Happy Sad Confused - David Goyer

Episode Date: September 21, 2023

David Goyer does not shy away from a challenge. Witness his current gig as the Executive Producer/director/show-runner for FOUNDATION. Now in its second season on Apple TV+ it's an awesome undertaking considering its pedigree as one of the seminal works of sci-fi by the great Isaac Asimov. But Goyer's resume is littered with such iconic properties. He was the writer of the BLADE trilogy, a huge creative force for the DARK KNIGHT trilogy, and so much more. David joins Josh to talk about it all including the one gigantic universe he'd still love to tackle. UPCOMING EVENTS! 10/9 -- Come see Josh and Josh Gad & Andrew Rannells at the 92nd Street Y in NYC! Virtual tickets available too. Get your tickets here! Check out the ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Happy Sad Confused patreon here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! We've got discount codes to live events, merch, early access, exclusive episodes of GAME NIGHT, video versions of the podcast, and more! To watch episodes of Happy Sad Confused, subscribe to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Josh's youtube channel here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

During the Volvo Fall Experience event, discover exceptional offers and thoughtful design that leaves plenty of room for autumn adventures. And see for yourself how Volvo's legendary safety brings peace of mind to every crisp morning commute. This September, lease a 2026 XE90 plug-in hybrid from $599 bi-weekly at 3.99% during the Volvo Fall Experience event. Conditions apply, visit your local Volvo retailer or go to explorevolvo.com.

It got Willa. They got my daughter. I need to find her. Willa! From acclaimed director, Paul Thomas Anderson. You can save that girl. On September 26th, experience what is being called the best movie of the year. This is the end of the line.

Not for you. Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Pan, Benicio del Toro, Tiana Taylor, Chase Infinity. Let's go! Here I come. One battle after another. Only in theater, September 26th. Experience it in IMAX. After the dark night, the head of Warner Brothers at the premiere saying, you got to do the riddler.

Leo is the riddler, you know, saying to me, you got to tell Chris, Leo is the riddler. And I just, dude, that's not the way we work. Prepare your ears, humans. Happy, sad, confused begins now. I'm Josh Horowitz. And today on Happy, Sad, Confused, I've got a gentleman with a positively legendary geek resume. Here we go, guys. He's a showrunner, director, writer, and producer of such films and TV as Blade, The Dark Night Trilogy, Man of Steel, The Sandman.

He's just wrapped up the second season of maybe the granddaddy of all sci-fi foundation on Apple TV Plus. It's, of course, Mr. David Goyer on Happy Say I Confused for the very first time. Welcome, David. Thank you for having me. I'm a listener of your show, so it's a bit surreal to be on it, so hopefully I don't shit the bed. I don't know if I'm allowed to swear on this? Yeah, you're allowed to swear. Trust me, I've definitely put in more time watching your stuff than you listening to my stuff.

So it's a mutual admiration society. We'll have a good time. First of all, I feel like we need to adjust the Wikipedia entry. It leads off with Nick Fury, Agent of Shield. We need to get Team Goyer on this. What's going on? Yeah, I don't even, this. Yeah, we should.

It's ridiculous. I mean, what's so annoying about that, and sometimes people will, give that as a credit or cite that as an example of like my not being a good screenwriter. And it's, it's like, I think after we had done Blade, I had, Marvel had said, hey, we're going to do a Nick Fury movie at New World. I don't know if you remember New World, which made a bunch of like cheesy B movies. And we're going to make it for, I don't know, $15 million can you write a script. So I wrote a script.

That whole thing went away and goodbye. And then some eight years later, they said, oh, good news. We're going to do it as a TV movie at Fox for like $3 million with David Hasselhoff. Do you want to take nothing away from David Hasselhoff? Do you want to rewrite it? And I was like, no, I don't want any involvement with it. No, goodbye. And I was rewritten by God knows whom.

Yeah, and or how many people. And then, you know, there it is. So that's the, that's the short version of the sad story of, yeah, yeah. I mean, David Hasselhoff is the one true, Nick Fury. We can all agree on that. Yeah, he's the guy. Yeah, yeah. Look, you have been, you've had a remarkable career and it keeps going, and it's very

bountiful as we speak today with, you know, foundation and Sandman going strong. But, like, I mean, talk to me a little bit about taking a step. back and looking at the macro level, like we get to do on this podcast, like, especially the last 25 years, seemingly, you have been working pretty consistently, almost nonstop. Does it feel like you've had a very steady trajectory, assent? Like, have there been times that don't show up in that IMDB where you felt like you were in writer, director, producer, jail, and that it could all end? Sure. Yeah, of course. I mean, it doesn't matter how successful not we all.

are we're artists and we're all riddled with insecurity and we all think that, you know, it will have, you know, end tomorrow. Yeah, of course. I, I sold my first screenplay when I was 21, about four months out of college and it immediately went into production and that was the, became the Jean-Claude Van Damme movie Death Warrant. Right. Which was not a great movie, but I was 21 and I was on the set of my movie and I mean, that was amazing. And so I was earning my key screenwriter again four months out of college and making a healthy living initially writing a lot of kind of B movies and I would say that that would have been in 89 and I did that for about five years and then I got the opportunity in very quick succession

to write Blade and to rewrite Dark City. And Blade was the first time that, I mean, I had pitched Blade, but Michael DeLucah, who was running New Line at the time, he just allowed me to write whatever I wanted to write. He just said, go for it. And the courage for an executive to do that is incredible. It was rare those days, and it's rare these days. And so that script was the first time where I was just allowed to write whatever I wanted to write, whatever came out of my head. And I ended up, the movie didn't get made for another four years.

