House of R - The ‘Superman’ Deep Dive

Episode Date: July 13, 2025

We’ve called in the Justice Gang! Mal is joined by Van Lathan and Sean Fennessey to dive deep into James Gunn’s 'Superman.' They delve into their thoughts on the movie, James Gunn’s vision for the character, David Corenswet as Superman/Clark Kent, the heavy amount of themes in the film, the world-building of the new DCU, and more! Also, The Ringer-Verse is going to Comic-Con! We'll be hosting our very own panel at 6 p.m. PT on Thursday, July 24, at Grand 10 & 11, Marriott Marquis San Diego Marina for all badge holders. Intro (00:00)Opening Snapshot (09:53)Initial Thoughts (21:23)David Corenswet as Superman/Clark Kent (48:34)Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane (57:27)The Themes of 'Superman' (01:01:51)Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor (01:16:29)Clark’s Parents (01:29:37)Krypto! (01:44:25)Mr. Terrific and the Justice Gang (01:49:14)Jimmy Olsen and Friends (02:01:17)Post-Credit Scenes (02:06:32) Hosts: Mallory RubinGuests: Van Lathan and Sean FennesseyProducers: John Richter and Eduardo OcampoSocial: Jomi AdeniranAdditional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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on Paramount Plus. Greetings. And welcome to House of Our, a ringerverse podcast on the Ringer Podcast Network. I am Mallory Rubin, and today I have called in the justice gang. Oh, wow. Van Lathen is here. Sean Fennacy is here. We have gathered, not in Metropolis, but here at the Ringer, to talk about Superman, James Guns Superman.

Joanna is not here. We miss Joe. We love Joe. We love Joe. Joe will be back. We'll be doing it. in our inception anniversary pod in a week or two. We will be back soon, but today we are here.

Before we get to it, before we talk about Superman, the Midnight Boys have already revealed this, but the Ring or Verse crew will be at Comic-Con. This is monumental. I cannot wait. I've never been to Sandy Angica. What is Comic-Con? You're not invited.

Everyone else is invited, but you're not allowed to come. You're not allowed to come. That's exciting. Yeah. What are the panels going to be? You guys are hosting a panel? There's a Thursday panel. Thursday at San Diego Comic-Con, 6 p.m., Grand 10 and 11, the Marriott Marquis, San Diego Marina. And then, if you have a badge to Comic-Con and you come to that amazing, great. We would love to have you fill the room, please. We don't want to be embarrassed. Yes, please. Whether or not you are attending the panel. If you attended the panel, you can also come to this next thing. If you're not going to Comic-Con and you're not going to the panel, you can come to this next thing. We're doing a meet-up. We're hanging out. Yeah.

Wow. Come to gas lamp. Meet and greet. Pretty risky, guys. 30 p.m. Gotta say. Pretty risky. Whiskey girl.

Whiskey girl. Whiskey girl. Whiskey girl. I looked at it. I looked it up online. It's like a popping place where things happen. Whiskey girl was also your AOL handle back in the day. Was it not?

Yeah. There you go. Still is. It's great. That's exciting. It is. I have never been to Comic Con. When I was a younger man, I desperately wanted to go.

Yeah. Why didn't you? Why didn't you? allow yourself to experience that joy. They didn't want me to be great. You know, they didn't want me, and then I got old, and then I got bitter and cynical, and then I got less excited about going.

What sort of con would be most year liking now? Scorsesee Con. Well, that doesn't exist, but perhaps I should start it. What about Santa Con? Oh. Hmm. I have a young child. Won Soto Khan.

Wouldn't we like to see a thousand Santa Claus. Different types of Santas that are going on. Interesting. A lot of different types of cons. Nothing about the Mets. You know, they lost a double-headed of my Orioles the other day, yesterday. Thanks for inviting me on the,

day after that happened. Really interesting timing, Mallory. Worked out great for me. No, I like to go to CinemaCon. Yes. Which is an actual event that happens in April. Every year in Vegas where they reveal all the movies, not just the movies in the worlds of fandom.

So, uh, interesting energy from him so far. That's, so the day, yeah, he's on his, he's shunning it up. Yeah. Um, was now, was cinema con the thing that it was the day after when I embarrassed myself in front of Jerry Bruckheimer? Yes. It was. We were texting while I was at CinemaCon. CinemaCon featured prominently in

the studio. That's my experience with CinemaCon. Yeah. It's a wonderful event, frankly. I'd love for you guys to come next year. I would love to. Is that you? That's a formal invitation? I'll go. I don't run the event, but I would love to be there in Vegas with you. And I'm sure they would love to have you. Sounds great. Hosts of successful podcasts that cover movies. There you go. Consider us in. You're still not allowed to come to Comic Con with us,

though. Did you buy Comic Con and now determine who came and can't go? What did just show up? Lex Luther. That would be so dope. What if I just asked a question, like, during the panel? Yeah. You know? Like the way that in mall rats, you guys see mall, no, not mall, chasing, chasing Amy. How dare you?

Sorry. So in chasing Amy, when the black comic book writer is presenting his like Malcolm X style comic book. And Jason Lee stands up and starts asking questions about his perspective on race, what if I did that to the Midnight Boys? I would love it. The crowd will go crazy too. Eric Voss might do it. Why don't you beat him to the punch?

Eric Voss of new rock stars. Of new rock stars fame. So you're saying that's my competition. Yeah. How would you compare your in a press conference asking a hard-hitting journalistic approach to everything that we saw from the Daily Planet Crew in this movie? I'm going to be more like that guy who asked Caitlin Clark that really rude and appropriate question and then got fired from whatever Indianapolis newspaper.

Done. Yeah, that's what I'm going to do. I'm against her. Now, I would say this. I've heard this. We know. I'll say this, though. we have to, before we even get into the guts of the film here,

yeah. Actual journalism happening in the Daily Planet again is something that's very awesome to see. Straight up in the CMS. We're in the CMS in this movie. Efficient CMS back end. I do have some notes on the editing process. Perry takes what appeared to be a 0.3 second look says it's perfect published. We call that the fantasy edit.

That's something I've been known to do from time to time. No, it was real CR, I am to the desk to me. You got to explain that. That's Chris Ryan writing a blog, sending it to the copy desk, not through an editor, and then putting in the entire production slack, I am to the desk. No notes.

Would not accept notes. Oh, wow. It's the best. But you know what? When you have penned blogs, such as the sea is dope, which of course was a Grantland blog, not a Ringer blog, but lives in lore.

Yeah. Then you get to do that. Okay, we are here to talk about Superman. Here's the spoiler warning before we get into it. There's not like a pre-spoiler chat. Spoilers the entire time. Anything that happened in the new film Superman is on the table today. If it has ever happened in a prior Superman movie or television show or comic book, it could come up today.

Now, I don't know you, I don't know how deep we're going to get into the other films. I think they'll come up occasionally as like references or touchstones, but we're not going to dive too deep into those prior movies because he's what you guys are doing. Monday on the big picture, Van and Rob Mahoney are joining me to rank all of the Superman movies in the afterglow of James Guns Superman, which will be fun. So we have been re-watching, so we are ready to talk about the history of this character on film. They're so top of mind right now to me. I cannot wait to see where Mahoney stands on these films. He's going to have some hot takes, you know it.

Yeah. He's going to come in and say, Quest for Peace number one. Batman v. We're not doing that one. It's all on the table. I think it's eight movies, Superman. movies including two different versions of Superman 2 and two different versions of of Justice League.

Oh, then two different versions of Batman versus Superman, the regular one and the ultimate cut. You know, I've never seen the ultimate cut. The ultimate cut. You should... Three hours? Sean, you got to watch it. I have my child's birthday party this weekend. There is a zero percent chance I'll be watching that.

I'm telling you, though. Watched last weekend. Watch them all last weekend. It's actually, as the theatrical release makes no sense. It just doesn't make any sense. They took too much out of the story, right? Okay. But the ultimate cut does.

Is the Martha thing still in it? It is. Okay. It remains the crucial pivot point of the story. And it's not going to work for me. Maybe I'll check it out. Can I watch it at 3x speed while I get the vibe? Probably.

I wouldn't recommend it. No, I wouldn't recommend it. Do you ever watch movies at an accelerated place? That would be sacrilege to you. But I would for Zach Snyder. Jeez. Sorry, Zach. I don't, you know.

Sheesh. Not my guy. Although Dawn of the Dead, written by James Gunn, I will ride for. Don of the Dead. He's got a couple of base knocks. 300 is cool. 300 is cool. Yeah, enjoy that.

What about Army of the Dead? I thought it was okay. Okay. I haven't seen that one. I would have liked to have seen it in a movie theater. Sucker Punch? It's a no for me, dog. As Randy Jackson used to say.

So you guys are going to be ranking both Superman 2 and the Donner Cut individually. Yes. Because there are different movies. Very different. Love the Donner Cut. Love the Donner Cut. No spoilers here. Right.

Okay. Okay. All right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got a sneak peek of Vann's power ranking last night at the movie theater, but I won't reveal it. Wow. So you guys saw this the second time. We did. I just, I happened to walk over in a very authentic moment to where Van and my husband Adam were talking about the director cuts. Yeah. Inspired by the Donner Cup, but then it just became, I walked over when you guys were talking about the Kingdom of Heaven steel book director's cut that Adam had just procured and he's very excited about. I'm happy for him that costs roughly $500, so I hope that's okay for your bank again. So it's hard to find right now. He's too very excited about it.

Adam had a very successful call out on me. Okay. I was saying it's a general rule of mine that I normally don't like director's cuts that much. Right. Okay. Right. And I basically said that the Donner cut

is one of the only ones that I really like. And then he just started popping off ones that are good. Yeah. Blade Runner. We talked about that. Yeah, we talked about and then he brings up Kingdom of Heaven, which is the all-time this director's cut is so much better than the theatrical release of the movie that they should have just left the fucking guy alone.

Yeah, but it was three and a half hours. I get it. I know they were afraid of it. But he was set out to make this epic and it was this big type of you couldn't make it smaller. be big. They would have let Cecil B. DeMille do it. So why wouldn't they let Ridley Scott? Three and a half hours is the length of a normal podcast as far as I'm concerned. And so I don't see the problem. That's right. You'd be right at home with seven-hour films in the theaters. I don't see the problem. All right. Before we get into our discussion of the movie, the plot of the film, the approach, James Gunn is a filmmaker, the characters, the performers, all of it. Let's just do a little opening snapshot table setting to give everybody like the amuse-boosh.

a little taste of how everybody felt about this and what you brought in to the film. So this is not a long movie. This is a two hour and nine minute pretty tight movie that includes the credits, the mid credits, the post credits. This movie costs $225 million to make. Box office tracking. We should say we're banking this pot. We're recording this on a Friday. So we don't know yet how much money this movie made on opening weekend.

If you check out the reports, it's like projecting tracking anywhere from 100, to 150 domestically, but the word of mouth is good. The reviews are good. It seems like we're trending toward the higher end of that. On the big picture, which we recorded yesterday morning, no, Wednesday morning. I predicted 150. Yeah. Domestic.

Domestic. Shit. Because I, one, I feel strongly about the movie. And I think I have not met a person yet who hates it. Yeah. And so I think that word of mouth will be really strong. And also, as you guys know, movies are going crazy. Movies are back.

Yeah, they're back. Movies are back. Rotten Tomatoes, deeply flawed, imperfect metric. At the time of the recording, we're sitting at like an 82 for the tomato meter for the critics, 95 audience score. Like, people are having a blast at the movie. Okay. Orient the bad babies. Orient the house of our viewers and listeners.

What is your quickly, what is your history with Superman movies? You go first. Superman is a character. James Gunn is a filmmaker. What was your, before you like say how you felt about the movie, what was your, your hype level and relationship to the property and the component parts, like coming into the film. So my hype level was terrified.

Yeah. Terrified that the movie would fail. Superman is a formative character for me. Superman and Luke Skywalker, those are the characters that expanded my world. And those are things that sort of shaped my childhood. And it was the way that I kind of understood comic book storytelling. Yeah. villain, hero, people in between,

how do you manage it? So every iteration of Superman that has ever existed, I've invested. If he's been animated, if he's been in a movie, if he's been in a television show, if he's been in a comic book, always. And I was afraid, I talked about this, like a little embarrassingly on The Midnight Boys,

but I talked about this, I was afraid that Superman was gone forever. Yeah. Because... This was not embarrassing. this was extremely, extremely moving and sweet. Oh, thank you. But I was afraid that Superman was gone

because it is a tricky character in a complex time. And no one seemed to be able to do it. Singer was way too traditional to the point to where he was on screen, fawning over Donner Superman to the point that he didn't tell his own story. And then Snyder was so aggressive with the character that he lost what makes Superman Superman. It's like, could anybody do this anymore? And I had seen some things on television that I liked.

I like Superman and laws. I like my adventures of Superman. So I'm like, he still has a place. But guns, trailers, and the first stuff, they did not sell me that this movie was going to be a successful telling of the story. So that's where I was. Terrified. Yeah.

And legitimately 10, 15 minutes in, I was like, I think we got something. As far as James Gunn, I love James Gunn. He is the type of filmmaker to me sometimes that I go, huh, there's a lot happening. Oh, yeah. There's a lot of jokes. It's a lot of stuff. But that's just him. He's earnest.

He's heartfelt. He's almost kind of akin to a throwback guy that didn't factor in the cynicism of the audience. just made an earnest, heartfelt movie. And here it is. It's the Monster Squad. Either you believe that these kids are plucky and they're going to beat these monsters or you don't. We can't make it. We're not going to tramp down the cuteness.

