Podcast: The Ride - Scott Goes To The Oscars, CityWalk Goes To Hell

Episode Date: March 14, 2025

Scott worked on the Oscars telecast and Universal Hollywood worked on evicting many businesses. Both endevaors were very successful. "Mickey Mouse Disco" episode is up at: Patreon.com/PodcastTheRide FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE: https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And a behind-the-scenes peek at Scott's recent directing gig on the Oscars. Wow! Scott goes to the Oscars. CityWalk goes to hell. On today's podcast, The Ride. a place for rock a place for roll hardly a place where oakland raiders merch is sold well not anymore a sublime hot topic and billabong some of that maybe a smattering of that a place where you can purchase a candy thong well thank god thank god for now for now but who knows what can we trust what can we trust? What can we grip onto? What can we move into the future knowing? I guess nothing at all. There's a grim tone in which we enter this episode of Podcast The Ride.

Hello, I'm Scott Garner joined by Mike Carlson and Jason Sheridan. Hi, Mike here. Uncertainty abound. The markets, stock market and city walk both. Everything is unstable. The stock market and the sock market all is unstable very good point uh yeah but oh no not the sock market well not yet but we don't know we don't know like like major pieces in the city walk hollywood lineup have uh have been been shattered have been tossed aside as if it was nothing. Stuff happens all of a sudden, too. There's no warning.

Yeah, that's true. This is what really is upsetting to us, is the store can close without warning. It could be half the stores could have closed while we record today. Not even. You're starting, you know, like, you'd get heads up possibly, presumably,

if there was an earthquake. You might get an alert. Ten seconds. Yeah, yeah. There was a little bit of a lead. All right, new fires have been spotted. But instead, you know, like the biggest disasters in the city, the closure of all of these stores,

in which we've never purchased anything. The Oakland Raiders. We get no heads up. The Oakland Raiders store was just closed one day. Yeah. People, hundreds, thousands of people drove up to CityWalk to get their Raiders merch on a Thursday afternoon. As they always do. As they always do.

Thousands of people. Well after the Super Bowl. Well after. That they were not in. Yes. And they all went. Well, well after the Raiders played in Los Angeles. They were met with a closed door.

A closed helmet. A closed helmet. A closed helmet. A shut helmet. And a promise broken. Sealed up forever. A promise broken. I don't want to say, did we cause this? I said we caused this.

I have proclaimed that already. What's the theory there? The butterfly effect? Like the ripples in a pond when you drop a pebble. You may not see them for a while. When when you drop a pebble you may not see them for a while you record a podcast and then suddenly

the raider image is gone suddenly years later years later the ripples take a while to get to the edge I would like to think though that we were more directly responsible the butterfly effect is like oh I take a drink of water now and then in 10 years there's like bulgaria goes to war or something like that to me was what the butterfly effect i want to be like directly responsible for something you know

what i'm saying i want it to be like three steps removed okay you know i want to be like we did a podcast about city walk it should have been pretty one to one like it should have been but what's the what's the theory of us causing it what's your more like closely tied together theory about us causing all of this CityWalk stuff? I feel like we directly put it into the air that the chapter of CityWalk that we all know is closed. We literally closed the book on CityWalk. That's what I think. So you think they looked around? No, I don't think they looked. People responsible for CityWalk. I's what I think. So you think they looked around? No, I don't think they looked.

People responsible for CityWalk. I think it's a feeling. I think we put something in that you can't even describe necessarily with words. Where they just felt kind of a gust and they went, it's done, isn't it? Right.

It's over. If you listen to all of our CityWalk Multiverse of Madness saga, we closed the book on that version of CityWalk. And now we are entering an unprecedented new version of CityWalk, and I believe we are directly responsible. Even though I just asked for it to be a little more direct, and you were like, no, it was a gust. You still say direct.

You're very particular, but Jason's was not direct enough. Mine is a little too direct. Maybe a little too direct. You're dialing the knobs of direct as precisely as you can. Because I think what we did with the City Walk saga, what happened there, what we did,

what we carried out. And we did a lot. I mean, it's going to take decades to parse everything that we did. Artistically, you know, that we can discuss at length. But in this case. But I think just,

I just think it felt obsolete. The current version of CityWalk felt obsolete at that point. Yeah, and never until the year 2024 did any part of CityWalk feel remotely obsolete. Vibrant, current, now, very now. Everywhere you look, every sign that you see, every music track that you hear could not scream more 2024. It's a shocking development, putting in businesses and restaurants that people actually enjoy and would like to patronize. It's quite disturbing, isn't it? The NBA, Hello Kitty. Cookies. You say that and I'm like,

hasn't everything that's called the NBA thing been an instant failure? It's pretty much a more narrow Litz though. If he won jerseys, people want hats. Litz is a big success, I feel like, but I think NBA in general seems like every time they open. And locker room by Litz. I think it was strange that Jason, as proof of why people want to go to the NBA store, pointed at his Philly sweater.

At my baseball? People wear baseball stuff. People buy stuff. People will go to the NBA store. Yes, I believe. Well, you know what? With the NBA store, I think it's really, generally with the Disney Springs thing, it's tied to a bigger idea that doesn't seem to work.

Probably just Jersey Store would work okay. I mean, I just hope that's what it is, because if it's anything other than that, it's overthought. Probably. Because what's it called? Is it called the NBA Store? Maybe. It better just be a store, because as soon as they add any sort of experience

or customize or live your NBA fantasy, that's where everyone checks out. Then there's, it will, it will failure. Failure, failure will come to it immediately. Yeah. Well, there's a lot to, to parse here. And it's been a, it's been a tough time for sure.

You know, all of us dealing with a, a crucial place having been torn asunder and who knows what else will happen to it. And it's in tough times like this that all we can do is, or try to do, is to take solace in the little things. The little things like directing Conan O'Brien's sketches for the Oscars. I'm just trying to see this as kind of a consolation prize in my life, in a life that has not gone the way

that I have imagined that it would yeah you would trade this experience though if you could just get sparky's back of course of course are you kidding it was just like a job fine i i need to stay distracted i as much you know sure you can just you know you can mourn or you can try to be busy and you could try to move past it. But now that that's over, all I have is free time to. To think about Sparkies. Yeah. Yeah.

And to, you know, and, you know, to worry about luck and stone or whatever the hell that is. Something and luck. I think so. I went in there the other day too. Virtue and luck. Virtue and luck. Is it that went in there the other virtue virtue and virtue and luck is it that i don't think that's right either i think i pulled that out of my ass can i ask what you are talking about there's a store at city walk now doesn't know virtue and luck but i don't i guess it's a store what does it have in it what do you think it is it's like

stone karma and luck there you go you bought virtue and luck, no problem. I did, and I was there literally a week ago. It's a store for stones, I think. Not sector stones. Like crystals and like worry stones, lucky stones. That's my guess. Again, I will never go in. They have like big candles, too,

and then they have things like ceramics that you can hang on the wall, and I think everything costs $200. I think everything is very expensive. These aren't. Why are they there? I don't know. So many of these places don't seem like they're designed to actually conduct business. Yeah.

There's jewelry, I guess. That's still there for right now. Yeah. So you can buy onyxx you can buy jade these are the different gemstones you can purchase at the karma and luck that's great pretty reliable city for onyx precious stones and gems not enough onyx talk on our various sagas but maybe that's i don't know i guess a problem um uh well we'll. Well, the whole thing was about stones. So whatever tortured expansion we do of all of this stuff,

we'll devote a whole episode to every stone. Right. Maybe you get your birthstones up there? I don't think so. Like your ring or bracelet? No. I don't think so. That seems too much like something people might need.

Yeah. It does seem like a thing you might buy as like a fun souvenir on a vacation. That's like a Wisconsin Dells thing. That's not a Karma and Luck thing. Okay. I can't tell. The only vibe I get from Karma and Luck is that it is of use to no one. I could be wrong.

I guess we'll have to poke our heads in there and see. But no, of course. Here I am standing next to actual oscar statuettes and all i can do is worry that something's going to happen to one of the stores that sells fake oscar statuettes that say best aunt every every little thing reminded me my heart was always being pulled elsewhere yeah you know it's what i made this a tough situation but it's a situation worth talking about for for a minute if if y'all don't mind you're right what's that yes yes yeah of course yeah i uh uh no it's a little bit of old

news as as you're hearing this and we'll touch on this for a minute before we get to the real shit uh but we uh uh yeah you know i we y'all went scot-free for a couple of episodes and and i thank you for doing that because things got really crazy for me because i got this gig of a lifetime which was directing conan's sketches for the 97th academy awards this was so bonkers to get to do uh just the thrill of a lifetime you you all would because of all this this has been going on also on top of me i'm like i've been finishing the movie yeah the movie that i've been working on since september this also landed perfectly as we're like wrapping picture on it and these things that i've committed to on the move like all of course all of this at the same time so the podcast we've basically been just doing one a week,

like on a weekend, and I come in just with a flurry of like, I don't know, I might be doing the Oscars. I'm not sure. We'll see. I don't know. And I feel like I, I don't know, I would always dump a lot of crazy stuff at you every time I saw you guys. It was on stay. I was like, sometimes you're like, it's on. maybe not on it's different it's on but it's not the same it's different radically different reports yeah every time and so i'm thrilled at this juncture to be able to say

it came together it worked out beautifully uh uh just a little bit of like backstory here and and how this came to be and thanks listeners by the way for uh saying nice things via via social media uh uh but um basically so i used to work at the at the tbs conan show um and my main bread and butter there was directing videos and you know all the way from like little sketchier things which is how you and i met, Mike, as you're jumping onto a bed, a futon made of ramen. And all the way up to big, crazy things like, you know, big stylized cold opens that were kind of cinematic when he would have like entire casts of a show on the show. Like I got to do these cool things that were putting Conan into the world of Breaking Bad and Walking Dead. And then I left the show

and they would still bring me back to do these things. Like it was this market that I sort of cornered and was so honored to get to do. You know, like I, Conan was driving around in the real Batmobile

from Batman versus Superman. And we put him in Sons of Anarchy and he was on a motorcycle. And it was just this awesome stretch of stuff that I got to do. If I can pay you a compliment, you directed the Wes Anderson Star Wars. Oh, yes.

Yeah. That always made me laugh so much because he's such a distinctive director with such clear text and visual styles, and I always thought you really nailed that. Oh, man. Oh, thank you. You know, that was one of the first things I got to do with the show.

I was pretty new. I didn't write it, but I was thrown in with, I think that was a Dan Cronin and a Todd Levin, two great guys who wrote for the show. And yeah, that felt like a, oh geez, if I'm coming in with the hype of like this guy directs, I got to really nail that one.

And I love Wes Anderson. And I got to make that look right, feel right. I also got to act in that. I was very excited in that piece to get to do, I was like, I'm going to try to do not an Owen Wilson, which everybody does, but a Luke Wilson. Can I pull off a Han Solo via Luke Wilson? And I've never seen that impression anywhere else.

I feel like I did a decently subtle, the more thin slice of impression to get to do. And then there was a part of that scenario, because I got to be in it, I was on a motorcycle sidecar, like an old-timey motorcycle sidecar, and the driver of the motorcycle proper was Chewbacca. And when we're riding along the LA River, and that's a moment I think about a lot in any situation that seems a little stressful or scary or outside the comfort zone. When I was there, I was like, if you don't sit back, relax and enjoy that Chewbacca is taking you for a motorcycle ride right now, then then you have no perspective.

You have to enjoy this moment. And I tried to get there when this came up. This is like a wonderful return to Conan world. So basically, like, you know, that's something that I got to do for a while. But then the TBS show ended and I was doing other things. And Conan has become this, you know, is leading this wonderful podcast empire. And, you know, it all felt a little bit in the rear view for me. And because like a podcast empire does not necessarily need big stylized cinematic cold opens. But then he gets announced as the host of the oscars and i thought wait a minute i know something they might need big stylized cinematic cold opens uh uh so i figured let me let me send an email what's the worst that can happen the worst that could happen is that

they ignore me the best that could happen is i direct the open of the oscars and hey that proved to me take your shot uh you know if you're if you're feeling like putting yourself out there it's worth doing because they i sent an email they reciprocated right away they said we were scott we were already thinking of you and that meant a great deal to me and then it was just kind of a holding pattern for a little bit i was just kind of like hanging tight and waiting to see what uh what they would come up with or if they would come up with something and just like weeks proceeding normally and then all of a sudden oh shit go go go they're calling you the academy is calling it was so wild like once it took off uh it was a launch to put things in in our terms and uh and then i was just like you know thrown a bunch of possibilities of what could

be the sketches and there were things that didn't end up getting made and things that got scaled back a little bit but eventually we landed on like what what the things were and if you were watching the broadcast and you you sort of clock some of these things uh it ended up being three little bits one was this little thing in the monologue uh where jeff bezos was uh delivered to the red carpet via an Amazon box, a delivery guy, like throwing it kind of brusquely onto the red carpet. And that was cool. Cause I got to go to the red carpet, like shooting on the red carpet was,

was super neat. One was called cinema streams, which is a thing we shot in a movie theater that was basically like, imagine a building where you can stream movies, just like us. It was like about, you know, tricking young people into thinking a movie theater is a streaming service. That was cool because we got to shoot at the Grove. Oh, really?

Close down a theater at the Grove. Yes, yeah, yeah. No, good high-end theater to get to do something in. The site of Aaron and I's first date, in fact. Really? She picked up Tour Guide Me at the little city walk cul-de-sac turnaround uh i she she picked me up and we went to go see little miss sunshine if that dates it and i think it does and that was the first date and then uh that is a great date movie like i that is a perfect

first date movie i went on a first date once to see into the wild um remember the movie what is that again that's the guy sean penn um did he direct that uh it's the guy who goes off the grid and tries to like he's sick of the modern work here so yeah me em Hirsch. Yeah, Emile Hirsch. Sean Penn directed it. He like dies in the woods at the end. It was a best-selling book but it was like an intense movie.

