Blank Check with Griffin & David - Critical Darlings: The 2026 Oscars Ceremony with Griffin Newman

Episode Date: March 17, 2026

It’s Critical Darlings’ biggest morning! After a marathon season, we react to this year’s Academy Awards: the winners, losers, presenters, performances, and awkward play-offs. One Battle After Another and Sinners nearly split the ballot with One Battle and Paul Thomas Anderson taking the biggest prizes in Best Director and Best Picture, while Sinners took home Best Actor, Score, Adapted Screenplay, and Cinematography. But for as many questions as the ceremony answered, it raised more: Do Sinners and Amy Madigan’s wins signal a shift in how the Academy sees horror? What exactly is the Best Casting Oscar tracking? Are we now doomed to see Timmy eat a raw elk in an Iñárritu film? As part of this special episode, we also check in with Critical Darlings fashion correspondent Ben “The Other Ben” Hosley on this year's Oscars fashion, review the best popcorn buckets of the year with Vulture’s Rebecca Alter, and reveal the future of Critical Darlings.  ✨Subscribe to our new feed in your podcast player of choice, and join us next week for Project Hail Mary!✨ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/critical-darlings/id1885681327Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/60n6Z9BUUMUR81CQoHbE8bPocket Casts: https://pca.st/1beh8dxuAmazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/a3598b5c-6f4a-4819-9457-44082cfea1fc/critical-darlings Sign up for Check Book, the Blank Check newsletter featuring even more “real nerdy shit” to feed your pop culture obsession. Dossier excerpts, film biz AND burger reports, and even more exclusive content you won’t want to miss out on. Join our Patreon for franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter, Instagram, Threads and Facebook!  Buy some real nerdy merch Connect with other Blankies on our Reddit or Discord For anything else, check out BlankCheckPod.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Critical Darlings, a conversation about the award season conversation. One contender at a time. Please welcome to this stage, your hosts, Richard Lawson and Allison Wilmore. Marie Barty, thank you so much for that wonderful introduction coming to us via satellite from London at this time. We are joined again by our wonderful producer, Ben Frisch. Hello, Ben. Good morning. And our special guest, Griffin Newman. Welcome back to the podcast.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me here. All four of us watch the Oscars together. Yes. Which is the first for all of us, right? I normally watch it, you know, just on my couch at home at this point. Stay tuned to the end of the episode. We're going to have an announcement about the future of Critical Darling's. And also, throughout this episode, we had Ben Frisch recording during our viewing party of the Oscars. And you're going to hear some special, I don't know, correspondent bits from Blank Check Universe's own Ben Hosley. So keep an ear up. for those. And near the end of the episode, we're going to be doing a popcorn bucket review, both for the Oscars popcorn buckets and for just some of the best, brightest popcorn buckets with Rebecca Alter. But Allison, what's your big question about this year's Oscars? I wanted to bring us back to my recurring question. How real is this award ceremony? How real are the Oscars? And why? Why do we care, I guess, is the essential question.

We've spent hours now talking about films in the context of the Oscars. Pretty, I mean, it's pretty high. There were some significant things happening last night, like the first woman to ever win the cinematography Oscar. Michael B. Jordan, joining a very small class of Black, you know, best lead actor winners. Six in total. I mean, that's nothing. That's pathetic. It's six, and it does feel like the six are all, like, hugely historic.

work. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And I think that, you know, if you want to compare, like, Michael B. Jordan winning that to, like, Denzel winning it for Training Day. Like, Training Day is a movie that people probably still watch and think about. But, like, Sinners was, like, one of the huge movies of the year. It had all this other awards momentum behind it. And so it felt like it wasn't just this lone standout to give a beloved actor a prize. It was, he was one of several representatives for a movie that was widely beloved, which I think is even rare. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, for me in general, the Oscars, I'm not like an Oscars trivia junkie. I have like really not great stores of historical awareness about them. Like I wish I could pull up like last time someone won or this. They are interesting to me always because they are a reflection of how the industry is thinking about itself and how it is changing with the times or not changing with the times and what it considers valuable and prestigious is, you know, it's only. kind of extremely imperfect mirror to every year and it's I think in that way an incredible check-in. And this year, yeah, I mean, I thought it was a really good ceremony. Like I thought like it was it was one that the vibes were good. It felt very invested in the idea of the movies being important without being self-important about that, without being all like cloying. Like there are lots of times when they're doing like, you know, cinema, the movies, the history and all of that where you're like, oh, for God's sake.

Like, let's move it along, please. And in this case, I felt like it was all coming from a place of sincerity, but also from a place where it didn't feel like it needed to reach out and be like, come on, guys, remind us of why, you know, you think this is important too. I think it was understood. This was a ceremony fairly devoid of montages. Yes. Which I usually am a person fighting for the montage because the montage is almost always always

make me tear up. Yeah. It feels like this is the one time of year I go to church. They do the Henry Veth music or like one of those other classic scores. Right. Or from Dragonheart weirdly is one that they've used to a lot. And you get eight minutes of like the best high fives or eye contact in the history of movies or whatever. Or like speeches, battlefront speeches.

Yeah. Any of those things I love and I've always been like, no, we need them. They're important to the Oscars. But there literally might not have been one last night. And I also felt outside of the memoriam. Yeah. Yeah, which had to be 20 minutes because last year was a bloodbath. Yeah.

Straight up into the first three months of this year. Yeah. The amount of people in immemorial who passed away just in the last six weeks was absurd. Yeah. But I also felt like it was the most comedy they have gotten into an Oscar ceremony in a long time. Yeah. And certainly the most successful comedy. I don't think the ratio has been this strong of good versus terrible.

And I think all the things that were failures on the comedy. were basically overly confident presenters. Yes. Overly confident underprepared. Yes, exactly. But every Conan bit was great. And I feel like there's been a reticence to the comedy the last 15 or 20 years. Can you even pull this off anymore?

Do people want this? This is a no-win job? And then you'd get like two or three big segments and the rest of the time the host feels like they're kind of gone. And I felt like there was comedy throughout the show last night that was all kind of like appropriately judged and actually funny. It's a simple metric, but I think the difference between a Conan versus a Jimmy Kimmel is like Conan, I think, genuinely cares. Yes. And genuinely is like, you know, he's a sort of Harvard guy. Like, he's like, he has a high mind for art, you know, and that counts for a lot.

But also just throughout the show, because he put in little jokes wherever he could fit them, it means, oh, he's invested. Yes. Like, he wants to be an entertaining, worthwhile show. Whereas, you know, yeah, Kimmel being like yet another monologue joke. about why are we all here, year after year, that got pretty tiresome. Yes. Yes, that's a great way of putting it. It felt like the comedy in the Oscars for a decade plus became lampshading about how

irrelevant the Oscars were. Or how self-congratulatory they were. And I'm like, don't deflate this. I'm watching this. Right, exactly. Like, this is insulting me as someone who is invested in this. I think especially, like, I hate the jokes about like, oh, here's a bunch of movies. We never watched.

Like, ha, ha, ha, ha, I didn't watch this Best Picture nominee. And I'm just like, I don't really want to hear that. The only person who pulled that off was Hugh Jackman in his opening musical number where he was like the reader. Yes. I couldn't. Yeah. That is like the one exception. Yeah. But I mean, something that I appreciated about this year is, you know, of the Conan Bits, like the opening, the weapons referencing opening, which I thought was terrific.

We've been waiting 20 years for them to bring back host runs through the movies. And they literally did it. It was so good. Yes. Run through the movies. I wrote about it on PremiereParty.com. People can read now online. But I was like about that bit

I said it's one of those things where you're like The minute it starts you're like Of course this was the only way to open the show It's perfect Reminded me a little bit of The opening to an MTV Movie Awards Or something complimentary

Yes In the golden bincillor days Yeah yeah Well and it's also Notably that is a bit From the ending of weapons And the award show closed off With a bit from the ending

Of one battle after another This was an award show that assumed you had seen the movies. Like, you would not get the jokes unless you... He ran through the end of Hamnet, too. Yeah, exactly. This was a great point you made in the moment, though, Allison, which is, like, there's both a... I've been very frustrated for the last 15 years or so with the Oscars being self-hating.

Yes. Right? It goes beyond even these jokes we're talking about of, like, calling out. Like, no one cares. We're just here patting each other's backs. But also this assumption of, we are out of touch. There is no longer this overlap between what we deem important. and the popular culture they've gotten further and further apart.

And the Oscars tying themselves into knots of like, how do we get people back in? If we nominate this, do they watch? You know, if we don't nominate this, if we bring on these stars or all of these things, that felt like just let the Oscars be for the people who want to watch it. And I think this year you both organically had a crop of nominees that felt like they stuck more to the culture that people actually saw and were invested in. And also, the Oscars just felt like they chilled out. about all of that.

Yeah. I don't know if part of it is that like the YouTube deal is done, ABC is in its final years. This idea of trying to chase, how do you get it back to 1997 ratings is never going to happen, and it's no longer a long-term thing they have to solve. But it just felt good to be like these are very specific reference points, not from the trailers, but from the endings of these movies that we're assuming both because they actually were widely seen and because who watches the Oscars if they don't actually care, this is a spoiler safe space.

Yes. Yeah. And that was nice. I mean, it felt like we were all in this together. Like, we do all care about this. We know we get the assumption that we were all there. I think that maybe the mistake that the Oscars made for a long time was a reaction to both the Ricky Jervais Golden Gloves years, but also kind of the Tina and Amy Golden Globes years

where, you know, Ricky and his sort of, you know, iconoclastic. I mean, that guy. Did you know what he doesn't believe in God? Richard, you can't say that all night. I'm sorry, sorry. Oh, like, I'm going to be held liable for these slanderous comments. I know. But, you know, obviously he just mocked it, you know, to sort of in this really, you know, kind of acidic way.

And then Amy and Tina made it, you know, they would come out and be like, hello, you entitled brats, you know, whatever. That works for the Globes, which genuinely don't matter. That's the great. But the Oscars, I mean, look, none of this matters, quote unquote. But the Globes are much faker. They are much less real than the Oscars. in terms of how they work. But also, if we, if we treat the Oscars as unreal, then this entire thing falls apart.

Yeah. I mean, the thing is like also, as if you're going to attach any meaning to an award show, the Oscars where it is made up by people in the industry voting on their own work, essentially, like is as close as you can come to something that has some weight or meaning. Totally. And, and I mean, to your point of, like, you know, how real is this and what you astutely say all the time that, like, the Oscars are interesting as a reflect. of how the industry views itself in that moment,

I think beyond that, the Oscars existing are one of the only things that still gets studios to take risks. There is still an ego involved in the industry as much as people become sociopathic, crass, you know, like a mega conglomerate, how do we just make everything for cheaper and faster and worse? Everyone kind of wants to win an Oscar.

Yeah. You know, the worst people in the industry still want to win an Oscar. Many of the worst people in the industry have won multiple Oscars. And it's still this one thing that gets major studios to be like, can we allocate 5%, 10% of our budget a year to making things that might turn out well and that promoting them with a kind of care and delicacy that we don't otherwise apply. Right. But also the idea, it is the thing that makes these extremely bottom line focused businesses do things that are not in the interests of their bottom line. I mean, like, the Oscars obviously do provide a certain boost, but, like, they're not really.

Like, you know, if you were going to zoom in on the stuff that, like, makes reliably, like, you know, the most money is not going to be. No, it probably accrues some value in the cat as a catalog. Yeah. Yeah, you know, sure. But, yeah, no, it is more about a certain sort of pride and ego. I mean, one of the nice things about this year was that, you know, well, depending on how you break down budgets. But, like, one battle after another did make some money. It was seen.