And I think we did 27 drafts of it and it went all the way kind of around the development circle to the point at which by the end and various creative executives on the movie had been like fired and new ones would come in. and there was no institutional memory at all, and we'd have a number of different directors that were attached to it. By the end, I was literally cutting and pasting like 10, 12-page chunks of the first draft back into the script, and no one had remembered. This is brilliant.

Yeah, yeah, completely. But the movie largely reflects, it's pretty close to that first draft and was pretty unfiltered, like good, bad, or ugly. That was just kind of came out of my, brain and my career really turned around not i mean it turned around when blade came out but it turned around after i'd written that because that script made the rounds around hollywood and people were that used to happen in those days like there was some script people liked and that was the first time

that i started getting offered jobs without having to audition for jobs right and and at the same time I got the job to rewrite Dark City and then both those movies came out in 98 back to back and that really changed my career but it's funny because even even that the blade script I had known Chris Nolan

socially even before Memento had come out I had seen Memento before it had gotten a distributor and I couldn't believe no one wanted to pick up the movie because it was so abundantly clear that he was genius in the movie was amazing and had a hook.

So I knew him a bit socially. And when I heard that he was going to do a new Batman movie, initially the script that he read was Blake. And another zigzag, the first movie I directed, he read those two scripts. And on the basis of that, you meet with me on Batman. So that script was really pivotal in changing my career. I will mention, we don't have time to do everything,

but like you breeze by Dark City, which is to be a stone cold classic, Alex Proyas, just like, it feels like it was kind of a little overwhelmed at the time by Matrix for whatever reason, but like... It was, and it came out before Matrix. Right. Stans the test of time,

a visionary film in many ways, check it out. But you mentioned Blade, and when I was reading up, one thing I came across that I'd never heard before, I'm like a Fincher obsessive. You developed Blade for a time with David Fincher? I did. I developed a draft with Fincher, and it was before he had done seven. So I think he had done Alien Three. Right. And maybe he was developing seven, which was, and I developed a draft with him. Do you remember what his contribution, what he wanted to do with Blade in conjunction with you? There were surely script things that me, but what was interesting was I remember going to our producer's office, Peter Frankfurt.

And Fincher had this, there was this giant conference table. And Fincher had laid out 40, 50 books of photography and art that were just open with posted notes in them. And he just said, this is the movie. And then took us, like a two-hour tour around the table of like, this is the aesthetic, this is the vibe for this scene. that scene, this character is seen. And it was such a fully fleshed out visual pitch. And there's no question that a lot of that thinking, because I'd never really seen something like that before, that a lot of that thinking then infused my further revisions and informed my further revision. So that part, surely there were plot points as well, but I remember that

was pretty fundamental for me. Amazing. I don't want to rehash. So there's a lot of war around, of course, the third part of Blade, which you directed. The Blade Trinity, there is a lot.

You guys can look it up on the internet. There's a lot. Suffice to say, worst experience of my professional career. I was going to say, there it is. I mean, what do you feel comfortable

even saying at this point about, I mean, you had worked with Wesley on those first two films. Did something go wrong? Was he in just the wrong space at the wrong time? and it all just went to hell.

It seems like he just didn't want to work in the way that you needed to work on that one. It was an incredibly fraught experience. It was personally very difficult. I was very depressed afterwards. You talked about one of the Nators. It was definitely that. This is even before the movie came out.

Despite all of that, I still think Wesley is one of the greatest actors of the current generation. And it's a tragedy that he's not acting as much as it. I mean, the guy is brilliant. He was going through a lot of trouble at the time that all that tax stuff was happening right as we started. And in fact, on our first day of filming,

there was this whole kerfuffle because the IRS had withheld like a bunch of his money. And that was all going on in the background. And it was, that's kind of all, I'll say. about it for now, but it was, it was a mess. If you ran into Wesley now, do you think you'd exchange words? Is it that, would you try to bury the hatchet or is it just too much? I don't know.

I've, I might, I might try. He says with a smile. The ears have helped a little, but, you know, yeah. I, I mean, this isn't, I, I go to Alonon because of, you know, events in my life. And so that's giving me a different perspective on things. Okay, fair enough. Curious about, you know, they've struggled in recent years to try to enter Blade into the MCU.