The main thing I remember from it is the Eddie Vedder theme song. Oh, So I'm Seeing. Yes, guaranteed.

Golden Globe winning song guaranteed. A depressing film though ultimately? An awkward thing for first aid? Pretty depressing. Yeah. Didn't get everybody horned up? No. guaranteed uh a depressing film though ultimately an awkward thing for first date pretty depressing yeah it didn't get everybody horned up no no if you and me ended up in a bus going across the

country then we were you know it kept the temperature more comfortable um yeah you got to be you got to be careful of those things yeah a little bit sunshine a pleasant one i would say um so anyway that that was super fun to get to do but the the kind of the big one ended up being this uh sketch that put conan into the substance and uh where he basically ended up entering the show uh by rising up out of demi more's back and this was basically like like a bigger backstory to this there was another piece being talked about that was more of a like Billy Crystal style opening where he you know where Conan was in a bunch of movies albeit with more of a kind of like a clever meta Conan twist

and um uh it ended up being like uh it didn't make sense for them to do because the opening ended up being Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande singing songs from Wicked. So they didn't want to do like big musical number and then you sit through a big video. But as part of doing that, I was watching all of the movies

and like getting excited about like figuring out strategy for putting Conan into the movies. And by the way, you guys know me. We did a whole episode about this stuff. I love the Billy Crystal Oscars. I think we're all fond of the Billy Crystal Oscars. So as this is coming together and I'm like,

holy shit, this is one of these things where the host is popping up in the movies and he's magically in a tuxedo. Hollywood. This felt just like so like clean and classic of a thing to get to do uh um and i also and it gave me license to all right for work what i need to do is research and study the billy crystal openings oh yeah it's like you know and these these things had such a tremendous influence on me when i was

a middle schooler whenever the hell he was he started doing them um and it got me thinking about how you know you think of those and you maybe think about like oh yeah it's where he would get green screened into the movies and i think they did that somewhat but when i started watching them i was like really like the really good shit is where they just they're doing stuff practically where they've just recreated the world of it. And he's actually interacting, you know, he's running from the English patient plane that Letterman is piloting. Oh, right, right, right. The most effective always are the ones where they just kind of matched it and did it for real.

So, the substance was part of the first one that was being talked about. And that's the one I was salivating over. Because, like, we can do it for real this bathroom set have you guys seen the movie by the way i haven't seen it yet hell of it i i really enjoyed this ended up being my favorite movie of the like uh of the season it's on movie it is right now i was gonna sign up an official movie film this is a movie well i don't know paid for it but i like cool i think they i think it's represented at least as a movie film i want to try movie for a little bit because they also have on there the people's joker no oh really that's

where that ended up uh documentary i like i only learned about recently called grand theft hamlet which is a production of hamlet done in Grand Theft Auto. Whoa. Really? Yeah. Because I think Grand Theft Auto is called Grand Theft Auto Online. I think there's a lot more flexibility

so you can kind of do stuff. Are they with like custom dialogue? Yeah. Like people are into your gaming mic characters and car and so they're trying to line up all the events of the game to perfectly mirror no no i i think maybe this was a pandemic thing where someone's like i think we can do like people we're collaborating right right so all these movies i'm like oh i kind of want to watch all of these you've ended

i feel like every once every four weeks or so you do just a voluntary ad for a streaming service this keeps happening yeah you get so excited about like and their library is immense this well this one is like independent and international film i feel like movie is a little more uh it seems cool. You like streaming services. He gets excited, doesn't he? I think so. Especially if it's one that isn't like one of the primaries.

He likes good ones. He likes bad ones. He likes talking about Quibi. He likes talking about Mubi. Tubi, I just got an email today. Tubi has Equalizer 1 and 2. I got to go down the, I got to learn about the Equalizer. Okay.

So you get an email that says when you get a new Tubi movie in your... They send a newsletter every now and then. My email is unusable. I just sign up for every... Too many streaming services. Streaming services, departments... And you can't parse the word the many work emails from the... As long as it's a B.

As long as it ends in a B, you know it's a good streaming service. That's the rule. Tubi emails? I'm looking. The last email I got from 2B was in 2022. Michael, your movie, I haven't opened any of these 2B. Well, it sounds like you're not as committed to the 2B relationship

as Jason is. I'm not. You're guilty as charged. You get what you put in. You get it back. That's what love is, yeah. The love you make is equal to the love you take. You need to dedicate more time to just endlessly streaming and then giving up and turning on the Bar Rescue Pluto channel. Sure. I'm excited about Beatlebee.

I don't know if you've heard about that, but Beatlebee, it's the new streaming service where you can get all the Beatles albums. They pulled it from all the other services. Oh, wow. So for the low, low price of $14.99 a month, you get all of the Beatles albums. They pulled it from all the other services. Oh, wow. So, you know, for the low, low price of $14.99 a month, you get all of the Beatles music. I don't know that's so far-fetched from what

will be happening in 10 years. Yeah, I think I just announced the plan. I think that's what it is going to be. No, I think you might be right. And they will somehow present this like it's a major bargain. No, this is better, actually. Those are pretty hard to track down, right? Yeah, yeah. No, extremely rare. You don't really hear it. Yeah, imagine the convenience of all of the beetles in one place you only have to pay every month for the rest of

your life my mother and i weren't going through her garage at the old house once and just found half of all beetles i'm so invited like all the later beetles well that's vinyl but you know can you get it sounding shitty on your phone phone that's a whole other thing pay for it um pay up it's just not that same it's the vinyl it's not mildewed for me yes yeah it needs to have accrued years of gunk that the gunk makes it sound good uh but anyways i like basically this this ended up being so exciting because i like as opposed to something that is entirely reliant on post effects where you maybe, you know,

you're like, okay, well, we'll see if we can color correct it right and insert it right. And if his size isn't weird and you know, maybe we can make it look like he's a, as opposed to that, it was like,

Oh, something like this. We can like, we'll leave set knowing that it was fucking great. We had like physical toys to play with. So when I realized it was, things were lining up for it to become just the substance, like, yes, I am so ready for this.

Loved the movie. Started analyzing, like pulling all the shots. I cut together a demo of clips from the real movie and then just like badly inserting just a still of Conan rising up out of the body, which, you know, like was quick and janky and I just cut it on my computer but I sent it to everybody and that gave everyone enough confidence that like

oh this could be really funny this might be the opener so things start lining up that way like oh this could be the entrance to the show so we really got to nail this thing I felt motivated in the best way we had to figure out how to do it and thanks to the fine people at Mubi who on their YouTube channel posted an excellent

making of the substance, we were able to just go right to the source and go, how did they do it? And we ended up building two little sets. One was just regular and on the ground for Conan to stand in and do his stuff to the mirror. The other one, we built up like a, just a two wall set, uh, up on a platform four feet off the ground because that's how they did it in the real movie where like

in the actual like transformation sequence where you know it ends up being like an elbow comes out of it's a lot more disturbing in the real film right a lot gooey or a lot gross so we did like the PG-13 version of it but you know they just had a bunch of people down there

like you know like pumping their fists and do it you know like making the weird things you know puff up uh under this you know this uh complicated back prosthetic basically it was like a muppet set that's where when i got really excited i was like oh this is how they do it they got to build all of these high upsets uh so puppeteers can be relatively comfortable underneath so So now I'm like, oh my God, it's toys. We get to build a set. We got to cut a hole in the ground and then place a Demi prosthetic,

which was done at some little shop in Burbank that does prosthetics for Star Trek and all these great things. So suddenly there's a woman of Demi's proportions getting into a plaster cast. And I went to go visit and like, oh, God, this looks incredible. This is going to be so fun. A great production designer, Dylan Hutchins, figured out how all this would work.

He really knocked it out of the park. So anyway, a lot of confidence going into the day because we got like, you know, it's going to look so great out of the gate. Like very achievable and not a ton to shoot. So we can just like take our time and not a ton to shoot so we can just like take our time and play but then here's what happens uh what we show up to set with here was the here was the plan conan will be birthed out of demi he will climb up out of her then he will have left something in demi's body he will have uh you know is maybe going to be a soda or a flask or a watch or something.

Nobody could really land on the right item. So it was like, well, we'll just have a bunch of things and we'll film a bunch of things. And that's how it'll go. Then Conan shows up on set. I show him around. I show him here's everything that we have to work with. And we're thinking it'll be like this. And then we'll pop over there and should be fun.

And I see his gears start to turn. He's like, he gets a little serious and he starts thinking and then he goes away and then i'm summoned up to his dressing room five minutes later where he has come up with entire new plan new plan is i left my shoe in there i have to go all the way back into demi to get my lost shoe and i'm like okay oh that's great so then you're reaching way down it's like a you know it's like a magical thing how far you're able to get and he's like yeah yeah but like i mean i'm going all the way in i want to dive head first and for my entire body to disappear into demi more and i i think for a second my initial thought to that is not it's not no it's like of course we're going to figure that. But I just get a little look of concern on my face, mainly because I know that we built the whole thing might cave in. So I just kind of furrow my brow

and Conan takes that as me saying no or something. And he's like, Gairdner, relax. You gotta cool down. I'll be fine. I'm a rubber band man. You'll see. It's gonna be great. Like, and I go, no, no, no.

I am not saying no. I just have to go talk to three people to make sure. And he's like, come on, cool it. He's like slapping me on the arm. I'm like, I can't let the boss down. gotta uh uh it was also very nice after all this time i haven't i i have not like worked with conan since i did the calculation it was 2017 the week that we first recorded podcast the rock really that was the last time wow we went down to comic-con and did those bits wow right yeah yeah yeah so it's it's been the entire length of the

show since i actually got to collaborate with this man and it was like no time had passed uh he's he's slapping me on the arm he's calling me gardener the desert rat which is a world war ii reference that i uh you know still have not taken the time to understand but that's what he called i'm the desert rat over there um so anyways we get this cooking uh we we get to that moment all right here we go i'm gonna do the dive we're only doing one take and he starts and i'm like i don't know where this is gonna go i don't know if he's gonna get stuck i don't he's got like stage hands helping him down there i don't like we did not build it wide enough for this gag and i'm like as long as we get some piece it should be good instead we watch

and we watch and he goes all the way down he slides all the way perfectly into that thing this is a slender man this is a guy in very good shape sure 61 he's like i should never have doubted it he was he just like perfectly burrowed in there uh it was astounding to watch and you know a is a physical feat i feel like i watched a little like olympic act occur yeah but then b watching this guy a hero to all of us i think come into the room see through the matrix like something that nobody else saw that is actually the funny thing about the piece uh uh you know just like charge past any doubts anybody could have had it's gonna be great we're gonna do it i'm doing it stop asking questions and like the spirit of it watching the genius at work it was so inspiring

he's been my hero forever he's been my hero since high school he's even more my hero now this was the coolest shit unbelievable to watch uh i love this man especially because the show was great too you guys watched the show right i like i loved all of it i loved the monologue i loved the song i loved sandler i loved every bit of it yeah i hope they i hope they ask him back and uh uh yeah it was just i'm so blown away by everything. One of the best things about Conan is man of a million ideas. And if the funniest idea involves him putting his body on the line, he will do it.

Yes, absolutely. Well, and it also, I went like, oh, and this is the guy who's been, like he stayed in prime shape with this travel show with Conor O'Brien, Must Go, like like you know where he's performing physical feats every episode he has yeah he does like it is comedy first safety second for sure i also got to watch him act out like what would happen if he got down there slipped weird broke his neck and then i watched him act out an entire here's what the oscars would be like if i had to do it with a broken neck which is just perfectly spun out of his brain with no effort whatsoever uh he's insane it was

wonderful it was it was just you know great great to get to be part of it a surreal memory came to me as we're talking about all this is i remember being out here for college going to universal hollywood for the very first time where we are minutes away from, for the first time, and then coming, leaving, and then immediately getting back to our apartment and turning on the Conan O'Brien hosted Emmys. Oh, really? And those were like killer. Yes, yeah. In 2006. Oh, another great, I mean, I watched that piece too.

That had a fantastic cold open where it's like host in tux and he's stuck in lost and he's stuck in the office. Yeah. Also all done practically. Like he just went and did it. He like smashed down from the ceiling onto Dwight's desk or whatever it was. Yeah, yeah, of course. I mean, like the pedigree has always been so high

for all of these things. And I just wanted to follow in the footsteps and make it cool. And it was really fun to get to do. The other crazy thing about it, you guys know, listeners may know, if anybody has ever clocked that I am a huge unabashed fan

of the Billy Crystal Oscars, you might know this from an episode that i am a huge unabashed fan of the billy crystal oscars you might know this from an episode that we did a few years ago that was like collecting all of this kitschy oscar nonsense uh uh and talking about all this insanity the roblo snow white thing and that what that was uh an episode with guest ryan perez our good friend uh a guy who we're all very fond of. And when, you know, so the substance part was that was like a pre-tape that was done with like a week to go before the show. A few days before the show, there was one little piece that we had to add to it, which is just like it was supposed to feel like it was on the live broadcast with the stage manager going back and knocking on the door and saying, Conan, we're ready for you. When I realized, OK, wait, this is a thing. We have to film it at the Oscars.

It's got to be a guy who seems like a plausible real guy who's not going to be like, you know, doing some goofy side bit. We need like a great character actor who sells this part. I was like, there's only one man for this job. Must be Ryan Perez. sells this part i was like there's only one man for this job must be ryan perez and and you know if you heard that episode i mean like you know we've watched the oscars together forever uh uh you know like the epitome of a cinephile to me mr movies yes yes and this year the oscars were kicked off by mr movies i know if so and as i was feeling this all come together and it did successfully land as the opening of the show i was like like, oh, my God, are the Oscars going to go from Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo?

Is it going to go from the wicked note from the Defying Gravity note to our friend Ryan Perez? And indeed, that is how it played out. I am so proud. I've never been prouder of anything in my life. It was like amazing to get to put together and to be like running around the Dolby with him. Like our holding room to wait for that bit was the theater. They were like, here, you guys wait here. Open door.

