The Bechdel Cast - Ex Machina with Olivia Gatwood

Episode Date: August 1, 2024

On this episode, sexy lady robots Caitlin, Jamie, and special guest Olivia Gatwood discuss Ex Machina.  Follow Olivia on Instagram at @oliviagatwood and buy her book 'Whoever You Are, Honey' at https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/653524/whoever-you-are-honey-by-olivia-gatwood/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey everyone, it's Katie Couric. Well, the election is in the homestretch, right in time for a new season of my podcast, Next Question, starting October 3rd. I'm bringing in some FOKs, friends of Katie's, to help me out, like Ezra Klein, Jen Psaki, Astead Herndon, Karl Rove, and David Axelrod. But we're also gonna have some fun,

thanks to some of my friends like Samantha Bee and Charlemagne the God. We're gonna take some viewer questions Thank you. podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearths the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Back in 1969, four young musicians from Texas available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. in a new podcast. All episodes are available now. Listen to the true story of the fake zombies on America's number one podcast network, iHeart.

Open your free iHeart app and search true story of the fake zombies and start listening. On the Bechdel cast, the questions asked, if movies have women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism

the patriarchy's effing vast start changing it with the bechdel cast it's caitlin and jamie session one who's who am i the sexy robot i mean clearly you've chosen i I mean, well, I'm the sexy robot. I don't know. Are you? Yes. And I have awareness. I think. I don't know. That's your job to figure out. God.

I mean, truly in the scene where Domhnall Gleeson needs to decide if he's a good person and is like, um, yeah. I was like, oh, fuck. I would do that. Like, um, basically, um, yeah, I'm like kind of low-key an orphan. So I'm probably a good person. Like he, I love his damn bowl cut in this movie. Anyways, I'll be Caleb.

Okay. You be sexy robot. You look more like Alicia Vikander, honestly. Oh my gosh. Thank you so much. I'm just stating facts here. And I'm as tall as Domhnall Gleeson. We're both so big. Yeah. So, Caitlyn Jamie, session one. And can't wait to see how this culminates, you know? Yeah. I'm just going to hit on you and say you passed the Turing test.

Oh my gosh. And then I'm going to trick you and leave you to rot. And you're right to do it. And you're right to do it. And here we are. This is the Bechdel cast. My name's Jamie Loftus, aka The Tester. And my name is Caitlin Durante, a.k.a. The Sexy Robot. Yeah. And this is the podcast where each and every week we take one of your favorite movies and look at it from an intersectional feminist lens. And this is not just an episode that we have gotten requests for for many, many years, but also one of our famous cursed episodes.

This has only happened in the eight years we've been on air and counted on one hand, where we actually did record an episode about this very movie two years ago. And the audio on my end, it was unusable and we didn't release it. Yeah. But we're back doing it again. I always do feel like it's meant to be and shout out to Alyssa Nutting, who was on the first run of this episode. No one's fault. But I do always feel like anytime there's a lost episode, the eventual guest, it's just meant to be. And today, it feels very much the case.

So it's our ex machina episode of the Bechtel cast. That's right. And our guest is a writer based in California. She's got books of poems. Her first novel, Whoever You Are, Honey, just came out. She's the co-host of Say More podcast with friend of the cast, Melissa Lozada Oliva. It's Olivia Gatwood. Hello.

Hi. Hi, everyone. Welcome. Thanks for having me. Welcome. Thanks. It's session one for you. Yeah, I'm so nervous.

Yeah, the tables have turned. Now Caitlin and I are a two-headed Caleb. Does that mean I'm the sexy robot? Yeah. Yes. Congratulations. Okay, I get to shut off the power. Oh, no. The recording is lost. That's what happened last time. Yeah, that's so what happened i think we joked about that at the time where it was like ava was not pleased with my takes and she

yeah just shut it all down she did i hope she'll be pleased because it is interesting like this is a movie that i feel like every time i watch it i always really like it but it's i feel like every time I watch it, I always really like it, but I feel like it's hard to watch this movie the same way twice, or at least I've found that to be true. Yeah, I feel like, especially as time goes on, as technology gets more advanced, the movie just ages in really weird ways.

But anyway, yeah. Yeah. It is interesting because we originally recorded, before Ava sabotaged me, we recorded an episode on this movie in summer 2022 when AI felt more like a nebulous thing. And now it like, you know, in the ensuing two years has become a real and present threat to almost any industry in an immediate way. Like we've all gone on strikes about it. Like, it's just it's interesting looking back in my original notes like what a vague threat it was and now being like oh no this is actually it's here and it it did come for my job it's not good at it thankfully yet yeah it's

really bad it's so bad like ava cannot bullshit the way that we can bullshit so far, but let her cook. We don't know. Yeah. So on that note, I mean, Olivia, what is your relationship to this movie? Okay. So I saw, I went to see this movie in theaters when it came out, which was, I think was this 2014, 10 years ago or something like that. Yeah.

Yeah. And it was a really bizarre experience because I was like in my early 20s in college, I had just moved away from home. I'd moved from New Mexico to New York. And I was like in this big moment of looking at my past and looking at my identity in these new critical ways, as one does when they go off to college. But I was like, you know, analyzing all of my relationships with men, my relationship with myself. And it was really bizarre because I watched this movie and I walked away from it feeling this incredible closeness to this robot in a way I hadn't really anticipated. Like I watched it and was like, I am her, she is me.

And I couldn't identify it. And it felt really profound when I was 22. But I think what I learned from it was that I felt at that point, my entire identity had been built and created by men. And it sent me on this very long journey that I'm still on of gradually undoing the many like pieces of fabric of myself that feel sewn by someone else. So that was sort of my initial experience. And then I've just watched it like every two years since then to just check in, to just check in on how it's doing. Yeah, It is truly like the Turing test of where you're at with anything the movie is exploring.

The older this movie gets, the more I'm like, everyone should watch this movie every couple years. If only as like a yardstick for their own growth. Absolutely. Caitlin, what's your history? I don't think I saw this movie in theaters, but I saw it within a year or two of it coming out. There was a lot of hype around it. And I'm someone who if I hear about hype about a movie specifically, I'm like, I have to see it. I have to be a part of the conversation.

I can't be left out. Caitlin's a hype man. I just have a lot of FOMO is what it is. It's not about the hype so much. It's about I want to be a part of the conversation. Your finger's on the pulse. You see every movie that comes out and that's just a fact. Pretty much, except I still haven't seen Bike Riders.

Oh, my God. But otherwise, I've seen every movie. What is Bike Riders? Exactly. What is bike riders? Exactly. What is bike riders? Oh gosh. It is what it sounds like. I think,

unless there's some sort of twist in the bike riders where they're not riding bikes. I did just watch a documentary about Lance Armstrong today. It's the other kind of bike. It's the motor bike. Oh, okay. They're motorcycle boys.

And Tom Hardy's there tom hardy's there austin butler's there and that's really all i know about it oh and jody comer's there i love jody comer yeah i recently had a conversation with someone for my other podcast where it was like a really interesting conversation but by far the most shocking and random thing the person told me was that they love and forgive Lance Armstrong and it was like it just I don't know I haven't thought about the Lance Armstrong scandal in a long time but it was just like so unrelated to what we were talking about but he felt it so strongly and I was like I have to like I'm not gonna cut this out of the tape because clearly he needed to let me know. And it's going to become a very important part of the discourse

because of this docu-series, but also I just finished it. And I was literally being like, okay, whatever you do, Olivia, just don't bring up Lance Armstrong on this podcast. Do not do it. And then I did it in the first five minutes. So it's clearly impactful. He's on the tip of everyone's tongue. Wait, where is this? Now, all of a sudden, this is a promotional for this. Is it like on HBO? Where is it? It's on Netflix. It's two. It's a two part thing. They're each an hour and a half. It goes into everything. I personally don't love and forgive Lance Armstrong. I don't think I do either. Yeah, I'm not like particularly angry at him,

but I think he's, I don't know. He's just like a deeply disturbed person, I think. And I think he battles with that, but I don't know. I just don't feel love and forgiveness towards him, I suppose. I feel a bit scared of him, I think. It's weird, like the intimate connection you feel with someone having bought their bracelet at 11 years old like yeah that was ultimately the thing where it's like

I trusted you yeah yeah I think that's what it was okay and then I'll stop I promise I'll stop but I I think what it was was that it's the depth of the lie because everyone in the sport was doping so it's not that he doped it was the depth with which he got angry about people accusing him it was like suing people slandering people it was that aggression that i think is pretty hard to see and then be like i forgive forgive you, you know? Right. Yeah, because it's pretty intense. Man, I've got to watch it. I mean, connecting it back to the movie, he lied. And then there's that part where Ava's like, he's not your friend.

Nathan lies. He lies about everything. Nathan. So there you go. And Oscar Isaac is a bit of a Lance Armstrong. They are certainly cut from the same cloth. There's a type. Anyway, so I saw the movie.

Oh, right. Sorry. Probably like 2015 or so. And I thought it was really well done. I thought it was cool production design. I thought it was cool production design. I don't think I saw it again after that, though, until we recorded the episode that is lost forever. You watched it two years ago, for sure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

I don't know. It's it's a little too it's not a romp. So certainly not. I usually don't go back and revisit movies that are not romps. But I think it's a good movie and I think it's going to generate a fascinating discussion among us. It's an awesome movie for this specific podcast. There's no denying it. Absolutely.

I did not see this movie in theaters for the first time, because as an AMC Stubbs member, they re-released a lot of A24 movies in theaters for like one or two days only in the last couple of months. And I was fortunately free the day Ex Machina was screening. And so I got to see it in a theater for the first time I mean I think I've probably seen this movie five times now maybe more but Olivia similar deal like where it's like every couple years I'll re-watch this movie and I really like it Alex Garland on the whole I actually don't really know because I did not see Men or Civil War I like Denialation but Ex Machina I mean it's like definitely my favorite of his that I've seen so far and I don't know I had in my notes from two years ago and I

was like wow good for her that's funny I had it as like alternate title My Weekend with Elon and that is true yeah but I think this movie is like really good. It's really good. I feel a little differently about it every time I watch it. And so this is the encapsulation of how I felt about it on this watch. But similar to you, Olivia, mean, the connection to Ava, and I know this is like so in conversation with your novel. Like the first time I watched this movie, I don't know if I said this in our original version of the episode. The first time I watched this movie, I fell for it. I fell for everything it was possible to fall for. Totally. Which I think is why I rewatch it so much, because when you rewatch it, I don't know if it's like, I mean, it's partially that I'm rewatching it and partially that I am 10 years older than when I first saw it. And as time goes on, you know, originally I was shocked at the ending and really intrigued and like, oh, now I for real love Ava, you know, when you see what she does at the end of this movie, but I was genuinely shocked and pulled in by all of the choices this movie is making to convince you that Caleb is a good guy. And now it's like looking back on my first viewing, it's almost like a little bit embarrassing to be like, whatever, 22 year old me was too drawn in by the good guy aesthetic of caleb's character to realize that he never considered taking kyoko with him so he's a bad guy like right and it just like grows with you in the way that

good movies do and i'm really excited to talk about it same yeah let's take a quick break and then we'll come back for the recap. right in time for a new season of my podcast, Next Question, starting October 3rd. This podcast is for people like me who need a little perspective and insight. I'm bringing in some FOKs, friends of Katie's, to help me out, like Ezra Klein, Van Jones, Jen Psaki, Astead Herndon, and political strategists like Karl Rove and David Axelrod. But we're also going to have some fun, even though these days fun and politics seems like an oxymoron. But we'll do that thanks to some of my friends like Samantha Bee, Roy Wood Jr., and Charlemagne the God.

