Talking Simpsons - Talk To The Audience?!? - August 2025

Episode Date: September 3, 2025

We've hit the beginning of the month, which means it's time for another episode of our community podcast! This time around—in the wake of Comic-Con—it's been a slow news month, but we at least have the broadcast season 37 premiere and Ella McCay to discuss. (That's right, THE Ella McCay!) And, as always, we read and respond to your comments and questions from the last round of episodes. It's all happening on Talk to the Audience, where we bad want money now!

I heartily endorse this event or product. Hello everybody and welcome to talk to the audience where no news is good news. I'm one of your host, Bob Mackey, one of the 4.4 million viewers of the King of the Hill reboot. Who is here with me today, as always? Already waiting in line for my tickets for Ella McKay, Henry Gilbert. And yes, welcome to talk to the audience, our community podcast. This goes live at the end of the month on our Patreon and the beginning of the month on the free feed. And in this podcast, we talk about what's happening in the Simpsons world and in our world.

And then we respond to your questions and comments from the last month's worth of episodes. And there is very little news to speak up in the Simpsons world. Henry had to scrape the news barrel with his news scraper. And actually two of the news items out of the three are not even related to the Simpsons at all. But they're in the realm of the Simpsons. So I think it's safe to talk about them. There was very little news in these gym mats this month. I had to have rind it up.

You know, there's two types of news in the Simpsons world. One is bad news that is not planned. And then there's good news that is a press release. And all of their press release good news was a comic con. And meanwhile, fortunately, knock on wood, there hasn't been bad news that was unplanned yet. Yeah, this goes live in about a week and a half on the free feed from this recording date currently right now. So things could potentially happen in the next 10 days. I hope they don't.

If they do, I hope they're good. So we're hanging out here on August 22nd, just in case you're wondering. And yes, not a lot of news happening because Comic Con just happened, as Henry pointed out, but we do have some news about broadcast season 37. The season premiere is set for September 28th, so expect to hear us talk about that on October's talk to the audience. And it's another episode that promises to break the hearts of timeline nerds. So there is no title assigned to this episode yet, as of this recording. But here is the official description, quote,

Lisa discovers Marge's vintage clothes from the 90s and is welcomed to the school's elite fashion club but to feed their hunger for retro looks the thrifters break the law becoming a fashionista bling ring so I assume Lisa is going to find Marge's oversized space jam t-shirts Charlotte Hornet's starter jacket

something like that because we all know Marge was a child in the 90s this is common it's common fact about the Simpsons what was the last season that they had a joke the entire joke was about her being mad that in high school that Tim Meadows had left Saturday night live, you know. Yes. This is Matt Selman officially tweaking all of us nerds out there by continuing this thread

of Homer and Marge, kids of the 90s, get used to it, everybody. I mean, if they want to make a story about Marge in high school, like, it can't be 1974 anymore. Like, we just covered the way we weren't. And then that one is Al Jean admitting, this is the mistake. This is the problem. So, yes, look forward to that on September 28th. And look forward to our coverage of broadcast season 37 as the year.

rolls on. So again, Henry had to scrape the news barrel. We had to retire that barrel. It was too scraped. But the trailer for James L. Brooks's next film, Ella McKay, was released. And it's about a young woman who becomes a governor. And it's about her relationship with her crazy family. And it's Woody Harrelson and Jamie Lee Curtis, I believe, are the parents of this titular Ella McKay. The mother is dead. So I think Jamie Lee Curtis is like an aunt or something. Okay. I must have missed that detail in the trailer. But Henry, I'm curious about your description, because you have it written down here that it seems kind of crazy. And I'm wondering, what's your take on Ella McKay? Well, my immediate reaction to watching the trailer was,

so the trailer starts with Julie Kavanaugh is also a major character. And she, in the trailer, the trailer identifies herself as, I'm the narrator. Hello. Actually, you're closest. When I was trying to imitate Julie Kavana for my wife in this trailer, I realized like, oh, she can't go that high anymore. So she sounds more like Patty or Selma. these days. And actually, she sounds closer to March's speaking voice in her natural voice in her 70s. But I didn't know that Julie Kavanaugh was such a major character in it. So what was crazy to me was the trailer feels like many other James L. Brooks films, which are about like, oh, this is a family. Isn't it crazy? And people are talking like James L. Brooks

characters and all that. And the young woman in her mid 30s, Ella McKay, played by Emma Mackie, a British actress, no relation, but she spells it just like YouTube. I know. Hey, maybe there could be a long-lost uncle in there somewhere. Maybe I'm entitled to the Mackey Fortune. So what seemed crazy was that it had all this like, Woody Harrelson is telling her like, oh, you know, I met a new woman and Ella seems jealous that it's like, oh, it's like you're forgetting mom kind of thing. And then at about the halfway point of the trailer, they're like, you're the governor of the state you were born and raised in. I was like, wait, this is a story about a governor? What? I guess we don't get many movies about governors that aren't political thrillers. So that's an interesting new take. from James L. Brooks. And yes, his last movie was the horribly titled How Do You Know, which for whatever reason, I'm guessing it was because of Jack Nicholson. It cost $120 million. Folks, they're not in outer space in this movie. They are people in adult relationships in, I want to say probably New York City. I haven't seen the film. It killed his working relationship with Columbia that last

film. Like, it did so poorly and cost so much money. And I've heard Tim Calpacus tell stories about being a production assistant and running around with that script to the most famous people in Hollywood and that's all they meant like Leonardo DiCaprio and all these other people just to share with him that script and now it does feel like

after how do you know I doubt that there was as much prestige around the production of L. McKay though I also wonder if James L. Brooks sees this as like that how do you know can't be my last movie? I have to do better than that. James L. Brooks he's still kicking around 85 years old

So this potentially who knows what could happen We wish him the best This potentially could be his last movie But if it is hopefully It'll be more successful than how do you know Which the title of that film led to a great bit On We Hate Movies. We love the We Hate Movies podcast

And at one point in their history They were trying to recall the name of the movie And one of them said Oh, it's called You Gotta Do It And so they eventually found the name of the movie But the phrase, you got to do it became a catchphrase on We Hate Movies At the point where I believe

Andrew Drupin even replied to me with you got to do it on something I put out on blue sky. So I credit how do you know for at least giving us you got to do it? I needed the blank check guys to remind me that like James L. Brooks was once regarded for like about 15, 20 years as like, oh, this is one of the best writer directors in film like broadcast news, terms of endearment, and as good as it gets, were beloved actor-driven Oscar-winning films that made the stars of it like household names. Yeah, yeah. And he was really brought low by that. You've got to do it film he made in 2010. But we're wishing him the best.

And actually, I do want to see this because I didn't care about. I keep wanting to call it, you got to do it. I keep, okay, I didn't really care about how do you know. I mean, it seems like not a lot of people cared about it. I'm not alone in this. But I was watching the trailer. And there were a lot of, like, classic James L. Brooks lines. Like, when L. M.K. meets her estranged father, he weirds her out.

And Jamie Lee Curtis tells him, you promise me you wouldn't be yourself. That's totally a James L. Brooks line. Yeah. What was it Mike Reese said he thought of the best, like James L. Brooks line of like, I wish I loved you as much as you feel I should or I deserve to love you or something like that. Yeah, they were spending a lot of time in those early years of the Simpsons trying to emulate James O. Brooks. And often succeeding. James O. Brooks's like heart is part of the mix in Simpsons, though we always usually prefer the sneaky bad boys who want to make silly comedy nerd stuff around the heart of a James O. Brooks. Yeah, it's a nice mix, but we're more a fan of the sneaky bad.

boys. But yeah, that is the most Simpsons-related thing we have to talk about outside of the season premiere. But we have one more news item that should make everyone happy if you enjoy our podcast and our coverage and Simpsons-related shows because the King of the Hill Revival hit 4.4 million views in one week and was Disney's biggest adult animated premiere in five years. So this news was shared by showrunner Saladin Patterson. So it seems like there could be a renewal soon. There was a 20-episode order. And of course, that was broken up a new two seasons and we'll see that next 10 next year presumably but i'm hoping the momentum of this will give them another order and it seems like never before has this show been more promoted by

any network it was like king of the hill was just a mainstay that was largely ignored by its parent company but now when i go online at least around its premiere i saw so many ads i and now things like i believe like what a burger has a branded king of the hill burger and lots of promotions And so for the first time since it premiered on Fox, I feel like the show is finally getting attention from the company who has chosen to air its episodes. Yeah, Disney, PR marketing, Hulu, whoever, whatever department had a budget, they spent it on King of the Hill.

Like more than, you know, the initial season of Hulorama, there's a new season of HuluRama coming out on September 13th, but you don't hear much about that. They are spending the real money on this King of the Hill debut for sure. Yeah, that's right. So by the time we cover the next talk to the audience, by the time we record that podcast, we will have probably watched a lot of the new Futurama and presumably a lot of the new Beavis and Butthead. But yeah, those are not getting the same attention as New King of the Hill, unfortunately. Maybe there was like a little bit of hype around Futurama.

I remember being in Portland right after a new season premiered and I saw a billboard and I thought this is the only time I've ever seen Futurama advertised anywhere, period. That's right. We told Bill Oakley about it. Like, no, by the Powell's books. There's a big Futurama on Hulu sign there, yeah. But what they weren't doing with Futurama was paying for ads in Fortnite. Well, actually, no, there was Futurama in Fortnite. I take that back. But they weren't paying for ad placement on WWE Smackdown or having Hank Hill be interviewed by Theo Vaughn.

Yes, yeah. A whole lot of promotion was going into it. I saw because Facebook is very weird. So if you joined Facebook very early on, you could put in like, well, here's all the stuff I like, and that was just a very basic social media profile. But eventually over time, Facebook turned all of the things you told it you liked into follows for those respective pages. So, like, way back in the day, I wrote, I like King of the Hill on Facebook as one of my interests. And so it made me follow the King of the Hill Facebook page much later.

And then I saw that some writer for the show is answering questions that were sent into Hank as Hank Hill. And they've been pretty funny. So they're doing a lot across many different media channels for the promotion of this new series. That is really cool. I mean, even, obviously, Theo Vaughn sucks, but you just called my attention to this guy. I have no idea. He probably has like 14,000 times the listeners that we do. But you told me he's a kind of not quite as right, Rogan guy. Pretty much if you're a brand that the metrics say that Rogan is too toxic for your brand. Theo Vaughn is more of the middle of the rogue guy. Now, you maybe saw him on road rules when you were a youth, Bob, because that's what Theo Vaughn first got famous for. I only saw the first season of road rules. How deep was he into those rules? Man, I feel like he was only in the challenge seasons or the later, like, post-cruise ones, I don't know. I kind of tapped out after that first road rules, but I did enjoy the hell out of it.

