Off-Nominal - 87 - Grippy Socks

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

Marina Koren of The Atlantic joins Jake and Anthony to talk about her recent viewing and reviewing of 2001: A Space Odyssey.TopicsOff-Nominal - YouTubeEpisode 87 - Grippy Socks (with Marina Koren) - YouTube'2001: A Space Odyssey' Is the Most Overhyped Space Movie - The Atlantic2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - IMDbThe Hopeful Traveler: The Cosmopolitan Las Vegas: Reception Lobby & Video PillarsThe hotel lobby @ The Cosmopolitan Las Vegas | Best viewed o… | Michael Contreras | FlickrThe audacious rescue plan that might have saved space shuttle Columbia | Ars TechnicaMeet the dearMoon Crew!Follow MarinaMarina Koren (@marinakoren) / TwitterAll Stories by Marina Koren - The AtlanticFollow JakeWeMartians Podcast - Follow Humanity's Journey to MarsWeMartians Podcast (@We_Martians) | TwitterJake Robins (@JakeOnOrbit) | TwitterFollow AnthonyMain Engine Cut OffMain Engine Cut Off (@WeHaveMECO) | TwitterAnthony Colangelo (@acolangelo) | TwitterOff-Nominal MerchandiseOff-Nominal Logo TeeWeMartians Shop | MECO Shop

TLS and go for main engine, start. Hey, everybody. Anthony. Anthony, do you know who Steve Aoki is? He's, yeah, where in his Wikipedia will commercial astronaut appear? Well, if you'd ask me a week ago, I would have said a right under magician, I think is what I said. I thought he was. And I said dead. And then I thought maybe MMA fighter.

I don't actually know where it ended up. I still don't know who Steve Aoki. You don't actually know, and you never will. No. No. Well, now I know he's apparently an astronaut in waiting. It's waiting. Emphasis on waiting. An ass waiting.

Oh, man. That's wild. That's wild. Okay. Let's see how long we can go without introducing Marina. Yeah. Let's see how far we can go. Marina, how you doing?

I am great. How are you? Oh, you know. I've been sick this week, but I feel better enough for a beer. So that's a good sign. You know you've crushed at the hill when it's like, when you look at a beer and you're like, I'm not grossed out by this.

Yeah. And it's been rainy and so Rocket Lab moved to the launch till next week for me, which is great. So everything's turning up, Anthony, other than the Dear Moon announcement. And they're getting sick. And the sickness, yeah. That's run of the mill at this point.

Okay. Well, we're going to talk about some crazy non-talking Topical stuff today. Maybe this might this maybe the least topical as we can get because this is a very topical. Well, yeah, but it's like a pretty old movie. Like this is not a new. This is not a new thing we're going to talk about today.

But Marina, you watched 2001 Space Odyssey for the very first time, which is wild. And you wrote a great article about it, which was chef's kiss. And so, yeah, we're going to talk about that. I guess we do start drinks, right? I'm getting ahead of myself already. but that's called the teaser that's called the teaser tee up yeah

an appetizer apatizer um marina what are you drinking today what do you got I have a vino verde white wine and a NASA glass you can't really see but there's a NASA

etched on right here I think this is one I had the last time I joined the show so I hopefully not the same bottle for originality no not the same bottle but I think

there's a space angle to my Vino Verde because I was at a trivia night, astronomy-themed trivia night this summer. And the final question was like, come up with the most creative, like, space-related alcohol names, terms. And I came up with Venus Verde. And my team ended up winning trivia night. So there's a space angle to this drink. That was like the tiebreaker? Yes. It was the tiebreaker. Yeah. Damn. Okay. What are you guys drinking?

It's a hell of a trivia team. Anthony, you go first. What do you got? Yeah, I've got a Troegs blizzard of hops. The winter beers are out. I always like the label of this one. Pretty great. Winter IPA.

Nice and wintery, yeah. Yeah, it's delicious. This isn't quite Mad Elf, which I feel like I have to get for the next show. Yeah, we're coming up on Mad Elf time. Yeah, that's like a 15% beer. That's like cherries and. taste like a Christmas tree, which it's not great, but, you know, I've been doing it every off

nominees, I think, so you got to keep it going. You got to do it's like, it's like, it's like one of those beers you can have once a year and you're like, I'm right. I remember this and now I can move on with my life for a year. They make one batch and that's it. Yeah. Well, I'm, I'm, I'm distinctively not Christmasy today. I have a Mai Tai. So, um, a Chiapas Mai Tai that I made. So yeah, I've had this, I think, a couple times now in the show because I found this recipe, I don't know, one of the first happy hours. I bet you if you went back and looked in the happy hours, you would find one of these. But I kind of fell in love with it. So now I make it all the time.

So yeah, it's got, this is the one with the rum. I wouldn't see if I can remember. Everything else matters. Just the rum. Yeah, rum, right? I've already, sounds like I've had a few of these already. orange is a cure and then the cool Mayan drink this posh like corn distilled corn drink which is super cool and weird

did you get that in the weird Mayan abandoned village or whatever you went to no no no they didn't have any stores there so but I bet you at one point it did exist there so yeah yeah what was going on with that how was your conjunction did you have a good conjunction Jake it was pretty cool yeah Jake was in this like yeah so There's this abandoned village. It's really close to my house. So there was this eco hiking group that does these night hikes.

And they were like, we're going to go to this place. And it was like, it's like four minutes from my house. This dark tunnel in the woods. Yeah. So I just drove over here and when we walked with them and snuck through this thing. And there's like this abandoned old village that used to be like an asciendo where the Spanish colonials put all the mines to work to make, you know, sissau rope and stuff. And it's all spooky and scary now.

and all the, like, you know, it's like a mix of like teenagers go here to drink and also like weird people that are into mysticism will go there and do crazy stuff. And sometimes you find like weird like panagrams painted in the ground and stuff like that. It was very spooky. It was fun. Did you specifically plan it for Mars conjunction of the moon? Well, I think they planned it for the full moon. And then it was fun because this is all locals. Like, you know, there weren't any English speaking people there. And so I got to do a little bit of SciCom outreach in Spanish, which was fun.