We're both in the Dolby theater for the first time ever. Like we've been watching this show our whole lives and now we're in the room. We're watching a fake emma stone hand a fake award to what's her name from amelia perez like a rehearsal only award that's another cool thing about being around there is that you get to see this like it almost feels like a weird like fake wrong ai oscars where like all the details are like okay all the right things are happening but it's all the wrong people. Like their faces aren't right and it feels like they all have seven fingers.

Just watching the demo Oscars was cool as hell. There was a musical number on it that was kind of derided a little bit. There was like a James Bond song medley and I caught in reviews later and just people analyzing it. Like, why was there that that was kind of a weird you got Doja Cat doing Diamonds are Forever what is that that's

what all the reviewers thought I got to watch that being rehearsed and I'm watching it from the fifth row in the theater and I'm almost in tears I'm like the majesty the magic of oh my god Skyfall somebody came down from the ceiling and then somebody else went back up like i was like this is i would almost want to tell people there's this james bond thing you were not gonna believe so i guess i was like i thought that was cool oh great well i don't know well so did i well then you would have you would have lost your mind in person uh oh yeah sometimes it is just i've heard people say this about musicals that you just get wrapped up at like the the power of people singing yeah no matter what it is and that that's kind of how i felt uh so like makes sense yeah yeah yeah i i

did want to ask because one of the big viral things of nominees this year yes of like oh my god look at this goofy french bullshit was that clip from amelia perez where they're singing from penis to vagina yeah did anyone pitch from nominee to winner oh geez that would have been a good way to do it there was a lot in the writing there was definitely a discussion of like how do you like can you do an amelia perez beat yeah of a thing like this you don't want the most annoying people to like latch on conan's emilia perez joke was killer what was the kind of about to like that's a few less f words than uh because because soans oh the publicist right right yes yeah yeah no no agreed all yeah all the jokes were killer uh uh it was cool to see the videos have joke runoff

and knowing like, oh my God, Demi Moore watched this. She was in the front row and she watched this occur and then she lost Best Actress. Sorry, Demi. I loved it. I have a big, I love Substance. And I also, also very cool that I cut this little video from cutting the little video on my phone to less than a month later, director of the substance, Cora Lee Fargella is posting about, I had a little back and forth with her on Instagram.

She really liked it and was posting about it. Cool as hell. This is, I just, I'm coming to you imbued with Hollywood magic. Hollywood magic is real. I'm feeling it. It's, it's coursing through my radiating uh uh here I'll sing I'll sing the defying gravity now that wasn't bad that actually wasn't bad see Hollywood magic is real yeah um well congrats on doing it I mean yeah I mean Conan we all love Conan and I love the podcast and stuff but it was good Conan and she'd be on TV doing stuff.

And I'm glad you were a part of that, too. Well, I also, even besides like, and that's, that's, there was a lot of comfort. And I feel like if it had been like you are doing stuff for the Oscars, but it's all people you've never met before. There would have been a little scariness to that. But being like, like it almost what overrode that was, oh my God, the Conan TBS show is back. And in this bigger,

better way, because that show, it ended really quietly in this weird pandemic way. And everybody felt that way. Even the people who were on staff back then were like, it never, it felt like it never had like a big finale. And then they all got to do the Oscars together.

And I got invited to the party too. It's a really special group of people all those writers are fantastic and everybody wrote that's uh Jesse Gaskell and Laurie Kilmartin and Mike Sweeney the greatest uh the greatest ever the head writer who brought me on years ago um it was uh yeah yeah I know and and that was and with the substance thing just like you know less than it being like it's a it's about this year's movies or less than trying to do something edgy or whatever. It was like, oh, it's like big physical silliness for Conor O'Brien to start the show with. I just felt like I felt the baton getting passed to me of an important thing and something that matters to me.

Just setting up a cool stage for Conor O'Brien to be goofy on. Yeah and uh uh yeah doesn't it feel good it just feels good it feels good yes or whatever it's not it's not the vibe is i mean tv isn't real anymore i guess in general so i really shouldn't like say oh he used to be on tv because what does tv mean really yeah yeah first youtube but him in front of a bunch of people being goofy is really what I'm talking about, I think. Yes. I mean, a big musical number. Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Sandworm.

Oh, yeah. Scott Cronick. I mean, that's classic. The Scott Cronick, his incredible wardrobe person. One of the coolest bits I ever got to do at that show, there was a thing they used to do called NCAA mascots who shouldn't dunk. Oh, yeah, yeah. And they would build these really complicated, horrendous costumes. It would be like an Olive Garden never-ending pasta bowl or something.

Send people up to dunk. The costumes go flying spectacularly, make a huge mess. So seeing the dune sandworm clearly made by those same skilled hands, who's also the same guy making Conan look sharp, like picking great tuxes for him. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's fun.

It all ends with that job. Just a great, really good detailed sandware costume, and then he's just doing the stupidest stuff imaginable on stage. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that's what you want out of him. A guy who had to, I didn't realize at the time how much I was torturing doing things like, please make a Princess Jasmine

costume for Nick Mundy to wear. I threw incredible curveballs that guy's way. And I don't know, boy, I missed it. I missed this crew. Just incredible to get to do something with them again. So thanks for letting me nerd out about all that. I also, I'm very happy with how it all turned out.

I'm feeling great about everything and all the support I've gotten about it. It does scare me a little bit though because there was another guy who achieved his Oscar dreams and shortly thereafter, some stuff went down and the equalizer himself, Denzel Washington,

was telling him at your highest moment, be careful because that's when the devil comes for you. Well, that's when the devil comes for you. Yeah. Yes. You know what? I didn't even need to finish the sentence, you know? Of course.

And we, isn't that fun? You and Mike and me and Brian Perez and others watched that moment live. Oh yes, all together. All together. In my backyard. Right, right. And was it just 2024? oh yes all together all together in my backyard right right and and and I

was it just 2024 we did the Billy Crystal segments that was 2023 2023 when we did the episode that episode

yeah I think it was 23 okay yeah so then from 2023 to 2025 then you guys are you and Ryan Prez opening the Oscars it's

oh geez yeah I mean isn't that yeah yeah as part of a little backyard Oscar gay who Then you guys are, you and Ryan Prez opening the Oscars. Oh, geez. Yeah. I mean, isn't that crazy? Yeah, yeah. As part of a little backyard Oscar game, who would have known from the Burbank backyard Oscar gang to the real deal. And now I'm just nervous about what does that mean for me? What I do, now I am worried the devil's going to come for me.

Well, is it this closures at CityWalk? Is that kind of part of it? Well, yes. I of part of it could it well yes i'm worried that it could be that i'm also i i'm i'm worried that you know also in the near future that the devil coming for me is that episode that we got to do about puppets the club yeah well the club three at patreon.com slash might be it right yeah i'm worried that the devil is goes by different name, which is Knucklehead Smith. No, he's a silly guy.

He's not right. Can I trust him? Am I worried? No, you can trust him. He's fine. You can trust him. Just don't count on it. Okay.

Well, that's a good piece of advice. All right. Well, there's a lot to learn there. But yes, indeed, from Hollywood's biggest night to Hollywood's biggest plight, which is, of course, the ongoing destruction of the place that we hold so dear. So I think, you know, we kind of talked at the beginning with some assumption that people know what's going on. But in case you don't, there have been. Sorry, just made me laugh that like all of that build up and then really what I'm about

to say is some stores closed at a mall a mall which has been a long running subject on the show and the kind of

cruddiness of it has been a long running subject on the show okay wait but like kayfabe right kayfabe but the allure

our beloved lands have been slaughtered and taken for their natural resources. It draws us there. Yes. I never craved Sparky's Donuts before, but now that I cannot have them. Yes, you craved a myriad of better donuts, but now that it's not an option.

Now I need to go to the second donut location. It's anyone. Which is, I don't know, if you want to do that. Look, voodoo is a tough one. Voodoo, we have never spoken too highly of voodoo. Yeah, look, if you've been with the show forever or if you haven't, you've gone backwards and caught up on the CityWalk saga. We have placed an odd amount of emphasis on these weird stores with these weird names with on popcorn opalus on the crepe cafe on sparkies and due to us doing this and kind of putting a spotlight on

these places and underlining them i have a kind of unreasonable amount of um you know just just affection yeah for for these places and uh over the course of, let's keep it a really rough time period. I would say like the last nine months, there have been a ton of sudden closures of a lot of these places. Sometimes for them to be replaced by a newer and better sounding retail location. Sometimes just for nothing. And in fact, if you go up to CityWalk right now, as you're listening to this,

you will find a lot of dead space. I would say that right now, for maybe the first time ever, we've had our complaints about CityWalk. There's things that we've laughed at CityWalk for, but one thing it has never felt like is a dead mall. Right now, there are finally stretches of it. I went and walked it the other day.

There really are places that feel fully dead. Yeah. It's a bit disturbing. And this is the episode to parse that. Yeah. There's a lot going on. There's a lot of feelings. You know, when you talk about dead space at CityWalk,

previously the only dead space you would say was vertical perhaps when we talk about where wizards was the three-story wizard themed restaurant and bar well the entire that yes there was the uh the the multi-room magic oriented uh bar and restaurant and then i think some of that space became various other weird bars the john lovett's comedy club and weird and bb king and weird other nightclubs that all has been nothing either somewhere between nothing and sheriff substation for many years so that all has been the idea of like and then up in the loft you can dance the night away that's been gone for a long time um it's also i guess it's not new that it's kind of dead in an area that you can just walk anyone up

there can walk which is um the unused top level of both margaritaville and uh bucca d jason Jason Pepo Is that for real Or are you giving the fans what they want I'm not I'm not I fucking broke on it I got confused I started doing the same battle You know what Conan

Conan giving it to us as good as he ever Has decades later As good as he ever has decades later uh as good as he ever has decades later uh some things never change and that's how i feel about this i hope you never i hope you never get it i i won't and once i sat down and ordered the full like appetizer salad entree dessert i'm like, now I'm really not committing this because this sucks. Like, this food. Wait, oh, wait.

So you're saying when you finally ate it. So he's saying that because the food was bad, he doesn't feel he owes it to learning the name. He's going to stick it to Bucca di Beppo by saying Peppo. I had eaten a lunch special in the bar before, but doing the full... Yeah, it was fine. Wait a second, Jason.

Jason, not to reopen this whole thing, but your defense for a long time has been, I've never been in there. That's why I don't know the name. Now you're telling us about this lunch special? Yeah, when did this lunch... No, no, hold on, hold on. I'm talking 2018, City Walk 1.

I went up there. Yes, okay, wait, I'll let you tell the story. I ate in the bar. Uh-huh. I ate in the bar. Uh-huh. I ate in the bar. I did. I had just, it was a sandwich and fries and an iced tea. The polar opposite of like the family style.

Yes. You know. But the argument has always been that you've never, you haven't done it, right? No. Am I crazy? Or I'm trying to remember. I'm trying to remember because Abercrrombie and fitch i believe you said you called it finch because you've never been in there but i was there a bucca di beppo

also that you said you hadn't been yeah that defense for a long time has been i never go over there now i'm hearing about this 2018 meal and is your defense that because you only had a small reasonable lunch which sounds like all the components of a lunch that because of that that you it makes sense that you wouldn't know the name well no i'm saying that lunch was okay i was just a bum like fool and then after i had the full like experience which was recently which yeah 2024 uh which of course involves sitting in a booth with a couple people and ordering different menu items right while a uh pretty sizable uh prayer group is celebrating the self-publishing of some christian book next to you and they are praying a lot were they in the

room were they in the yeah they were in the the pope room? Yeah, they were in the tiny room. I don't think we were in the pope room. Well, you would have known if they were in the pope room. I'm just confused. If you're a religious group going to celebrate a religious book at City Walk, Bucca di Beppo, why don't you go to the pope room? You wouldn't ask for the pope room? Maybe they didn't know.

Or they got confused about B's and P's and they called it the pope room. And then the people who worked there got confused. Plenty of flavors of evangelicals are like, oh, Catholics aren't Christian. That's not real. It could be you're saying it didn't necessarily could have been people that didn't want to believe in the Pope. So that would have been a disgrace. Do you think anybody, just speaking of Oscar movies, did any groups go to see Conclave at the CityWalk KMC and then follow it up at the Pope table?

Perhaps, yeah. I think that's a very strong possibility. I imagined all of the different popes that it could have been. Hey, no spoilers, but your Lithgows. That'd be a fun exercise, I think, to go to the Pope table and imagine John Lithgow's head in there. Oh, they should change that. That's disney would do if it was on property at disney because they want everything to be like ip yeah yeah they're arguing over where they were going to eat afterwards mirrored the tense cardinals retreats no i want to go to two

something out chocolate bread no i want to go to the pope room all right we will take another vote all right send out the smoke signal. We have landed on just going to the food court and going to different places. Some of these places would have been improved by a vaping cardinal. The smell would have been improved by the presence of a vaping cardinal. Well, we're going to have to look into this. This meal is surprising to hear that you had a meal before this, but I don't know. Maybe I'm misremembering.

I just feel like the argument has always been, I've never really been there. I've never really been there doing the family style. Last year, I did the family style. But the family style is what's crucial to you knowing whether it's Beppo or Papo? Well, I just never thought about it. I like the argument, though, that you've never really been there in the way you've ordered a big enough meal. That's what... Even though you've eaten in the restaurant.

I always thought, well, I hadn't done the song and dance, and I don't really think about this place that much. Then when I did the full book experience, I was like, this is not deserving the respect of me remembering. Well,

some listeners are going to go through. It feels like there might be a bit of retconning happening, but if a listener tells you, again, it's I'm remembering Abercrombie and Fitch situation was that you said you'd never been to the store. So maybe that's what I'm thinking of. I could be wrong. I don't know.

The smells make my eyes water. Of the cool water cologne? Yeah. I'm just saying. From the shirtless hunk that would stand in the doorway? Sure. Well, no more. Get splashed by that universal city wind blowing the dancing fountains. Well, that's something you and I agree on is that wind up there.