But he made his mark as a road rules contestant. Yeah, I mean, now his job is to play it being like, he's a millionaire who pretends he's white trash. Like, that's his thing. Like, oh, I'm a white trash Louisiana guy. And he's just like, I just talked since. I first heard of him because Bernie Sanders did his show. I was like, how, what's this all about? And then, of course, it's like, he only, in my opinion, he only had Sanders on to then as cover have on, like, Trump and J.D. Vance back to back on the show.

So he could be like, I talk to everybody. Well, it's okay. So Hank Hill was on the same talk show as Donald Trump. Yes. Interesting. Interesting. Interesting. Interesting phenomenon here.

But, hey, if you watch that thing, you'll get the answer of does Hank Hill know what a podcast is. Oh, nice. Maybe I'll just watch that clip alone. But yeah, that is all that's happening in terms of Simpsons and Simpsons related news. Now let's talk about what's happening in our neck of the woods, specifically on the Talking Simpsons Network, and we want to start things off here by giving our schedule for the month of September.

So some people took things the wrong way when we let them know during our anniversary podcast that anime was not as popular as other things. That doesn't mean we're not going to do anime anymore. I want to keep pointing that out. And because of that, we are covering anime in September a classic anime for old people, Slayers, the fantasy comedy series that was really part

of a Slayer's bubble in the, late aughts to early 2000s, but we're going back to the first series. We're covering episode 16. It's titled Passion. Shall we give our lives for the stage? So classic anime episode title there. And yes, this is something I've always wanted to do for a cartoon since we started the episode. And we're going to have Nina on as a guest. And Nina did a lot of original research on the Japanese internet. So I imagine that this podcast will have a ton of information that has never been heard on an English language source like ours. We're recording it later today and I myself can't wait to hear about it because I was a casual Slayers enjoyer and I have been looking forward to this.

And yeah, I swear this was like one of our like brainstorming what a cartoon years ago is just like, well, if we did a only animation podcast, what would we do? And like, I feel like Slayers was mentioned that. Yes. And I was like, if only I had a wife that knew a lot about Slayers, then we could do the podcast. And then, you know, the prophecy finally came into being and came true. So yes, look forward to that. I imagine I'm kind of scared because we're recording this later. today, but it likely will be over three hours with all of the notes and original research that

Nina did. So please look forward to that. Again, that is Slayers. And I will say it's pretty unavailable these days, unfortunately. Funimation had the license for a while. It let the license lapse. And currently, if you want to find these episodes, they're on your old buddy internet archive. And you can watch the dub on there. I fully recommend that because there's legally no way to find these. They're not streaming anywhere. You can't buy them anywhere. But again, archive.org, always your friend if you're looking for lost media. And up next, we have our mini-series episodes for our people on the Patreon at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. Up first, Talking Futurama Law and Oracle, and it answers the question, what if Fry became a cop?

Now, it's not as bad as you think, because mostly this episode is interested in making fun of the Police Academy series of films. I had remembered it as the Minority Report episode, when in actuality it's like 20% minority report and 80% Police Academy parody. Yes. They're really giving it to Police Academy, perhaps. 20 years too late, but hey, it's probably the last possible time in recorded history, you will get to hear Police Academy jokes. And not jokes from Police Academy, but jokes about Police Academy. So look forward to that if you're a patron. And also for patrons, we have a really special thing coming up for talking of the Hill because we're covering one of the reboot episodes, we're covering episode seven of the King of the Hill reboot any given Hill day. This episode went on for a very long time, this recording, and it is over three hours long. we had so many things to say just about the whole season it is slightly spoilery for the whole season so if you haven't watched it all yet and don't want it spoiled

watch out for them but we had so much fun on that one and it was a mini therapy session too for me a little bit for that specific episode of father's son dynamic stuff a lot of the new series is about an adult man and his father and we talk about that too so this episode went on for so long we're going to give a portion of it to the free feed so if you're on the free feed you'll get to hear our discussion about the series as a whole the reboot series as a whole and how it came into being and kind of the history of King of the Hill's rocky relationship with Fox.

So if you enjoy hearing that chunk, you can hear the rest of the chunk and the rest of Talking of the Hill by signing up for the Patreon at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. I recommend it because it's how I get paid. And also for what a cartoon movie, that is for $10 patrons at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. We are moving far away from Disney. We're putting Disney behind us for now because we just covered four Disney films in a row. And we're covering the Lego movie for September, something far different, something I've seen before and I really like. So I'm looking forward to digging into this, maybe finally watching the sequel. This will give me a chance to understand the full Legoverse because I have seen the Lego Batman movie.

And I do like it to a point, but I really enjoy this. And it will bring us back to the time when we liked seeing Chris Pratt get cast in things. You'll be saying everything is awesome if you sign up for the Patreon and listen to it. That is true. And again, the What a Cartoon Movie podcast is for people at the 10. our level at patreon.com slash talking Simpsons. So it's a very exciting month for all of you patrons out there and all your few free listeners. And Henry and I are preparing for some big trips.

So we are working far in advance. Like we're like a month to six weeks ahead in terms of recording. So we've got everything covered. We're looking forward to all the great stuff we're putting out for the rest of the year. And now we've covered our Patreon stuff and our scheduling stuff. Let's talk about what we've been playing and watching that's not necessarily related to the podcast. Well, me, I've had a real Metal Gear month. Actually, I'm wearing my Metal Gear Solid 2 t-shirt right now from Uniclo.

Could you believe it was marked down to $8? Nobody wants to buy a Sons of Liberty t-shirt except for Bob Mackey? Well, it's true, unfortunately. But yes, in the month of August, I did play through Metal Gear Solid 1 and 2 via the master collection on my PC. It's fairly okay, although I do recommend you look up some of the mods that improve things like loading times and prevent things like crashes, and they're very easy to install if you have the PC version. But Metal Gear Solid 1 still holds up, still very impressive. still love all the characters, the story, the voice acting. And actually, I found it to be very easy because as the series rolls on, you get to do more and more advanced versions of the

things you do, Metal Gear Solid 1. The controls aren't quite as smooth, but it does feel a little primitive in the actions they're making you do. So I kind of just plowed through it. It's like a 10 to 12 hour game, but really enjoyed it, loved going back to it, have not played it since probably the Twin Snakes remake in 2003, and maybe just a few times before that. So it's been a good 22 years or whenever that game came out. I think it was, was it 2004, 2005, so maybe it's been 20 years. Yeah, Twin Snakes, I think that was 04 or 03, because Metal Gear 3 I know was the end of 04 and I feel like I played Twin Snakes before I played Metal Gear 3. Yeah, it's still worth going back to it. I'm glad for whatever reason, Metal Gear Solid 1 was

unavailable for a very long time until recently, I guess, because they weren't really sure how to present it. So when you go back and you play Metal Gear Solid 1, nothing is going to be touched up. You're not going to be seeing this in a high resolution. You're looking at these chunky PlayStation graphics like 320 by 200 resolution but that's the way it was meant to be seen and yes I did play through meta go solo too again I have a soft spot for that very very weird game and I enjoy it up until the end when it becomes like a real cutscene pile up and they're trying to explain their way out of this elaborate story they crafted for themselves and yeah it's such a fun weird experiment a lot of really big swings by kojima in this game and I was there when it came

out. And it really brought me back to that time where 9-11 happens. Yes, it's coming up on this podcast once again. And you're like, oh, man, everything I know has changed. The world seems so unsafe and dangerous and unpredictable. Now it's time to sit down and play dependable metal gear game with my good buddy solid snake. And then the game is like, fuck you. This is not what you're expecting at all. Everything is different. Don't believe in anything you hear and has some fun things to say about politics. So despite the gameplay being very limited and there being a lot of cut scenes. This might be the last time I replayed this game in my life, but it was really fun to go back to it. And by the way, this is all in preparation for Metal Gear Solid Delta, the remake of

three that's coming out at the end of August. Our friend and great comic artist of Metal Gear stuff, Maddie Kopp, she got to go to a Metal Gear Delta preview event in New York City, and she even took like a picture. She brought like, I think, a solidist toy with her and posed it on top of the building where the fight happens, you know, from perspective. Right. Yeah, that was a really cool picture. Yeah, I believe as we record this, she's actually at Metal Gear Solid Con right now, which happens every year. So yeah, yeah, looking forward to Delta. It's not like a super necessary remake because they're basically changing nothing outside of the presentation and they're giving it more modern controls in line with Metal Gear Solid 5. But

I just like the idea that they're rebuilding the game from scratch because if you play Metal Gear Solid 2 on any platform as part of that master collection, it is a emulation of the 2011 remake, not remake, sorry, it's an emulation of the 2011 H-10. It's an emulation of the 2011 HD port that went to PS3 and 360s. So you're seeing all of those old load screens from that old version. So instead of seeing an emulation

of an emulation of a port, you're actually going to be seeing a thing that was built from the ground up to be the Metal Gear Solid 3 experience. And I'm looking forward to it because that's my favorite game of the series. And it's really reigniting my love of Metal Gear.

And now I'm going to bed like reading wikis and reading the Metal Gear Solid Reddit. I'm back to where I was in my early 20s being very annoying about Metal Gear Solid. my husband is planning to play delta i'll probably play it a little too but i'm looking forward to watching him play it now death stranding two look all cojima games speak to one another and have references so i'm not spoiling anything but i'll just say after playing death stranding

two it also made me want to at the very least like crack open the first metal gear again just for like there aren't real like big metal gear references but there is stuff in death stranding two are like oh that reminds me a metal gear man i should play that one again yeah it's a really quick game to play through. It took me only just a few days. I know it very well, but I think for most people, it's like a game you can play over the course of weekend. And yeah, I need to play Death Stranding 1 and 2. I kind of put Kojeba on the back burner after I played over 100 hours of Metal Gear Solid 5. And I was like, all right, that's enough Kojima for a while. But now after getting a little sample of what he used to do, I thought like, man, I want to see somebody

get to be this weird again. And I know all that stuff is happening in Death Stranding 1 and 2. And now I know there's like a puppet in two. I want to meet the puppet pal. What's going on with that guy. I fucking love that guy. I want a two-scale toy of that guy. I'm going to be looking for him in Japan to see if there's any of them out there. So yes, Metal Garsall, a lot of fun. You don't need me to tell you that. And I'm probably going to do a retronauts about Delta at some point in the future. So look forward to that. And in terms of watching stuff, lots of movies, but I wanted to call out three of them like I've been doing in the past here. So Henry can comment on this as well. I saw weapons for a movie by Zach Krieger. I'm getting to really be into his stuff.