We're not going to tamp down any of that. We're going forward. And that's what made them the right guy to direct this movie. Right. What about you? Gun, Superman movies, Superman the character. What did you bring into the theater? Quickly, Superman the character, he only exists to me for the most part as a movie.

movies and television character. And in the 1990s, the first two Superman movies and three a little bit, in part because of their presence on HBO, were just huge for me. I watched them over and over again as an adolescent. And I also watched Lois and Clark on ABC. And I love that TV show. And that was probably the first romantic adult TV show I really got interested in because it used Superman as kind of like the entry point to that kind of a story. Also, Terry Hatcher, dear God. She was number one

An unbelievable human A meta human to me And so I like Superman the character But I never read the comic books With the exception of the death of Superman moment Which was huge in comic books at the time And if you didn't read it, it was strange And didn't watch Smallville

I didn't watch the recent series That you're talking about, the Superman and Lois show I despise Man of Steel I am Mixed negative on Batman v Superman And while I think the Snyder cut is interesting, I don't think it's successful. Right.

So you're lower on Man of Steel than Batman versus Superman? I think it is a complete misunderstanding and rejection of the character. Like a complete zero for me. It is like, it is one of the worst movie-going experiences I have had this century. Singer Superman. I think what you said is exactly right. That's a tough movie.

I think it's exactly right, which is that it is trying so hard to just be a continuation of something that happened 35 years in the, or 25 years in the past, that it has no soul, it has no spirit. Yeah. And it's just actively confusing in terms of like the continuity.

Yeah. Yeah. So I just, I just didn't really, I don't really care about Superman that much anymore. You know, he just hasn't really been a part of my life for a long time in movies and television. And this movie becoming this critical decision point in all superhero storytelling is really interesting to me

as someone who has had a real, you know, the pendulum has swung way back in the direction of struggling with almost anything like this. With the exception of Thunderbolts, it's been years since I've actually liked one of these movies. Revisionist history, you famously liked Quantummania. Infamously. It was not bad.

I'm on the not bad corner. I still don't get the overwhelming hate for the movie. I don't want to go off on a tangent. I think the camel's back broke when that movie came out. And then there was like an overreaction to it. Yeah, I think there is. Anyway, we can come back to that because actually there's a segment of this movie that reminds me a little bit of quantumania. I know which one you're talking about.

Sure. Anyhow, quickly, I just think it's an interesting referendum as a close movie watcher. It was very extremely relevant to the summer to the future of Warner Brothers, which I'm really interested in. I'll just say right now Warner Brothers is now like six for six and is on like one of the great winning streaks in recent movie studio history. I wanted to explore this with you. I know we don't have a ton of time. How did this happen? How did they fucking get the fucking train back on the tracks with original stuff, with IP stuff, with stuff that appeals to people that, like, what happened?

I mean, Mike DeLuca is one of the best studio chiefs of the last 40 years. And he's also one of the only studio chiefs who started out as a creative. He was a screenwriter who worked on horror movies. He actually understands and likes artists and lets them do a lot of the things that they want to do. That's a whole other pod that we could talk about. Okay, yeah, for sure. You know, part of what is so special, I think, about this Superman, I'm like, this is. James Gunn's Superman. This is his

vision of the character that feels very uncompromised. And Gunn is a director that I like and have always liked. When I was a teenager, I also discovered trauma. You know, he wrote a trauma movie very famously, and that was where he got his roots going. I think he is also really the only good filmmaker who has entirely devoted himself to superhero storytelling. There's not a lot of film make, most filmmakers, they'll make a superhero movie to get their small indie made or their drama with a movie star. No, he's like, this is my life.

This is what I do. It's the only thing I do. And since Super, it's the only thing he has done. Yeah. I appreciate that because this genre needs good filmmakers. Yeah, I think that connects to Vance point about the earnestness is obviously in terms of the text of each story, but also just more broadly the relationship to this type of genre storytelling, like, period. And that was part of why I was so excited for the movie.

Like, I think, you know, I'm very excited to listen to the Superman Ranking episode. I genuinely can't wait. I recently revisited them all. And, you know, my relationship to Superman films is that some of them are really amazing and iconic, and some of them are terrible. Yeah. Like the variance is extreme. I love James Gunn's movies. Like, I love The Guardian's franchise.

I really liked his Suicide Squad movie. And so in terms of like the pairing of Gunn and Superman, but also what this is, moment carried on its cape for like the dawn of the gun saffron DCU given where we've been with Marvel, given where we've been with DC. It's such a massive moment. And so like, you know, I took it number one overall in the hype draft that we did for the year. Like I've been really looking forward to it. And I had a sort of odd experience where conceptually, intellectually, emotionally, like, this is going to be the moment in our universe for the year. I can't wait.

It's going to be good. I will not stop doubting that it's good until I am finished watching it and have a reason to doubt it. And then as each trailer came out, I felt a little more nervous than I had before. Some of it was, I think, just like the centering in the trailers of the, like, this was filmed to be watched in 3D, like twirly, whirly, popping in the center of your tea. I was like, I'm a little worried about

why the green baby is swinging into the middle of the trailer like that. The teeth hitting the lens. The teeth hitting the lens. Made people go nuts. Ended up not even being a thing. But endless litigation on whether or not the teeth were hitting one of Lexus probe drones

and like, how could that happen? It's like this in the movie. Yeah, exactly. And that was what was ultimately such a relief is like the trailers, this is so often. in the case or just a collection of the first seven minutes of the movie and then a couple like set piece action sequences. I thought the movie rocked.

I loved it. I've seen it twice now. I already can't wait to see it again. I had a great time. And that conversation that we've all had for months beyond months actually at this point about like how would the gun style and sensibility pair with Superman as a character as a symbol as an ideal, I thought that those, not only did it work, I thought it was kind of magical.

Like, I thought that they unlocked and amplified something about each other. I'm excited to talk about the gun of it all with you guys more and the characters and the performances, but like broadly, what did you think about the movie? For anyone who hasn't listened to, you've done a Big Pick episode already, you've done a Midnight Boys episode already. Obviously, everyone should check them out. But if they haven't listened yet, what did you think of the film? Loved it.

Loved it. We talked about it before. there was an oh shit moment in Manistil when I realized that the movie did. I didn't hate Manistel as much as Sean did, but Manistel did not do Superman any justice at all. It was a moment where I was like, fuck, there's some feeling that you're supposed to get

from a Superman movie, and this movie is even not trying to give you that feeling or it's incapable of doing it. The most pivotal scene in the film to me is the... I guess the 10-minute scene between Superman and Lewis where they're talking. And you go, he doesn't know who he is.

He doesn't quite get it yet. He's not, he understands his strength, but he doesn't know who he is yet. That's intriguing. It's intriguing to take a character with that much power, with that backstory, and put him in a situation where he's questioning himself and there is so much happening in his world.

And the person that is the flashpoint, the tip of the spear that's saying, hey, I don't know if you've thought about this is the person that's closest to him at this point. Right. Those are real human stakes for a superhuman character. And if you treat the character like that, you'll get a good movie

because he can do such amazing things, right? Nobody else had tried. Everybody else had made it about how fast he can fly or about the people that worship him. Never about the people that question him other than Luther, right? So I just felt like it was a re-centereding of Superman. It was cute.

It was funny. It was endearing. The movie is a testament to how deep his comic knowledge is. Oh, yeah. Because he uses characters like Metamorpho and Mr. Terrific to be really central parts of the plot. And nobody knows who those guys are. Right? It's like Guardians all over again.

It's the same. Same thing. Nobody knows who those guys are. So I just thought it was a home run. I think like we talk a lot about James Guns. quippiness and the humor and the needle drops and like obviously the punk rock text is very centered in this and I thought it was great. That specifically to me is James Gunn's superpower and I know like you guys got into this on Big Pick and on Midnight Boys like I get the sense actually that the

that's a mileage may vary for people with this movie is like did you love all of the characters or did you feel like it was too crowded too stuff that was one of the things I was most worried about just from the marketing and like the run-up to the movie, this is a fuckload of characters, not only to incorporate into a coherent story, but to feel compelled to introduce because you're launching a new cinematic universe. I thought the calibration was really expert.

This is obviously what he does to your point, beautifully in Guardians, but I think also like one of the great master strokes to this day to me of the MCU is not just bottling that in Guardians, but then putting the Guardians with Thor in Infinity War and having it working. Like create something that can actually exist and port over

to the larger tapestry that has to function. I can't confirm this though, but, you know, it's widely understood that most of those sequences in Infinity War are written by James Gunn. Because James Gun is the person who understands those characters. But this is his DCU. So he has the ability to let other people put their fingerprints on their movies and their characters and then make sure it fits together.

So I left this with like, such confidence in the thing that awaits and excitement for the thing that awaits. What did you think about the movie? And where are you, Mr. Movie, on Chapter 1, Gods and Monsters, the next few years of the dawn of the DCU? I think the movie's great. I think it's legitimately a great Superman movie, which is rare as we know. Yes. And that's exciting.

I did feel that feeling that you're describing, that kind of ephemeral, the hairs are standing up on my arms. when you hear the John Williams did sort of like alternated score and you feel, yeah all that stuff is wonderful that's his fucking music don't change the music

that's his music yeah with Superman and that's another thing that's his fucking music man Hans Zimmer is a fucking badass yeah one of the greats that's the music

yeah tweak the music put a little baby on it if you have to but don't fucking it would be interesting but that's the music it just feels right yeah

The thing that is so interesting and I don't know if successful is the right word, but so rich to me that what makes this a real New York strip steak of a movie. This is not a salad of a movie. This is a big meal of a movie is that it is going crazy with themes. There are so many ideas about decency towards one another, conflict around the world, the way that, you know, journalism and. tech and power operate the way that the United States government operates. I mean, there is some very heady stuff in this candy-colored PG-13. Parenthage? Summer Blockbuster, yes. Absolutely, found family.

Obviously, all of the ideas of immigration that Gunn has been talking about publicly, which is like legitimately in the movie, not in the movie in a fake way. Like in a significantly close to what our reality looks like. Now, my biggest quibbles are also kind of with not, what the movie is, but how it is, you know, how it is about those things is the thing that I'm still sort of sorting through. What do you mean? Speak kindly on my Superman movie. I'm guarding it close. I'm just sure. I'm, I'm... Because you think...

If I had to put a number on, this is like an eight, maybe even a nine out of ten. Oh, wow. I really, really, really like this movie. But what is it out of 12? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. But no, there are things. I wasn't invited to the midnight meter. So I, you know... There are things. There are some quibbles. Yeah, of course. You know, and it's, and your mileage may vary. I thought the same thing going into the movie.

I didn't like the trailers. At the aforementioned CinemaCon, they presented roughly like four or five minutes of the movie. Oh, interesting. And what they showed us specifically was, and this is relevant, Superman at the very beginning of the film, crash landing in Antarctica,

and then being dragged to the fortress of solitude and sort of like rebuilt by the sun by the robots. Oh, yeah, I did see that. Like when people, once again, people went nuts. And to me, it did not work. And here's why it didn't work. You did not get the title cards. You did not get that critical thing that Gunn does,

which is a really smart act of writing, which is three minutes ago, Superman lost a battle. Yeah. And as soon as that hit, I was like, let's go. Yeah. Like, I'm so excited about where we're going to go from here. But that being extricated from this clip that they showed us, I was like, I don't know about this tone.

Yeah. This kind of looks weird. Corn Sweat is down so we don't get to see him be charming in that moment of the movie. It was a weird thing to show us. So I was very nervous in the same way that you were and the same way that you were. And so to be nervous and to go into a movie with low expectations,

I felt elevated by the movie. So we're not going to get growing up in Kansas. Oh my God, I can run fast. We didn't do the origin story, but we incorporated all of those elements. Smart. There's a trick. Shout out to George Lucas

and the old sci-fi things of the past. Hey, guys, you're in the middle of this shit here. Yeah. Let us tell you. you real quick through some great right all is lost oh my god you know to me and then the whole thing Luke Skywalker has disappeared you're like shit

where is he and the movie's about to tell you that that part of it I don't know if we got to talk about that on Midnight Boys as much I said literally what you just said on big picture which I was like this is Star Wars this is what Star Wars does the first Star Wars they're like here's all this info you're kind of nervous that you have to know all this lore and then like here's Darth Vader right you're on a ship

we're going and then this is so weird this is going to sound It's so crazy, but it's also well written. 300 years. Just like, I'm like, oh, this is, I'm, yeah, it's a very clever way to, like, signal that, you're in a new cinematic universe and, like, there is going to be a shitload of mythology and lore, and it's going to, in many cases, connect to the comics canon or the prior film canon and in other ways feel really new. And I thought it had that gun shorthand of, like, I am making an unapologetically comic book

movie. that I tore open a Skittles bag and I didn't just throw it at your screen. I melted it over your screen, right? And like when that's working, it's the best, but I'm gonna like allow you to latch onto it and not get lost. And the three, the repetition of the three was so smart

and then like, yeah, you know the thing you need to know coming out of it, which is like we're meeting our hero at a low point to establish right away that he is the ideal. And this is, of course, the thing for Superman, period, no matter which creator has their hands around the character, like what he represents as a figure for people as a symbol of hope and possibility.

And I agree with you completely. Like to watch the character himself grapple with that and try to understand it with the people closest in his life. I want to go back to your points about the themes. We'll talk about that more maybe when we get to like Lex. But the micro and the macro of that, looking at that in a big way, how is the world seeing this person?

How do they accept or reject that? When do they need it? When do they fear it? and then how inside of a relationship or a family unit might you process that and think about it and wonder where it leads you? I thought was like really well calibrated. To open the movie with Superman getting his ass kicked. Right. If you're like a comic book nerd, your brain is racing right away.

You're like, how? Why? Of course, the answer is going to be his. By and by himself. Right. So this is like really smart. The only person who could beat him would be him. Yeah.

Right. But he got his ass kicked. like constantly throughout the movie and some of that is in the fights but a lot of it was like to the point about the lowest conversation like kind of forcing him to interrogate his ideas his beliefs just as the world is interrogating that

and the challenge with Superman always is the character is the most powerful is he going to be relatable and Cornswets Superman James Gunn's Superman is relatable immediately and then consistently throughout the film and that is, I think, the single hardest thing to do believably convincingly and well

with a Superman film. It's like full marks for me. I think it's part of the reason why it's been so hard to make successful versions of this story is that there's no real credible villain for Superman. He is the most powerful being on Earth. You never really feel like he's losing. So to introduce us to him helpless

just kind of changes your perception of what kind of character this is going to be. And then that, I think that escalates what you're describing, which is the personal vulnerability of the Superman character in the movie. This is the most unsure and I'm saying emo Superman we've ever had. The punk rock unsure but also certain he's right. That's like a good combo. Yeah.