Hang on. Wait a minute. The wind is not at the fountains. The wind is not at the fountains. It's more at city food. The wind is not at the fountains. The wind is not at the fountains. It's more at city food. The wind is not at the fountains. It's more at city food. There's no way for it to get,

but it did it now. Did I go up to that top level the other day and try to put myself in your shoes and imagine this brisk, this hurricane that occurs only on the city food level? Did you try getting- Oh, it's a lately thing.

Oh, I've been up there a couple times lately. Everyone's timelines are on now. Climate change. When we were doing City Walk Saga last year, it was windy up there. It was very windy up there.

Look, I go often now. When my wife says, you want to take our daughter to the park? I say, can I take her to City Walk instead? Park stresses me out too much.

Park stresses you out? Yes. Oh, yes yes park is great park there's so many parks i love the idea of parks in bourbon i love the idea of park but every time i go to a park a bossy seven-year-old takes over parenting from me just body slams you yes is rude to often rude me. Takes my toddler and just tries to get her to do everything a seven year old should do but not a two and a half

year old. This has happened to us for sure. You're not describing an unfamiliar and I always want to like just cut and run when a bossy kid shows up for sure. It happens almost every time to me. It's so like when we get there and there's no one on the park I go, oh thank God. I'm so like, when we get there and there's no one on the park, I go, oh, thank God.

I'm so excited. We do that too. My son would certainly prefer no one at the park, but you just move to a different area of the park, maybe. You got to stand your ground. You can't only- I don't know. Your daughter deserves a chance.

You have to take her places that aren't CityWalk, or she's going to end up like, I hate to say it, well, look, like us. Like all of us. Let's make it us. There's so much fun to say it, well, look, like us. Like all of us. Let's make it us. There's so much fun to be had, though, at CityWalk. Oh, yeah. Nothing to play on or with. No, that's not true.

What is there to play? Come on. Wait, wait, wait. Answer the question. What is there to play with at CityWalk? Play with. Okay, there's not really toys or like a big wheel no there's not a slide or swings there's not a slider swings no but there's not many snl character cereal boxes she

can pick up and then quickly put down yeah she likes to go up and learn who gilly is she likes to go up and down stairs she likes to see the dinosaur the jurassic park dinosaur on the wall uh she likes seeing the dragon she likes seeing there's a lot of fun stuff look i take my son up there too i'm just saying this is not a replacement for park well the second replacement for park is there's some play areas in the burbank mall that are not always so populated if you go at the right time there's that little section of like hill kind of like this weird like it almost looks like an art installation it's it's it's weird little plastic rainbow hills uh at the entrance near the cost plus right and she loves that yes we've spent a good hour there that's fun

and there's not a ton of kids there and there's more and more arcades every six months. Well, that's true. That's good. Yes. Round one is expanding. There's a weird AI advertised Candyland. Yes, and I don't think that's the only location of this Candyland new kid play area.

Soon, I mean, soon we should do an episode on the Chuck E. Cheese style like Billy Bees that's around here. There's various chains with various bee characters that we could discuss yes yeah b family characters unless look is that a harbor hoedown thing oh perhaps it is

perhaps if people get people are willing to wait for billy bees perhaps it is harbor hoedown also an interesting thing to say in this in this state because i look this is a weird if you if you put on this episode with a title presumably related to city walk uh you might be wondering well does that mean we're going to get an appearance from an old good point yeah but we said goodbye to our old pal no yes I mean there's no way to even how would we contact our old pal we don't our old pal uh and by which we mean the sector keeper and you know just like I don't want to spoil the end of conclave I also don't our old pal uh and by which we mean the sector keeper and uh you know just like i i don't want to spoil the end of conclave i also don't want to spoil the end of the city walk

orlando saga but let's just say it's you know it's not as easy to contact our old friend yeah and that leaves us also as here as his land decays as the land that forged our friendship decays, as the land that forged our friendship decays, we also, you know, we're without a guide. We don't know, the sectors are all falling apart and we don't have a keeper to help us get through the sectors. I mean, this is just, I feel a mess. Right. I don't even feel, are we even capable of putting on a show or any of the words I'm

saying making any sense? By saving the keeper, we may have destroyed unpleasant city walk. Well, that's kind of, I guess that's what was weird in what you're saying. Yeah. I'm saying more like a positive spin, but I guess it could be that as well. Well, we don't know. That's some of what we're here to figure out. Right. What are these changes?

Why are they happening? Are they happening for the better are they happening to slowly start piecing off city walk to no longer exist what is it this is so okay let's let's start with just rumors and kind of what we know because there is stuff we know permits have been filed well can i also have i don't want to you know if you've got an order in your head but i it also feels like we should maybe say some of what has happened yeah sure like where where we stand today because uh i have uh i went and looked i found the list that we made of what's going to be right uh well you know what's in each sector and i did a count of what all of the i i just left it at like, you know, because we talked about things that are a little more abstract, like the King Kong or Walter's Gate, the entrance to theme park employees. I didn't count things like that.

What I counted were restaurants and stores, places that you could walk into and have an experience. And I, of that, I counted 57. I didn't count things that we talked about that were already gone. I didn't count wizards. I didn't count the hotels. I didn't count parking garages. 57 retail locations are what we covered

in the original 19-part series. Since we did the original series, in what year, 2018? Yeah. 27 of those places have closed wow my god and within that nine of them have closed in the last nine months that that is i i expanded it to the nine months because i think that's when we lost oh which one uh uh i mean they really started flying i mean it's been a ton yeah you know kind of since november or so right um is it worth saying what we've lost meditating a little on what we've lost yes i

think it's worth it um the saddest one to me is sector one sector one almost doesn't exist and i don't think anything in the original list is still there. Oh, wait, actually, I missed one. Whatever angle or A-N-G-L, that's gone. Oh, yeah, all right. I didn't count that, so it's 28. Angel, yeah. Is it angel or angle? I think it was angel. There was a few other locations of that story thing in Malts,

and I was still going to be angel. Okay, okay. I guess that's more appealing than angle. Angle. Like startup app, you just remove the vowels. That's always what it is. Right, right, right. Just pull all those vowels or put BI on it, and that's how you get your app.

Sector one, this is the craziest one. Sector one, here, you know what? Just for old time's sake. Sector one, billabong, popcornopolis, fossil, Zen Zone, Angel, good luck boys. Was that offensive that I did that? Maybe. Or was it kind of nice? I think it was a memorial.

I tried to make it a tribute. I tried to make it like, you know, Jamie Foxx doing Ray, but you know, you can't stack up to the original. Fossil, Zen Zone, Angel, long gone. Billabong, Popcornopolis, gone recently. So Sector 1 as we knew it doesn't exist uh yes it's and this is okay let me say this we'll save this for the end but i do want to say and tease right now in case you weren't going to listen to this episode i was there the final day of billabong

oh oh mike mike i went up to city walk on the final day of operation now i was very thankful that they announced when they were closing because we don't get that kind of heads up with other stores and other restaurants here because mike you go through surf wax like no one's business i'm a big surfer we know that i love the beach but i i will tease that uh i will tease something i got something happened whoa wow at billabong the final night of billabong and and we'll end with that something happened tears were shed scars were formed that'll last forever and it's interesting it was funny i'll say this it was funny because for a couple weeks, I think, you know how you see a store going out of business,

they have those big yellow signs, and they have some company that comes in there and figures out a way to trick people into thinking they're getting a deal on the clothes or whatever. And this is what was happening at CityWalk for like a couple weeks. You had big yellow signs going out of business sale

at CityWalk, which just didn't feel quite right. I don't know why. It's surreal. But I thought it was funny also like just like some common store some dirt place yeah this is this is the finest shopping institution on earth just shouldn't be the case it just feels too low how did it ever come to this but yes this whole chunk is gone it's all gone and empty and now we were talking about this they're building a hotel right here in this area and this is a key piece that people may not know right um this has been rumored for a long time and i think this is pretty official that they are building a pretty big hotel

that's going to wrap around i don't think we know the exact lay of the land right but it's certainly it is more akin to grand californian being there, being mixed in with the retail, bordering the park. And I think it's going to wrap all the way around to another Fallen Brother, Saddle Ranch. And it'll take over a lot of parking lot. That's sort of the... A lot of stuff that is non non-garage just one level parking is gonna become a hotel and the current security corridor oh yes right we'll be uh knocked down and it seems like we'll get replaced by some sort of more permanent facility where like disneyland

the security happens before you're even in the mall. Yes. So the way you have to go through security to be in downtown Disney seems like it's going to be the same for CityWalk. I think that's happening soon. Thank God, finally. Get them up to CityWalk. That's going to get them up there doing a quick metal detector pat down. It's going to bring the people in. Look, it's a look. It's about time because if I see some some godforsaken teen with a switchblade starting to, you know, climbing up and starting to carve up with a cow that's upside down. No, we don't want the Ben and Jerry's protect City Walk.

Yeah, I will. I will kick that switchblade out of their hand, put it in my hand and slice them up a little bit. You would turn their face into a slice house. If City Walk was its own country and we could enlist in its army, we would. Yeah. It's the only one that we... Yeah, yeah. No, if there was a CityWalk flag...

CityWalk was its own country. We would always stand and salute it. We would. I will draft a bill to let CityWalk secede from the union so we can have it be its own country. This sounds like a good deal. Hey, the three of us and the listeners,

let's go find some places to, you know, I guess, all right, here's the plan. You can't really live there yet. So we'll just go sleep in the bathroom every night, hide on top of the toilets until the security guards stop checking legs. Yeah. And then we get to live at CityWalk

as a sovereign nation forever. Beautiful. Yeah, and you know, like, in the way that medieval castles and stuff are fortified with moats, soon CityWalk will have a whole building full of rooms that are difficult to escape from. Oh, well, that's, we haven't even gotten over there.

That's the other side of the place. Yeah, yeah. The whole other side of CityWalk. Well, let's keep progressing via sectors. In sector two, we have lost the Crepe Cafe. I knew it was serious when we lost Crepe Cafe. Because Crepe Cafe has sustained for many, many years in which I imagine a total of six people bought a crepe per day so you know if they're able to live to survive in those conditions yeah and then suddenly you're gone i knew this was a transformation yeah this was nothing we could

turn back from right and and you know i should say and i don't know if it's completely true we've said that i've said this at least a hundred times on this show at this point it feels like universal we've heard universal is going to replace everything with Universal owned businesses. Yeah. Well, this is something that's said a lot about what the plan is or why this is happening. Seems like that's not the case as far as things we've heard now. Or at least it's not so the folk, at least in the moment right now, it's not the case.

Yeah. It is still all these outside things, isn't it? Hot topic and Ben and Jerry's still standing strong, for example. Well, yes, they are still there. Oh, yeah. It's not everything, not by any means. You're right, you're right. By the way, if I say any of these and you know what the replacement is, feel free to shout it out. I don't think I do in all these cases.

I'm trying to remember now. Look, I've been, I hope he doesn't mind, I've been communicating with Universal High, the Twitter account, or X account a little bit. Okay, one of these accounts that's been tracking all this stuff. Okay, I was correct. Now, apparently, there was a permit filed for Halal Guys to replace Crepe Cafe.

Ooh. Which he says is now it's been pulled. The permit doesn't exist anymore. Oh my God. What happened? This is wild. Would immediately be the best food at CityWalk.

Like number one. I haven't had Halal Guys in a while. Anything that goes in goes straight to number one. Number one with a bullet. Like I love Halal Guys. I haven't had in a little while. Some people said the Glendale location has gone downhill a little bit, but I always liked it when I had it.

And that's a chain. And yes, that would be very exciting. I didn't know anything about this until today, but apparently it's not happening or it doesn't seem like it's happening. No. So we don't know what's going in the Crepe Cafe. We certainly don't know what's happening with Billabong and all that stuff. No idea.

No idea. Mini Monster has recently departed. Yes. Now, Mini Monster, is that one that's being replaced by this new dessert location? Insomnia Cookies? Insomnia Cookies? Insomnia Cookies. Jason, in a previous episode, you, before time, pulled whatever story you have about Insomnia Cookies.

Now is the time. What do you know about Insomnia Cookies? Okay, well, we're flashing back to 2005 or 2006. And at that time in Ithaca, there was warring late night cookie delivery services. The late night wars. The late night wars, yeah. And one time, one of my older roommates and I, he had his own dorm room that year.

And we were just hanging out late on a Saturday watching Mystery Science Theater 3000 on DVD setsd sets as you would it wasn't a thing that you could for the streamers this is before a 2b this is before a pluto before you could just pull it up on any streaming free channel uh and we were hey, you want to get cookies? Do you want, let's, because there was one, the one I liked would sell cookie, like slices of cookie cake, or they'd bring you a Ben and Jerry's pint for $5. And the economics of this was all insane at the time, too,

because it's like, why did the place down, like that sold $5 calzones deliver one $5 calzones. How did that make sense? These are the mysteries that Jason has been grappling with for 20 years. I've been still thinking about it. So anyway, insomnia cookies had just opened. So at about one or two in the morning,

we ordered a set of cookies and brownies now when you say set yeah what does that mean like uh a box okay meant to be shared 12 uh 12 cookies hey it was probably like six cookies four brownies okay and i you know was going nuts on those i was eating a lot and by the time i left his door of course when i left it was like 2 a.m 3 a.m the middle of the winter and it goes freezing out and my stomach hurts not made any better by the cold and i woke up with the worst stomach pains the next i just like horrible so for years i like side eye and intomino cookies anytime i see it now was it the cookies or was it my own foolish actions who's to say what do you mean foolish actions oh eating like half a dozen cookies and brownies at like

two in the morning did you okay yeah did you i hate to be crass have a bad shit or throw up a lot i didn't throw up i i don't know that my shit was i think i was just pounding pepto this doesn't even sound that bad honestly it was really pain it was really unpleasant don't start teaching. This behavior, this is not good. This is how it spreads about bad behavior, how nobody ever learns. You're saying that a big stomach ache is like, that's not so bad. You can get through

that. You should keep doing that. Keep having those. Let's go to insomnia day one. Let's be at opening of insomnia. I had insomnia in San Diego a month or two ago. I will give them another chance since they're reviving at all okay but it's been 20 years what we have it has been 20 years what we need to do though is you need to eat the exact same no no no at two in the morning at two in the morning

for a science it's for work it's for science experiments six cookies and four brownies and you have to go fucking wild on them just Just getting a room at the Universal Hilton. Yes, yes. And depriving myself of sleep to eat this stuff. You have to recreate this situation perfectly. You could be Sloppy Telly. Right. Just you and me, babies.