Sinners was obviously an enormous hit, those being the two frontrunners. It meant that there was a sort of populist momentum behind, you know, kind of joining the art, you know, the sort of ego-driven thing. I would say there was a slight downside to that, though, in that I think in the age of social media, that heightened scrutiny made it, like, when the show was over last night, I was like, thank God. Like, I enjoyed watching the show. I was happy with most of the winners, but I think there was such an exhausting kind of world surrounding. Sure. That and such a huge lead-up because the Oscars, you know, we're recording this, it's what, June 20th right now?

Yeah, of course. Yeah. It was just so, it felt so delayed that, like, I almost found myself bitterly wishing for, you know, a few, just a few years previous when no one had seen anything. And we could just be in our little bubble. Yeah. I mean, that's, it's the, um, the champagne problem, literally. But, uh, you and I turned to each other when best actor was about to get announced. And I was like, I'm genuinely nervous.

And we're like, our hands are shaking. There was just this feeling of like what's about to happen and what is going to be the discourse cycle around this. It's genuinely dirt. And they announced Michael B. Jordan, he gets up and we're like, this just feels right. This feels good. Yeah. This is going to age well. This feels good in the moment.

He's nailing the speech. Right. The speech was like very classy but earnest and heartfelt. I showed you a picture of Timothy Shalameh arriving. It was like the Getty photo from the red carpet. And he had the sunglasses on. He had the kind of like dirtbaggy facial hair. He was in a white suit stealing Wagner Mora's like signature move, but it was like a kind of hypebees fit like baggy and he was just standing there like this.

And you immediately were like, he's not going to win. I said he's not winning tonight. And I had the exact same thing last year with a complete unknown. I don't remember what he wore, but just him showing up with a with a Jenner on his arm and just feeling a little too swaggy, you know, a little too like big for his britches. I was like, even though they're not obviously voting at the moment he shows up on the red carpet, this is the exact thing they don't want to happen. That's the energy made manifest. It is. It is.

And it's the reason they're going to keep making him wait. Yeah. And I think, you know, even though when DiCaprio would go to the Oscars, he would play grown up very well. Yeah. But I do think, if I can invoke it again for the second consecutive week, I do think the pussy posse stuff hunted DiCaprio for a long time. where they were like, it's in what you're saying of like, the academy is picking what they want to represent how the world sees the film industry, there is this feeling of like, is the association bad here? Right. I mean, it is like their testament to what they want in a movie star, right?

How they think a movie star should behave right now. And clearly they looked at what Timi did. And for all credit to Timothy Chalemay, who I think is great and Marty Supreme. and who also, through like, sheer force of swaggy will, powered that movie in the box office to, like, heights that I don't think anyone would have expected for, you know, a period piece ping pong saga. But it was not the right energy for the Oscars as you're clear.

Or for a while, probably. I think there's a question of, is he fundamentally unsurious in a way that we can't reward him until he gains that piece, right? Yeah. And obviously, we talk about these things as if the academy is, like, you know, 800 people in robes who all sit around a long table and go, how do we feel about the way Timmy is dressing? It's, you know, there's a sort of collective unconscious, but also there is something about

as much as people think, like, show me, was great. That's the best performance of the year. And then you get your link and you open up for voting and you look at the five. And suddenly there's this sort of like, wait a second. Yeah. You run the mental simulation. You imagine the speeches they're going to give. And sometimes I think you make an impulsive decision based on, like, you.

vibes, right? Yeah. And I think you look at the two other, the two youngest best actor winners of all time. The people that Chalemay would have been in the class with are Richard Dreyfus and Adrian Brody, who are both cases, beloved figures, where they gave it to these guys young and he goes went out of his rule and arguably were already bad like before. Yeah. Right. And I think to me a current state is better than either of those two guys. Sure. He has more humility and what he has, he's doing is more theatrics and self-aware. He's self-aware. But I think there is that concern, especially when last year they brought Brody back.

And then this year, he wanted to do five minutes of self-referential bits about how much he sucked last year. I mean, I left. He's not great at like that delivery, but it's still pretty funny. Yeah. And like not to, I don't know. Who knows what the voter thinking was? But, you know, I had this thought a couple days before the Oscars, against better judgment, watching, deposition video of these two

doge assholes. He's like 20 something guys. I'm impressed you could watch it because I got so angry right away. No, I mean I watched maybe three minutes of each one being deposed. And I was like, you know, that's not exactly Marty Mouser energy but it's not too dissimilar.

And then you compare what Chalamay's character is doing in that movie and he plays it very well but you know, maybe people are sort of passing some sort of moral judgment on the character. And then you can, you know, to what Michael B. Jordan's two characters, you know, one, a tragic figure who becomes kind of a villain, but not really.

And then, you know, just kind of avenging hero who, you know, sacrifices himself, you know, whatever. I just, I have to think that there was something subconscious even in voters' minds that were like, I don't want to give it to this little pipsqueak, piss-and asshole, you know? And even not even just on a Chalame level, but on a character level. Oh, yeah, for sure. People really struggled with Marty. I feel like even understanding that he was clearly not like, the movie was not being like, here's a broad endorsement of everything he's doing.

People really struggled with that character. Yeah. I will say, this is going to guarantee us many more Timothy awards campaigns. It is. It is. Like all in ones. I mean, not this coming year.

I do not think. No. No. Like, June 3 does not seem like it is necessarily going to be a best picture. Well, there was a joke online that he's going to, now he's guaranteed to do an Inuri 2 film. Yeah. I mean that's... Which, like, le. Yeah, I mean, okay, so if I can brag for a second.

Please. My predictions, PremierePriety.com, I got only three wrong for the whole night, which I'm proud of. One of them was best actor. Yeah. And I had to do a little analysis of that when I wrote about the show after the broadcast. And I think that one of them was I was reading sort of tea leaves about like Bafta and Sag a little bit wrong or a lot wrong. The other was, I think there was a subject. unconscious thing where I was like, I just want. I'm not, and predicting and wanting is not the same

thing, but I kind of confused them. I wanted shallamade a win solely so we wouldn't have to have this discourse anymore, that we could finally be done with it, because like, we all chilled out on Leo, and that was in a much younger social media age than we are now. So, but yes, you're right. That didn't happen. I think the ultimate, the end result was the better one. But, yeah, I sort of do dread already what the next, but maybe he learned. Yeah. I mean, we were talking last night. I'm like, is the next move he did the biopic?

He has done like this like really kind of brash, it challenging, like abrasive, totally challenging. Like gay. Like gay. Like gay. I feel like what's next is, um, yeah. Physical transformation, right? Like, uh, prosthetics.

Yeah. Well, I feel like it's either going to be gaining a lot of weight for the role, which is a tried and true narrative, right, for your actorly transformation skills, or he's going to bulk up. He's going to get, like, really good. Some sort of suffering for the art. Yeah, exactly.

You know. Yeah, can I throw out, I think, his three nominated performances, and it is wild that he is 31 now and has three best actor nominations. Yeah. But calling by your name, Complete Unknown,

and Marty Supreme, or I would argue three very different performances, but they're all digging into what his core movie star energy is, which is a weird balance of brashness and incredibly sensitive emotionality, right? Like an almost transparent. With a charm sort of, totally, well, but it's different versions of that and very different films, but they're all digging on. That's what David Fincher likes to say, the quality that's still going to be there in an actor at three o'clock in the morning when you're on take 100, right? David Fincher should also not make people do it take 100.

That's a whole other conversation, but yes. So like David Fincher, just go home. But he says, you know, he cast people for that and that movie stars are often about what's the thing that's still going to be there at 3 o'clock in the morning no matter what because it's not an act. It's their core kind of being that makes them a little interesting. I think to win now, he almost needs to find a performance that's outside of that. Rather than transforming in some demonstrative, you know, external way. He needs to find a performance that has an entirely different energy. And that's when I think they'll also be like, oh, you grew up. Because the defining thing about those three performances is that's the kind of energy we ascribe to overly confident. Yeah. Unaware young men. The thing is like he, like boyishness has been his chief quality for such a long time. And I feel like.

He and I have that in common. Yeah, you both are. You're young, squirtly, lads. That I feel like it's not necessarily something he's going to be able to shed. I feel like he needs to maybe grow out of it. Yeah. You know? And so, like, we might be waiting around.

for a while for that type of role. Possibly. Yeah. Another question is, what does this do for Jordan? I mean, I want to throw out a couple Jordan thoughts here. I remember sitting with you at a bar. It was when we had the first conversation about doing this podcast in person. And you had just come back from Venice and Toronto? No, just Toronto. Just Toronto. And we were sort of like, I was getting your opinions on what you had seen and where you thought the Oscar race was going and you said to me then beginning of september or maybe end of september i feel like the

oscars might circle all the way back around to sinners you would seem one battle it hadn't come out yet we didn't know how it was going to do with the box office but it was like this is beloved but i feel like there could be a kind of everything everywhere all at once horseshoe especially because it's a blockbuster and like these are you know shun fantasy and big picture keeps pointing out that like uh Cooleur's key crew has started to become like Spielberg's key crew. You know, where you're like, Ruth Carter's winning multiple costume awards under him. By Ludwig Gorensen. You know, like, right, these things that keep boosting him.

Yeah. And I feel like in the last month there was the vibe shift of is everything going to swing centers. But at very least, it felt like something major has to swing centers. They can't just give it the best original screenplay that felt kind of like a lot. lock. Yeah. And does that mean that picture's going to swing, that director is going to swing, that Michael B. Jordan's going to swing, that maybe it wins both supporting categories. And I think part of what worked for Michael B. Jordan was there was all this pressure on the idea of Timothy Chalamey as the last movie star and the movie star that Gen Z connects to and the guy who drives

box office and brings legitimacy and he pulled off making Marty Supremma hit. And there was this kind of like, is Michael B. Jordan kind of getting in on the back of the movie? He's the fifth nominee. He's overdue. It was a kind of performance that, I embarrassingly said in some episode of blank check to Sims, like, I question if he's going to get in there. And it was, I mean, we didn't know, you know. My thinking was, in a way, it felt like the kind of yeoman's work performance of a movie star who's also a producer, who's carrying all the weight of the film, but is generously allowing the supporting performers to really get the flashy stuff. And I kind of comped it to Mark Wahlberg in the fighter, snubbed all of the supporting people nominated, supporting wins.

De Niro and the Irishman, Leo and Killers of the Flower Moon, all kind of like nomination morning surprises were an A-list movie star who willed that movie into existence in close kind of tandem with the director was snubbed for just sort of holding the center of the movie. And being taken for granted. Totally. And I think the two things I weren't considering were, one, there's the stunt factor of Michael B. Jordan. playing two characters really subtly that was kind of hiding in plain sight and it felt like in the last six weeks they like hit the gas on that narrative. Hey, have you

noticed like how skillfully he's differentiating these two characters and even like Delray Linda and Wooni Misako going out in interviews and explaining what the process was like suddenly made people go, oh, that performance is better than I realized preventing

people from taking it for granted. The other thing I think supercharged him is you could argue this is the overdue Oscar after three previous Michael B. Jordan, Ryan Coogler, snubs. Yeah. You could argue that he should have been nominated for Fruitvale, Creed, and Black Panther. Yeah. And that he was snubbed all three times and that here we have something that generationally feels similar to like Scorsese and De Niro if none of the performances were nominated before Raging Bull. Yeah.

Right. I mean, I think the tricky thing. with Michael B. Jordan is that he is someone who has been so good working with Brian Coogler and then has made some other things in between that have gone basically unnoticed, you know?

