The Big Picture - ‘Black Widow’ Is Finally Here. Was It Worth the Wait?

Episode Date: July 9, 2021

The first new movie installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 737 days is finally here, available now on Disney+ with Premier Access or in movie theaters. Amanda and Sean break down ‘Black Widow’ and the future of the MCU, emphasis on the “C” (0:30). Then, Sean is joined by writer-director Leigh Janiak to discuss her three ‘Fear Street’ films that are rolling out on three consecutive Fridays on Netflix this month (61:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Leigh Janiak Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Head into the Ringerverse to stay up to date with all things superheroes and nerd culture entertainment. Hosted by a rotating lineup of superfans at the Ringer, including Mallory Rubin and Van Lathan, shows will provide instant reactions to blockbuster releases, insightful backstories on canon, and mind-bending theories, as well as fresh takes on the latest news and rumors. Check out the Ringerverse on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about Black Widow, the first new movie installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 737 new days, is finally here, available

now on Disney Plus with Premier Access for $29.99 or in movie theaters around the country. On today's show, Amanda and I will discuss the latest film and the future of the MCU. And later in this episode, I spoke with writer-director Lee Janiak, who shot three Fear Street films for Netflix. These are three horror movies that are rolling out over three consecutive Fridays on the service this month. Hope you'll stick around for that chat.

But first, Amanda, let's talk black widow. It's been a long, long, long, long, long time coming. We've gotten some MCU stuff in between this movie's much delayed arrival, but this is the first movie in a,

in a great many days. How did you feel about black widow? I enjoyed it, which is probably the first signal that it doesn't work in the context of what it is supposed to do for MCU fans and the MCU and like Marvel writ large in this moment in time. I do think it mostly works as a movie in the sense of there's a beginning, a middle and like three ends. You know who the characters are. It's fairly fully baked, some fun performances. You go to the movies and you have a nice time, but I don't know if that's sufficient for any event movie at this point, but I certainly

don't think it is what anyone going to a Marvel property expects at this point. It's an interesting example of the opposite of everything that Marvel has been building towards, which is to say that this is very much a standalone kind of a movie, which doesn't mean that it doesn't necessarily preview what's coming in the future, but because it's a period piece within a period piece, it takes place largely in 2016 after the events of Captain America Civil War. And also we know the fate

of the main character in this movie, Natasha Romanoff. We don't know the fate. I mean, that's a big umbrella of we, you know, you did. I, when it started, I was like, I actually don't remember who died in which snap and who came back and, you know, I, you did. I, when it started, I was like, I actually don't remember who died in which snap and who came back and you know, whatever. I'm just, I'm going to go with it.

But I do understand that, that, that the people who are really logging on do in fact know what happens to the black widow. I think most people who go see this movie know that black widow died in the movie Avengers end game. And so that this this period a lot of people died and like a lot of people died the first time and then they back seized on that and then some more people died and it's it it it is not the easiest thing to keep track of also there are just a lot of them at this point but you're right there are people who are more dialed in than I am and those people have probably been waiting for Black Widow movie for a very long time. Since 2010's Iron Man 2, Scarlett Johansson's Natasha Romanoff has appeared in eight MCU movies. This is the first one centered on her character. It's just the second movie in the MCU that is focused

on a female superhero. It's directed by the Australian filmmaker Kate Shortland, who was first hired in 2018. It's written by Eric Pearson with a story by WandaVision head writer Jack Schafer and Ned Benson. This movie was supposed to come out in May of 2020 and it was delayed three separate times during the pandemic. You know, because of this somewhat standalone origin story slash

I don't know, kind of launch pad for future characters aspect, do you think people are going to be a little bit disappointed by what they get their hands on here or do you think that they're going to just be relieved to be back inside the MCU on the big screen? Well, I think everyone's disappointed about everything at this point, you know, and that's not specific or to be hard on MCU fans in particular, right? There's a expectation thing and it's baked into everything that we do now is that we all got to have some notes and we all got to do whatever.

I wanted to ask you to go through WandaVision, Falcon and Winter Soldier, and now Loki and help me put those on the timeline. With the exception of Loki, which I understand is reinventing timelines all the time. Like what is time, man? I get it. But in terms of do those happen before endgame or after endgame

where are they in relationship to black widow and kind of how is this supposed to be rolled out chronologically originally so that's a very good question and without getting in too into the weeds of what actually happens in those stories both falcon and the winter soldier and the wand division and the wand division series are both taking place effectively in the immediate aftermath of the events of Endgame. So we know that Steve Rogers, for example, is an old man who has who had his his life with Peggy Carter. And so he is out of the frame, which is one of the reasons why the Bucky and Sam kind of rise up into the mantle of Captain America. Same with WandaVision. You have Wanda who's kind of coping with the loss of vision.

So she is creating this sort of alternate universe where she can live happily with her robot husband. And so both of those things specifically happen. Loki is a little bit harder to describe because it is happening in this sort of like purgatorical universe where he's working with a government agency who is helping him understand alternate realities and alternate history. So let's just set that to the side. But all three of those shows, to your point, are happening after Endgame. And that matters because this is a story that is happening five years ago.

Right. And I think it's going to be a little bit confusing and disorienting for fans of the films who have gotten used to, especially those who pay close attention to the TV shows. And frankly, there are a lot of them

because it seems like those shows are doing very well. They may be confused as to why we're going back. So I think my understanding of this was that Black Widow was supposed to be the first new thing

you saw after the most recent Spider-Man movie, which came right after Endgame. So you're supposed to see the Spider-Man movie, which came right after Endgame. So you're supposed to see the Spider-Man movie last the summer of 19. And then you'd wait until the spring of 2020 and Black Widow would hit effectively kicking off phase four. And then from there, all the TV shows would start to unfurl. And so it's different. This is not exactly how they planned it. They had to shuffle some things around. And if we talk at all about the stinger, and I don't know if you stuck around for the stinger,

but what happens in the stinger is notable. I'm not an idiot. I know that there's a thing at the end of the season, you know, and you and I both got to watch it at home, which we'll talk a bit more about, but a lot easier for me just to stay at home, go do the dishes or whatever, and then come back and be like,

have they gotten to the stinger yet? No, go do some more dishes and then come back. I watched it. I did watch it. But so the last Spider-Man movie is still post-Endgame as well, correct? It is, but that was officially, officially the end of phase three, according to the creators of the event. Sure.

And, you know, shout out to the phases and to the people with the spreadsheets and how they understand stuff. Shout out to the phases, man. Absolutely. You know, like that's great of how you're organizing your life but black widow is the only movie going backwards in time which we're just putting an asterisk in loki because i just cannot be drawn into like you know time moves in all directions and variants and multiverses like i you know i understand that they're trying to do a comic book thing with that and time's different. But everyone else is moving the plot forward.

And this is just moving it back five years. And my question to you is why? I think that there's a very clear answer for this. I'm not basing this answer on any information that I have about the inner workers of the MCU. But I think that they just screwed up by not making a Black Widow movie in 2016. I think that that was the move. I think the move was to isolate that character

and give her this story, which lets you meet her family. It lets you better understand how she became a Russian spy who was turned into an American operative. It lets you better understand this sort of like world of female agents that are going to clearly influence the future of the MCU without it having to feel like this recent history period piece.

And they didn't make that movie. And I don't know why. I think that movie would have been successful, at least as successful as say Thor 2, but they didn't make it. I thought that you were going to say that they screwed up and just didn't make a female superhero movie. And then eventually they did make Captain Marvel. And I

was like, why did they have to do that? Because I don't really think anyone is that enthusiastic about it. But even Captain Marvel, they have to introduce her because then she plays some sort of important role that I don't remember in Endgame. But, you know, once they're in that kind of very drab in between world and the hammer is flying around that, you know, she does something right. She saves Tony Stark at the beginning of the film. And then I think she plays a somewhat impactful role at the end of the movie and trying to defeat Thanos. But the point is, Captain Marvel felt like a makeup or not doing a female story sooner

even though the MCU had been around for eight years by that point nine years maybe secondarily Captain Marvel was I thought

atrocious like I thought it was quite poor and this movie is way better I thought I totally agree that it's way better

but this feels like a makeup for Captain Marvel being really bad and no one caring about it and they're like oh well we gotta do something I guess so what if we you, have this character who's like dead, but we can develop some other characters as well. And at least it'll be like a female superhero

that people know and an actor who people know. And that to me feels like what's going on here. Yeah. It's a very, very curious set of decision-making. It's probably the single biggest thing that you could question Marvel about. I mean, they've obviously been on this unheralded run. There's never been anything like this in the history of movies and now television where someone like Kevin Feige and an organization like Marvel is just so consistently successful.