By which I mean cookies and brownies. Then did you ever order from them again? No. In college? I haven't had them in 20 years. Did you ever order from them again? No. In college? I haven't had them in 20 years. Did you ever order from a different cookie? Oh, yeah. I ordered from the other cookie place all the time.

And did you order the same amount? No, because it was different form factor. It was like slices. But would you eat a similar amount of treats? No. No, because I would usually get one or two cookies and then split a pint of ice cream with my girlfriend

at the top okay so you never recreated you didn't have a control or you I guess you did have a control but you never tested

the experiment as far as the amount if I just throw in Manos hands of fate I don't know if I'd be I wonder if it would just my body would just react it could have been that

that might have thrown you too. It is a nauseating film to watch. Yeah. This is going to be a big episode for us. Back to Insomnia. You returning to Insomnia Cookies after 20 years. Yeah. To see if you can handle it.

It is like a place usually that when it first caught on, I think sprung up around the college campuses for like stoners and drunks. These dumbasses will eat anything. That is a lot of the food services around the college campus. Just use a bunch of newspaper. Cook a bunch of newspaper and feed it to these losers. These hogs aren't going to put down TikTok long enough to know what they're eating.

Oink, oink, you pigs. Oink, oink, little piggies. Pay up and eat up. You know, a lot of people experiment in college. People try on different personalities, interests, predilections. And to me, this is a more experimental kind of Jason. A Jason who would get stomach pains

and then not immediately go back to the place that gave him the stomach pains. I don't even know this, Jason. You didn't really test them out like you should have. It comes with maturity. What do you mean? I'm saying you and I go to CityWalk and if something kind of tastes weird or bad or something, we'll try it out a couple more times.

Alright, you're on bless for six days. Right. Scott, did you get like a three-by-tuna sandwich and test the wind factor? No, I did no wind experiments. No, I was not a little Ben Franklin up there. I'll leave that for you guys.

You did a two-bytes of a pickle to get blown away. Oh, yeah, your pickle blew away. No, in fact, because we recorded after. I went up there just to kind of walk around, take stock of things. And I saw you guys for a record right after. And as I told you, I made a point of getting food not there. I left early so that I could eat lunch somewhere that was not CityWalk. Hey, shout out Roadside Tacos.

Real good spot down at the bottom of the hill on Lancashire. If you're going to Universal Studios and you want food that doesn't destroy you and that actually tastes good and has real flavor, Roadside Tacos is the place for you. Very well reviewed local taco spot. It's as good a time as ever. I'll tell a second part. I'll tell what happened after the Billabong story right now. Okay.

Because I was trying to figure out where to eat at CityWalk. I had gone up there with my friend Tim, and was just like trying to figure out i really was having a difficult time what time are we does this a dinner late it's late eight or nine oh that's for city walk for city walk hours yes that's basically two in the morning yeah so i said ah i got a free i got a free menu item on the taco bell app. And I was extra excited about this because Taco Bell prices at CityWalk are three times more expensive than at a regular Taco Bell. Yeah.

So I wondered, is it going to still, is the conversion rate going to be the same here when it comes to the free item? Because you get a free item, it's, you get one cheesy gordita crunch, one chalupa, whatever. And those are four bucks. At CityWalk, they're eight or $9. It's wild.

It's very expensive. But I realized i realized yes i could get the extra expensive cheesy gordy to crunch for it's eight eight ninety nine for a cheesy gordy to crunch at city walk which is insane that's for a full meal this is generally how much you'd spend so i could get that for free and i said okay i need one other thing to eat and i love taco bell generally speaking i never have a bad taco bell meal very rarely uh so i go oh there's this like there's a quesadilla for ten dollars okay i'm getting a free item so the whole meal will be ten dollars that's pretty good the caliente cantina chicken quesadilla. Uh-oh. And it's a new menu item. It says we're scared just of the name. I eat the Cheesy Gordita Crunch. It's delicious.

It's as good as a Cheesy Gordita Crunch ever is. Sure. I open the Caliente Cantina, and it's covered in neon yellow sauce. Just even like crazy fake looking for Taco Bell.o cheese no or it's the caliente sauce like lemon like lemon sauce what the fuck did someone uh open a glow stick that's what it looked like on top of it accidentally and i this this goes so south i forget to even take a picture before it's thrown away okay i i take a bite of this it is like tasting like rancid lemon candy that's soaked in a chicken quesadilla and it's it is so it is like a pool of it my quesadilla is sitting in a pool of like neon yellow candy it's leaking out and again i've seen all sorts of taco bell shit in my day i'm a veteran of this place i've never seen anything like this it's like wet it's like

been soaking in piss basically what do you think it is in their world a cantina that you first thought the only thing trustworthy on that menu is the crispy cantina uh chicken taco is pretty good there's some great new cantina items too this is thing in the last couple months the burritos and quesadillas are too much gross they brought the shredded chicken back which is what i was i've been that i like yes it's much better than their shitty chunk chicken the shredded chicken is a better quality i don't know why but it is. Imagine the candy piss from its sugar, and they just dribble it all over your chicken quesadilla. Maybe that's what it is.

It might be. It could be surplus piss candy. It could be surplus piss candy. You got to get rid of this piss. Was it spicy? Is that caliente sauce spicy? It was maybe supposed to be, but it just tasted like this weird artificial lemon sauce. That's weird.

That was really, it felt like it was giving me a headache. And I just, I couldn't take it. I threw, it's actually, it was worse. It's radioactive. Was it Barbicide? It felt like, in some ways it was worse than the chicken oil. It was yellow Barbisol. It felt in a way like worse than the Flounder Almondine.

I would have rather had the Flounder from City Walk Orlando Toothsome than this chicken quesadilla from Taco Bell. So you just had your worst City Walk food now? Yes, just had it. Wow. Never had a worse City Walk meal than this. Oh my God. And from my beloved Taco bell of all places i don't know if they i suspect that since it was a new menu item they put like 50 times the amount on the quesadilla that they should like they didn't know what they were doing they had not been trained so there was

a new right somebody didn't come like the regional manager didn't come around and explain the proportions they're making what no they're not ready at least at johnny rock did you get a flat top grilled dog you know i should have gone to johnny rock i thought about it and then i was like i don't know why didn't you go to a taco bell down the street i made a mistake i got excited at the prospect of of getting the nine dollar cheesy gordita crunch for free. But then you still paid for this other thing that was bad? Yes. Because the quesadilla was still- So the prospect of the free, but then he just gives him $10 of the worst thing he's ever

eaten in his life. Because it's still a case. I'm sure that quesadilla was $4 more than it should have been regular retail, but it still felt closer to how much it should cost than the $9 Cheesy Gordita Crunch, which is absurd. We only spent $10 on the worst food item that's ever been in front of them. Scott, you know what else set the foot of Universal Hollywood? A Ralph's grocery store. Oh, yes.

Where they have this food that you can make for yourself and control it. Spitz is on Ventura down there. No, you're not a Spitz guy? I like it okay. There's a Paquito Mas. I like Paquito Mas. Do you like Mediterranean style food in general? I love Mediterranean food.

Okay. Did you just have one bad meal at Spitz once? I just thought it was kind of- Just fine. Yeah, just fine and a little overpriced. Well, again, you take that and you move it right, you just plop it right on CityWalk and you're raving about it. Well, yeah. Number one, if you're

craving CityWalk Eats, it's Spitz for you. Yeah, because CityWalk are the most beautiful people in the world. My favorite thing about Spitz, there's never yellow battery acid all over the food. It is reliable for sure.

I mean, unless you want battery acid. It is reliable for sure. That's insane. It was so gross. Wow. So how soon are you going back? I would go back as long as I order something dependable. I'll go back to the Taco Bell. Especially if I have a free item. You get a free cheesy gritty crunch and it does make me feel good that I get that $9

for free. You paid them $10. You got screwed in this scenario. You're right. In this scenario, I got screwed, but I'm saying in the future, I'm screwing them. In the future, I'm taking it to them. I'm trying to just figure out how much Taco Bell you eat, because the only free items I get are like

value menu, like rice and beans, like a basic taco. And he's getting like the giant freebies. So he's racking up points.bies. It seems like a lot. Like, I don't really know. I don't have a log of Mike's day to day, but it does feel like there is a lot of Taco Bell. Maybe once a week.

We would pretty regulate my health. It's James Vegetarian, very reliable. Very reliable. You can get a bowl too. I get a power bowl often as well. You know, we get beans, you get a little chicken in there, you get...

Yeah, because he's a health nut. Yeah. This health nut over here with his power bowls. I don't know, man. He needs 350 get a little chicken in there, you get- Yeah, because he's a health nut. Yeah. This health nut over here with his power bowls. I don't know, man. It may only be 350 calories to get one of these bowls. If you make it right- You put Taco Bell pieces in a bowl or Subway ingredients in a bowl. I'm like, I shouldn't be seeing this.

I shouldn't be seeing this like this. Subway bowl is the most foul thought I've ever- It's really- I got one of my orders. Wednesday- Deconstructing it. foul thought i've ever really i got one of my orders wednesday Wednesday 2 12 25 cantina chicken bowl modified reduced fat sour cream easy on it guacamole easy on it health nut added a little mexican pizza sauce though uh but i removed the avocado ranch sauce and i removed all the rice

so it only ended up being like 350 calories you're playing with fire with this many modifications i think no i'm not i know exactly what i'm doing i'm just saying the trust you're playing with fire challenging him you're coming at the king you're coming at the king so real the response you're coming at the king i know you're the king i'm just saying i stick to the standard goo that's on it oh you never modify the goo at taco bell i I modify, I might add one more goo, but like, I don't go too crazy with it. My Taco Bell thing is just of like, of as little meat as possible.

If it's just potatoes or beans or stuff like that, I don't get sick if I just eat vegetarian at Taco Bell. But you'll get sick if you do the meat? I'm saying that beef is questionable. That goo beef. The goo beef. I can't. Am I experiencing this on the show?

That someone who isn't me is talking about the poor quality of beef at chain restaurants? What's happening? Jason and I are aligned. We're both making fun of how mike is eating the sands are shitting on this all you're eating is what the lettuce at taco bell then why do you even go beans cheese nacho cheese you're throwing shame you're mr taco bell power bowl you're power bowling your way to the shell The shell is more unhealthy than the meat. I don't care about unhealthy. It's Taco Bell. I'm not trying to eat healthy.

I'm just trying. I'll live on the edge. I'll order Cinnabon bites if I got a sweet tooth. You know? And there's empanadas. There's sweet empanadas of plenty coming back. We were texting about the Liv Moss presentation

event where they talk about the new Taco Bell stuff. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. There is a Taco Bell keynote that you both follow. Live Moss, yeah. The Live Moss event. That's how we live.

That's how we live, Jason and I. All the snacking counts. I follow an Instagram. We're all over. So you text about Taco Bell enough to cover the Live Moss keynote, but you haven't run into this specific issue of that you don't eat the meat and Mike's mad that you don't eat the meat. It just seems silly to me, unless you were a vegetarian or a vegan, to not ever have meat. I mean, I've always, for the last few years, been trying to eat less meat.

But unsuccessfully. No, I'm doing a good job of it. What are you talking about? That's a weird judgment. And you're also saying to never eat meat he's not saying i'll never eat meat he's saying he doesn't want to eat the shitty meat at taco bell i make sense to me i'm not perv i mean look i like a little shitty meat so i'll have big mac sometimes but i'd rather have like it's either either i'd rather have big mac or i'd have a decent steak and otherwise i'd

prefer not i prefer chicken or fish. Mike goes to a steakhouse. He's like, how many modifications? Do you have an app? Do you have an app for this? All right, never mind. I'll go somewhere else.

Oh, oh, oh. I mobile ordered for the first time at Crypto.com Arena yesterday. The modern world we live in. My God, we are in the future. Now, our friend at Needs was telling us how dog shit the food is at Crypto Com Arena. How do you respond? You don't say.

He's right. Yeah, it's awful. Okay. But that's besides the point. Mike has a lot of thin slices in his food discussion. This is all about skipping the line, which was very exciting. You got to, in a faster way, get dog shit food. I ate a shitty hot dog

faster than the line i ordered from the chair i walked up it was ready to go then you were to the toilet before they were even done ordering that's right that's right i threw it up let me ask because you were at aw revolution uh were you eating a hot dog during any of the very bloody matches? No, I ate the hot dog pretty early. Yeah, no, there was no blood. Because I was eating a salad as one match was ending, and then the next match was in a steel cage.

So I really finished that salad quickly because I was starting to get grossed out. When you see a human being bleeding, it makes your appetite less? I know, I might be going out on them here but yes michael my favorite that to me the craziest bloodiest match of all time was mike carlson versus flounder almondine yeah i bladed that got wild my mouth yeah i bled is a bucket of blood from that for that flounder during City Walk 2.

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The card for living unlimited. Conditions apply to all benefits. Visit pcfinancial.ca for details. Value is for illustrative purposes only. I'm going to keep going through the list here. Please. Sparkies, we have just lost. Sparkies, I think in all that time, I never actually walked into Sparkies.