So, you know, I explained all like, oh, wow, full moon. I'm like, not only full moon. I'm like, hang on, hang on. I'm like, look really close to the moon right there. Right next to it. You see that little red dot. That's us. That's everyone you, no, that's a different dot.

Yeah, so that was kind of fun. Yeah, how do you say cosmic alignment in Spanish? All I had to have to tell them was Conviction for the two together. And then, you know, Mars is all. also at opposition. All the I-O-N words are the same in Spanish. It's perfect. Oppositions, Conviction.

It's great. It's really easy. Fantastic. Yeah. Well, this intro is nice and drawn out, isn't it, Jake? It is. It is. It always is.

Yeah. Is it 25 minutes long, though? Nice. Nice Tia. This is a segue. Really great. This is a great segue. Thanks.

Thanks to both of you for acknowledging my segue. It took a while. The gears are like, click and click, click, click. I'm still not too. You mean, do you be the first 25 minutes of 2001 Space Odyssey? Yeah. Yeah, I'm certainly talking about that. Beautiful, beautiful scenery.

I don't know if I would necessarily call it like a setup for the movie. It's like just a pre-movie. It's like a different movie. It's just, yeah, I don't know. I want to hear Marina's take on, though, because that was the most shocking thing to me when I watched it for the first time. play where I'm just like they're still showing monkeys what is going on here yeah it's that sequence definitely slings the long it takes its time and so I felt like I was watching a

nature documentary and I mean the shots are beautiful right like it's beautifully done and you get these I don't I'm not even sure where that part was filmed but she's like you know I'm a midi yeah I just looked it up today because I rewatched this morning and I was like man I feel like I need to go to this place knowing my national park love. Like, let me check out where this is. Let me pull up some pigs. Well done. Yeah.

Yeah. So I'm watching that and thinking this is really lovely, like, waiting for David Attenborough to like chime in and be like, oh, the apes. Here they are. Doing their apes thing. That's a pretty good Attenborough. That's a pretty good Edinburgh. That's the only thing I do at home is like, I know my partner.

by narrating his movements, like an old British white man. Wait, has anyone actually made a David Attenborough 2001 intro, though? Because that would be spectacular. I think that would work wonderfully. It would really work. Because he would explain a little more about like, oh, they've found tools. They use tools. Here they go.

Doing stuff. They'll be great. Yeah. Go to work, Andrew. I have no idea that this ape scene was going to be in the movie at all? Or were you spoiled at all? I guess is my main question here. Like, did you have any inkling on 2001 The Journey?

Yeah, I'd say that I had flashes of footage in mind. Like, I had seen maybe like a two-second clip of an ape bashing an animal skeleton with a bone, right? And, like, that is the scene that comes at the end of the, I guess, like, the ape chapter when after the monolith appears and the monolith, like, makes something click with the apes. And they're like, okay, we're going to use, we're going to turn these bones into weapons now. So I'd only seen that. And of course, the music that accompanies that scene. I think pretty much everyone has heard that music. I did not, I didn't know anything else about the movie.

Like, nothing. I just knew that it was a classic, that people loved it. And I was really excited to watch it and to love it too. Spoiler, I did not love it. And so everyone hates me now. So what got you in? What was the moment where you're like, oh, I should watch this. Like when you sent that tweet that you were like, hey, if I was going to

to watch this, should I live tweet it? What was the inspiring moment? Yeah, so I don't really consume space content outside of work. Like my hobbies are like jigsaw puzzles and true crime. And like, you know, they're not space related. So I kind of turn off that part of my brain. But I was thinking, you know, I should, maybe I should like watch something. So I started watching for all mankind. Do you guys watch that show? Yes. Yes. And loved it.

And I'm like, okay, you know what? There is room in my life for sci-fi. Like, I love that show. It's fantastic. Everyone should watch it. I cried every episode. So I think I was just like making a little mental list of other space-related media that I had missed out on.

And 2001 seemed like a no-brainer. Like this is a classic. It's been out for 50-plus years. You know, I've had a lot of time on this earth to watch it. I should watch it now and see what all the fuss is about. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's like, I remember, I think I did the same thing you do where I was like, how have I not seen?

Because it wasn't that long ago. It was maybe three, four years ago. I was doing all this stuff. I was doing the shows at the time, I think, when I first watched it. And I was like, I can't, I can't go on being me. I can't keep going being me and not having seen this show. So I better get this under the, under the belt. But yeah.

And it was just like, I don't know, you just, some of it was expected because you see, like, they start showing spaceships. You're like, oh, yeah, okay. I can, I can get into this. And then it just sort of like takes weird turns. And then you're not really sure where you are anymore. And then, yeah, I don't know. I was, I'm still confused by it. I'm not sure.

It's also, I've always been trying to dissect because at this point, right, we're all young enough that that we weren't. definitely not watching it for, it sounds like I've watched it the longest ago, and I think I watched it in high school, which was like 13 years ago. So I have a distinct memory of the first time I watched it. My sister was home from college. My now wife was hanging out,

and we were looking for something to watch. And I was like, let's watch this. I haven't seen it. And everyone talks about it. And they're like, all right, sure. And like an hour in, they were like, how, like, we need to go do something else with our lives. Like, this is not going to work for us tonight.

I was like, all right, I'll watch the rest later. So a lot of what we had to analyze as we're watching this movie is the presence that it has in culture that predated our watching of it, right? So like I feel like a lot of my experience is trying to figure out which of the pieces are like deserving of the place and culture that it has and which of the pieces are definitely not. And like it is a fantastic movie to look at. and I feel like that's kind of as far as I get, to be honest. Yeah, I mean, the visuals are iconic, and it's true that they inspired pretty much every other space sci-fi movie that came after. And as I was watching it, I kept saying, like, how did they do that?