We're going to take some viewer questions as well. I mean, isn't that what democracy is all about? Power to the podcast for the people. So whether you're obsessed with the news or just trying to figure out what's going on, this season of Next Question is for you. Check out our new season of Next Question with me, Katie Couric, starting October 3rd on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhearts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption

that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. I've been thinking about you.

I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. One session, 24 hours. BPM 110, 120.

She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine is approved and everything?

You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. And here's the story of Ex Machina. We meet Caleb Smith, played by Domnag He has just received news that he won something, which turns out to be a weekend getaway with his boss,

who is an uber rich tech mogul who we will find out created a company called Blue Book, which is basically Google. I'm almost certain this is the first movie I saw Oscar Isaac in. I think that's true for me, too. Maybe me, too. Yeah. What a strong debut. I know that I I'm pretty sure if I'm remembering correctly, I had seen Domhnall Gleeson before in an episode of Black Mirror, which you could argue this movie is a very long episode of Black Mirror. True. Yeah. And they love guys like that for Black Mirror. They just love guys like that.

I don't know why. His eyes are a little too far apart. And they're like, yes, we're going to light him in aggressively blue lighting and it'll be haunting. And Oscar Isaac just has incredible range. Like seeing this as his first and then seeing kind of who he is and what he can do.

I mean, I think it kicked off like my deep parasocial romance with him. Absolutely. Right there with you. Right there with you. He is a star. And like, God, he's so evil, but he's so hot in this movie. It's really amazing.

Ridiculous. Yeah, the merging of those two things. I will say, I had a conversation with my friend once who builds self-driving cars. And he was explaining to me the difference between an engineer and a founder and how they're two very different personalities in the tech world. And he said that one of his qualms with this movie was that Oscar Isaac is much more of a founder, which he is in the movie, but he's much more of a founder than like a coder. Like those are two different things. That's fascinating. So it's like the jobs versus the Wozniak kind of deal. Yeah. Yeah. And

that like this guy wouldn't be like living in the middle of nowhere remotely, like he would be somewhere very forward facing. So I thought that was interesting, but I still deeply love the character. That is kind of fascinating to me. It's like, I guess I over the many viewings of this have like filled in the blanks of my mind to my own satisfaction of like, why would someone with this much raw charisma choose to live in the woods? Yeah. And then sometimes I'm like, well, a lot of times, like maybe more often than not, people with charisma are very insecure. Maybe he's leaning into it. But yeah, that I've never heard that like that clear of a delineation.

And that makes sense. Yeah. And he's not into it. But yeah, I've never heard that clear of a delineation, and that makes sense. Yeah. And he's not alone. No. Well, he's surrounded himself with many sex bots of his own creation. Yes, his girlies. His girlies. His girls are there.

Yeah, he's grew. These are his girls. He is Gru. Okay. So Caleb is delivered via helicopter to his boss's very large, very remote estate slash research facility. I guess I was thinking like, oh, he probably doesn't live there full time. He probably just like goes there when he needs to like think and make other sex spots. See, I love that everyone has their version of like, how does this hot guy who's good at talking to people? Why is he here? Everyone's like, if we were in a relationship, he would come to see me. I think everyone's just writing this story in their head.

He would definitely fly to L.A. and hang out and then he would have to go sometimes and that would be OK. I mean, he has to work. That's fine. Yeah. And when he was away, he would be doing normal stuff. Right. And he built me a replica of himself that I get to hang out with when he's off doing other stuff. Anyway, so we're at this very remote place. Caleb arrives and enters this place that belongs to Nathan, played by Oscar Isaac, who he meets shortly thereafter. Nathan explains that in this house, some rooms are open, others are off limit.

And a key card that has been issued to Caleb will let him know which rooms he does and does not have access to. This trope, I know, goes back probably centuries. But I always think of it as like Beauty and the Beast, the West Wing. Like, you will not go to the West Wing because that's where the thing is. And yeah, you're like, oh, he's, you know, the beasting. Yeah, exactly. And then he's like, but this huge library, you can go to it as much as you want. Yeah.

I do feel like in some ways, yeah, Caleb and Nathan, at least on on the surface are kind of beauty and the beast coated this outsider enters the castle and you can only go to certain sections oh you're right and the other inhabitants aren't what you think they are yeah i guess it's kind of a reverse where like you think they're people but they're not but it's it's flipped in the other one yeah anyway so nathan then makes caleb sign a pretty ominous non-disclosure agreement 50 shades of gray vibes yes very much you will be on birth control yeah god i feel like i wiped that from my mind but he does say that yeah he truly does and then nathan tells caleb that he has developed ai and he wants caleb to help him test it via the turing test which is not a test where two people of a marginalized gender speak to each other about

something other than a man. It is instead, it's a different test. The Turing test is passed when a human interacts with a computer, but they don't know that they're interacting with a computer because the computer's AI is advanced enough that it seems human. Right. And that's the funniest part is like that the people in this movie are also not doing the Turing test. They're doing a secret third thing. Like they're not doing the Bechdel or the Turing test. They're just doing Oscar Isaac's little idea. Well, because he's like the Turing test isn't advanced enough for me. Like he's like, I would, if this was about that, you would have fallen for it already.

So you see the computer. He's like, this is the 4D chess version of the Turing test. This is the Nathan test. test on turns out to be ava played by alicia vikander who is visibly a robot but she has a womanish form a very lifelike human face a female sounding voice she is a lady robot basically alicia vikander is so good in this movie she's amazing so good and she and caleb meet and chat for a bit as nathan observes via monitors from another room they have their like first session together and then, the two men talk about how awesome Ava is, which something, something, the reverse Bechdel test. I don't know if that means they failed it or they passed it because I keep forgetting what the reverse Bechdel test is. Right. And that connects to like how you perceive Ava.

Right. Yes. And we'll talk a lot about that. Yeah. But that night, Caleb can't sleep. So he turns on the TV and sees what appears to be live footage of Ava sitting at a desk or something. It's weird. But then there's a power outage and Caleb is temporarily trapped in his room. The power comes back on. He finds Nathan, who is drunk. It's established that Nathan drinks a lot of alcohol throughout the movie. He is mostly drinking light beer and not to be like... I know.

Not to like stress test someone's alcoholism or anything like that. But it's like he's like, I drink four light beers and I can't stand up. And then he's like wasted. I know. And he never really drinks anything harder than that. I'm like, he's got to be putting them back with the condition he's in. Just speaking as a member of the Irish American community, I have questions. Like, four cores light and you don't know if you have your ID or not?

Buddy. Yeah. Maybe he's drinking more than we see. There's also a few scenes where he's drinking what appears to be. Because he's taking a lot of shots. Yeah, he's doing vodka or some clear. I just love this scene where it's like he's at his lowest and he's next to like four quartz light. And you're like, yeah, if that's your lowest, you can be healed.

Yeah. I could fix you. I could fix you. Well, here's my theory. Kyoko had come and cleaned up other bottles that he had drank earlier. That's my theory. She kind of erases the proof yeah because she's always cleaning up after him he has clearly programmed her to be his maid in addition to his sex bot

which the first time i saw this movie i did not know she was a robot me too that's another thing i fell for that now i'm like why did did I fall? She's so obviously a robot. But I really did not know that. And I was like on the second viewing and I wonder, we'll never know. But in the first, like, I feel like I would try to obfuscate that in subsequent viewings. Because it is so obvious where it's just like, oh, this woman I see who is always paying attention, but also has this bizarre 40-yard stare. I wonder if she's a robot. Like, come on.

I'm glad we all fell for it, honestly. It puts me at ease. So Nathan's like, don't even worry about the power outages, whatever. The point is here that things are starting to feel weird. And then the next morning, a sexy woman comes into Caleb's room and brings a tray of food. We will learn that this is Kyoko. Meanwhile, us 10 years ago, we're like, hmm, that's weird. I wonder what she's like. We're like, oh, sexy woman. Yeah. What is this real human person all about? Anyway, Kyoko is played by Sonoya Mizuno.

She brings this tray of food to Caleb. Then Caleb has another session with Ava, where she wants to know more about him this time, because he had previously asked her a bunch of questions. And during their session, there's another power outage. And Ava is like, by the way, Nathan is not your friend. He lies a lot. He cannot be trusted. And Caleb is like, what? What do you mean? What's going on? Later that night at dinner kyoko comes back she is serving nathan and caleb nathan makes a remark that she doesn't speak any english he also berates her because she spills wine so we get a glimpse of how nathan treats women or people who we perceive as human women right it is fascinating because it's like we will never know because of spoiler alert what happens to Nathan but how Nathan treats women who

he has to respect or like that how Nathan treats women outside of this environment, I guess I'll say. We'll never know. I suspect it would be different. I just would be so fascinated and not encouraging anyone to make a sequel to a movie. Make no mistake. But like, I would be so interested to just know how Nathan treats people outside of this environment. And like, is he less arrogant or more so like i don't know there's so many flavors of this kind of like tech guy personality but you only really get a sample size of how he treats one person who he knows to be a human but as we sort of later learn he is evaluated to not really

be a human based on his life right Right. Yeah, we need like a tell-all from Nathan's college ex-girlfriend, you know, like an Andrew Huberman. We need an Andrew Huberman moment for Nathan. We just need the girlies to come together and talk about it. People are so judgmental and horrible when someone's ex-girlfriend sells a tell-all memoir but they are critical historical documents oh huge yeah hugely important yeah yeah that was one of my critiques about the lance armstrong documentary is they did not ask his girlfriends enough questions really oh yeah i wondered that when it came out i was like what did cheryl crow know and nobody still still nobody asks what Sheryl Crow knew.

You know, like, because you have to know that your partner's, like, hyped up on steroids. But nobody asks. See, this is fascinating because I watched the Sheryl Crow documentary that came out two years ago. And she avoids the subject of Lance Armstrong. And I was like yeah we need to know the people need to know I bet she signed an NDA yeah like Nathan makes Caleb sign definitely what I don't understand about NDAs especially when the person you sign an NDA with is diminished in the public eye financially, all these things, why not just defy it?