I'm read a text. A friend of mine was like he didn't like the movie as much and we had a conversation with a friend from back home. He goes, got his ass with the whole time. The movie didn't really highlight his superiority. So, and my response to him is you don't want that. You don't, like, you don't, you really don't want that because they tried that. They tried a guy who, like, there's, one of the coolest scenes of the Justice League movie is at the end when Superman finally shows up and Steppenwolf swings his axe. And he doesn't realize that there's a kryptonian setting in front of him.

And the ax just sit there. Superman just looks at him like, you fucked up, right? Which is very cool. But you only want that in spots. You do not want that the entire movie. Yeah. Because it's an amusement park, right? If so, it's just, if you do it that way where nothing can touch him, where he's completely impervious to anything, then it's just watching him do a bunch of different feats.

Right. And we've seen him save planes. We've seen him fight doomsday. We've seen him. It's all back to story. It's story. It's about what you can give this character. to put him in a place where he's unsure of himself

because he is that powerful. I will say the comic book nerd in me was like, okay, so Superman gets his ass kick by the hammer of Bravia. He had no curiosity about who the hammer of bravia was, which to be honest with you, he is Superman, so if somebody whoops his ass, maybe he should want to understand. Maybe it causes an existential crisis with him.

Maybe if Clark Kent were interviewing anyone but himself. Right, he would have asked me. We'll be putting some of those journalistic chaps to use to look into that. But look, he's right back to it. He gets up and then not to dive to go forward too much. Do it. We're in the deep dive. Do it.

Lex's combat style against Superman is fucking brilliant, y'all. It's brilliant. It's brilliant to have a visual and cinematic representation. of brains over Braun to where Lex is in a room choreographing these fights with a bunch of different people running around. It puts him into action.

It makes him more than, I have a scheme. It makes him... It literalizes the puppet master quality. Absolutely. It was just a ridiculously awesome way to start and shape his character. There's also something really smart about that choice, which is that without telling us, it makes us understand that Lex is obsessed.

obsess. That he has studied him so closely that he knows, he thinks he knows his every move, which is not over-explained to us. We just get it by watching that. It's just really good comic book writing. Absolutely. Yeah, I thought that there's a lot to talk about with Lex, but I thought that, like, the choice to use Ultraman really connected a lot of the thematic

strands for him because he has to, like, basically admit to himself that the only way he can beat super, Superman is to use Superman, right? So he is inherently acknowledging the thing that we will hear in his big, like, yeah, yeah, it's my ego. Like, yeah, you make us feel weak, right? He has to acknowledge that in order to execute the plan. And then, of course, his warped psychosis is, well, I will wield that power. I will seek to control it. I will turn it into another tool.

So I thought that was really smart. And then, like, for all of his brains over bronze, speech, in the truest moment of heat of battle, what does he keep doing? It's not all of the like different, you know, 25C, 1A, 1A, 1A, 1A, 1A, 1A. He just freaking loses it. And the end of the day, he just wants to punch another dude in the face.

It's so angry that he loses it. He is overcome with rage, envy. He's the living embodiment of I fucking hate you. Yeah, that was great. Anakin was crawling or boost far. I hate you. You are my brother, Anakin.

I loved you. We can do it right of prevention. Could you guys not do a revenge of the Sith pod? Like, is there, is any pod ever not a Revenge of the Sith pod that you guys did? Why would any pod ever be anything but a revenge of the Sith? We started the ring or verse on the Ring of the Revenge of the Sims. It's like our core bond. What is you, because we're talking a little bit about the action, what does you guys think more broadly

across the movie about the set pieces about the action, the volume of the incorporation, the visual style of the filmmaking, all of it. Pretty good, I thought. I think Gunn's got like a real knack. He's got a, he's got tics. He's got recognizable, you know, slow motion pop song to reveal the balletic choreography of devastation. There's a very

exciting one of Mr. Terrific in the center of the film. Five years time is going to be on every Spotify app. Yeah. That was that was the song I went looking for afterwards. That is a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant scene right there. That was a great, great moment. I mean, it's not a Superman scene, which just maybe a

bad thing for the Superbanks scene but that was the best fight scene in the movie easily. One of my notes is like this movie needs like 10% more

Superman, particularly one unique Superman individual set piece. I agree. Nevertheless, that scene is awesome. The Hammer of Baravia

fight at the beginning is great. Kaiju stuff is also great. That was sad. That poor creature. Yeah. I think most of the final battle is also pretty special.

There's a couple things that I found a little bit CGI. You do not like. the were being sucked into the black hole on the proton river

in the pocket universe black site prison and holding the baby sequence. And then the black hole and also some of the splitting. I'm just like this is from a different era of these comic book movies. Like part of what is special

about this movie and you got you got at it with the Skittles metaphor. So many directors are afraid to embrace that color palette. I think because they feel embarrassed to be making something that looks that color. It feels unsurious.

And Snyder did this. Obviously, Nolan did this. I think it's very justified in the world of Batman, less so in other comic book storytelling. Even some of the MCU stuff is like kind of gray and brown and yellow. We need to make you believe this is real life. Yeah. And I don't want that.

That's not what this is. Totally. Like I didn't open comic books hoping to feel the experience of a wounded man. Now, you can, Logan works, right? There's like versions of it that can work. But James Gunn is so unafraid to make this movie pop. But when it slips into like you're in the pocket universe or the black hole has come to earth and everything is dark again, I'm like, I don't, that's not really what I want. I want Mr. Terrific.

That was a crying crowd. You know, doing back handsprings with his drones and eliminating mercenaries. Yeah. So for the most part, I thought the action was very, very good. You know who fucked you on that? Who fucked you on that thing to where we had to get away from it? Brian Singer. It was Joe Schumacher.

Oh. Oh, because he failed. It was candy colored. It was Batman and Robin. Too camp, too gay. It was, it was, we're playing hockey with diamonds, and this is comic bookie and everything. And everybody was like, all right, let's do this.

Let's strip it down. And part of the reason why people were a little afraid of Tim Burton's Superman, because it was like, do we totally know what audiences want in terms of our superhero movies? So let's strip it down. Let's make these movies. black it out, mute it out. Captain America goes spangly. One movie, one movie he goes spangly.

Well, two, with Avengers. And then we put him in a tactical suit, right? People, people... And it looked great. And it looked great. Like, people can't handle it. And Gun, to be honest with you, has never been afraid of it.

He's never been afraid to splash it onto the screen and make you see the colors that these superheroes were supposed to have. But when you think back on the most successful moments in the MCU. The thing I thought about watching this movie is Thor arriving in Wakanda in Infinity War.

Where he's like zooming in and he's holding the hammer. He needs the axe. Say it. Bring me Thanos. That's a great moment. Shot in daylight and there's rainbows in it. It's like it's a comic book.

He's a fucking Norse god. Don't be ashamed to do that stuff. So I think that this is a huge part of why this movie is is mostly very successful, is it totally embraces that idea. Yeah, I love that about it. And I think, like, at the end of the day, if you were just going to describe the movie, the bare bones, the skeleton of it, which characters are here?

What do they want? Like, who is the primary antagonist? It's Lex Luthor. At some point, will part of the plot hinge on whether he wants a country that he can rule over? Like, a lot of the beats are classic and have been, present and centered in more of the Superman movies than they haven't been in. But it didn't feel like rehash and reheated.

It felt so fresh. And I think a lot of it is because James Gunn is such a confident, assured filmmaker. And he's like, this is what I do. Maybe you're not going to like it, but like I definitely know what movie I'm making. And some of it feels very familiar and guardians like. But like some of it, when Superman saves the woman,

the lone woman in the car, from on the bridge from the falling building. And we get what I would describe as not a gunshot at all, but he, like, classic Superman shot. He rises in the ash and the smoke and the clouds. I got like a full body shit. Jomey laughed at me. Like, that was just incredible.

Jomi, I said it on the Midnight Boys. Jomey laughed at me because we were in the theater and he rized up and I went, oh my God. It was amazing. And Jomey laughed because he, rise up. Hey, I'm beautiful. Rise. I'm here. Everything's going to be okay. It's Superman. Are you okay? Cool. I got to fly away and do more stuff.

It's like an erogenous zone. If you're like, oh, you just like touched my spot. You're like, oh, that's a Superman moment. You have the like the punk rock, you know, everything with crypto, who I can't believe we've gone this long without talking about, picking up and making sure the little squirrel is safe. you know, punk rocker at the end over the final sequence of the movie

like all the things they feel so specific to gun but none of that came at expense of understanding the thing that people love about the character which is a moment like that and the ability to bridge what is classic, what is sacred with what is going to be like my spin and my presentation I thought was like

really, really great and part of the reason that it not only worked so well but like it's such a confident starting point for like all the other films. To ask you guys a question, when you were watching the movie now that you've seen it twice, you've seen it. How much of it do you feel like, if any,

was a reaction to the most recent depictions of Superman that we've got on screen? Like, there are a lot of saves in this movie. Yeah. Tons of saves. Yes. Like, the squirrel one seemed to be almost like being like, you see what I'm doing here.

Every living creature matters. I love that. So it's like there are a ton of saves. And what people were saying, which is a rejection of Man of Steel. where like 100,000 people die? Of Man of Steel. They just, Superman cares so little in Man of Steel

about the lives of the people in Metropolis that he has a full-on fight with Zod to the death right in the middle of the city and essentially nukes it. Taking us into the plot of Don of Justice. Exactly. Same thing. But like, as I was watching a movie,

it does seem to be at certain points in the film that James Gunn was saying, that's not Superman. And not to one specific film, not to Zach. I didn't think of it as a response. You didn't think about that at all? I think he knew he needed to take a different turn,

but it also is just consistent, I think, with how he sees the world. I mean, his last film was an exploration of animal cruelty and the way that we treat each other in the world. That's obviously really matters. He's very soft-hearted about those things. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. I've never gone back to it. Volume 3. I can do it. I fucking love that movie. It's so sad. It's so sad.

It's so sad. My God. I loved it when it was in there. But, like, there was a point in the movie where me and Collegu were sitting down watching a movie. I love telling my stories of watching movies inside of theaters. And my eyes were full of tears. And I was like, I'm not doing this shit again.

Oh, I was like freely weeping. I'm not looking at this no more, man. Like, I love my dog too much. But no, and that's a, that's well stated by you guys. And I guess what I'm saying is that, like, at the point that he saves the squirrel, he saves the little girl. Yep. Like, Superman is literally.

there just to make sure everything is going to be okay. The creature they're fighting. Yeah. Like that's one of the, because of course, obviously, like, Lois and Mr. Terrific will team up and they'll align. And I can't believe I've made it this long without talking about one of the great loves of my life, Nathan Philean, who I thought was, like, should win an Oscar for what he did as Guy Gardner.

I thought it was fucking incredible. Honestly, all girls here, like, the justice gang and this tension, even though they are, of course, ultimately a lot. of what's the right way to do it. Like, Superman doesn't want to, well, I thought we could like take it to an intergalactic zoo or at least find a way to euthanize it less painfully. And he has to watch the belly of this poor creature explode and then gently lower its corpse. Yeah.

To a more open area so that more people don't die. He's like he wants things to be okay. There's a deeper story choice, though, in the movie that I think indicates why it's not just a reaction to something else, which is that, is it Molly? Is that the character's name who is killed? When we get to that moment in the pocket universe, where the Russian roulette happens, and that is the most bracing moment of violence in the movie, and it is the execution of someone who we know is empathetic to and understand Superman, the idea that he cannot save that person, that he has

to watch that person die, is meant to be the payback for saving the woman, saving the child, saving the squirrel. Like, again, very good screenwriting. Like, we, like, talk about what is good and not good about movies, and we're like, I didn't like it. And you're talking these generalities. But to me, one of the reasons why Gunn is good is because you can see in the construction in the aftermath the choices he's making to make you better understand the characters

and feel inside the world. That was an example of it where it wasn't just, this isn't Zach Snyder's Superman. It was, this is my Superman. Oh, that's really powerful. And he also puts whipped cream on. on that scene too, because the guy gets killed, metamorpho goes, he just killed that guy, and Superman goes, his name was Molly.

And he remembers, he knows. Remember that that was a person with a full life and a full set of experiences that was killed for no other reason than the fact that this guy's a megalomaniac. Yep. And you're helping him. Yeah. Right?

So, I mean, all those little things that really are, these comic books get heady. We read them. We get deep into them. We get to other dimensions. But there's other things that kind of that we have to believe in to make these worlds to be able to come on to these worlds. We've talked a lot about Gunn. Let's talk more about Cornswept

and what his performance and his casting unlocked as Superman, as Clark. I want to go through like the key relationships, obviously most key of all with respect to Lois and the Kent's and Jarrell and it's crypto, but we'll get there in a second.

I thought that this casting was perfect and that he was fantastic as both Clark and Superman. I thought one of the key choices in the movie was that he is only... Tell me if I'm forgetting something. He's only Clark in two and a half scenes. He's Clark when he goes into the Daily Planet and he's like on the phone call with Ma and Pa

and he and Jimmy are doing there like, Oh, dude, you got the front page story, right? He's initially Clark, when Lois goes back to the apartment, he's like, I'm making you breakfast for dinner. It's your favorite. It's your favorite, actually, classic. But then he kind of shifts. I do love breakfast for dinner.

Don't you love breakfast for dinner? No, you love this restaurant. Exactly. And he's obviously Clark in Smallville when he goes back home to recharge and reset. But even in that scene in Lois's apartment, of course she's interviewing him as Superman, he's moving kind of in and out. So that's the one that I would call only like half.