Even a movie like Captain Marvel, which I don't know a single person who liked that movie. That movie did quite well at the box office. And this is probably the biggest misstep they made, particularly when you put it in light of a movie that you really like, which is Wonder Woman. And in 2017, Wonder Woman comes along and they had only just started developing

the standalone Black Widow movie when Wonder Woman hit theaters. And Wonder Woman, of course, was a massive success. And there was audiences were ready to have a standalone female superhero movie like this. So they aired. And so ultimately what you have here is kind of an odd duck of a movie it's a it's not bad but it feels very much not like an mcu movie and mostly to me felt like a james bond or a mission impossible

movie you know it's very much focused on the big set pieces it's very much focused on the mission there's sort of a global a villain who's seeking to dominate global power, but the ways that he's doing that are a bit confusing and shaded throughout the bulk of the film. There are amusing side characters, but the film is primarily focused on the sort of two key heroes at the center of it, much like most Mission Impossible movies, frankly. And so it becomes something a little bit outside of what we've experienced with the MCU before. And then I think after this movie comes along, we're going to have two new films that are going to introduce entirely new characters in Shang-Chi and Eternals, which sets off a whole new course, I guess, for what these stories are going to ultimately become. As a standalone movie, though, if we take it at its face, did you like that it had like more of a it

resembled more closely a series that you like especially in james bond and mi yeah of course like i like james bond movies i like mission impossible movies i liked frankly that it did not matter whether i remembered that black widow was alive or dead like that i could just kind of surrender myself to this like popcorn kind of dumb, but at times funny summer blockbuster and then move on with my life. I thought I really liked performances. We'll talk more about Florence Pugh, but perhaps you've heard Florence Pugh runs away with this movie. She really does spend a lot of time wondering how much time Scarlett Johansson spent thinking about her contract and agreeing to be in this movie with Florence Pugh. And like, at what point did Scarlett Johansson realize that Florence Pugh was running away with the movie and was she mad or was she at peace with it? She does a pretty

good job of, of being at peace with it in the movie, I think. And so far in the promo, I'll keep you posted on that monitoring Florence Pugh's Instagram very closely. I like the weird international Bond villain feel. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but I'm so used to that as like a programmatic film device that I was like, cool, cool, whatever. So he's a Bond villain and he's trying to take over the world and they got to stop him. But I liked not having to worry about the lore or is he connected to X, Y, Z. It was like a no homework movie, which I have been begging for more no homework movies. So I had a great time. And I do think it's so much better than Captain Marvel. Like it's,

they're obviously going to be compared because of the only two standalone movies about female superheroes, but it's so much more successful in every way. And except that it doesn't seem to have the same sense of purpose within the MCU. So, you know, again, anytime that I'm like, oh, I was kind of charmed by this and this was a nice time, I've become aware of the fact that those are buttons that not everybody, you know, wants hit in the same way yeah i mean i'll i'll probably ask you to just clear out for a couple of minutes to let me do an info dump at the end of our conversation we're gonna be like here's here's where this will go you know like that and that that thing that you're identifying which is like it doesn't really feel

like there's a lot of here's where this should go in this movie perhaps is raising like firing a trigger that the movie isn't as successful as some of its forebears. But on the other hand, as an action adventure movie, it's pretty cool. It's not perfect. There are flaws for sure, but it's pretty cool. Right. Well, I mean, and successful is another like really fraught thing that I am both.

Listen, I like had a nice time watching this movie, so I don't know why I'm doing this. But what is a successful MCU property at this point? Or what is success for Black Widow? I mean, obviously success is like getting a lot of people to watch and it probably will just because it has MCU and you can go watch it any number of ways. And people are kind of trained to do this. But it's intentionally not advancing the plot until the very end and seems to me to be consciously doing some different things, which, you know, I wonder, is that like trying to attract new viewers or like broaden kind of what these movies can be? But is that even possible at this point for a Marvel property?

And if you don't succeed at that, is it successful if it's not just kind of printing out the same onto the next one, like happy customer routine that it is made so much money on at this point? I don't know. It's a very good question. I mean, I think it is the central, the sort of the lowering or even at times absence of stakes is part of the challenge of the movie, but it's also part of the success of the movie. We never ask these questions when we watch a Mission Impossible movie.

We never think like, will Ethan Hunt finally come to grips with all of the loss he has incurred and stop trying to take his own life by solving some global domination scheme. We just say, I just want to see Tom Cruise jump out of a plane. And in this movie, Scarlett Johansson

jumps out of a plane without a parachute. This is the kind of movie that has that same level of adventure without connectivity. And it's not that that's radical, but it is radical inside of this series of films i think that the it's we're making it sound like it's a sincerely different movie from a lot of mcu movies it really isn't right it isn't insofar as like there's these core set pieces there's this same kind of like winking jokey you know almost fraternal sense of humor coursing throughout the movie.

There is also simultaneously this effort to make you understand a character's trauma. That's a real signature of the MCU now is this hero went through pain and through that pain, they have persevered to become a better hero. This movie has that too. It has all of those, I don't know,

hallmarks, I suppose, of the MCU movies. It's definitely origin story and it's origin story for a character whose, of the MCU movies. It's definitely origin story. And it's origin story for a character whose time in the MCU seems to be over, though perhaps it's also origin story for a character in the MCU whose time is just beginning. And it does, like, it's a sister act movie is really what it is. But sorority is much harder to say than fraternal. So I honestly don't even know if that's the right word,

but you guys know what I'm going for. I studied Latin in college. But it is really recognizable as one of these movies to the point that that's the flip side of, it's not so radical that I would recommend it to my friends who have like zero interest in the MCU. Like, and who might take a flyer on a Mission Impossible movie or a James Bond movie because like we all grow up going to those things it still has enough of

the reference points and like that kind of the shared language like visual and reference wise but again I just think that kind of makes it like a little bit of an odd duck I don't know who it's for totally while it's also clearly just for everybody else I don't know who it's for totally, while it's also clearly just for everybody else. I don't know why I need to know who every movie is for now in order to understand it. But I guess maybe that's just like my bad corporate brain taking over.

I just think those are the perils of movie podcasting is this expectation that you have to understand the goals of the franchise while also watching the movie. I think it will be a movie that if people are content with a standalone experience, they will probably be mostly content with this. But if people are desperate to know the future of the MCU after watching this movie,

they're not really getting a whole lot to chew on. I think Natasha is also a tricky character. It's a character that is really rooted in the Cold War historically,, it's a character that is really rooted in the Cold War historically, and it's a character who has changed. Her accent has changed, her kind of demeanor, her look has changed over time during the MCU movies. Scarlett Johansson, I don't think,

is always necessarily given an opportunity to flex her skills as an actor in this part. You know, I think if you look at the work that she did in a movie like Marriage Story a couple of years ago and put it up against the work that she's doing in Avengers movies, I mean, this movie, in fact, kind of lampoons her kind of

sort of aerobic balletic posing that she's always doing in these movies, which kind of takes the place of acting. And Scarlett Johansson, I mean, for me at least, I think is an authentically interesting and strong actor. and she's not always engaged in that because she's such a striking looking person and i liked that this movie made an attempt to at least create a sense of self-awareness about what the black widow baggage was and what the ridiculousness of it was

while also kind of falling prey to all of this there still is art sequences where people are landing in that kind of spider-like ball of this. There still is art sequences where people are landing in that kind of spider-like balletic pose and then flipping their hair back and showing off for the camera. You know, like they kind of can't get away from what they ultimately fundamentally are. Yeah, that's true.

I mean, there's like actor acting, there's marriage story acting, and then there is physical blockbuster acting. And I think they're both valuable skill sets. Some people can do both. Some people can do one better than the other. Some people do one, you know, differently than the other. And I just feel like Scarlett Johansson never got a chance to do anything, but that, you know, one shot of her posing before they cut to like the five other guys who got to go save the day or whatever. So they kind of back themselves into a corner that they do have some fun with and specifically Florence Pugh has

some fun with but it is interesting to try to flesh out a character who was always really secondary at least in the main event um I you know I know that there are there's lots of comics and there's origin stories galore out there if you want but in terms of the avengers she was just kind of there um to to be a woman and i like some of what they do i like the family aspect of this and the sister aspect of this um and the bond stuff is fine but it it is it is, it's, it's, it's funny watching them try to walk that line. Yeah.