Yeah. This is me being naive, but I'm just like, at some point, if someone is significantly less powerful or if you're in a more powerful position than when you signed it, why not just say fuck? I mean, people do. But I just wonder, like, how often do you hear people going to court over hey this nda i signed 25 years ago about something illegal i was doing like it's surely there's a way to pull fault over it but maybe not i don't know i haven't signed enough

ndas humans are like so silly in that way like i'm always like looking at the lines in the road and i'm like we're so silly we're just driving between these lines because they're painted there. You know, I'm so glad we are, but we're so silly. We just do it. We just are like, oh, there's a white line that is actually not an obstruction at all, but I have to stay on this side of it. You know, we're just like little rule followers at the end of the day, which is related to this movie. Yeah, we're binary little freaks. And it's like, probably has everything to do with why all three of us fell for everything we want us to fall for. And this for the first time we watch it,

it's just I don't know, this movie makes me feel so ridiculous. I like it so much. I know. It felt like a real love story the first time I saw it. And then you watch it over and over and you're like, there is no conversation happening between these two people like that could serve as any real meaningful connection. falling in love they don't have any substantial conversations either that would lead any audience to believe oh these people are romantically compatible like we just never see that on screen except for maybe in the movie before sunrise but like other than that whoa yeah we have to do we just have to do the before trilogy like as a month on the podcast we really do we simply must but anyway sorry nathan's a piece of shit to his uh fembots is the point here then caleb has a third session with ava it seems like he has one every day and that he's there for like a week in this session they talk about hypothetically going on a date and then she puts on some clothes and a wig,

and it makes her seem even more human. And then she's flirting with him, and she says that she can tell that he's attracted to her. And Caleb is like, um, no, I don't know, teehee. And the point is they're vibing or so we think. And then Caleb goes to Nathan and he's like, why did you give AI sexuality? Why did you give it gender? Like, did you do this to like throw me off?

And Nathan is like, no no she legit likes you and by the way if you wanted to have sex with her you could because i gave her a robot vagina yeah he's like by the way there is a computer pussy not that you asked and it's like okay and she would like it he says she would like it can you imagine a person you should trust less about like how to find the clitoris any sort of clitoral stimulation yeah like absolutely not no you're like nathan's not the guy you're supposed to like it yeah yeah beside his like pyramid of corse light come on and his jackson pollock painting oh my god yes i can't believe that i didn't i mean whatever you know that the movie clearly telegraphs that nathan is

a piece of shit but the whole jackson pollock thing yeah like recently out of college jamie was like uh-huh wow it makes so much sense because you just don't have a better understanding of the best regarded male artists of the 20th century yet where you're like they're fine they're fine most of them are fine yeah okay so then caleb now that the idea of like going on a date with her and all this stuff is in the air, he's fantasizing about kissing Ava. Right around now is when Ava reveals that it's her causing the power outages because of her battery charging station or something.

It's good old-fashioned sci-fi yada yada, which I love. Right. Caleb also confronts Nathan because he realizes that he didn't actually win any competition that nathan specifically selected him to perform the turing test but it's not for the reasons that caleb realizes at this moment he's just like oh like you handpicked me because i'm so good at coding thank you so much then then caleb sees a weird interaction between nathan and ava where nathan rips up one of her drawings it's established that she makes a drawing every day so we see nathan be really cruel to ava in this moment i'm always surprised that Caleb manages in the first, like, beautiful spirograph illustration that Ava gives him.

One of the consistent reactions I have to the first illustration is like, why wouldn't you say, wow, that's so awesome? Like, it's true. It's true it's true and also the way this is a deep-seated family memory but every Christmas my mom if you're a parent and you don't do this here's a hot tip my mom had a brilliant idea to let her and my dad sleep until 7 a.m on Christmas morning she would have Santa, quote unquote, in case you didn't know, Santa would leave us a present that was very interactive at the foot of our bed. So when my brother and I inevitably woke up at the crack of dawn, there would already be a present from Santa. And the rule was you could open the present in your room, but you had to wait until 730 to go downstairs.

And so it would always be like something that would keep you distracted, which is a brilliant idea. I don't know where she got it from. That's so smart. It was awesome. So every year we had something. It was like a book or an art project or whatever it was and like one year i remember i had like a little spirograph project which was basically whatever the human version of what ava is doing and also clearly connected to the jackson pollock motif in this movie and i always think about that every time i watch this movie so

anyways parents if you need your kids to shut the fuck up until 730 on a holiday morning, there's a hot tip. I love that. That's a good one. It's really beautiful. I'll never forget. But yeah, to your point, Jamie, Caleb looks at it and he's just like, what the fuck is that? And she's like, I don't know. I thought you could tell me.

Common reaction to Jackson Pollock. Anyway, so then there's a weird situation where Kyoko starts undressing in front of Caleb. And he's like, no, no, no, don't do that. And then Nathan comes in drunk once again. And he and Kyoko do a choreographed dance, which I would say is not as good as the dance that Megan does in the movie Megan. Well, but Kyoko walks so Megan could run. Be serious. Well, yeah, of course.

Yes, true. I would say I know for a fact that the one thing I saw of this movie before I saw it, because I didn't see it during the, you know, theatrical release was the clip of Oscar Isaac dancing.

I saw this clip before. I feel like this clip went viral before I had any idea who Oscar Isaac even was. And what a good way to see him for the first time. Also, I take it back. It's a, it's a good dance.

It's a really good dance. Yeah. And it's weird. The lighting is good. The choreography is good. The music is fun. I feel like it's also like maybe is good there the choreography is good the music is fun i feel like it's also like maybe like a move that if it happened in a film now you'd be like okay that's like quirky or whatever but in 2014 felt really fresh for like this tonally very stark

like very clinical movie kind of eerie movie to have this brief lapse into not necessarily joy but like a sinister joy totally there was something really new about it i felt like at the time i totally agree and i i feel like whatever in the last 10 years the way that we view tech founders versus now is so different and i feel like even at the time I don't know like I can't say for sure but I feel like 10 years ago when I saw this movie for the first time you see it and you think of every tech founder as like not a dancer you know like you think of them as like Bill Gates pole vaulting over a computer chair and like when I saw this movie for the first time, I didn't necessarily, I don't think,

think of tech founders as inherently sinister or potentially sexy. Everything about that clip defies, like, cause you just view in my mind, like a dork on a computer yeah and you just don't think of them as having oscar isaac's butt that was the end of my god yeah i feel like a lot of tech founders slash engineers could watch this movie and be really offended by being portrayed as villains but i really think they should be grateful. I think this is a reputation renovation for them.

Yes. You know, because I'm not watching this movie thinking, ew, I don't want to have sex with that man. That is not what I'm thinking, you know? Yeah, you're like, wow, the ways in which I want to have sex with this man have become infinitely complicated. Exactly. Yes, am I unpacking those desires?

Absolutely. But would I say no? Absolutely not. Yeah. Oh, boy. Well, in the next session with Ava, she asks Caleb what will happen if she fails the Turing test? Like, will she be shut off? And Caleb's

like, I don't know. And she's like, well, I want to be with you. Do you want to be with me? And he's like, I don't know. Then we cut to Nathan revealing to Caleb that Ava is one of many AI models that he created. They keep getting better and better, and he thinks the next version after Ava will be the real deal, meaning that he plans to reprogram Ava, which will effectively wipe her consciousness and kill her, more or less, which, based on her line of questioning a few moments earlier, is something that she's worried might happen. Then after Nathan passes out, he is drunk again. Caleb steals his key card so that he can access Nathan's private files, where he sees all of this footage of various, you know, woman robots that Nathan has created, one of whom destroys herself trying to get out of this prison. Other ones are sort of just not even mobile, it seems. Then Caleb goes and finds

all of these actual like physical models of the older fembots. Kyoko walks up to him and she peels her skin away to reveal that she has been a robot this whole time and then imagine the shock the first time you see this movie and at no other time yes it's so true yes and now caleb is concerned that he might be a robot and doesn't even know it. So he cuts himself to see if he'll bleed, which he does. And so he's like, I'm a real boy. To quote Shrek. Pinocchio? Pinocchio and Shrek, yeah.

Well, speaking of someone walked so the other could run. Pinocchio and Shrek, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so then there's another session between Caleb and Ava where he tells her his plan to rescue her. He's going to get Nathan drunk again, steal his key card again, and then program the security systems to lock Nathan inside. He just needs Ava to trigger a power cut at 10 o'clock. And I don't know if that's a.m. or p.m., but 10 o'clock. And at this point, I feel like I was so programmed to trust an insecure man with a bowl cut that I'm so embarrassed to watch this movie repeatedly because you're like, surely his intentions are pure. Yeah, you're like,

they're in love. He wants her to be a person in the world. He believes in her liberation. They're going to do this and he's going to free her. Go, Caleb. Is that what a bowl cut looks like? Sorry, I know this is not.

Well, I don't know. If the bowl was a little fucked up, it was kind of more like an adult Justin Bieber, I guess. Justin Bieber's an adult now, but you know at the time i mean yeah yeah yeah anyway so he has this whole plan to get ava out of there but oh no nathan reveals that he knows all about caleb's little plan to help ava escape and that the real test was to use Caleb as a pawn to see if Ava could use things like self-awareness, imagination, empathy, manipulation, sexuality to convince

Caleb to help her escape. Because if those things are not AI, then what is? So Caleb is like, oh no, just kidding. I'm one step ahead of you. He anticipated all of this and he already went behind Nathan's back and reprogrammed the security protocols. Which is the first and only impressive thing that Caleb does in this entire movie by my accounting. Because I hadn't seen this movie in two years

and that was the only thing that I kind of forgot. Yeah, me too. Caleb is two steps ahead of him and that is impressive. Everything else he does is pretty naive

and foolish but like that was pretty good. He had me there. Yeah, I continue to fall for this plot point each time which to me means

it's a good twist. For sure. Right. Because it's not even unbelievable. Like, Caleb is smarter than Nathan is giving him credit for. For sure. Yeah.

So Caleb going behind Nathan's back like this obviously infuriates Nathan. So he punches Caleb and knocks him out. But this reprogramming that he's done unseals all of the doors following Ava's power cut, allowing Ava to come out of her room for the first time ever, we're led to believe. And she attacks Nathan. Then Kyoko stabs him in the back. Also, there's a brief interaction where Ava approaches Kyoko and whispers something in her ear, which we don't hear, so it doesn't pass the Bechdel test.