And I think... All the way from like Tom Clancy's without remorse to Just Mercy, a perfectly well-intentioned. I mean, Journal for Jordan. Yeah, exactly. Like these movies where you're like they might as well not...

Like Just Mercy is a great example. Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton. You know, it was about Ryan Stevenson. Right, Brian Stevenson. the Civil Rights Attorney, but it is like just an incredibly boring movie. Like it is like very dutiful. It's like very well-intentioned and just like has very little spark of life. It is a true Oscar-rate movie.

It feels self-consciously Oscar-Bade. Yes. Or even like, I mean, he did that HBO Fahrenheit 451. Rameen Barani directed it. Great director. Yeah. Just an incredibly kind of like lifeless movie. So I feel like the tricky thing with Michael B. Jordan has been like that the movies in which he really just has that you're like, oh, you're

such a movie star have been either with Ryan Cougler or when he's directed himself in Creed 3. Yeah. Which is a really interesting movie, you know. And I feel like the biggest test for the kind of movie star he will be, which I think we are still kind of learning, is his Thomas Crown Affair. Totally. Which he's directing. I mean, the potential for that to just be like a weirdly, you know, like almost in reverse order. I mean, he's already a movie star.

Don't get me wrong. But now he has the Oscar, and then we can kind of go back to be like, oh, right, but you're also fun and sexy. And I want to pay for, like, you know, to see you on a Saturday night, you know, at the theater. Like, I really hope that movie works out because, like, you know, the more recent remake, you know, from the 90s, like, that's a really great movie. And I just, you know, they're big shoes to fill, I guess. We covered that on blank check, I guess, a year or two ago. And it's a real, like, why don't we have this in the ecosystem anymore? Yeah.

There was a movie starring grown-ups that came out in August. And Bill Conti just freaking at every bar of that score. It's just like, yeah. It was a hit. You know, and it does feel like that's a very strategic move on his part to try to identify what his movie stardom is. I think you're right that there was this kind of recognition of the industry has been putting all this pressure on. Can we identify the next generation? And what it wants more than anything is to be like, can we have a Tom Cruise where no matter what?

Everything he makes will cross $100 million domestic. DiCaprio being able to do that, mostly working with prestige directors and sort of more highbrow fare. You know, Julia Roberts, what have you. And I think there's been this pressure for Chalemay to be that because the track record was building towards that. And maybe people looked back and they were like, you know, we've been like hard on Michael B. Jordan when they're like minor missteps. But the missteps are small. Every major movie he's made has been a major hit. There is no bomb that people associate with George.

Correct. Right. You know. Correct. And if you just look at the cougler work and especially the last three, you're like, that's billions of dollars. Yeah. And then you add in that he made like two successful creed sequels where he basically took over as the main credo voice fully on the third one. Yeah.

I think there was this feeling of like this guy has quietly, you know, through quiet little ups and downs, proven himself. Yeah. as if not the definitive star, certainly a definitive star. And also, we don't really know about his personal life. He's not out there grandstanding. When he does press to promote his movies, it just feels like he's a serious, focused, you know, discipline. Like, this is a actor we want to present to the world as, look, here's our new serious leading man. Yeah.

And, I mean, you would certainly also say that, like, black actors are punished more, are not allowed the kind of leeway to act out the way Timothy Chalameh has. well, and then be kind of taken seriously. But I do think that, yeah, like up there on stage, giving that award, like Michael B. Jordan was like, and like kind of explicitly putting himself in this kind of history of these like, you know, like milestone like performers. And yeah, the full list is Podier, Denzel Washington, forced Whitaker, Jamie Fox, Will Smith.

Yeah. And Michael B. Jordan's the six. And Will Smith, that win has been pretty memory hold because of, you know, what had preceded it. But if you remove Forrest Whitaker, who's a phenomenal actor and was, like, fully deserving of that award, but is more of, like, a serious actor, the other five, Michael B. Jordan included are, like, generational, definitional movie stars. Yeah. They are people who, like, change the culture. Hi, this is Ben. We're doing Broach Corner.

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If we want to shift gears a little, I'm curious, what did you guys think about Sean Penn speech? I thought it went a little long. Yeah. Yeah. It is funny that after all we've talked about about what the Academy wants in, like, its best actor. Like, to be like the opposite apparently is true for best supporting actor, Sean Penn showed up for the Golden Globes, smoked in the room, didn't win, did not show up for the other things. No. Then he won.

The ones he won. Bafta. Yes. The SAG Actor Awards. And the Academy Awards. Yes. Zero speeches. And there were some concern in the room last night, like, oh, I heard a rumor he's not well or whatever.

And then people were like, no, he's in Ukraine. Boots on the ground. Boots on the ground. I will say that there is a part of me and maybe this. I think if you don't fucking show up, the next person down the list of ends. Unless you have a real reason for not being there. The ceremony suffered from not having someone give a speech in that slot, especially because you consider the other.

were guys would have probably given a very memorable day they they plan out the the order of awards in they're like okay and then we need the the actor speeches are there they're sort of like the supportings are their tent pulls you know in the sort of first roughly half of the show we need two famous in the first hour we need to get us through the next two hours where we go into craft art lane and then we circle back to exactly a friend of mine was texting last night and he was like I don't know I just feel like something's off and I was like it's because we're we've only had one actor speech so far that's why and not that Sean Penn would have given some rousing, you know, stump speech.

But both of his speeches were memorable, the two previous times he's won. Yeah, yeah. I was, years ago, this is a sort of silly anecdote, but years ago, I was traveling abroad with a friend, and I just had this little sound sort of echoing in my head, and it was just rise again. And I just kept thinking and saying it, I was like, what the hell is that from? And as we were on a train going from somewhere in Italy to somewhere in Italy, I was like, Sean Penn's milk speech when he was talking about Mickey Roark rises again.

And she was like, what is wrong with you? Why is that in your head? But no, I think it's, yeah, he does kind of give like, somewhat like, you know, memorable speeches. They are interesting speeches. And I think it, and that was also milk was what? Over 15 years ago? It was 2008. Yeah.

Yeah. So it would have been interesting to hear from him, especially at a political time. I will say that there is, I've seen some criticism and I maybe have it myself. for it. The show did skirt around political stuff to some extent. I mean, do we want them weighing in on all this? But Sean Penn, he would have done it, you know. I want to get to that in a second. But I will also say, I did appreciate that it was Karen Culkin giving that award. And he did not pretend to be gracious about. Yeah. Anyway, he doesn't want to be here. Yeah. But I mean, like, that felt right to be like, you know, this asshole, like not being here. Yeah. Yeah. And I also made the rhythm of the show feel off because Kieran Culkin was like, I don't know, let's get this. Yeah, yeah. John Pank. You know, it kind of like the whole moment went by so quickly that it almost felt like a hallucination.

Right, right. I was doing the tally at my head sort of toward the end of the night and I was like, wait, but they haven't done supporting actor yet. And it's like, oh, no, they did. It was just about two seconds long. There was like no moment that stuck from that. I mean, I think as a performance, he's kind of undeniable in that film. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's not like an embarrassing win in any way. Yeah. It becomes the sort of like how many Oscars does a person need, especially when that category contains two like historic actors in their 70s who have never been nominated before getting their first nomination and giving like a great performance and a best picture nominee. And then like a Lorty who's another one of those is it the future guys. And Daltoro who'd be winning for the second time, but fully 26 years later. There's more of a distance and you know, he's he's certainly a towering figure.

It felt like any one of those guys would have given an emotional speech. And I saw people speculating that Penn not showing up at the other events after getting called out by Nikki Glazer at the globe's chain smoking and looking like a bag of garbage was strategically like the less people see of me maybe the better chance I have it winning. Yeah. And then it was so funny that's like, no, we're just assuming all this shit on him. He just actually kind of doesn't care. Yeah. Yeah. But so with the politics, I mean, I feel like whatever I'm asked to write about the Oscars like the next day, the take is always just like,

The Oscars were surprisingly apolitical, or the Oscars were very politically, like, the two takes. And what was interesting about this year? Well, as an editor who fired me once said, I want any Hollywood story to be one that everyone in D.C. cares about. Which is like, there's no such thing exists. No, no. Anyway. But, like, it was funny. Like, in the beginning, like, I think in the, in his opening, Conan, like, this might get political.

Tonight might get political. But, like, these Oscars were, the politics came through much more from the president. than they did in the speeches. Like, there were a few. Kind of doing his, like, isn't it funny that Trump's angry at me thing? Yes. Yeah. Or, like, you know, Javier Redem being, like, no war in free Palestine, like, explicitly.

That was the moment that I think people thought was going to be happening across the show. Yes. And I do think he did exactly what you should do, which is just get out there, say the thing you want to say, and then read off the teleprompter. Exactly. Grandfet Chopra looked a little thrown. Yes, yeah. But, you know. She rolled with it better than I would have guessed.

She did. It did not seem like someone from afar who would have necessarily... Excuse me. I'm sorry, Priyanka Chopra Jonas. I apologize. Oh, my God. We're stuck in the past. Yeah. I wanted to be single. But I feel like it actually worked better that way in that I feel like one of the things that having a political speech, like what is challenging about that is that someone wants to also get out the thank yous and I'm so grateful.

And then also here's a political statement. And those don't go together very well. Like, they often feel like you're just trying to serve these two enormously different purposes. So having presenters feel more freed up to make jokes about, well, without ever mentioning Trump by name, you know. Yeah. It did feel like it offered some relief to, in terms of like, the expectations that are on the people giving speeches. Yeah, like the assumption that people had seen in the movies, there was an assumption like, obviously, like, we're not, everything's a fucking mess. And, you know, we can acknowledge it riley or directly, but, like, we're not going to make that the theme of the evening because that's giving him yet another thing or whatever.

I think that's a big part of it. I think it's, there's this feeling of it's a vicious cycle, but it's like if you get up there and say anything at, like, the woke liberal academy awards, is that just going to become fodder for Fox News? Right. And, you know, sitting members of the administration. Or for a red and car to, like, you know, pull ABC's license. Right. It's like, what are you accomplishing? here in a weird way? Does it become not like an echo chamber, but does it just become fuel for them to stoke outrage in their own base? Yeah. I also think it's fascinating to look at like early 2000s during the Bush administration.

There would be these very fiery political speeches and the audience would turn on them. Yeah. Like it was Hollywood was no less liberal, but there was this feeling of you're being unpatriotic. Don't politicize this. And, you know, Michael Moore. is a famous one of those. When he won for Bowling for Columbine, right? He gave basically explicitly political speech and was booed in the room because Iraq had been invaded like that week. What do you say? We're engaged in a fictional war with a fictional president.

Yeah. Was it a year later, two years later that he was nominated for Fahrenheit and he was 9-11 and was greeted as if like, you know, Jesus returning to Jerusalem for Easter, you know, or for Palm Sunday? And it was just, yeah, like, like the, the, the Oscars are not traditionally that polite to that kind of sentiment. No, no. And then, you know, Sims and I were recently talking about in 2001 when Robert Allman was seen as the best director frontrunner of like, it's time. Yeah. Here's the Lifetime Achievement Award for Robert Altman. And then in the run up, he won the Golden Globes.

It was like, here we go. He did a big interview where he criticized the war. and Bush and everyone turned on him. And there was this energy of we can't give him an Oscar who knows what he's going to say on stage. Right. And then I think in the last 10 years, the Oscars got more overtly political. You had these moments of like, you need to take a stance. And there's a little bit of possibly a step back.