I don't think I ever bought anything from Sparkies. Sparkies is very confusing. It seems to be, it was a store that sold 100 hundred things it had a cat that looked like lady gaga well it doesn't have that anymore yeah um sparkies is being replaced by uh slice house slice house tony gamignani gamignani um don't get in on me you guys uh spoke pretty highly of this institution Oh no I didn't I've never eaten there You have not eaten there Mike spoke highly of it It has a Burbank

Location where it replaced The Doughboys perennial Steak and Shake by Big Laurie Which if you follow Steak and Shake On Twitter Has turned into an Elon Trump simp account. Oh, no. Specifically, RFK.

All three of them. All three of them. Beef tallow. They're like, we're frying our fries in beef tallow again. Yes, they're frying their fries in beef tallow. Make America healthy again. There's like AI art of Steak and Shake being also like half Steak and Shake, half Tesla dealership or Tesla restaurant. Oh, my God.

They're like going hard. Like they have a red hat. They're just pissing the brand down the drain. Wow. It's really interesting what's happened to Steak and Shake. Wow. Wow. I was not aware of the Big Laurie turn.

Big Laurie is like kissing Trump in everyone's ass. Yeah. It was very interesting. Oh, my God. Well, anyway, this is a legit chain that's been going for a long time. Just showed up in Burbank. As a theme park journalist, got a little bit interested in trying it, seeing if the hype lined up with reality. It was, I'm going to be honest, nerve-wracking to do so.

Going to a food establishment where the only recommendation had been Mike made me very nervous. And knowing that CityWalk has said, yes, you can set up shop here. I was wondering, am I about to give my entire family food poisoning? But some bona fides. I believe he's won some pizza making awards. Yes. And he's called like, I forget that his Wikipedia says he's like, I don't know, he's the Elvis Presley of pizza throwing. I don't know who the, Michael Jordan?

I guess Elvis makes no sense. Would you, Scott? He's the Savion Glover of, he's the river dance of pizza throwing. Would you direct the cold open for the pizza awards? I'd love to. Host Jason Sheridan. That's really just what I've been... Yeah, me and Murph from the Impractical Jokers are having

a ball. Well, that's what, for Oscars it's Ryan Perez. For pizza awards Jason Sheridan's my man. Yeah, yeah. Try to make people's dreams come true. Of course. Anyway, he's also bona fides wise he was a bar rescue pizza expert.

I don't think recurring, but I think maybe just one or a few, but he was the guy who showed a place how to make better pizzas that they probably did not implement as of four days later. And that one stretch of shopping and dining in the movie theater in Burbank often used as B-roll in early bar rescue. Oh, is it? Oh, to show Burbank is used as B-roll in early Far Rescue. Oh, is it? Oh, to show like Burbank is a driving area. For some of their Southern California's emulation.

Lots of college students. So the Burbank one makes sense because it's literally at the foot of a 16 screen movie. Yes, yeah, yeah. Oh, a quick slice. That's kind of decayed. They've lost a lot of places. Why there's been a Hooters that has sat empty for many years. When will this Hooters ever become something else?

Who wouldn't want to open a restaurant in a parking garage? Yes, it is literally Indian, isn't it? But that said, there is a very solid Indian restaurant in the ground floor of a different Burbank parking garage. Yes, that place is great. We at this point are going to have to distribute a map of all of the Burbank malls to the listeners so that they understand what we talk about every single episode. It's almost impenetrable. Alright, please consult

A6 on your map. That is to what we are referring now. Mike and I were also messaging about some souped up trading card vending machines that are on the grounds of the Burbank mall. Alright, where's that in the mess? C2. Consult your map.

That's in C2. Anyway, with some trepidation, got Slice House for the whole family to try. Brought it back. Big hit. This was a hit. This was great. Great. Correctly hyped, Mike.

I believe you brought up the grandma pie. Yeah, grandma style. What is grandma pie? What is that defined as? It's square. In this case, Sicilian. I don't know if they're always Sicilian, which is more of a thin crust. Grandma pie is a popular East Coast preparation of pizza involving sauce and Parmesan cheese.

It's heavy like sauce, kind of like more like Chicago. It's closer to Chicago style Which I like They're like kind of square slices It wasn't so heavy with the sauce It was actually more of a light dusting I had the sweet Gino With sweet tomato sauce

And mozzarella and basil and sea salt I thought this was excellent I mean I liked everything But that was the one Like the one that's A little more You know I didn't have Any just regular New York

But that's what's great You can mix New York and Detroit And Sicilian Yeah you can do A grand bag of all of them Instead of just one pizza Although I think next time

I probably Put my eggs into The sweet Gino basket I thought this was great My son liked it Aaron liked it I like this We

We were pretty knocked out. We're happy to have a pizza location we like in the area. And there's already a few. We got solid pizza in Burbank, but we got that now, too. And you get to doff of the cap to Batman, to the Batman statue as you get it. So good. So this is eerily good news for CityWalk, I would say. Replacing a store that was utterly confusing with a pizza place that is actually solid.

I don't want to get ahead of myself, but there's news that broke today about another place that's coming to CityWalk, which is farther down the line, that also is shockingly good news. Wow. And it is scary because it's like, what are they going to do to these places? Should I get to it in the list or do we jump to it? Yeah, I guess get to it in the list. Because we're not so far. We've getting through a lot of the recent ones we've never addressed by the way that nectar bath treats is now nectar life oh right that fixes everything um abercrombie and fitch is uh becoming the nba store which we discussed a little bit i still i feel like nba

might be a weird cursed brand, but. See what it's like. Yeah. If they try to like put you in VR goggles and make you become a player. No, it's over. Yes. Yeah. Close it up.

Who was the commissioner who there was a statue or a wax figure of? Adam Silver. Adam Silver. If it's your opportunity to meet Wax Adam Silver, then I don't know if it's going to work out. Dongpo Kitchen. Yes. The site of the worst meal experience of my life.

Oh, well, right. Well, what's coming to Dongpo Kitchen? Jason, I'll let you do the honors, sir. The rumor is Raising Cane's. Raising Cane's Chicken. You guys are that expensive. That's everywhere. I love Raising Cane's.

It took a while, but it's grown on me. I like Raising Cane's a lot. It's not like it's so special, but I do think Raising Cane's is pretty consistently good, and I have grown to really like it. Would a Dave's Hot Chicken excite me a little more, even though Dave's has fallen off because it's franchised so fast? Yeah, the Hot Chicken, some of those Hot Chicken places are falling apart for sure. But yes, but still, Raising Can raising canes is a solid if it was to

maintain the quality of the burbank location it would still be like oh i can at least have a reliable chicken sandwich up here you know i still have never been because when they open and the one close to us open and it had like the huge line thing for a while and it's not the kind of thing i eat all the time anyway uh compare contrast contrast Chick-fil-A and Raising Cane's. God, I haven't had Chick-fil-A in a long time. Does that imply Raising Cane's better? It's better. Because Cane's only has a certain number of things on the menu,

similar to In-N-Out Burger. Okay. Everything is, the chicken is cooked really fresh. In fact, that's my worry about the CityWalk one, because I find the best way to eat Raisin Cane's is takeout or drive-thru because then it goes from scalding hot to reasonably hot by the time you get home.

I promise you the CityWalk location and CityWalk tradition will find a way to be lukewarm whenever it gets to you. I would prefer that because I ate a Cane's once and I bit into it and like scalded my mouth. Well, yeah, it does feel, I'm a car eater. I love to eat fast food alone in my car. Yeah.

That is one of my favorite things to do in life. And it's hot. There was a moment that went, like the prepping of the movie that I've been doing was exceedingly stressful. Yeah. And the shoot way more fun and the post has been a blast. We locked picture. We have picture locked, baby. But the prep was really insane

and that I like actually had five minutes to myself before I had to go to some other meeting and I sat and ate Jersey Mike's in the car in five minutes. Heaven. This was glorious. Heaven. This was, yes.

This was like having a full weekend day off all of a sudden in the middle of the schedule. Yeah. It was really, I will really cherish that Jersey Mike's in the car. Tossing some Miss Vicky's chips. You may as well be getting a massage. I sure as hell did. Jalapeno, my friend. Oh, the best.

They're really good. That's a solid chip. Barbecue one's really good, too. Yeah. Yes, those are my two. Wow. All right. Hey.

Vicky Brothers. The placement. We're getting the low. We're getting matching. good too yeah yes those are my two wow all right hey yeah uh the vicky brothers the place we're getting the low we're getting matching yeah we're gonna get matching we're all getting this vicky the placement of here's what's interesting city food which is the upper level where the taco bell is and where pink the awful pinks hot dogs is where you cannot firehouse where you can where any pickle is to the wind. And where last year it was very windy. This year, less windy so far. But last year it was very windy.

The placement of an establishment at City Food does indicate that it's going to be worse than the restaurants with more space, more room. True. So that's what gives me. So City Food feels cursed. Yes, that's what gives me- Somewhere coming to City Food feels cursed. Yes, that's what I mean. So if the rumors are true and Raising Cane's is going to be in the Dongpo spot, I have a little more hope for it than I do. And same with Slice House. I have a little more hope for those places than I do for something moving up to City Food.

City Food just seems like it's going to be worse. It has to be. There's just some rot. And even when they change out locations yeah maybe they keep the they keep they keep all the appliances like it's the same crud that was accruing at the walk-in dodger dog location right right that is making the pinks taste nightmarish today yes um so yeah both of those things are like oh man if those are if that's open like at 9 p.m and you need to eat something you're coming out of the park like that seems like that would be a godsend honestly sure if they're 75 percent of other consistent quality yeah but they gotta change some of these policies this everything

closes at nine and that's the hotel so the the rumor is two hotels i think we know they're moving faster on the first hotel that's outside. And we're going to get to where the other hotel is potentially. Yeah, because you might have some info that we don't know. Well, I don't know that much more. The second hotel I don't think has been, I don't know that I would bet a million. I think I would bet a million dollars that they're building the hotel outside the entrance. I'm less certain for sure that they're building a hotel over where iFly is.

Okay, yes. But that iFly is. Okay. Yes. But that's still a rumor. Okay. And we've seen kind of weird plans that indicate they're doing that. Yeah. But we don't know. Because they're going to hold all guys permit. Yes.

No, we don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Things could change. If you want to jump around from, I was going to go to sector 11, but I'll go to sector 13 instead because there's no keeper to tell us not to do that. Such a crazy jump. Crazy jumps also what you could do in iFly, which is no longer.

You can no longer indoor skydive at Universal Studios. They have knocked that out to be replaced with open air. I think that zone will be an entrance to something. That is what we seem pretty confident of. Did that also take out some of the outdoor seating at Margaritaville? I don't believe so. That's all right. Don't worry. Really?

Yes. I thought the construction was. And don't worry. No one is ever out there. Well, you know what? I don't know if it's closed because they're working. Perhaps you can't go on the patio right now, but it's not. It hasn't, as far as I can tell from looking, it hasn't encroached on it.

But maybe you're right. Oh, okay. Because I took a peek in there and maybe those doors were closed because they wouldn't want you near the construction. Not the fire pit, but where we were like fiddling with equipment once. Yeah. While I ate bad truffles. Maybe they won't. Bad truffles.

While I ate bad truffles. While I ate bad truffles. I hate bad truffles. The wall hanging man. Do some truffles. So this is interesting because this area, yeah, there's an idea at least I think they had to put a hotel here, which is a small piece of land if you're just going by the iFly, but there's room behind it. I consider that the iFly is gone to be an ed an exit that takes you over to maybe and then years ago i read a rumor that they would do a second gate and there would be an entrance over here in this zone wow um and i don't think that's happening but all of this and we should as i guess said this even earlier all of this i think is happening right now because as soon as epic universe wraps up the word i've heard from many people is we are

go go go in hollywood for what all every we're going we're doing like creative team shifts over really yes so we get all the universal stars that is the oh that is the vibe i really feel very strongly from a lot of different people the construction too when you're going up the hill by the existing hotels yes is for a building that people are calling a creative campus oh wait sign sorry where where is it wait point point me in the uh sort of by the charlatan and the hilton okay there is uh when you're going up that hill to the left really there is a large building going up and they're like oh that's for you is that by the frankenstein parking where the old the unused chinese restaurant used to be well that would there was a rumored a hotel there i feel like for a long time there's been a

couple feel like and there's also i yeah i don't know scott you might have gotten these mailings too. We both used to live a lot closer to Universal. They were always sending surveys and sketches and stuff of like, we're going to open combined shopping and living spaces on the back of the back lot. And that tanked. I haven't heard that in a while. Yeah, maybe nobody's living over there. So you think not-

I sent a Google map a couple days ago or last week of behind that iFly zone. Okay, yeah. And I think I don't remember. I probably stole it from somebody, and I can't remember who it was online. But there's a bunch of land back there. There's a bunch of space that people are speculating that's expansion i think which is current which which is where to again talk about early dating erin the place where i brought her back to see the decaying oh right right right right it was

like just like not a parking lot but just kind of like storage right i think it's where they yeah that that's what that's what it's always seemed like over there it's just like i don't know big like uh you know just a vacant lot to put shit. Yeah. And that, perhaps they will put some permanent shit. Yes, I think they're going to put permanent shit there. Like, if we have to identify, now, I hate to get actually into the theme park of it all, but. No, please don't too much.

We may as well a little bit, because it's, we could say right now. What does that have to do with taco bell goo we could say right now like things we want speculation like there's rumors of transformers and mummy going away more nintendo down in that zone and mummy yeah i mean mummy's been rumored to go away for years and just never seems to happen they're moving the tram entrance today is the last day to see fast and furious supercharge oh you're recording today and you know Okay, and that always felt like, because also if you're not up on what's going on at Universal Hollywood,

they're getting real close on this Fast and Furious coaster. Maybe not that close. Well, they say next year. Maybe it's going to open with a new movie. Maybe that's why they're holding it. But geez, does it seem like they're going fast. I know, and the track is, oh, you got a track that is looping above the starway.