Knowing that this came out in 1968 and there was no CGI. Like, I was extremely, extremely impressed with the special effects. But I think I was expecting, because everyone, called it a movie. Like, I was expecting it to have the things that movies have, which is like, plot, stakes, character development, climax. And so I think I went into it with the wrong expectations. And like, that's a good point you just made. Like, you're trying to see, like, how, like, I don't know, a 1960 audience might have experienced it. And more than one person on Twitter in their criticism of my story was like, you should have seen it when it can. And it

came out as it was meant to be experienced on the large screen and like someone said like live through World War II and then go see this and be amazed. I was like, if I'm going to time travel, it's not going to be to go back in time to see 2001 as it was meant to be. Yeah, by the way, the day after this movie was released in theaters was Apollo 6. So like if you're going to time travel back to April 1968, you're going to see a rocket launch. Let's be real. You're not going to watch this in a theater.

Oh, yeah. That's a wild thing to put in a Twitter reply. You did it wrong. You should have gone back to 1968. Honestly, like, I don't think you can encapsulate the trolls that you summoned out of the internet by

you. You are a very, very intelligent person. So I feel like you had a full awareness of the sector of the internet that was going to come out with the knives for this particular piece, yeah? You know, I think I had an inkling, but I could not have imagined how strongly people felt about this movie.

I think I have not, I've never gotten this much hate for a story before. Like, this tops even stories I've done on Elon Musk and SpaceX and like some uncomfortable things there, like on Boca Chika Village even. Yeah, yeah. Topps that. Wow. Like Kubrick fans are passionate. Yeah.

Wow. Especially for that kind of thing, if they were somebody that watched that long ago, it, like, seeped into their identity at this point. That, like, you know, this is, like, a foundational element of, of nerdery probably for many people. So it's, which I think maybe that's kind of similar to,

like, the Elon, you know, cult of personality, that it was the thing that got them into something. So it's, like, a beloved core tenant of whatever that fandom is. Yeah. Yeah. And it's not like I was, you know, telling people, like, I can't believe you liked this movie. I could totally see why people really enjoyed it and why for them it was this transcendent, profound experience.

It was not just, it was just not that for me. And I think there's room enough on our beautiful giant earth for both opinions. Absolutely. So I don't think I'm writing about a movie ever again. People were like, have you read the book? Because the book, apparently, it was written in tandem with the movie script. like those happen simultaneously. And I got some nice people in my replies being like,

oh, like reading the book will make this a better experience for you. And I told them, like, I'm not touching anything 2001 ever again because. It's radioactive. Yes, extremely, extremely tense. It is. The pacing is just absolutely like. Yeah. Well, I mean, I kind of wonder about that.

So, like, one thing that I think about sometimes with movies is that like, Not only do movies just like iterate and get better, the concept of what a movie is changes over time. And so like the things, like the reasons you went to a movie theater now versus in, you know, 1995 versus 1968 versus 1938, versus 1938. Like the reason you went to those, there was like they were different. They were similar, but they were different. And so sometimes I think about trying to watch a movie. in the context of its time period and what, you know, what was, what made good movies in

1968. And I don't think those standards are the same. So it's like really hard to to jump back in time with your today's standards and then enjoy a movie, right? Like sometimes, some things are timeless. You know, you can you can go back and watch Jurassic Park today and it is transcended the 1990s very easily, right? But, but, you know, I wonder if maybe 2001 is not one of those movies where like it is obviously super and iconic and in 1968 it was probably mind blowing to see that on a screen and and to experience that artistic thing but yeah it's like really hard to just transplant it to 2020 and be like is this good. I think the one aspect that that keeps it I think even your your subhead marina was 2001 of Space Odyssey is prescient beautiful and entirely unsatisfactory

the prescient we talked about the beautiful part but the prescient part is that like most of the tech stuff and even the visuals of space, they nailed on how it would feel, how it would look. I think they didn't have any, you know, like, dictation, translation problems with the AI. So they probably missed that part a little bit about how accurately Hal would hear you as you just talk on the spaceship. But other than that, like, that stuff stands up and we're like, oh, maybe not the socks. The grippy socks are kind of a weird aspect. That was one of my favorite things about the movie.

I was like, how creative? Why don't we have those? Why do they walk as if the plane is undergoing turbulence? They all walk like they're bracing themselves. You know, like they're using grippy socks because there's no gravity. So that's like great. But they walk as if the whole thing's unstable. I'm like, well, you're wearing grippy socks.

The point of your grippy socks is that there is no stability. So why are you also stabilizing? That's the one part about the grippy socks. I need you to say grippy socks. Like, chripy socks. We haven't have a title candidate here.

Yeah, I want to be clear, I would wear grippy socks if I was going on like Starship or something. Skylab, Skylab should have had grippy socks for sure. So, anyway. Yeah, it felt modern in a lot of ways.

Like now everyone's like using that, that the GPT chat bot to like have AI write their, a few of my colleagues were having their obituary's doing, asking it to write their obituaries this week. I asked it. to write mine and said I'm survived by two children somehow. I don't know, we can't trust the AI yet.

But like 2001, like, yeah, it got a lot of things right. And like, you know, we're still moving toward that future of having space travel be like air travel. Like we're still working toward that. But it was hard to watch it without a modern brain. Like when one of the characters is on that flight by himself and it's supposed to be like a luxury airliner. And I'm like, that is extremely wasteful. Think about climate change. One person on this flight.

we had the same we were doing the thing on um the that terrible bad space movie i watched uh now the things escape me with charred butler i can't remember geostorm geostorm was the one and he rides his own space shuttle to the space station like he just gets on and the whole payload bay of the space shuttle is like airline seats and he just sits down and he's by himself like looking out the window and just going to space i was like what are they where is the rest of the people and cargo on this thing this is wild I'm going to stand the underutilized infrastructure of 2001 NGO storm. Number one, on our current utilization trajectory, that is where we're heading.