You must, you haven't, you had, we're so close to that character for a while. Are you excited at the prospect of, do you see Mahershala and R-rated blade fitting into the modern MCU? Have they said it's R-rated, first of all, I don't know. Mahersela is amazing. I mean, I can't think of anyone better to take on the mantle of that, they've clearly had struggle after struggle after struggle with it. So I'm really curious to see where it goes, but also I absolutely believe that it should

someone else's story to tell now. It's ironic because at the time that we made Blade, Marvel was in bankruptcy, X-Men hadn't come out like they were trying to develop you know i think fantastic for x-men spider-man there was no thought that they would ever develop any of the secondary or tertiary characters and they i think i think the purchase price to make the movie for blade to marvel was like a hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars nothing and marvel was so concerned and wanted it held at arm's length once they heard that it was going to be our rated that they didn't have the logo on the film either. And then it became this massive success. And they realized they had this treasure trove

of characters that they could exploit. But it's ironic that now they want to bring Blade into the MCU because they didn't want Blade. They have anything to do with the MCU. They were afraid of it and just assumed it would be like a black mark on their reputation. No pun intended. You know, I actually took the opportunity to watch it again last night. And it definitely holds up. I love Wesley's performance, Stephen Dorff, Deacon Frost, iconic. Yeah, and it feels like, I mean, if people don't realize it, think about the context of where, and you've alluded to it a bit. An R-rated, you know, African-American-led superhero film in the late 90s.

I mean, that's hard to do now, let alone 25 years ago. And that's how groundbreaking it was. And it really succeeded thanks to you in Norrington. and everyone's just, it all came together. Okay, so you alluded to, hopefully you're willing to go down a little bit on the Batman memory lane. It's obviously a high watermark for you and Nolan, like, I mean, that marriage. It was, it was Batman Day yesterday.

It was Batman Day. Happy Batman Day, a sacred day in the Glorier household, I'm sure. So you had said you were aware of him. You definitely saw that he had the goods. He comes to you. Like, what did he have in mind? that he had been given the keys to Batman, but did he have a take already that he said to you,

like, I need fleshing out and figuring out how to execute this? I remember in our first conversation, he was very interested in doing a naturalistic take, which was the exact opposite of where we'd gotten to with the Joel Schumacher movies. And that in and of itself was, kind of revolutionary at the time. He wanted to do an origin story, but he, you know, in the comic books, they depicted his

parents being shot. And then I think in the comic books, Bruce Wayne is in his study in a bat, like flies through the window. And then he's just Batman. And they hit it. And in the comics, in the, in the, in the comics. even in the movies, they'd just kind of elated over all of that. So he was really interested in exploring that.

Batman Year 1 had come out with Frank Miller and Dave Masa Kelly, if I'm pronouncing his name, right. But even Batman Year 1, Bruce Rain returns to Gotham after having been gone for a year or two. And we just don't know what happened. So he was interested in exploring that period, and that was really interesting to me. and we had an initial conversation.

And he asked me some thoughts. I think we talked about it for an hour. And I, I, I, I, I, I, I, a bunch of ideas. And then I said, I don't want to do it, which is amazing in hindsight. And the main reason I felt I didn't want to do it was because I didn't believe it would get made. I had had three or four friends that had written Batman scripts that hadn't been made. Boise Akeen had done a Batman Beyond and Kevin Walker did a Batman Superman and Mark, I think Mark Protasevich was another friend of mine had done a bad. I knew at least four or

five people that had written Batman movies that weren't getting made. And I just thought they're they're just never going to do it. They're never going to take a big swing and do something different. And Chris went away and then he came back, I don't know, maybe three weeks or later and he said that he met with a bunch of people and that my take or what it I don't know if it was take conversation was the only thing that really resonated with him would I reconsider and meet with him and that that's what started that path were you keyed into the casting process it's been said that you were yeah yeah that that jillen hall was your vote at the time was that is that true yeah I mean initially Chris well we're still close but uh we were

Chris was not Chris Nolan, you know, yet. And so in the early days, it was Chris and Emma, his wife, and then Nathan Crowley, who was a production designer, who was in the garage next to us while Chris and I were writing, building early, you know, kit bashing early models of the Tumblr and things like that. So it was like the four of us, and we would chat about all sorts of things. And there were a number of people that had screen tested in, and I had advocated for Gyllenhaal.

I mean, Jillenhall's amazing. Christopher Bail is amazing. So who knows what. And then there were a couple of different candidates in the running for Raja Gull as well. Wait, is the Lord, by the way, did Daniel D. Louis ever get contacted for Raza Gull or for Man of Steel. That one always sticks with me. Did they, you guys ever compose?

I don't believe he was contacted for Man of Steel. He may have been, I don't remember anyway, because it's been a while since we did, Batman begins. He may have been. But I remember having this conversation with Chris between two of these candidates for Rajah Ghul, and he said, what do you think? And I said, I vote for Liam Neeson.

He said, why? And I said, because the other candidate wasn't, as old, was a contemporary of Christian Bales in terms of age. And Liam was a little older. And I said the whole story that we're telling is this paternal story, you know, about the shadow of his father. And Roger Bull, with all the Batman Robs gallery in the Denny O'Neill stories had this sort of paternal function.