I think a handful of the performers over the years were able to get more comfortable and kind of imbue their characters ridiculous as they may be with, if not a level of humanity, a level, like a sense of humor and a kind of no ability. I think specifically Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth just got more rope than all their other kind of co-stars. Tony Stark's, you know, Robert Downey Jr. was who he was the whole time. He never really modulated his performance. But Evans and Hemsworth got to work with more interesting filmmakers.

They got to be more central to the stories that were being told. And in Hemsworth's case, really got to play around, you know, really got to have fun in Ragnarok and figure out a new stripe for that character. Natasha never really got the chance to do that. So they try to give you some of that in this movie. And you're right. It is ultimately a family movie. It starts out with a family in Ohio circa.

It's at the mid 90s, I think, when we open on the film. And very quickly, we see that this family in a sequence that really reminded me of the americans the fx tv series about a family of russian agents that are living in the united states undercover flee to return to mother russia um in an exciting pretty exciting and and solid chase sequence um one of the one of the more i don't know high octane moments in the film and the family members of course are david harper plays the father figure and rachel vice plays the mother figure and then we have two young children who are clearly natasha and her sister jelena and they do flee and they do escape and they do get back to russia and then we very quickly are in russia circa 2016 and figuring out where, what, what,

where does Natasha stand in the universe after the events of cap captain America, civil war. And frankly, I didn't remember, and I have not revisited civil war. And that's one of the challenges of this movie is if you're a hardcore fan, this is the only time it really matters to have all that info where they're talking about what Natasha was responsible for with, you know, the president of Wakanda and what she did or did not do to him and

how the world has been threatened. I was like, in fairness to me, that is five years ago. And while I really like MCU movies, I do not have an encyclopedic knowledge of them. And I assume for you, you were just like, that just washed right over you. You're like, I don't know what this is. So Chris, I'll never hear this this but i listen to the watch pretty regularly don't watch many of the shows that they discuss but love the watch and so i'm really familiar with the idea of the sokovia accords that's what it is right correct um just like as a as a joke slash reference but really a joke that chris makes uh from time to time and so at some point they say Sokovia and I was just like, oh,

okay, right, right, right, right. So like a bad thing happened and the Avengers kind of had to reassess who they were like to the world and what their mission was. And so clearly Natasha kind of fell on the,

on the bad side of that. And now she's renegotiating. That is, that is correct you've more or less got it and she finds herself a woman without a country effectively and we get introduced to this kind of handler slash gopher

that she's working with and we also quickly realize after a showdown with a kind of robot villain figure who has a MacGuffin of some kind that she, she needs to find her, her long lost sister,

Yelena, or who we believe to be her sister. And her sister of course is played by Florence Pugh. And so effectively she returned, she goes to, I want to say Bulgaria. Where, where,

where is Florence Pugh? Budapest. Excuse me. Because that's where they felt. That's the joke. Because that's the tax break. Very beautiful. Good point.

Seen that bridge and that dome in a lot of movies at this point, but I would love to visit someday. Yeah, I've never been. In fact, while we were watching, I asked my wife, would you like to go there on vacation? She said, I don't care.

So I don't know if I'll ever be going. And nevertheless, they're ultimately, they're reunited. They have a hand-to-hand fight, as you do when you see one of your siblings after a long period of time. You are an only child, but I can assure you this is how I greet my brother every time I meet him with a knife fight. Sure. And then the movie's off, and it's kind of on wheels after that.

And it's kind of, we're exploring what their family really was. We're exploring how these two young women were actually raised and the circumstances under which they were raised. What this program is that they were a part of, and the story unfurls. What were like the highlights for you from this movie? So the opening sequence, which you already mentioned, but, you know, is a chase set piece involving David Harbour, Rachel Weisz,

one of my favorite actresses of all time, and two children and a plane. And, you know, it's kind of I understood all the various parts of the set piece. It's like, OK, it's a car and then it's a plane and they've got some guns and some people are coming. You know, like the the choreography and the geography of it all was very legible to me, but still exciting. And then like a reveal. I don't think that I totally understood that they were Russian agents until they made it to Cuba. It was clear that something was up, but I didn't know whether David Harbour was good or bad. And again, that's being a little simplistic as the rest of the movie will just, you know,

reveal. But I couldn't tell whether he was on the run because he had like, he was like a whistleblower, you know, like one of these sorts of things until we got there. So that was a nice reveal. Spoiler alert, he's a Russian agent. So you raise an interesting concept that the movie kind of sort of tangles with, but I wouldn't say necessarily deeply explores though though which is when you're working for the government and you think you're a hero on behalf of your country are you really a hero that's obviously a core conversation around the avengers movies and around the captain america movies and we get to see it sort of from russia's point of view because david harbour plays a effectively the jokey mirror counterpart to Captain America named Red Guardian.

And he is asking himself a lot of questions about duty and his purpose and the way that he took care of these young women or did not take care of them, as they might suggest. And, you know, it's one of those classic, like, you think your cause is more worthy than my cause, but in fact, you are the one who does not understand what is good and true about the universe.

So it's, it's, it's kind of has an idea, but doesn't, I'm still trying to wrap my head around, like, what are the ideas of this movie? If they have any,

I mean, the main one is just like, you know, families can be found everywhere, but they're so important, you know, but that's made literal in the movie. That's the problem with that. I know. I mean, that's what I'm saying. It's like, it's a little bit of Fast and Furious

envy throughout, but you know what? That's proven to be very powerful. Families are everywhere. And then I think the other idea is, hey, look at this very tiny, powerful woman who's going to become the new Black Widow. Aren't you excited? Absolutely. Yeah. So another highlight for me was the again the aforementioned um natasha yelena fight it had some real killing eve apartment energy and which i liked but then they just actually they really they fought again i like it when people just punch each other that's it's kind of it's like action I can understand, you know? And they're just making jokes along with it.

You know, it's kind of, it's witty. So I enjoyed that. And then I enjoyed the first family reunion scene between David Harbour, Rachel Weisz, who turns out to be like the mad scientist behind the russian you know splinter programs operations to control the world through the fembot army you know cool stuff but i mean that is what it is basically it is there are parts of this movie that feel ripped directly from james bond for example the jumping out of the plane thing is almost almost shot for shot out of the opening sequence of moonraker which is a movie that we see very briefly in this film it's paying huge homage to that in the same way that fest and the furious feels like it's paying huge homage to the finale of moonraker by the way we're very

weird how moonraker which is one of the less respected james bond movies is in our culture right now nevertheless um it's also fascinating that, this movie doesn't really have a villain. It has a, it has a, a, a big bad played by Ray Winstone, um, as a character named Dracov, but we don't really hear from him except for a kind of a final 20 minute throat clearing, almost Bond villain-esque series of speeches that he gives. And we don't understand the motivations of any of the characters. And we also know that Natasha is going to die in the Endgame film. So through the final hour of the movie, I was like, okay, so we're just kind of waiting until we get to a point where Florence Pugh gets to be

the future of this franchise. It significantly let the air out of the balloon for me, I must say. Yeah. Again, even though I didn't totally remember what was happening, I don't, I didn't feel like that, but I know she's going to die.

So none of this matters like tension as much in the movie itself, because I think they imported the, the family tension. And then also just kind of like the Cold War spy tension. The villain is Russia, which is an easy target these days and always, I suppose. But I was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the Fembot army. You got to stop them. You got to take revenge. And that's what you have to do. When there is a Russian mind control operation, you just have to stop it.

What would you do? Especially if you had this pheromone lock that was talked about? Oh my God, that was pretty brutal. Pretty good. I've never seen that before. Yeah, me either. And I was quite taken aback. But again, I think it's like the simple just smashing your head into something or smashing your fist into something. And that's just really connects for me. I don't know if I would be brave enough to do that, but I guess you got to do what you got to do. Because once again, you just have to take out the Russian fembot army. So the Red Guardian has super strength,

but pretty much nobody else in this movie has superpowers except for one character. Now, I like this character. I do not know this character from the comic books. I never read about it. I heard about him or her on an episode of Ringerverse when Van Lathan explained the history of Taskmaster. Taskmaster is that robotic-esque figure that we see early in the film that seems to be getting into it with Natasha and then becomes an irritant throughout the film, and then we learn is very closely associated with the big bad in the movie. Taskmaster has a cool set of skills as supervillains go, which is to say Taskmaster can replicate the fighting form, really any of the actions that anything on Earth does.

So if he or she fights with Captain America once, he or she knows how to throw the shield and hand to hand combat in the same style. This goes for all of the superheroes in the whole thing. And yet, the same way that this movie is really not a superhero movie, Taskmaster is not even really a superhero. Just sort of a trained soldier in a lot of ways.