Now, I like Barbarian a little bit more. The reveal of what's happening in weapons is where the film lost me a little bit. I wanted it to be something different or something a little more elaborate than what the solution ends up being. But the ending is super great, and I want to be very cagey about how I talk about this. But the format of the movie is very satisfying and how it parcels out information and, like, gradually solves mysteries throughout by showing you different perspectives. I really, really enjoy it. I just wish maybe it's setting itself up for something it can never. pay off. So maybe the payoff was not as much as I was expecting. But I am into the future of

Zach Kregor. Now I'm kind of a little bum that he's being attached to IP as he's getting off the ground as a director and a writer of these two really fun movies I enjoyed. But hopefully the fact that he's doing Resident Evil means he can then do some of his own projects. I'm hopeful that when he's in those meetings for Resident Evil, he says, guys, you made it, you made 18 movies starring Milozovich that were this. You've also made, you know, direct to video CG films that are pretty much exactly

the video game CG with stories of like Leon and the other characters. Let me do something new with this, please.

I have a cool idea. If you want the A24 indie prestige comedy vibes on your Resident Evil that does take a level of trust in Zach Krieger to do

something interesting. Yeah, this will be the first Resident Evil movie I ever watch. Not for a podcast, I think. I will see it just to

support him. But yeah, very happy. And I know, you can project any kind of metaphor or symbolism you want onto horror. It's a perfect playground for that. But for me, at least, I'm just happy that at least the way I viewed it, there was no like super elaborate metaphor about society.

It just, I think he wanted to tell a fun story. And yes, you can kind of pull a few things out of it about like the modern state of certain things that are happening in culture, again, being very cagey. But I was just happy that unlike Jordan Peel, Zach Craigor, he put down the metaphor gun and he surrendered quietly to the movie police. Which is extra funny when the movie's called weapons, I thought it actually was going to be more.

There was like gun imagery that's in the trailers that made me think it was going to be like, oh, is this sort of like a, you know, gun control type metaphor? But that would be so boring if he was going for something like that. Like he's better than that. Yes. And actually, when my wife and I left the theater, we're like, well, why was it called weapons? So maybe we're dumb,

but to me at least, there was no elaborate metaphor. Just like, here's a fun idea. And then when you realize what's causing all the problems. It's kind of silly. It's kind of goofy. And you're like, okay, I'm just having fun now. I expect when I came home from seeing him, my husband did not want to see it too scary for him. He doesn't want to feel, especially in a movie theater, horror films. He's just like, you know what? You enjoy it without me, was what he said. So when I came home, I told him like, if a couple drag queens we watch together do not wear some costumes based on

this film, I will be surprised. I will be very surprised. Oh, yeah, yeah. There's one very draggy character in this film. Again, no spoilers. Yeah, in terms of like modern horror, I did actually like this a little more than the movie I'm forgetting with, oh, God, what was the other big horror movie that came out?

The spring? Oh, fuck, man. It was called, oh, fuck, man. Didn't like it. Didn't like the fuck man in that movie. God, no, I can't remember this horror movie from the spring. I'm sorry.

I'm only remembering the Zach Krieger fun ones. I'm going to look it up now because everyone is screaming. They're pulling over the side of the road. They're saying, what's wrong with you? I'm unsubscribing immediately. Where the hell is it? Okay, it's not in June.

I'm looking at, I'm vamping now. I'm not looking for, oh, fuck, man. It was, it was the movie with Michael B. Jordan, Henry. What was it? Oh, Sinner! There you go. Yeah. Editor, do not edit any of this app.

People need to know how stupid we are. It was a movie I couldn't stop talking about. You know what? It's bigger than horror, man. Yeah, I did enjoy sinners. I wasn't as head over heels as most people were about it. But I kind of like weapons more, and weapons seems to be doing very well. Barbarian was barely released. It still doesn't have physical release. And Weapons is doing so well that they already announced the physical version of the movie. So I bet Zach Krieger is very happy right now.

Oh, yeah. I actually still have not seen Barbarian yet. I plan to. But everybody's talking about weapons. I was like, I want to see weapons soon while it's hot. Everybody's talking about it. And I really enjoyed it a lot. I liked it storytelling structure. All of the actors are, you know, people who I am so used to only seeing in Marvel movies. It was great to see them acting in things, like, without green screen and, like, just real thing. And it's so weird because one of the things about weapons behind the scenes is that the entire movie had to be recast outside of, like, two people. So I believe Pedro Pascal was originally the character played by Josh Brolin in the final film. Like, everybody had to be recast. So it's surprising that the film didn't end up to being a disaster. I believe that the junkie character is the one dude that remained on cast list as they changed everything around. I had heard the Pedro Pascal part, but not anything.

the other. It would have been funny if he had filmed that too because then he would have been in four movies at the same time in theaters this last month. I've had enough of that guy. Mr. Fantastic, indeed. So yeah, check out weapons, everybody. It's great. And a movie that everyone's seen that I watched for the first time and I don't know over 20 years was Austin Powers. International Man of Mystery. Yeah, baby. Yes, we all know the catchphrases. We live through the era. And it was really fun to go back to this. I was in the mood for a spoofy comedy after seeing the naked gun. Henry and I both saw that and really enjoyed it. I was like, oh man, I love this kind of comedy, and I remember being an Austin Powers nerd back in the late 90s early odds. That fell off immediately when I saw Austin Powers gold member. Not a great film, but I remember being Wayne and Mike Myers, Austin Powers, the first movie kind of comes and goes in theaters. And then I'm like, oh man, it's at the dollar theater. Let's go see it. And I fell in love with that. I was like, oh, man, this is so weird. He's so confident about these characters. And I remember you go into that movie knowing about Austin Powers because it was heavily promoted. But the secret fire

in that movie is Dr. Evil. And I loved all the Dr. Evil stuff. I remember walking out of that theater and saying to my friend, Dr. Evil is now Mike Myers' greatest character. And some part of me still believes that. It's like, what if Lord Michael's was even more evil and was basically also

Blofeld from the James Bond series? But yes, even if you live through the Austin Powers Bubble, you live through all the impressions, you live through all the Halloween costumes, at least the first movie is like super solid. I would say, as good or possibly better than Wayne's World. I think we're all forgetting just how great

the first Austin Powers is. And it actually tells a real story that is kind of moving about this man lost in time. I love Austin Power. I feel like I watched it in full of a couple of years ago. And like I remember seeing in theaters and thinking

one of the things was the reveal was that like Mike Myers is like playing Dr. Evil because they hide Dr. Evil's face for like the first like 10, 15 minutes or something, right? Yes. Yeah. And he was never in trailers or in like TV. spots. It was all like Mike Myers playing Austin Powers on like TV shows and stuff like that. And I remember the last time I watched it, one of the coolest revelations or things I had

forgotten was a turn in the movie was, if you don't know the resolution, I think like, oh yeah, Austin Powers with an out of date guy. But like he's told like, you're out of date. He's like, yeah, but you know, free love, we had our reasons for it. And we still want to be groovy and be against the man and everything. I think he made actually a good speech for reclaiming the values of the 60s that were good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I was getting like goosebumps at some point during Austin Powers when I'm like, I believe in this guy and I want him to fit in the 90s

and it's more progressive than you would think. Of course, yes, she's a man, baby. That part, that's in the movie. But also, like, he won't have sex with Vanessa when she's drunk. He's like, it's not right. I wouldn't do that. This is going to be quoting lines from it, but I love the one where she tells him, like, I hope you will protection.

Well, only sailors have to do that. It's like, no, they don't. Well, they should the dirty. Yes. There's so many great lines. like we're wasting time talking about Austin Powers but I just fell back in love with this movie but that entire speech that Austin Powers does

in therapy about his father it's just such like a confident hilarious monologue it's so great it's like one of the outstanding set pieces of the movie so yeah I'm just encouraging everybody go back to the first Austin Powers if you haven't in a very long time I love the first movie so much I bought the widescreen version on VHS for like $35 as a teenager I was like I want

the ultimate Austin Powers experience at home I also think of like the Scott Evil speech about like we'll just shoot him like right now like we'll do it together his father and son like you just don't get it there's so much good stuff in there yeah and I do want to show Nina the spy who shag me the second movie which is just that's when they start redoing all the same jokes over and over again which I don't like but I just remember my mom in particular loved that movie and I just remember her screaming with laughter while watching it and basically reciting the shit drinking scene

constantly as I was a teenager she just that was her favorite scene in the movie That one I saw in theaters and liked less, but I did like it. But the great balance in the first Austin Powers compared to it is like, Austin kind of has no story after the first movie. And that's why like Dr. Evil takes over. But the first movie is the perfect balance of Austin and Evil. Yeah, for about two years after the second Austin Powers movie, my mom would sip her coffee and go, a bit nutty.

It's shit, Austin. Yes. Well, we're going to watch that soon. I'll report back. I did see that one twice in theaters I was so into Austin Powers. And man, what a time to be alive, everybody. Now, moving on to a movie, fewer people have seen. I didn't get a chance to watch this in time for our Treasure Planet podcast, but I did see Muppet Treasure Island for the first time.

This movie came out when I was like, I'm too old for this crap. So now that I'm regressing back into my childhood in my 40s, I thought it's time to watch this finally. I enjoy the production design. I'm echoing a lot of things that Henry said on the Treasure Planet podcast. Production design is great. Of course, Muppet performances are pretty good. But too many humans, the kid is fine, but the kid should be played by a. Muppet, like, let's say, Kermit or Robin.

And also, you think you want Kermit and Piggy in the movie and lots of stuff with them. But that really takes over the third act, and I didn't think it was very good. I was like, to that point, it was a fairly interesting adaptation of Treasure Island that I was kind of getting into. But then they're like, well, we got to have a Kermin and Piggy thing

and wasn't really into that. They sing a very long duet with each other, where the joke is that they're kind of hanging upside down while singing, but they don't really do anything outside of that. So, yeah, this is me arriving 30 years late to the party, but not that great up at the Treasure Island. And also, we love Tim Curry, and he's a hilarious, like, comedic performer in songs.

When I just rewatched it, I was brought back to my teenage years of seeing it. And when Tim Curry starts his song and the joke in his song, as he says, guys, this is my one number. So we got to do it well. I both like that joke. And also it pits me off of like, why do you have Tim Curry sing once in your musical? Yes, that is crazy You know, Mr. Rocky Horror Picture Show himself Only gets one number in the movie

And that kid with his like soprano voice Gets this thing maybe three times Yeah, it's not the kid's fault of just like Like actually I can't get high as that kid Well, yes, our balls have dropped I hope at this point I promise listener, yeah Yes, mine definitely have

So yes, Muppet Treasure Island I just wanted to weigh in on that Because I read the book and I watched Treasure Planet it. I really wish they had followed the same kind of philosophy they did with the Muppet Christmas Carol movie, but not so good. And then it's the Muppet decline for the rest of the decade. I do want to watch Muppets from space again, because it's like, okay, we want to make this a little X-Filesie, a little more late-90sie and reveal the origins of Gonzo. I remember liking it to a point when I rented it on DVD like as a teenager, but we can talk about that at some point in the future.