He was this shadow father. And I just, for that reason, I think we ain't in that direction. I have no idea if that's, I convinced Chris or not, other people could have said the same thing. But, but yeah, we talked a lot about all of these various elements. Did Jacob ever actually screen tests? Like, is there footage of him in the back costume? I believe there is.

Yes. Would have been a solid Batman in his own right, but a different one, of course. Yeah, it's hard to know. So I'm curious just generally over that trilogy. You know, there was always so much conjecture from film the film, which villain from the Rugs Gallery you guys were going to choose to take on. Like what that process was.

Like, did you start with what the story was, what the themes of the story were, and then kind of look at the Rokes Gallery and say, who fits what the story we're trying to tell? Yeah. Yeah, that was, Chris is very process driven. And I feel like, again,

one of the things that in hindsight is revolutionary that we did in that process, we kind of stumbled into it, I suppose. was I had this sense, like with the Spider-Man movies or one superhero movie started getting made and you had sequels, that the studios would always say, okay, who's our villain of the next movie going to be? Right. And let's build a movie around that. And then Chris was staunchly against that because he said that's, that's not a bottom, ground up way of telling a story. Let's do it in a very naturalistic way.

So let's figure out what kind of story we want to tell and what we thematically want to explore with Bruce. And then let's figure out a villain that fits that story. And we had all these pitches. I remember after the dark night, the head of Warner Brothers at the premiere saying, you got to do the riddler. Leo is the riddler, you know, saying to me, you got to tell Chris, Leo is a little bit. And I just, dude, that's not, that's not the way we work. And, uh, not taking nothing away from him. And, and I just remember in the process, we were talking about

this and how the Joker had kind of challenged Bruce, uh, intellectually, but, but, you know, the dirty little secret of the dark night rises is it's kind of model after Rocky 3. And, And, you know, you've got to get knocked down and get back up. And, you know, he's just getting old. Yeah, instead of going to Siberia, he goes to the pit to straight. Yeah. And you need, you know, someone that's just a brute. And I just remember saying, well, it's Bain.

And he was like, oh, Bain so cheesy. I don't know. But it's a, it's a process, you know. And it just, it did seem in hindsight that it had to be Bain. That is a process that I've certainly carried through, you know, into the room on foundation. I mean, we're very process driven. It's, you know, instead of deciding, well, this is what we want to happen to this character. It's where does the story lead us?

Let the story lead you. Exactly. Even if it takes us to a place we don't want to go. And like people, I was, I loved how much people in the new season love. loved, you know, Belrios and Homer Mello. And I personally love them. And spoilers, if anyone hasn't seen it yet, but they, you know, they had to die.

It was right for the story, even though I adore those characters. And I adore, the same is true for Selver. And, you know, there are people online going, oh, but maybe he or she's not dead, or maybe this is, you know, it could change. And I just think you have to do what's right for the story. And then you have to stick to that and not impose. a desire that exists outside the story onto the story. Right.

I will say just one note on Bain. You're talking to a guy that basically did a Bain voice for a year. So, like, I'm good with Bain. Like, Bain is in my psyche forever. All good. Look, Hardy did an incredible job bringing Bain to life, as Chris did as well. And, I mean, so much of that was Chris figuring out how to make Bain cool

and not look like a, you know, a W. WWF wrestler or WWE. Yeah, we're aging ourselves by talking WAA. Yeah, exactly, exactly. I do the same thing. So in your head canon, wrapping up our Batman discussion, your head canon, does John Blake become Batman very soon after the end of Dark Night Rises?

Has he donned the costume? Yeah, yeah, for sure. Of course. Yeah. Is there any scenario you could imagine no one calling you up in 20 years saying, I think we have more to do with these characters? Or do you feel like confident? No.

It's done. I don't think that's ever going to happen. Not him, not his. And I don't, and I don't even, I don't, I don't, I wouldn't want to do another band project, either, you know, I mean, I, I, no. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, why even tempt fate, basically.

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Presumably you solved it. It was a third, yeah, it was a third act problem. I don't remember exactly. I'd have to go back and look at my notes. But we were just stuck. We were blocked. And Chris said, okay, let's just take a week off. and see if anything dislodges.

And, you know, I was sitting in my home office and nothing was dislodging. And I went back and re-read all, you know, a volume of the first action comics. And then I wrote maybe a three-page outline for a Superman story. And we met with Chris and he said, did he crack? And I said, no, but I have an idea for a Superman movie. And he said, well, let's hear it because we all procrastinate. And he said, that's pretty good. And he said, I would produce that if you want me to.

Do you want to see if we can make it? And I said, sure. And in the same meeting, he called up the head of Warner Brothers and said, Goyer has a pitch for Superman. We should do this. Can we come in and speak to you tomorrow? And we did. And then it was on.