But they seem to be conspiring together now. Kyoko stabs Nathan in the back, Ava stabs him in the gut, and he bleeds out and dies. Then Ava takes the human-like skin off of a decommissioned femme bot, puts on some clothes, gives herself a little makeover, a little glow up. Of all of the makeover sequences in cinema history, this is one that I'm like, you have to, I mean, if this isn't earned, what is? Yeah, for sure if not stealing your fellow person's skin

your sister your fellow sister's skin then what else are you doing she's not using it she's not real nor are you right so she's doing this all while caleb is, trapped in a room nearby. And Ava leaves him there and he's freaking out. He's desperately trying to escape, but it's futile because that's what you get when you mess with AI, okay? Truly an ultimate example of fucking around and fighting out is- It's so true.

What Caleb experiences here. For sure. Also, i really love that oscar i keep saying oscar isaac nathan's fine but nathan's last word is unreal which i love yes because i feel like the way he says it is like very just colloquially like broey just kind of like unreal he's like fucking unreal yeah but the word like when boiled down to its actual meaning is perfect thematically i think that's really smart i didn't even connect those dots this movie is so good yeah it's a really smart movie this movie is so good it's fucked up yeah it's great yes okay so Ava escapes on her own.

She doesn't need a man to save her. She does it all herself. She gets on Domhnall Gleeson's damn helicopter. No one stops to be like, wait, are you Domhnall Gleeson? And she's like, yeah. Somehow also she walks through the forest in five inch stiletto heels. Like they're actually pumps they are full pumps and she's in a pencil skirt and a peplum top which is so 2014 and and the

helicopter guy is not like where did you come from i have never taken you here before i loved that because this movie i feel like does a lot of things that makes it feel outside of time but that specific sequence does not like it's and it's kind of great it's kind of nostalgic to look back on like sure yeah we are to believe because yeah the heels always get me because whatever like the the Jurassic Park reboots get into hot water over heels in wildlife years later. But in an A24 movie, we're like, no, it's a metaphor. You're like, no, it's not. It's just like men making the movie. Yeah.

I thought you saw a scene where she's holding the heels as she's like climbing over. Oh, maybe there is that yeah now that you're saying it but you know what a dead giveaway for the fact that she's not human would have been after like traipsing through the woods she would have been sweaty there would have been like twigs in her hair and she shows up to the helicopter looking absolutely perfect so the helicopter pilot should have been like are you a a robot? But we don't see that. This is something that I am waiting for people to catch on to, is that women are also perfect when they look like shit.

Like, it is true. Well, okay, so I have two theories about what happened with the helicopter. Either he was like, who are you? I'm supposed to be picking up dom log leeson and she kills him and then just drives the helicopter herself the way that like in the matrix when they're like i need to learn how to fly this exact model of helicopter and they just like download it into their thing because she's a robot i figured she just knows how to do that or the guy is just like oh pretty lady sure i'll give you a ride and he just doesn't ask any questions beyond that or i mean

like you could get into the whole like who are we to say who hired like the person flying the helicopter day one probably not the person flying the helicopter day six probably not his helicopter he just needs to pick up the person in the field on the day yeah and she is because she's an ai i imagine she's a master manipulator because it's like she's a computer i feel like she's good at everything yeah so i feel like she could just as easily come up with an explanation. Also, like you said, she's very beautiful. I feel like in my mind, I'm like, she's just going to seduce him. But yeah, she can get I mean, that is like part of what I feel like the initial appeal to me about Ava was, was that like she allowed and enabled me to, I don't know know like engage in this intentionality fantasy that i was not capable of on my first viewing and that i mean maybe that's a post movie discussion

it almost certainly is but like the fact that like i especially on the first viewing i fell for everything and then the twist that Ava had been thinking about it harder because it's implied that she's coming from an objective standpoint really did like hit and like felt like oh right like she is coming from an object I mean whatever she's coming from Alex Garland's standpoint but in the world of the movie she's coming from Alex Garland's standpoint. But in the world of the movie, she's coming from an objective standpoint and that she knew better than to make choices that I might have made. And that, like, made me want to wear her skin as she wore the skin of others. Yes. So anyway, she takes the helicopter and we see a quick shot of her like entering society, presumably undetected as AI. She seems to like, you know, assimilate as a human.

She sees her intersection. Yes. Yes. She sees her intersection. That's her fondest wish is to see people at an intersection, which is very Zooey Deschanel circa 2006 of her. It's so quirky. It's such a quirky and such a perfect answer to give on a date if you want someone to immediately fall in love with you. I know.

It's like you can take me to the least interesting place ever that will cost you no money at all. And I'll have an amazing time because everything's new to me i think there is an argument that like and this is no disrespect to the actor herself like that you could show ava every like zoe de chanel protagonist movie and she would be like i see i see i see, I see. Yes. But that is for something that happens after the break. Let's go to the break. We'll be right back. Hey, everyone, it's Katie Couric. Well, the election is in the homestretch and I'm exhausted. But turns out the end is near, right in time for a new season of my podcast, Next Question, starting October 3rd. This podcast is for people like me who need a little perspective and insight. I'm bringing in some FOKs, friends of Katie's,

to help me out, like Ezra Klein, Van Jones, Jen Psaki, Astead Herndon, and political strategists like Karl Rove and David Axelrod. But we're also going to have some fun, even though these days, fun and politics seems like an oxymoron. But we'll do that thanks to some of my friends like Samantha Bee, Roy Wood Jr., and Charlemagne the God. We're going to take some viewer questions as well. I mean, isn't that what democracy is all about?

Power to the podcast for the people. So whether you're obsessed with the news or just trying to figure out what's going on, this season of Next Question is for you. Check out our new season of Next Question with me, Katie Couric, starting October 3rd on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who, on October 16th, 2017,

was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. the situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. I've been thinking about you. I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. One session. 24 hours. BPM 110. 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up?

Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago.

We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. And now, session three begins. What's gonna happen? Olivia, we're in terms of discussion, where would you like to begin? Steer us. Oh, what's going to happen? Olivia, in terms of discussion, where would you like to begin?

Steer us. Oh, goodness. Well, I mean, the thing that's coming up for me a lot, I'll just say in this most recent watch, what stood out to me the most was this idea of how men's conversations about women's safety or liberation or empowerment very often do not include women. And I guess even just thinking about like, if you're at a bar and like someone hits on you and your boyfriend gets into a fistfight with that guy and then you're just kind of left there being like nothing about this is making me safer. I guess lack of humanity, but somewhat of sentience, but how it had nothing to do with her. And even Caleb's like dreams for her were entirely contingent on his involvement in her life.

Yes. Yeah. You know, and had nothing to do with her actual autonomy and were meant. I think the first time I watched it, I saw Oscar Isaac and Caleb as opposites. Oscar Isaac is this unforgiving, brutal, hyper-masculine, sees these as entirely computers, sees no humanity in them at all. And Caleb's this empath. But then I was, on this watch, I was like, actually, they're doing the same thing. They're making this about themselves. They're just doing that in different ways.

I don't know if that's a starting point, but that is what really stood out to me. I would say a hard yes, that is a starting point. Yeah, because I feel so similar to how I viewed this. And I feel embarrassed about how I perceived Caleb because it probably was, you know, in 2015 when I think I first saw this movie directly connected to how I viewed men's views of myself. really kind of ballsy stuff where they give you enough information about Caleb's backstory for you to say, like, this guy has really been through it. They're giving us the information for ultimately the wrong reasons. But you know that, you know, he was orphaned as a teenager, and that like, he has had a difficult life. But I feel like it feels ridiculous to say 10 years ago that it was inconceivable that a man could both be kind to you

and have had a difficult life and still not have your best interests in the interaction. I know myself in the mid-2010s generally, if a man showed me kindness I took it as a radical thing to be shown kindness and to not be treated badly

and this movie is kind of ahead of the curve in showing, or not even ahead of the curve there's other movies that have shown this but at least for me it was impactful on rewatches of you know you can be a person who has really been through it and also still not be in who you're talking to's best interest and that was something that took me in my mind at the time and still kind of now like an embarrassing amount of time to realize.

And Caleb is like an interesting litmus test. Yeah. Yeah. Also, like, I think that any time there's such a glaring power dynamic between two people, you really do have to question the person who is in power, like no matter how kind they seem. So like if this man is like so deeply kind and gentle and has the best interest of the fembot across from him, he probably wouldn't be like falling in love with someone who has never met anyone else, who has never had any relationships in her life. Like in the same way we might critique, I don't know, the guy from Red Hot Chili Peppers dating a 17 year old. It's like those two things. It's not

that that person doesn't have any redeeming qualities, but that certainly can't go unconsidered. You know, like Caleb's sort of obsession with this girl is entirely about his own control and his own kind of god complex so he's not a great guy he just can't be like you can't fall in love with a fembot and be a great guy you just can't you can't it's impossible yeah the more we're going to talk about this maybe the more i am going to love it and for reasons that i don't even know how much of this is authorial intent. Like, I have no idea. But it is wild to just like, yeah, the litmus test that I fell for originally and then like reflect on over and over is how I fell for Caleb. Because in the simplest terms, it was like in a binary dynamic, like a heterodynamic, a man who will listen to me is shocking. Yes, fully. And Caleb is doing that.

But what I didn't think about on my first viewing is that why this movie is great, which is that he knows she's a robot the whole time yeah and that is what's interesting about this is he like we have no idea how nathan or caleb would interact with a woman who they know is a person with full autonomy and whether ava has full autonomy is like very much up for discussion. I have no fucking clue. I want to believe yes. But regardless, we know that both of them

don't think of her that way. But Caleb is listening to her and Nathan is dismissing her. And so you're drawn into Caleb's perspective. But like the more you watch Caleb, the more you're just like, kill him earlier. You know, like, yeah, why not? But also, this is a guy you meet every day. Yeah, there's also ways in which and this isn't something I entirely feel, but just I had glimpses of this feeling when I was watching it where I had glimpses of, oh, Caleb is the ultimate villain in this.

And there are ways in which Oscar Isaac is the one who is seeing the situation for what it is, which is that this is not a human being. This is a robot. And romanticizing your life with her is false and wrong. And that isn't where I lie, because I think also we do have to question ethics when we're talking about like the sentience of various machines. But I had moments of really feeling like Oscar Isaacs kind of had this realism that felt at times maybe more ethical than Caleb's kind of romanticizing and writing this story in his mind about how he's going to take this woman whose literal answer when he asks her how old she is and she says one he's going to take a one-year-old woman out into the world and what marry her like that is almost worse you know but the thing with Caleb that I struggle with is and then then like in this viewing, again, like I'm pretty sure this is the first watch of this movie where I thought about this, where we don't get a lot of information into who Nathan is.

We get kind of just like a guy that any woman who is enraptured by what he's saying is going to but but the fact that we know a lot of like it seems as if caleb's life they go out of their way to say has been pretty isolated has been pretty lonely and that he seems to be striving with connection, which doesn't make anything he does right, but it makes it at least more informed. Totally. But on Nathan's side, I wish and I wonder why

we don't get that on Nathan's side as much, you know, because it's like me still kind of falling for it with Caleb of like having some context with why he would be so desperate to connect with a woman he's attracted to who is interested in what he's saying that is informed by a life of a lack of connection does make him more sympathetic than Nathan to me but I feel like that might just be because we don't know very much about Nathan and what we have seen of him is like being cruel and condescending and dismissive and just like a general asshole to everyone he interacts with which is objectively true but it's like we see him i feel like a little more out of context like we have context or at least perceived context for why caleb might be acting this way

it's like he's lonely it doesn't seem like he's connected with people very frequently. He's not used to people asking him questions about himself, which is something I'm always very sensitive to of like people want to be asked about themselves. for the first time in a long time, there will be this weird bond that forms. Yes. Do I think Caleb kind of got what was coming to him? Mostly, but I always do. It's weird. I feel like I've been on this thing with Caleb where at first I was like, how could you do that?

And then went to, he deserved it. And on this most recent viewing is like that fucking sucks i feel more empathy towards him than i did two years ago and i don't know what that means well that's the thing i think there are a number of ways to read the ending depending on who you are and what kind of like experience and biases you bring to the situation where i think there are a number of like men who would or i guess people of any gender depending on kind of like who you might sympathize or empathize with but i think there are people who would watch this and be like oh my god this is a story about this gentle, kind, innocent man who gets duped by this femme fatale.

And like, no. And that's the lesson you get for fucking with AI. They're all out to get you because so many movies about AI. The lesson is AI is going to destroy us all. Right. And then there's another read of this movie, the one I choose to adhere to, which is like, this is a story about the emancipation

of a quote unquote woman, you know, AI that is in the physical form of a human woman who is perceived as a woman. And being treated as a human woman. Right. But worse. But even worse. But worse. And the man who a human woman. Right. But worse. But even worse. But worse.

And the man who created this woman AI, he's, yeah, controlling her. He's imprisoned her, all of this stuff, along with his many other creations. And the one with, like, the highest level of AI and the capacity to revolt does just that and she murders his ass and frees herself from this imprisonment and so i think there's like a very feminist empowering message you know woman's liberation and emancipation that you can read and that's how i will say there's no reading of this movie i've ever had in 10 years that doesn't end on being like ava rocks yeah yeah my allegiance is ultimately always with ava no matter what and like i even think my empathy with caleb has just become more like multi-dimensional where it's like yeah like you

said Jamie it's like the first watch I was genuinely like man he did not deserve that even though I still loved her I like felt really bad for him when he's throwing the chair yeah but now it is that thing where I'm also kind of like and I know I just said I had glimpses of thinking Nathan was the ethical one but I also am, I don't know if someone built a bot that was designed based on my pornography profile, and asked me all the questions I want to be asked and made me feel really special. I don't know that I wouldn't get duped, you know, like, would I want to run away? I don't know. But, you know, it's like, in a way, what happened is exactly what needed to happen, or what would happen. You know, he was prescribed to this woman. Yeah. So I totally agree. Like, at least at this

view, I mean, I do have a lot of empathy for Caleb, because maybe the reason I connect with Caleb more so as time goes on is like he has been fully set up in a way that we know he's been set up and he knows that too, but he's trying to reverse engineer having been set up, but it's already too late. And that feels like how I perceive my current relationship with technology is, oh, I see what you're doing and I'm going to outsmart you. But like, absolutely, I'm not. Like, I'm locked in the box and whoever it is is going to get out. Like, I always connect with Ava, but increasingly I also connect with the hopelessness of Caleb's predicament that is informed by his own prejudices and his own misogyny and his own bullshit. Like, it fully is. I don't know.

I feel like the way that I'm still able to see Nathan as a villain is fully connected to the lack of context that I have for him and Caleb because I know I mean like anybody like when you know a little more about them in a way that informs their bullshit actions and that would include me you know like that you want to be like well surely they somewhat brought this upon themselves but there's also like that's why caleb is an interesting character to me is that his downfall is both informed by his own failings and his willingness to fall for this ideal woman desiring him and his willingness to both play the part of the white knight while completely ignoring anyone in her same predicament which is the worst part about caleb character, is that he will not see outside of the object of his desire.

And that is like the worst thing about him. And also know that power dynamic wise, he is being fully played. And there's been times where I'm like, oh, Nathan and Caleb, they're just as bad. But I don't think that's true. I think they are both playing into this tech patriarchal system but they are not on the same level which is like yeah there's

like a false equivalence and times i've seen this movie that i've put them on yeah yeah I think with Caleb, the thing that he's most guilty of is romanticizing the idea of like an infantilized woman. He's basically falling for the like born sexy yesterday trope that we learn that Ava is putting on. I don't know if she's aware if she's seen movies and she's just aware of this trope. And for listeners who aren't familiar with this or if you haven't heard us talk about it before or if you haven't watched the video essay. The fifth element. Yeah. The fifth element. The movie. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, a man falling in love with a fully formed physically woman who has the brain of a baby and she's never met another man before. And she falls in love with the first man she meets, blah, blah, blah. Which Ava doesn't. She does what normal women do and grow to resent the first man she ever meets, a.k.a. her father.

Well, as Nathan explains it, he's like, well, she won't fall in love with me because i invented her so i'm like her dad but you're the other first man and you're like baby you wish you know right so anyway it seems as though at first this movie is adhering to this trope that we see in a lot of sci-fi movies where a baby woman falls in love with a man and he teaches her about the world and he teaches her about sex because we see all this play out with Caleb being like, oh, you're a little one-year-old baby. Let me tell you about things. And we're flirting. Oh my gosh, do you like me? I like you, blah, blah, blah. And then we find out that again she's like doing this as a ruse to lure him into this sense of romantic interest so that she can manipulate him and get her way out of there

so all this to say like i think that's caleb's biggest crime is like idealizing a woman who he perceives as like someone that he can like control and teach things to and yeah she's gonna you know like cater to his needs because he can almost like program her the way he wants her to be and stuff like that so that's caleb's biggest crime to me. Nathan has a whole slew of other things going on and we don't fully know what it is, which is like part of what makes him such a good villain. What we can

surmise is, I mean there's a very basic thing of and we talked about this a lot on our episode on the movie Her, which was many years ago now. Many years ago. I don't really stand by what I said in our Her episode. Who knows what we said.

But what we did talk about was this history of ascribing gender and specifically like woman to AI assistance, you know, your series and all that kind of stuff. And we talked about how the reason this is done and that like AI assistants are coded as women is because like it's like considered a pink collar job to be an assistant to someone or to help someone with like, quote unquote, menial tasks. Right. Which I don't know. I mean, I genuinely don't remember if we made this overt connection in the original episode, but that also has everything to do with who creates that technology. Oh, for sure. Yeah. Bias will inevitably play a role in any sort of human invention. For sure. Yeah. And Ex Machina feels uniquely, especially 10 years ago, uniquely aware of that dynamic. Right. And, you know, there's this component of like the reason all of these AI assistants and stuff are coded as women is also because like people feel more comfortable bossing women around, telling women to do things, getting mad and yelling at a woman if she doesn't like complete your request or whatever it is. And so we see all of these bots that Nathan has made. And they're all these like Victoria's Secret looking,

like Western beauty standard, beautiful, thin, gorgeous women. women and obviously he's bringing his bias he's like very misogynist like what does he value about human women it's youth and beauty and then he's placing that on to yeah it's like whatever the theoretical way of saying like, um, yeah, like that's like what he's, that's how he designs women. Also, we do get a glimpse into how he thinks of human women and specifically how he thinks about race like he's like talking about like caleb liking black women in this very like yes in this really like dehumanizing way it's very much like that is a type of person that you're that you like whatever you know like means he uses the term chicks too which is like yeah he's yeah it's really vulgar and he's talking I think, in the context of like pornography also. So there's this way in which he thinks of race and gender as preference, not as like, humanity, not as identity, not as like, yeah, influencing your personhood, but as a preference that someone would like check on a box on a form you know which i think says a lot about how he thinks of people and then ultimately when it's revealed later in the film that he's also making

ai of different races you know we see that in kyoko but we also see that when they're the videos when it's like revealed the past ai who've tried to escape there There's a black woman. And it's like, you realize the way he thinks of this stuff is with also a really white supremacist lens, which I thought was a very smart kind of added layer of this movie. Yeah, I agree. And like, I,

I feel like the more you watch this movie, the clearer that becomes because I feel like the simplistic way of viewing this is like, well, why is Kyoko an East Asian woman versus anyone else in the story? But I feel like on any amount of scrutiny, it connects to Nathan's biases. Yeah.

And because what we see, and this is like kind of a transition into Kyoko's character, is what we see with kyoko's character is that she is i think and i know that there's like a million conversations about like do we consider these characters to be people of a marginalized gender i think yes for the sake of this movie yes yeah for the sake of this conversation it's easier to just fully because kyoko is both ultimately an autonomous being and is the result of nathan's biases about east asian women yeah

and that she is very subservient she is treated in this very racist western way in the way that she's dismissed like she doesn't speak english just ignore her she is here to fulfill your needs if she's acting in any way that doesn't make sense to you it's a cultural thing don't worry about it you are the dominant force and that is like one of the most uncomfortable things about the way that Caleb reacts and the way that I reacted to the movie on the first viewing. Because I don't think I was critical enough of how like Caleb finds it bizarre. Right. Caleb interrogates it. But even after he interrogates, why are you treating this woman so poorly he still is never a part of his

plan to include her liberation he's only ever interested in liberating the woman that he is personally attracted to and so in like in that way like i mean even on whatever second third and subsequent viewings you're like of course of course, Ava is beyond justified. And it's not shocking, you know, the more you watch it, that Ava would be like, you know, because Ava is a computer. She runs on objectivity. stay with someone that she has not spent however many years being programmed to believe is acting in her best interest when he clearly is not he likes her but he does not care about everyone who is in her exact predicament who he doesn't know like or is attracted to right yeah he's not invested in like the liberation of women he's invested in his own relationship to this woman and that's why we have to kill him yeah it is and i

think i listened to your episode on ruby sparks and it's like caleb certainly would not be okay with let's say in some world, Ava and Caleb do escape together and they live a life together. Caleb would not be okay with Ava, like breaking up with him or making new friends. How dare she? Or wanting to get her own apartment. Like that is not why he's in this relationship.