Like, what did that accomplish? Right. You know, which isn't saying it's not worth saying something and speaking truth to power. But it does. We just live in a time that is. insane and everything becomes like weaponized and picked apart. Yeah. And I don't think people were like strategically going like, I don't want to get political

because it will hurt my career or we need the Oscars to be inclusive or anything like that. I think there's genuinely a moment after like a kind of 2010s of do we all need to be tweeting all the time, turning everything into a press release. Like what is actually going to move the needle on any of these issues? Yeah. Is it going to be whoever wins best? Right, exactly. Best supporting actress.

Going. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, I also feel like, like, obviously I support anyone who wants to, like, go up there and make a political statement. Use that, use their time to do that. But I feel like it was telling that the first really political speeches came from the documentary winners because there's just a very obvious and easy way for them to speak to how their work, you know, has relevance. I also feel overtly political films. The films about Russia and Putin and about school shootings in America. Yeah.

Yeah. And, you know, I feel like. like, and maybe this is just me being too generous, but like, I, there was just a definite, definite feeling in the room more so this time of being like everyone understands, like, everyone is like on an approximately same page about their feelings about what's happening in the world right now, at least certainly, like, within like, uh, the presidential regime. Um, and that kind of provides, you don't need to keep saying it out loud, you know, uh, I mean, like, when Jimmy Kimmel came up and, like, told his, yeah, his, his jokes, like,

his late-night jokes. He's going to hate this. Right. And it felt kind of like... It feels a little glib and pat. I think there's another thing too, which is like everyone's sitting there going, I don't want to be Adrian Brody. Right?

It's not even like I don't want to speak out for fear of career repercussions. Yeah. It's a thing that's talked about a lot of like, these aren't our elected officials. These are like actors and creatives. And even if they're smart, they're not necessarily like political science majors. And if they get up there and give some like, self-indulgent speech where they completely muddled their own point. And the audience is like, what are they saying?

What does that accomplish? Yeah. Yeah. I feel like it was telling that the bits that felt the sharpest were not aimed at the larger political world, but like the more immediate ways in which corporations have been affecting the industry, right? Like Conan's bits, by the way, they should bring Conan back forever. As often as he wants to continue hosting these. Forever host. Yes, exactly.

Until Mr. B steps in, of course. that, you know, the bits about, like, his job at, like, Ted Sarandos being like, here is a movie theater, you, like, it had enough, yeah, zest on it where I was like, oh, you genuinely dislike, like, what this man has done. He kind of had the right targets. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And the, I mean, I loved the, Casablanca is maybe, like, a little easy as, like, the film to, like, riff on, but, like, that bit was really funny about just repeating. Yeah. And they did it live. Yes. You know, like, it wasn't, like, a pre-tape thing, which I was fun. And the Jane Lynch. Uh, YouTube ads also very good.

Uh, the flashlight that killed bin Laden stuck in my head forever. Um, like those, those are bits were funny, but also like they felt like there was both like legitimate grievance, uh, and a way to make those have zing while also working as jokes. We were also, we were talking about right before we started recording how fascinating it was that it did feel like ultimately, despite, you know, us very confidently deciding Hamnet episode will be about Hamnet being the Oscar villain. That is clearly positioned as the Oscar villain this year, and one of the episodes in this miniseries needs to focus on that phenomenon. Things absolutely came around to one battle being seen as the Oscar villain, which was fascinating. I was arguing that to Sims that, like, the last time that felt like this was 2007 where no country and there will be blood were the presumed frontrunners. And you were like, you have two movies here that are just sort of like adored and held in really high esteem by serious film. people that also had some level of like popular crossover box office success where it's not like

there's a low brown movie and a high brown movie and which one's going to win it's two highbrow movies that feel like in conversation with each other and those two like weird modern american marfa westerns were that and sinners and one battle very much feeling conversation well they were fighting but then one of them said marfa and they said how do you know that name i filmed there nice at a thousand comedy points. But yeah, it felt like a similar kind of thing. And I think in the last month, there was a lot of like, what are the politics of one battle?

And what is the statement if we give this the award? And in his first of three speeches, I feel like PTA has summed up succinctly, whether or not you like it, what that movie is about, which is the feeling of like, did we fuck this up? Yeah. Have we fucked this up for the next generation? Yeah. Is it done or is the next generation the one that's going to fix this?

You know, have we put the burden on them or are they the first generation that's ready to sort of solve things? And he mentioned his children, which like everyone, including myself, had read into that movie and put it in reviews or read up to the movie. And I, and I don't always want, you know, PTA can be kind of an elusive storyteller and you don't always know what he's getting at in an intriguing way. It's, you know, what keeps people coming back to his movies. But like, I appreciated that given, you know, the political tenor of the evening and what was happening outside the evening and all that, I appreciate that he was like, yeah, I'm going to be. give you a little bit of an answer to the question. I'm going to give you the thesis. Without being self-important about it or, you know, self-aggrandizing about it, I'm going to humanize it because I genuinely believe that's why he made the movie. A hundred percent. Yes. No, it's coming from a

really real place of like, in their own ways, have the DiCaprio character and the pen character fucked up things equally. One of them was doing it maliciously and one of them was doing it kind of fearfully. And, you know, at the end of the ceremony, he calls out at best picture, Chase Infinity, the heart of the movie. He gave her kind of the ultimate credit. My American girl. Has now replaced Linda Cardellini as the heart of Green Book. Jesus Christ. She is the new heart of. Well, I want to see Chase Infinity's husband fold a pizza and half. Well, that's all I'm saying. I know. I mean, like that, a few images more iconic, really, in this celebration of cinema that is the Oscars. Green Book 2, Just King Culkin. Yeah.

Can't wait. Yeah. Griffin, Allison. Yeah. Reveal your ballots. How do you do? I can't remember how many missed. Definitely a lot more than Richard did.

I did not do as well as Richard. I went for Tiana for Best Supporting Actress. Found Amy Madigan's speech delightful. Love that, you know, weapons got its one win. But, yeah, I don't know. I love Tiana. I think Tiana's amazing. I love her during the ceremony.

like when PTA won just like, you know, giving him like the... She was also standing one or directly, one person away from her directly next to DeCaprio who had just lost best actor, like vocally cheering on Jordan on stage. And I was like, great, good. Yeah, yeah. She was, you know, I used to, when I did the 20 years ago recaps, I would, I became obsessed with how good Sharon Stone was at being at the Oscars. Just the most enthusiastic clapper, a great presenter who really did. took it seriously. She would do fun fashion things. And I'm like, Tiana Taylor, if you want to come back to these Oscars every year, because you're a great, she's a great audience member.

Yeah. Yeah. I did call out, speaking of political speeches, I did call out when Amy Madigan won. If she had real backbone, her and Ed Harris would stay in there, see, refusing it flat for her own wins. Yeah. Just arms crossed. I do wonder, how did you did okay in your balance? I think I missed five or six. I swung Sinners for Best Picture at the last second on a vibe. I went Stellan. I thought they were going to give him the lifetime achievement award. I got the other three acting categories.

I got director, both screenplays. I think I missed animated short. I missed casting, which was sort of... Well, I wanted to bring that up. One of the three that I missed... I missed four in the room because I switched to F1 winning editing

for some reason, but in my official predictions... The ones accounted. Anyway, but I, you know, I think a lot of predictors, prognosticators, gold derbyites, got casting wrong.

And I think part of that is that Cynters has this amazing ensemble that probably had to be found more than like, you know, PTA making a few phone calls or or Safdi making a few phone calls. It didn't win and one battle did and then it won Best Picture

and the question is like, okay, with this new category for the time being is it just like, I don't know, whatever I'm voting for Best Picture wins best casting. I said this in the room. I wondered if, because when that one, it felt like, oh, one battle has best picture locked. Yeah. In the way it kind of used to for like editing or something. Yeah. Right. There's always been this

Oscar metric that editing and best picture line up more than any two other categories. Yeah. Even director sometimes, they'll swing a different way to spread the love. But editing rarely swings to like an editing focus movie that doesn't happen to be the best picture frontrunner. And in the way that very often, not always, the SAG ensemble award feels like a good, predictor of best picture because it represents the acting branch, which is far and away, the biggest branch in the academy, is that going to be a one-to-one? It might be a thing where it takes five to 10 years before we understand how the casting category works, because, and they called this out in the presentation, which I thought was really good. They had an actor from each of the five

nominated films talk about the casting director specifically, but they said it's like invisible architecture for these movies. And what is casting, right? In which cases are you like, Their job was negotiating 10 difficult contracts, in which cases you had to find one unknown person discover a key star, in which cases is it the amount of cast? Is it the strength and the cohesion of the ensemble? Is it like, you know, Marty Supreme is like five people you know and then like 50 speaking roles that are mostly streetcasting? Well, that's the thing is like when you watch Gwyneth Paltrow on stage talking, you know, at Jennifer Vendetti, you're like, okay, but like. Like, did Jennifer Vendetti reach out to Gwynethel? I'm assuming, like, sadly did, you know?

Like that movie has like three kind of real actors. Yeah, yeah. And then everyone else is someone you know for something else, but not really acting first and foremost. Or people they literally, like, found in a park muttering to themselves. I mean, I think it just raises that question of like, yeah, what are we talking about when we're talking about casting? And I do feel like one battle had this thing that like the search for, yes, this, the heart of the movie that was just such an irresistible story. So, like, even if, I think, like, my vote, if I had, like, you know, would probably go to The Secret Agent, which is, like, a movie that is, like, filled with these incredible faces. But, yeah, like, it's so hard to be like.

You would have voted for the only man. Yep, exactly. But it is the question. I hate women. It is the question of, like, right, is this award going to represent best discovery? Is it going to represent best cast? Or is it going to represent some understanding of what made the casting director's job difficult? Yeah.

Right. And I think one battle might have. just the best mix of all three, it's got a really, really strong core ensemble of known actors. It has this one big, fresh face discovery who's probably going to be a movie star for decades to come. And it also has a lot of people you've never seen before giving like five-line performances who are like, who is this interrogator? Turns out he's a real former interrogator, you know? Both of the nurses, you know, these people who like really pop in these small moments, it might just be the one that's checking all three boxes at once. Or it might just be that this category always lines up for best picture.

Yeah. We'll have to see that we only have one thing. I mean, you know, maybe Paul Thomas Anderson called Jim Downey, but maybe the casting director called Tony Goldwyn, you know, or whatever. Right, right. Yeah. But I think those were the ones I missed plus documentary I predicted perfect neighbor instead of Putin. Yeah. Going back to the Amy Madigan win, I think that, you know, I mean, Sam Sanders would disagree, but you could say that centers is a horror movie. if that's the case, two out of the four best acting winners were from horror films. And that is, you know, there have

been horror winners in the past, but it's rare. And I do think that there's something being said perhaps about the industry that like these two great performances but in very successful financial, you know, films in the genre space, I turned to you, I think, last night

when we were watching it and I asked if like, does Madigan winning sort of blow the door open? That unfortunately Tony Colette couldn't, you know, et cetera. It was a fascinating moment because I feel like you're you're less hot on weapons and that performance, but she wins and you turn to me and you're kind of smiling and you're like, that is kind of cool. Like you had this moment of this does feel big beyond just her being an actress who's

overdue, right? Like, that's cool that someone won best supporting actress for playing a witch. Yeah. In a summer, you know, plays a vampire. It's part of his, you know, multi-class. I mean, a vampire, like, coming in in an incredible period sweater. Like, there's, like, a kind of silliness to that that is, like, great that it can be part of it. A vampire and a witch winning two of the poor acting categories does feel representative of something.