Well, Hulk Hogan's in that movie, so you can celebrate his legacy. Yes, he fought the gremlins he helped gonzo but then he fought the three ninjas at mega mountain i was not a fan of that leave them alone hawkogan heard you had to fight three nia and he was like i'm there i'll be there brother yeah uh the hulk let me finish my sentence their children come back that's what i watched this month a lot of other stuff but that's the stuff i wanted to highlight and then i'm really powering up my finances in free time for a larger vacation later this year so keeping it nice and low profile in Vancouver, doing a lot of stuff locally. Just one thing I wanted to call out is I did see

Kyle Mooney live in his Real Me Fake Me tour. He shows up. He plays three different characters and he performs some songs. And depending on where you are, I believe his tour might be over by this point, but depending on where you are, there are special guests. So at my show, it was Vanessa Bayer

and Taryn Killam from SNL. And then because he's a local, Nathan Fielder showed up to waste everybody's time in a delightful way. So I had never seen Kyle Mooney live. I love his comedy. I love his sensibility. I love his personas. And if you want to see that for two hours, it was a great venue to do it in. I wish I'd have gone to it when he came to Seattle. Though you had probably the best show based just on the names that appeared, you maybe had the

best show of all of his shows on the tour. We really did. It was at a rock club, though, or like your standard club. And the entire day, it happened at night. So the entire day my wife and I were out were walking around. By the time we get to the venue, we have over 10,000 steps on our Fitbits. And then when we realized we have to stand the entire time, we just said, we're so stupid. Why do we walk all day? And then now we're going to stand for two and a half hours. And we did. And we were fine. But that was only slightly distracting part of the event being like, I'm so tired and I'm 42. Actually, now I'm 43. I keep forgetting how old I am. Are you at least now a fan of the tragically hip now that you've been to that show? No, Nina had to explain that to me because

Nathan Fielder was playing a tragically hip song for both Kyle Mooney and the audience on his phone holding up to the microphone. And I was like, well, people are really getting into this around me. And then Nina had to explain it to me. Canada's own, tragically hip. It's just like how you had to learn about the sucks to be you. I know, I know those guys. What's their name? Prozac. Yes, Prozac. Yes. If you come to Canada, I teach you all about Prozac, not the pills, but the electronica rock duo, whatever their genre is. But that's all I've been doing in the month of August. How about you, Henry? I gamed it up quite a bit in August. I finished Donkey Kong Bonanza, and it ends Great. Don't let it get spoiled for you guys, but it's a great, great game.

Then I moved on to the game Bob Beat last month and played it just as long, Claire Obscure Expedition 33. Yes, and you also encountered the steep learning curve when it comes to understanding how the battles work, how parrying works, and how eventually there are like four different kinds of parrying you have to do in the game. I sent you a message on Discord when I was an hour into it. I was like, am I doing this wrong? What is wrong? Because it's like one of your first battle.

in the game is like before you like leave the prologue one of your friends will be like hey let's practice battling and I lost every time I was like what the what am I doing wrong I was shouting yeah and unfortunately like people were comparing it I'm not calling you out Henry people were comparing this to Mario RPG and I think that's just an an easy frame of reference but they're not that similar they're similar in the case that where you have to push buttons during combat in order to have certain things happen like defend you know return the attack have special things happen during your special moves, et cetera, et cetera. So that part is the Mario RPG. But what's not Mario RPG is for much of these timed hits and time parries, you're not getting any button prompts. You're not like waiting for meters to fill up. You're not playing micro games. You have to study the animations and figure out, okay, when is the best time to hit the

button to parry? And it's a lot of trial and error. And I know you were experiencing that too. And unfortunately, there's no way around the trial and error. You just have to throw yourself against these animations until you crack the code. Yep. And I did. When we talked about it on Blue Sky, I eventually likened it to like, well, I left Mario. You compared it to like Paper Mario preschool. And I was like, well, then I eventually graduated from this class with a C-minus. But I did finish the game on regular difficulty. I barely scraped by too. I never loaded difficulty. But it's like if Sekiro was turn-based, essentially. That's more what the combat is like. This was a dynamic I loved in it, but also what made it so hard is that if you choose the coward's path or the easier path of dodging, which has a wider area of like it's a little more forgiving, instead of parrying, you're basically giving up MP to do your attack. So it's like, oh, I dodged, but now I can't do anything.

It's an elegantly designed system with lots of, you know, risk, reward things built into it. But there's a lot of nuance, and it's not, it's not always immediate when you first start the game. So I guess what Henry and I are saying is don't let it push you away if it seems like you're doing something wrong because you're not. It just has initially a super steep learning curve. I mean, I love the cast. I love the characters. The story really pulled me in. I liked the way it was told.

And I could go back and play it a little more for the side stuff just like you were considering. But also my hour count really was 33 hours. I was like, boy, that's just kind of perfect, isn't it? Like I said last one, there's a lot of game that opens up. But I really had my fill. And I like that they allow you to punch out whenever you. want. You can make it into a 50 or 60-hour game if you want to and then become like super overpowered and kind of break the game. But they can also let you punch out early and have a

fulfilling experience that way too. After my husband watched me play Claire Obscure the entire way, he said I would really like Final Fantasy 10, a game I've never beaten. I only played like five hours of. I also like Metal Gear Solid too. I consider like a post-911 game, one of those like right after 9-11 video games. Oh yeah, that came out like Christmas of 01. Yeah, it was crazy that it starts with like basically an entire city of like skyscrapers exploding and falling down at the opening of it. But my husband didn't spoil anything for me, but he's just like, oh, the story and characters of Expedition 33 reminded him of 10. And we warmed up our steam deck and I'm playing the HD remaster of 10 and perhaps 102 on it. And after the speedy turn-basedness, the combat

does remind me of Claire Obscure, except I can do it on two-time speed and not have to think about parrying. I just have to plan things in a turn-based style. Yeah, like, Clarepscur is good, but it takes a lot of energy to play. And I've kind of stopped listening to podcasts while I play video games outside of a few games that are really just about grinding, and the audio is not important. But especially with Clear Obscure, you have to be completely locked in to the audio as well. And it helps to have, like, big headphones on because a lot of the parrying, you have to listen too, because the sound effects will also, like, kind of key you into the right moment to hit the

button. And then when you do these paris, the audio feedback is so satisfying when you can actually pull them off. Oh, man, there were times where I did a big hitback for 9-9-99, and I like literally screamed to the screen like, fuck you, I did it. Like, yeah, it felt good. Now you can play the game where they let you restart immediately at a boss fight if it kills you. And yes, the first time you fight a boss, it's all about just, okay, I'm going to die. But every time I fight this boss, I'm going to learn something in terms of like studying the animations or knowing like the order of attacks and things like that. So the fact that they made that a lot more manageable is great. I just wish they had that when I was playing the game.

They released that update right after you stopped and right when I started. It was like to prank you almost. That'll teach me for being an early adopter. And as for watching, other than the weapons like Bob mentioned, I am watching the new season of Twisted Metal. Season two is more like the games in the actually has like a tournament and car combat and more of the named characters. And it's fun, and it's also fun because our frequent-to-talking Simpson's guest,

Mike Mitchell, is very funny in it as well. Yeah, I think last year we got him right before he left to film Twisted Metal Season 2. Maybe that was Lisa's Pony or whatever season 4 when he was on. I forget what it was. Camp Krusty, Camp Krusty. Okay, yeah, I think that was like, he had his bags packed at that point. It's funny. It's funny to watch it and see, like, him interacting with Sweet Tooth,

and it's full of actors I enjoy. They had to do some recasting of characters from season one because I think not everybody was available. But it's good, and I must compliment again that it has a 30-minute episode. It's not these hour-long streaming episodes, just 30-minute regular-ass TV episodes. Nice, nice. I like that.

Goes on Smooth. And as for movies, I saw The Boy and the Beast. A bunch of Hosoda films are being released in theaters with 4K releases right now from G-K kids. And so I check this one out after seeing one. Wolf Children. You know, I need to see more of his movie, but the more I see of his work, the more I feel like I'm not really into his vibe. I enjoy the artistry in the technical qualities of his movie, but the things they're saying, I'm just kind of like, I don't find that interesting. But again, I need to see more. Wolf Children, I think I gave like three stars too. It wasn't a bad time. But ultimately, I walked away, is thinking, well, this concept should have made for a much more interesting film than what you gave me. Yeah, see, this was what I walked away from The Boy and the Beast with again, too, which was, like you say, Ma'Oru has he's like one of the few autore filmmakers in Japan

who gets the budget to make these types of movies like it's an opportunity almost no one gets and it makes me, you know, also in a world where Satoshi Kohn lived he'd be getting to make these kind of movies and I do feel like he'd do something more interesting with it. My problem with The Boy of the Beast

is it's half a good film and then just like in Wolf Children I'm not going to spoil it but in both those movies the second half is like well enough about being an outsider society Let's be part of society again. So go back to school. Like, I hate it.

Yeah, there's a sentiment. And maybe it's like a cultural thing that I don't connect with. But Wolf Children is one of those Japanese movies where ultimately it's like, isn't it so nice when everybody works hard? And that's kind of all you walk away with. It's like, well, I guess so. Actually, like from up on Poppy Hill was another one of those. There was not a lot of tension in that movie.

It's like, everybody's working hard and accomplishing goals. And it's just like, I need something more than that. The Boy and the Beast also reminded me of Wolf Children in that it tells the story of like, wow, this is a non-traditional family that's showing that it can work outside of society, like, isn't that interesting? And then when it's something that is at the very least a little to the opposite of society or living outside of the conservative norm, a small C conservative norm, then in the second half, they're like, but you really got to adapt to just be part of society. Like, you really got to do that. Got to pull up your pants, tuck in your shirt. Yes,

it should like that like literally like go to school and go to the boy in it learns to be like an awesome samurai swordsman living in this world of beasts and animals and then he's like you know what i should really go to school and i was like ah i hate this i need a degree i can't get a job with my sword it just bugs me honestly i feel like at a certain point i feel like hosota is like an op in that he is like oh weirdos in the case of the boy in the beast furries are going to want to see this but i need to stealthily get them in with a cool furry story and then at the end convince them be normal go to school the next movie is going to be about how to wash your ass it's uh i mean i think of how tokyo godfathers is also about a bunch of weirdos who live outside of society and the answer at the end of the movie is hey the weirdos saved the day and they weren't changed and they didn't decide to reenter society i mean i enjoy that message but maybe that's why all of toshi kone's movies were horrible failures yeah god uh that's

The fact that I hate when you see how little anyone cared about his movies and how he's barely able to make anything and how they still can't make his final project. Yeah, God, you're right. But even like Oshi, like, in Ghost in the Shell or Pat Labor, like, those messages are not society is great or let's all be part of it. Like, I'm not even trying to just compare Hosota to Miyazaki like most people do and can, but like just compatriot, like guys who are around his age, like Satoshi Kohn or Osi. OSCE is like 10 years older, but they do more. They do more. Well, you know, honestly, the message I get from OSHA is go to sleep, it's okay to go to sleep.

I find his work very boring. But enjoy Angels Egg, everybody. You can watch that movie and, you know, you can put your Ambien away for one night, I think. I think that's getting a 4K theatrical release in the U.S. soon, I think. It is. And then speaking of great Japanese films,

a bunch of them, Kurosawa films were being played around here. And I saw The Hidden Fortress and Ikiru in a theater with a full house at the Siff in downtown in Seattle. And The Hidden Fortress, a very funny movie to watch with people to laugh along with. It's great. It's a really great movie. And Ikiru, the feel-good movie of the year, right? It was a silent theater.

Like, it was like, I was trying to, at the end of it, I was like, who else is, like, wiping tears away from their face here? Well, I know my wife wants to watch that, but I think we've decided that it's really depressing and we need to be in the right mood for it. because it's about a man coming to terms with his imminent death, correct? That's the plot? Well, yes, but there's so much more. I mean, by the end of it, I felt both cynicism and uplift. Kurosawa is not, it might be his masterpiece. Like, it might be his greatest film.

Yeah, I mean, I wasn't trying to undersell it. I don't know anything about it, but I feel like that in itself is a very complicated idea. Like, what do you do when you know the end is coming? I've seen other films about terminally ill characters in them. And this is not a spoiler. The first thing in the movie is you learn this guy is terminally ill. But rarely have I felt as much like, you are this man, feel what it feels to have a death sentence. What do you do with that time?

That also led me to watch highest to lowest, the Spike Lee remake of High and Low. I did like it, but there are changes made to it that I did not like from the original. Well, I'll tell everybody, good luck finding it because it's barely being screened. I think we're getting it very soon. but it's an Apple TV plus movie, whatever that service is called. So you kind of have to watch it there. Yeah, it's another one of those like, oh, giant movie stars are making a movie. You've never heard of it or seen it because it's on Apple TV.

So I counted myself lucky that at one theater in town in Seattle, not even in Bellevue where I live live, highest to Lois was playing. I could see it. And I mean, if you have missed Spike Lee and Denzel Washington working together in a film, I think the last one was The Inside Man, which I love The Inside Man, or just Inside Man. Highest to Lois is a great return to that. It's full of hilarious. Guess what, guys.

If you're a Celtics fan, Spike Lee still doesn't like you. And he's mean to you again. That's good. I just saw a bad Denzel Washington movie. So it'd be great to see a good one. I saw Deja Vu with my wife. It kind of, it stinks. I really wasn't into it.

It's fun because it's a Tony Scott movie and the movie looks great. But it's rock stupid. And I hate when time travel plots go awry in terms of the rules and setting up and paying things off. I just really hate when people have a time travel movie and they piss. sit down their leg. And that's the case of that with deja vu. But Denzel, in my opinion, he's like the best part of the film because he is one of the greatest living actors. And when he takes over a scene, you're like, wow, you're the greatest. But I also feel like there are choices in that film that are made because Denzel Washington had a lot of power to make a choice.

And I'll leave it at that. Otherwise, I'm about to go see an Evangelian concert in Los Angeles. The only time they've ever done an official Evangelian concert in the U.S. is going to be happening. Now, Henry's having an action-packed birthday, Labor Day weekend. out in L.A. But unfortunately, I think all of the events involved screaming. So when he comes back, he will sound like Julie Kavner. I guess listeners, check it out on, well, you'll hear, I guess in October podcast at the earliest will be one of those you'll hear. Welcome to Talking Simpsons. If I scream, I throw bloody for Yoko Shimomora, the singer of the Evangelian. She knows you forgot her name, so she's not even going to be looking at you in the audience.

Now I failed. I have failed. But I phonetically learned all of the words. to Cruel Angel Seethis. I don't know. Maybe the people around you might want to hear the singer sing the song. That's all I'm saying. No, no. I'll try my best to be like, just biting my tongue.

You can go to karaoke later. It's L.A. Honestly, my throat is too bad for karaoke now. It does too much. I can't. We're also thinking of going to Japan soon, and this is another time where my husband was like, let's just not book any karaoke.

It ruined your voice for a whole week afterwards. That's the moneymaker, Henry. We're going to have to start embracing A.I. My husband has also reminded me like, it's your income, babe. Can't scream, but yeah. We can sound too grizzled on this. Because people will go back to our old podcast and say, you guys sound like babies. Now we're like,

welcome to Talking Simpsons. I'm Bob Mackey. The vocal fry keeps increasing, like, every year. Yes. Okay. So that's what's going on in our lives. Henry, nothing about Happy Gilmore 2? I need to know about this. Okay. You know what? I'll talk about it. Happy Gilmore 2. Woof, man.

Here's the thing. If you want to watch one of these movies. Let me know. I'll pirate it for you. I don't like you clicking on that on Netflix and letting them know. I want more of this. I probably should have done that than to give to the metrics. We were like, yeah, let's do it. Let's just watch it. Like, it sucks. It's not good. I swear they reanimate some people with AI. I can't prove this. But there's some dead actors who appear on screen for a few seconds. And I'm like, that doesn't look like you paid a person to do it. Are they using existing footage? Like, what do they look like? I feel like they start from existing footage, but then they like pasted a face onto a new body.

I mean, that could just be CGI animated by a human being. Well, it feels wrong no matter what. But the biggest problem I have with the movie is that there is occasionally good jokes in it because Tim Herlihy is still a co-writer on it. And he actually is pretty funny in a couple scenes. But the biggest problem is that Adam Sandler is only friends with famous people now. And it used to be in the original Happy Gilmore, it's full of funny people who are his funny friends who aren't famous yet. And this movie has very few of those actual. funny people. There's a couple of people like, oh, you like

this new guy on S&L, now he's in this movie, or you like Eric Andre. Eric Andre has a part of this movie. In no comedy, should Bad Bunny or Travis Kelsey have more scenes than Eric Andre? I think this movie was just made so Rob Schneider can renew his health insurance through SAG, right?

At least he's barely in it, but yes. But seriously, like Bad Bunny is in much of this movie. Like Travis Kelsey, there is a scene of like, oh, Bad Bunny and Travis Kelsey share a scene together and they're the crux of your comedy. It's like, What the fuck am I watching? This is not a comedy movie now.

This is a TikTok I'm watching here. Yeah, not for me. Well, I'm glad you at least investigated. I was morbidly curious, but, you know, I don't like Happy Gilmore. I'm sorry, everybody. I did like Billy Madison, but I think a friend just hyped it up too much for me, so it could never live up to the hype. And then my wife and I watched a huge chunk of it in a hotel room.

And I was moderately enjoying it. But, you know, friend of the show, Ian Boothby, he's the man who catches a sub in his mouth. He says, hey, happy. So if you want to know the man who was on an episode Talking Simpsons or two that said, hey, happy, watch Happy Gilmore one. they did not invite Ian back for two which is why I'm boycotting the film I mean that's also very wrong of them yeah

I watched Happy Gilmore one again with my husband beforehand and I was repeating like every line to him I have many warm fuzzy memories of the first Happy Gilmore that's maybe two why I wanted to see this one other funny thing about it from a structure standpoint

as far as like Adam Sandler paying people he knows clearly when plotting the movie they thought the funniest thing is if Adam Sandler sorry if Happy Gilmore had four boys and only one girl. But if you know the real Adam Sandler, in real life, he has two daughters who he wants to have in all of his movies all the time.

Yes. Interesting. So you can see the conundrum. He, obviously, his own daughter is going to play Happy Gilmore's daughter in the movie. That's non-negotiable. But what about the other daughter? She has to be in the movie too. So he creates a secondary character has no reason to be there, who then literally in the movie says to him,

you remind me of my dad and then they like look at the camera and I was like oh fuck this they're dabbing on you they're making fun of you for clicking that thumbnail on Netflix there's they should have had adam sailor hand his daughter a check for the making of happy Gilmore too and we follow her to the bank we watch what she buys afterwards I mean the red letter media guys said this like 13 years ago they're like no Adam Sandler movies are scams like you're watching a scam on film that happens to technically be a movie but occasionally I did chuckle Tim Hurley he and Robert smigel when they're in small scenes can't not be funny even in a piece of shit sure i like those guys we don't get egot back richard keel's dead yes everybody's dead you're like it just kept seeing do you know who plays jo flaredes chari's son in the movie oh oh god no em anem okay you know when i was watching in that hotel room i was like oh jo flerity i love him and he's gone now too many people are dead in the movie and yeah god it's a mess and then Also, like, I guess the real life golfer John Daly is one of the funniest characters in it just because he's an old drunk and he's playing an old drunk, and that's the joke.

It's no, Hubey Halloween is what you're saying, right? People, I've heard Hubey Halloween actually isn't bad. Maybe I should have watched that instead of Happy Gilmore. For what I hear, it's like a Sandler multiverse story where all these characters smash into each other. Well, though, so was Happy Gilmore, too. It's full of like characters who weren't even in the first Happy Gilmore, but are played by actors who later became his friends. Steve Bussemi has a character in it The guy who's the voice of Slinky Dog

After Jim Barney He has a character in the movie That was like, wait, you weren't in the first Happy Gilmore You were in like Waterboy and now you're in this Well, we could see the rise of Little Nicky If this continues It's the only sequel left, I think, to do Who cares? I guess at least Little Nicky

Oh man But yeah, Happy Gilmore 2 Not worth the time Henry's choking on his own rage over Little Nicky Well, we have nothing to talk about this month So I at least wanted to hear about Happy Gilmore two because it seems odd to me. But I'm sure everybody who has Netflix

watched it. Sadly, I bet it got millions of views, yes, unfortunately. Well, yes, that's what's happening in our lives. Let's talk about questions and comments left on the episodes on patreon.com slash talking Simpsons. And we're going to start with Talking Simpsons, the episode Catch Em, if you can, one that we did not like. And Tyler

M says, another aspect to the triple X throwdown line that makes it even more grownworthy is that it's a reference to Baby Got Back. The line is as follows, quote, So ladies, if the butt is round and you want a triple X throwdown, dial one 900 mix-a-lot and kick them nasty thoughts. So not only was Marge referencing her own triple-d-x throw-down,

she was referencing the Sir Mixalot line, which now that we know Marge was a child of the 90s, she knows those lyrics by heart. That song was an oldie to her when she was in high school in 1998. Yes. Thank you, Tyler. You were one of many who corrected me on the triple X throwdown and me missing that, which is like I know that song all right.

I'm tired of it being in like every eighth commercial for a time. It's such an overdone comedy song. I remember that when that song was risque and I got to listen to it on the school bus. Somebody was like, you want to hear a dirty song? And then as a kid, I'm like, why do people want to look at butts? Buts are gross. That's where poop comes out of. I don't understand.

It made no sense to me as a youth. Now, of course, we all understand this. The power of butts. We were the white boys who did have to shout it eventually. Yes. Jeremy Hawkins also on Catcham said, I'd say there's actually a lot of value that a left-wing person

could get out of reading the Economist as opposed to say the local news which is right-wing news created to drive your parents crazy. The Economist is essentially one of the main channels that the ruling class uses to talk amongst itself and it's incredibly valuable

for socialist organizations or groups to know what the ruling class actually is worrying about at the moment. Ideally, you will have already read a bunch of Marxist economics and when they are reaching a conclusion that is wrong, you will actually have a good sense of what's happening. Thank you.

Yeah, we had a little sidebar about The Economist because Homer's reading it on the plane and he's like, did you know that Malaysia is at a crossroads or whatever the country was? And that it became like, it became a meme for the economist. Like they referenced it in their magazine multiple times over the last 20 years. So it turned into like a bigger thing for the Economist.

And yes, I again point listeners to the Adam Johnson and Nima Shirazi podcast citations needed, where they've talked a lot about the economists. But Jeremy has a good point that if you want to know what the evil neoliberals are saying about their evil plans, read the economists to learn about what is the acceptable, like, mass murder numbers to the centrist Democrats. I say read it at the library so you don't think of the money. Or just read it at the bookstore, rudely. Of course, on archived is pages that get around any paywall as well, too.

That too. Yeah, thank you, Jeremy. And moving on to Burns' air, Dennis Kay says, Toys is a very odd film. But what makes it stand out for me is the director deciding, quote, as much as possible in this film is going to look like a René Megritz painting come to life, unquote. It's a very unique vision, and I love it for it. Also, L.L. Cool J's line of, quote, I hate it when my food touches.

I'm a military man. I want a military meal, unquote, has taken up permanent residence in my brain. And yes, thank you, Dennis Kay. I may do a Toys rewatch this holiday season. It was one and done for me in the theater. and I really want to be transported back into the Christmas of 92 when I was a small, confused boy wondering what the hell I was watching on the screen and why they were being so mean to the video games I loved.

And then they had a video game. I say hypocrisy toys. You know, I don't think I have seen it on like Comedy Central or some cable rerun. I recall seeing it that way, but I've never watched it all start to finish. And I've only really engaged with it in a bad movie podcast content across multiple like movie podcasts making fun of it as a ridiculous film.

And like the trailer was the most I knew about the Toys franchise. Yeah, yeah. It was not a very popular film. I don't know why anyone took me to it, to be honest. Maybe it was just Robin Williams. Though I'm thankful that those great archivists on YouTube, who also saved the film version of the Simpsons T.HX trailer, also saved like a 4K of the original Toys trailer of just,

Robin Williams doing all the stand-up you expect him to do. Yes, yeah. Doing the schick that made everybody turn against him until he did like World's Greatest Dad in the last decade of his life and was trying to do some other things alongside wild hogs and old dogs and all the would-be trilogy. Yeah, he was in dogs, not hogs.

Okay, he was in dogs, not hogs. Meanwhile, our buddy Thad, who I just actually asked Thad some questions the other day because our pal Drew Mackey was trying to figure out the gayest Looney Tune ever, And the list is long. I'm like, well, basically every Looney Tune cartoon had at least one scene of like a effeminate acting character in it pretty much. Speaking of effeminate characters, they had this thing to say.

Regarding Richard Simmons, the real tragedy is the Polly Shore biopic actually forced him to plan a bit of a public comeback on Howard Stern. He had personal friendships with Gary Delabate and others. Sadly, he died after taking a fall in his house and refusing to go to the hospital. because it was his birthday. Oh, that stinks. Yeah, I mean, this is Uncle Bob saying that so many injuries happen in the house, so many fatalities happen in the house. And you don't expect to die in your own house,

so you really don't ever take it seriously. But yes, like the great comedian sketch comedy guy, Trevor Moore, he died from a fault in his house. Also, not in his house, but didn't like Bob Sagitt died from something like that? Yeah. He hit his head and then just went to bed at a hotel. Basically, yeah, he hit his head, didn't take it seriously. And then he woke up dead.

By that, I mean, he did not wake up at all. I didn't know that aspect of the Richard Simmons one, so thank you, Thad, for more sad insights into the life of Richard Simmons. That's too bad. Yeah, it really is too bad. I also wanted to we poke some fun at Bill Watterson, the great comic artist who brought us 10 years of Calvin and Hobbs, and a few people. I think we upset a few people on our Patreon, at least with that. And I think part of it was us joking about a sacred cow, which is always fun to do. You know, we're poking the bear a little bit. Often we say facetious comments that people do not read as jokes and they get a little steamed about it. But I think my point with making fun of Bill

Watterson a little bit is that he became a recluse for 30 years and because of that he made himself irrelevant and then nobody really cares about the fact that he has a new book out, which is tragic. And I really wish he would have made himself available. And I was kind of kicking it around in my head. And part of me is just the tiniest bit upset with Bill Watterson because he doesn't owe us anything. He doesn't owe us any interviews. He doesn't owe us any more comics, etc., etc. But I really wish he would have used his powers as this esteemed comic strip artists to provide like advice or a platform or to be a steward for newspaper

comics instead of just like going away to paint landscapes for 30 years. I really wish he had that platform because he had the luxury of being able to retire from being of that generation of comic artists and some part of me thinks he's kind of a crank and if you read a lot of his comments in that 10th anniversary Calvin and House book, some of them as a kid I was like oh come on dude because there's like one comment where he's like I hate all comic books they're all filth and garbage in my opinion and I was like I read comic books so I think he has some heightened opinions about things and ultimately I'm just disappointed in that he just went away again we don't deserve access to him he owes us nothing but I feel like a man of his stature and power should have been

a force for good in that newspaper comics world which only kept shrinking and shrinking and shrinking after he left and feel like maybe he could have helped in some way I don't know we didn't him to become Jim Davis or even Charles Schultz like you don't have to like do the same thing forever and merchandise the crap out of everything like and I totally understood why I didn't want to do that but you're right like he had

power he just gave up to live separate from to just be done with it but then to like he could have it maybe it worked better in the comics in the Calvin and Hobbs comics when the crank stuff he I think just truly believed was said by Calvin's dad and then made fun of it. Yes

that didn't help that didn't help but I mean I was talking it over with my wife and just going through these thoughts. And we were just discussing how he's from a generation in which the concept of selling out was real. And it was fine to believe, like, I don't want to be a sellout. Now it's like we can't just have one job. We have to keep advertising ourselves. We have to keep finding venues for income. And maybe that's not a great way to live.

It's just the state of reality. But it must be nice. That's the thought I have when he's like, I won't even sell you a Hobbs doll. Fuck you. Yes. And yes, I really envy that generation of artists and creators. because they were able to make that decision. I'm not going to sell out.

You're not going to get a cartoon. You're not going to get merchandise, et cetera, et cetera. But I feel like he should have realized that privilege and used it to help other creators. I don't know. It's very conflicting because I love him. I love his point of view and I love his comic. But ultimately, I think we were just poking this sacred cow for the sake of making some jokes out of it. We do love Bill Waterson.

It was more in fun. I also think of like, it reminds me a little of the pro wrestler CM Punk too, where basically both of them, identify what's wrong in the thing they love like in the business they love and they see the problem with it but then they kind of abdicate a responsibility to try to fix it which like look it can't be fixed

I don't expect him to fix the business either but could have done a little something when he's saying like yeah the Sunday comic page is dying and all these other things are dying it's like anyway I'm out of here see you later yeah and I feel like not to go on too long about this but the whole we're not selling out idea again

that is a luxury that a certain generation had and that we no longer have But I feel like that idea got into the brains of a lot of people our age and they still believe that. And I feel like it is holding them back where they feel like a lot of these things that are just necessary like advertising yourself. They're like, I don't want to sell out. I don't want to shill my things. But we kind of have to do that. And I often find myself pushing people of our generation to be like, no, you have to get out there.

You have to present yourself. You have to say, please buy this thing that I made. I love it. I want you to love it too, et cetera, et cetera. There's nothing shameful about that. Nobody else is going to do the advertising for you these days, unfortunately. May Bill Watterson live forever and may make more books. I do want to eventually pick up that book he put out with another creator, but hopefully that won't be the end for him.

Hopefully he won't disappear for another 30 years and release a book that I don't know anyone who's ever read or I've never heard anyone ever talk about it online, period. So moving on to Simple Simpson, Andrew Bouvier says, Bob is partially on the mark in regards to why Brussels sprouts used to be a hated vegetable. In addition to just being prepared horribly, modern Brussels sprouts are mostly all. cultivars of a single strain that was developed 30 years ago that is significantly less bitter than the Brussels sprouts that Boomers and Gen X kids would have grown up with. So in addition to better cooking methods, roast your hard vegetables people. They are literally less bitter and bad tasting. Yes, thank you, Andrew Boofia. I'm glad you had the science behind that and roast Brussels sprouts are great. I'm a big steaming guy. I bought a really nice steamer last year.

I use it constantly and just add a little seasoning to those puppies and you're good to go to make up a huge portion of your meal as just a bunch of vegetables. It's great. That is really nice. I've had roast Brussels sprouts at restaurants. I've never roast them myself. But it's funny to hear it's like, no, it literally is not the same thing that our parents or people 20 years older than us were eating when they were young. I mean, yeah, what we've done with bananas is incredible.

And corn? Oh, yeah. Wait. Bananas are just different than they were 30 years ago, right? I wouldn't say 30 years ago, but we really mutated the hell out of those bastards to the point where they are just, for some reason, bananas are. basically free now and I don't understand it like a nectarine is three dollars but a banana is like two cents and I'm wondering like how how does this make any I don't understand meanwhile I've been eating healthier this last week or two weeks I've been given myself like I've been having either a spinach or a pre made like salad every day I've been having that so the spinach how is it prepared I'm just curious as to what you're doing sometimes I just have it plain but other times I steam it or nice I don't know if I could just eat it plain spinach by itself unless I'm about to fight bluto then it's That's a different story. I mean, honestly, in my head, I am thinking like, hey, I'm like Popeye, shram, chomp on my spinach.

But the important thing is I'm getting greens in my body. That's the important part. Cody M also says on Simple Simpson, when I was a young and foolish child and still believe that there would be another Simpsons video game within my lifetime, somehow I had absolutely convinced myself that during the popularity of the Batman Arkham games, the Simpsons would release a parody game with Homer as Pie Man. I thought that since several of the other successful Simpsons games like Road Rage and Hit and Run just wholesale copied the mechanics and gameplay of hot franchises at the time,

they had to do a Pye Man Arkham. How could they not? Well, I mean, who knows what's going to happen now that Tapped Out has been sunsetted? That's still, I don't know why they let that lapse because that was a money printing machine. But yeah, Pye Man actually was a character and Tapped Out, so there was a point where you could get him. That's the only playable Pye Man content there ever was when it comes to Simpsons games. and I honestly wonder, will we see another one? The Simpsons game came just too early.

It was like three years after the episode aired because it was timed with the movie. So there's Bartman stages in the Simpsons game, but not Pie Man stages. Yeah, and honestly, Disney, they don't make their things into video games, right? We're not seeing, what's the latest Disney movie right now? There is a Tron game coming out soon, right?

From an indie dev that's time. for that upcoming Trot movie with Jared Leto. That feels like an interesting curiosity, but they're not interested in making, okay, here is the Moana 2 platformer or whatever. Like that era ended in the late odds, I think. Yeah, I have no clue what they want to do with Simpsons. I keep hoping every time we have friends like Chris Kohler

who work for Digital Eclipse that release retro game collections. And every time they tease something, I'm hopeful it's like, oh boy, did they finally get like the Simpsons Old Games collection set up? But it never, still hasn't happened. Hey, I'm available for liner notes, Chris, if you're listening. I'd love to do that. But that would imply that it's actually happening.

And I don't know how tangled all of those rights are. So moving on to Talking Futurama, we have the episode, Moby's Dick. And John Halski says, I'm not an engineer, physicist, or weapons expert. But I just do not get people seeing the hold-o maneuver in thinking, why not do that every time? It solves every problem the way a gun can always kill someone. If you aim it just right, in space. Also, you only have one bullet. And if you miss, you're dead.

actually you could be dead either way dying is kind of the best case scenario actually otherwise you're far from the battle which is probably lost now and also it only really makes sense when there are exactly two ships to think about so yes we were complaining about the Holdo maneuver being introduced and thinking why does that not solve

every problem but I guess these are valid reasons but then this also makes me think why can't we have basically robot kamikaze ships yeah with droids the millions of droids that exist in this world make a droid doing it. So take that, John Houski.

Yeah. Like, these are good points, Houski. I've heard these two is anti-Holdom. Also, I hate being an anti-Holdo maneuver guy because that is a position by bad Star Wars fans who hate The Last Jedi, which did you see the new red letter?

Yes. Yeah, it's great. You know what? I hate how poison the discourse is about The Last Jedi because it's a movie I did like in theaters. It actually made me excited for the third one. But there are parts of the movie I don't like and I could never talk about them

because I didn't want to seem like a chud online. Exactly, yeah. And the Holdo maneuver is one of them. But when you put, I still say that like, yes, the droid thing you just mentioned, or even just a, why can't you just put a hyperdrive on just the equivalent of a star of a drone in the Star Wars world and have it going to hyperdrive. And I bet if you just did 18 of those, one of those is going to hit a fucking Star Destroyer and kill a million people. And that's pretty good for a missile, I'd say. Maybe only people with purple hair can launch the Holdo maneuver. And again, it was something J.J. Abrams had to deal with in the third Disney sequel. But yeah, it's all that to say, I really did like the new Plinket review that came out. Like, yeah, I just watched it with my wife last night. Sorry to cut you off, Henry. I know you've seen a lot more of the Star Wars stuff than me. And you think it's going to be nothing but complaints. But the Plinket character through Mike basically is saying, I liked Andor. Andor is great. I just wish it wasn't a Star Wars thing. Because when they bring up Palpatine or the Death Star or whatever, you're like, oh, right. I'm kind of just watching an ad for Star Wars. It's just being presented very elegantly. but that's what's keeping me away from it actually just the idea that I love the idea of this hard sci-fi story about fascism but when they're like we have to go to Daegobah or whatever I'm like all right

it's Star Wars Yes no look when they have to go to Yavin 4 and it's like but I know those things so it's like oh I like this part but some of my favorite stuff in it is when they have to like write around like well you know in this Star Wars movie this was said about this place and so you can feel the good writers

on Andor Gore like fine One character says, oh, we can't go there because of this thing that happened in that movie anyway, and then they move on to a new place. Yeah, honestly, great video on Radler Meena, by the way. I believe it's called, like, What is Star Wars? It did leave me asking that at the end,

I still don't know, but some part of me, maybe it's because I was young, but I feel like the best time for Star Wars, for me at least, and I was not even a huge fan, was that, like, the 90s before the prequels because they're just, you're living in the era of promise. Like, there wasn't that much material to work with, and we had the idea, like,

there's going to be more of these, but until then, all of this, like, these fun video games and extended universe stuff, and now they're, like the video says, there's too much. There's too much to sift through. We were the first generation that didn't have Star Wars keep playing in theater. Because, like, Star Wars comes out in 77, and it keeps kind of staying in theaters for a while. But then by the time we're like the late 80s, it's not getting re-released in theaters. Then we get it re-released for the 20th anniversary. And yeah, there was so much promise of Star Wars being reactivated. And then I also love in the Red Lighter Media, video they are answering the question of like

how they still hate the prequels and like Red Lighter Media and Plinkett especially exists to complain about the prequels and then Plinkett had to live long enough to see all of his complaints about the prequels addressed in movies he hates more than the prequel. Yes, yeah. I mean this is stealing a line from Chris Cabin but

essentially the third movie of the last trilogy is essentially customer service. They're like, we've heard your complaints, we're addressing all of them and it's the last movie you ever want to see. That's what it feels like a lot of this content is like we've listened to the fans And we're trying to, you know, get a group together to placate them as much as possible. But it makes for not interesting art.

It makes you nostalgic for a time when George Lucas instead said, I think Jar Jar Binks is good and I don't need to customer service test this with you people. I'm giving you Jar Jar Binks and you're going to like it. And he brought so much joy to us, at least in terms of making fun of him. I posted that. The last thing about Star Wars for a second is that ILM doc, I don't like when Yoda has a lightsaber fight. But I learned from the ILM doc that the actor who played Jar Jar Binks

showed his anime collection to the animator of Yoda to tell him like, he needs to move like this. And I know he showed him Ninja Scroll. I'm certain. It's Ahmed Best. I assume like a Gen X guy like him, he probably had Ninja Scroll at the ready. The only clip they show in the movie when they're saying anime is they pulled up a scene

from Shar's counterattack, which he very well could have showed him that too. but I think they pulled it out because Gundams have lightsaber. They call them beam swords, but they're lightsabers. And they wanted to show like, oh, look, see, lightsabers. This is what they weren't influenced by. Anyways, okay, hey, a different star thing to talk about. Joe Moore says, I just

finished watching all of Star Trek Enterprise for the first time, thanks to the fantastic Star Trek, the next conversation podcasts. Like most Star Trek shows, the first season is a struggle, but you need to watch for later context. There's a long, serialized arc that follows, and then some

decent one-off episodes with good character moments. As someone who originally gave up watching during season one when it first aired, I'm glad I went back. It was filmed in HD widescreen too, so it has a more modern look but with early 2000s politics, a weird blend for sure. It did

strike me as a fairly interesting show especially when it was made and what they were trying to say with it, but ultimately Enterprise, the baccula presence is too distracting for me. And maybe now I'm further enough away from it, but I saw him, I'm like, no, you're quantum leap guy. What are you doing on this ship. Did you leap into this body?

I feel like I need to watch all a Voyager before, because I watched all the next gen and, or most of NextGen in Deep Space 9 when it was new, but then I fell off a Voyager. So I still feel like I need to watch all a Voyager before I can do Enterprise. Though also, I should really just watch all of Picard Season 3. I watched the first two episodes

with my mom because she loved TNG and I was like, I've heard we can just skip to season 3. Honestly, I should just watch it all with her. Yeah, that's what Nina tells me, season 3. She told me, watch it with your mom specifically, but outside of that she said you can just skip the season three we all know seasons one and two or not what really anyone wanted uh season three is just like just give me the the reunion please yeah pay everybody stop being cheap and only paying one guy so up next we have what a cartoon the episode of superman

the anime series of late mr kent i got to say we had a real summer of superheroes and i'm so burned out on superheroes because we had like the fantastic four at superman what a cartoons and then discussions about the new fantastic four in superman movies oh and pie man and pie man too so I feel like I'm hearing about superheroes constantly, but I'm happy to get into Slayers next because it's time to go back to 90s anime. They're all wearing capes, by the way. So if you want superheroes,

they're kind of superheroes in a way on Slayers. But moving on, we have Andrew Giacetti, who says, For what it's worth, which may not be much, a lot of us were really mad about the death penalty thing, but were shouted down in the wave of vote blue no matter who. To be clear, it wasn't a don't vote for them anger, but pointing out to the extent to which the Dems were going right at the expense of their base before the end.

election. And for some more context, the podcast kind of undersells how baffling it was for the Dems to be silent on the death penalty. And it was the entire Dems, not just the candidate. The DNC dropped it as part of their platform for the first time since 2004. And yes, thank you, Andrew. We are bringing up just the modern state of the death penalty. This is a very capital punishment focused episode, rather. And we were expressing our disappointment that that was off of the DNC talking points for the first time in a long time. And to see them drop that really signifies just how far the right they're sliding. And it's very disappointing.

As someone who did believe in Democrat candidates at one point in their life. There were other parts of their platform. I wasn't a fan of in 2024. But I had honestly had forgotten the same bit of like, oh, right, they got rid of the state general. And as I recall, it's

not even like you heard the candidates like Hillary Clinton was not saying and I'm going to abolish the death penalty. But it was the very least like, if you asked somebody, well, are they going to get rid of the death penalty, they'd say, uh, look at their platform. Why don't you go to their website? To even remove that much of it sucked. Yeah, there's a lot of cowardice on display. I don't want to relitigate the 2024 election because we're already religating 2020 and 2016 so often. But

the Kamala Harris statement about trans people, like, I think they should follow the law or whatever that was, the non-statement. I just thought, man, I wish you had anything to say. It was just, again, really, really disappointing for someone, one of the most important elections of our lifetime, as the last two have been as well, just be like, I got nothing. I do feel a general, and to go back to Andrew's comment, like removing that and being disappointed at Dems, it's like, they want to appeal to the middle of the road person is how it's presented as, but it's like, I think your regular voter who doesn't follow it too closely, they can tell when you don't believe in anything. And that all, like, so if you just waffle on everything or just let it go, like, well, what do you want me to believe it, person I imagine? It's like, they know you're fucking fake. I hate you. Fortunately, we have to cover these modern-day political things when we talk about these issues because it would seem like we were ignoring them completely if we weren't.

And the reason why these episodes are so great is because they touch on these things that are unfortunately still relevant. Dennis Kay also talked about some recent stuff in their reply. In regards to the recent Superman movie, I didn't at all take the abundance of characters as a cynical Marvel Studios-type way of setting up multiple spin-offs. It reminded me of the experience of picking up my first Superman comic, which happened to be the Death of Superman Collection, in which the Justice League of America filled with characters I had never heard of

at the time, such as Guy Gardner, booster gold, blue beetle, fire, ice, maxima, and Bloodwind played a key role in that story. There's nothing inherently wrong within Media Rez storytelling. Well, I think I would be confused, but I'm not sure if I'm the audience for this film in particular. I remember that's so funny.

Dennis, thank you for bringing that up, because Death of Superman collection was one of my first times reading regular weekly Superman comics. And the Justice League appearing in it and getting their butts kicked by Doomsday was also them trying to sell Justice League comics. Like they appear in it to introduce new readers to the Justice League. And part of it is like, what's the secret of Bloodwind? Like you're supposed to read more comics to learn. Bloodwind is secretly somebody else. I see.

Oh, spoiler, it's the Martian Manhunter. See, this is all news to me. I did not receive my latest Martian Manhunter update in my inbox. So yes, thank you, Dennis Kay. I understand there is some appeal to this. And I'm a big fan of IndMedia's Riz storytelling. All throughout this summer in our What a Cartoon movie, I'm like, cut out the first 10 minutes.

I don't need this. That's true. And you know what? I warmed up to it a little more, actually, having watched just last night, the season premiere of Peace Maker Season 2. And because it's several characters who appeared in the Superman film, appear in that and are very funny and it's just I like them being like

oh these people are just like constants of the DCU and here they are so hey thumbs up to that so moving on to our what a cartoon movie episode for Atlantis the Lost Empire and Jacob Vassar says incredible timing boys my local rep theater is showing Atlantis currently as part

of a summer retro escapism film series I caught it on Saturday and it was honestly amazing to see with a big crowd on a big screen so tragic that didn't get to stick around very long at all in the format it was finally tuned to be seen in at the time of its release. The spectacle really works in that context and the awe of the swooping camera shot, showing the vast Atlantis Kingdom matches the awe I felt seeing what this amazing

2D, 3D hybrid technology with deep canvas could make possible. And for that implementation to be basically gone, like the forgotten civilization of Atlantis, added a lot of resonance I was not prepared to be hit with, even teared up a little over it. Welcome to the kingdom of 2D animation. That has to be really nice. see it in theaters when we did now when we did atlantis and i was watching it on my screen i was like man this probably looked pretty amazing in theaters i took it so for granted that i never even considered seeing it when it was in movie theaters in the year 2001 yeah it's funny the theater

experience can really add a lot this is obvious but to me i'm often surprised by it where i just saw terminator two for the first time in a theater i've obviously seen it before i grew up with it might be the first r-rated movie i ever watched at home and you know i honestly think in my heart, I'm like, oh, I'm a Terminator one fan. I might like that more than the second one. But then when I see the second one in a theater with a crowd, I'm like, well, I kind of think this is the better movie. And I'm a T2 guy. Maybe the theater experience pushed me to that. But I feel like, yeah, that can change your opinion about a movie. I think seeing things in the theater, you laugh at things or you realize something's a joke for a crowd, not just for one person at home. And it changes. Like, that's how I've seen those Kurosawa films, the same in a theater. Going experience with a packed house was different than alone. Yeah, Terminator 1, a horror movie, obviously, but I don't think I realize Terminator 2 is kind of a comedy until I saw it with a crowd where like everything Arnold says gets a laugh. There are so many moments that get a laugh. I'm like, man, James Cameron, you're calculating bastard. You knew exactly what you were doing.

This is the most crowd-pleasing movie ever made. Even the T-1,000 gets so many jokes, like the, uh-uh, uh-uh, finger move. Oh, it's so good. Also, in that ILM doc, it gave me new respect for Robert Patrick. They show how they did it. and for one of the special effects for him walking through the fire and reforming he basically had to be

almost totally naked like just a tiny pair of white underwear then walk down the street in broad daylight with lines painted on him and be filmed doing that and he did it like I was so impressed it's so funny like the attraction in 1991 was the CGI you've never seen anything like that before

today obviously it's a little creaky you're thinking of Pepsi Man whenever he becomes liquid metal And now I feel like in 2025, the real attraction is all of the practical effects, all of the stunts, all of the cars. There are so many chases, so many cars exploding, so many cars flipping, helicopters crashing, guns tearing things apart. The practical stuff now, I feel like, man, impossible today. This would never, ever happen today. Alex Irish says, what I enjoy best about Atlantis is what a character animatory movie it is. Every member of the team has terrific character acting with specific ticks and nuances that make them memorable.

Special shout out to Russ Edmonds, who led the animation for Vinny and Sean Keller, who led Cookie and Preston Whitmore. And of course, John Pomeroy is the star of the show with Milo's terrific acting that matches Michael J. Fox's performance. Yeah, and actually, just on Blue Sky or Twitter, maybe I saw a John Pomeroy clip, and it was from his work on the Don Bluth video game Dragon. layer. And I was like, oh, man, he is so good. And he was doing it all the way back then, too, because he was a bluth guy. You know, now that you mentioned that, yeah, the movement on Milo is a little bluthy in a good way of the bluth style, like the movement of the mouth, the popping of things. I think on the episode, I did mention I looked up a Pomeroy video. He has, I think, his own YouTube channel, but he's like, here's how to draw Fival. Here's how to draw Milo. Like, he talks a little

about his work there. But I also appreciate Alex. Yes, the shout out to people like Sean Keller and Russ Edmonds who did it. It's a great, there's so much great character animation in it. And moving on for our last little discussion here. Talking to the Hill to kill a ladybird and Andrew Bouvier says, To expound further on rabies, it is the only

non-Pryon disease on the planet with a 100% mortality rate. There is a no longer used method called the Milwaukee Protocol that involved an induced coma and a plethora of drugs including ketamine, but it didn't have a high success rate after its initial success with a young girl around 20 years ago, so

is not recommended as a treatment anymore. Once rabies symptoms of any kind of peer, the first is typically numbness or a tingling near where you were bit, it is too late for the vaccine and you will die. So Andrew's comment goes on a bit longer after this on the Patreon with more rabies information,

but yes, if like a bad bites you, get the fuck to a hospital. Rabies sounds terrifying, everybody. It really scared me about rabies, these things. I did take it for granted just to like, well, you get a couple shots, or we must have like solved rabies by now.

It's not a problem. then to learn, like, no, it is still. Like, I had the same shocking revelation that Dale has in the episode. Like, are you able to live a life with rabies? Scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, no. Joe Hodgson, as our final comment here on the same episode, my grandfather shared the tidbit with me years ago that he had a pet raccoon as a kid for a short time. It would have been in the 40s, and sadly, I can't recall the circumstances that brought the critter into his home,

and he's no longer around for me to ask, but it was a thing that happened. He said he was great, got along with a cat and dog, and pretty much acted like a cat as well. The one notable thing he could recall is that the raccoon would steal food from the dog and cat and hide it, and only when they weren't around with the raccoon, retrieve it and consume it. He had the raccoon until it died and never befriended another one as far as I know. I feel like raccoon's probably a little smarter than dogs, and they have those little hands. And I've noticed that whenever an animal is smarter than another one, you see a complete lack of respect from the smarter animal, like with my parrots.

You could tell he just hated the cats I lived with occasionally. Like, you're stupid and I'm going to watch you die. I'll live for a thousand years. What do you got, 15? Damn. I understand. Also, cats are jerks. I can understand why a bird would be like,

though this sounds like Tweety Bird versus Sylvester situation. It's true. The cats were just terrified of him. They would come up close with like a trembling paw. Like, can I touch it? And he would just say, get out of here. And they'd run. They'd bolt out of the room.

I mean, that's adorable with that. raccoon thing. You know, when we were talking about raccoons' pets in that episode and how, like, you mainly see them just on social media, I totally forgot to even mention that one of my favorite, like, adorable videos online was when I think it's like at a zoo, but a raccoon gets a piece of cotton candy and then washes it to get it clean, but it vanishes and he doesn't know what's going on. Yes, it's like, my food betrayed me. I love this fact that in the Japanese language, a raccoon is translated into washing bear because they're little bears that dip their food in water. That is adorable. I didn't know this. That hasn't come up in my language training app. Duolingo is not teaching me about any animals. I only know through like context of hearing anime and hearing like neko. I've learned Yagi and Kamo. I've learned that. Godin duck, but not raccoon. I know specifically the African gray parrot is Yolmu, which means western parrot. Oh, that's fun. Oh, and Zoe. Well, actually, I knew Zoe was elephant already because it's a plot point in one piece.

I see. Well, everybody, you got a free Japanese lesson and you didn't have to pay any extra for it. So cancel your duolingo. We'll teach you five new words every talk to the audience. At least because we're that big of weaves. Yes, yes. But that is another episode of Talk to the Audience. Thank you so much for listening. And Bill Watterson, we're extending the Olive Branch.

If you want a guest on our show, we know you're a listener. You know you're probably always listening to a podcast. You're probably always on the computer. Definitely hit us up because we'll have you on. We'll talk about The Simpsons. I'm sure you love The Simpsons, too. Oh, God. I mean, all of the merchandising of the Simpsons is just the kind of thing you love, too.

And same with like, you love people. who remember all the toy cartoons of the 80s and oh man me with my love of comic books i'm sure he loves that talk about spider-man i feel like it'll be like when the mac grating met charles shultz he has told that story on a commentary and charles shultz was like did not seem impressed he seemed a little annoyed like oh you're that guy huh right that's rough that has to be tough but yes enough about bill waters still talk about us lots of stuff happening in september again we put together like a three plus hour episode of talking to the hill if you're on the free feed you're going to get a little sample of that. We recommend you sign up to hear the whole series on our Patreon, but also

we're dipping back into anime for the first time in a long time. It's going to be a very long episode about the classic 90s anime Slayers. And we're getting away from Disney for the time being and covering the Lego movies. So much great stuff happening in September. We can't wait for you to hear all of it. And we've got some really cool guests coming around too on Talking Simpsons. So stay tuned there too and some cool stuff. You know, we're reaching the end of the season. We've got some neat stuff coming up there too. Absolutely. So thanks for listening everybody. And thanks for being patrons if you're a patron and we'll see you next week for another episode of Talking Simpsons and next month for another talk to the audience and we'll see you then