And so ultimately, I think the reason I'm bringing all this up is, this isn't a superhero movie. It's just not even really in any form or fashion because it's not about spinning forward isn't a superhero movie. It's just like not even really in any form or fashion because it's not about spinning forward the future of superhero storytelling. It doesn't feature any superpowers

except for David Harbour like effectively punching a guy for a while and then flipping a car over to get his family free on a plane. And so it actually is just the spy movie. And that seems kind of obvious,

but I will say it's radical in the face of a lot of the other shit that we've been watching for the last five years yeah but like if anybody who is just a special well-trained person with you know fancy gadgets is not a superhero then like batman isn't a superhero touche it's a very good point I think I'm thinking of it in the context of the MCU, which features a Norse god and a gamma ray infused scientist who becomes gigantic. And the kind of like

over the topness, the magnificent nature of the Marvel superheroes. I mean, Captain America's just chemically enhanced, right? Iron Man also, just he has his little propeller that you put in his chest and all his gadgets. He's not like a god. I mean, most of them aren't actually gods.

That's the DC universe, right? I think it's actually interesting. It's like part of it is costume. And part of it is having a name, a title, a purpose. And part of it is just the iconography that we choose to accept or not accept. Taskmaster is like that's one of the worst names I've ever heard for a superhero or a supervillain. I mean, it literally sounds like a TaskRabbit offshoot that you would put on your phone. Right.

But I thought as like a, as a feature in the film, as like a character that fights effective. Well, I was going to say that I think you're right in that I just like didn't really register Taskmaster until the end. For a while, I thought it was going to be Rachel Weisz because, you know, she shows up at the beginning and then she's nowhere to be found. And I was like, I know that you're not booking one of the great actors of her generation to have her disappear after the cold open. But in terms of like the lore and who is this person and how will this affect whatever which is also a part of a superhero movie i was like oh i don't really care like i that you know i forgot that she hadn't gotten rid of this person after she got rid of

the three other villains that she had to kill in order to um to escape the weird you know spy tower in the sky why is it always a tower in the sky i got i can't understand that how is that efficient i don't know i mean i i guess it's impregnable you know like it's you can't it's harder to get there and then until the black widow shows up well you know it's a mod movie i don't know what to tell you like they have to figure out a way to get the hero on board and then I guess they just like exploding more things

it's like one more place to fall from right because you fall from the different levels of the tower and then you fall into the just keeps the ending going and they like to do that in these movies

there's always a an edifice of some kind that starts to topple and then people slide across. I saw this in another superhero movie that's coming out later this summer as well. And also we saw it and you know, the airship that collapses in the first Avengers movie and then people sliding off the airship. This is a tried and true strategy for action filmmaking.

Do you care to hear what I think this movie is setting up? Will you listen to me tell you what I think is going to happen here? So can we talk about the stinger then? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. can we talk about the stinger then yeah that's what i'm saying let's talk about the stinger right so to do so i want to i want to put like a big bright sign that says if you don't want anything spoiled for you to this point we've done an okay job of not spoiling too many things right you don't want to hear this because i think that this actually is the one place where it it it pushes towards some of the things that you were suggesting the movie otherwise does not have right so i would like to participate in the part where we explain what the stinger is,

because I did watch it. And also like the big picture takeaway, which is that Florence P will be a superhero. That is correct. Which is like, I mean, that's obvious from the minute she shows up on the screen. Like I said, she's kind of eating ScarJo's lunch. She gets all the best lines. I would say she actually was even more effective

as a physical presence than I expected. I don't know that, you know, she's obviously very young and seems like a very vibrant actress, but I don't know that I necessarily saw her

being able to do some of that action, filmmaking, acting that you were talking about, which is a skill. Scarlett Johansson has always been very good at that. She's appeared in many action movies

over the years, movies like Lucy. And so for Florence Pugh, I mean, we last saw her in little women, right? That was, that didn't,

didn't exactly scream knife wielding murderess, but she, you know, she has range. She has range. Right. And she also, you know,

she, she is just like powerful, you know, like small, but mighty. And so it doesn't surprise me that there's one shot where she's like doing her movie star run and i was like oh florence pugh you practice your movie star run but it was pretty good i liked it she was good she was effective um the stinger effectively ends this

way the movie comes to a conclusion in the year 2016 we understand that yelena and the series of fembots um have gone off to work towards a better cause once they've been deprogrammed exactly um the antidote and then we fast forward to the future to a post end game moment where Yelena is visiting Natasha's grave and she's come to lay flowers at her I guess adopted sister her sort of associated sister's grave. And who shows up but Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Now, did you- Sure. She's a totally normal person to show up at the Sting Art. I was like, what is happening? So that tells me that you did not watch The Falcon and the Winter Soldier because- I have told you myself that I did not watch The Falcon and the

Winter Soldier. I listened to every watch podcast about it. But Wesley was like, no, you don't need to watch it. It's not that good. So I passed. He was right. You don't need to watch it. You also don't need to watch it because you co-host

the show with me and I will watch it and then tell you what happens. Yeah, great. But effectively what happened at the end of that series is that this character, Valentina Allegra de Fontaine,

who's kind of a well-known, I don't know how to describe her. She's like a- That sounds like a seven-year-old made up like a fancy wealthy lady who's going to fund a superhero network. What is the fanciest name that I can think of that only grownups who want to fund superheroes would have? Allegra de Fontaine. Okay. Is it any better or worse than being called Black Widow or Taskmaster? I mean, these are all pretty childish when you think about it. Iron Man is literally a man made

of iron. Sure, but it's direct. It's to the point. I like that. Taskmaster is like a little rural juror for me. You know what, as in that, I learned this summer, Arnold Palmer, a wonderful drink, but I just, it's very hard. Anyway, Black Widow, again, concise. Like, I get it. And I, you know, it's not, it's silly. I mean, I wouldn't be like, hello, I'm the Black Widow. Please call me Black Widow or whatever.

But, you know, Allegra de la Fontaine is just a mouthful. So when she showed up, you were like, oh, wow. Here's Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Oh, let me say her full title is actually Contessa Valentina Allegra de la Fontaine. And in fact, is often referred to as Contessa throughout this series. There's only one Contessa in my house. And who is that? The barefoot Contessa. Thank you.

So anyway, this character shows up. She had previously shown up in the Falcon and the Winter Soldier. She's clearly trying to put a team together of some kind. What that team is, we don't know. Speculation is it's a team called the Thunderbolts. Who is organizing and running the Thunderbolts?

Could be any number of people. My guess is the fact that William Hurt is again appearing in this film. William Hurt keeps showing up in nothing but MCU movies. One of the greatest American actors of the 1980s

and he's relegated to playing General Thunderbolt Ross is one of the strangest career turns in the history of movies and yet I think he is probably the guy

who's behind this group and she's recruiting people. She recruited Wyatt Russell's character at the end of Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Oh recruiting people. She recruited Wyatt Russell's character at the end of Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Oh, okay. I like Wyatt Russell. I do too.

He was the best part of that show, I thought. You know, and he was also just really done dirty by a woman in the window. Everybody was, but that was tough. It was really tough. He deserved better, and he's clearly going to get better because he's going to be a superhero

in a Marvel property. What that property is, we don't know yet. There's probably a number of other people that are going to join. It seems like Emily Van Camp's character, Sharon Carter, also could potentially be a part of it. What the Contessa shows, Yelena is a photo of Hawkeye. Yeah. And blames Hawkeye on the death of Black Widow, which I suppose you could make the case that that's true. Though, of course, Black Widow, which I suppose you could make the case that that's true, though of course Black Widow sacrificed herself

really. They fought to die first so that they could I believe it's the soul stone that they acquired from Red Skull before going to Do you remember what I'm talking about? When's the last time you saw Endgame? In the theater the day that I went to saw it? It's three

hours long. No. You can't help me here. As you were saying that they were fighting, I was sort of saw it. So you don't know. It's three hours long. No. You can't help me here. As you were saying that they were fighting, I was sort of remembering it. I just remember like Jeremy Renner like in a field at the beginning of the movie with some family

and then he's like, oh, it's time to go. I gotta go. No, they disappear. That's what happens. Oh, that's what happens. That's how the film opens. Oh, yeah.

