The Big Picture - ‘Spiderhead’ and the Five Netflix Movies That Matter

Episode Date: June 17, 2022

It’s real and it’s here. Chris Ryan joins Sean to discuss Netflix’s new sci-fi drama ‘Spiderhead.’ Then they discuss Netflix’s challenges as a movie studio in 2022 (1:00). Finally, ‘Spiderhead’ screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick discuss with Sean how they came to adapt a George Saunders short story and their careers (56:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey Guests: Chris Ryan, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Bill Simmons. We're not just reacting to the NBA playoffs on my podcast. We're also doing it on the Ringer NBA show and the Mismatch podcast. They are coming after some of these NBA playoff games. Check it out Monday, Wednesday, and Friday nights on the Ringer Podcast Network. I'm Sean Fennessey, and this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about Spider-Head, a movie that exists. Have you heard of this Netflix blockbuster science fiction adventure film starring Chris Hemsworth and Miles Teller,

directed by Top Gun Maverick filmmaker Joseph Kaczynski, now available to watch? Well, if you haven't, you can check it out right now. And you can listen to my chat with the screenwriters of that film, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. They also wrote Zombieland. They also wrote Deadpool. They're some of the most successful screenwriters in all of Hollywood. I hope you'll stick around for that conversation. They're really cool guys. But first, let's talk about Spiderhead. Big movie this weekend. Joining me to do so is the Spider Daddy. It's Chris Ryan. Hi, Chris. Sean, have you ever committed to a bit so hard

and then found yourself boxed in by the bit? Yeah. Well, let's give some context for the bit you've been boxed into, which is that way back on July 18th, 2021, we had a movie auction on the big picture. And Chris, you spent some of your movie capital on a movie that was then known as Escape from Spiderhead you spent $80 on this movie sight unseen it's been an ongoing bit that this movie doesn't exist it does we've seen it and how are you feeling about the movie you bid on I think this is what guys who bought GameStop last year would have felt like if GameStop wound up being a pretty thoughtful, normal company. You know?

They were like, I'm buying this crazy meme stock. Screw everything. Let's set the money on fire. And then they get to, what if you just found out they were like, yeah, we have a really good plan to expand franchises and we think brick and mortar is going to make a comeback after COVID. And it was just like GameStop's here.

That's how I feel about Spider-Man. I had been so over committed to the idea of this movie being terrible or insane or a masterpiece. And it turns out Joseph Kaczynski just made a really solid movie. Yeah. It's a little hard to get over excited about it because it's it's good it is a good movie and it is probably nothing more than that we'll talk about the details of that and how that comes to be but um before we go into spider head more deeply i do want to recap for you the films that you auctioned for sure in that draft back in 2021 okay uh number one you spent 150 on eternals which might be the worst mcu movie um number two you got escape from spider head which in retrospect solid deal on a movie that i'm not sure if it's going to be massively in the culture but a quality flick number three

you got um for 50 venom let there be carnage which i'm almost certain you haven't seen we can't say who can say who can say uh what movies chris certain you haven't seen. We can't say. Who can say? Who can say? What movies Chris Ryan hasn't seen? The list grows longer and longer by the day. Number four, you got Spider-Man No Way Home. You did like that movie. You liked it a lot. Yeah, I did see that. Come on, don't be a prick. And you know that this thing where you're like, Chris doesn't actually watch movies is not going to be the new thing that we do. Well, you never know. You spent $230

on that movie. And I would say that was actually a pretty good bargain because that was the movie sensation of the second half of 2021. And we all loved it on this show. And then number five was Red, White, and Water, a movie that does not have a release date. And you know how much money you spent on that movie? Like 800 bucks, like $490. Yeah so this is a an unfinished auction so anyone who checks out spider head this weekend and all the cr heads are like chris did it he won the auction we can't say that yet because we don't know what red white and water is um okay shall we dig into this movie do you think that it's a bad thing that jerome powell has been asking me how to fix inflation yeah you um he's jerome powell classic cr head he's just like chris i've seen heat five times this week what should we do about about these basic points man when is our uh margin

call rewatchables with janet yellen getting broadcast you Do you know that I texted Bill this morning and I said, do you like Margin Call? What did he say? Not really. But it's one of those movies where I bet like he's like, oh, Margin Call. And then he'll be like, actually, yes, I love it. Well, if he's not interested, you and I can do a top five. The economy is in the shitter movies.