It looks fucking nuts. It looks so crazy. Especially if those pictures are right and you're in little cars that rotate. Spin around. That was going to rule so hard. Yes. If it's like Velocicoaster level,

but also flips you in little tiny cars. Velocicoaster level built into a giant hill, like a tiny mountain. And goes over the Starway. Holy shit, is that exciting. It impacts the skyline of the city. You'll see that from everywhere, from all around. It's huge.

It seems like the Fast and Furious finale to the tour is going away for that reason. I hadn't even clocked it like okay so they're getting rid of that because it's going to be a better fast and furious thing yeah but that's right that land is pretty close to that's that's tour exit so that is land they could turn into something else yeah if you know the the lay of the tour land at all then it's it seems like i feel like i've heard that fast and Furious stage is up for grabs, that Falls Lake is up for grabs. The big lake with the backdrop where they filmed the TLC waterfalls video.

My favorite thing to say on the tour. Oh, right. I'll go a step further. The residential neighborhood that overlooks War of the Worlds. I saw an account speculating that at this point, a lot of those houses, I had heard it over the years, oh, Universal owns some of those houses for directors or actors or producers. They're putting up there. I've heard they own a lot of it now. I think they own a lot. Yes.

I believe that's true. I don't think they're going to do anything with that for theme park development in the near term. It's just a buffer to where there are neighbors who can complain right about loud rides right in their backyard right but but overall i think right now if you want to have fun speculating speculate on what will happen to transformers mummy what will happen to simpsons and then the area down where tram loading is now which will be moved they're they're doing work right now on the hill. They're doing something to it.

They're clearing things. They're moving it. Like, I don't know if an e-ticket that could go next to Harry Potter that replaces Simpson could kind of hang off the hill in a way. Like there's not enough room. There's not enough room to put anything other than a simulator ride right now where Simpsons is. Yeah. But I don't know if there's something they could figure out anything other than a simulator ride right now where simpsons is yeah but i don't know if there's something they could figure out to build sort of on the side of

i don't know interesting i don't like because there's spec like there's i think and i've this is was my guess but then i've seen a bunch of other people say it uh wicked will be the finale of the of the tram tour oh yeah that's my guess okay yeah there'll be some sort of wicked thing and they want to do it fast because why close fast and furious now unless you've got something that will be the finale soon okay and the guy from the one of the universal guys was talking about how wicked's gonna make a great theme park yeah yeah yeah no and that's that's been overdue not overdue because the movie was only out recently, but that's a pretty big thing they're sitting on. Even Ariana Grande was like,

I got some ideas for Wicked Rhymes. Yes, I know she's a Parks fan. She's a big, and there was a recent video from Universal Creative where they were teasing Epic Universe stuff, and they're also like, just so you know, this isn't the end. This is the beginning.

We have plans for every park in the block. Yes, they're putting the pedal to the metal. And they're like really... Now, a lot of people have modern Disney brain. And they're like, yes, put Wicked and Marvel Super Hero Island. But that's what Jim Hill said 10 years ago. That's what Jim Hill said 10 years ago. But I'm like, they're not going to retrofit uh 25 year old rides oh for this brand new movie

i don't know when they have uh when they have all this space and stuff it just feels like that's i i don't i don't think they're gonna do it because i think it's still valuable enough to keep disney from having it i think so yeah i think that's probably right. But I don't know. Toon Lagoon? Well, I don't know. Sorry, Mummy. Toon Lagoon, I think is not... I'm worried about breaking hearts over here. I'm worried about Toon Lagoon. I'm compromising getting them Lost Continent.

Well, what's left? Because that's all vibes. There's nothing left. That's no compromise. It's all vibes. It's just mythos. That's no deal. But I think we're getting, just because it's fun to talk about, I think Nintendo's going

to sweep out Transformers and Mummy. I think we'll get Donkey Kong. Probably Donkey Kong, and then whatever the next land they build, or we could put Pokemon down there. Oh, is all of Lower Lot? Well, but Jurassic World is the holdout. Yes, but what if otherwise, well, huh?

Yeah, that's weird. Mummy is awkward. I don't know what you do with Mummy. Yeah, I just think that whole chunk then will become nintendo yeah just because it makes the most sense if you want to have they want to keep this thing where the portals take you that's what's weird i don't know what happens to do it but it's or mummy becomes that you you enter not there but like you go through a portal and then enter the other way they flip it around around like Toy Story Mania in Florida, a different entrance. Oh, boy, that'd be great to skip early at Epic Universe.

It'd be great for getting Donkey Kong out here. It'd be like, oh, that's a whole portal to just skip. There's no way I'm not going to Donkey Kong. We gotta go see the big Donkey Kong guy. That's fun. He wasn't as big for me as you. Well, that's true. I like it. I want to see the big Donkey Kong guy. That's fun. He wasn't as big for me as you. Well, that's true. I like it.

I wouldn't say the big guy. Yeah, you just got into Nintendo like a year ago. If you're crossing stuff on the list. Huh? I just started playing Mario Kart like a year ago. Yeah. You're not as fond of Donkey Kong as I am. No.

Okay, well, that's fair. I like it. Don't get me wrong, but that ride, the video from Japan, it's like 80 seconds, 90 seconds. I'm worried about the ride. I'm excited to go on the like 80 second 90 i mean the ride i'm worried about the ride i'm excited i have a feeling the ride is going to be fun but it's not the e-ticket we want the blow away nintendo e-ticket we want and deserve that's that's the reality i'm more i have to meet vincent various in his various shops and establishments i i would play guys we

do we have to explain what Vincent Various is. I know. It's short and for us, but what is Vincent Various? They put out a casting notice in Orlando for a character named Vincent Various for the new Epic Universe. And apparently I've heard on the inside some rumors and not rumors that there are deep lore about new characters at Celestial Park. I'm so excited for Celestial Park because two things. 14 hours of original music. I saw that too.

That's really fun. A lot of people who worked on Port of Entry working on Celestial Park. I saw that. Yes, I saw that as well. No, that's going to be awesome. And Vincent Various is very exciting. I don't know anything about him, but I love him. He's an astronomer, a scientist,

who converted a lot of his workshop spaces to restaurants and shops. Is that where Celestial Park is? It was some magical gathering place for great minds. Yes, the greatest philosopher. I think that's the vibe of it. So I think that's, you got Nintendo. I do think we'll get a version of monsters somewhere i think there'll be a version of their monsters somewhere out here

i'd like that um and then i do think wicked is number one i think wicked goes in orlando we're out here faster than we expect does it go does it knock out fast and furious in universal studios florida maybe but i could see it being a bigger they wanted to use a have a bigger footprint for it because that's pretty small you think it's built fast but it's also huge yeah i think it's i think like wicked replaces toon lagoon i don't know that as a rumor but i think it's that size of a project i'm guessing dare tell me that wicked replaces race through new york starring jimmy talley i think it's too small i think there's the coat that coaster there's a new coaster that will replace rip ride rocket possibly the fast and furious coaster a version a different version of it uh-huh um but i think that i think that a

lot of this city walk stuff and hotels is in preparation for what our park looks like in five years that's the vibe i'm getting. That's what people have said. So just to recap, parking lot behind current CityWalk becomes a hotel. This we know. We think a hotel over by, over the area that they've cleared out where iFly used to be. Do you still believe any more park over there?

Or is that kind of an impossible? By iFly? Yeah. Yes, I believe that. i think there's lands there i think there'll be enough can you can they somehow turn it into a second gate or is that insane i think you i think they could do it i just don't think they will do it i think if they're opening one hotel they're gonna need a bunch new attractions let alone two hotels yes that's for sure i just think i just think the second gate i don't think they want to i don't think i don't think they want to build it all at once now i hope i'm wrong because that would be really cool if they did because then you could and you could fix the problems of universal hollywood with a second

gate in a sense that like Universal Hollywood still is like I don't know if it's completely fixable to put in the magic that it needs to make it on par with Disney just because it's still very piecemeal the flow of it is a little awkward yes there's plenty of magic yeah it was built in this weird janky way unlike Universal Florida which at least did start as a new theme park designed from the ground up it's always been around weird this movie theater's staying and these bungalows are staying right but i think they've done a tremendous job oh absolutely but it does still have to remain a working studio and offices need to not move it's it's it's weird it's some of the same awkwardness as disneyland expanding as opposed to disney world yeah and

that's the i mean there's i i like it i've heard people be negative about it that's the charm of like you see Fast and the Furious from hogs or Hogwarts or something like oh I love it all just slapped together I love that yeah new new coaster will be whipping by big minion it's like the it's like you know hey it is magic of the movies kind of true kind of true. It's random shit all thrown together. Not chosen for Universal Hollywood, but the original Universal Florida, where it was like a movie studio. There's lots of stuff going on.

I'm a big defender of it, but I do think it would be really cool to have like an Islands of Adventure port of entry second gate, where you did get Jason's... If we could get like a Toon Lagoon out here. A new Toon Lagoon. Guess what, everybody?

Toon Lagoon. New for 2028. Dudley Do-Right. Well, I would pick that over a lot of things. I'd pick that over Wicked. Wicked's fine. I like Wicked. But while I was saying this you could do like a themed

hotel that looked into a land you could do wicked hotel right there and it looks into a wicked land these all do feel like more of like like like disneyland paris style like or what they've done recently in tokyo like hotel that's like backdrop to theme park or entrance to theme park right because because the one that's in front of the entrance you'd still see in from it's it's a fairly tall hotel from the paperwork so like you're looking into the park but if they do build a hotel right where i fly was and they put stuff behind it there's no way you're not looking right into the park like that has to be an element of it so i don't know if that hotel has to be themed. It doesn't necessarily have to be themed like the land,

whatever they decide to put there, but it could be. It could be a monster's area with a monster's hotel. Oh, my God. This is a complete speculation on my part. The movies and stage plays and going back to the original Frank Baum books, Wizard of Oz has entertained people for generations so hey listen I don't believe you

I don't think he's right on that hold on fucking Emerald City Hotel is like that's like a home run well we already had it it was called the MGM Grand well but that was unlucky you don't want to enter through for a half second I thought you said Emeril City,

the chef. I mean, sure. Start your day with a bam. So, I think all of that's on the table. I do think maybe there'll be another Harry Potter. I think Monsters, I think Wicked, and then more Nintendo is probably in our near future. Now I'm just like,

how can I get that Wicked simulator experience to transition straight into something with ryan perez oh i'm on a streak now i don't know how i'm getting greedy i could see the wicked i could see also see the wicked finale just being there for three years until the land is built or something it's a little stop i could see it being just like we need to get into the park now that's why we got to get rid of Fast because they're going to... I also think it's wicked because why close it now if you're not going to put something new in there? That might be Fast because that second movie comes out in the fall of 2025.

Right. It could be Fast, but you know what I'm saying? Why wouldn't you just keep it open as the finale? Sure. Because if it was a new finale being built somewhere still don't get fast and furious for another year right right there's got to be something they want in fast to be the finale i assume yeah yeah so it it was very abrupt too that they announced that closure hmm my my no one was sad no no one gives no one uh my prediction for wicked part two is that is kind

of like an award season sweep in the way that uh lord of the rings return of the king of like all right there's been three let's get in the last one yeah yeah maybe i don't know about that yeah maybe i don't know well part two is i think act two of wicked is the more supposedly the more uh upsetting oh yeah okay the dramatic that's another thing when i watched this weird demo oscars i got to watch the a rehearsal of the opening performance with two people who were not cynthia and ariana and they didn't sing either they but they did mouth the words so i basically i sat there let's go down clips play we love los angeles and then two people come out and just like silently pantomime the song that's weird it was so crazy i didn't know they did stuff like that wow but even that was very stirring

because it was still the orchestra playing still all the chorus like popped in from the from all the balconies yeah like that made me emotional and it wasn't even the real scott i that really is the magic of the movies just people going through the like a rehearsal a live rehearsal yeah we'll put it in later or we'll tape we'll do a take later it really got to me and then and then and also the woman who did the big final note who was the stand-in cynthia Erivo, like, dung. And then there's just the space left. And she just mouthed it. She just went, ah. And she got a huge applause.

I think everybody really enjoyed applauding somebody who was on mute doing the final note. That's great. Fun stuff. That, of course, that musical number at the Oscars, yes, started with Ariana Grande singing somewhere with the rainbow. Oh, yes. They kind of made it. Yeah. They went all in.

And then the whiz later in the show. Yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. They got to all of them. Yeah. But anyways, now, so, you know, what started, we started all grim because our beloved land is being picked apart. But now what we're finding is that maybe it's for very good reasons and exciting reasons.

But where does that leave us with? Are we worried about, like, what if big chunks do disappear? What if we lose entire sectors? This is my theory that you guys seem to disagree with. What I said about sector one, that they're all gone. Like, currently, there's almost nothing there. I think it's possible possible and bill bong's out i think it's possible they yank that entire structure that's what i was trying to figure out because that one's kind of an island i think any any sector right any like city walk technically is broken up into like seven different

buildings you see and i think that if any that are attached to a parking garage are safe they're not rebuilding any parking garages. That'd be a waste of money I think. Because you're going to need people, I think, are there multiple security stations there's going to be? Because if you park in the ET one, you'll go through one

set and you'll be well. They're going to have to fix this problem of that there's eight ways to get into CityWalk and you don't know where any of them take you or where they take you out i think any flat parking is gonna go away yeah a lot of it absolutely yeah yes but any parking garage is dang but i think then i was analyzing other buildings and i was like okay some of these do have offices up top where people work sector one with billabong and the wave pool they don't use anymore. There's nothing going on there. I could see that becoming like a little bit of extra hotel.

Maybe not. Maybe they don't have to. But something's moving in one of those stores, isn't it? Yes, there's some like cutesy character store, but I still think you could evict that 10 months later. It's possible to do that. I just don't know why they wouldn't immediately move it to some other empty store,

which they have plenty, seemingly plenty of. That is true. So that's the only reason I'm skeptical of that. And because one of the pictures of, of a permit or a plan didn't show that play, that area gone. You could retrofit that building in to incorporate it into a larger building.