Okay. And then Dear Mr. Fantasy hits and then we're off into that magical journey that is Avengers Endgame. So Hawkeye is still alive. Hawkeye is still alive. We saw him mourning at the end of Endgame

and we see him now being positioned by Contessa as a target, someone that Yelena should go after. Even though it's possible that long-term Hawkeye might also be a part of this team, the Thunderbolts team, it's possible. We don't know. There's a Marvel TV show coming next year called Secret Invasion where this group of characters figure prominently. So I don't know if that means... I would be surprised if Florence Pugh is the star of an MCU TV show. I kind of feel like she's above that. I feel like she should have her own movies,

but maybe that's not how this is going to work what do you think is going to happen there i assumed it would be movies because she's a movie star but then also as previously discussed they don't make movies anymore uh and people are pretty wild about these tv shows and if julia louis-dreyfus is going to be in the thunderbolts is that what it? I almost said Thundercats. Honestly, it's not the Thundercats, I can assure you. I'm also just so Emily Van Camp was on Revenge, right? She was. For the last two minutes, I've just been trying to remember how Revenge panned out.

Finally, like, did she get Revenge? Should we get Eileen in here? Because she followed Revenge so closely. Did she like, did she finish it? I watched like the first season and a half just devotedly and then just no idea what happened. I couldn't tell you

what happened on that show except that Henry Zerny was on it. The guy, Cherney, how do you pronounce his last name? No idea. The guy who plays

opposite Ethan Hunt, you know, who's one of the Ethan Hunt says, you've never seen me very upset. Agent Kittredge, is that his name?

I think that's his name. Anyway, great character actor. Terrible show. Anyway, if Julia Louis-Dreyfus is willing to lead up the Thunderbolts in whatever medium they decide is appropriate, then Florence Pugh can show up for like eight episodes. I don't know. What about Daniel Brühl's Baron Zemo? He might also be a part of this. Is he married to the Contessa?

Is she Contessa Zemo? She's not. It's possible that they have some sort of partnership. We saw Zemo came back in Falcon and Winter Soldier as well. From where? He was in jail. He was in prison. He was in prisons for his crimes.

Oh, so he's evil. Oh see he was evil they brought him out to help them then he went back into prison so isn't florence pugh then gonna be like i who are you lady and team up with hawkeye to avenge the you know now you're thinking like an ncu fan yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah i mean i don't know i don't know where they're going to go. No, but I think you'll ultimately see those people team up the same way that Black Widow and Captain America were not originally allies and then they became close friends.

That's how these stories usually work. So that is really like the one part of the movie I felt like that was tipping to the future at all. And it wasn't, there weren't three stingers. There weren't like all of these notes

to, you know, characters in the future. all. And it wasn't, there weren't three stingers. There weren't like all of these notes to, you know, characters in the future. It was pretty contained. What is David Harbour's future? That's a good question. I'll say one, I enjoyed him in this movie, but I don't think he's going to be for everybody.

He's, he's doing a very bad Russian accent and it's a pretty like clownish portrayal of the aging ex-soviet hero figure i don't know very much about red guardians so i won't pretend to putin's gonna be mad like what are you talking about no i just think i think his performance is pretty over the top you know it's like it's pretty goofy you know i have like a real soft spot for the guys who like the one male character in female um centered movies who like show up in our game and are like sure i'll just like be a dummy because women have had to do that for you know the entire history of cinema so i like i i was kind of with it i was like i see what you're doing

and you're you're in on the joke and making fun of yourself but it is a particularly bad russian accent i thought florence pia's accent was pretty good pretty good this is a this is a particularly bad Russian accent. I thought Florence Pugh's accent was pretty good. Pretty good. This is a, this is a Florence Pugh fan club. It, it, it slipped out a couple of times, a couple of times we got into like Lady Macbeth, Florence Pugh.

But she, she was very good. Harbor, I thought was very good. Rachel Weisz, I wish had a little more to do. Right. It doesn't seem like there's much of a future for her.

Just kind of like programming fembots i agree um i thought she looked dynamite in the in the black widow outfit she's one of the most beautiful people in the world i i really i feel very strongly about rachel vice and just how i'd like having her in movies um so i hope this paycheck was great hope it bought a lovely home for her and Daniel Craig in the country locale of their choosing and I hope they're thriving

forget about the kind of critical aspect of this conversation but just purely as a kind of a consumer and somebody who looks at the landscape since so much of this conversation at the end here has been about what is the TV future and

what is this going to be a TV or a movie or what are the stakes of this thing? Do you think that the onslaught of these TV properties coming before this movie and now being an active part of the storytelling has watered down the Marvel experience or the Marvel dominance at all? I think I'm probably the wrong person to answer that question. I don't know whether it's watered it down. It's certainly made it feel like more vocational, essentially, like the people who are watching the shows. And granted, I work at The Ringer and I have a lot of like very smart colleagues who really enjoy this and whose job it is to just like dig in and, you know, count every one of those timelines on Loki, more power

to you. But it does seem like the way that these shows have are being consumed has changed. And obviously that's true in the sense that they are like TV shows at home, but also sort of the, the, the theory first and, and really kind of the extent to which the audience is involved in it. And so this sort of big top, like, I don't know, just a couple hours at the movies that like we should check into what our friends at the Avengers are up to these days. How are they feeling? Feels a little less focused, I guess, than the rest of the MCU experience. And so I'm curious how people who have really bought into that MCU kind of every week, part of the community viewing experience will receive it. And I'm curious how people who have like not checked in

since Spider-Man or the Avengers or like, you know, the casual, like informed, but casual viewer, which despite my idiocy, I think you would categorize me as I've seen most of these movies. I know most of the characters, how they'll respond to it, or honestly, whether they will feel like the, oh, I got to check this out right now because it's a new mcu movie and it's like a big event and i'm not gonna get it because you you know there's gonna be something else always it's a good point i thought of somebody like my dad while watching black widow where i thought my dad actually could enjoy this movie he's kind of somewhat fluent in the marvel characters he

has a daughter who is following them closely but he doesn't care about the lore just like you don't care about the lore he's not invested in the ongoing project of the mcu he's like if i have two hours to kill and i have a semi-enjoyable movie that's good enough for me and i think that those people might be more satisfied than the hardcore fans here there's there's a couple of other wrinkles to this conversation too one is box office expectations so there was all this panic around in the heights and the box offices started to go down and down and down now three weekends in a row after a big comeback for a quiet place part two which is really the only movie

thus far that has truly distinguished itself at the box office thus far unlike a quiet place part two this movie is available on Disney Plus Premiere and also in the theaters. You and I saw it at home. I had a very good setup to watch it at home. I felt good about it. I felt like I got a very immersive experience. I wasn't pausing. I wasn't looking at my phone. I was very locked in. I'm very interested in these movies, of course.

But it is still different. And I'm wondering how much that box office and that cultural seepage will be affected. So I'm curious how you think it will perform. You don't have to put a number on it, but just if you think it'll be a success, will it outpace what they're projecting, or do you think it'll be significantly lower? And then will there be an episode of this podcast perhaps the following Monday in which we say, holy crap, what does this mean for the future of the box office? I definitely think there will be an

episode of this podcast where we're like, what does this mean for the future of the box office? I think once you factor in international box office, I don't think this is going to be a failure. I agree. I do also think there are a lot of people and a lot of families who are trained, oh, hey, I can watch this at home. $30 is a lot less than it will cost for a family of four, you know, if you factor in parking and all of popcorn and all of that stuff to go see this film. And I'll be honest, I had a pretty nice time watching it at home. It's again, not like high cinema, holy church to me, but I did feel like, Oh, Hey, it's like a big budget movie. And that something is happening every five minutes and there's a joke and I'm entertained. And my eyeballs are being held to the screen. Like you, I didn't take any breaks. So it kind of worked for me in that context. And I think there's no reason to,

if you, if you want to go see it on a big screen, you can, but a lot of people are used to watching these shows at home now. Yes. That's that. That was the other thing I was going to mention was, is it have, have people getting fired up at midnight for Loki on a Tuesday?

Do they have the same viewing pattern expectations for something like black widow? Now we know that Shang Chi, for example, is not going to be available on Disney plus. on a Tuesday, do they have the same viewing pattern expectations for something like Black Widow? Now, we know that Shang-Chi, for example, is not going to be available on Disney+. And what will that mean in September

when you can only get it in the theater? Maybe it means nothing. Maybe it just means people go to the theater and nothing changes. But do they lose any audience that has gotten comfortable

doing exactly what you just described? I don't know. I mean, I guess we have time to figure that out. But I'm very curious to see if the only sure bet in movie going is at all disrupted by this. I think it has to be in some capacity just because things are so different, but how and whether it's a disaster and what it means for the future, it really does seem case by case

to me at this point. It seems like we're all still feeling out how to live in this new world and what's going to stay and what's going to change and how much we want to spend on all of these things. Does it give you any anxiety as a movie podcast host to think, I don't know when anybody's seeing anything? No, I don't feel any anxiety about that. I mean, I guess I should because you and I have talked about it in terms of how do we cover things and how much do we spoil? And I assume if you're listening this far in the podcast, you either watched the movie or you don't care about the stinger or you're not going to watch the movie, but you're listening to this podcast, which is a behavior I do actually relate to, as previously mentioned

on the watch. So in terms of trying to figure out who this is for and how we should talk about things, yeah, it's a little bit of a head scratcher. But in terms of this sense of, you know, something only matters if it's like a collective at the same moment experience, I just, I don't think that's true anymore. I still really like the collective at the same, oh my God, can you believe this is happening? Because they are so rare, but I don't know.