I thought this was great because it connects in such a core way to like, who was my Superman? Like that's part of the point is they're actually not different for him. For this Superman, Clark and Superman are half a degree removed from each other. And that's part of why he is, I love the moment before when the message is playing

before we get to hear the new part of it and he has to hear the new part of it for the first time where he's like, I don't get it. Like, what's bad about that? Right? And like, obviously there's the humor in the lowest interview scene of like, how do you think this is going?

Well, like, I think, like, I'm doing a good job. I'm doing a good job. Some of the best lines in the movie. Really good. Really good. But his humanity, obviously, I think one of the moments of some people are going to be like,

I didn't need it to be quite core text and literalized and maybe that severe of an extent when he at the end is just like, I get scared, I try and just, you know, kind of like says the moral of the movie out loud. I thought it was quite touching, actually. But he is a person and he has grown up as a human being on this world and he is trying to channel that humanity and everything that he does is a hero.

And when people reject that or question it, or when he has to confront the fact that even though he is the most powerful meta-human, he can't save a person who's two feet in front of him is incredibly effective and poignant because the humanity is that heightened and the two aspects of his identity are not drastically separated from each other they're very closely aligned.

What did you guys think of the performance? What did you think of that aspect of the portrayal? So if you're not doing a... If you're not doing a version of the story where she doesn't know that he's Superman, he doesn't need to be Clark that much. I'd just be honest with you. If you're not doing a version of the story,

where that's the central tension. I hadn't thought about that. The central tension is not whether or not the world knows that Superman is Clark Kent. The central tension is whether or not. Yeah. Lois Lane knows that he... So you could do a movie soon about the, like,

revelation of his identity, but that's not what this movie is. Right. Right. The public wants to know who he is. So you don't need to spend that much time on him, that push-pool between him and the public if you're not doing that. However, there is something interesting. he has not really called Superman in this movie very much.

Even the people that know him, they don't refer to him as Superman come in. They say Clark. Yeah. Or like Big Blue or something. Yeah. So the people that are talking to him, when they are referring to him, for the most part,

there is some, but the people call him Superman. Yeah. But the people that know him. Right, exactly. It's like one in the same. Lex calls him it. Lex calls him it. So there is a, that's a choice that, to me,

me is just it indicates that James Gunn understands the audience. Marvel completely shuddered the idea of the secret identity. They completely shuddered it. Right. He doesn't completely shudder it, but he does let you know that these characters are one and the same. Right. But they're both still searching kind of for one another.

Superman in this movie actually becomes more human because to be a human is not to be able to understand what. what you can do in a lot of ways. To me, it's to be able to understand what you can't do. Yes. You're going to lose people. You're going to grow older. Like there's a part of this stuff where being a human is kind of about accepting loss.

You're going to question yourself. You're going to fail. Exactly. All of that stuff. And that's the point that we get to at the end of the movie. And I feel like Superman and Clark take that journey together. Yeah. Agreed.

So, Corns, what's an interesting choice? Because he's obviously huge. Incredibly hot. And very handsome. Yeah. and tall. It's quite tall. And so he is kind of like on paper, like the measurables.

Yeah. You're like, yeah, that's Superman. Yeah. But watching him in the movie, I was like, he's not that big. It didn't say everybody seemed to be as tall as him to be honest with you. He doesn't really seem that big. Yeah. Like relative to when you're watching Henry Cavill and you're like, this is a giant statue.

Like, where did this eight foot tall man who is 380 pounds? The trap? Like that on Cavill is just, there's never been a thing like that. So there's a differentiation there. Now, he's closer to Reeve, right? Reve was very tall. Like six foot three, six foot four. And clearly very strong, but not muscle bound per se.

He was broad shoulder, but not muscle bound. So Corn Sweat invariably is like kind of the lankiest Superman. Maybe he and Brandon Brown. Wasn't that great about it though? No, it's good. It's a good thing. Parts of the movie where you went his suit moves and you can kind of see the like excess material. Yes.

So I love that. I like that too. And it's a good character choice because, you know, I wasn't saying that he's the emo Superman as a tongue-in-cheek gag. He is literally, generationally, would be a fan of emo and pop punk and is a fan of that kind of music. And that kind of music is defined

by a kind of unsureness and an openness and a sentimentality but also a kind of like generational crisis feeling. And he's like a 31-year-old young millennial who's like, is everything going to be okay? Am I going to be able to buy a house? Should I get married? I'm going to pretend that I'm not looking at

my mentions on Twitter when I definitely totally. He's defined by insecurity. And the one thing I know that is a good thing to do, you're telling me that maybe I shouldn't have done it? Right. Like of all the questions I have,

I know people dying in war bad. I went and did that and now you're saying I shouldn't have? And his first reaction is bluster and to fight back. But deep down, he's like, am I wrong? And you can feel the self-questioning. Which is just, again, Like, it's a very modern representation of this character.

Yes. You know, when you look back at the origins of Superman, Jewish creators riffing on the Uber Munch, looking at the idea of a decency in a society that is like about to be confronted by fascism in Europe and all these things that are meant to come, this is not that character. This is an evolution or at least a shift in what that character was,

which is a great choice. That's why it makes it a very contemporary feeling movie in addition to all the other themes that we can talk about. That scene, talked about this a little bit on The Midnight Boys, there are a couple of times where I know that gun or feels that gun is looking at past portrayals of the character and going, okay, how do we update this? Because when Superman lands on Lois's balcony

for that interview in Superman 1, she is totally overwhelmed. She can't get her shit together. What color are my panties? Just the amazing sequence in that film. She steps away from the lid, pink. And she can't get this shit together. Now I'm going to take you on a flight

and you are like, how big is my universe? I'm with the most powerful thing in the world. I am gone. It is over. I never lie, Lois. Right? The whole deal, totally different. Totally tore it apart.

She is reading him the right act. He does not know how to respond. She is two or three or four steps ahead of him. And not in a way that belittles. him in a way that's trying to re-center him. Specifically I think because, and listen, we've worked together for 13 years.

Oh, wow. What's about to happen? We've agreed on a lot. Ooh. Can we call her our shared wife? Rachel Brosnahan has never let us down, has never failed us. The marvelous Mrs. Maisel killing it as Lois Lane, unsurprisingly. Just fantastic. But... I was just thinking about her.

Your eyes have actually gone glassy and we've lost you. Do a real-time daydream. Just take a couple minutes. She's good. She's very special. She was amazing. And the way that she was, the reason that it didn't feel like superior of belittling is because she wasn't saying to him, I, you don't know and I do. She was saying, I ask questions, including of myself. Like, you have, it's a moral imperative to stop and think and wonder. Not only like, am I right, but should I get to decide that? And I, and I, and I. And I, I thought that that was like to, especially to frame that and present that to us in a like very charming, fast-paced. It actually is like a little bit choreographed as a dance. Like the way that there, you know, you go from the intimacy of the swooped up with one arm, put you on the counter and kiss you. Like we were one of the things we were talking about before these, the pod started is like you can believe that these two have fucked and will continue to fuck. And that is like very powerful and they have great chemistry together. The how do I turn this like recorder off? Not only does he not know how to use a recorder because he's not a real. He's not a real. reporter and she is. It's just like the charm of like the shorthand of a relationship. He's about to in another scene say, I love you and she's like going to then reveal like I was about to break up with him. What do I do? Yeah. You feel believably that they've like worked together and known each other for a while.

Their relationship is new. She doesn't know he has a dog. But she does know that there's like something kind of foundational about needing to like maybe not laugh and think it's cute when you say you push somebody up against a cactus. Right? And so, like, that was just, I thought that scene was great, not only to give us that kind of confidence boost that the performers have the necessary chemistry together, but to, like, make clear that Lois is not trying to be the moral authority and arbiter. She's just making sure that he knows he shouldn't think he is either. Right. But does the movie totally land there. Well, I think that it does what, that scene does one more thing, which I really liked, which is that it shows that Lois. represents the modern conundrum of media, which is that she thinks that she has to represent a position for fear of being attacked or sued by the other side. But that isn't that position that she has to represent

as an objective journalist is not what she believes. Which is, again, a very modern idea that has been in the news the last 10 years, the idea of like, is there a such thing as journalism that can come completely unbiased? And the whole movie is about division. The whole movie is about what is real and what is not real. Yes. And so putting her in the position,

a character that we are naturally sympathetic to and rooting for of making Clark feel like he's being gaslit or something by the questions that are being asked where he's like, I saved lives. How is that bad? And she's like, well, you broke a treaty. You know, you didn't follow the rules. And that the idea of making Superman crazy by that,

which candidly represents the way that a lot of couples fight. That is exactly the total. There's one person who's like, I'm just being logical with you. And the other person is like, I have feelings. Exactly. You can't, kind of sorting through that, which is, again, this is really good screenwriting. And something else, you get the feeling of something else,

she was waiting to have that conversation with him. Yeah. She was so... She'd written those questions down beforehand. She knew exactly what she would ask him if she got the opportunity to speak to him as Superman. Yeah. And that's why she kind of resented the fact

that he was doing interviews with himself and not with actual journalism. That's why she was making fun of him. Preparing his sound bites. Exactly. I loved that. I also just really, really loved the moment where

she said to him, like, I asked questions and you just think everyone is like beautiful. And there was kind of a, I thought a really effectively presented blend of and that is what I don't understand about you and also why I love you

captured in a single sentence, right? Like we are not, that is not how I see the world. We are so different. We will hear her actually say elsewhere in the film, like, we are so different. How is this relationship going to work? And of course, I think that's another good example in the movie of the micro and the macro really connecting because this question, which is one of the things that one of the many ripped from the headlines aspects of the movie and, you know, Superman is eternal, but the film feels very contemporary, very urgent in a number of the thematic presentations and political aspects of the movie.

of the plot. And the way that Lex is trying to weaponize this idea that Superman is an alien, he's not from here. And I have my planet watch to come in and take him away to my black site. The fact that that is like the large global plot in addition obviously to everything with Bravia. And then inside, that is not what's happening inside of the more intimate relationships. but there is that question of like, how do we talk this through to try to like find some shared understanding at the other end or ask ourselves

if that's even possible? Was an interesting balancing act. I'm curious if you guys think that like where the movie landed at the end in terms of those bigger thematic swings was like successfully rendered. And in part, we're asking a lot of questions of Superman,

But the movie does sort of end and like, and he was right? Like, how did that feel to you? I'm eager to discuss this with you guys. Because the movie is, if not intentionally, unintentionally drawing allusions to Israel and Palestine. Absolutely. Russia and Ukraine. Do we need billionaires conversation? Yes.

The corrosive nature of social media. Yep. The history of torture and black sites. in U.S. foreign policy. What am I forgetting? There's a couple of other major strands. The danger of technology run amok in the wrong hands. Yes.

So, you know, these are the quagmires of our time. These are like among the most unsolvable, difficult, frustrating aspects of life that are dangerous, like literally, you know, mortal consequences around all of these ideas. And one of the incredible successes of the movie is that he managed to pretty legibly get, all this stuff into the most important movie of the summer. That's fucking crazy to me that not only that this happened, but that he does it pretty well.

However, I'm not sure that Superman is the valence through which you should be exploring these ideas. Because Superman is an ideal. Superman, his response to the complex is decency. Yeah. And hope. And I'm not sure that decency alone is the answer to some of these questions. I think that the world is actually much more, I know that the world is actually much more complicated,

fractious, and hard to live through. And so when you get to the end of the movie, I really appreciate that James Gunn is thinking about these things, that they have affected him and he's processing some of those experiences in his art. That's what I want from movies. I don't want someone just like adapting a book

and putting it on screen and not changing anything. I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in a filmmaker taking their feelings about the world and putting it into characters and then letting us understand his point of view better. That's why I interview directors on the show and mostly not actor on the big picture and not actors. You know, like I really like writer directors.

But the quagmire of Israel and Palestine is so complex and so fraught that conjuring the idea and then just saying we're all human. I don't know that that is enough. Is it a first step? Yes, it is. I thought about this a lot.

And I'll tell you why I think that it is, I view myself as a humanist, right? Which is very difficult. And it sounds really pretentious in a way. But I think about just what's best for people. Then I think about what we would do if we lived in a world where we actually, actually put that first,

there would be compromise, there would be understanding, there would be decency, there would be kindness, there at times would be consequence, right? I think when you're looking at a superhero movie, particularly one like this with a character that's this old school, that's all you can ask,

All you can ask is that Superman is a humanist. These problems that you have, oh, excuse me, these problems that we have, you have. You're your fault. You were acting as Superman. Right. These problems that we have. You humans. They all come from, they all stem from the same thing, which is something that's a part of us, which is the tribalism.

Yeah. Selfishness, territoriality. All of that stuff, right? But if we ever truly put us first, really us. first, we would understand that the way to get through all of that stuff is compromise. The way to get through all of that stuff is understanding. The character in this movie gets to that point. That soliloquy monologue is pretty ham-fisted.

I thought that it served to set Lex up with a joke that didn't quite land. When he goes, oh, that was beautiful. If Hackman was there, The whole theater would have bowled over in laughter. I think this is a good moment to talk about Lex Luthor. Well, no, I want to hear how you feel about the theme stuff, though, because you're the best theme person I know. Like, I actually, does it matter that at the end of the movie that Superman is like,

we all put our pants on one leg at a time? And then like, that's the answer to being alive in 2025. The last thing I'll say about it is this. Last thing I'll say about it is this is in the movie, to me, the fundamental thing is that like it doesn't paint Superman as an otherworldly figure that is here to save humanity's problems.

It paints him as a human that is solving humanity's problems. And the takeaway for me is we are both capable of creating these intense, seemingly unsolvable problems, but we are also capable of solving them if we have the right thrust to do so.

So, can I just say one more thing before you share your thoughts? That works for me when you're making Superman a human being with Lois. It doesn't work for me when the answer at the end of the movie is that the justice gang has to go flip tanks over in Jarnpur. Like that part where I'm like, so it is war is the answer? Like if it's violence is the answer? Ex-Hik is the head of state? Yeah, I mean, that's, is that the answer? The movie doesn't really understand that part of itself.