And then he was like, now you really have to figure out the problem and write this other thing. But that was super surreal. Yeah. Was there ever a moment where? he was going to direct or you would even throw yourself out there to direct no no he because he was still had to direct dark night rises right and i was just not ready for you know i had never intended to go on and direct blade three and i knew i wanted to direct again but that i wouldn't have taken on a challenge like that yet and so that's then i've been doing a lot of tv and i directed a lot

of the foundation episodes and and things like that. But no, no way. And I promise, in case you're word, we will get to a foundation. The problem is fine. With your resume, damn it, David, you've done too much. I can't just gloss over. It's all good. It's all good.

So were you sold on Zach immediately as the right guy for that job? Obviously, the man can create visuals like no one else. Did he get it, get your, just of what you were going for? Or did you guys vibe immediately? Because obviously, you worked together again on BVS, so that clearly was working. He did. I mean, it was a very deliberative process. Chris met with, I want to say about five directors.

And it came down to Zach and another director. And it felt like Zach was the right call. And I think Zach was the right call. And it was really exciting that the fact that Zach wanted. to shoot that movie handheld, which was just, I just thought, a brilliant idea. What's interesting in the Elseworld's version of what could have, should have been, not should have been, but could have been, is Chris had also met with Tony Scott. So there's a version of a Tony Scott man of steel in some parallel universe that,

and I just think Tony Scott is, he doesn't give, get as much credit. it as he should be given because he was an really phenomenal director as his brother. And that's just a movie I would have also loved to have seen. Was Tony into it? He was game?

Yeah. And I don't know exactly what was going on. I mean, he passed away relatively soon after that. But that just as a parallel else world story, I think that would have been really interesting. Were you guys

and I'm sure you're sick of talking about the killing of Zod. But were you surprised at what that became? Did you know in your heart of hearts like, oh, this could touch a nerve with the fanboys and become like just a cause celebrity? I guess, but again this was like, it just felt what's

right. Right. For the story and the idea that Superman doesn't kill is a it's not canon in the comic books. I mean, it's like it's this idea that came out later and it just felt um the whole the whole point it was this is a story about him

becoming Superman and understanding uh the import of of who and what he is and what it means to the world and and and stumble and and grappling with this and so um and and then having done that deciding I can't, I have to make sure that that just never happens again in any possible way. And so I think that the, look, people can debate and debate whether or not we should have done it. But I felt for that story that we were telling, and Chris felt the same, so did Zach, that that was the right way to go, which was a much more air quotes, realistic take on Superman. Right. And, you know, there's a scene I wrote that never made it into the movie. It was a flashback with Jonathan Kent in which Jonathan is taking Clark out hunting.

And they kill a deer. Clark, I think he's like 12 fires. And he misses. So he doesn't miss. He hits the deer, but it's not a kill shot. and the deer's suffering and his father has to finish the deer off. And it's, and young Clark is incredibly shaken by it.

And they have this conversation about the responsibility of taking a life. And I just felt we had to cut for time, also for budget. And I've always wished that scene could have made in the movie because I felt like that was also a bit of a tee up into what happens. Thematically, what's going on. Totally.

Exactly. Are you, in retrospect, of course, then you collaborate on BVS, and a lot of the fans, you know, there's a lot of dialogue about like what went down with Cavill and the run of him and Superman, and I think a lot of us felt like, oh, where was that solo Superman sequel?

Like, we always wanted it. In retrospect, I don't know, it's easy to say this now, but should there have been a solo Superman story before BVS? Was there a rush to kind of throw too many characters in there? I think I think I think so. And I just think I know the pressure that we were getting from Warner Brothers was just we need our MCU. We need our MCU.

And I was one of the people that was just saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's not run before we walk. Like, hold on, hold on, hold on. Like they were very methodical in the way we built it. We just can't jump, you know, into all of these things. But the other thing that was really difficult all that time is, you know, there was this revolving door of executives, both with Warner Brothers and D.C. And it just felt like every 18 months, someone knew would come in and someone knew would come in and someone knew would come in.

And we were just getting whiplash. And then just, and every new person that would come in, like, we're going to go bigger. And I remember at one point, the person that was run for others at the time had done this big release where they had pitched like these 20 movies over the next 10 years that like none of which were written yet. And like it was just so crazy how much sort of architecture was just being built, you know, on air. And I just, for me that some some of the stuff that was going on in that time was just an example of like, this is not how you built. the house right you know was was there a was there a superman story in your head that you would have yeah there there there there was and and uh but it's what it should it could have you know anything you can tease of what it was no i just think it's bad form in that case it's like

it's one thing to talk about a scene that i wrote for a movie that did come out but i don't know i just think it's all good form so what's what's it like now looking kind of from the outside in You've kind of made seemingly a conscious effort. You're still working with some ginormous IP. We're about to talk about foundation. But you've made so much of your career in superheroes and comic books. Do you feel kind of like, have you cleansed yourself? Are you like, I have some distance.