We watch things that you and I watch things at different times. And then we're just like, Hey, this movie, huh? It's just kind of seems how most people do things now. I, I agree.

I still think I'm trying to personally figure out the cadence because one of the things I like about movies is the mass aspect of them, especially when they're done well in the sense that, you know, it's not just about saying, oh my God, have you seen Parasite yet? It's so good. It's about the dinner conversation about Parasite among eight people who've all seen it. That's what I really love. That's what I really want to, I want to hold on to that.

And that may be- Call me when you're going to a dinner with eight people, you know, and then you can get to- Right. This is what I'm saying. We're like, we're all working towards that. And I, there is still that energy of like, oh, have you seen Parasite or, oh, have you seen the Soderbergh movie? Oh, have you seen, you know, XYZ? And in some ways it's, it's fun because people are seeing different things and recommending things to

people. I do find just in terms of like random text conversations and someone being like, check out Starstruck on HBO Max, which by the way, I finished it. Delightful. Could have been a movie, but delightful. And random things that feel kind of like nice discoveries because it isn't like being shoved down your throat and like, here is the thing that everyone is talking about. So there are benefits to that. But in terms of us programming a podcast and in terms of feeling like those moments of that, those moments of Parasite, honestly, where it's like, oh, my God, this is amazing thing that we're all sharing in together. They are fewer and farther between. That said, Parasite's a masterpiece. So like masterpieces are few and far between.

Do you think we should be affixing star ratings to films that we review? My instinctive reaction is like, oh God, I don't want to, but it can be useful as a project that you and I have been working on for a long time that we're going to be able to share with people soon really illustrates. So we could consider it. I mean, it's also, as you remind people very often on the rewatchables, like Rotten Tomatoes doesn't mean anything at all. And I am wary of being. Like Rotten Tomatoes doesn't mean anything at all. And I am wary of being sucked into Rotten Tomatoes land. I already feel like our top five lists just don't, once they get posted, there's no nuance. No one's really like appreciating all of the work that we go into making lists and talking about lists. No one appreciates

the editorial integrity of a list. So am I reluctant to have it like boiled down and then flung off into corners of the internet that I never want to visit? Yes, absolutely. But do I live in the year 2021? Also, yes. So I ask you for a very specific reason, which is this is one of the first movies in a while that had me asking myself, would I recommend this to people on the street? Would I tell people you should check out Black Widow because it feels so encased in this broader experience that you've been talking about throughout this episode. And so I have been trying to evaluate it as kind of a standalone property. And it's the kind of movie that me, that as a standalone property, this is a real two and a half star movie. It's got some stuff

in it I like. It's not great. It's a little baggy as all of these MCU movies are. It's got one performance that I'm like, this is absolutely dynamite. You got to see it. Maybe you could bump it to three stars for Florence Pugh, but I am just trying to apply a kind of numeric rationale to my feelings around the movie. And for years we've been doing this show and we've never done that.

We've never said we, we don't even necessarily always end the episodes by saying like, do you recommend film X? We just kind of stop. Well, that's kind of what I was trying to talk about at the beginning of the episode. And,

and, and specifically what I recommended to pretty much all the people in my life, except for you who don't care about the MCU movies. Like I guess Chris like sort of cares about them, but that's it. There's no one else in your life that cares about the MCU. That's shocking. No, I like, I, I hear from some friends in your life who care. I mean, number one, please text me guys. I haven't heard from you in a while. Love you. Like, feel free to let me know if I didn't know that you're a huge MCU nerd. I understand

why, because you were afraid to tell me, but it's okay. This is how I spend my time. But no, I don't, I don't have friends who like, my friends barely watch movies. I love them a lot. They just watch Instagram. So would I recommend it to any of them? Probably not, but only because of the MCU-ness of it. If it were this exact same movie, but it was a Mission Impossible movie, I'd be like, sure. It's pretty fun. It was dumb, but I had a great time. But because I know none of them care about the MCU stuff, I'm just like, you can skip it. That's so interesting. I mean, that's really, really interesting that that historically is almost being held against it as opposed to it being in its favor.

Well, I think that's the flip side of cultivating such a strong, forgive me, brand identity and fan base and people who are so attuned to it and are like, this is my thing, which is if it's not your thing, then you're like, oh, I guess this is not my thing. You know, and it's, you pick one or the other. And they clearly have a strong enough fan base and enough people who are like, this is really my thing to lean into what's working for them. And that at least through, you know, phase three, did we just finish phase three? Is it, which, what are the phases? The kickoff of phase four, the first film in phase four.

So at least through phase three three that really worked for them um and right and and wasn't if if it was like exclusionary or like you know turned off some audiences it's like those audiences weren't going to watch a movie anyway who so who cares um but i i do think it's a it's a very very it's like an insanely large specific audience at this point. Final question for you. Is this the first superhero movie that passes the Bechdel test? Well, I'm trying to think in Wonder Woman and Themyscira, they're like talking about training and stuff. And, but they are often talking about the world of men

i guess i think that would be like real borderline but whether to protect against it i don't really remember there must be like a scene or two where young diana is being taught to like honor her power or you know know, some stuff. So that might pass. Definitely don't remember anything in Captain Marvel. Was there a second woman in Captain Marvel? Annette Bening, but she was like evil,

right? There was also, there was Lashana Lynch's character in that movie. And they had a friendship. Right. But again, often the conversations that the two female characters are having in this movie is about someone like Dracov, the head of the Red Room, who is the big bad and who they're obsessing over and they need to take down. So even by the absurdities of comic book movies, it's still hard to have two female

characters talking about anything that isn't the big bad. Right. I guess at some point they're talking about Natasha's mother, right? So they're talking about Natasha's mother, right? So they're talking about families. So this one does pass it. Just, just by a nose, by a hair.

Yeah. Congratulations to, to women. We, we did it finally. Congratulations to women. Congratulations to you, Amanda,

for surviving and thriving through another Marvel cinematic universe entrant. I'm sure we'll have more of those to talk about in the future. Until then, let's go to my conversation now with Lee Janiak about Fear Street. Delighted to be joined by Lee Janiak. Lee, we have a lot to talk about because you've made a lot of films all in one shot. Before we get into the many films that you've made, maybe you could just walk me through your relationship to horror movies over the years, because it feels like you have a real affection and admiration for them. That's a very accurate, I think, description of my relationship to horror movies. I don't know. I grew up kind of, I was, I was a kid in the eighties.

And so when I started to be around like nine, 10, 11, doing sleepover parties with my friends, we would always go to the video store and kind of like sneakily try to rent things that we weren't supposed to see. So some of like the early movies that I saw were Child's Play, Nightmare on Elm Street, Psycho, weirdly, Rocky Horror Picture Show, which is a horror movie and also not. And so those were kind of like the early ones that I grew up watching. And then as a teenager in the nineties, I think Scream was kind of like the first big one that I really connected with as like a teenager. And then, you know, cut to I'm an adult now ish. And I, I, you know, wanted to be a filmmaker. I had been writing with my writing partner, Phil, we had been, you know, writing different things, trying to break in. And, and we wrote

this movie honeymoon, which was my first movie. It's an indie film and it's kind of a very intimate body snatcher movie. And there's a lot of body horror in it. And a lot of other stuff that's weird and horrific, but essentially to me, horror movies do this great thing because they let you have this amazing popcorn, fun, insane theatrical or at home experience. And then you can like sneak in that they're also like about something else too. And I think that's kind of the brilliant of horror. So I've really enjoyed being able to do things in that sphere. So you first hit my radar when Honeymoon came out. That was 2014. Yeah. So what's been happening in that time?

Obviously, you've been making a number of films in this Fear Street series, but kind of walk me through after your first film comes out, where do you go from there? So right after there, I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to start directing television. Honeymoon was so well received by the horror community and kind of the festival circuit that it was, it was, it was a really amazing kind of first film experience for me. And then on, on the tails of that, I started getting work directing TV. So I directed some episodes of Scream, the series for MTV. I did Outcast for Cinemax, which was amazing, created by Robert Kirkman. And then all the while I was also writing. So I did a few kind of studio assignments with my partner, Phil, and then I was also attached

to remake the craft. And so that was something that I was doing for a while. And then I would say around 2017, which is insane for me to say, I was approached by Chernin Entertainment, who are my producers on Fear Street, saying, we've been trying to crack how to tell a multi-movie version of these Fear Street books that R.L. Stine wrote. Are you familiar with them? Would you be interested? And that's when I started working on that, which is crazy. It was literally 2017 that I've had the first conversation about this. Yeah. I feel like that's right around when I started hearing about it. And so when it was announced that these movies were actually coming out this year, I was like, wow, I feel like I've been waiting a long time for this. Yeah, you have. So when Chernin comes to you and they're like, are you familiar with this? Were you familiar with the books? Were you familiar with R.L. Stine? Yeah. So that was one of the other things, like I said, being a teenager in the nineties, Fear Street, Christopher Pike, like all of those

kind of hit the horror sweet spot for me. I was a big fan. I loved them. It was, it was like one of those things when Chernin first came and started talking to me, I was so excited. And then also like, ah, like, what do I do? You know, like that's a, for me, like as a fan, I was like, how do I do this? Because the books are, um, I don't know if you're familiar with the books, but there's like a million of them. There's a million of them and anything that could possibly happen in a horror universe happens in these books. Um, but I was super excited and just like, fuck yes. Like definitely like 100%. So, so like 100%. So I came on board and then we started building out from there. Do you have to sell your vision then to the producers or to the Stein estate? Like what happens next in terms of saying like, here's how I see and also why did, whether it's Churnin or you see it as a multi-film execution, that's the thing that is most fascinating to me about this. Yeah. So it's interesting. So that's kind of two things. So yes,

I did have to sell my vision. Um, and, and that's kind of like a normal process when you join a movie as a filmmaker, you, um, you know, people do different things for me. What I did specifically with fear street was I kind of, I had my initial pitch for how we should tackle the movies and what they should be. And I'll talk about the multi-movie thing in a second. But then I made this lookbook, which was the craziest lookbook I've ever made. Cause I've made a lot of lookbooks, but this one was over a hundred pages. And it kind of did, it tackled the three different time periods and it, it touched on everything. So it touched on tone and touched on the style, the vibe, the nostalgia, the music, the scares,

like what the horror would be for each time period. And it was cool. I'm really proud of it. I used kind of the, the fear street book covers and, but I changed them to say like, you know, whatever it was that I was talking about in the, in the, like the particular, like each particular section. And then I also made a mixtape that I put a USB that had all of the different songs that were supposed to kind of like evoke the time period. And then I also cut together like a little sizzle trailer using movies that I love. So movies from the nineties, movies from the seventies, and then using like footage from the witch or the village or whatever, and made like a little

trailer for like what my fear street would be. Um, so I edited that together. So that was like the, the visual part of that presentation. And I presented it to turn it and I had to pitch it to Fox. I don't know it. Some of it was shared with the sign estate, I think as well at that point. But that was, that was kind of how I got hired. And then to speak to the multi-movie thing, it was also one of the things that I was most excited about. This was an idea that Peter Chernin had, which I don't really know exactly where the Genesis was, but he just thought it would be awesome to basically release a trilogy all in the same year as opposed to having to wait years in between which is you know traditional and that was kind of his idea the question for me was like the main thing that we had to figure out going into writing the scripts was why like like why do we want to do this beyond the gimmick of it's cool?

And how do you get audiences to stay engaged in this and not feel like they're just being, you know, tricked into buying a ticket or like tune in next week, you know, like, how do we, we do this thing? So that was the, that was like the main kind of like intellectual experiment that we were, we were all kind of tackling. And what we ended up coming up with was that we were doing something new and it was kind of a hybrid between movies and traditional television content. So we wanted to tell movies that felt satisfying each by themselves, but also we had that connective narrative. So you really did have a reason for having to continue to peel back the layers of the onion and keep watching.

So, you know, this show is primarily about movies. I'm obsessed with movies. Lovely. I'm fighting for the lifespan of movies as it begins to morph over time. And so this project is really fascinating because they are still standalone movies, especially one and two, I find particularly fascinating because they are still standalone movies especially one and two i find particularly are like they are unto themselves and effectively like why because i feel like you could have gotten this prompt from churn and you could have said you know what let's

actually just make this kind of like a mini series where everything kind of like blends together but you you did you kind of not just from a time perspective in terms of the different years that you chose, but even from like a structural perspective, from a cast perspective, what was it that made you want to kind of retain those shapes? I don't know. I think it was also for me, this thing of like being a movie lover and wanting it to still feel like

movies and not just like, like, cause we've seen like very successful, amazing versions of kind of limited series and there is like you know the movies originally were were greenlit at Fox and so originally they were going to be theatrical and there was still this idea like I think that someone could release a mini-series or a limited series theatrically and potentially be successful in that um but but there was that thing for me that felt like, just like really, I was thinking about it as an audience member. And I was thinking like,

if I went to a movie, and then at the end, if you didn't resolve, like the main kind of tension of that movie that I've spent the last like hour and a half watching, would I feel gypped? And like, you're just tricking me into buying a ticket. So, you know, like I wanted the cliffhanger, like feeling like, I think that that's important and, and also like very kind of intrinsic to horror, but, but I also wanted it to still feel satisfying. So it really was like just figuring out how we could do something relatively new and cross our fingers that an audience would be excited about it and wanting to go along on the ride too. Because it's three times as many movies, was it three times as long to write, three times as long to shoot, three times as long to cut? How did all of that convert?

Yes. Yes, it was. The answer is yes. The writing part was interesting. So we basically, like I said, I think I got hired sometime in the middle of 2017 and I had a small writer's room, which included my writing partner, Kate Trefry,

who wrote on movie three and Zach Olkowitz, who also wrote on movie two. And we kind of spent, it was a tiny room. We spent maybe a month together kind of breaking the initial pitch that I had come up with into like more like specifics. And then from there, we each tackled a movie. So Zach wrote this draft of the second movie. Phil and I wrote the draft of the first movie. Kate wrote the draft of the third movie. And we got drafts pretty quickly. Like I would say by the end of 2017, we had drafts.

And then the writing part, the writing process kind of just continued to evolve as we were trying to get a green light. So the writing process actually was probably like, while it was very challenging because it was like a lot of material and it was essentially like writing a show, but also not, it's also challenging to get a green light. So the writing was happening as we were moving forward, closer to a green light. The filming was crazy. It was 106 days and we shot,

which is not actually that much for three movies, but it was mostly nights, I would say. And, and that was, that was crazy because it was three different movies with three different looks and three different like camera styles and three different everything. And that was, so like moving through, like we shot all of 94 first across like any piece of 94 from the three movies we shot first then we shot 1666 and then we finished in 1978 um were the films shot in sequence or no no they were like we tried to do it like as much as we we could but it was it was often not possible um as it as it is how many days did you shoot Honeymoon?

So Honeymoon was 24, which was actually a lot for an indie movie. Yeah. I was going to say, what was it like going from 24 to 104? And is that 104, were they consecutive or did you have a break? It was 106.

106. We had four days of hiatus between shooting 94 in 1666 and 78. So basically to prep the camp. So I was, we were mostly prepping on the weekends. Like that's like what we, we did our normal kind of like, I forget how many months prep. I think I got down into Atlanta like January of 2019 and we prepped for four months that we started shooting. And then we were always prepping. Like there was never, I don't think I had one weekend that was totally off the entire time while we were, we were shooting. Cause it was always like chasing our tail, like trying to catch up and do everything, but it was awesome. And I had an amazing crew and it was really fun.

Um, so it was good. It was really good. It's a, 106 is a Kubrickian length of time to be shooting. It's a lot. And it's a lot to shoot. Like I said, the three movies, because the page count was really like significant every day. So it was weirdly like close to the amount of work of honeymoon just for longer, if that makes sense. So what were the actually the biggest challenges, especially bouncing from time period to time period? Because like you said, different camera moves and the costumes are different. What was that like having to bounce between those three? You know, the actual reality of the three different movies didn't hit me in the face as much until we got into post. When we were shooting, I joked a lot with like everyone around me that we were like in a black hole where there was like no past and no future. There's just like the task, like right

in front of us, like in that day. But I think it was challenging just like when I was shooting and I'd be in 94, but then I'd have to also be approving and prepping stuff for different time periods. And like, we were still casting. So we were still casting for 78 while we were shooting 94 and 1666. And then like dealing with kind of all of the period costumes for 1666 while we were still shooting and very much in the nineties, like that was a lot. And, and also, you know, we had young cast. And so they, we, we, we say that they pumpkin.

So like after, like after a certain amount of time, the actors pumpkin and then you lose them. So we always like had to shoot like very quickly. Um, and then we're doing stunts and blood and everything too. So that, you know, that's like normal horror, like challenge stuff, but yeah. Um, of the three, which were you most excited to shoot? Oh man, I don't, I think, I think I was the most excited to shoot 1666 because I love shooting handheld. So like 94, I was excited about like with 94, we looked to the horror films of the nins and obviously Scream. I know what you did last summer, The Faculty, like kind of all of those that are very like self-referential horror.

And so I wanted to have that kind of like traditional studio filmmaking, lots of like dolly track laid, crane work, things like that. In 78, I knew I was going to do a little more study cam work. And we were going to start to get a little more fluid with the motion, but 1666, I was like, we're doing all handheld. And, and to me, handheld is just like very exciting and kind of freeing. And I love it. And I think if it's like done well, it's, it's so good and like so organic and I don't know. So that was, I was, I was excited to shoot 1666. I was excited to shoot all of them, but that was like, I was like, I can't wait till we're like free of the Dolly track.

As a, as a 39 year old, I could, I could sense the delight you took in the needle drops of the 94 film. I feel like it's, it's packed, very resonant song. So like, how did you go about picking what should appear in the film? I mean, for all the films, but specifically that one, I felt like it was very specific. Well, we have Netflix to thank because they really supported me. Because like I said, when I was pitching the movies, music was a very important part of that pitch. So playlists are always important to me when I'm working,

but for this one, especially because I think that like it, to me, it's like music and smell are the things that like bring you back, like right back to where you are. Like if I smell herbal essences, shampoo, it's like the summer of 95. I'm like there, but the music was important. I made playlists for all the actors before we were shooting that were kind of like a extension of what I had done for my pitch. And then, so like, I kind of like knew the pieces that like, I don't know, it's all the, it's all the songs that like, I loved listening to like growing up.

And I was lucky enough to have Netflix say, yes, we will, we will support you. We will pay for these amazing songs and do it. And yeah. So yeah. You got a lot of good clearances. Well done. So let me ask you about the tone because the tone of the movie is really interesting and it is not at all what I expected.

It is this balance between homage and a kind of meta satire. And then there's like hardcore slasher, full core. And it's pretty unsparing. I think I was expecting something a little bit younger than what I got, which I liked. I mean, I'm a serious fan,

so I was into it, but I was like, Oh, she's freaking going for it. Yeah. Was that, was that always the plan did you have to fight for that like because horror films you know are in this interesting space where

like appealing to teens is important and what can you kind of get away with in the space so how did you land on making something as aggressive I would say as you did yeah it was always part of my thing like when I got hired I was like these are R rated. They have to like, cause to me, the kind of the awesomeness of like, there's great PG 13 horror movies. Like, don't get me wrong. There there's great ones, but I was thinking because these are slasher movies, I was thinking a lot of that experience that I mentioned earlier when I was like 10 or 11 and it was like, oh, this is like stuff that I definitely shouldn't see, but it felt cool. It also probably fucked me up, but whatever. Nonetheless, I was like,

that's like part of like the beauty is like sneaking into a theater or like sneaking that tape in your deck or like streaming something that you're maybe not supposed to do. And it felt like if I was making a movie that had teenagers in it, I wanted it to be like kind of a authentic to what how teenagers act and speak and what they do. And then B, I just wanted it to be like really fucking bloody and like, you know, scary in that slasher way. And that was, you know, that's a change. Like you've seen, I don't know if you've seen all three, but the type of horror and the way that the characters exist in the universe also changes depending on the era that we're in. But yeah, R-rated was always very important to me. It was not a fight.

There was only like one or two conversations that may or may not have happened while we were shooting about the number of fucks that the characters say that's all i'll say i was i was a little surprised i think just because of the netflix providence i feel like they're not as known for that more raw r-rated horror so there was no really no pushback for that they were into it i think that netflix was like an amazing partner when we when we came over to them, they were, I think they saw like the potential of, of something new that they hadn't really done.

So there was that excitement of like, Oh, this is weird movie TV hybrid a and then B yeah, we haven't really dipped into hard like horror before. Um, let's do it. So yeah, they were, they were very supportive. So I do think, well, it sounds like we had very similar experiences growing up trying to like sneak into the theater early and sliding the VHS tape. And it's kind of easier than ever if you're 10 years old to land on fear street, 1994, how do you feel about being like a gateway drug for young horror fans?

I got so good. I don't, I mean, I feel so good about it. I hope that it happens. I hope that kids are like, click. I don't even I mean, I feel so good about it. I hope that it happens. I hope that kids are like, click. I don't even know what kids do to like stream things like secretly, but I'm like, it'll only scar you a little bit. Like you'll be fine. Um, so you've done this Herculean task. It sounds like there's probably a lot of post-production as well, or just to make sure that all this is working together. When did you finish and how long have you been waiting? Basically what happened post-wise was, you know, we finished filming in like basically the beginning of September, 2019, I was back in LA starting post and, you know, I was, I did the first director's cut of 94 and that then, you know, the holidays came around and then January, I started doing

the director's cut of 78 and then pandemic happened. And, and like everyone else, we were affected by that. So we were lucky enough that for a month or so, a skeleton crew of me and my editor and like an assistant editor and like, like we're able to continue working kind of remotely and small, like a very small crew, but then even that got cut off. And so we didn't work for another like six months or something like that. And then essentially we, we were back up and running full speed ahead, September of 2020. And that was, that was amazing. I was so happy. Like once we we all got back and we were at Netflix and we had all of the support that we needed and everything.

Now it's just been a train moving, trying to finish. We have 2,000 VFX shots across the three movies. We had, obviously, the score, which was huge. Picture-wise, we were in a pretty good place as far as locking, but it was just everything else. It was VFX. which was huge. So picture wise, we were in a pretty good place, like as far as locking, but it was just everything else was VFX. It was music. It was color. It was sound mix. Like everything's epic. So last week I just finished coloring the end and the last few VFX of movie three.

So congratulations. What, what are you going to do next? Are you going to go right back to work? Yeah, I am actually. I am lucky enough to be working with my friend, Antonio Campos. He is doing Staircase. Been a guest of this show. Oh, Antonio's great. So he's doing The Staircase, which is a limited series based on the documentary um about the michael peterson case

and he is directing six of those eight episodes he created it he's been working on it forever and i'm going to go and direct two of those um cool so i'm excited about that i i get to like be back on set and kind of support him and his vision and um i'm excited that'll be like a reset for me yeah that's very cool and maybe like somewhat similar in tone, but also different in tone. Yeah, it's obviously different because you have like real, like someone that actually passed away. I think the tone is a little more serious,

but there's that kind of horror of everyday life and sleeping in. So yeah. That's cool. Leigh, we end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers, what's the last great thing they've seen? I know you've been working at a breakneck pace, but what have you seen lately?

That's good. Oh no, it's so embarrassing. So when I'm, when I'm shooting or when I'm in post, I only rewatch things. Like I can't, like, there's like something in my brain where like, I can't keep watching new things. Um, so I've been rewatching the great British bake show. No shame. Party down is the other one that I've been, which is amazing. Great British bake off. Not really a show that I get. My wife loves it. Many of my colleagues love

it. Just from your perspective, what is it about that show that appeals to you well you know what it is i i'm an i'm an amateur baker okay so i that's like one of my hobbies is bake i have the hobbies of an old woman so i like to bake and i like to knit and so and shoot slasher movies yeah and shoot slasher movies which all women like to do so anyways it just kind of hits the sweet spot for me of like craftsmanship and then everyone's just so fucking nice on it and like it's just like chill i don't know it's like comfort food i literally re-watched it like three times all of them it's insane you need to find a way to get netflix to serve that up to audiences when they finish 1666 right like i mean you know how they have that button where it like just starts like playing 100% you're exactly right. Lee, congrats again. And thanks for doing the show. It's really

nice to talk to you. Yeah. Thanks Sean. Nice to meet you. Thanks to Lee Janiak, Amanda, and of course our producer, Bobby Wagner for his work on this episode. Next week on the big picture, we have a very special episode coming your way, a deep dive into the career of one of my favorite filmmakers, Brian De Palma. It's on the 40th anniversary of one of his masterpieces,

the film Blowout. We'll see you then.