Like it doesn't really... It's not actually recognizing that humanist concept if the answer is Guy Gardner needs to just give the middle finger to the invading nation. Like, it's not... That's the point. The world is more complicated. So...

That's part of why I asked about how you guys felt about where it landed at the end in that respect because I don't think that's the most successful part of the movie. I do think that what you're saying worked, though. And the fact that, like... The filmist and Gunner are so interested in looking at how the ideal of Superman, but just more broadly, what role, what chance does Hope have in a like mega outrage Fox News world? I thought it was fascinating. Hope and action, though.

Yeah, yeah. Deciding to do something. Deciding to try. And I think the fact that the, like, I think the fact that this is a Superman, this is a Clark in his. life as a hero, but in his just life period, who is very much in a moment of dissonance and dualities, of like feeling assured that there must be a way forward. Well, if you didn't believe there was, like, what would be the point of any of it? And also confronting that it's not actually that simple. I think it's really interesting that to the, like, well, I called in some friends point

this is a little bit inverted to start with an ensemble for Superman. We usually start very focused and small and then we build toward like a Justice League team up or something. We're meeting this Superman at a moment where because he's getting his ass kicked because he's facing Ultraman

or because the problems are actually too big for anyone even Superman to solve. He has to work with other people. It's still through the modes of like Interventionism, like old school, the world's policeman stuff that is like, I don't know, that's kind of an outdated idea. I think there's some muddling. Yes, I agree. I think there's some muddling of the kind of like thematic messaging and takeaways on that front for sure.

It's more successful, I think, posing and asking the questions and the ideas and totally landing them in that respect. But to your point, I think it's like, it's cool that we got those questions presented in this form. It doesn't ruin the movie for me, but it's like, if you put those ideas in front of me, I'm going to confront them. Like I will look at them as you're trying to look at them. Yeah, of course. And the movie has to be understood on that wavelength. Yeah. I think, look, like Charles, me and Charles went back and forth about this and he had some

really, really good podcast. He's a very brilliant guy. I had a meeting with him this week and I was like, wow, Charles has grown up a lot. I said this to him in a follow-up meeting that we had, so I don't mind saying it on a podcast. But I was like, he's really smart. He's really matured. Yeah. But, you know, I think.

Put a pin in this before we go. That is like something that superheroes have never actually had to litigate before. And it's interesting watching them do it. The most interesting thing about the middle part of the Marvel run was Captain America going very arrogantly going. The safest hands are still our own. I'm a good person. Yeah. And I can flip.

Yeah. And that means that when I see something that I should get to decide. I should get to decide was right or wrong. I trust the people in this room. I remember sitting in the theater going, I don't know, man. It seems like we should make these decisions by committee. But that's the plot of Civil War.

Right. Right. But now, I'm on the other side. I wish somebody would just go over there and I just wish somebody would go to places and take care of it. It's not nearly as active of a debate in this movie. But there's also one more material difference between the two. In the MCU, the arms dealer is a hero. In the DCU, the arms dealer is the villain. And so you are forcing us to be binary in that way.

Marvel, I'll give it credit. Like, that is a kind of nuance. That, that's part of why those movies are the best movies in the run of that series, is that there is a gray. There's a moral debate between these two really interesting characters and these two good actors. And you get invested in who is right. Is it the person who says, I am the one that carries the big stick and knows the way? Or is it the world is changing.

We have to think differently about how we act. It's also, though, not to make this a, I'll try to make the same pledge you guys did. Not to make this a Marvel pod, but by the time we get to like the Socovia Accords debate and the fracturing of the Avengers, it's not just that. It's also that we have so much time with Tony and so much time with Steve that we are like completely wrapped because they are both inverting and subverting our expectations. Steve has gone through movie after movie at that point of needing to reject question and reject structure and authority. And the thing that you signed up for and committed your life to. recognizing that not only is it maybe fallible, it might actually be literally hydra. And then Tony, the rogue, has to be like, maybe we should have some checks on us, actually. We have so much history with those characters.

We don't have anything close to that because it's the first movie with this version of the characters for understanding what is Clark's relationship to the government? To the people who are sitting in that room with Lex. That's another thing. Yeah.

In those scenes, you ask yourself like the U.S. government is punting on so much of this or being manipulated by the evil of Lex Luthor that you go, huh? Tech power. Tech power. There's really only the movie, the movie does put you in a kind of a posture

where you start to believe, well, there's really only one person who can do anything about this. And it's crypto. It's crypto. And it's crypto. Because everybody else is so controlled. by forces that like are so compromised that you go, well, there's only one person who can do something.

I think that hits on a frustration that a lot of people feel right now. It's like, who is the one person that even that their paycheck, their livelihood, their fame, their whatever, is not connected to somebody that doesn't stop them from doing the right thing or saying the right thing or taking action when action is supposed to be taken? All of this from Superman. It's a rich text. It really is a rich tech. I'm quite surprised by how deep this movie was.

Guns got a lot on his mind. I know. Always. Do you guys? I'm surprised that he went there because when you're, the second time I watched it, I looked over and I was like, this is pretty on the nose, man. Like for what, pick a conflict, but all of the ones that are in our sphere. Yeah. Right now.

But like, this is, I'm so I'm interested to see the takes that will start to come out Monday. Same. I know. Wednesday next week. It's going to be a fascinating time. I think conservative pundits are very big fans of this film. Oh my God. I've already seen like Shapiro shit on it.

Scott Jennings looked like he weren't to shit on it. It's a WB thing, so maybe you won't. Interesting. Are you looking for support in your weight management journey? Zepbound terseptide may be able to help. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help adults with obesity. Or some adults with overweight who also have weight-related medical problems

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Okay, I want to come back still to Clark and his parents, both sets, to Clark and Crypto. But because we're on the big themes, the incorporation of these very urgent. intense ideas. Let's talk a little bit more about Lex Luthor here for a minute. What did you think of Nicholas Holtz's performance? This is a character. I mean, this is like one of the most trotted out villains in storytelling. We have seen many, many, many versions of Lex. How did this one work for you in general? How did it work for you in terms of how he is really the puppet master, chess master, the person who is getting all of this going and then saying in a kind of grand fashion, I did all of this so that I could kill you because you make me feel small.

Nicholas Holtz, Lex Luthor, where is he falling for you among the other Lexes? How does this performance work for you? So it was actually awesome. How do you feel about his current tour to force on the fashion front during the press junket? I thought when they first announced him as Lex, you know what my gut feeling was like? My reflex, shall I say? It was like, he's too good looking.

He's too great looking. I was like, he's too good looking for Lex Luthor. He's going to take away from Superman. It's going to be like a situation where he's drawing magnetism from the Man of Steel. And now every day you open Instagram and you see him with the bleached blonde hair and the tied sweaters and you're like, I was right. He's going crazy. He's going nuts and he's too tall.

Maybe you want Lex to be a little short. order to Superman, it totally worked. He brought an ugliness to the character that he was able to do through performance, which is very difficult. Lex looks like somebody that has

all of that stuff, but you still kind of feel sorry for. You feel sorry for the fact that he's so obsessed. You feel sorry for the fact that he's so damaged. You feel sorry? Like you feel empathy for him or you pity him? Not empathy. Like, think about what he could be doing if his entire life

wasn't being the biggest fucking hater in the world. It's more than he's pathetic. He's pathetic, right? And then also, something else that this character was able to get that a lot of the Lex portrayals don't get

is he is fucking dangerous. He is a danger to anyone he is in proximity to. He is dangerous. Nobody in that room, even as he's massaging soldiers and giving high fives and all of that, the cool, Otis reveal at the end of the movie was cool to.

I know. I know. We finally got an Otis shout out. But no one around him feels like they're safe. Everyone feels expendable. Everyone feels like a lower life form to him, which is what you have to get right to get less. I don't know where we're going to land when there's no earth was a good moment for the minions and like the, you know,

because everybody actually played for like a huge laugh in the theater, you know, the knocking over of the. the mom. It's very amusing and then you sort of very quickly realize you're complicit in laughing at the monster

but like you know whatever context he's in if he is the very like overt Elon-esque tech billionaire who is walking into the halls

of power and saying look at this thing I've made for you to make it all easier for just let me do it for you just let me do it for you or if he is in his the separated

you know ship bridge of his building saying I'll give you the codes to input. Like, we can do it when we get to a city that I care about. Yeah. No matter what the context was and how small or large, the scope of the horror that he was about to inflict,

it was, like, terrifying to watch. And that glint in his eye was chilling. I thought he really captured. I'm, like, not, I love Jesse Iceberg. I'm really not a fan of that version. of Lex, which I thought was just like... Don't give me fucking started, man. Too grotesque.

Twitchy and strange to like kind of process that I do enjoy a Jolly Rancher as well. So maybe there's common ground even there. Revolting. Revolting scene. But like, you know, the Hackman Lex is... An all-time movie character. An all-timer.

So everything is measured against that, of course. And like, we get a lot of the same character beats but very different performances across the various movies. Yeah, I think he's good and not great. Like, Holt, I mean, I don't have any problems with it. I like what you guys said about the way that Lex is drawn as a character. I think the dangerous thing in particular.

I hadn't quite thought of it that way. Insecure egomaniac. Yeah, but that's a really good point, though, that he, you know, he will literally put his ex-girlfriends in a shadow prison. Like, he is, he's in bad man. And that was effective. She wrote a blog about me. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. He's the pettiest of petty. Yes. And a real, like, Googling himself all day long kind of a guy. And how scary is it when someone that powerful is also petty? Of course. James putting the reality shit into the movie again. Same thing.

Yeah, I mean, who is more likely to the literal, like, troll army of the monkeys with the super shit hashtag and, like, farming the outrage to just spread and, like, creep into the interwebs in society is this noxious fume. Who better, of course, to do that than a person to do that. than a person who feels that way about their life and what other people think of them?

What would have made them great? Because I tend to agree with you. I would say great. I would say good plus, but I also don't want to be unfair to him because I do think that like, okay, when Superman comes into his office and slams the desk.

Yeah, the first time he's looking for crypto. He's looking for crypto. Great scene. Happens in the other, it happens in the original Superman movie. Yeah. And Hapman just throws it away. Oh, my attorneys will be in contact with you about the damage to the door.

That's so bad. And there's a part of me that that's Lex Luthor. So I don't know if I'm judging Holt. It's possible. I mean, in the comics, as far as I know, I could be wrong about this. But I feel like Lex is just older than Superman. Yes. And Corn Sweat and Holt are more or less contemporaries.

And so there is this kind of like. know my idea of the world thing that is put forth, which I think makes sense. You've got this division, the two sides, and they come from the same time. But not to be like not my Lex Luthor, but that's just not how I see the character. I see the character as an older guy who is self-made,

who has built up this corporation over decades. And it is because of his success that he is driven mad by Superman. He's like, I did this all by myself. I built my empire. then this guy comes along and they don't worship me, they worship Superman. And so that to me

is where I'm like, I don't really know, I'm not sure if I really buy like 34 year old Nick Holt. But like we are in the era of the world where that like does happen, right? We're 30 year old, 20 year olds. It does, but if it's Bezos coded, like he's like in his 60s, you know? Like,

Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg, yeah. But the problem is that Zuckerberg was too much a part of the Snyder idea in casting Eisenberg and even in the like the way he's portraying that character that kind of goofball, curly haired like mop top like is this guy seriously in charge that energy

that he's giving in that movie? So I don't know like I try to not be like you could have done a better job of writing Lex Luthor than you can James Gunn, brilliant screenwriter but it just didn't totally pop for me the way that he can see the character. There were a couple of times

to where I was like I'm getting his Lex Luthor. Yeah. I agree. Like Lex Luthor, the three leads got, they're good. They're all good. They all did their thing. Superman is a home run.

Lois Lane is a grand slam. I agree. And Lex Luthor is a very solid double, which you can leg out to three if you're Pete Crow Armstrong. That's true. Never ever say his name to me again. Very beautiful for that stands. painful for Mets fans. That was mean.

Are you okay? That's a tough one. You know what's doubly worse about that? Is it Hobby Baez also in the All-Star game this year? So we don't even have Hobby Pye. That one annoys me too because he, of course, he beat out the holiday. Oh, I'm sorry. That's second.

It's very annoying. Pete's amazing. Okay. Pete's amazing. You know what's really interesting about that? Heading into the film or just around the casting news, I would have said that Holt was the most to be a Grand Slam. Because I just think he's like

a best-verizing performer. Do you guys watch The Great? Yes, he's great in that show. The Great. Have you seen The Great? I've never seen it. Van. The Great? Yeah, it's about Catherine the Great.

He plays Peter. Here's my sales pitch to you. That might sound stuffy and boring. It is not. It's like, did you watch the favorite? I don't watch those shows like that about that type of shit. It's a, it's basically a comedy.

It's like a sex comedy. He spends the entire show talking about how much he wants to, and I'm using his. his words here, eat pussy, and how every time he does, it tastes like pineapple or peach.

He will receive a vibrant bouquet of breakfast offerings and he'll pick up a pig and just look at it and then say, I want to go eat pussy. That's the show. It's the vibe of the show. I've never seen it. It's great.

It's very fun. Okay. I'll check him out. I love him and everything that he's in. The next thing makes me start to think, because people talk about the fact that we had a Superman problem. I would say that the Superman that we've cast more have been capable more than not.

Brandon Roth, he was a lot for the kid, man. It was like one of his first big things. He looked exactly like Chris Faree, not exactly, but enough to where you are. Uncanny. You are going to compare him. But I remember in that movie, going to the film and going,

Kevin Spacey cannot miss as Lex Luthor It was It was going to be great And coming away going Huh That's not a very good That didn't work

It was a nice yacht Who was his assistant though? Is it Parker Posey? I remember her enjoying her I have to revisit that movie this weekend I watched the last weekend Not a good film Cal Penn was in it

Cal Penn was in it So it's like, I remember going to the movie and going, and then when we come to, at the same time, you have Rosenblum who is on Smallville, yeah. Who is like kind of a little, kind of a mini legendary Luther, like a very iconic portrayal of that character. Reinventing the character. We spent so much time with them. You come back to not Man of Steel, but like Batman versus Superman, and we've totally lost the plot. Like, we don't know what we were doing. And I know that Zach had a bigger plan

to, you know, he goes ball at the end. We're going to do the whole deal or whatever. But like, we've lost the plot. We don't know what we're doing anymore. You know what the tricky thing? I mean, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself and where you want to take this conversation. But Lex is the antagonist of like five out of the six Superman movies, right?