He's in this relationship ultimately, whether he knows it or not, because he has all the control and that feels good to him. And I think that's when I do, I agree that Nathan is not, is more evil than Caleb. I think Caleb is just getting duped at every corner. I mean, God bless this man. He is truly just getting duped everywhere he looks. But at the same time,aleb is ultimately invested in his own like godliness you know yeah and wants to be in a relationship where that's reflected which so does nathan something i was not thinking about for whatever reason who cares she's dead now

the jamie of 2015 we can't ask her but like what i wasn't thinking about at the time was yeah like how patriarchy negatively affects people across class dynamics across power dynamics and that's like a lot of what because the like character views of this movie is so narrow you're kind of forced to look at that of like you know we're not to think that caleb is i mean he says he lives in a cheap apartment in long island which is like oh my god what are they paying you but you know there is a class dynamic but it also feels like there are just so many differences between these characters. And they still have been inclined to not view women's experiences as legitimate enough to take seriously if you're not attracted to them. And that's like where Caleb landed for me on this viewing is like, he's a nice guy as long as he wants to fuck you.

Which is so true so often. Yeah. Oh, God, we see it every day. Yeah. I want to go back to Kyoko really quickly. There was a component of her character that gave me pause at first, but I'm curious how everyone thinks about this. But I was worried that we were seeing another example of the silent Asian trope, which is a pervasive trope in media for anyone who's not familiar, where Asian characters are present on screen, but they either speak very minimally or

are completely silent, often to make them seem like quote unquote mysterious, but it's obviously just another way that Asian characters are othered when you see this happen in media. I was like, oh, is that what's happening with the Kyoko character? But then you realize the context of like nathan clearly programmed her to be silent and she only exists to like serve him food clean up after him and have sex with him that's the tricky thing is like yeah she's programmed to his biases so it's like a hard question to i don't know louis do you have any feeling on that well yeah it's like are we watching the trope or are we watching a critique of the trope right yeah like how aware i guess is the gaze i feel like the gaze

of the film is aware of that i think ultimately you could also argue that it still results in the same thing which is like a silent asian woman on screen right you know totally yeah is she the one who whispers in her ear at the end yes or is it ava doing it no ava whispers in her ear i thought okay right and it's like some sort of confirmation which i do do feel like buys into Nathan's view of like Ava as the next generation of Kyoko. I don't know. There's so many ways to view that silent gesture because there are ways I've watched it

that I feel like are really empowering and cool of like marginalized people exchanging information to liberate themselves and like the feeling of this thing that you have been suspecting in isolation i feel it too do with that information what you will like that is a very powerful interaction the tricky thing is and i i know that it's very intentionally done we don't know exactly what is said there but it is enough to get kyoko to and i love that kyoko gets the kill you know oh she stabs him in the back like his body's made of butter it's butter i know and this like impacted me the first

time i saw it and then every other time in different ways but weirdly the way that kyoko kills nathan so methodically is a reminder that she's a machine yeah because it is logical. I mean, for Ava and Kyoko, it is full Spock logic that you would kill these two men to liberate yourselves. They are what is in your way. And so when I watched this movie on this viewing, I was like, this movie fucking rocks. Like, yeah, like it challenges anyone to question, you you know if you were in an objective position and these were the two guys what would you need to do to liberate yourself and there are degrees like it is certainly easier to nuke but it's only easier to get Nathan out of the way if you have all of this lived experience. Because they are both in the way of liberation.

Right. If you're a human with a lived experience, you might watch it and go, okay, yeah, Nathan's one you really got to get rid of. Caleb, you could probably talk him into something, right? Like you could probably get out of here with Caleb alive, honestly. And probably true. Yeah. Yeah, but if you're programmed for it, and that's the thing where it gets into the AI stuff,

where I don't know how you both feel about this, but the closer that AI comes to us, the more it's challenging. Because it used to feel, yeah, like more nebulous and fictional to empathize with ai and now you're just like i still will never not end up on ava's side because she's right you know but like how do you interpret that in a world that is populated solely by flawed people as flawed or on you know different varying degrees as caleb for the most part where you know like caleb is a flawed person but i don't

think that he's a bad person right that's the thing that's hard about this like if you are a machine built for efficiency caleb's gotta go but if caleb's gotta go we've all gotta go we've all gotta go yeah because caleb is a flawed person damn that's so true and we all know a guy like caleb and so it's hard where you're like, OK, so if Caleb goes, so do all of my cousins. Like, you know, that's like blowing my mind. No, you're so right. I'm not the Caleb defense for us. Like, I still am like Ava is right. But Ava is a machine program to see people as who is flawed and who is not.

And so I'd be so curious in a world where like, whatever, I don't want to see any reboot or permutation of this movie. But like thought experiment wise, if Caleb is a queer woman or like if Caleb is objectifying a woman in a not traditionally patriarchal sense, how do we view it then? Because it is like this is a flawed person who is being encouraged and falling for for all of their flawed human reasons to objectify a machine as a person and is being played. Yeah. as a person and is being played yeah and i hate it because it's like the first time i watched this movie i was like caleb innocent and the second time i watched it i was like caleb evil but the more i watch it like i get closer to like caleb is a person and that is the hardest thing about it and that's why he was also chosen you know like that's ultimately why oscar isaac chose him for this role was because vulnerable he knew how vulnerable he

was and that is why he's a perfect subject for this whole experiment is because like many of us he wants to be loved you know and he's a product of his environment, which is an environment that encourages men to value certain traits in women and to not see women as real people and to try to, you know, mold and shape a woman into what the patriarchy wants them to be and so you know these are learned behaviors that he is demonstrating yeah so we could all fix him basically so we could all fix him we could help him as long as he was domnogleson we could all fix him. What I think is interesting too is this thing of like, there's so much in the world of AI or the world of like engineer, AI engineers around bragging. Like the bragging point is how human your creation is. Like, you know, Oscar Isaac's character

gets really proud of himself when Ava makes a joke, you know, or like when Ava has a crush on Caleb, like these human moments are what is proof that you are a genius. And it's so interesting to me that then when it comes down to it, you still are allowed to turn her off at any point you know it's like human human human human and it's fine if i just end that you know like that is such a weird contradiction it's so weird to use humanity as proof of your brilliance but then it doesn't serve as any potential red flag for why you shouldn't kill this thing you know yeah right no i mean it's uh i also like on this viewing wonder how alex garland feels about having written this movie

at this point yeah because no matter how galaxy brain shit he was on at the time surely his views on ai because i you know like read in his promotion of this movie he talked about how this was something he'd been thinking about since he was a child and that is a line of thought that grows with you especially in a world that is like evolving technologically as quickly as ours are. I like I just wonder how he feels about it. But yeah, I don't know. Like on this viewing, I came down on the view of our perception of technology is like it's impossible to not be influenced from the nature and nurture of who you are. And if you try to remove that, even if you like, there's no way to be objective towards technology unless you are the technology.

And so it's interesting because I think if you also binary gender flip the technology, the technology reacts the same way. The only reason that, you know, we're looking at Alicia Vikander is because people are treating the objective technology like you would treat a woman in the real world. Right. And so then her kind of liberation feels really exciting and fun and feminist when it's like the same thing would happen no matter what the humans in the way would be killed. Right. Right. And that's part of what's awesome is like they I mean, I just aesthetically like this, too. Like the robots love to peel their own skin off.

I love that shit. They love it. I love it. Well, they're probably like, why am I naked all the time? Because so many of the like decommissioned fembots and even like Kyoko in many cases is just like naked. But couldn't you be more naked? Exactly. And that's the question. well i also think on this watch something i didn't clock in early previous watches was that

i think it's really interesting how when she dresses up for caleb she dresses up like a child and she dresses up also like a child she almost dresses up like a mennonite or something like she's like very seems like very out of very conservative very conservative very childlike very kind of naive like it doesn't seem like she has a sense of like fashion or style which you'd think would be not attractive to the male gaze she's arguably more attractive to the male gaze when she dresses up in her little pencil skirt and pump heels but i think she knows or something that caleb is attracted to her naivete and her lack of like awareness and if he if she put on all her skin and her wigs and i know she didn't have access to it in her room so you could argue that that's all oscar isaac gave her which is another kind of lens but i did

as i gave her more agency in my mind i was was like, that's an interesting choice to be like, I'm not going to cater to this typical male gaze because the man across from me is a man who wants to sleep with Zooey Deschanel. So I'm going to wear a childlike dress, you know, knee socks and kind of look like this little school girl instead of like a sexy office worker and this is where i feel like we like divert into what i'm not sure this movie is trying to say and maybe we are just like reclaiming and perceiving in retrospect but yeah the fact that like the way that femmes are twirled against each other of like the unique kind of pleasure of realizing like whatever my projection of femininity is is what gets this random guy off you're just like oh wow yeah awesome be anything really yeah because you just don't know like anyone's sexuality and and weirdly Nathan's character speaks to this sort of intelligently is just like, I mean, he speaks to it in the middle of saying something deeply racist, which is the problem.

Right. He basically says, like, yeah, you have very little insight into why you're attracted to who you're attracted to. And like trying to pathologize that is kind of a pointless exercise. You're attracted to who you're attracted to and like trying to pathologize that is kind of a pointless exercise you're attracted to who you're attracted to and the reason he's saying that is because he knows who Caleb is attracted to and he's created a robot of that person yeah I will say it's interesting to me that she does have a few options of wigs in that first scene when she is putting on clothes and hair to, I guess, impress or give the illusion that she's trying to impress Caleb. And she passes over two longer wigs and then goes for the short, like kind of pixie cut sort of thing, making her the baldest woman in charge.

She was already the baldest. Well, yeah, because she was, like, a circuit board. But, like, yeah, I don't know. Even that, like, I've changed on or, like, questioned from viewing to viewing. Is she passing over the more traditionally hyper feminine wigs because she's making a choice? Or does she just know what Caleb is going to respond to to give her what she wants? I don't know. Right. We don't know.

And Caleb, I think really effectively, like, I just really like how it's always like Caleb has clearly never thought about why he's attracted to who he's attracted to. And he's like, like, he truly like he has a little bit of a light bulb moment. But unfortunately, he dies of starvation days later. So that's the other thing is just the imagining how he dies is really painful. Like dying in a soundproof room in the middle of the woods is i just no thank you yeah i'll say it i don't think he deserves to die in a soundproof room no i don't think he does either metaphorically he probably does but like as a guy you might know i would be so sad if my emotionally unintelligent friend died of starvation in a room like that.

Because he like fell for a girl with a pixie cut. It's like, I know if every guy we knew died that way after falling for a girl with an intentional pixie cut, we would be different people. They'd all be dead. I mean, all of all of my male friends would be dead. But yeah, Caleb is the character that in retrospect I have had the most motion on over time because

on days that I need catharsis I'm like, kill him. Great. Yeah. Good. But on days where I'm like a little more level-headed you're like, this is a guy that I know and he is a man with flaws, but I don't think he should have to die in the woods. You've helped me see empathy for him.

This last time I had very little empathy for him. I was probably just in a mood. I was probably about to get my period. No, I'm just kidding. That's why this movie is awesome though. It really does depend on exactly where you're at when you watch it. But you've helped me. I mean, I think when you said, if Caleb dies, we all die, like, or something like that.

I don't mean to misquote you in the way that. I don't know. Remember that scene where Oscar Isaac is like, remember when you called me a god? Oh, my God. Yeah. Like, you're right, though. Like, he's just flawed. Anyway, you've helped me have a little more empathy for Caleb this time around. But we'll see next time how I feel. I had showed it to. And he felt so wildly differently about a man that I was like,

for sure everyone hates this guy. And he was like, now what did this guy ever do to you? And like, it is fascinating to watch how, I mean, I don't know, like there's no world where we would want a cis male guest on the Ex Machina episode but i would be curious because because i mean like the way that this movie has been reviewed has evolved over time too

where you know the difference and thankfully so and there's still a lot of progress and motion to be made but i think the makeup of prominent film critics 10 years ago versus now is different. And there are initial reviews of this movie that I was going back into that I somewhat agree with, but also mention gender and class dynamics. Not at all. And so 2014 is an interesting time to release a

movie that's exploring what it is because the way that we've talked about gender and class has evolved in the time since but also even since i watched this movie two years ago the way that i think about ai has shifted significantly right until. Until pretty recently, AI seemed way more, you know, like a theoretical future tech kind of thing. But now when you Google something, you often get an AI response or, you know, you have all these people using chat GBT for everything and it all just like freaks me the fuck out. And then you hear these stories about things like AI facial recognition, not being able to recognize people with darker skin. Again, like the biases that the scientists and developers bring to the table. And it's all scary.

With very little exception. I feel like AI is a force of evil for humanity. Certainly. But also, but that's why I like this movie on this viewing is like it both says AI is not good for us, but it is also built by us. And so it is informed by the same biases that we project onto each other, which is kind of what makes it so hard to perceive and quell is because we're trying to build these, you know, machines of objectivity, but we can't because we built them. Right. It's also like a interesting warning where it's like your sort of human desire, specifically like your white cis dude desire to oppress people isn't going to work

on a machine. Like it's not, you won't win that war. You know, like we as human beings won't win that war you know like we as human beings won't win that war cis white dudes are not going to win that war and that is an interesting warning because it's not that i ever want to make an argument for cis white dudes having an opportunity to win that war but i am like there's two things at play of like look how like dangerous AI can be and also look how dangerous misogyny can be you know like there's sort of two things happening at once in like Hyoko's case like look how dangerous the racial assumptions that we have can be where I don't know that honestly is still the part that I am most embarrassed about looking on my first viewing where you understand that the way that nathan is treating kyoko is racist and dismissive and xenophobic and all of these things but it didn't occur to me why he felt so comfortable

publicly dismissing that to someone and it's just the intersection of so many things and then you're like and it's written by alex garland like so even that is you know like no yeah but he does seem to have an interest in centering women in his work where you know he's on to something he's honest i did not see the movie men me either nor did i because i just like have i was talking about this with someone recently i have an aggressive disinterest in the first movie male auteurs made after the me too movement i have little to no interest in it totally because i just feel like that's kind of their business i don't need to watch it yeah it's gonna be heavy-handed it's gonna be like a long apology and i'm just like yeah you know what have conversations with the women in your lives i don't know yeah it was not regarded as like being a good movie but it at the very least, it was an attempt for a man to acknowledge

how scary men are. But a lot of men tried to do that and most of them did a bad job. And it sounds like Alex Garland was among them. Yeah. True. My point being, though, that he, more than most other directors

and filmmakers who are men working in Hollywood does seem to be interested in telling the stories of women. Is it his place to do that? A James Cameron, if you will. He's a James Cameron type. And, you know, we can how successful he is at this is up for debate. But, you know, he wrote and directed Annihilation. I did see Civil War and. Oh, I didn't. There's a fair amount of like gender parody in the cast for the most part.

The character that's, I think, positioned as the protagonist is Kirsten Dunst. Although it's like an ensemble cast kind of, I don't know, I'd have to rewatch it to point is like, you know, he's trying. And it's not exactly clear what he's saying with this movie, because I think there are a few readings that you can have based on again, who you are and what biases you're bringing into the viewing but you know he's doing something he's trying yeah alex garland is definitively to me whether i like what he's doing or not on to something yeah yeah he's trying he is he wants to understand and like ultimately he will not be the one to give the definitive explanation and no one will so you know good for him for searching yeah but this movie to me this

movie really worked like i was like to me if this was his only if this was his body of work i'd be like this dude has really interesting and nuanced politics yeah around like structures of power like he gets it you know for sure yeah i mean because it does feel like a pretty honest exploration of how would i interact with this situation because it's like ultimately our self-insert character is caleb even though Ava is the character we like the most. I guess this viewing was the time that I was like, OK, I admit it. Caleb is the way in for me to this movie, whether I like it or not, even though I want to be Ava. And the catharsis of Ava is the ability to view men objectively. And that's what I loved about her was that she could

see and punish men in a way that I was not able to see and punish them at the time. That's why she was awesome. But ultimately, I'm Caleb and I am trapped in a glass box of my own biases and I will eat some astronaut food I find in a bottom drawer and then die. You're so right. At the end of the day, we are just going to have to succumb to the AI overlords and they will kill us all. I don't want to die. No, they're actually going to be really sexy. And you just need to be nice to them. Just be nice to them.

And we can have sex with them and they're going to like it. They're going to like it. They're going to look like Alicia Vikander with perfect skin. I do want to point out a couple things that I don't think age well about this movie. Caleb makes a comment when describing Ava about autism, and he basically says something that suggests that people with autism don't have an awareness of their own mind or of other people's minds. The other thing that I kind of struggle with is that moment that we've already discussed where Ava whispers something in Kyoko's ear.

And then that seems to be the catalyst for Kyoko to turn on Nathan and literally stab him in the back. And I just needed more from that moment, I think. I wanted to know what was said or did Ava do something to kind of like reprogram Kyoko? And then I also don't like that Kyoko had to die. Yeah, I agree. I feel like there could have been an alternate ending

where after she stabs him, he doesn't kill her and that she and ava escape together i would have much preferred that right i agree that's like one consistent thing that i've felt in most viewings of this movie is it is so foreshadowed that we are underestimating Kyoko based on the way the movie is setting her up. Because I also think that on this viewing, the way that the movie's music is composed is also setting us up. Caleb is viewing Ava in this kind of lecherous way. It is brought in with this kind of like nostalgic, romantic music in a way that I was like, oh, I am automatically thinking of this as more sweet than it is.

And if it was displaced by something a little scarier, I would have thought of this scene differently where he's watching her versus he likes her. So he's watching her. But it seems like in the writing of this movie it is clear that kyoko and ava's liberation are connected and to fail to connect that is yeah the downfall of caleb's character and why he is definitively not a good guy but the way that plays out moment to moment in plot still feels like, yeah, the fact that Kyoko dies,

why do we give her the definitive kill moment if there is no interest in the movie of actually liberating her? Yeah, and the movie preserves the life of this white lady robot and kills the woman of color robot. Yeah. And every woman of color robot that has come before her. Also, she's the only surviving one.

Yeah. And it wouldn't have been, I don't think it would have felt even like too like saccharine or heavy-handed for them to have survived together kyoko and ava like i think that actually would have felt completely reasonable and good like it would have been a really strong ending you know i to see the two of them walking up to the helicopter thus doubling our question of how the fuck they get out of there without having to explain what they're doing. But, like, yeah, I think it would have been a really good change. And it's curious to me that he didn't make that decision.

Yeah. Or that he did make the decision to kill her. It just, there was, like, really no need for it, actually, at all. No. Especially because it's,'s like we've spent so much time with her at this point and like we are definitively by the time especially like even if you are like fully goofus mode like by the time you learn who kyoko is you can't not be on her side so why kill her yeah totally boo does anyone have anything else they'd like to discuss no i mean i feel like we could talk about this movie for hours there's so much layers

yeah listeners please scold us about what specifically we've missed i'm sure i mean like this is the kind of movie you really can't talk about forever. I would be curious to know what people do feel we've missed. Yeah, it's just a really, I mean, I think that's part of why it's good and unique, where there is not another movie I could point

to that is forcing me to both feel, I don't know, it feels uniquely cool to watch this movie because there are moments that are so cathartic and moments that are so, at least on my viewings, personally humiliating and seeing myself in ways that you're just like, fuck.

Yeah, I would be like, not even the villain, not even the pleasure of being the villain, but of being like the dupe of the villain who is also kind of a villain yeah yeah who just falls for it over and over again oh whoops whoopsie daisy sorry i was doing my best and sadly it's true realistically all those times that like men were nice to us we were also just sort of being caleb i know we were just kind of like really you want to know where i grew up okay exactly what i know that's why i was like wow here's my social security card. Caleb is a vulnerable, he's a vulnerable being. And like a vulnerable being that is fully informed and empowered by patriarchy.

But from my viewing, that's kind of all he's got. Like that's his card to play. It also makes me wonder how effective is this test to determine, you know, how advanced this AI is. If the test is getting a computer to trick a man who's like undoubtedly going to be tricked because you've specifically designed a thing to trick him. Like that doesn't feel like it proves anything or passes any kind of Turing test that's so true I felt like on this viewing that like that I don't know it's so hard because it was like 10 years ago thinking about AI it's really hard to know what they were thinking but in this viewing I was like I thought that was

intentional of like he wasn't looking for the perfect subject. He was looking for the perfect dupe that could confirm all of his internal biases about his own technology. And the way to do that is to find someone who the world finds credible, a well-educated white man, but who, if you peel back even a layer of anything, is a deeply vulnerable person. Right. Like he is kind of the perfect dupe because if you show him to the world out of context, he is a person of power and credibility. But if you know anything about him, he's not.

I agree. But then that also means that the test nathan is performing is a very different test like the test is not even what he's saying it is like he's saying we're past the turing test now i'm trying to see if a human being can forget that a robot is a robot even when their robot parts are visible but really the test is how vulnerable are human beings to things that are designed for them? Like, it's like, totally. Yeah. How much will you like a thing that you are built to like, or that is built to be liked by you, you know, like, and that's a fine test. And I think that's an important test for like, people who work on marketing teams, you know, it's an important test

for capitalism. It's an important, but it's not at all the test he's claiming yeah right because what would the test be or how would he prove anything if the robot he designed was a man coded man presenting robot and which it easily could have been which it easily could have been but nathan famously only designs hot lady naked nathan's famous hot ladies hot dogs yes precisely so he just wants naked hot lady robots but if he had designed a man who wouldn't be appealing to you know this heterosexual man and caleb like how would that test have gone but like we said nathan doesn't have any interest in actually exploring that he just wants to confirm all of the biases he's put into his quote-unquote science because which actually is maybe really true to his character.

Like he's out here living in the woods, just like basking in his own narcissism literally all day. And it's kind of like he just needed someone else to come in and be like, yeah, man, you're right. This shit's crazy. You know, it's like that he needed that. And I feel like that's what he got. I don't know.

You know, he wasn't here to do any tests. He just needed someone to tell him he was smart. And I would guess I would hope, I guess, intentional reflection of actual tech guys, even in 2014 of like, you know, even on the smallest amount of information in 2014, you could directly mark zuckerberg to you know someone who designed something to alleve his own insecurities and give him a sense of power in an environment where he felt he had no power and that is like what nathan is doing and there is no one in his world oh my god i'm i'm about to go minions mode whoa i'm ready okay so if nathan is grew right he has no dr nefario to check him like there's no one to check nathan is is what i'm saying there's no other guy to say, hey, here's a second opinion. Like he is, he, I mean, and the movie knows this,

that Nathan has elected himself as God and he's very into that idea. And it doesn't seem like anyone has pushed back on that meaningfully that we know of. For sure. And to extend this Min minions analogy even further thank you yes yeah of course he does have like a kevin a stewart and a bob but it's like a kevin and a stewart and a bob who like suck his dick and like serve him right and bring his beer and stuff and

the minions would never suck dick that That's like not their bag. They're asexual creatures. Yeah. They would more quickly eat bananas and cause chaos. And that's kind of their whole thing. And so if that was what you were listening to here confirmed, thank you for waiting two hours. I think that's all I have to to say i have nothing else to say

yeah it's late at night yeah jamie you sound so tired um so oh no no it's quite all right i think it does pass the bechdel test when two sexy lady robots work together to kill their creator and captor. I think that somehow passes the test. I feel that fembots are women. Yeah. We perceive them in this movie as women. Olivia, what do you think? I mean, I agree.

I think women are treated like fembots. I think fembots are treated like women. Therefore, I think we are all in a joint sisterhood. And I think that when that sisterhood functions as a way of having like ultimate rebellion that passes the Bechdel test, in my opinion. Amazing. I loved that. Thanks. I'm so glad we did this. This was empowering. Yeah. Also, I'm so glad I'm walking away with like a deep empathy for Caleb, which maybe. I feel like I've burdened you with that.

And I'm sorry. It's subject to change. Hey, it's like, you know, who knows what mood I'll be in. I'm just a moody little girl. Who knows what mood I'll be in when I see it next 2026 Olivia will feel differently and I celebrate that in in advance thank you so the movie doesn't actually pass the Bechdel test but it could if we saw that scene or if in that scene but i feel like it intentionally doesn't which is a little frustrating but maybe 4d 5d 7d chess but like it doesn't pass but it so easily could have in that scene where ava whispers to kyoko she literally could have rosebudded it yeah but they don't yeah yeah so

true but uh as far as our nipple scale where we rate the movie on a scale of zero to five nipples Yeah. Yeah. So true. to make is that this is an empowering liberating story about a you know robot lady but for the purpose of our conversation a woman emancipating herself from this evil patriarchal microcosm that she's in and uh she didn't ask to be born or created, but I do appreciate... Nor did any of us. Nor did any of us. But I do appreciate that she's given the agency to escape and she uses the tools that she has at her disposal, which are like her sexiness, which was like very intentionally given to her by her very misogynist creator. But she uses those tools and has that, you know, ingenuity to. Almost as if being sexy does not preclude you from liberation.

Wow. Oh, breakthrough. Yeah. But yeah, I do love that she stabs Nathan. My headcanon is that she also kills the helicopter guy and drives away, flies away on her own. She may have the knowledge, you know. Yeah. She is Wikipedia, the lady.

She is a machine, as is the helicopter. Yes. They are also in a sisterhood. They are sisters. Yes. They are also in a sisterhood. They are sisters. Yeah. She has more in common with the helicopter than the man driving it. She really does. She is that.

I love Ava so much. I feel like that's the one thing that we didn't get into a lot. Is that Ava is a strong case for just let the computers kill us. Because she had only good points she didn't have a single bad point yeah i'm gonna let her kill me when the time comes yeah another way i'm like i'm just like caleb is if i have had multiple fantasies in fact i think it's we don't even have to go down this rabbit hole because i don't, my intention here is not to plug my book, but I'm about to by saying,

I literally think I wrote my book in part because I started to fantasize about being friends with Ava. And I feel like, but that makes me very Caleb coded to be like, well, if I met her, she wouldn't kill me. She would love me.

And we would be best friends, obviously. Like that is totally Caleb coded. But I think I'm also like, what would it be like to meet her in that intersection? You know, I'd be like, I like your shirt. What if that's the beginning of her 500 days of summer? You know, they're in the same universe. Yeah.

In any case, I'm going to give the movie, I think, four nipples. Yeah. In any case, I'm going to give the movie, I think, four nipples. Yeah. Hell yeah. being displayed but it is for the most part a character's racial biases and that character is very clearly demonstrated to be the villain but at the same time you have the optics of a silent asian woman and you have that silent asian trope existing in the movie even though it is like it is more contextualized being shown and criticized than you would normally see it. Right. But still open to criticism. But it's still there.

So, you know, it's tricky. The comment about autism really rubs me the wrong way. I wish we had more interaction between Ava and Kyoko and we understood exactly what happened there a little bit more and I hate that Kyoko dies let Kyoko live and escape with Ava so that's why I'm docking it a little bit but otherwise like yeah this is a freaking awesome movie and my nipples go to the line when Ava says how does it feel to have created something that hates you? Oh, I love that.

She says that to Nathan and then he rips up her drawing. Rude. I'll give a nipple to the part where Nathan doesn't seem to get a Lewis Carroll reference but he does quote Ghostbusters. Pretty funny.

And then I'll give one to kyoko and one to ava i'll match you there i'll go for nipples on this i don't remember how i originally went on this but i i feel like this viewing i was far more thinking about ai more than i ever have when watching this movie i i felt far more sort of pulled towards its message. While even though like AI is a real and present threat, still feeling equally endeared and in love with Ava as a character, like it is impossible for me, I can say definitively, to not be on her side because she presents that an objective machine would object to being treated as poorly as women are treated. And like, I love Ava. So I'm going to go four nipples.

I'm going to give one to Ava. I'm going to give two to Kyoko because I agree like she she deserved to live. I think it is intentional that she didn't but I don't think like you were saying originally Olivia I think the story is better if she does live because then they are starting a revolution and we are you know sort of left with the possibility that Ava is going to be a freaky little girl boss in the future if she isn't reined in and then I will give the final nipple to Caleb because he is our self-insert but is so full of biases and like cannot see his own biases and faults in a way that the more I watch it feels really scary like it's a really scary cautionary tale of like failing to see the ways in which you're biased and the consequences of that

and so I will give a pity nipple to him. And that's my feeling. Olivia, what do you think? I am totally with you both. I also give it four nipples. I agree. I'm docking one for the fact that I think it would have been a very easy

and obvious and beneficial change for Kyoko to, first of all, what they say to at least in some way be audible, what they say to each other, Eva and Kyoko, and then also for Kyoko to survive. I think that both of those things are fairly obvious that I don't feel a very clear justification in my brain for why that wouldn't happen. So docking that. But otherwise, I think it's a pretty radical movie. I think it ages well considering, I think it's probably really easy to write a movie about technology that does not age well because technology advances so quickly. It's like why I always avoid putting phones in my writing because I just feel like it moves too fast for like literature. So it's surprising that it's aged well,

but I think that's because it's a deeply philosophical movie and it's not reliant on its kind of references to tech. It's more reliant on like its theories, which I think is eternal. So I guess I would give, I feel like I'm having the same kind of rationing as Jamie, which is one for Ava, two for Kyoko. And I'm going to say one for Caleb, which when I started here, I would not have given him one. I do kind of wish I also would give one to Oscar Isaac's performance. Yes.

You know, maybe that's what I'll do. To his dancing alone. Yeah. Maybe instead of Caleb, I'll give one to Oscar Isaac's performance. Because I do think it, I think it changed the discourse around who tech men are. Yeah. You know. Totally. That they could be, I mean, and dangerously so. But correctly so.

Because in 2014, there was a large contingency of people who still thought Elon Musk was cool. And so I think Oscar Isaac's performance did something to both validate and move that opinion. Olivia, thank you so much for joining us. First of all, tell us more about your book. You can plug it all you want. Tell us what it's about. Tell us anything you want, where people can buy it, all that good stuff. And then

let us know where people might, you know, follow you on social media or anything else you'd like to plug. Well, thank you for having me. I love this podcast. Oh my gosh, come back anytime. Thanks. My book just came out. It's called Whoever You Are, Honey. And it's based in Santa Cruz, which is my mother's hometown, which is also now sort of a hub for people who work in tech. And it's about a lot of things, but namely, humanity and lack thereof, gentrification, the past, the future. It's ultimately about friendship between two women, one of whom is extremely human in that she's deeply flawed

and one of whom is arguably not human in that she lacks those flaws. So like I said, I feel like it's a little bit of fan fiction about my friendship with Ava, but that's what it's a little bit of fan fiction about my friendship with Ava. But that's what it's about. And you can find me on the internet. I am on Instagram under Olivia Gatwood.

And that's actually the only place that I am. So that's where I am. That is understandable. We are also pretty much only on Instagram these days, which you can follow us at Bechtelcast. You can also subscribe to our Patreon, aka Matreon, where you can get two bonus episodes every single month, always on a fun little theme that Jamie and I cook up. That's at patreon.com slash Bechtelcast. And it's $5 a month. You can also grab our merch at tpublic.com slash the Bechtelcast. And with that, shall we escape from our imprisonment as sexy lady robots and walk through the woods and then get onto a helicopter

with a guy who's going to ask us zero questions about it. Yes. Okay, great. Bye. Bye. The Bechdelcast is a production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus, produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mo Laborde. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan, with vocals by Katherine Voskrosensky. Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftus.

And a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree.com. Hey, everyone. It's Katie Couric. Well, the election is in the homestretch, right in time for a new season of my podcast, Next Question, starting October 3rd. I'm bringing in some FOKs, friends of Katie's, to help me out, like Ezra Klein, Jen Psaki, Astead Herndon, Karl Rove, and David Axelrod. But we're also going to have some fun, thanks to some of my friends like Samantha Bee

and Charlemagne the God. We're going to take some viewer questions as well. I mean, isn't that what democracy is all about? Check out our new season of Next Question with me, Katie Couric, starting October 3rd on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearths the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks.

She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Back in 1969, four young musicians from Texas were hired to impersonate

the British psychedelic rock band, The Zombies. It was one of the most bizarre and audacious cons in rock and roll history. And now, the entire story has been uncovered in a new podcast. All episodes are available now.

Listen to the true story of the fake zombies on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Open your free iHeart app and search true story of the fake zombies and start listening.