I can watch others kind of play with the toys now? Yeah, yeah. And look, I have three sons. We don't, they didn't even know what I did for a living for a while. We don't have any stuff from my film or TV shows in the house. It wasn't until we were filming Man of Steel. that my two oldest son, they went, they were on set for some of it, that they even knew what I did. Dad would just go away and they had no idea. And we walked a man of steel and they were like,

wait, what? What do you do? You know, but they, of their own accord, became huge sort of Marvel and DC comic book readers. And it just so happens that their dad knows a shit ton about all that stuff. And so they lucked out in that regard. And I personally, I don't ever want to touch a superhero movie

or TV show ever again. Because I've just done it too much. I think I did it too much. But I can absolutely enjoy it as a fan with them. I mean, we see all the movies. We see all the MCU movies, all the MCU shows.

And, and you know, some we like and we don't, we dissect them. And that's, it's just funny because they just came to all of that stuff, you know, on their own. And my, it's also interesting, like my 13-year-old is reading a lot of the current, for whatever reason, a lot of the current DC checks. And I'm just way out of touch on all of that. Like, I just, like, completely out of touch. In this case, sometimes he's asking me about characters that didn't exist 10 years ago.

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Please play responsibly. I'm Amy Nicholson, the film critic for the LA Times. And I'm Paul Shear, an actor, writer, and director. You might know me from the League, Veep, or my non-eligible for Academy Award role in Twisters. We come together to host Unspooled, a podcast where we talk about good movies, critical hits. And favorites, must season, in case you missed them. We're talking Parasite the Home Alone. From Greece to the Dark Night.

So if you love movies like we do, come along on our cinematic adventure. Listen to Unspooled wherever you get your podcast. And don't forget to hit the follow button. Okay, it's official. We are very much in the final sprint to election day. And face it, between debates, polling releases, even court appearances. It can feel exhausting, even impossible. to keep up with. I'm Brad Milkey. I'm the host of Start Here, the daily podcast from ABC News,

and every morning my team and I get you caught up on the day's news in a quick, straightforward way that's easy to understand with just enough context so you can listen, get it, and go on with your day. So, kickstart your morning, start smart with Start Here and ABC News, because staying informed shouldn't feel overwhelming. all right let's talk a little foundation because this show man okay so you just wrapped up your second season and i can only imagine this is such a big swing it's like all the stuff the cliches are true i think what they've said about this for years this is what we're looking at stuff that was written in the 40s and 50s but it is kind of the granddaddy it's azimov it's it's a touchstone for everybody

that grew up with sci-fi and it's been tried never brought to the screen but but certainly developed many different times, including, I think, you dabbled with it a few different times. Almost. I was offered it a couple of times, yeah. So is this a case of like it all lining up? Like, look, we have the technology. Apple has the money and wherewithal to devote time to this. The audience is primed for complex, dense sci-fi.

It feels like for any number of those reasons, even 10 years ago, it wasn't the time for foundation. And maybe even for yourself, you weren't in a place to dive into something like this. Am I onto something? I think you're 100% accurate, all of those things. I think when we started developing it about five years ago, before they sort of, you know, during the streaming boom and in the shadow of Game of Thrones and all of these streamers wanted their Game of Thrones, their big whole genre show. And we'd seen with Game of Thrones that there was an appetite for these big kind of novelistic shows that the audience might have the patience and that they could sustain a lot of characters. I think I had turned 50 and I was a more

mature, seasoned writer, I don't know that I would have been as adept at doing that I not had that experience with Chris Nolan. And I worked with James Cameron, one on a film that was made, one on a film that has yet to be made. And so I think my approach to storytelling matured a lot because of my collaborations with Chris and James. And then in the case of Apple, it felt like the right project for Apple. It felt like a good fit. And there was someone at Apple, Matt Churness, who just loved, loved foundation. And he had actually called me up. And when he'd heard that Scott Anderson and I had acquired the rights to it, and we're going to be pitching it, they hadn't announced that he was going to Apple yet. And he said, I can't tell you where I'm

going, but we're the right place for it. I promise you. And they really have that. And so, just all of those things, you know, came together. What is, when you return to the text, like, what does Asimov give you and what does Asimov not give you? Clearly, he wasn't writing, like, as many authors do now, in the back of the brain, this is going to be a movie, a TV show. That was clearly not. He wasn't even writing that it was going to be a novel.

Maybe a play. Yeah. That it was going to be collected. Right. He was just trying to make a paycheck, any paycheck, really young, 21, 22, just pitching crazy stories to Campbell at, and, you know, he was just desperate to sell anything and stop working at his parents' candy store. And so that old one. And then his editor said, give me another one. And so he was just building this in real time. He was making it up as

he was going along. And it's not really until you get to the, third novel, that it's even a proper novel. And he was revising his mythology as he went, and then in the prequels and sequels, retconning his mythology and combining it with the I-Robot stuff. So Chris calls it interrogating the text, right? You have to, like, you read it, you reread it,

you try to distill what is it about foundation that makes it so seminal? A lot of the ideas have been stripped mined by Star Wars and Dune and other things that had come after it, even though foundation had come first. And so the first thing you have to decide is what's still unique about it? And then how can we take something that might be old hat like a Galactic Empire and make it seem fresh, even though people are so familiar with it in Star Wars. And then you have to look, because we're all victims of circumstance,

we're all victims of our time. So Asimov was writing the foundation stories in the shadow of World War II, you know, as Jews that had been forced to leave Europe with the fear of Nazi Germany rising up again in this, you know, the whole new world order changing. And that, when we were developing it five years ago, that was just not the world we lived in anymore. So you have to then figure out a way to make it relevant. And since all science fiction is about today and it's a mirror shining back on society, you think, can I update the metaphors that we're interrogating?