Like he is the primary enemy and the movies keep going back to him over and over and over again. Part of it is because it's a brilliant design. It's the most powerful being in the world and the smartest man in the world. And Superman doesn't have a deep rose gallery. Right. Yeah. But, and it worked in this movie. You know, it worked that it was Lex and felt very modern because it was Lex.

Yeah. I don't know that I want Lex to be like really a part of this going forward. I was going to ask you guys that because he's crypto kicks his ass incredible. Great stuff. He's shipped off to Belrieve at the end. Like, do you think we're going to see him again soon? It's obviously like, in spots. I want the Mr. Mixpola.

I don't know how to say. I could not have to say. Mr. Mix a pixel leaks or whatever? That's what I want and I want him to be a participant in whatever is in the message with his parents and I want to go back to that because they're kind of like hinting that not as all

as it seems even in that. Well, let's talk about that. We haven't talked about the parents. This is like a huge part of the story. My guy, Brad Cooper. Two Eagles fans. To make total sense that Brad Cooper would be David Cornswet's father. We haven't gotten Chris Ryan

to chime in yet, but I have to assume that the watch will come out pro, given the... I think they're solemnly sworn to support those two boys. Last thing quickly, before we move on from Lex, to your point about him being too young, I do think of all the things that feel like very contemporary about the movie. The like, I don't have to wait to earn it. Why am I?

He's like so mad that Superman is the center of the world's attention. And he's like, I should right away beat the center of the world's attention. It felt kind of true to me. But, okay, the parents. Let's first take the, the Kryptonian parents, and then let's take the found family in Smallville. Is your read that it is an open question, whether the message, despite all we hear about the fact that it's not fabricated,

that little moment where Lex is like it's not fake, like in private where he didn't need to say that if it were. Obviously that's something that could be left open to rec hunting regardless. But did you think it was actually like a trick? I think there's still an open question. And if they want to return to it, they can with a certain kind of character. Because, you know, Superman, one of his other kind of vulnerabilities is he can be kind of tricked, you know, that you can't outmustle him, but he can be duped. And a lot of the, a lot of the Rokes Gallery are often about kind of like undermining his perception of reality. Yeah. And so there's a way to do that. And this would be the deepest cut for him. And I kept waiting for the movie to do that. I kept waiting for the movie to show us that Lex had in fact changed the message in some way. On the other hand. It seemed to be saying that that is not what happened. It was definitively saying that in this movie.

on the other and Jorrell and Laura like being um Patricia assholes is like kind of canon you know I would say simultaneously

in line with canon and a real bold ratcheting up of the extent of their it is it is how is that sitting with you it is definitely canon that they are

the elites of their planet right but the fact that they have direct negative designs on the earth Earth? That's new. That is a wide. I'm sure there's somebody

listening to this somewhere that goes, man, you haven't read the Superband Run, 1970, where Jorrell was the word. I get it. But to the bulk of the people watching that, that's going to be shifting them into the Zodgam. That is a, right. Which now, which all these things I think can be kind of explored

in Supergirl, by the way, because there's another Kryptonian that's on Earth that is she trying to start a secret hair? You know, whatever. I guess we'll have that conversation, but that's a significant change to the lore of Superman. It is.

Because if he's said, he's a viltramide, right? Yes. It's very, it's very omneman. Like in that, in that case,

then he's come here to rule over everyone, and that changed, he only thinks that he's supposed to be good. Now, once again, they have gone very heavy with the Jesus themes and the Moses themes of the past movies. They've gone very heavy with putting the baby in the basket

across the river of galaxy and they're going to look to you. You're going to be their thing. Right. That would have seemed repetitive. Right. To go back to that. To go back to that.

But to secret harem, lord over them, show no mercy, shit. Like, I was surprised. It's a bold choice. Yeah. Very bold. My question is, will we see Joriel and Laura like again? Yeah.

Are they just a divide? for this specific movie because we never see Superman's parents again. There are no fucking holograms and there's no... We saw the crystals were in the background. They were, but yeah, the implication is that he has this one message,

not that, like, Marlon Brando is looming over him as this ever-present guiding AI until, like, that goes away. So, yeah, it seems like that's it. What about Angel Saraphan, you know? Another one of my gals. Yeah, this is a big movie for you. I thought that this was, again, really smart

to, like, really play with... our expectations of what might be waiting on the other end of that glitch. As soon as you see that there's a glitch, you're like, okay, what's the rest of the message? Right? It's set up effectively. They can absolutely retcon that in future stories

to say Lex did lie. The people who were the 28 or whatever, like, you know, tech bros who said it was authentic, also lied or were duped because Lex is that smart or whatever. Or that could be what they stick with. Either way, it works inside of this movie because it causes this complete and utter crisis of not just confidence, but like, who am I?

And what have I built my life around? And I thought that the way that this, the message from Laura and Jarrell stitched in with Ma and Pa Kent was like, maybe my favorite non-Crypto edition part of the, and non-Gygar-Gar-Ditchin part of the movie, because, okay, so when we first moved, me the Kent's when we first see

Ma'i and they're on the phone I was like what the fuck is happening here? Like what is this like bumpkin caricature that we're getting? I was like worried and a little like insulted. I was seriously like what is happening? On behalf of the state of Kansas? On behalf of the state of Kansas yeah.

I so quickly moved into I was so moved by the scenes with the Kents and Clark, when Lois takes Crypto and Clark back to Smallville. And first of all, a great moment where he wakes up

and Crypto is napping on this belly. Just wonderful stuff. I mean, for the pet lovers, this is just inspired. It's just fantastic. Crypto like sniffing the cows and running around in the yard. That's just great. Oh, that was great.

The scene where John goes out and joins Clark on the bench. I was like in tears. I was so moved and touched watching that. Two things that I thought really stood out. One, the moment, he's just like, it doesn't really matter what was in the message. Like, of course it feels like the most monumental

and seismic thing that has ever happened to you in your entire life. But what matters is what you thought the message meant. It's what you thought it should be about. And then, of course, the other thing that he says is like parents aren't for telling their, children who to be. Like, we give you the tools

and we help you. Like, I thought that was like... Real as shitty ever wrote, though. That's like being parent, I feel it every day where I'm like, I'm just trying my best to give you as much as I can

of what I think is right. Yeah, and then you have to figure out what you're gonna do. Right. I feel the same way. I loved that. Like, but Jomey.

Nah, I fathered these niggas every day. Well, a little uncomfortable now. But, but, but, but, but, But no, yeah, yeah, I mean It's beautiful. Yeah, like that's what I liked the country bumpkin thing At first it was jarring

Yeah, and then it's like so earnest and sweet And when Ma calls a mush And he's just like I'm so proud of you And they're nuzzling their heads It does feel like a rejection of Kevin Costner and Diane Lane But that was smart And of Gregory Peck

Yeah And of like Fucking the dude from the Dukes of Hazard that was on Smallville. Like, wouldn't he, what he, John Kent? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bo Luke, whatever. I don't know the actress.

I don't know the actress. Let's just say it. Two of the hottest people who've ever lived. They look fucking great. They're two of the hottest people who've ever lived. The problem with that choice is that it looks like they are Superman's parents. The whole point of the story is that they're not, they're supposed to be more ordinary. And so I really love that this, like, maybe it's a little too, like, literalized.

But I love that it sort of heightens the idea of, like, the family you choose and the family. and the family that chooses you. And I don't know about you guys, but like, at the end of the movie, when he goes back to 4 slash Gary at the Fortress of Solitude, and Gary's like, you know,

sues you, gonna boot it up. And it's not the old message that he always listened to, but it's the clips. Uh, that, I was fucking weeping. The clips of the Kentz.

That's James Gun, man. Dude, it's his, like, it's Yandu saying, like, he might have been your father, but he wasn't your daddy. Like, that's, it's perfect. It's a vintage gun. YonDoo was a human trafficker.

Well, I mean, the non-content did not work with the ravagers, that's true. But other than that, there are some parallels. No, I totally, I totally get it. And even that, the Yondu thing, I'm not going to get off on this, but the Yon-Du thing is also indicative of how James writes,

because Yondu loves Peter Quill the whole time. It's just that we don't know. And the rest of the ravages are saying, like, you're sweet on the boy, sweet on the boy, we just think maybe he just has a soft spot. But really that's his fucking son. Like Peter thought he's like he needed I was small. I could fit in the small spaces. Right. But I enjoyed this number one because these are more, this is a more believable mind pock can't.

Myon pot can't don't have to be fucking amazing and they just have to be simple people with simple wisdom for a guy who looks at the world. Good hearts. in very simple terms of good and evil. And, like, that scene at the end is actually his father, not the end, but, you know, that part, his father, distilling a very complex idea down to something that Clark can understand, which is you've already decided to be good. Yeah. What difference does it make what they say? Exactly. What does differences make what we say?

You've decided to be good. We've put you in a position where you make that decision every. single day. Go out and bring that to the world. Keep doing what you're doing. And like, sometimes when your parents give you messages, they don't reinvent the will. It's their authority and their love

and their investment in you that reassures you that what you're doing is the right thing, right? But the past John Kitts, these guys were fucking from Brown and Princeton. They were societal experts. They were telling him, don't tell people.

Don't tell him about his secret identity. This is how you have to position yourself. This is how you have to position yourself. This is what you're going to have to do and all of that. I'm going to have the wherewithal to sacrifice my life so you cannot save me. Well, I still have some notes on the tornadoes. It's a real paradox. I mean, I'm reluctant to get too far into the psychology of a parent.

But the truth is that in my very limited experience thus far, it is both. It is that when you're raising a kid, you, constantly are telling them what not to do because they don't know what to do and what not to do. And so for their own safety, I feel like all the time, I'm like, don't please, wait, stop, hold on. You know, like that feeling is kind of comes naturally

because you have this protectionist instinct. And so I think that portraying Ma and Pa in the previous films in that way, rational and reasonable. And I also think that there's something nice about the way that we see Monpa in this movie, which is sort of like encouraging and thoughtful and inspiring. It is a little bit of a fantasy,

the same way that I think a little bit of his engagement with the real world in this story is a little bit of a fantasy. You know, they're just like, you be the person that if you have good and you go be good. Like that's actually like, that's not really a message you would give your kids. You would talk to your kids about human decency. Right.

You talk to your kids about how you want to, how you want to be treated and then how you should. treat others. But these like bromides about goodness, I think that doesn't really prepare you for the world. By the way, I would like to apologize to the family of Glenn Ford. I didn't want to correct you. No, no. It's not Gregory Peck that played John King as Glenn Ford. I knew I was wrong when I said it this time. I think I might have said on the Midnight Boys too for family. Apologize. They all, they all unsubscribe from Briggerverse. Yeah. That's not what my dad said to me at all. What did you say?

Get your ass in this fucking house. How about that? That's what he said. As we've discussed, you and our race very similarly. Like, right. That's what he said. But when I think about the things that he told me,

they all had this direct pathway to just personhood. Yeah. Like, just, it wasn't too much about how I was going to navigate my life. And I'm sure there are a lot of people's parents out here that told them, hey, you're going to study this, you're going to do this, and you're going to go here. every lesson I ever got was about personhood.

It was about this is what type of person has utility and value in society. And these are the traits and characteristics that you want to have if you want to be a person like that. And the reason why he was able to tell me that is because he kept me alive. Because he taught me how to use the urinal, because he taught me how to play baseball. Because so many other parts, he gave me my diet. He gave me my religion. So there are parts of my personality that he could both give to me and then also cement in me like when I didn't know who I was.

You know what I mean? Yeah. And I thought, I think that's why I really loved the end when they boot up like all of the home movies because like they're the most ordinary things, right? It's like I was playing with you in the yard. Like I lifted you up. Not actually I told you how to be a hero. That's not, it's like that's not what the story of these Kent's were.

It's like you grew up and you lived a life and like now you're figuring out who you want to be. Now you're a soy boy living in a big city. It's true. You know something else about that little, that quick little. You know something else about that little montage? There was no super stuff in it. Yeah. I think that was a choice.

There was no super stuff in it. There was no time when they were playing with him and he was flying. Yeah. No Jack Jack from the Incredibles. No Jack Jack from the Incredibles. Yeah. I just watch The Incredibles 2 again. That's a great, great.

Fucking masterpiece, bro. And so, like, know him picking up the car like he did for Glenn Ford. Like, like, none of that stuff, right? It's no othering of him. He was one of them. He was a kid. He was their son. He was their son.

You go into his room and it's just like the trophies and the diploma. And, of course, Lois gets to look at, like, the music posters and everything. It's like, yeah, it's just this was their life. What was the name of his band that he liked? The Mighty Crab Jaws. The mighty crab joys. Mighty crab joys. Mighty crab joys.

And then James, as he always will, he gave you an original tune. He did. Sure did. Not nearly as many needle drops in this movie isn't a typical. No, but I would encourage fans of this movie to go explore the official Spotify playlist. That's right. Every character has their own. Because again, James Gunn, just very learned in music.

He knows a lot about music and he has a lot of great choices on those playlists. I would like to talk for a couple moments longer about crypto because we have not spent enough time on the dog. We are pet enthusiasts. You are, I would say, I don't want to go with like empty inside, but you're not when we talk about animals. I was raised with pets.

Yeah, but. Well, I have seen, you've met my cat a couple times and you were very sweet with him. If I remember correctly, the first time you met Halo, you went up to him and you said, Halo, what's up? Yeah. Okay.