I think you're right. I think it's part of a lot of... I think it's part of a larger kind of, like, has the idea of elevated horror now settled into something more sustainable, right? But then, is weapons elevated horror? No, I think now we've come back around to these movies don't have to dress them up in a certain sense of self-seriousness. They can be personal and they can be about something. But they can also exist as genre entertainment, be well made, but not have to be like we're not like these other horror films. Because both of those movies engage in things that are very traditional, gory, silly, over-the-top, static.

They're not kind of these very earnest. Osteers, right? Yeah, they're not 824. Yeah, but I will say, like, the Amy Madigan win does very much rhyme with Ruth Gordon winning for a Rosemary's baby, you know. So, like, there is precedent there as well. But also, that's so many decades ago. I know, no, it is. You can't even point to another performance in between that's close.

Yeah. I saw some stat that in supporting actress, Madigan is the first lone nominee winner. Like, she's the only nominee from her film since Vicki Christina Barcelona, which was practically 20 years ago. Yeah. I, that's the trend. I mean, horror, yes, would be great, but, like, in general, I would love it if, like, you know, in April or June or even November, if any of us saw some great supporting or lead, even performance. And we're like, wow, that would be so cool if that got awards attention. Yeah. And years past, you know, for decades, it'd be like, but that'll never happen. But now it's like, I don't know. For us was another one where you're just, like, this felt really close and how could they ignore this? Obviously, Daniel Kaluya got in for Get Out, but that's him playing the straight man in a horror movie. Right. It's an unbelievable performance.

But, like, the person playing the creature, the big bad, you know? I mean, I will say the real test of this will be if we can get any serious traction for Ray Fines for 28 years later, Bone Temple. He is incredible. He's incredible that I think it needed to make more money. Yes. I'm still going to hold out for it. I mean, New York Film Critics Circle, we could always, you know. We could make the case.

But, I mean, you should have been nominated this year for supporting actor. And next year for Lee. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. I do like that, yeah, like something like sinners or something like one battle, they do work as genre films. Yeah. You know, like there is no question that they work as entertainment.

And I think the big thing is they're not embarrassed to be genre films. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the only really traditional, you know, in some sense, Oscar win of the major categories was Jesse Buckley for Hamnet, which, you know, it's funny that, you know, we, we, we, we. did sort of couch our academic conversation weeks ago at this point as an Oscar-villan narrative. And now it's like, oh, why were we ever worried about that? Like, it was just going to win that. And yes, it's an old-fashioned kind of movie and an old-fashioned kind of win. But, like, that's fine because it fit into the mix, the sort of collage of this year way better than it initially seemed like it was going to. And that's not to say that it didn't deserve to win other things. But, like, you know, I think that all told, Hamnet winning, best actress kind of passed by with

no friction, which is not what people thought a few months ago. It felt like a fate of complete that it's like, Buckley's winning and otherwise the movie is like happy to be there. And so any sort of animosity towards Hamlet felt like it mostly dissipated. Right, right.

I also, I think it was 2005 or 2006 is the year where Helen Mirren and Forrest Whitaker win the two lead categories. And that was the last time, in my opinion, that like, movie screen at the earliest festivals in the fall, and immediately upon sight, people are like, they're winning. And then they just won uncontested.

They won every precursor. It was like a done deal. And in those cases, it was like, yeah, Palin Mare and Forest Whitaker should have Oscars. No one's angry about this. It's fine. But there was a real lack of drama throughout that whole season. This year, at least the other three categories felt so up in the air that the Buckley thing didn't feel as boring. Yeah.

And she's, you know, in a certain way, obviously, it's why give it to her now when they know they're going to have to give it to her for the bride as well next year? They're sort of in a Tom Hanks situation of like, do you really want the same person winning two years in a row? That's the only criticism I would throw out. Well, no, but they'll give her, she is a producer on the bride. So when Best Picture, they'll give her that. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, no, you're right.

That is a tricky thing. Right, because she'll win lead actress, supporting actress for the other voice she does. For playing Mary Shelley, of course. I think they're just going to have a special bride Oscars. I think it's all the acting. Like, I think that here comes the motherfucking Oscars. I mean, actually, actually, the bride probably, they could, they could run in every category. Sure.

In that movie, it's very good. I do like that mental exercise sometimes. What if the qualifying period for next year's Oscars and tomorrow? Does the bride get into like 10 categories by default? And then you have a- winning a lot of Golden Globes, certainly. You have a second year of people on the, Oscar stage holding trophies thanking Frankenstein.

Hey, this is Ben Hosley fashion correspondent for Critical Darlings. I've decided to give myself that title. So we have Chalemay and Jevenche wearing his big boy Bar Mitzviluk. Looking like, you know, a grown boy. you know Tiana and Chanel and then Kidman also in Chanel

and Demi and Gucci all rocking feathers I thought they all looked really great I was hoping though when Demi presented that she would have done a bit where she spit out a feather Chase Infinity looks incredible and Louis

Louis truly just like a lavender dream. She's so young and just like really, I'm so excited for her. I think she really looked great on the red carpet. I haven't done this before. This is funny.

I'm like, I'm like really channeling Joan right now. Michael B. Jordan. I mean, he always wears like stylized, very like modern kind of cut sort of suits but to me the accessory other than the brooch chain wallet Pedro Sands mustache kind of crazy just to see his face like that that's fucked up wearing a brooch and I'm taking this joke from richard but it's worth repeating wearing an Iwa looking brooch giant like dandelion lion like pedal brooch.

So yeah, had to shout that out. Conan all night, he was wearing color, which again, men are always just so boring. And I, it really inspired where I want to

get my own velvet sports jacket. Because he was wearing like a, like a kind of midnight blue, you know, full velvet suit. and it looks so good. And then I want to end on Sigourney. Unfortunately, the dress, not so great.

To me, it kind of looked like the optical illusion dress, the one famously where people couldn't tell if it was gold or blue. I saw it as gold, but I'll leave it to the listeners out there to make their own decision. But yeah, that's my fashion. corner. Thanks, Ben. Yeah, of course. David. Yes. Start to think about your finances. It's true, but look, paying off debt, building an emergency fund, saving for something major, like buying a home or college or, you know, retirement, stuff like that. Plans to do all three of those in 26. If you want a tool that helps you plan, project, and proactively achieve those kinds of goals,

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Like that made it so that, I mean, I do love a montage as well. Yeah. But I feel like it does stop the thing dead. Like the momentum is dead. And so instead to be like, we're going to get the bridesmaids, except for Wendy McLevin, Wendy McClendon Covey, who iconically posted on Instagram during the ceremony, like, the reason I'm not there is because I got a necklift because, quote, I'm tired of looking like a melting candle. So I had to skip the Academy Awards.

No drama. Everything is fine. So you read that out. didn't hear the beginning where you said the name. So I thought you were saying that was Sean Penn's explanation for why he had missed the other. He's fine looking like a melting. Yeah. Melty is his thing.

I always argue he looks more like a boot left out in the rain. Yeah. I mean, I agree that I think they, those sort of like the bridesmaid thing was really fun. Yeah. I thought that doubling up presenters doing two categories, I think, helped keep the show moving along. Especially Downey Jr. and Evans, who were really just kind of charming, funny. The chemistry between those guys really just made me long

for Avengers what's it called joke about it on Twitter but like It is what it's called actually Avengers what's called I mean maybe it doesn't matter because just RDJ was under rehearsed or whatever but like

man 10 years ago when everyone was eating out of the palm of their hands like that would have gone over so well and this time it was like who what? Oh right you guys like the the superhero stuff like

it was just very interesting It feels like a mirroring of the response to the first Avengers Doom day trailer revealing that Chris Evans was back and they clearly thought that was the ultimate mic drop. And instead, the public kind of responded by like, has he not been in these? He was gone from them? You know, it's the same thing where they're coming in like victory lap.

Like, aren't you thrilled? We're back together again. We're like, the culture has moved on. And then add to the fact that like Robert Tendon Jr. in the second bit made a magic mic joke. And it was like, what year do you think it is, my friend? And then they like throw to Chang Tatum in the audience and he nails his. part. Yeah. He gets like four successful laugh lines. Yeah, he saved the whole thing. He saved the thing. That said, it is something to watch, you know, either a bit that doesn't work like that or a bit that does, like the bridesmaids, and they go on for some length and then have literally the mic dropping and the lights going off when someone's in the middle of their acceptance speech. Yeah. Like I did think there were some pretty rude cutoffs. Like five or six times. That also led to awkward television where people didn't know where to cut. Yeah. Yeah. They cut to Conan on the. side and like laughing just like,

like, yeah. Just be like, throwback to them. And then like the, the one for the golden win was just the most egregious where they just, she spoke and then he was like, and they just like, turn the lights off on him and pull the camera back and were just like absolutely no way. Like there's just not. And they didn't budge.

They cut to a wide shot for 20 seconds as they turn the lights off for him. And I'm like right now you're showing a silence from the back of the room. Right. Instead of him he could be finishing his speech. He wrote one of the things that's saving movies. Yeah. This is golden winning best. song.

Yes. Like, this is why, like, 10-year-olds are tuning into the ceremony. And he's from Korea. Yeah. Yeah. That felt ugly. And I guess one sort of hope for the YouTube Oscars in 2029, right, is that there wouldn't be run. There won't be run times, you know, like, just let it go.

You know, there are downsides to that as well. But, but yes. You don't want to be watching for five hours? Can we talk about in Memorial briefly? Because I think this also was a big reason there were less montages in other areas. Is everyone just kind of. kind of new going into this. How are they even going to tackle it?

Yeah. Because it's been such a like red wedding 12 months of historic people that kept piling up. Yeah. I thought they handled this really well. Yeah. I thought it was smart to kind of like do a few spinouts into like spotlight sections. To start with the Rob Reiner thing with Billy Crystal. They're so emotional.

Love that they skipped north. And then stopped at America. And stopped. Yeah. And they were like, and that was it. Yep. That is exactly why we have always said we can't cover. for him on Blake check.

Because it gets really bad. Yeah. And after he, you know, after he, like, tragically died, a lot of our listeners

were like, but you have to do him now. Right. And I'm like, it would be so rude to be like, and after 1997, we ignore. Just do it all the way up

to his first presidential administration. Right. With Michael Douglas. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's tough when you're like, now we have to do LBJ

starring Woody Harrelson, you know, like, but yeah. And you're like, no, He did like that stone cold round of masterpieces, yeah. Which was important to call out.

Yeah. I thought Crystal's speech was like beautiful. It was. And then having the cast members, yeah. It was lovely. And then you go in. I am sick of having Daphneesuniga's presence at the Oscars every year, year after year. Daphne's always there.

I mean, it's Courtney Thorne Smith sometimes. Totally. But basically, the Melrose place cast just needs to get away from the Oscars. It's crazy. I mean, it feels like sometimes Daphnees Zunegger gets thanked more than God at the office. With these heathens. That's a kind of nation we live in there. But that was nice.

I think Rachel McAdams was lovely. And she spoke to, you know, about, you know, Catherine O'Hara, her fellow Canadian, Diane, Ladd. And Keaton, because she was in morning glory with her. And Family Stone. And Family Stone, of course, right. Yeah. I thought that was nice. And then I guess we were talking while we were watching.

We were like, okay, so who do they get for Redford? But then it seemed like, oh, Redford's just in the montage. She's just the last person in the final segment of the montage. And then Babs came out. Well, actually, Richard, she hates it when you call her that. I don't know if you caught. It was a subtle thread. She gave me permission, I thought.

In her time. She gave only you permission in the letter. Oh, what a legend. I love that she comes on. She tells this, yes, lengthy story about the, and she's like, fine, I will allow you, Robert Redford to call me Babbs. And then she started singing. She started singing in a way that was like, she was at a lectern with a mic, but then she had a hand mic, and it was like, stage management is better. I'm sure she didn't really either show up for rehearsal or, you know, whatever.

It also felt like there had been rumors. They're going to have her sing memories as part of the in-memorium. And it felt like the way it manifested on the final ceremony felt like there was a lot of back and forth of like, I don't know if I want to do it. Maybe I want to sing a little bit. Maybe I just want to call. Yeah. Real, I'll see how I feel energy. It ended up, in a way I liked, feeling like a wedding toast. Of like, she's kind of going on and on and emotional. And then she grabs the mic and you're like, is she about to sing? Yeah. Yeah. If you start singing, you're like, is she going to sing the whole thing? Is she going to walk over to the band? And then it just kind of wrapped up.

But I thought it was, it was great. And it was in a show that had a lot of modernity to it and a very contemporary sense of comedy and all that. And pacing even. And just to have this old-fashioned kind of schmaltzy, but meaningful sort of Oscar moment, I think it was just the right amount of that in the show. Yeah. Well, I mean, especially you're like watching her, I feel like you're just acutely aware of this thing that has been causing panic in the industry for a long time, which is like you have this class of like larger than life celebrities and movie stars and filmmakers in her case as well, right? historic who are all dying, you know, or older. And there is this real question of like, we will never have that back, you know? Right. Like, you may have a Timothy Shalame, but like, he is not going to be Robert Redford.

He's not going to engender that same. Yeah. Well, I was asking you guys, like, last night. So when, and I'm not putting this out in the universe, but it will happen. Yeah. 400 years from now. when Lustreep goes, they're just going to have to do

a fucking 40-minute segment at the officers, right? Like, the most nominated actor in history, no one will ever beat that record, I don't think. I think that record is permanent. Like, that's, like, what are they gonna do?

But then you think about all the other people. What happens when Tom Hanks died? What happens when, you know, and it's just... We started talking... He died in an accident. Yeah. In space.

We started talking about this last night and you said, actually, no, we have to keep this for... And the point I started to make was, I think we're in a somewhat unique time where our octogenarians are still present. Yeah. They are still active. They feel they are deceptively older than they feel. You know, some of that's advancements in cosmetic work.

Some of that is just people used to retire, you know? And it's like, Carrie Grant didn't make a movie for the last, like, two decades of his life. Greta Garbo, it was like four decades, you know? Yeah. A lot of these people would retreat or they would just do one movie. They all, like, moved to Paris or like Topanga or something. They felt like elder statesmen who would mostly come out at the Oscars and remind you they were still alive. And when they died, it was sort of sad, but it was, of course, they've existed as.

Right. You'd be prepared for it. They feel like former presidents, right? And there is a class of people who are all, like, in their 80s, and a lot of them have started going. But, like, De Niro and Pacino and. Dustin Hoffman. And Nicholson. And we've lost Hackman and Deval and Diane Keaton and all these people recently who still feel very present to us, who still feel modern and active, even though they are historic.

They're not stuck in the past, which I think is going to make it feel all the more shocking when they go. And we're just living through a time now where we have people who tragically are gone far too soon. And people where we almost aren't conscious of the fact that they are now entering or close to entering their own. ninth decade. I mean, yeah, it's something that I sort of briefly touched on when I wrote up the show is that like, we just have to steal ourselves that these in memoriam bits are going to

be hard ones for the next, you know, 15 years. Like it's going to be every year is not going to, maybe not as big as this one fell because it just happened to be an extinction level event. But like it's going to be, it's going to be rough. And like you said, Alison, like, there's not a ton of iconography coming up behind them. Yeah, not on the same way.

We're just not going to have that kind of relationship with... Just doesn't exist. Yeah, it's just different. Can we, before we bring on our special guest, I wanted to speed run a few topics. The two live musical performances, how did we feel about them? I thought they were both excellent. I mean, I always think it's a little rude when they don't let the other nominees perform, especially, you know... You didn't want to hear the aria from...

It would have been good TV, even if... If no one has heard of this movie. Well, I was joking that Angelina and Julie should have just come out of stage to do it. Like, you said you sang live for Maria, so let's prove it. I mean, train dreams would have, it would have been a bit like when poor Elliot Smith got sort of like pushed out on stage to perform the Goodwill hunting song. And he was like, what am I doing at the Oscars? But, like, you know, like, any man always talks about like how getting to perform at the Oscars that you're basically made her career. Yeah.

You know, she's still touring off of that. Obviously, she had an illustrious. career before that point, but there was a level of mainstream exposure that an Oscar nomination gives a musician that is unique. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I appreciated the showmanship of these two, where they basically staged both the numbers.

I lied to you from Sinners and Golden, like a bit like they were in the movie, but also to be like, this is going to be, these are here because it makes for a good show. Yeah. It had NBC live musical event energy in a good way. Yeah. Where you wanted to see how are they going to pull this off? Yeah. And I love the audience with the light.

for Golden. Like, that seemed like right at Paltrow, like. Yes. Yeah. That was, yeah, that was fun. Yeah. How about the orchestra playing the scores live for the nominees? Because I loved that. I mean, I love that. I sometimes do wish they would give a little more time to that. Like, like, the 20 years ago that

I recapped, Isaac Perlman plays selections from each nominated score. And I was like, well, they're really giving the scores there do. It maybe does eat up a lot of time. But yes, some sort of nod like that is, I think, kind of key. Yeah. I mean, just like having the orchestra. I like, I mean, that kind of

like showmanship. And involving the orchestra like Conan did with like the Marty Supreme joke and, you know, the bum drum. Yeah. The tie for Best Life Action short. Very rare occurrence. Seventh total? Yeah. How do we feel about the way it was announced? I did. We, I think we all felt sort of pity for the other four because he's like, we're going to call one winner and they're going to go up to the stage and then the other four were like oh wait did I win suddenly I have a one and four chance but also if they don't call my name I know I didn't even come in second place right I can't even comfort myself with that um it was good showmanship it made for an exciting tv moment yeah yeah was a good person to be stuck in that situation because he was able to throw out like

five good off the cuff jokes about it yeah no it I think it was and it was exciting um and you know, a funny sort of bit of cosmic irony that the shorts took really long, you know, I don't know. I, I, we were talking like, so the most famous probably tie was Barbara Streisand and Catherine Hepburn, Barbara Streisand won for Funny Girl, right? Yeah. And luckily, Catherine Hepburn never went to the Oscars.

Yeah, she was hanging. Never did. She used to have Sean Penn over to the House of Genica and they'd smoke cigarettes and talk about whatever. No, but so, so Streisand got to give a speech as if she was the sole winner. But when you have both winning parties there, it gets a little hairy, I guess. I appreciated Kumales just to, like, don't panic.

Like, this is what we're going to do. He really, you know, hopes this through it. Yeah, I wonder if they had told him beforehand. Yeah, I kind of hope so. Bill Pullman and Lewis Pullman. What was up with that? I mean, he's, Lewis Pullman's really hot. I don't know.

I just felt like they're, you'd be like, their timing just felt so off throughout that. And you're like, do you guys just not talk that much? It's like, why? It's like two dry guys. Yeah. In their sensibility and their humor who maybe need a more boisterous person to play off of. I also think it's just like the third rail of the NEPO conversation where almost any time a NEPO tries to address it head on, it just makes everyone more uncomfortable. Yeah.

It's a little bit of like a Kobayashi-Maru-No win discussion. Yeah. And also, Lewis Pullman is not famous enough. I think if Anne Lee had been like a player at the Oscars, and he's like, oh, he's one of our characters this year. Right. Louis Pullman, it would have worked better, and maybe they had even, like, booked him before. Like, I don't know. Is there some percentage of audience members who are only realizing for the first time when they come out on stage?

Oh, right. Those guys do have the same face? I saw several posts on social media to that effect. Right. Like, oh, I never put that together. And it's like, okay. So the joke doesn't work if people are learning that information for the first time. Lewis Pullman's a very familiar face at this point, but maybe not a household name by name. And Bill Pullman is infamously, the guy who was all.

always confused with Bill Paxton, where even though he is a historic that guy, there is a little bit of, oh, wait, they're both named Pullman thing. Yeah. Yeah. And Bill Pullman, I mean, he has a new movie that was at Berlin. I saw it at Berlin. He's wonderful. Yeah. It's like one of his best performances. Yeah. But it's been a little while since he's just, he's been floating around in public awareness. He's trying to get gin up support for the Casper sequel. Oh my gosh. Legacy sequel. Yeah. Who had better speech laughter? Jesse Buckley with the giggles Or Amy Madigan with the cackles? Oh, got to go cackles. Yeah. Cackles. Yeah.

Was Timothy Chalomey ragged on enough about the ballet comments? I think just the right amount? Just the right amount? Yeah. Yeah. I agree. He had this... Yeah, I mean, look,

we talked about it last week. His sentiment, I don't disagree with. He just phrased it badly. But he did have to sit there. And like it was a requirement of the evening that he get a little bit direct, you know, fire for that. And yeah, I think it was just the right amount. Yeah. And finally, did anyone else think about when Paul Thomas Anderson admitted that there was a pleasure to having the Oscar in his hand?

Did anyone else think about Fiona Apple's story about how he threw a chair across the room when they were watching the 1998 awards together because he lost to Matt Damon and Ben Affleck for a screenplay for Goodwill Hunting? I did think about his Oscars had passed, you know, like the famous, you know, Fiona Apple sort of making fun of the winner, whatever, well, you know, they're sulking in the audience. But I also think that in a way, it's nice to think about that past because, like, I think that he's shown a lot of, that he's matured as a filmmaker and a person. And it's like, yeah, you can be the brash young thing. And then, you know, time and experience changes you. It comes full circle back to the Chalemay conversation, too, which is just like. Like, this guy was a prodigious talent. And the Oscars were like, you're so convinced you're a genius.

We don't want to give you that validation yet. And it felt like... We're already dealing with enough fucking Quentin Tarantino, dude. Just sit. Just wait, okay? Right. Right. Yeah.

It felt like he had settled into the exact right place. Yeah. In terms of his own, I don't know, relationship with himself and his work. I also, I appreciate the candor of it without it being a like, finally it's about time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think clearly everyone in that room wants to win. That's a thing.

Yeah. You know, people come up. Except for Emma Stone. Except for Emma Stone, who was clearly like, please. I'm actually kind of surprised she went in a way. Yeah. Like, I'm sure she was just there to, like, support the film. But it was kind of like, just don't.

Just don't. Yeah. No, but I think a lot of people get up on stage and go, oh, my God, I never believe this could possibly happen. And it's like, you don't really go into any film-related line of work without at one point going like, What if I want to ask for someday? Yeah, thinking about what your speech would be. I don't think, I don't think, I don't think, I don't think,

has thought about it eight trillion times. I don't think that Kate Hudson would bring her husband Grogo to the event if she didn't think there was a chance she would. Right. What a couple, though. Yeah. A beautiful couple.

I just don't want it to think about that there was some puppeteer hiding under a fake auditorium seat. They'd be like, what am I doing? Like, this is, yeah. David, it's time to take a break from your school or work routine, but stay consistent. That's the tough balance while staying consistent

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I think so. We're going to do a very special segment, a kind of award segment of its own, an award ceremony of its own. Yeah. The great Rebecca Alter from Vulture. and Popcorn Critic Extraordinaire has cultivated for us a look at the best, the Academy Award nominees of 2026

represented in popcorn buckets. Amazing. We are honored to have Rebecca Alter here, Popcorn Bucket Correspondent extraordinaire, to run us through your popcorn bucket. Sorry, I can't believe I forgot that. To run us through the rarefied Popcorn Bucket Award Season offerings.

Thank you so much. This is the only aspect of the Oscars I feel qualified to comment on at all. And something exciting about this year is this is probably the first year where something like half the nominees for Best Picture had a corresponding promotional popcorn. Because last year was just brutalist, right? Right, of course. And it was the model. Yeah. If we had really made that, it would have been the best collector's item of all time.

It is really fun in a sort of Oscars party menu way to imagine what the bucket would be for each thing. Sentimental value is like the father's head morphing into the daughters. Hamlet. Oh, yeah. Hamlet is a child's body. But if it's like the dead hawk and like that kind of like that. Right. No, it's the skull that Hamlet holds.

Oh, duh. Well, speaking of skull, we could start with that, which is, One that was really difficult to acquire, like, on the black market, secondhand market, eBay, which was Netflix's Frankenstein bucket. Oh, because barely a theatrical, I mean, it did have some theatrical play. Apparently did fairly well, like, given the Netflix of it all. Now, apparently when it was screening at the Egyptian, they gave the buckets out to people for free for the opening weekends. Here at the Paris in New York, they did no such thing. They put it up on their website.

It sold out really quickly. and eBay, it was going for hundreds of dollars, and also for a while, the internet was riddled with 3D printed fakes. People were ordering buckets and subpar quality was showing up. Wait, will you talk us through what this looks like? So it is sort of a pretty generic-looking skull. I like the detail on the eyeballs, which are sort of rolled into the back of the head. You don't normally see a skull with eyeballs. Yeah, I have some questions about that, but yeah.

And, of course, the most delightful thing. thing about this is the popcorn coming out of the head looks like brains. That is good. Yeah. Yeah. Now, it is not a representation of Frankenstein's monster. It is seemingly just like a prop recreation of another experiment Victor Frankenstein has in his lap, which feels like a slightly weird choice. I think we'd all love to eat out of a lordy's skull.

Absolutely. Some of us have. Or even, do you know what, like that one guy that he has opened with the spine exposed on the table, like that would have, I would have loved to have either. out of that exposed by area. Oh, that would be great out of a 10. Yeah, yeah. This is actually the one out of the 10 best picture nominees I haven't seen, so I'm just taking everyone's word at it.

There's a ship. There's a ship. And if you went to the Egyptian and you asked, if you knew to ask for it, you could eat popcorn out of Christoph Balls. Like, he would just be there. He was there. He had to hang out. Yeah.

Essentially feed you popcorn. Yes. Yeah. You just sort of fit him in your lap. Yeah. Next best picture I'll bring up is, of course, the Marty Supreme Bucket, which, how do viral moment, A-24 on the back, dream big on the front. It is the orange ping pong ball, which played a big role in the marketing.

It doesn't hold a ton of popcorn. I got to say also, it has to be the ball. The hole is a little small. I feel like getting your hand in there would be a little bit difficult in the dark. I don't know. Would anyone like some popcorn from a screening of the secret agent 24 hours ago? Oh, wow. You're like, oh, wow, it's fresh.

I'm okay. Thank you. I feel like you talk a lot about in your bucket reviews the sort of accessibility, right? Literally, like, how easy is it to get popcorn in here and get popcorn out of here with your hand? This does feel, despite the opening being narrow, it's a clean, unobstructed. Your hand did go in clean. It did go. It's a clean ham.

Also, I mean, like, I appreciate that you can close it and then travel with the popcorn. Yes. Like, that is a nice feature. And I love that it's just a sphere. I think this is very elegant. And it speaks to the sort of the bestow. The round themes of the movie. The round themes, the spherical themes.

This is the ovum from the opening credits. Nice. So this is the really like elegant bespoke. You know, this is the, yeah. The tasteful one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is like the hype beast bucket for sure. Yeah.

All right. Another bucket that we have in studio. I'll veer away from best picture ones for a bit. That's fine. And I'll just call out. I tried to, out of the blank check production and funds, purchased the two other best picture nominated buckets, the F1 helmet and the Sinner's guitar case.

And both of them were purchased over 10 days ago and have yet to arrive. I've been getting constant delivery updates that they're running behind. So thankfully, I'll just have these buckets arriving probably the second this record finishes. They're still printing the 3D models. Yes. But here's a common complaint I've read from bucket fans and I've spent a lot of. of time on our slash buckets as I assume you do as well. The Marty Supreme, the Frankenstein, the sinners, and the F1 have a commonality which is too small, is the complaint.

And very often the collectible bucket is supposed to be equivalent to a large popcorn. And you're getting that amount of popcorn inside. In my bucket reviews, I also do measure how many cups can fit into each bucket and correspond that to, you know, is that a large? Is that a medium? A lot of them come with a large that's just in a separate bag. So it's defeating the purpose in the theater, kind of. I feel like people aren't even opening half of these in the theater.

No, they're, yeah. But I do think Marty specifically came with a small. Like, they're sort of channeling skinny timbre. Sure, sure. Yeah, yeah, he just does not look like a guy who is eating a large popcorn in that movie. So I appreciate it. Exactly. Big eat small.

Next up, we have a best animated nominee. And maybe, you know, counterintuitive. to the bucket game, there were not many buckets of animated films this year because a lot of them, you know, we had two sort of European RD ones. We had Helio, which I don't think. It was not very merchandisable. Well, they were putting all their effort behind Stitch at the time. There was Stitch stuff. And Cape Pop was Netflix.

Yeah, yeah. I do find it a little offensive just circling back to Frankenstein for a second when Netflix throws their hat into the bucket game. where I'm like, you don't get to do this if you're telling us to stay in home. Right, right. I have my own bowls. Exactly, yeah. These are the in-theater experience. This is part of it.

Okay, so we have Gary DeSnake. It's very cute, I think. This is my first, you know, I learned about the character through the bucket before I saw the film and was instantly endeared to him. He's coiled around the popcorn. It's elegant, I think. Yeah, I like that. It's a classic bucket, and it's a kind of earned organic design. Yeah.

Yeah. I like anything where you can pretend to feed the bucket creature by putting the popcorn in his mouth. That's actually a huge deal. You can do that here. A voiced by former Oscar winner, Ki-Hi Kwan. Yeah. Very well. A very anointed bucket.

Great performance. Yeah. So I'll add that there. There was another Zootopia bucket I saw at a Cinemark that was the little Italian-coated rats walking into a little movie theater. That's good. And I thought that was very fun. Next up We have the

2 and 1 Jurassic World Rebirth which is a sippy cup and This is very involved Yeah Wait so just to Like it is like a It looks like a water pick

It's like Like yeah it's got A clear Yeah like plastic case to encase the Dinosaur fetus A test tube dinosaur Yeah it's an incubator And then on the side is like, what is that supposed to be?

Like a... Well, so it detaches and sort of almost looks like an 80s cell phone. Yeah, I was going to say. It has like a walkie-talkie vibe. But that's like the drink. Okay. It has the classic logo on the side. Sure, sure.

But so when you put the popcorn, like you have to go around the fetus. Yes. And when the light was still working, you know, it's sort of lit from underneath. Sure. I found there to be a horrible plastic taste to this one. Even popping the top open, you get a sort of plastic smell. Do you remember the price point on this? It was probably in the 50s.

Okay. That's high. Yeah, yeah. But it is a pretty elaborate. Yeah, I mean, I appreciate the idea of it. It just feels functionally like it would be inadequate. Is this well-liked in the collector community, this one, the Jurassic one? I think so.

And certainly compared to some of the, other Jurassic bucket offerings, which one other was like a generic dino head. So this is clearly like. You reviewed that one and that one was, yeah, it's certainly lacked. Yeah, it just doesn't, it doesn't compare. But speaking of expensive, I will get to another effects nominee, effects winner, which is the Avatar fired ash. Oh, yeah. Banshee bucket, which does anyone want to guess how much this cost?

I feel like Griffin knows off the top. $80? Yeah. Really? Yeah. That was my guess. Oh, wow. So this was an $80 bucket.

It is, of course, a banshee, which are also known as, are they Ikron? The mighty Eichron. The mighty Eichron. Which are the dragon-type things that they ride in the movie. And it has a basket strapped to it with a sort of harness a la something, the wind traders that we were introduced to in the third movie, Woodcraft. And it is carrying popcorn. And it also looks like a very inadequate amount of popcorn, especially for a movie of that length. Seriously. You'd have to go back at least twice to get refills.

Especially that size. We had a miscommunication where I thought you had the bucket and you thought I had this bucket. I, in fact, purchased every bucket that came out for the way of water, all of which now live permanently in the display of the blank check offices. But this was the Regal one, which is pretty minimalistic, but I liked is just kind of a translucent blue water bowl, but it lights up. It has a nice bioluminescence. I love that. Then, or no, I'm sorry, that was AMC. Regal had this tin bucket covered with

Oh, Regal, come on The water life It has a pipe on there. What you must understand is that Was this 2022? It was a different era? We had not, you know, we had not entered this type of territory

Making these elaborate molded things Even the dune bucket, people don't remember They have cultural amnesia about this. It is just a tin bucket. It is a normal tin bucket With a fun topper on it. But this was the one that I really

liked. I think this was Cinemark because I had to get it online. No cinema marks in the Tri-State area. But it's the Banshee's Nest, which I thought was a really good form factor. Yeah. I mean, it recalls a bit, you know, this. Gary Desnake. Yeah, Gary DeSnake. Becca, can you show off the images of the sinners and the F-1 that did not arrive in time? Yes, I absolutely can. I've got sinners. Sinners, and this is tin? This is tin. It's a guitar. It looks huge. It's covered. It's enormous. As if it were stickers, every poster for sinners.

But it is weirdly not super big. It's like a ukulele side. It's smaller than ukulele. Exactly. Okay. The other thing is this was not a product available when the movie came out. It was when they re-released it. They put it back in IMAX theaters, I think, in January, which speaks to how much maybe everyone was taken by surprise.

The massive success of sinners. Because when it came out, it was just the Lola Kirk bucket, right? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes, it was just her skull. Yeah. Okay, beautiful.

And we have F1, which I will pull up. Again, another sort of head sort of, yeah. Yeah, so this is the helmet. I actually have upstairs a Project Hail Mary helmet that looks very much. All right. I do like that the visor allows you to see the popcorn inside. It's nice. Yeah, that's a nice touch.

Like the lid is on top, all la the Marty Supreme, kind of like that kind of lid. But you can see the popcorn. Quickly. I also, I appreciate it. That's the best of both worlds of. You want visibility of the popcorn. But if there were a micro Brad Pitt skull inside that you had to root around. Yeah, that's just awkward. I mean, it would be a fascinating choice. But the implications about what happens to Brad Pitt's character and F1 would be significant. But I do think next year, every movie should just have a skull of one of the actors. That's a good point. Yeah. It's a classic. It never goes wrong. No one battle bucket this year. Sinners took a long time to get there. We had four out of ten best picture nominees, which feels like major progress. For sure. But there's so much further we can go.

You could get the Train Dreams pot of beans if you went to see it. Do you have outside of the Oscar nominees a pick for what the best bucket of 2025 was? Ooh. Ooh. I mean, a really exciting moment in buckets last year was... It's up there on the shelf, Galactus. Galactus. The theater of world.

It's enormous. He was also $80, but he is half as tall as me or more. Can we bring it down quickly? Is that possible? For those listening at home, it's the Galactus head. It's Ralph Innocent's skull. Yeah, it is another skull, but it's huge. It's so huge.

It's truly bigger than your head. Because it has, like, the helmet wings that come out on either side. He also lights up. The button is tastefully hidden. Oh, that's lovely. Yeah, the eyes light up. And I respect, you know, you're someone who lives. in a city and I don't know

that you have a car but like this is designed for someone to put in their car after a movie not to carry home the subway You have to fold down the third row of seats in the bathroom. I do like they have someone trying to eat it in the theater

and you would be bumping both of your neighbors all of the time. Oh yeah. Yeah, this would be very antisocial. No. That cost 80 as well. That cost 80 as well and there I really do see the value

because that could become an amazing planter. Is that the current ceiling for pricing for now? Nothing's surpass that. For now, but it's so interesting to see these 20, 22 ones, and they're all priced at $20, $24. Right. And now, yeah. It does feel, yeah, like things have changed. I, my favorite bucket of last year, which I might be wrong here, I don't think is one that you got, but from the same film, the Herbie bucket from Fantastic Four.

Oh, yeah. I believe it was only $50. It has sounds. You press a button, it plays a sample of the Michael Giacino score. Wow. You push a different button. It projects the Fantastic Four logo. onto a wall.

It's exactly what you want during a movie. 100%. And it had three compartments. Three compartments. So included in the $50 was your choice of candy, popcorn and soda. His head is the soda with a straw on top. And then his body, the front is for candy. The back is for popcorn.

So I sat in a theater with a robot on my lap pouring all these things into it because I insisted this is how this film is supposed to be watched. You need to be eating and drinking out of him and then just had to carry it around. with me for an entire day. I love that it's fun. I love that it's interactive. I got a SpongeBob one last year that has a viewfinder in it. Good. And the thought of sitting at a movie and like doing viewfinder, well, that's a great type of

sort of old school second screen. Yeah. I appreciate that all of these are, of course, like the most important part of supporting the theatrical experience. Like you've got to come so you can get your expensive collectible. Yeah. Another one that was really good on the same lines. Mission Impossible, the final reckoning, had a lot.

lot of buckets, but I know the ones at AMC, it was the cup had binoculars on top, like spy binoculars. Sure. Which I tried to use during an IMEX screening as if they were opera glasses. Oh, perfect. Don't tell to me. It harkens back to like Inspector Gadget Happy Meal toys where they were all little spy toys. Yes. I was thinking of another, but I forgot it.

But one more sort of a bucket that came out last year that I am claiming for one of the best picture nominees is it was the 50th anniversary of Jaws, and we got an incredible Jaws bucket. Perfect. And that, you know, major motif in the secret agent, so it's top of mine. Yes. Yeah. No, it's relative.

So I'm saying this is the secret agent. Absolutely. I like it. So we got to five out of ten nominees. And like with Gary to Snake, you can make him munch the popcorn. Yeah. And that's, you know, classic design. You want to put your hand in Jaws' mouth, so.

Just not your leg. Just not your leg. If I'm not mistaken, the teeth are kind of rubbery, right? No, the teeth are sharp. Oh, I like that. I like that. The threat of injury makes a popcorn more delicious. You have to work for it.

Dune had the rubbery flangeas. Well, that's because it was, yeah. Well, yeah. It's being used in different ways. Yeah, I think that's my favorite. I also think that if you wanted, you could mount it on the wall. Oh, head out. Oh, sure.

Yeah. Oh, that's great. That's lovely. There was also a naked gun beaver that would look really handsome on a mantle. We could also, we could also, we could. reclaim that as a train dreams bucket as well. It's him chomping on a log, right? Yeah, yeah, he's got a little stumped. Oh, I love that scene where Joel Edgerton eats that law. Oh, yeah, it's so beautiful. I like that. The future maybe of poppouring up buckets is repurposing them for smaller movies. Yeah. Like, we can, we can go rogue. We don't need to stick with established branding. Is there anything you'd like to say to the bucket companies in terms of what you think they can do better going into the future? What you'd like to see in 2026? I would, I mean, I don't know if it's possible, but whatever happened with the rubber plastic smell and taste here was a real misfire.

So I would like them to be using, I don't know, food-grade plastic. Sure. Fair, a fair ask, yeah. Imagine recycled plastics. A possibility, probably not. We can't, we can't have it all. Not from InGen. They're corrupt horrible.

Yeah. It's established. It's their slogan, actually, which is weird, you know. Just in Jen, we're evil. And I would love them to not, you know, let's try to keep it at 80. People are strapped. People already complain. People already complain about, oh, you're taking a family forward to the movies.

And with the this and the that and the that, it's like $200. They will use these as for their fuel to make that complaint, which is not helping. I think the Herbie model is a way to look forward, too, of don't charge $80 for an amount of popcorn you couldn't possibly finish within. the runtime of a movie, if you're getting over 50, at least have it tackle multiple areas of concessions. Sure. Give me the all in one. Yeah. And I will always prefer, you know, a sort of custom-molded thing with nice little details, like the sort of scarring and the gills on the shark, for example.

Yeah, it's well-made. Versus, like, this even has the look of those 3D-printed dragons that people sell on Etsy. Like, I like, I like quirk and little. Yeah. Yeah. Give us some texture. Well, this is a great recap of the year. I think this is the only important recap of the year in movies.

So thank you. This is, I hadn't seen most of these before, so I'm into them. You're doing the work. And thank you for coming here to share your work with us. Keep doing the work. What the movies are really about. Yeah, of course. Merch.

We all know that. All right. So, I mean, guys, award season is over. This means we'll never be able to see each other again. No, that's over. That's it. We're done. Goodbye forever.

We're no longer darlings. Or? Or? We could keep going. We could keep going. You know, there are other movies coming out? No. Like for the whole rest of the year?

I mean, awards movies? Well, maybe. Some are saying already. I mean, nothing could top the bride. Well, sure. And, of course, we are going to do the spinoff podcast about the bride. Yeah. But, you know, there are movies like, I don't know, Project Hell Mary that some people are already kind of being like, well, reserve a spot in the best picture 10 for that one, you know?

Who knows what else is coming this spring? can't the can film festival might reveal some things to us so we kind of figured like why not keep going and talking about stuff that's coming out new movies i'm game if you are yeah i i compared it last night to howard dean giving his speeches of the of the states he was playing away we're going on to Patrick del mary we're doing a super Mario galaxy movie yeah yeah yeah exactly exactly and that worked out very well for him yeah um as we all know yeah he's our patron saint uh yeah i mean look there's a lot to talk about that will, you know, not necessarily always bend back to the awards, you know, campaign and all that. But like, but often these days, you can make the case for a lot of different

things. Yeah, but I think we would love to continue talking about new releases and taking the same tactic we have here, which is to put them in this kind of larger context in which they're arriving, not always awards, sometimes awards, but also just, just how are they landing and like what, like, how are we looking at that? And what does it represent in sort of the state of the industry right now, which I think you guys have done a great job of doing sort of what is the larger conversation behind each of these movies. Yeah, like I think one topic for Project Hill Mary might be like the strategy behind like showing a movie to this group of people three weeks out and then another group of people one week at, you know, like the idea of the quote unquote four quadrant movie,

you know, like the movie that can please a whole family. men over 40 men under 40 rock monster fans and Sandra Guler fans? Yes, that's it. Those are the classic demographics out there. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so we're going to do it, you know, same, you know, once a week kind of thing. And what we're going to do is we'll be covering new releases the week after they come out.

So you'll have an opportunity. We'll tell you what we're going to talk about the following week. You'll have an opportunity to see it. That way we're also helping keep the theaters a lot. live hopefully. Also, and if there are sometimes movies that are getting a platform released, we'll try and give a bit more time there so that it's not just open. No, I don't only, I only want New York and not LA listeners. I don't care about anyone. Yeah, screw the rest of you guys. Sorry. Coastal elites. So we will try and give enough windows

so that you can see the movies and join us, you know, to talk about them. Yeah, we want to be talking about these things together. Yeah. And we should also acknowledge that up until this point, Critical Darling since, of course, lived in these safe banshees now. of the blank check feed. But moving on to this next stage, Critical Darling's is going to exist as its own standalone feed. So it is very important to say the thing.

Sarah Jessica Parker showed up because Kathy Bates and Terry Bradshaw hired... Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah, hired her. And now we are... Push it out of the nest. No longer a failure to launch.

We're going to have our own apartment. Exactly. Yeah. But to say the rote thing, but really mean it this time, please subscribe. And we're going to put links to the new podcast feed

in the description of this episode. So if you want to go click down there right now and subscribe, that would really mean a lot to us. We're really excited about moving forward. Yes, please. Please find our new feed and subscribe if you would like to continue joining us on this journey. Yeah, we're going to have great conversations, great guests. Yeah, we'll have people from the blank check extended cinematic universe.

And beyond. And beyond. It's going to be a great time, guys. And I just want to quickly call out because the sinners and the F1 popcorn buckets did not arrive in time. But there was another big production cost, production value cost I put down at the beginning of this run. Yeah. Which, you know, has gone. We try not to put too much of an emphasis on it.

But this incredible kind of set dressing that I contributed. Yes. The day before our first. These are these beautiful set of trophies. From trophy world in Brooklyn. Yeah. And Peter a trophy world who hooked me up. They had just moved locations.

They were truly like active construction site setting up their new home. And he was like, everything's in boxes. I have these three lying around. And I was like, I'll take them. But if we can grab those off the back line quickly, I want to award the three of you. Oh, my goodness. And much like the Oscars and people, I don't know if they know this. When you win an Academy Award, they hand you the statuette without any kind of plaque inscription.

Right. Right. And then after you give your speech, you go to some back alley and some guys like, how do you spell Paul Thomas Anderson? But I would just like to quickly award the three of you, Ben Frisch, an award for the best Ben Duceer in podcasting, Critical Darling's Division. Yeah, well deserved. Richard Lawson, best co-host in a leading role. Oh, thank you. This is my Volpe Cup. Yes. And then Allison, best leading co-host.

Oh, thank you. It means a lot to me. I think that's a fair. I actually, I've practiced his speech a lot, and I deserve it is what I wanted to say. Yeah. And screw the rest of you losers. Absolutely. Can we give an honorary award also to Anne?

Absolutely. The great Ann Victoria Clark here at all. Sure. Who has been so patient with us in doing these recordings here in the Vox offices. We are actively at work at a gift of appreciation. for you, Anne, that is not just an oversized trophy. So know that something will be coming soon. It's a smaller trophy.

It's a smaller trophy. All right, so all that said and done. No more talk of 2025 movies. We're moving to the future. We're going to space. Next week, we'll be back here in a new feed talking about project coming. Critical Darling's is a blank check production, an association with Vulture. Hosted by Alison Wilmore and Richard Ler.

Lawson. Produced by Benjamin Frisch, executive produced by Griffin Newman and Neil Janowitz. Video production and distribution by Ann Victoria Clark, Wolfgang Ruth, and Jennifer Jean. Hey! It's a critical darling. It's a critical darling. One wish you rang. Make a speech. Hey, make a speech.

Speech, speech, speech, speech, speech, speech, speech, speech. This is the best. thing that's ever happened from a drunk tech message I sent to Griffin and David after I lost my job but seriously actually I didn't think you bet they would take it seriously but they did it's been super fun so far yeah yeah we're not done yeah we're gonna keep going hopefully in some fashion right yeah yeah yeah and we can announce our our third host timothy shallame Thank you.