And so when we started developing the show, and I initially developed it with Josh Friedman, we said, well, what's happening? Who are the big, you know, pressure points? Okay, it's, it's me too. It's the seeming fall of, you know, it's Black Lives Matters, it's the seeming fall of the white male patriarchy. It's the rise of nationalism. It's Trumpism.

And some people say, oh, my God, this show is woke. This show is woke. And it's like, no, no, that's just the stuff that's happening now. I'm looking at my window. Sorry. Yeah, yeah, exactly. that's just what this it's it's climate change it's just all the shit people are arguing about it's just undeniable that that's that's top of mind and so the show then has to interrogate that because that's

what's going to make it relevant in even if we're not standing on soapbox and we're preaching about this stuff it's in the background and people it's it's relevant in ways that people might not sometimes they're conscious of it, sometimes they're not conscious of it, which is makes it resonant and makes it evergreen. And go ahead. No, I was going to say, and yet as you interrogate and kind of like imbue the show with all these issues, then all everybody wants to talk about is Lee Pace fighting naked in the opening scene of season two.

Now, how aware are you, David? You're a smart man. You know what the people want. You're thinking. 100%. I was the one that suggested to Apple that we released that scene early. And then, I mean, I asked Lee if he was okay with it first, and he was. But that, I felt, you know, season one was fairly well regarded,

but I think a lot of people considered it maybe too highbrow or too dense. By the way, I happen to think season two is also pretty highbrow. But it was intentional that I wanted to broaden the palate and have more fun and say that it was a big tent. and come out of the gate with some scenes and some characters that having seen season one a foundation they might not expect. But you also alluded to

not exactly the drawbacks of Asma but one of the other challenges was Asimov is not particularly in the first few books. He wasn't known largely for creating very memorable or very deep characters. He was interested in

exploring ideas and having his characters largely be mouthpieces for these ideas. But largely people tune into a dramatic show on television for characters, not for ideas. Certainly the characters are first and foremost. You have to care about who lives or dies. And the fact that people are debating whether or not we should have killed Salver, whether or not we should have killed Bell. I mean, that's the bread and butter of television storytelling, right? It's fundamentally soap opera.

And someone once said that in movies, characters solve other people's problems. In TV, they try to solve their own problems or explore their own problems. And I think that's kind of a truism. So one of our big challenges was figuring out how can we take some of these characters that are relative to cardboard or ciphers that don't have much of an interior life and how can we flesh them out and make them characters that you care about? about and that you're invested in whether or not they live or die. So the, uh, it's said that you pitched Apple basically eight seasons, 80 hours.

As we speak today, season three hasn't officially been green lit. There are high hopes based on the reaction, fingers crossed. Is that still kind of the plan? Are there scenarios where this like, if they only give you five, you'll figure it out? Or is it like, I need, I need my eight. I need my 80 guys. At the start of it, I was like, I need my eight. I need my 80.

But now knowing that it takes at least a year and a half to make it. You shouldn't do the math on your. Yeah, yeah, I am. I am. And it's really hard. And so if you were to ask me today, look, it's, I've got a lot of wind of myself with the reaction of season two. But if you were, you know, depending on the week, I might say, I don't think I can survive past season four. Just, so it depends. So what I'm hoping to do no matter what is end the show, you know, on its own merits and bring it in for a soft landing because I hate when the brugs pulled out from under me as a viewer.

So I think I can do a satisfying off ramp at the end of four, one at the end of six and one at the end of eight. And I'm just hoping that, you know, if the show keeps going in my relationship with Apple is in the place, if they can give me enough, you know, then we can have a conversation about like when you want this thing to end hypothetically so that that, you know, I've enough time to turn

the battleship. Fair enough. So I've taken a lot of your time. Let me end with some semi-Rapid fire stuff. Sure. Wait, waiting if you want. Just curious, your take, having done so much with Batman, did you like Matt Reeves' take on Batman? Did he find a different angle in?

Loved it. Yep. James Cameron, you mentioned. Am I ever going to see Fantastic Voyage? It's funny. I was literally just talking to Louis Latterier about this. He's, like, desperate to still get involved. So I developed a script for Fantastic Voyage with James' producer that Caramel DeOro was going to direct. And it got fairly far along.

We were deep into prep. And then it kind of all fell apart. That's a really cool script. And it was a great experience. What do you make of these arguments that crop up every so often when we talk to the luminaries, the filmmaker luminaries that kind of denigrate the comic book films as kind of not worthy of discussion among the great films? Does it bother you? I'm not going to even name names, but you know what I'm talking about. I think it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous.