We have a lot of infrastructure space that we don't use a lot of, is all I'll say. Number two, if you're an optimist about space travel, then those flights should be regular enough that they are as well attended as an off-hours subway, which there's many open seats on. Now, being the only person is not something that I've ever been on an off hour subway. But, you know, maybe they should have had maybe one or two other people. But it was kind of funny. It's like they spent all the money on the sets and they had no money left over for extras. It's really what it felt like.

I believe that. Damn it. That second spinning set broke the budget. We don't have any extras in this whole thing. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you're totally right about the depression part, though, because like, and even when you talk about the, setting the bar for what sci-fi is.

Because you mentioned for all mankind, so even the first episode of this most recent season has got like a pretty similar, I don't want to try not to spoil stuff, but like it's got a pretty similar space station-y vibe as to what you saw in 2001, right? You can see a lot of the visual elements traced to the first episode of this newest season.

So it's pretty interesting to see that. And you mentioned the space toilet in your article, which is like the number one question. right? That's a great bit. A real Brendan Burn bit right there. Oh my God, it is a classic Brendan Burn bit. Yeah, if we ever, if one of us ever

becomes loaded, we need to find that prop and buy it for Brendan. Yeah. That's what I think we should spend our first million on. Our first million. Find the instructions for Brendan, yeah. Yeah.

I want to hear about later in the movie. So the classic, classic scenes, Hal 9,000, what was going through your mind? Because there's some interesting stuff here. Yeah, I would say Hal is creepy. I did find that the movie really got it, the creepiness of machines and robots really well, like the steady, monotonous voice. That was pretty unsettling. And I wondered, like, I had, I don't know when there's like a little news segment and about the hell 9,000 computers and the computer is like, I love people. They're my friends. I would never do anything wrong. I would never hurt them. Like I'm sure even audiences in 1968 were like, oh, it's not going to work out well. An extremely obvious moment. I was very impressed at Hal could read lips. That was very impressive. That was very impressive. Good for Hal. Yeah. Oh yeah. And then right up to the intermission. That one really puts you.

in your place of like, oh, there was an intermission in this movie. That's, number one, a thing that I feel like should come back to movies today. It totally should. You can get snacks, get drinks. You don't need that site that tells you when to go pee. What was that cycle? Anyone ever used that? There was some site where you would put in what movie you're watching or going to see at the theaters,

and they had to like watch the screener, and they mapped out, like, what are the times at which the plot does not advance at all? So it would tell you, like, now's a good time to go pee? could you look that up for 2001 because is it like 70% of the movie that you can go use about me? I'm not making any friends today. Oh, run p.com.

Oh my goodness. Runp.com. This is wild. What a name for a website. Do you know how much like confidence in yourself you have to be to buy run p.com? Like, just to like go to the domain registration site and type that in and be like, yeah, I'm going to give you my credit card number right now and purchase runp.com.

I think I might have to get the app to see this. They might only have things in Web 2.5. App only. That's it made. I do. I hate to break it to you that when I searched RunP 2001 Space Odyssey, the most recent result was from a post on their site December 2019, six classic sci-fi movies you can't afford to miss

and number one is 2001 of Space Odyssey so not looking great on on when they'll tell you to go paper in this movie but I'll see if I can find out if I can find the answer so Anthony you said you watched it in high school and then you rewatched it today

like how how do you compare those two experiences I had no different feelings to be honest like I felt the same both times like and even now having advanced in my space knowledge, I still am like, yeah, it's a very good-looking movie that

holds up technically very well. But actually, probably, the thing that I would like to compare it to, you mentioned in your article, which is Interstellar. Interstellar has many moments that are like an homage to 2001 of Space Odyssey. The ending is wild as well,

which is like, did you have to do a 2001 ending? Couldn't you have landed this one differently? I found that, number one, there's a 8,000 times more plot in Interstellar. But I went to the theaters to see that. So I, again, whoever that was on Twitter, like, you can't throw that one at us. I did go see this one in the theaters. I saw it with a similar group of people. My wife was there.

She enjoyed this one totally differently than 2001 of Space Odyssey. I found the moments in Interstellar that were like, part of 2001 was trying to project like space nerdiness onto the audience by way of being an artist as your article ends in the best way but interstellar used like spoiler alert if you've never watched any of these things then just like come back later but uh the planet is it the black hole planet that they go down to with the big waves yeah and like the one guy stays on the ship and then they come back and he's like ancient yeah i remember being in the theater for that one and like uh yeah but like a in the theater, there was like a wave of gasps when they got back onto the ship.

And at that moment, I was like, that's a feeling that 2001 never imparted on anyone of like a completely emotional understanding of space. This is great content right here too. Of like space nerd bits that no one would think of except us about like relativity, that everyone instantly understood. And I felt like having then seen Interstellar, I realized all of that. that was missing from 2001. Any of the weight, you know?

The stakes. The stakes, yeah, you put it exactly right. Yeah. Yeah. More than one person, I keep saying more than one. I mean, like, 500 people told me that I didn't like 2001 because I'm not old enough to appreciate its meaning. And it's interesting, you watch it in high school.

I don't want to assume how many years have passed, but some number of years. There's like probably 13, at least, yeah. Yeah. So it's like, I don't think when I watch this like 15 years from now, I'm going to feel any different thing. I don't. I don't think you need to be like, yeah. It's millennials ruining the 2001 space audacity business. Well, everyone kept saying that I was Gen Z and this is what happens when Gen Z watch classic movies. And I was like, I'm 32 years old and it's just a matter of personal tastes. This is what happens when you can't separate nostalgia from an objective reading of,

of content as far as I'm aware. I feel this way about, I grew up spending like every summer down the shore, right, in Jersey. And so I have many fond memories and tons of nostalgia. But when I go down there, being this age, I'm able to like zoom out a little bit and be like, some of this stuff's not that good. Like, just straight up. It's not that good compared to other places that you can go to the beach, you know? But I love it.

And I feel like if you can be in touch with, when your nostalgia is running your emotions, you can see things for what they are. And like, when you go minutes with silence in 2001, none of your brain is lighting up, like, oh, this isn't really, this isn't a good experience on this part. I don't know. None of your brain is lighting up. But when you're at the shore, man, your brain is, I also went down the shore every summer as a kid.

It is lighting up. Jake, what did you think? What did I think? So I don't know. I think I came away with all that. I don't know. Your article was pretty close to where I fall on it too. Because I watched it and I was like, okay, well, I'm really glad I watched this.

Like, I'm really, it was an important thing for me to do to add this to my, to my memory. And like, it is definitely iconic. And like, you can tell, you can see the seeds of. of this, what this planted in like everything else that we watch today, right? And so you have to ask yourself, like, how would sci-fi be different if this movie had never happened? And it would be different. Like, there would, it would, you would notice 2001's absence today if it had suddenly been removed from the timeline, right? Um, but yeah, it's, I mean, it's just, it's just not a, that good of a movie today, like just straight up. Like, it's, you know,

it's, you don't watch it because you want to have a good movie experience. You watch it because you You need to see what the fuss is about, right? Which is a different requirement. So I don't know. I guess if you go out with the right expectations, it's probably pretty good. Yeah. I don't regret watching it at all. It felt informative.

And like you said, like it would, sci-fi today would look extremely different if 2001 wasn't ever made. But I'm not going to, I'm not going to watch it again. No, I don't probably won't either. I'm even thinking like I'm now like making all these connections to like sci-fi throwbacks to it even just like the so in 2001 there's the part where he like jumps out the airlock at the thing right and like he's exposed to vacuum I think right isn't that part of it yeah yeah because he forgets his helmet yeah I just someone said to me like haven't you ever

made a mistake and I'm like sure but I don't know this seems like ah seems like an oversight battling artificial intelligence so Yeah, I too have gone scuba diving and just print by my oxygen. Yeah, it's happened. No, but that happens in the expanse, right? The expanse has almost that exact scene with one of the characters jumping from one airlock to another. I haven't watched it, would you recommend? Very much, very much recommend.

I was just about to bring up, like, if we would point people to a piece of space media today, like, which for like space nerdiness, which one would you point to in the expanses? That's great. Well, and for both reasons. One, because you just need to see what the, what the fuss is all about because it's like a pretty big deal. And then also it's good. So, yeah. It has characters, character development, plot, all the things you like. All the things you're interested in the movie.

It's in there. Dialogue? Dialogue, lots of dialogue. A whole new language, in fact. Dialogue in different things. Oh, okay. Yeah, there's some fun stuff in there. So, okay.

Should we talk about the ending, though? You should talk about the ending, for sure. This probably deserves its own segment. Deep breath, deep breath. What is this room? It's like... I know exactly what it is, Jake. Okay, tell us about the room.

Have you ever been to the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas? It is just straight up the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas. That's where this stuff is. Look at this. You need to go to the Cosmopolitan. The lobby is like, whatever. that hotel is. It's very strange. Wait, the bedroom is? I saw.

I didn't watch it again, but just look at this. Look at what this cosmopolitan looks like. Like, this is the vibe. Is this not the vibe? Of the bedroom that he's in it? Yeah. That, oh. You know what I mean? All the light up panels, the squares, the weird ornate, old stuff.

See, maybe I missed all that because I was just so horribly confused and trying to say that I was not paying attention to the aesthetic of the room. That's all I could look at. The floor lights up. Why does the floor light up? That's what I'm struggling with.

Let me find a picture of it. I can't tell if Jake is frozen or processing. He's frozen. He's on Starlink. He's on Starlink, so I'm just going to leave him there. I guess I could put you here. Let me, no, I'm going to leave him there. He'll be fine.

I mean, the way he is right now is me watching 2001 for the most part. Yes. just yeah yeah all right so give us your breakdown on the on the ending yeah on the room yeah on the room um I mean I think pretty quickly you understood what was going on uh Dave Bowman aging before our eyes before his eyes the passage of time and then the monolith shows up again I think for the fourth time in the movie at the end of his bed number one creepy as hell right like

you wake up and there's like, that's like a night. That's like sleep paralysis, but in space, I think if a monolith turns up at the end of your bed. And I was thinking like this is the moment that we're like maybe the monolith will like not speak, but like convey. Oh, I see the light up floors. The light up floors. See, that's the part I was forgetting.

I was thinking like, though I had the walls in my memory. I'm like, there's this like very like European Baroque like room. It honestly reminds me of like here in Merida Like all the mansions downtown look like this So it's uh The Cosm Falls in lobby is all I'm saying Check it out next time you're next time you're there I was really invested when we were in this room

Because I was like all right we're gonna we're gonna find something out And then the glowing baby orb appeared and I was like no There will be no answers The movie ends It just it felt very abrupt the end of the movie. What did you guys think? Nailed it. Yeah.

That's... Yeah. You go through the whole movie and you're like, well, this was kind of weird, but okay, I think I can like, I think I can accept this. Like, I think this is, this worked for me.

And then it like goes to this last segment and you're just like, okay, room, getting older, obelous is back. This is like Europe, but also the floor is made out of Las Vegas. And then there's the glowing baby orb and then it just sort of like ends and you're like, all right. Okay. That's fine.

Honestly, like the ending of Lost. All right. I'll move on. I'll do find something else to watch next. The ending of Battlestar Galap. Yeah. Just, okay. They're all getting their inspiration from this movie. See, this is, if we took away Space Odyssey, none of these shows would have this crazy ending. They would all have legit endings. So I've never watched Lost, but I'm fine with having it spoiled. So that ending was also extremely unsatisfactory? Oh yeah. Yeah.

I'm someone who loves Lost. I absolutely love Lost because my nostalgia lights up with it, right? I was watching Lost as it was live, which meant I was listening to all the podcasts and talking about theories with my friends and posting on like Reddit or whatever about what the theories are. And that was like that journey of Lost was way more fun than if I went back and watched Lost now. But I'm also. I don't really get that worked up at like bad endings.

I kind of just have the reaction that we have about 2001. It's like, all right. The rest was fun. Okay. I'm like, I don't really commit that to my personal, you know, I'm not really personally invested in the way any particular piece of media.

I don't know. I have this weird quirk where I don't like to argue about like how particular piece of media could have or should have been better because it's just feels like, healthy. It's so healthy. Good for you. That is extremely healthy. I'm like, whatever.

They didn't make it that way, you know? They made that thing. and if you don't like it, that's fine. There's other things, too. So, I'm not good at the flame worse. I'm, I was, I mean, I never watched Lost, but I wasn't bothered by a Game of Thrones. Like, I didn't like the ending, but like, I still liked the show. Like, I'm happy with, I'm glad I watched the show and I'm glad it existed, you know,

the same sort of thing. Battlestar got out because it's exact same thing. Everyone hated the ending. They were just so mad about it. And it's like, I don't know, it was a good show. Like, just watch it again and don't just skip the last episode. if you really don't like it. Like, it's fine.

You know? Yeah, it helps to be chill for everyone. For one's own blood pressure, for the blood pressure of others. Yeah. Yeah, just chill out everybody. It's fine. 2001 iconic, not good. It's okay.

I have never watched the sequels, right? There was 2010, right? Is that an official sequel? And then there's like something else, too? I think so. And I think people said that it was better. I mean, obviously I think has more plot.

But I don't know of others. Maybe. 2010, the year we make contact. I didn't know there was a sequel. It was a 1984 movie. Yep. I don't know. Should we watch this?

I was like, yeah, is Marina coming back in like January to do the first watch of 2010? Should we all watch this and do a review? You want to write an article so you don't get those shitty tweets. You know what? I'll come back in 54 years and we'll do. I mean, when it's 54 years from 1984, if that's the timeline, if that's what I'm watching these movies.

Oh, that's fantastic. Yes. Yeah, put me down for whatever that is for the show. Okay, cool. December 2038, we'll have you back on. I'll put that in the calendar. Oh, is it that tune? Yeah.

That makes me feel really old. Yeah, I mean, maybe then you'll appreciate 2001 more because we'll be older. Still wouldn't have seen it in the theaters. Because we'll be old people. I still wouldn't have lived through World War II and then gone to see it in the theater. Weird take, honestly. I think that was one of my favorites. I don't even understand.

Can we at all figure out what that means? Because this movie doesn't really have a lot to do with fascism or anything. Like, this is not, I don't understand the cultural connection to what was going on in World War II. I don't know. Were they implying that, like, my best guess there would be like, like, total doom and. Yeah, I mean, but aren't we living through total doom right now? I feel like the last couple years might match the similar state. Have you been stuck in your house and sick for, you know.

Careful, careful, careful. No, I think, I think that's what it is. This is like World War II was a time when no one had good morale. Like no one was feeling good about being humans on planet Earth around that time. And then not that long later within one generation, you have the sparkling gleam of space exploration as something that you can look forward to in your life. That's a pretty stark reversal of fortunes if you're like watching the morale chart over time, right? That's my guess. You should have written the piece.

You sound like a film critic way more. I mean, I'm not one, but. mine would have been all about grippy socks as the one with a toddler here I feel like I'm particularly attuned to grippy socks that feels like relevant content to my life I think toddlers would have the easiest time managing the grippy socks right?

I could go get a pair of what I call grippy socks this is why this name is in my head there are socks that we have that are grippier than the rest of the socks that he has. And so when we go to his grandparents' house and have very slippery hardwood floors, you got to make sure you bring the grippy socks. And this is how we ended up here. Oh, yeah.

Toddlers and hardwood floors do not make. Yeah. Either barefoot or grippy. Oh, yeah. Hmm. Do you have any, so let's project ourselves. Let's be the gatekeepers when we're old of like things that people should have seen when it came out. Do you have any leading candidates for pieces of content?

we will feel like those people feel about 2001. Interstellar is probably high on the list, right? That's my favorite space movie. Are we just limiting it to space movies? Because I'm going to bring up Jurassic Park again. Otherwise, that is like... Drasset Park. Seeing that on a big screen when you were a kid, like I did,

that was a big deal. We watched that recently within the last year. and mutually my wife and I agreed we should pause this because we're both too stressed out at the moment. Like the tension does not go away. That is still an incredibly tense movie. And even when you've seen it a bunch, and you know, Titanic,

another great one for that. Yeah. Like, you know what's going to happen, but the tension is still gets your, it gets your physiology going. Actually, you bring up Titanic,

that's got to be on the list too, because that is one that was also, like, in addition to being just like a movie with his, own, you know, you can, you can judge it on the merits of how good of a movie it is. It was also just like a huge cultural phenomenon and like kind of still is today. Like we're still making Titanic memes today. 20, what was it?

Late 90s, right? So it's like 25 years later or something that came out. And we can still make good Titanic memes. So that's probably one where if you saw it in theaters, that's a memory. You can tell your grandkids. They'd be like, wow, you saw it in theaters, Titanic? Right. Yeah, wow.

I totally did. Are there any movies that came out in the last decade, like in the 2010s that you feel are headed in that direction? Like, okay, this is going to be iconic or a cult classic. You had a stray line about gravity, which is my least favorite space movie, and I don't know how to parse the line you had about gravity. I wish I could remember anything from that movie. I think my favorite thing about that movie was my favorite part about 2001. It was just so visually stunning. Yes.

Like that movie felt like, all right, we have CGI now. Look at what we can do. Look at how beautiful we can make it. But I don't think it was a very interesting story. A horrible story. And it's the only movie that got my like, that's not how the force work works, nerdery going. I'm like, you just flew from that space station to another on a fire on a fire extinguisher.

Like, what's going on here? Like, it got my, that ain't right, Gene fired up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I just, I think what I was, this is the literal one movie that violates what I just told you about myself that I don't like to criticize, like, how people decided to make stuff. I just felt like it was yet another disaster movie in space that went like all the other disaster movies in space of like space of like space. Space debris, slices through a bunch of people and all the space stations fall apart. Yeah, that, that, but da-da-pap. And I felt like there's just a lot of other interesting ways to have disaster movies in space and they have not been explored. And this was just like, let's just like, let's be. Let's do it with today's CG. And it felt underwhelming. Hmm.

Yeah, yeah. I still want somebody to make a movie. I don't know when too soon is for this, but have you ever read, I think it was an article in Ars Technica years ago about the plan to save Columbia if we had known exactly how Columbia would have went down and like what it would have taken to turn a space shuttle around in like two weeks and get it going into space. and it reads like what would make an epic movie. And I've always wanted to see that visualized of like,

we saved everyone on Columbia. But I have no idea how long you have to wait until we make that movie. Yeah, you need to have a, there's like a time period. You need to wait, right? But I mean, we're coming up on 20 years for that, right? Oh, yeah. This is the article by Lee Hutchinson from 2016. I will post this in the show notes.

It is long and fantastic. It talks about all the different things they would have had to coordinate. They would have had to send a certain amount of people up to do a spacewalk to transfer everyone over to the other space shuttle. Like, epic, epic read that made me, and when did gravity come out? Probably around this time, right? Why am I thinking 2014, but it's probably going to be like 1992 because they don't understand. Okay. We'll review that one in 54 years as well.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm putting this in the show notes because people should read this article. Does Avatar meet that criteria of like pop culture experiences? Oh, I hated Avatar. That's why I think this is the perfect answer, because it was a huge pop culture sensation. Everyone went to see it, and they're making sequels, right? It's like mixed reviews. It's coming out right away.

It's like next week. It's like right now. And even at the time I went to see it, I was like, what the hell am I here for? I was so confused as to why there was so much hype. Yeah. Avatar. Avatar is our generation's 2001. That is totally right.

God, that's so good. From that comes out, there's going to be some young whippersnapper journalist that writes an article about. It was like, oh, this movie is not great. This is all bad CGI. Why are their tails like that? And we're going to be like in the comments of whatever God-awful mess Twitter is by that time. And we're like, you shouldn't have been in the theater. Stop disrespecting James Cameron.

We had the glasses we had to put on and it was a whole experience. I don't know James Cameron. Oh my God. Avatar is the perfect one. That is the perfect one. I mean, make your choices now. You could be like the one nice person in the replies. It's like, it's okay.

You didn't like it. We didn't like it either. Be brave. We didn't like it either. We just went because everyone told us we had to go and all our friends were going and it was like the worst $14 bucks I ever spent. I mean the soundtrack was great. Soundtrack is great.

I just do not understand the tales. Why did the tails? The tails. Isn't there like a theme? Is this an animal kingdom or something? There's somewhere there's a theme park, right? That is Avatar World? Hmm

Oh God I got to look this up I had not heard about that But I would not be surprised I would totally go Avatar yeah Yeah Pandora the world of Avatar

Is it next to Apcot Is it next to Apcot? It's in Animal Kingdom So yes Hmm Have you ever been to Disney World Jake? Uh yeah Okay

So it's just a weird question To ask if you have Yeah look Look at this You can go Why are there no pictures Of the cool because it's awesome.

It looks legitimately awesome. Come to Avatar world and touch your tail to ours. Oh my guy. No. Immediately no. Of board. That joke was not PG-13. No.

I think Avatar confuses me because it is discussed and positioned as such that there is a gigantic fan base behind it. And I've never interacted with that fan base. So I don't really Yeah, do they exist? Is that true? I don't know. I don't even know that it exists, but I feel like it is talked about in a way

that there is like a Star Wars fan base and a, you know, like, Marvel fan base and whatever else. But is that actually a thing? What if it's like, you know, completely, like it's just bad data. Because when it came out, when it came out, you know, everyone went because it was like this weird, like,

you have to live through the Iraq War first to probably experience Avatar. Nate and the chat. That's pretty good. Anyway, sorry. That's great. See, I was going to make a joke like that earlier, but I was like, is it too soon? No, it's like, you just went for it.

Like, you're like, you know what? Screw it. Going to do it. Oh, my God. That is maybe the funniest comment has ever been dropped in this chat. So congratulations, Nate. Jake, what are you saying about the 3D and everything? Well, I was saying, like everyone, like you said, you had.

to go to Avatar. Like it was like a cultural obligation because it was this weird thing. It was like, it's this three hour movie and you wear these dumb glasses and it's in three dimensions and like no one's ever done that before. And like this is this is like you cannot miss this. This is the, this is our, like we knew ahead of time that it was our generation is 2001. Like everyone's like you got it. You can't miss this. You can't. So everyone went. Everyone bought a ticket. It made like a boatload of money like more money than any movie ever and then and then we all forgot about it and do you think that the producers all just like man look at the sales we got to make us and they just like you know i never ever asked the question again because that money is still last like that's so much money is

probably there's probably still going out for martinis on that money because it's like you know it's yeah you're right the budget was 237 million the box office is 2.9 billion so right like yeah Have you seen that SNL skit about Avatar with Ryan Gosling? With the font? With the font, with the papyrus font. Like, every time, and it's true, they're on like different like teas everywhere. Every time I'm at the grocery store, I'm in the tea aisle. I'm like, there it is.

It's the Avatar font. This Wikipedia article is so long. I'm just trying to look up some basic facts about this. Yeah, man, 2009. what a time. What a year. Yeah. December 18th, 2009

is when it was released in the U.S. so we're right up on it here. And I remember that. I remember it being part of the spectacular nature. It was like everyone's home on winter break, go see this movie. I think I did that.