That's true. Down some stuff to make it all seamless. And I think, uh, what is your daughter like? The line friends. Yeah. incorporate it into a larger building and knock down some walls and stuff. What does your daughter look like? The line friends. I think if those were temporary, I think they'd try to full court press marketing. Papa! Only here

for a little while. It's possible. If something moves into Billabong, we'll know, I it's possible. If something moves into Billabong, we'll know, I think. If they move something into the Billabong. If you find out it's happening, you tell us. You don't keep that secret from us.

Right, don't keep it. These accounts out there, you come to us. Right. This matters to us. We got skin in the game. Yes, it's very important. But I feel like things actually are pointing

to perhaps a changed city walk but a thriving city walk because it might be the you know the the conduit to even more traffic than it's than it's ever been before city walk might be more important than it's ever been i even say i would dare say if these two hotels are built maybe you can find something to do after 9 p.m maybe things will have to stay open a little later and i'm not always wanting to party late at night at city walk anymore but it would be nice to have the option so if there's a bunch of other people that are going to be walking around maybe later at night you're going to have to have a little more fun available i don't know that how old the

moon will reopen there's no talk of that but i just hope there'll be you're saying that if you bring hundreds if not thousands of people plant them directly in city walk yes they're likely gonna want to enjoy food beverages and various amenities i am making this point yeah i never considered yeah how about it think about it when you go home tonight i will but it's gonna keep me up at night are they willing to make a city walk that has things for people to do that they like to do? I don't know. That's probably the big push and pull right now at Universal is do we want to make this okay? This isn't us, don't you see? Well, they are putting in a weird third-party escape room company.

Oh, right. We missed that. Samba Brazilian Steakhouse is now an escape room and that's okay so this is why i okay real quick before we do the big finale oh real quick um um i do think that at one point they were thinking they would put mostly universal owned businesses places because they have an escape room in orlando with their ip with their classic things and for some reason they're not just cloning it and moving it over here it's probably because it's bad and i i have to assume that because this is like a company that has a place in woodland hills i think at the mall

escapology this is yeah they have other locations and they have like there's a bat there's gonna be a batman escape room at cityWalk, which is funny. It's not going to be good. Which probably won't be good. But it's funny that Batman's showing up. Scooby-Doo. But to me, that's waving the white flag already of like, we just don't have the resources to own every business at CityWalk.

Yeah. But I'm sure at some point the thought was like, yeah, we're going to do these escape rooms and then we're moving them over. Why not? We did all the work anyway. Oh, sure. Why wouldn't they have done – why wouldn't they just put them over? They got too much to do, I guess.

That's what I – that's my theory is that maybe at a certain point they were like trying – like our ultimate goal is to own everything because why not? But at a certain point they went, we can't do this. And there is something – We can barely open up Toothsome and keep it edible. There's something in the, because downtown Disney in Orlando, in the former Disney Quest space, that was the NBA experience,

mostly the NBA experience, is getting what is essentially an off-brand Disney Quest. It's another laser tag escape, like no name. Yeah, yeah. It is really interesting. They're just back to that. Yeah, so it's another like really laser tag escape like no name yeah it is really interesting to that yeah so it's gone full circle uh right but can we just decide that we like these things we need things to do for god's sake we can't just wear helmets at home i got kids i gotta take them somewhere can we keep these places around well i if you're gonna outsource it just outsource it to dave and busters or round one i sure i listened to the uh the recent doughboys episode

with griffin newman where they went to chucky cheese and had a horrifying experience and it is a very funny podcast episode i went i went to a kid's birthday party there uh this very weekend and like oh my god that is an unpleasant chuck E. Cheese and i'm a fan of the brand and i'm still yeah and i got to watch my son be confused like he was trying to say hi to chuck who is of course a robot who doesn't respond or move and i had to explain to Dad, why isn't Chuck saying hi to me? And why does he look different than the other Chuck? And I said, son, this is the, there's a lot about parenting I don't understand,

but this is the moment I've been waiting for my whole life. Now this I can do. Can you just clarify, when you go to Chuck E. Cheese now with kids, you have to buy socks there and kids have to put them on yes yeah yeah you buy like man i don't know anything about this this is not insane it's not just for there no i know i know i get it but i'm like that is no wonder they were saying it stinks in there if

every child is changing socks yeah that's so nasty it's one of the worst ones I've ever seen. Yeah. I have stood up. Everyone's looking at me. Yeah, what's happening? So, now I'll do the rest of the show standing in a weird way. Whoa, this is weird. It is weird.

So, I went to Billabong. Yeah. Unless you have something else. I want to just close out the big finale here. I have nowhere to go now that you've stood. So, I was like,

I had been keeping my eye on the prices at Billabong. I had been, and they were bad. I went in, there was a big dirty like plastic tub they were selling for $10 that they kept in the stock room to like store t-shirts or something. And I was like, what, $10 for a dirty tub? Like what do they want? $2 maybe if you need a tub, but you can buy a new one for this price.

So I went in there last day, I go, well, maybe there will be like some deals or whatever maybe it'd be some something funny now i saw universal high posted that day this is of course parallel thinking that they went in and bought some hangers some coat hangers from billabong and plants and plants like that all and i was like i was thinking the same thing i go are they selling like parts of the like retail space or stuff on the wall or whatever? And I go, wouldn't it be fun to go in there and do this? So I went in and I immediately, there were hats

that were pretty reasonably priced. Oh, you've been hiding things in plain sight. So I've these are shorts I actually just bought for myself but I bought you guys hats from the final billabong. Wow. They were discounted.

The last items to touch the rarefied air. Here you go, Scott. Have you picked them out for who's who? I bought this one for Jason because it's more like a Sherlock Holmes pattern. Oh, absolutely. Oh, my God. It says who shit in my pants. They were 75% off.

Wow. Or 80%. There may be more. shit in my pants they were 70 they were 75 off wow or 80 there were maybe more that money stayed in your pocket and then went right to uh lemon lemon battery chicken yes that's very true so i'm looking around and i was like i need to buy something from billabong i need to buy something from the off the wall or something obviously in the same way that you bought something from Fry's Electronics. Oh, yeah, on the way out the door. I want to own a piece of CityWalk. So I walk, and I'm looking around, and I see there's pictures of surfers in frames for $5.

And I'm picking them. I'm like, this is kind of funny. It's just a guy, and it was on the wall for a second. There's stuff where there's a metal porthole or whatever, like a picture. And I'm like, oh, that's kind of funny. And everything's like dirt cheap, $5 or whatever. And I'm looking around and I turn around and I see the greatest thing. I don't recognize it, but I go, oh, oh my god i need to own this and i look five dollars

oh boy and now i will reveal to you what i have purchased from the billabong i thought this was a set of some weird thing it's forever dog i purchased a flat of santa claus but he's a wave he's like an actual water santa claus is water oh my god let me take a picture of my my view right now he's got a candy cane and he's got sunglasses on and he's like giving i don't know it's a thumbs up or whatever he's got a santa hat on and i would like i almost i was so excited it was five dollars i like grabbed it because i was like someone else is gonna to want this. And I picked it up and walked around. And an employee looks over.

He goes, yeah, that's a great piece. And I go, it is a great piece. It really is. So I was like, I put down, I think I was holding one of the framed pictures of a shirtless surfer. And I put that down. I'm like, fuck this. This isn't worth it. This is worth it.

$5. $5 for Santa a wave. I kind of broke it. Holding a candy cane, wearing sunglasses. I can't wait for listeners to see this. I broke his foot a little bit just now when I was bringing him inside. Well, his feet are tiny.

They're music notes. He's got low feet. There was a neon pink sign that said vacation mode that i also inquired about but that had been taken already i would have paid like 50 for that though that was cool but that taxidermied pheasant or wild turkey whatever that bird is you did not buy that's no that's part of a difference there's a lot of weird there's a lot of weird shit in the room we record in yeah basically so i so i bought this i bought the hats um and then i took the santa wave on a last ride through city walk so i will post this i i have i have me and

santa outside the sock market wow i have uh a photo of there's too many of these, but I have Santa Wave and Tony Geminati from Slice House. Whoa, passing the baton. Old generations and new. And I'll set this to some music. I'll post this, of course, when the episode comes out. Me and the King Kong and the Wave Santa. And I have us by the Raider store. It was open at the time.

Wow. The last possible visit. I have Santa, wave Santa over by the Bucca di Beppo. Wow. And then I have

wave Santa, which I think is the best one, by the mural with the angel's wings. That is a great picture. That's really good. is a great picture that's great and there was a that's great there was a 13 year old that was just laughing his ass off he was like that's so funny man still got it carl jeez and wow that takes me back too we haven't heard a 13 year

old laugh like that since that guy said what's that a new slap shop right uh and then i got him i got uh wave santa with a michael ferrari uh pointillism painting wow and i think wave santa is so chill and easygoing i feel like he would get along with the venice boardwalk keeper i agree um and uh the uh little addendum to the Taco Bell story is that he was sitting up against the table and just the compliments from people. People fucking loved Wave Santa. Like, oh, wow, that's so cool. Where did you get that? Well, you know, Billabong's closing.

I purchased it. Wow. Wow. You had the respect and admiration of your peers. At CityWalk and the place that i wanted the most um so i i've been asking around too i am addicted to owning pieces of city walk and i just none of these other stores have given me a heads up or an ability to buy pieces of the actual place so this is my first first chunk of that and i don't know if I'll have an opportunity to do it again. Wow. Well, if anyone has a

way to help you do it again, if there's anybody who deserves to own some CityWalk, it's you. Thank you. You have a spectacular piece when the Christmas season rolls around. You got to put that in the front yard. I got to fix it first. Because anybody, you know, there's a lot of Grinches out there. There's a lot of Peanuts gang out there. You will be the only house that has Wave Santa. Wave Santa. Original CityWalk IP, Wave Santa. Or Billabong, I guess.

Well, yeah, technically. My friend Tim asked about the sign outside, and they said, oh, no, we're taking that back to corporate headquarters to destroy it. Whoa. Wow. Wave Santa would have been put into a wood chipper. I know. Wave Santa would be dead if not for you.

You saved a life. I'm really disclosing a lot of my correspondence, but I sent this to Universal High, and they were like, what the fuck? Where was that? So I think Wave Santa was hanging out in the back for a while, and all of a sudden just popped up, and it was fate that i would get wave santa oh my god wow this is really you know in an episode where i tried to share some of my my hollywood magic i got to experience and then where i when i thought it would get hollywood

tragic instead you have brought a wonderful new character into our lives i don't either your pictures are great and i don't want to create work for you sure but it does occur to me that putting them all into a video would be a movie i think that's what we'll be doing if there's a way to all right all right if you have a minute no pressure maybe with that fast and furious when i see you again i was probably gonna do the Walk theme, but maybe I'll do that. Oh, yeah, you can do that, too. Or Despacito, maybe. Oh, Despacito is also good.

Fast and Furious was just in my mind because we talked about it so much. Yeah, yeah. We can do that. I mean, just, I don't know. This guy making it, him like propelling himself out of the ocean into our world, not being held down despite being an unusual color all i can think of is is this guy's wave santa singing defying gravity oh yeah i'm defying gravity i'm surfing high defying gravity Flying gravity. Ho, ho, ho. Ho, ho, ho.

Ho, ho, ho. Anytime I try to do that, I just end up doing the Tarzan yell. Because I kept seeing that Brian Blessed talking about doing the Tarzan yell and getting two contracts for Tarzan in the movie. Close enough. It's close enough. I'm realizing now, is Wave Santa, Santa, is this an original character to the store or is this something in other Billabongs?

Well, listeners, if you have Billabongs near you and if you've done Christmas shopping at Billabong, then you're going to have to let us know that. Yeah, because if not, I think I just bought the IP. Wow. You bought an entire IP for five bucks? Wave Santa. Yeah. But you didn't sign any contracts that give you the exclusive right, as far as you could

tell. I don't think so. But I think it's best to assume. Yeah. I love him. It definitely looks like- At first, I was wondering, like, oh, is this going to be like, in 10 minutes, I'll be like, man, I bought it.

No. God. I'm so excited I have it. It does look like it could be shipped from Corpip, but it also looks like they could have printed it at a Staples copy and print center. Oh, it's not. Yeah, it's like pretty cheap. It's really charmingly hand-drawn. I don't know. It's like a comic character.

Yeah. I really love it. He is cute. Yeah. He is cute, yeah. No argument from me yeah very cute and very cool and very pointing towards the future he makes me feel optimistic about the future i'm not scared of what's happening to city walk anymore i'm excited about it and uh yeah hey uh

hang ten my man keep it loose geez congrats to Thank you. Congrats on the new addition to your family. Thank you. But if anyone knows where I can get more, let me know. Yeah, yeah. Please, information about Wave Santa. Wow. Geez. Well, what a thrilling finale.

My God. And I mean, I guess that'll do it. I guess you survived podcast to ride. We will track whatever's going on if whatever going is going on gets so confusing that we need to find a way to talk to a friend beyond this mortal realm and i don't know if it comes to that then it might have to but uh for now we just figured we'd parse it ourselves but you know what this one's for usk and i guess for three bonus episodes every month check out the stuff check out podcast the ride Check out Podcast The Ride The Second Gate

or get one more bonus episode on our VIP tier Club 3. Hey, go to Hulu and watch the Academy Awards where you'll see my work. And besides that, our stuff at patreon.com slash podcasttheride. Definitely go to the socials so you can hang ten with Wave Santa. Ho, ho, ho.

Forever Dog. This has ho, ho, ho. Forever Dog. This has been a Forever Dog production. Executive produced by Mike Carlson, Jason Sheridan, Scott Gairdner, Brett Boehm, Joe Cilio, and Alex Ramsey. For more original podcasts, please visit foreverdogpodcasts.com and subscribe to our shows on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keep up with the latest Forever Dog news by following us on Twitter and Instagram at Forever Dog Team and liking our page on Facebook.