Comics are also a mature art form now. And yes, it's still dominated by superheroes. But, you know, like I, my family loved Nimona, you know, that there was a really successful film, you know, based on a really wonderful comp. And I'm still waiting to see a Mouse Guard movie or a MouseGuard TV show, which is another wonderful comic. And it's in art form just like any other medium. And so I think that's a bit short-sighted.

Line you've written that's been quoted the most in your just day-to-day life. take a certain pleasure when you hear something from Blade or Dark Knight or Batman, put it back to you? I mean, sometimes my kids will coach stuff not even knowing that I've written, which is crazy. The problem, here's the problem with the Batman stuff. I don't remember in some cases who wrote what, right? You know, I think that some other fuckers always want to ice skate uphill is certainly a line that's quoted back to me, which was kind of,

hybrid between Wesley and myself, you know, but it is, it is funny to see things that I've been involved in or written lines for like show up as these, not just a meme, like a third generation meme where people don't even realize like where it came from. And that is, that just makes me feel really old. Do you have a favorite like kind of geek out moment on set when you like seen someone in costume, some surreal moment. You're like, These are the characters I grew up seeing I've written them into the situation and now it's happening in real life in front of me. Yeah, I mean, I can, I can cite two specifically that I had real out-of-body experiences from, you know, one was the first day that we were filming Jared Harris, welcoming Gail into his office and showing her the prime radiant because I had first read Foundation when I was 13 and that is, you know, largely.

I mean, that seemed hues relatively closely to the story. And so the fact that I was doing that, my father gave me the book, I'd never imagine I would become a screenwriter,

director, a producer, and that Jared Harris was my first choice for Harry Selvin, and we got him. I mean, that was really busy. But another moment when we were filming Man of Steel,

we were in Illinois, and we were in a cornfield, and we were filming one of the flashback scenes with Jonathan and Clark Kent. And it was magic hour. And we were worried about trampling the corn. So we just had a very, there were 30 people like out in the corn and there weren't any chairs. And there really wasn't anywhere to sit. And we were in between setups. And I was sitting there with Kevin Costner. And we were sitting in the bed of his pickup truck, just he and I as a Sunday,

was going down in this cornfield and I was just, fuck. I'm like sitting here with Kevin Costner, any cornfield in Illinois, and I'm from Michigan. So we were like three hours from where I grew up doing a Superman and we're just talking about life and shooting the shit. And it was just, yeah, I have auto body experiences all the time. Amazing. And last thing for you. Okay, I'm going to give you the case to one genre kingdom that you've touched virtually

everything but you know harry potter game of thrones star wars star trek david goyer godspeed with this entire franchise you can do what you want with it what do you take i wrote an i wrote an unproduced star wars movie that german del toro was going to direct stop it wait wait wait wait david i have six follow-ups what yeah yeah when would tell me something that was about four years ago and then i have i also wrote an unproduced. I have a scriptment for a, an origins of the Jedi movie, also for Star Wars that I wrote for them,

that took place 25,000 years before the first Star Wars film. So that would have been, I got to do the Vader-immortal VR thing, but dabbling in Star Wars, you know, would have been fun for me. What happened? Guillermo and Star Wars and you seems like a no-brainer to Greenlight.

what happened? There was just a lot of behind stuff going on at Lucas film at the time, but it's a cool script. You got Garemer on the show? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You'll actually put that up. You have to ask him about that next time he's on.

It's a cool script. There's a lot of cool artwork from it that was produced. Oh, my God. All right. I'll pass you my info. You can feel free to send it over anytime you want, just for fun. David Goyer, as you can tell, I'm such a fan. I've watched your work.

It's part of my life the last 25 years. So it's a real pleasure to kind of like dip into it. Congratulations on foundation. I mean, if folks haven't checked this out, what are you waiting for? This is 20 hours of ginormous, big, entertaining. Yes, it's heady at times, but this is entertaining stuff from the master. Isaac Asimov filtered through the master. That is, Mr. David Goyer.

Congratulations. And I hope they let you make a lot more of these, man. Me too. And thank you for having me. It's been really fun. Thanks, ma'am. And so ends another edition of Happy, Sad, Confused. Remember to review, rate, and subscribe to this show on iTunes

or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm a big podcast person. I'm Daisy Ridley, and I definitely wasn't pressure to do this by Josh. Goodbye, Summer Movies, Hello Fall. I'm Anthony Devaney. And I'm his twin brother, James. We host Raiders of the Ler, Lost Podcast, the ultimate movie podcast, and we are ecstatic to break down late summer and

early fall releases. We have Leonardo DiCaprio leading a revolution in one battle after another, Timothy Salome playing power ping pong in Marty Supreme. Let's not forget Emma Stone and Jorgos Lanthamos' Bougonia. Dwayne Johnson, he's coming for that Oscar in The Smashing Machine, Spike Lee and Denzel teaming up again, plus Daniel DeLuis' return from retirement. There will be plenty of blockbusters to chat about, too. Tron Ares looks exceptional, plus Mortal Kombat 2, and Edgar writes,

The Running Man starring Glenn Powell. Search for Raiders of the Lost podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube.