. That really didn't add a
Jason: lot, did it? It didn't. That whole sub arc could have been sliced out. Yeah.
Scott: Put somewhere else. And there may be a payoff with it. In the Armor War. Oh, I'm sure there will be, yeah. But, you know, when, and when I say something about [00:03:00] Phase 4, I am not one of these that have just jumped on and hated everything in there.
Right. I've enjoyed a lot of it, but I think what happened is that we got spoiled a little bit with Infinity Wars and Endgame. Yeah. Because if you look at the, I'll go back, if you look at the Thor movie franchise, it runs like the comic book sales wise. First movie, everyone's like, hey, that's Thor.
What's wrong with his eyebrows? The second one, you're like this isn't... I don't know if I want to do this anymore. But then you get the third one. Right. Greatness. And you get excited and all happy and that guy's going to do the next one. And he kind of just goes a little too overboard. Yeah, sure. I love Jane Foster.
Yes, I like to look that. I think Hemsworth does a great job with... The comedic aspect he
Stephen: does of the
Jason: role. Think it's too much. He's but no too
Scott: much. It's gone too much. Too much too far. Love and thunder did take it too far. But see, like I think Thor can't [00:04:00] be the heavy unless it's in combat, right? Because the idea of a God standing around with a hammer is funny to me right now.
When Thor shows up on the battlefield, after getting Stormbreaker and all of that, he's not cracking jokes there, he is blowing shit up. He's all business. But, you know, there is, I think, a, and these are the best, Walt Simonson's Thor stories, there was humor in there when there was nothing going on.
Yes. It wasn't slapstick. No. , but the whole phase. Thor, I think every or phase. Phase. Thor phase, phase four. We got WandaVision. Right. And we kind of got excited because somewhere in the back of our, some of our minds are like, I'm going to have Marvel TV. Yeah. Growing up as a kid, I wanted good Marvel TV.
And this is just weird enough. Wait, hold on,
hold
Stephen: on. I'm sorry. Are you saying that [00:05:00] Spidey and his amazing friends wasn't good Marvel TV? Well, it. Are you saying. They're the greatest. That Human Torchless Fantastic Four cartoon. Are you telling me. Well, I'm telling. That Bill Bixby's Hulk show was
Scott: not good enough.
It wasn't long enough. But I will tell you that my Spider Man Amazing Friends Wolverine doesn't have an Australian accent. Just gonna leave that right there, out there. Does not. Listen, you don't know. That was also 30 years ago. Details. But you have this, and then God help them. They're doing Falcon and Were Soldier.
Right. And, I love. The guy that's playing the Winter Soldier, I think he's great, and I love the guy that's playing Falcon. Yep. And you know you, the nice thing about this is that you didn't have to watch, you really didn't have to watch any of these streaming shows. None. To care about going to see Thor or Wakanda, because you already knew Sam was going to be Captain [00:06:00] America, because you know.
Right. Old man Steve, which should have been Stan Lee handing the shield, but that's a whole different thing. You knew what that was going to go, and these were all, they were all fillers, and we were expecting big, super, well thought out stories. And they weren't. Some of them were not in the streaming service.
Some of them were just fine. Like, I don't hate She Hulk as much as most of... Male white America seems to, I thought, you know, the show had enough fun and that character worked for that. Yeah. But the, I think the hate for phase four is just, I'm going to be saying it
Stephen: all day and night. You are so stuck on that, man.
Scott: The pandemic, people don't realize the pandemic screwed up a lot of things. Yes, that's right. And. Even, you know, Chadwick's death screwed up a lot of things. So, God bless them for putting together a Black [00:07:00] Panther 2 movie at all. They didn't recast him, which I'm glad of. I don't think they should have.
They dealt, but then you do have to squeeze Ironheart in there or something else, because I'm sorry, his sister is Black Panther. That was the weakest acting in that whole movie to me. Her dealing with his death. I get it. But then this whole militant anger crap that, I mean, I get it. Your brother's dead and you're blaming yourself and all of this.
See, I liked it.
Jason: I liked that part that, because they actually, they do a good job of tracking through the stages of grief in that movie ending with acceptance. Right. And I thought that was really well done. And it was a smart sort of approach to it to sort of. More in this loss with the fan base, right?
I like
Scott: to, yeah, I think the idea of it on paper worked, but I think this actress and maybe I'm holding some of her antics outside of the movie [00:08:00] weighed on my skewing the judgment for performance. Right. Okay. Because there's times when she's going a little over the top. I'm like, okay, come on. Come on lady.
I enjoyed Namor. Yeah. For what it was. Yeah. I mean, for some reason Marvel can't use the word Atlantis. So they came up with a whole nother underwater culture. They can't use Atlantis for some reason. Interesting. Oh, I
Stephen: assumed that it was, that was a choice that they don't want to. I saw Because of
Scott: Aquaman.
I saw something in the Entertainment Weekly where it's like they can't use Atlantis for some reason. I don't know. I liked,
Jason: I liked that they made it like a
Scott: Mexican thing. The myth, the mythos made sense. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I, I'll applaud them for that. And I don't know how much of that was held over from before Chadwick's death.
I knew he was supposed to be a part of it, but I don't know if he was gonna be, you know, it was Black Panther was gonna be down there instead of his sister. What all of, what all that was going on that whole Mayan. Stick was Make greatness. I and unfortunately we can't get a solo [00:09:00] name or outing anyhow.
It is tied to the Fantastic Four and the Hulk stuff. Like we can't have a solo Hulk movie. Well, no, we,
Stephen: well, yeah. I
Scott: mean, it's, he has, someone else has to be. Who owns Hulk now?
Stephen: Universal. Oh, universal has a Oh, has hu still, yeah. They've got some weird grasp on that where they can use the Hulk. as an ancillary character in other things, but it can't be his own.
But they can't have a Hulk movie on Disney Marvel. Yeah. They can't do it. Okay. So
Jason: he could
Scott: be in, he could be in Avenger, he could be in four, he could be an Avengers. He could be in a Planet Hulk with his son and all of that. The scar. Yeah. He could be all of
Stephen: that. And I guess we can have She Hulk on tv.
Yes. But we can't have Hulk as a headlining. Movie. And we got Scar in She Hulk. Yeah. So, I don't know.
Scott: I'll go back to Black, I took us off Black Panther about where you were going because I'm curious [00:10:00] what you thought of.
Stephen: I liked the things that I liked about Black Panther were to, to a
large degree of the things that I liked about the first one. I liked the world building, I liked the mythology, I like... How it's got a different feel to it. I like the, this sort of, you know, cultural it's got a really nice flavor to it. And I like that. I like that they are their own Their interactions with the rest of the world are very guarded.
I quite like that. It made a lot of sense. Oh yeah, it does. Absolutely it
Scott: does. And the other government's reactions made a lot of sense.
Stephen: Well, yeah, I know. And that's quite, you know, that beginning bit when when Queen Ramona is at the U. N. and she's, you know, kicking, you know, verbally kicking ass and taking names.
And I quite liked that. That was great. I wasn't too crazy about the[00:11:00] it's a bit of a, it's funny talking about tropes. Before there's a bit of a thing in there with the American. Guy and it's like, oh they got their sneaky plans and all this kind of stuff, it's like, ah, okay. You know, you would think that we don't have, you would think we've got a little bit of trust in Wakanda because, well, they just helped us take out Thanos, you know, I mean, they, they didn't have to show up, but they did.
Same with all the monks from, you know, the Doctor Strange thing. But, okay, alright, whatever. But I liked that. The Namor stuff I liked a lot. I wasn't sure that I was going to like it big Namor fan have been since I can remember and I liked what they did with that, I liked I liked that a lot but this was, okay, so, yes, Chadwick Boseman passed away and they made the decision not to recast I've had some very interesting [00:12:00] conversations with my wife about this because I'm, I was quite on board with that.
And my wife who is not really a comic book reader at all, she's really just looking at this from the cinematic perspective. I, she has made some actually very good arguments about why she thinks they should have recast. Because it's about that character and now what they've done. Is they've diluted that character and raised up all of the others and there's something kind of missing there.
This isn't, it's not a team book, it's not a team movie, it's about Black Panther, it's about King T'Challa. It's, you know, it's like, it would almost be like if something if something unfortunate had happened to Chris Evans after Captain America. And Marvel said, well, we're not going to recast Captain America and instead we're going to do a movie that's all about Bucky and [00:13:00] Falcon and you know, yeah, I'm sure they could still do something good, but you would have sat there and thought, yeah, but I wanted a Captain America story because I want a Black
Jason: Panther story.
But what they would have done is what they actually did. They didn't recast, they wouldn't recast Steve Rogers. They would make Sam Wilson Captain America. Yeah, but you know what I mean. But that's what they did with his sister. They made her Black Panther.
Stephen: Right, but...
Scott: I get what your wife's saying.
Yeah. I don't...
Stephen: If you want to do that later on, that's fine. But there was still stories to tell centered around T'Challa. Well,
Scott: it's James Bond. You changed James Bond, it was always James Bond, from Sean Connery to Roger Moore, so you kind of did that here, but, because, Jason's right, it went from, you know, Chadwick to his sister, but there could be, the [00:14:00] emotion, they made an emotional decision, that
Stephen: was you that time, not me, they
Scott: made an emotional decision, and not a business one would have been, Find another young, talented that would, to keep, because I think what you're, I'm speaking for your wife, so forgive me, sweetheart is that the actor, the character is bigger than the actor.
In Marvel, the actor is bigger than the character. In this instance. Well, Robert Downey died today, and they wanted to bring him back. I
Jason: think sometimes you retire the jersey. In this case, that guy was such a class
Scott: act. In 30 years, if the superhero movies are still going on, then we will start over again.
There's no way to recast Robert as Iron Man without starting the whole damn universe over. And the nice thing about some of this, as Hugh Jackman will tell you, is that you can be almost... 55 and have a gut on you like I've got and they'll [00:15:00] still bring you back as Wolverine and you can work it out, but I see what It's
Stephen: an interesting point of view.
And I mean, I look I don't think there's there's no right or wrong. It's just what you think it there's now it's a timely thing because We had That thing with Quentin Tarantino recently, who made the comment about how there are no movie stars in Marvel movies because the characters are the movie stars.
It's not, of course, I believe Samuel L. Jackson had a few things to say about that. He said, I'm in that one. I'm not a movie star. You can't tell me anything differently. But interestingly enough, the way that the Chadwick Boseman thing played out in the end, clearly he's the star and they decided, no, we're not going to do what we did with Ed Norton and the Hulk.
We're not going to do what we're now doing, I guess, with Harrison Ford and and General Ross, which is kind of interesting. Or [00:16:00] did with the Spider Man or did with the Spider Man, or I keep feeling like there was another bit of recasting that the Hulks.
Scott: I mean,
Stephen: You said, yeah, there's another one. I feel like there was another one that was recast,
Scott: but every time we look up, there's a different Batman.
I can't think of what it
Stephen: is, but anyway, it's
Jason: so screwed up Superman with
Stephen: the devil. They did something different with this. And again it's their decision. And I understand, not only do I understand, I respect the, what they decided to do, but what that means Is that for this movie, that's such an, it's the elephant in the room, you know, is okay, we're going to have to address this.
And I think they did a fantastic job with that. They allowed us to see. These characters and look, you know, when you hear that, you know, some of these actors, you know, those emotions that they're showing on screen are genuine. The emotions that they're suffering through with the loss of this colleague [00:17:00] and this friend.