Sounds right. Sounds like me. Which is a proper way to agree with a cat. Which was nice. Yeah. I had three cats growing up as a child, the end. And I had a dog. Yeah.

You love it. I do love it. Maybe not as much as we've. I haven't had a pet in my life since I was 16. I thought crypto was an instant rock star, just a complete sensation. They gave us, did you get this when you went earlier in the week? We got comic books at the movie. We received nothing.

Yeah, we got comic books. Very cool. We went to a IMAC showing. They bought you guys off. It worked. Here we are. Look at that. We got comic books.

Crypto was, of course, on the cover with soups, as he should have been. I thought that crypto was. amazing. James Gunn likes to put people in his life, whether it's a friend like Nathan Philean or his brother or his partner, you know, all of whom are wonderful performers and deserve to be in these stories and are great in the movies. And now his dog, Ozu is the model for crypto. So the dog has been added to the list. And you can watch online some clips of Ozu watching crypto and check out his own work. And I think it's mesmerizing. And I have no notes. That's my take on crypto. I thought I was not expecting crypto. I was not expecting

crypto to be in the movie this much. Fuck no. But I really loved it. It's a lot. It's a lot of the dog. I knew he was going to do this. It's just, it's not that it's bad and it is canon. It's just, he gets like five moments in the movie. Maybe more. That's a lot. That's a lot.

So crypto, crypto gets a moment where Superman's not even around. Crypto gets a moment to attack the engineer inside of the forces solitude. Like, crypto's in this bitch. Yes. That was sad because he got the nano. He got the nano stuff on it. The dog. I thought it was well used. He didn't leave a lot of... The movie is both like really bloated,

but also there's not a lot of fat in it. Almost everything that's in the movie has some type of use in the film. Yeah. And it's like you had chicken for dinner, but a lot of chicken. But a lot of chicken. Like way too much chicken.

Like a lot of chicken breasts. Like fucking, what was the one? Did you see it? Did you see Jonathan Majors' magazine dreams? I certainly did three years ago before all the news happened. I saw it at Sundance and I watched it and I didn't like it then. Right. It's very intense. Great performance, honestly.

But he eats a shit ton and that's basically what this was. Yeah. But crypto was in the movie a lot. Yeah. But he served a purpose. He was great. He served a purpose. No?

How dare you. First of all. He's the closest the movie gets to like McGuffany, you know, where I'm just like, Oh, he's here to save the day. He is a central character with an arc and a soul and a heart and formative bonds with his co-stars. And also, he's never more than a dog. He's just being a dog the whole time. He just wants to play.

He wants to play. Yeah. He's a pup. Yeah. Strong story set up. We have strong story set up because before he annihilates all of Lexus drones, he has previously destroyed the T-Sphere's in your least favorite stretch of the movie. in your least favorite stretch of the movie in the pocket dimension,

River of Doom. So that was all great. Crypto was wonderful. He's cute. He's funny. He's charming. I loved at the end, the payoff of like when Super.

I thought the Supergirl intro was quite effective. It's like just a couple minutes, not too much. It gives you a, I feel like she's really good casting. Millie's going to be great. We're going to go get hammered on the planet with a red sun, like setting up.

But then like when crypto goes over and just like, they're wrestling on the ground. It's like, oh, right. bad parenting, like behavioral issues. We see where this comes from. I thought that was very satisfying. But on the, on the Superman front, I loved the like,

well, it's more of a foster situation. And you're doing this all for a dog. And it's like, he's not even like a very good one. Right. But he's like alone and he's scared. Yeah. It's an instant tugging on the heartstrings. And I'm sorry.

That's great, guys. I'm happy for you guys. Superman cares about dogs. This is what you do. See, I see what you do. You crinkled your, you furrowed your brow at me when I started to say, what's in here. what's in here ticking away and now look at you.

I got something for you. Is it going to be a picture of Bozeman? Yeah, I got something for it. I love dogs. I don't need a dog to be the engine of my superhero movie. Sean, look at that. It's adorable. And this is wonderful.

I'll salute it seven days a week. I got no beef with dogs whatsoever. Oh, my God. Are we going to do any Mr. Terrific? Yeah, let's talk about Mr. Triphic right now. Fantastic. So the whole Justice gang was pretty cool. They were the thing that had me the most skeptical of skeptical.

skeptical of the movie. Yeah, I think out of the trailers, we were like, oh, this feels like a lot of character introduction for this movie. And then it is actually pretty well executed lean. I thought Mr. Turfick was fantastic. But Mr. Triffick is the third lead of this movie. He's in a lot of the movie. He's in more of the movie than Lex. Yeah.

That's an interesting choice. Right. And they were able to take a character that not a lot of people have a lot of familiarity with, unless you're, if you watch the cartoons, he pops up there. But if you're a comic book fan, but Arrow, he's in Arrow. So it's not like people don't know Mr. Terrific, but I'm saying he was cool. I thought he was amazing.

He was cool in the movie. His fight scene was really cool in the movie. And rather than tell us, oh, Mr. Terrific is the third smartest man in DC Universe. You see it. You see it. He walks in there and they go, oh, don't worry about it.

It's just a smart one. And then you realize how fucking dangerous the smart one can be. I really enjoyed the portrayal of the character. I thought it was great. I think the performance is really good. The character is cool. I don't know this character. Like, I'm just not up on the lore of this character,

so I didn't know what to expect from it. I did feel a little bit like, let's see if we can put Drax and Rocket together in one character. And that's Mr. Terrific. Yeah. You know, where it's like he writes to these, like, archetypal molds, and they all represent, like, different energies of teams, and he's really good at writing for teams.

Right. And so he wanted somebody who was, like, super smart and super strong to be, driving the action of a lot of this movie. I think he's the challenge of that part is not Eddie Kiki's part problem. It's just that he's the only vessel for exposition in the movie.

So he does spend a lot of time having to just explain to Lois what's going on. Which then helps us better understand what's going on, but it is, it's a comic movie exposition. But he's also actionable in that role. He does stuff. He leads. Yeah, and there's stuff in the movie

that you go, okay, how would this have happened if Mr. Terrific wouldn't have been there, right? Um, comic book nerd shit. Yeah. It's going to be very difficult to put nanotech into Superman's blood. How are you going to get in his bloodstream? But like that was, but that was crazy. Did you put it in his food?

Did he eat it? A lot of nanotech in this movie, actually. There was a lot of nanotech. Yeah. We haven't talked about the engineer. Because to get into Superman's bloodstream, Superman is impervious and invulnerable. It's going to be pretty hard to do that.

But I guess he's the smartest man in D.C. He figured out of it. Was any of that like COVID shot stuff in there? Oh, what? It didn't occur to me, honestly. I'm just, he's pulling from so much stuff in the last seven years of our life that, I'm probably not. But like, that's one of the theories, right, of the COVID shot. Sure.

Yeah. They put something in the shot and then they track you, you know? I didn't even thought of that. Didn't occur to me. Maybe. I'm just ripping here. I'm not saying that's what happened. We're just three of us here talking.

I'm not saying don't take the shot. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, you guys have your breakout for social. I thought that like that moment where he's like, yeah, I do that to like all my friends. And then we cut to Hawk Girl and she's like, what the fuck? It was like great. It tells you a lot about their dynamic. Obviously, we have with the justice gang, all this stuff about is this our name?

Is it permanent? Who gets to vote? So you get a little bit of a sense of just what their dynamic is together. Are we going to let metamorpho in or not? I thought, by the way, of all the things that we could have gotten at, the end, just like the fact that that looks exactly the hammer, it like just looks like Neil Neer. Like, very purposeful

certainly. You know what Mr. Drew kind of was in this movie to me though? He kind of was the Batman of the movie. He is. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, like using resources and invention and the mind. And of course, that's also like... His sense of humor, his no nonsense

and his character, and that's kind of how he is. Yeah, and like the idea that because Lex is very much positioning the battle with Superman as like Brains versus Braun and then you have Mr. terrific where it's like all there. Everything's present. He can solve everything with his mind,

but then also, as we already talked about, like, the best fight scene in the movie is his. I thought that the like, line deliveries and the nature of interaction with the other characters was really great, too, like the moment with Lois where we go to the,

get the, you have a flying saucer, but like you can't figure out how to make your garage door open quickly. It's like, I haven't gotten around to that yet. It was great. So we had a sense of like not only,

what each of these characters is interested in and how they behave out in the field, but just like how long or not long they've been doing this together? I thought that was like very succinctly established as well. Nice, uh, mural in the Hall of Justice was like, you got Batman, you get your little Easter eggs and glimpses.

We get our jitters coffee mentioned elsewhere. So that was nice too. Um, I thought Mr. Terrific was great. I can't wait for more. Again, I thought Philly and as Guy Gardner was great. It's a very comic aspect of the, movie the way the Phileans doing it. He's always... How many women was it? So about the haircut?

340. 340. I didn't disagree. Like, that was incredible. Here's the... Okay, here's... This is not a quibble, and I know we're getting a Lantern's TV show. Yeah. It's just like, it's kind of a sin that there's never been a cool Hal Jordan movie. It, to me... I hope the Lantern show is good. I feel like it will be. It's kind of a hard character to do right, but it's a really cool character. Obviously, all the Lantern course stuff is generally kind of interesting. But for, like, the most successful representation of Green Lantern to be like

Guy Gardner's stupid haircut. It's not exactly what I want. I want and I hope that show is cool. I'll be honest with you, what I've heard about the show does not make it sound cool to me. The idea that it's like way more of like a procedural. Boots on the ground procedural rather than this like intergalactic

story about a pilot. I don't, I'm just kind of spinning my wheels here. On the flip side, we're getting Aaron Pierre and Kyle Chandler in Atlanta. And they're both extremely well-cast for those two characters. Ridiculously well-cast. So these were my thoughts about Green Lantern.

I thought about the choice to use Guy Gardner there instead of Hal Jordan. And I considered it. One, I consider it number one, it's the comic lover's thing to do. It's like everybody knows Hal Jordan. This is the nerdy Green Lantern. It's a nerdy Green Lantern if you want to go. Let's go to a Green Lantern that you got to kind of be a little deep into the Lordigate, put him in there, and he makes for a cool, surly, angry, whatever.

Then I thought, well, is that a decision to save Hal Jordan for a way to roll Hal Jordan out in a way that is a little bit deeper that you don't want to put baby in the corner if you're doing that, right? Yeah. Because if they're going to do a gritty procedural for the lanterns movie, it doesn't really seem to work with the version of Superman, the tone. that we just got. So it's very interesting.

I'm like, which is weird to me because I'm like, how Jordan Lantern done right is Han Solo. Oh, you know what I mean? Like that,

and this movie could support a Han Solo, this Superman world that he made. Certainly. So I think we'll get it eventually, but I'm interested to see this movie was supposed to make you more interested in the world

than it did. It made me more interested in Mr. Terrific. It made me more interested in Supergirl. For sure. It made me more interested in what they're going to do

with the Lanterns because it seems to me, me like Guy Gardner is such a misanthroat that it makes me think about what the Lantern Corps really is and like what this the whole universe is going to look like. The conversation about his vows, right? It's an implied vow.

It's an implied vow. It's a nice way to kind of hinted like, well, we're going to explore what all of this looks like really. My guess, based on absolutely nothing other than tone, is that Guy Gardner, who is confirmed to be in the show, will be like very rarely in it. Oh, Guy Gardner is in the lantern It is. Yeah, it is the same universe.

Yeah. Oh, no, I didn't know. Okay. He's going to be in it. It feels like a tonal clash. It feels like a tonal clash. Even some of the shots that I've seen of them. I think they've just shown one production still.

Well, it's just them walking road in plain clothes. They look great. And it looks like some penguin type shit. Yeah. But like, I mean, that's, you know, that's going to be the balancing and mixing and mixing and melding of tones across the universe is going to be one of the interesting things. But, like, I think we would all agree. kind of at the most basic level.

Like, on the one hand, we always wonder and worry, okay, will these tones mesh? But we don't want every show or movie to feel the same. That variance is so crucial. So I think, like, we'll have to see in real time

how that stuff works. Like, I, it was interesting. Obviously, Peacemaker is being basically, like, re-canonized to fit now. Like, some of there's just changing between seasons. Got just talked about this. Some of the stuff that basically, like, now won't work as canon

from the first season to make it. work as can and moving forward. That was one of the biggest cheers in the theater when Peacemaker showed up. No Eagley. No Eagley. Peacemakers in the movie. Have I underestimated how popular peacemaker is? Do you think that was because people are like, I love Peacemaker

because John Cena is incredibly famous? I think it's one of the only, it's the only callback to a character we know. So that's a common experience we've had as comic book moviegoers to the last 15 years. I feel like, oh shit, moment. So you get one of those. It's a very funny moment, right?

scene obviously as great as that character. It did have me kind of like, I got confused for a second because I was like, wait a minute. So Grillo's playing Rick Flagg. Yeah. But I forgot it was Rick Fleck Senior. Senior. Yeah.

So is Rick Flagg Jr. Canonically dead because of the suicide squad? Yes. Maybe not though. I think that's part of the premise of Peace Maker season two. Is that he's like, I need my revenge. Oh. Oh.

Well, that's muddled because that stuff was. Brillow still got it. That stuff was so weird. He's basically playing like the same character in two different comic book universes. Well, the Justice League shows up at the end of Peacemaker's season one. Yeah. They don't show them, but it's very clearly Caval Superman.

It's very clearly Galgado's Wonder Woman. They pop in there. So I thought they were leaving. And then Rick Flagg Jr. dies in the suicide squad. Yeah. Interesting. It's a little confusing. It's a little confusing. Well, it's a lot confusing.