I was home from college on winter break. I went to see this. Yeah. That's totally our generation's 2001. That's great. But we hate it, apparently. So maybe for that fan base that exists out there.

I don't know. I hated it. I just thought it was just a movie. I'm like, I'm like indifferent on it, you know? On Obtainium. Come on. I've heard worse ideas. On Obtania. Oh, God. No one, I just can't believe that that made it all the way through that production. It feels like a placeholder thing.

Just make it out of nature. I'm looking into the Wolverine world, you know? Sorry, I realize I've been sitting in the dark, so I just had. I wanted some backlight him on the lights. I was like trying to discreetly message him and he wasn't responding. So I emailed him from my work account. Please help. Turn the lights on.

That's amazing. Well, I feel like we did it. I think we unpacked it. Marino, what else is on your list for the to-do list? Are you done for the year? Was this your great masterpiece for 2022? I mean, this was the piece that made me question my career choices. But no, there's, I mean, let's see, we're coming up on the one-year anniversary of the launch, the James Wob Space Telescope, which is pretty exciting, right?

I think that was the last time I was on the show, like right after launch, so time ready to buy. Yeah, and I thought that, I mean, I was going to cover the end of the Insight mission sometime this month, but I just heard from NASA the other day saying that the lander's going to last until January. January. So good, good for the little lander somehow still holding on despite being absolutely covered by Mars dust. I'm queuing up that podcast too. And it's been evading me. I was like ready. I've had a placeholder in like the content schedule for Wee Martians for the end of insight mission that I think I first put it in like June and then it's just been moving it back like a month out of time every month because it just keeps surviving. So can we talk about you playing with chat GPT and asking it, why didn't NASA add solar panels cleaning or solar panel cleaning the

Insight Mission? What did it say? So you know how people are worried about AI stealing their original work and then using it? This was written by Jake and just taken by the AI entirely. Recycle back through the ACI. Are you serious? Like you recognized it as something that you wrote? Oh, no.

But yes, right? Like I did, but I didn't. You know what I mean? Like this just scraped wee Martians.com. a bunch and you got this. Yeah. I guess it did not add solar panel cleaning to the inside mission because the mission is focused on a different purpose.

The insight mission is focused on studying the interior of Mars and gathering data about the planet's structure and composition. Solar panel cleaning would not directly help the mission achieve its goal. God, that's just so good. Nailed it. Yeah. Chat GPT. Did you ask it how they would have added that?

Like what strategies would be good, whether it's brushes or wind or something? No, once it confirmed my bias as I left, so. It's a great tool. No, we asked it to like write a story in the style of me at the Atlantic. And the results were kind of eerie. And I'm like, take it. Take my job. Really?

Yeah. I tried to get it to tell us which who is the more handsome host of Off Nominal and it refused to answer the question. So it sure did. It was really plain. It was very being very polite. So. Oh.

Well, which of us is more productive? Have you done anything since we talked last Jake? No, I'm still dealing with the curse, but hopefully the curse is broken next week and I can get a guest that doesn't get, you know, very, very sick or I don't get very, very sick right before interview. And, yeah, it should be good. That'll be a good one. I think I know about that.

It's going to be great. It's going to be great. If you do. Yeah, I'm going to attempt. It's going to be hard to miss focus. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, it's ending this weekend.

So. Ending on Sunday. Yeah. we have any odds on how it will go? It's going to go fine. I think it'll be fine, yeah. Watch it be extremely not fine. Oh, God.

I think it'll be okay. Yeah, I mean, between the last mission in this one, they did have to redesign the heat shield. So, you know, I wouldn't count it as a for sure thing. We'll find out. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I've got nothing left.

I think there might be some launches next week. One's out of Virginia. We'll see when it lands if I can drive there or not. Oh, next week. We should talk about next week, Jake. Next week. Big show next week. It's everyone's favorite.

Off nominees. What's going on next week? Oh, okay. Very exciting. Miriam Kramer. You know, even you know. Yeah. Join us and sort through.

There's some good ones. I've been doing my pre-notes, Jake. There's some good ones. Yeah, yeah. Some good things. Not as many of it was last year. Last year was really wild. Yeah, it was really wild last year.

Rina, I think you were on one of the original off-nominy episodes, weren't you? Wasn't that like your first time on? I'm trying to remember now. I don't remember. Like not last time, but before that. Either me or Lauren. I feel like that's like my whole life. It was either me or Lauren Gresh.

I don't know. remember wait no yes it's all coming back to me now i'm looking to yeah i'm looking to some yeah i want to go into the archives but i want i want confirmation yeah i'm pretty sure it was like one of the original off nominees like maybe the first one or or at the worst the second one oh go where's the time gone you guys right where is the time gone yeah no kidding right but we're going to have that next week though so that's coming up uh miriam kramer is coming on to do that with us

She's always a blast to hang out with. And it's going to be interesting. We do have some weird ones, I think, this year, right? I think there's going to be, it's not going to be as. I have confirmation that it was almost exactly three years ago to the day that you were on the show for. Oh, yes, we talked about Apollo 12, the regional Pennsylvania saying. So something about Pete Conrad, which is great. And I didn't, we never put in the show notes.

won the off nominees. I feel like I should have a page somewhere that says the winners. Yeah. I don't know about this now. So I'll have to look back. And next week, you should ask Miriam about 2001 because she likes it. So. Oh.

Maybe we'll just keep doing a poll. Do you know who Steve Aoki is, Marina? I do. Yes. He has that song. Don't tell us anything. Jake doesn't know who it is. He's got a song.

Okay. All right. He's going to gather Intel over the next several weeks until we have him on the show to talk about Dear Moon. So far, he is a magician, MMA fire musician. I think he said barista at some point as well. Anyway, that's all we got, folks. Thanks for hanging out, Marina. You're the best.

Any time. Thanks for having me. Let's go watching a Ryan press conference. That was that right now? It'll be two hours and 25 minutes long, just like 2001 of Space Odyssey. Zing! Got them. See you, everybody. Bye.