Yeah it's very believable. I thought Letitia Wright as Shuri, I absolutely believe. The rage and the emotions and the feelings of the loss and all of these things. I, but I see what you're saying as well, Scott, and I agree because I think that, unfortunately, that gets a bit diluted because of where that
Scott: story kind of went.
And also think, if you've taken out Iron, I mean, some people my, someone I was talking about when I said, I wish they'd taken the Iron Heart out. Yeah, I do too. They said, but then you would miss the mentoring between the triangle of women for her. Save it for the third one. Well, I was like, save it for something else.
Yeah. But, you know, and also I don't know if Chadwick had passed away because of what Disney's views of what Letitia's off campus. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know how much she was in the movie. Original movie to [00:18:00] begin with either but. I didn't know, I didn't know if she, what she did. She went hard anti vax, COVID isn't real, all this stuff, all of that, and Disney was like, you need to stop.
And she's like, FREEDOM! And you were like, oh Jesus, and you know, they just they just shit canned old girl from Mandalorian and they were looking at this going, oh God, are we going to do this again? Right, right. Yeah. And I don't fall either way on that. I'm just saying, I'm just reciting history, I'm not making a judgment on who was right or wrong.
I don't need any of that crap. But, it, I enjoy the movie. I like the fact that if you watch Black Panther 1 and Black Panther 2, it looks like the same movie. Yeah, sure. You know, the cinematography, all of that, the, once again, the world building and even with the Mayan stuff, even though that's a different culture, it still worked within the storyline.
Yes. They even did a good job of explaining why skins are blue and all of that. It all made sense. I, and I kind of like the little political undertones of, Oh yeah, y'all want Vibranium, we're watching y'all. And yes, [00:19:00] unfortunately, it is a stereotype of the Americans going, Well, we're gonna, and that would have been us.
That would have been us. Whether Thanos helped us or not, I've been an American long enough. We're stealing your resources. We are.
Stephen: Okay, here we go. Find me a Native
Scott: American. I can't wait to read the comments. We'll get a Native American sitting here and have them explain their views and all that. I know who we are. Right. You know, that's I know what we're doing. So it made sense in that movie. The whole storyline you could have pulled off and the movie not change at all would have been you know, Vals and Martin's marriage.
Yeah. And all of that. Yeah. That, I mean, that was for such two pretty talented actors. And granted, I'm sure they'll cash a mouse check anytime, right? That was
Stephen: worthless. Yeah. It's set up for
Scott: something else. I mean, yes. Okay. Her run in Thunderbolts, which if you're a good writer, you could just, WR wrote, written that in anyhow, and I'm glad he came back, but, Did, did old girl [00:20:00] call him colonizer in the first movie?
I don't remember that. How's my favorite colonizer? I just was like, well, that's odd. Yeah, I was like that. Well, once again, it's true. I mean, I was Wakanda forever. Yeah, every time, when when the general, yeah, the general that got demoted when she rescued Martin Freeman at the end. Everett Ross. Everett Ross.
She's like, how's my favorite colonizer? And she said that a couple of times and I was like, was that? I never cared enough to go back in the first Black Panther and watch it to see,
Jason: I couldn't remember the, like, the Black Panther love interest that showed up at the end and had the kid. I was like, I don't remember this character at all.
Well, she
Scott: was in the first one.
Jason: I'm sure she was. I just don't remember her at
Stephen: all. I didn't like that. That was the, yeah, I
Scott: hated that. Well, it made sense because you knew he had a thing for her in the first movie, but then when...
Stephen: Okay, but you know that, that comment that you just made a little while ago where you [00:21:00] said, you know, 30 years from now, they're going to have to restart this stuff.
See, I'm not convinced that they're going to do that. I think that they'll just kind of keep the narrative going. I
Scott: mean, if we look up and have young Avengers,
Stephen: that'd be great. Right. So that's their way of saying, okay, well, unfortunately, poor Chadwick passed away. But we will get around to... This kid's name is T'Challa.
We're going to get to those T'Challa stories that you know and love. It's just gonna be later. It's just gonna
Jason: be later. It's gonna be a bit later. This takes a long time to make movies. Well,
Scott: at that time, one of these days, Kevin... Phase 52 of the... One of these days, Kevin Feige's gonna get hit by a bus, too.
And someone else is gonna, they're gonna bring in... James Gunn. James Gunn or Jared Leto to direct the universe. Oh, man. You know, Grant Morrison will put his application in and, I can't wait to see that. That, or, you know, Zack Snyder may still be... Wow,
Stephen: you're just punching everybody in the privates today, aren't you?
Scott: It beats him giving it to Roger Corman. Okay,
Jason: let's talk about, let's talk about this James Gunn
Stephen: situation. Right. [00:22:00] Okay. Okay. Alright,
Jason: so this guy shows up. Yeah. We're all pretty excited. We are. We get our, DC gets his own Kevin Feige. DC guy. Yeah. I was pretty excited. Yes. And then, he committed the ultimate sin.
He fired Henry Caval, but he didn't. But
Scott: he did. But he, I mean, according to them, but he did, I mean, according to him, he, Hey, this was, you know, I'm
Jason: gonna, he, no, like six weeks, like right before Henry CA's like, I'm gonna quit this other job so I can be Superman. They told me I'm gonna be Superman again.
And we all get it. And we are all cheering, shouting from the rooftops. We have a good Superman, all of us
Scott: and I You weren't excited? Nope. No. Oh, he's
Jason: a good Superman.
Scott: Well, I think he's a good Superman if he's got a good story. He just hadn't had a good story yet, but we'll stop I mean, no
Stephen: you guys carry on.
I have a very definite thought and it can wait
Scott: Here's what I really think happened with that [00:23:00] James Gunn knew when he was doing Peacemaker Okay, he knew he was coming Okay. He knew it was coming in some way, shape, or form. Maybe he didn't know it was going to be Kevin Feige, but that's not a job you interview for a week before it's announced.
They've been negotiating because, at the same time, Marvel fired him and then got him back. Yeah. Yeah.
Stephen: So, Marvel Oh, and it's a commitment. I mean, he's going to be locked in for at least ten years. So
Scott: On DC. Yeah. So, he's sitting there, and I'm sorry, if I, if you sold the shop tomorrow Yeah. To Ron. And I walked in and you went, Scott, you're going to be here for the next 10 years.
Enjoy yourself. Good luck. And I haven't spoken to Ron. I'm out of work. Yeah. You're listening. And the Rock went and talked to people that were leaving and he trusted their word. Jane, you know, all these people who were leaving said, yeah, man, let's bring him back. And I was excited when I saw him, I was [00:24:00] like, maybe this guy's going to get a decent shot.
Right. I can go on forever about their problems with even, as much as I enjoy bat, you know, Affleck Batman. If you want a Batman for the future, your plan is not I'm going to kill him off and make his son Batman. You don't hire a 50 year old to be Batman. Agreed. Yeah. So James shows up and he's like, what to do?
Well, we're not bringing anyone back. Maybe gal. We're going to bring Gal back. Possibly. I don't know. Just cause they're not doing her movie. Cause they were all mad at Patty anyhow. First Wonder Woman they were excited. Second Wonder Woman, what the shit. We got the Mandalorian guy. Why didn't this make any money?
Jason: Listen, that made it where I couldn't get a Rogue Squadron movie. I'm
Scott: pretty ticked about that. So, she's on the outs and you know it. So we're going to kind of keep Gal. And maybe, you know, Jason's funny. Jason Momoa, he's a hoot. Does he want to do Aquaman or do we want to put a wig on him and make him Lobo?
Okay, you told James all of [00:25:00] this ahead of time. You did, so if I'm going to buy the company, you're going to let me know, you know, hey, who you might want to keep and who you don't. So James doesn't have any culpability. , but he's like, I'm gonna write the next movie. 'cause you know what? Everyone wants a young Superman movie.
No. None of us do. No, none of us wants that. Nobody wants that. I want a good Superman movie.
Jason: Don't tell another origin story if you tell me a Superman origin. Well, he's not. We all
Scott: know it. He it's, when he shows up to Metropolis, he gets to learn about Metropolis. Well, I've seen that a couple of times too.
I don't really need to know. Yeah. We all read You're one and so rebirth. And then everything else, other than the Harley Quinn animated cartoon, which is signed on now for three years, that's great. Everything else you've done is being shitcanned. You know, Doom Patrol and Titans have ended on season four now.
They've said that. And they said, well, we already knew that before they showed up. It's not some grand conspiracy. James Gunn just went, hey man, you set in motion whatever y'all want, and I'm gonna show up with a clean slate. Right. Maybe I'm gonna have [00:26:00] Wonder Woman. I'm gonna tell you this Batman 2 after that's done.
That guy, Robert's gone too. Yeah, well. I mean, I'm, this whole. It was
Jason: more of his own little universe anyway. Well, but there's.
Scott: Joker too. Yeah, I mean. They're weird. You're gonna do your musical Harley Quinn thing with Lady Gaga. At least you got someone who could sing. You know, I mean, I'll give you that. You got someone who can sing.
And she looks crazy. So, I mean, that's not. I mean, I've seen her in American Horror Show. She plays. Depressed batshit nuts pretty good. I still like Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn And I don't know who she's got a bribe to maybe keep He used her in Suicide Squad So I think I sad to say I think some of his Suicide Squad elements are going to find a way over here Peacemaker is going to find his way over his wife is going to be in everything she showed up and she was in Peacemaker and then she was in Black Adam and they booted the rock to The Rock is a great front man.
They shouldn't have ended that relationship. Let him get out there that's your guy with the sign with, we'll [00:27:00] buy, you know, gold for cash, twirling in front of the store. That's your Harvey, out there spinning a fucking sign. That's really what that is. Let the Rock, but you but you know, you just don't, Gunn has shown up and he's going to, he's going to write his cute little universe.
We're going to have some great 80s music as soundtracks that we haven't heard in a while. I'm sure Chris Pratt and his brother are going to show up as something. You know, Dave Bautista was homeless before Guardians showed up. So I'm not sure anyone's taught him money management between that since Guardians and now.
So he'll probably be in there as well somewhere.
Stephen: Welcome to the runaway tsunami that is Scott Gilbert, ladies and gentlemen. I'm gonna tell you,
Scott: I have some thoughts because I really, you know, I love the DC Universe. They have such a rich history. And I've never seen an outfit that has no idea what to do with their properties.
Jason: I just hope he gets the characters, like,
Scott: the beauty. I mean, when your lead's gonna be Ezra Miller. Right. I thought he was a god before he got [00:28:00] arrested, okay? I'm,
Stephen: folks. This is all... Okay, I... Please. Oof, man, okay. So, I I'm the devil's advocate in this scenario. Okay, because I didn't want Henry Cavill back.
I actually don't want any of them back. I'm... Of the, just rip the band aid off, and let's just start anew, under a singular vision. Now that was the thing that, with the Marvel movies, they've gotten very lucky. Because, I don't believe that there was a solid like a, no I shouldn't say solid.
I don't believe that there was a mapped out plan. When they did Iron Man and Incredible Hulk. I know it looks like there was because Sam Jackson showed up in the, in, at the end and said I want to talk to you about the Avengers initiative. And so we all look back on that. [00:29:00] 14, 15 years ago now? 2009.
No, it was before then. 2007? Iron Man came out in 2000 and... I think they, I
Jason: think they want, they, their plan was to make,
Stephen: they had an idea, each
Scott: of these characters. Sam Jackson, he said, you know, they picked him up in a, you know, taped up limo or something. So they couldn't see. And it was supposed to be a one off because of the ultimates.
Right. And right. And that was no, no one thought about it, but if,
Stephen: you know, if you think about how well Iron Man did. Yeah, 2008. 2008. Okay. It could have also, it could have gone the other way. It could have done what every other movie had done. Iron Man could have been a one and done. Robert Downey Jr.
I mean, Robert Downey Jr. was not, didn't get, he didn't get the biggest paycheck on that film. That was, I believe it was Sarah
Scott: Toward.
Jason: Everybody there was like, I don't know about this guy. Big insurance
Stephen: risk. [00:30:00] Yeah. Iffy, very iffy. Is he going to show up? Right, exactly. So, I mean, so, look. They got very lucky.
It's, you know, Providence shined on them. And they got very lucky. Yeah, there's been some missteps, Dark World, and Iron Man 2, and okay. I liked Iron Man 2. I didn't, but I, there's things I liked about it. I just re watched it. Things I liked about it, and I watched it again about a year and a half ago, and it was better than I remembered it, but there's still, anyway.
But, that, what they did, Is they established the flavor of Coke. Yeah. Okay. So, you've got Coca Cola, you've got Pepsi, you've got RC, you've got this, you've got that, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But there's Coke and then, and Pepsi, and they sort of established that's the flavor that people expect when you say Coke.[00:31:00]
That's what people expect. Marvel has done this now with superhero movies. movies. Rightly or wrongly. What's
Jason: interesting about how they've done it though, is that every movie fits a separate genre. Almost. Yeah. Oh yeah. So you've got Ant Man, which is a heist. And you've got Doctor Strange, the one that just came out, definitely, like, a horror movie.
Horror movie. Absolutely. Yeah. A clear horror movie. Sure. So, they're superhero movies, but they're not all the same. And that's actually pretty impressive. It is.
Stephen: It absolutely is. Now I remember, I think, I want to say that this was Diane Nelson the lady who was calling the shots at DC. For a while I can't remember.
But I remember reading an interview with somebody, muckety muck with DC Entertainment, who was saying, Well, we're going in the other way. We are going to make movies that maybe do not... Connect. Maybe they exist in their own universes. We're just gonna [00:32:00] take these characters and make great movies with them.
That's a wonderful idea. Unfortunately, the expectation has been set that people actually quite like a bit of connectivity. So, what I, so, without not to take over the whole thing here, but... I think they need to scrap the old and start afresh. They can do it once, and I think people will go
Scott: along with it.
And out of everyone that's running the universes they've tried to bring in, I think he's got the best chance. I do too. Of putting it all straight. And here's the other nice thing about being in a superhero movie. Yeah. You don't like Henry as Superman. , but 10 years from now. , we can have our Earth two Superman.
It could be him or the guy on the CW show shows up and see. And I think that's an did, did to McGuire. Ever think he needed to come back and play [00:33:00] Spiderman? Oh yeah, of course. Under Disney, of course. No. So if it's done right, he doesn't have to be the main Superman. I think also you need to peel off the, I don't need the Michael Jordan Superman writing or you know, I don't need all these other, get me a.
Good Superman story. I agree about starting over, maybe getting rid of all of them. I do have a soft spot for Gal. Of course, absolutely. I think if anyone, if he had to dump them all, I'd like to see her. She's a great Wonder Woman. Because I think you could probably bring any kind of script to her. And she'd go, okay.
as long as it made sense. Now, if you find other actors great five years from now, maybe saying, Hey gal's, great, but you know, Cindy Lou over here is doing just as great of a job. Right?
Jason: It, well see, I think the same thing with Jason Momoa too. Like him being, I think Momoa is a great Aquaman, I mean, is
Scott: fun as Aquaman, but if he's gonna be Lobo I think that's a fine fit.
If they're gonna do, I don't know. I mean, but I don't need a [00:34:00] solo Lobo movie. No, nobody knows that. No. No, I mean, maybe that's the guy that Superman's punching around or something, or he's in the Green Lantern Green Lantern Corps. But if there's any real truth or traction
Stephen: to... It's not that I don't like Henry Cavill as Superman.
I did. I actually, I do. I think he's fine. I haven't really had a problem with any of the casting choices. With the exception of Ezra Miller as the Flash. And that's not, that has less to do with Ezra Miller as a, as an off screen whatever they are and more to do with, it just feels like stunt casting, like, let's go as far away from what's his face Grant Gustin is doing on the TV show, because that's kind of working.
Scott: Yeah. Characterized Barry Allen, that's never been Barry Allen. The way Ezra plays Flash, that's almost Impulse. Kind of the bumbly...
[00:35:00] I don't know what that Flash movie, and I'm sorry. I'm
Stephen: still not convinced that we
Scott: are. They got a date, and Ezra's been apologizing. He's going to meetings and stuff. There's only so much money they can write off to the insurance company as a loss. You know, they chunked the Batgirl thing and all. I mean, it's...
I would like to see Michael Keaton get one more shot as a Batman somehow. That's just me. If Christopher Reeve was still alive, I'd want to see him get a shot at Superman.
Stephen: I've just had a brilliant idea. Oh no, I've
Scott: got it. I can't dig, I can't dig up and reanimate another court's
Stephen: man. It's, no, I've got it twice in one.
It's just 20 Lazar. It's so simple. I'm almost afraid to say it in case I'm right and
Scott: I've just ruined something. All these ideas are copyright of multi multiverse. Yeah, absolutely. Stephen St. James.
Stephen: What if they tweak the flash movie and at the end. The Flash blows up that [00:36:00] version of the DC Universe and the next movie after that is whatever James Gunn is working on right now.
Well, it's supposed to be Flashpoint,
Jason: so Flashpoint can come out to whatever.
Stephen: Yeah, they can end it and it'll be Rebirth. It'll be the new 52 well, let's hope it's not the new 52.
Scott: Well,
Jason: the Rebirth was terrible too. Like all the Rebirth
Scott: started
Jason: well. Well, let me take this back. The New 52. Remember the Superman they had when that started?
There was like, in the jeans and the t shirt, like, jumping around. I was like, this is ridiculous. I don't want to read this. Right. I have no interest. And there was like a year difference between that Superman and, like, Superman in action. Yeah,
Stephen: George Frizz was doing... Superman and Grant Morrison was doing action comics, or the
Scott: other way around?
It was Grant Morrison was doing an action comic. I think he was doing both. And, but, or no, he was doing action. He wasn't letting Perez know what's going on, which is why Perez left the damn book. Right,
Jason: yes. It's, it is the only time that I didn't collect a Superman
Stephen: [00:37:00] comic. I've got the Omnibus, but I still haven't gotten around to reading it.
Even
Jason: the Son of Kal El thing, I still kept action. Even though I hate what they're doing with Jonathan Kent, I kept action going because I didn't even like the story and I kept it. But back then, nope, I was done.
Scott: The one thing I'll give Gunn credit for is he has not tipped his hand. Other than saying he's writing.
He doesn't know what he's doing yet. He's trying to figure it out. I think he's got an idea. He had to have pitched something. And he's also, you know, he's actually confronting some of his critics on Twitter directly. He's savvy enough to know how to handle that end of the business. Now whether his vision and what's actually going to get put into place will work.
If anyone's going to... Screw it up. It's gonna be Warner Brothers and because of the behind the scenes turmoil Discoveries in there now, they're [00:38:00] put making some decisions and they want you know, you know, we might get a whole animal verse of And of superhero animals, you know, super Fox and bat duck or some other ridiculous crap that makes no sense whatsoever because if you look at how they're chunking stuff off the Streaming service and y'all laugh like I'm just on this rant But I've seen enough of that silly crap where it's like, oh, that's the decisions.
I expect them to make yeah They're universally that I mean they it's you did Superman in this and grants a different company That's more through different owners. You did Superman in the 70s Batman and then comic book movies kind of fell out of favor and then You just make Horrible decisions.
I mean marvel made horrible decisions With their punisher and some captain america some other stuff and then they grew up and straightened it out They got their one guy and this is going to be their third one guy over there And if I had to think anyone was going to handle it be him, but if not my resume is ready I mean, I mean because if you're gonna hire i'll do it for a million [00:39:00] Just, dude, I'll run your universe for a million, what's gonna, it's like being the head coach of the Cowboys.
I'll be there for three years and get fired and I'll walk away a millionaire. I'll take it. I'm disappointed Jeff Johns couldn't have done more with this. I think because Jeff Johns used to bring Richard Donner his coffee doesn't make him a doesn't make a film. is his
Stephen: medium.
Scott: TV, you know, he was, he did stuff with Stargirl and some of these other things, but Something happened behind the scenes, just like it happened with Bendis, that soured him.
On that world. Because, you know, Bendis was coming in, got my Naomi TV show, I'm gonna do this, I always love this, and then all of a sudden, he's just out the door and he's doing other things, you know, you, Now granted, Marvel hadn't grabbed him either, but you know, something, I think there's a, without any evidence, I think there's a chaotic work environment or something going on at Warner Brothers where, At Disney, Marvel Comics is not their big breadwinner, but they know that there's some value there.
That's the R&
Jason: D department,
Scott: and they understand that. And Warner Brothers, even though they've been around longer, had the [00:40:00] properties longer, had more success in animation, some TV shows and things like that, every time they change owners, they don't understand what they've got. I mean, when you fire a bunch of editors, and it's like, Stephen, what were you doing yesterday?
Ah, he was running network cables for a switch to, for IT, cool. Do you want to edit the bat books this month? How about that? I mean, you know who Batman is, right? Have you seen him? The Super Friends cartoon? You remember that? There you go, great. And Jason, you've heard of Superman. Why don't you go over and do that?
I mean, it's... Well,
Jason: so this is the challenge that this company has with Superman. You've got, Marvel got who, their character. I, my theory is that Superman and Captain America are the same character. They're different power sets for the same character. They're the mom in Apple Pie, Boy Scout that is their character.
Rep, represent hope and freedom and all that to the people. They're out there in the front. They're the bright, shiny hero. Right? The aspirational [00:41:00] hero of the group. Marvel understood who that was. Like in the beginning of the second Avengers movie, where the language. And that's exactly who Cap is.
That is exactly who Cap is. And the, gosh, the first Avengers where you've got Loki in there and he's got, and he's like, there's only one God and he doesn't dress like that. That's exactly who Captain America is.
Stephen: Right. Right.
Jason: They got it. They put it in there, didn't diminish captaining America, made you get him and Right.
And get behind him. He was a perfect character. And he fit in ju with the flawed people just as well. Right. Superman is that character. Exactly the same thing. But what do they do at dc? They make him kill Zod. . They before that they made him the world's most powerful deadbeat dad. Which is not a Superman thing to do.
And Superman returns. Right. Right. They just don't, they don't get who Superman is. Right. So my hope in this whole thing [00:42:00] as a giant Superman fan is that James God for the love James gun for the love of God understands who Superman is and gives us a good Superman. Yeah. Give us a Superman as good as captain America is
Stephen: in Marvel.
Yes. I completely agree with you. And that's why I think. This also supports the Henry Cavill thing. There's too much baggage. The General Zod thing, killing General Zod. I was hanging on by a thread with that movie. Like it started well, and then you get through the whole Jonathan Kent thing. Trying to explain to his kid how maybe you should have let a bunch of kids die on a bus and then the thing with the tornado and every and but I'm hanging on them
Scott: and I still think Jonathan Kent said that because he thought those kids were Marvel fans, maybe trying to help them trying to help.
Jason: I do like Kevin Costner as Jonathan Kent. Oh, yeah. No, that was great. It's great.
Stephen: And then they're having The [00:43:00] big punch a roo in Metropolis, where it, oh man. But I'm, and I'm hanging on, I'm hanging on, and then you get to that, that, you know, well I'll just, I guess I've got no other choice, but I'm gonna have to snap this guy's neck.
Ah, and I'm screaming. Okay. So, there's too much baggage. But I actually think, and it's funny, you guys mentioned this a little while ago. I think what we need is, not an origin story. You don't need that, and they've already proven with Ed Norton's Incredible Hulk, and What's His Face the kid with his Spider Man movies.
They don't Tom Holland? Tom Holland, there you go. Sorry, Mr. Holland. They don't need to do an origin story, we've got this. But what we haven't yet had is Superman, Lois Lane. Metropolis. Just a good Superman story that fits into the classic. We haven't had one of those in over 40 years because Christopher Reeve's Superman [00:44:00] and then Superman 2 kind of, yeah, okay, so it fits that bill.
Then you've got Richard Pryor, then you've got Nuclear Man, and then it's...
Jason: Superman Returns, Deadbeat Dad. Yeah,
Stephen: enough time has passed and that's the thing. Is one of the things that I think has made the Marvel movies work so well. Is you don't actually have to have any knowledge of the comic history at all to enjoy them.
And in some respects I think it almost hurts you a little bit if you've got too much comic knowledge. Like you said earlier with I know how Kang Dynasty is gonna end. Okay, so it's, no, I would like to see, I want to see him run into the phone booth. I want to see him, Change his clothes real fast. I might have
Scott: a problem with that.
You know what I hate? I don't know what a phone booth is anymore. What's he going to change
Stephen: now? Starbucks bathroom, probably. Yeah I want the juxtaposition between great and mighty deeds [00:45:00] and saving a cat out of a tree. I mean, I don't need a remake of Donna's Superman. But those character beats You just have to remember that whatever the adversary is, it's got to be stronger than Superman's power set, but not as strong as Superman's conviction as a humanity, that's how he gets through.
That's where the great, that is why Lex Luthor always fails. Because Luther is so focused on, but I'm the human, he's the alien, with that, but he always misses the point that alien is more of a human being than he is, and you'll never see it. See, and I think
Jason: we missed some, we lost an opportunity with the Jesse Eisenberg Lex Luthor.
I think he could have been like a, an updated version of the Gene [00:46:00] Hackman.
Stephen: Lex. I struggle with that. I, yeah. Lex Luthor has to, Lex Luthor has to be Lex Luthor. Not, you know, the enfant terrible with the jelly bear in the mouth and the,
Scott: Well his Lex Luthor fit the universe that Zack Snyder was trying to create.
Yeah. It was a warped Mark Zuckerberg. Yeah, right. Yeah, that's it. That's really what that was. I'm sorry that some of Kevin Spacey's extracurricular activities has kept us from being able to cast him because I think he did out of Superman Returns he was even though it was the same script and the same we're gonna do land but I mean I think he could do good things that but yes
Jason: most powerful deadbeat dad the whole
Scott: film I'm gonna say you know John Cryer from Supergirl did a hell of a Lex Luthor I didn't see it.
You ought to just go walk. That [00:47:00] was the dangerous. I already have the answers when I walk into the room, but not hawking Donald Trump ism of the 80s where, you know, Every rich guy was a bad guy like Burns Luther. Yeah, but this guy was brilliant. He's Gordon Gekko focused But what's gonna he's his lack of humanity is what Had Supergirl thumping
Jason: him.
See I would love to see a We're super far from this but a Tower of Babel story because the thing I love the most about Tower of Babel Is he had Lex Luthor versus Bruce Wayne? on the business level. So the businessmen were fighting each other in business world. And that was so good. Like nobody had ever done that.
I don't think they've done it before or since. Right. I was just
Scott: fascinated by that. Something I was thinking about cause we got off track just a little bit. We haven't talked about [00:48:00] Thor, but when you were talking about Oh no, I think we kind of covered the beats that, yeah. But as a, you know, a fan who can sit in a comic book movie and go, I know what's going on.
There are two movies that I went to is what I call a civilian. Cause I had no or very limited background in their history. The Eternals, this is a 50 50 split. The Eternals and then Shang Chi. Right, okay. Enjoyed Shang Chi And it was, you know, I kind of sat there was like, so this is what it's like for the rest of y'all.
Huh? I mean, in a way, because when you've been in the hobby for 40 years, right. And they all tend to steal from. Legend and lore. There's very few like the only thing that surprised me in the Watchmen was how bad it got in the movie versus the source material Still alright, but there's just other like yeah, [00:49:00] but the Eternals sitting there was the Realization I was like man Jack Kirby was brilliant and you can't make his some of his She can't make some of his source material into film.
Well It wasn't horrible. I enjoyed it. I liked it. But when we step away and we look at, I mean, I hate to say it, when the box office receipts and the general public's response to that was not their favorite. No. No. They were confused by it. They didn't enjoy it. We all sat around like, Oh, that's an interesting...
And I think like, you said Iron Man 2 wasn't your favorite. Dark World as
Stephen: well. Yeah. No, I said Ironman two. Dark
Scott: world. I didn't
Jason: like. I agree with Dark World. I like Ironman two.
Scott: I like Ironman two and I don't like Ironman three. The reason why I like Ironman two is the world building. I saw them beginning to do with the introduction of Black Widow, whether her response, you know, her acting and the materials she had.
Right. But I was like, there's another one. At that point I was like, we might be serious about an [00:50:00] Avengers movie, because even at Ironman two we hadn't yeah, sure. We hadn't been told yet. I was like, Because when I saw the end of Iron Man, Sam Jackson was like, hey, that's cool. That's a neat callback.
It's never going to happen. Oh, no. I went
Jason: there like, we're going to get an Avengers movie. We're going to
Scott: get an Avengers movie. Well, we've been teased so much over life that I was like, Avengers movie. Because I didn't believe anyone would show up to see Iron Man. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'll still go back to the reason why Blade was a success was that no one knew they were watching a comic book movie.
Right. When they first showed up. And that was my formula for success. Same thing when Arrow first came out with the CW grant, we had a little more mileage on the Marvel stuff at that point. Arrow was successful because you didn't know what you were watching. You saw Stephen Amell running around without his shirt on.
So all the housewives got excited. And then, you didn't, and very quickly, we all figured out, oh he's Batman. You can't do Batman, but he's Batman. But he's got a bow and arrow. That's what he's [00:51:00] doing. And then, you know, the typical CW. Two, two seasons, it's alright. We introduced the Flash. Two seasons, and then, okay.
I'm glad they're ending the Superman and Lois show. At the third season, cause CW's just gone. Because I'm sure by... Episode, or Season 4, we have the super monkey and the dog running around. But that
That world building I think sometimes is what I enjoy more than sitting and going, I don't know what's going to happen, I don't know what's going to happen, I tried to
go back and go, is this what everyone thought when they saw Iron Man? Right. Or, you know, because we still had X Men, we still had the Spider Man movies and the Hulk movies and that was going on and that was a widely diversed In quality and No, I understand. But
Stephen: that, I think phase 4 has, It's been very interesting.
Because I've gotten more out of the TV series that they've done than the movies.
Scott: I think that's what's caused Marvel and Disney to [00:52:00] pause all of a sudden. Yeah. Because the exiting CEO was very big on the streaming platform and you know, I wasn't, I don't know if he was. Misrepresenting numbers or not.
I think there's a very well. So was Bob.
Jason: Well, no that Bob left there on the He left that place with all the laurels We've launched this Disney plus thing and look at the huge numbers we did in the first year Yeah, he left on that and then he crucified the guy on the well
Scott: history is written by the victors Yeah, so if I'm being brought back then that guy had to be shit Yeah.
I got you right. How dare him raise prices at Disney World during a pandemic. Yeah. But y'all weren't giving it away for free to begin with. So don't, y'all.
Stephen: Okay. So that got a
Scott: little
Jason: obnoxious though. Like they went
Stephen: a little overboard. Okay. But here's the thing. What, and I believe this, I feel this and why I'm very glad that Bob Iger's back.
I'm, Is that what I got understands that I don't think the other guy did [00:53:00] is the brand. Okay. You can think what you like, but as a company, you don't get into political pissing matches. You don't, you just don't. You can't. You, you've got to stay. And they, and there, there are those individuals who will try and pull you in and.
The strength of your ability as a leader will be your ability to not get pulled in. Well, people
Jason: get lost in the noise. They forget that this country is basically half and half. It's a 50, 50 country. And even the landslide elections are like 48% to 52% like it's a 50
Scott: 50 country most of the country's moderate yeah it's the nuts on both ends that get yeah it's
Stephen: it's but it's it's more than that it's that they are in [00:54:00] the quote unquote entertainment business And they have always been in the entertainment business and they have a very strong brand of being accessible to all because they're in the entertainment business.
I know people family members, as a matter of fact, who They cancelled their Disney Plus subscription. They all say they'll never watch another Marvel movie. All this kind of stuff. Because they feel like, That got sucked, Politics got sucked in. And it's like, Okay you, Don't just don't do that.
That's not your place. Stay in your lane. Don't alienate
Jason: half of the audience. Yeah. Well, instead of it, it's proven, right? Like their box office scores were terrible for things like light year and this strange thing where they got political. They're they got all [00:55:00] sorts of noise. In Florida.
I mean, honestly, the politics is what I tell you what,
Stephen: though, with those things, when it comes to the light year thing and the strange worlds thing, I actually think those things would have could have still been no changes, and they would have flown right the way through. It was the news worthy stories.
The nonsense with The Government of the state of Florida and things like that, where all of a sudden, because people look, we value our entertainment. I do not put my politics above my entertainment because I'm more impressed by my entertainment than my politics and have been for quite some time, but there are many who their politics is at the top of their list, you know, they'll cut their kids loose.
Okay. So just don't. All right. The other thing is that less is more. [00:56:00] And when you're cranking out, because it almost seemed for a moment there, like a Disney show ends, there'll be a little pause, and then the next Disney show will begin. And there's also the, you know, now we're knocking on three movies a year.
And I'm just, and I think, I've kind of heard, I don't know if it's true or not, that Iger is like, okay, slow down. I've heard he's going to slow back. And
Scott: I think that's a good idea. Three Marvel movies a year to me feels like a light year. I mean, because there have been other times we've had five. Or I? No, three
Stephen: is the max,
Scott: I think.
Is it? Yeah. Three is the max. Didn't I have Captain America? Thor, Ironman, three Avengers, and then something else. Right. Maybe it's where maybe it feels like they wear, yeah. No. Three is the max. I think one in the first quarter, one in the summer. One of the back end is fine. Oh, it's time. Yeah. I will say this to wrap it up, I think what happened with [00:57:00] the streaming service.
is that when the pandemic hit, Disney had no money. We saw the debacle with Black Widow. So, that, it's they suddenly went, well, everyone's watching streaming, let's push it all in here. I think we'll probably see a more intelligent now, if they were all taking off, we'd have one every week. If they weren't getting slammed critically, if the critics weren't slamming them, they were making money on advertising and all that, we'd have one every week.
But I don't think I
Stephen: have no faith that they would be able to put that much. I'm just saying, yeah, no, I know what you're saying.
Scott: All right. Yeah. Well, Jason is flagging us. It is time to wrap this up because we could also go for it. You can go forever. We could. And yeah, that's
Jason: true. All right, gents. Till next time.
Till next time. Till next time. Adios.