It's like it's a completely different universe. What's more or less confusing? That or how Superman got the nanotech to come out of his lungs? I guess it's because the engineer is knocked out. It wouldn't affect him. So, yeah, my read on this... Cleveland Guardians baseball stadium,

that would not be where I wanted to die. As an Oriole fan, I've seen Jose Ramirez had too many home runs against my team there. It's not where I want to die. I don't think this is what Gunn is doing, but this is what I thought of while watching that whole sequence. This was the Sabre Metrics versus

do you know ball debate in superheroes? Yes. Do you just, are you a scout who sits on the hard bench and watches a guy's energy on the mound? Or are you crunching the numbers? Lex is crunching the numbers. He's a saber matrician. He's big on eggs of velo and spin rate. Yes.

And he believes that after putting all this data together and churning it into his machine and pressing A1 100 times, he will be able to defeat Superman with the engineer's help. Right. And Superman is a ball knower. That's right. Superman is, he doesn't just watch the tape. He is the tape. Right.

And he knows. Fly up, smash down. Yeah. Pull the nanotech out of my goddamn nose and mouth. Engineer has nothing on Superman. Nothing. And Superman's ability to score from the mid-range. That's right.

You know, his ability to hit the curveball. Oh, yeah. His ability to run out of the power eye formation. You know, like all of the things that we think are the old way of the game. You know who? Who else turned out to be a five-tow player? 80 grade power. We didn't see it coming.

Stickman Jimmy Olson. We got to talk about it for a minute here. Of all the Lex blind spots, the Eve selfies having everything behind her, and then Jimmy just scrolling through his phone and being like, this is just like a bunch of tits. But it's all of the key information.

Great stuff. By the way, I did not know this actress. I looked her up. Former Victoria's Secret Angel. that has moved over into acting. What a performance. She's very funny. She's very funny.

Testbacher, a classic. Yeah, like, what a performance. And you guys to call that out in the big picture. I love that it was just the Valerie Parin character from the first film. Great stuff. Like, what a, like, what a performance. Like, she was very amazing. I'm not acting like, she up for five Oscars.

But normally, like, people cannot be that funny. She has to be consistently funny. She got a lot of laughs. And every scene that she's in, And normally when you see the change to model to actress, it's worth sometimes, but she's actually really, really good. Renee Russo, it worked. Yeah. Oh, René Russo.

Incredible that Jimmy, you know, Lois says, like, how do you do it? But also just he doesn't understand, like, who, like, he's like, hot. Doesn't even understand what's happening. The women in the Daily Planet Office who are, like, watching him from across and like, oh, my God, Jimmy, he's, like, really got it. And he has no idea what's going on. Just all absolutely wonderful. The second biggest, Zach, besides Joriel. parents was making Jimmy Olson this

Babe magnet. Sex God. Yeah. Incredible stuff. Like it just, that's the kind of thing that went, oh, okay, this is Superman, but also there's some new things here. I thought if you can make that character work, who is just a pal of Superman, if you can make that character work. No. Yeah. He, I'd like to commend James Gunn on showing more restraint here with the mutant toes bit than he did with Taserface in Guardian too, which was a joke that recurred about 97 times. In that film, we got to see mutant toes in Jimmy's phone here.

And then we have the conversation later in the alley about how he said that her toes looked like shrimp cocktail spilled all over the floor. And that's it. So that felt like progress to me. Was the character at all unwoke in terms of ladiness? Was Jimmy Olson being a stick man and kind of, You know, you can make a dis, he was kind of, he was kind of on his bitches saying shit, shit. So was that at all?

Did that rub you the wrong way as a lady? I loved it. I thought it was great. It rubbed it the right way. Exactly. I mean, Jimmy also knows how to rub the right way. I think that was clear. I think that was clear.

Nice contrast to Guy Gardner's 348 number. You know, it's like that actually was Jimmy's number. You actually put up that score. Maxwell Lord. We got a quick, Maxwell Lord. Real quick. Sean Gun. He knows how to put his, he.

knows how to cast his brother. He's going to be in peacemaker as well. We got some other like, you know, some gun faves, Palm, Jen Holland, Rooker there along with Alan Tudik, of course. The Fortress of Solitude. They're the Fortress of Solitude, Robo voice crew. Okay.

There was one other notable one too. He said Palm, Alan Tudik. Jennifer Holland. That's his partner. Rooker. Rooker. That was one I was thinking. Michael Rooker. Well, Tudick is four. Four. or slash Gary.

Who would work her if then? Let's find out right now. What do you guys think about? I always feel like directors, when a director works with the same amount of people, with the same people over and over again, those people actually aren't.

One? Those directors have emotional support actors. I think they have people who. Yeah, they're troop. They're troop. But also people that make them feel super comfortable particularly when they're doing a movie that is a big swing or very ambitious.

You don't want to work with new people because these people you're comfortable with and there's like an energetic thing. There's, that's definitely a factor. This is one of my favorite things that directors do. Preston Sturges did this. Robert Allman did this.

Quinn Tarantino does this. The figures who recur all my favorite directors. Nolan? Nolan does this. Michael Kane has been in eight of his movies. If you can get one Nolan movie, you're about to eat for five to ten years. And some of it is,

that characters bring gravitas or recognizability. But I think more than anything, I mean, I know this for a fact. Quentin just likes how Sam Jackson says his words. It's sometimes it's that simple. You know, like, obviously James Gunn likes how Michael Rooker says his words. He just wants him doing his dialogue.

And that's a huge part of the idea of getting a movie across. You want people who you feel like know how to sell your shit. Like you hear the voice when you're writing the dialogue. Exactly. Yeah. So it's cool. I loved it. These are pretty modest relative to his history with these actors.

Sprinkled. They're there. They're there. He didn't give any of them a big, oh, it's up, Nathan, Philly. Phillion was, like, very present in the movie. And Maxwell Lord, as we understand it, is like in Peacemaker season two, right? So the Stingers. We get the cute little crypto-soub's moment on the moon as the mid-credits.

And then the end credits is this moment with Superman and Mr. Terrific looking at the misalignment of the resealed rift. Is this like a, you sat around and it's a vibes. I'm sorry, I'm such a jerk. I didn't think how this would make you feel, Stinger, or is that setting up some future story where the misalignment of Metropolis will prove crucial? I don't know.

But as you know, I don't like meaningless post-credit scenes. Hate it. It's not the post-credit scenes that I grew up on. You know what the first post-credit scene I ever saw was? Masters of the Universe. Frank Langella as goddamn Skeletor pops up. I didn't Superman.

He-Man did not kill me. I was like, oh, my God, there's more. And I started watching to the end of all the movies. And the movies just goddamn went off. But, but. Can I interrupt you and make one request? Sure. When you guys are doing Masters of the Universe next year,

can you just make me a part of the Ringerverse coverage in some way? You're looking forward to it. Because He-Man was my first thing. You're always a part of the Ring of the Universe, man. Well, that's nice if you just say. But I don't think Amanda will ever let me talk about He-Man on the pod. You're correct. So I just keep me in mind.

Just keep me in. That's all I'm going to say. I'm sorry to interrupt you. No, but I thought the mid-credit scenes now are almost always nothing. But the post-credit scene, to me, said more about the character of Mr. Terrific that he put him in that. Oh, yeah. That he's thinking about more for him. Yeah, good call.

Like, he's thinking about it. about more for him because I kind of... I hope so. He was great. I kind of don't know what it meant and don't think that it meant anything and it was like if I got to watch five minutes of credit for you know fucking special effects people

give me something. I mean metaphorically it was nothing's perfect. Right. That was the takeaway, right? In a movie where we're constantly talking about how to heal and how to fix things, nothing is totally fixed and that made sense story-wise. I really truly, truly thought he

wasn't going to do one. And I sat there thinking that this would be like a rejection of the MCU. So it would be like, we are dispensing with this. Guy Gardner hurls all of his middle fingers throughout the movie and that's Gunn's middle finger at the end is no stinger. That's what I thought. In the same way that I read some of the, um, undermining Superman's public reputation storytelling as a direct James Gunn reaction to what happened to him in 2018. Where I saw that as a very distinct and there are other factors involved too, the way that, you know, governments have bots that undermine the public trust in the world. But that felt very much like, as I said on the other pod,

like revenge porn against Disney. And I thought it would have been, I thought that would have been a really funny thing to do to say like, Stingers are for losers. That's the old times. We're in the new times. But he didn't do that. At the end of the day, Stinger or no Stinger, the revenge against Disney is the movie succeeding.

Yeah. Yeah. It is. I mean. Do you, okay, so do you guys feel like there's any heat off fantastic for like, it's like, because this movie's clearly going to be super well received. Good question. heat off? Not that the heat has never been more on. That's pressure, but how about like interest and intensity?

Is there like a turning of the boat here happening? When you say heat off, you mean, oh, have the stolen thunder. Yes, yes, exactly. That's a better way of putting it. Yes. Two things. I'm going to say one thing. I wonder if you guys have ever heard this for people that work on movies.

People that work on movies, particularly these superhero movies with all of these credits, they like these stingers. Of course, yeah. Because. Forces you to sit in the seat. They want you to see their... Oh, yeah, yeah. You heard that...

I heard, like, I was at the screening one time when I was, somebody was like, stay, stay, stay, stay, there's something at the end of the movie. I was like, oh, wow, okay.

And it was like, yeah, by the way, I worked on this movie so you can see. So they... But I want to start getting them for like, Sundance indie dramas

about like guys who were tortured in prison. You know what I mean? Like, I want later to be like a nice little stinger at the end of my Oscar movie. This was a movie

about people being tortured in prison. It's a very good point. It's not a Sundance indie Just one last dance. No, with this her and what's his face? What's the guy? The Igor. You're a Borosov?

I just want to see them holding the hands. Just a quick shot. Well, that would, I think that would disrupt the ending of the movie. No. So what. Okay. Did you like an aura? Didn't like.

Love. Oh, okay. Did you like it? I thought it was fantastic. Didn't like love. The type of movie that makes you just want to like literally go somewhere, pound out of screen, and tell some weird two days in somebody's life. I love movies.

I legitimately thought you were going to say make you want to go to the strip club. For that too. But no, the Fantastic Four, they got to bring it on. They got to come with it now. It's tough now.

It's tough now. These movies aren't dissimilar in terms of what they have to do by making these characters contemporary. There was more, I think. on, Superman was carrying more on his shoulders. I agree. I think. But.

And kind of pretty much did it? Yes. Oh. No question. After the numbers come out, James gunning them. Like, man, Warner Brothers is coming for that number one spot. So yeah. It's a big deal.

But if they're both good? If they're both good. I mean, you guys are back. We're going to be. Guys. Yeah, we're definitely back. I have been. The question that you.

asked when I thought, you said the heat is off Fantastic Four. I've looked at this in a couple of different ways. Is this going to make audiences more eager to see the Fantastic Four? Because what I do feel like is disappointment after disappointment at the movie theater for these superhero movies kind of puts people in a wait and C mode. And when us die hards go to the first week and then those big fall-on, the second week are coming from people that are saying this movie sucked. Right. And they were

like, I don't want to run out right there in the first week and see it, whatever. But just the overall energy of Superman being so good might make people go, I don't want to miss the first week's sensation of the Fantastic Four. Let me run out there and see if they have anything. Yeah. And even just more

broadly, like F1 has nothing to do in her culture, but it's just like it's a summer blockbuster run here. Like, people are back in the movies. What a time to be you. You must be thrilled. We did it. Even the movie you didn't like that I really did like.

Oh my God. I really liked it. I haven't seen it yet. So bad. It's so bad. Don't listen. It's good. Don't, don't listen.

The eternal debate. Don't listen. It's good. We had a blast. The midnight boys were going crazy. Charles came into the studio and was like, Jurassic rocked. I was like, what is happening? But it made a shit ton of money.

It did. Yeah. So. People's interest is back. The movies are somewhat delivering. So we'll see. I mean, what a time to be us, guys. You think the Mets are going to win the World Series?

No, I do not. Okay. I think they are a bit short in pitching right now. As you witnessed this week, taking two of three from my favorite team. Orioles are eight under 500. Is it too late? No, you're selling at the deadline. Already traded Brian Baker.

I saw that after he got absolutely smoked by the Mets and a thrilling comeback victory on Tuesday. How did they get to this point? of blowing it up so soon. They were just like 100-1 team. Yes, they very, very famously had one of the, maybe the best turnaround in the history of the sport, made the playoffs twice in a row. As you guys might know, did not win a game in the playoffs either year.

It's not over. They're going to be back next year. Everyone on the team got hurt. You can't withstand that many injuries, especially to the young lineup. Like Jordan Westberg is back and healthy now, and you can't stop hitting normal runs. You like that.

Happy for you. Thanks. You must be feeling happy that Anthony Santander has also fallen off a cliff since going to Toronto. I don't root for, I don't root against. Like when I watch Mani Machado, now granted, he didn't choose to sign with another team. He was traded in a core betrayal of the sanctity of fandom. But when I watch Mani, I root for him, you know? So I'm not, I'll always root for Tony Taters.

He was a great Oriole. Fuck them. You left. Fuck you. Well, like when Messina signed with the Yankees, I was like, you're dead to me. But like the Warriors didn't want to resign. Eli Ricks. What about when Van signs with Ben Shapiro's podcast network to host the fandom show?

Will you, will you still cheer for Van? I would listen. I'll always cheer for Van. Daily Wire. Black fan. Like the Black fan show. Hey, I'm the last of the Vanguard here, Daily Wire.

Check me out. Vanguard. Vanguard. Vanguard. That would be a good name for your Pod. Vanguard over on the Daily Wire, the one liberal that they got,

damn near socialist. This movie was delightful. This is great. And it was such a blast to talk about it with you guys. Thanks for having me here. Thanks for joining me. Love you, Joe.

We love you, Joe. Thank you to also, you guys weren't the only ones joining us today. Eduardo Ocampo came in and pitched it for the pod. He's not in the room with us. He's on Zoom.

Oh, he's on Zoom. I don't see him. Thank you to Eduardo for picking up this pod. And thank you, as always, of course, to John Richter, Arjuna Ramga Powell and Jome and Denneron. We will see you when we see you. Crypto, take us home. All pay off your home, travel for life, drive a Ferrari. In celebration of the world premiere of the Monopoly Big Board Buckslot Machine by Aristocrat Gaming,

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