Yeah. That sound good? Or top five things Jeremy Irons says in Margin Call. Yeah. Maybe we should just broadcast Margin Call on the Big Picture feed. That would actually be better than whatever episode we're about to do. But let's do that episode. Spiderhead is an adaptation of a George Saunders short story.

It is kind of a soft satire. It's about two convicts who are played by Teller and Journey Smollett living in a near future society and they're grappling with their pastett living in a near future society and they're grappling with their past while trapped in a facility that allows prisoners to reduce their sentence time by volunteering for experiments using emotion altering drugs. These experiments are run by a prison overseer named Steve Abnesti and he is played by Chris

Hemsworth. This is a fascinating movie. You can see why it emerged in this time because it's kind of a pandemic production. It's a small cast. It's a pretty confined space. The scope of the story is fairly limited. You could see why it would be appealing to get into motion over the past few years. What did you think? You mentioned that it's very respectable in quality, but what did you make of the movie itself? Yeah, I mean, I think it was more in... Because I'd kind of built it up in my head into this thing that it was never going to be, I was almost surprised by how traditional it was in some ways. It's essentially like a little bit of Coen Brothers, a little bit of 70s sci-fi, a little bit of Michael Bay, The Island. And, you know, it's just like a really solid, I would say, like b plus movie uh i think

i'm gonna you might be a little thrown off while watching it because there are legitimately two gigantic movie stars in it and it's directed by the guy who did top gun maverick and it kind of looks like it i mean you're right that it does feel a little covid in the sense that it's a lot of interiors there's a lot of drone shots there's a lot of like we're establishing mood by showing you that this is the outside of the facility but then like we only ever really see like a few rooms inside the facility and it's always like one or two people in it or whatever it's like kaczynski does a really good job like hiding that but i do think you can feel it at times but it looks gorgeous it It's like he is a really good... He's got a really good painterly eye.

Yeah, composition. Yeah. I think that when you get to the there there, it's not super significant when you get to the kind of like, what is this movie about and what is this movie saying about society? I think it comes up like 15 yards short,

but I really enjoyed watching it. You know, it's the rare case where we have an easy comp in the world of television that maybe that is going to ultimately end up being more celebrated, but has a lot in common with it, which is severance. There's kind of a core theme here, which is the idea of like big tech companies and the way that they kind of soften our working life by providing snacks and these creature comforts in order to keep us more invested in our working lives and not sort of blacking out the idea of the fact that you're turning over the majority

of your time to this professional environment. And Saunders' story is pretty clever about this, and it uses the prison industrial complex as a way to kind of make some comparisons and some contrast to the way that we all work together. And a lot of that is in the story. So if you've read the story, there is an expansion on that idea. On Severance, I think that idea is allowed to deepen and become a little bit more complicated over the course of seven or eight hours. Whereas in this film, it's sort of like pretty clear in the first 40 minutes what the idea here is. And then you just kind of sit in it. Are you advocating for long form storytelling, Sean? Well, I like both. I mean, I think actually the one thing that I felt like was just a little bit missing from Spiderhead was just a bigger sense of adventure. I think it was like, it's

much more of a mood piece than I was expecting. you know the way that the film opens which is with this you know soaring super tramp needle drop and this shot of this sort of biplane flying over you know i don't even know what sea it is the indian ocean and flying to this uh lone island you do think you're getting something that is maybe more akin to Michael Bay as the island. I'm not saying I needed more explosions here necessarily, but it is, it's very talky and it's humorous at times and it's sometimes intellectually penetrating, but

it is, there is also like an inherent inert quality because it's really only people talking in rooms for more than an hour and a half. Yeah, and it kind of holds itself at a little bit of a distance. So, there is, without getting into the spoilers of this story, obviously Miles Teller plays this prisoner.

There are some flashbacks to why Miles Teller is in jail. And I found those to be probably the most effective parts of the movie in some ways. And in the back of my head, I was like, it'd be kind of rad

if Joseph Kaczynski and Miles Teller had made this movie, which is just about a guy with his girlfriend who likes to party and what happens to him. And I know that probably on the surface does not strike people as interesting as escaping from Spiderhead. But there is an element to it where I was like, oh, there is a human movie somewhere in the middle here. But Wernick and Reese, who I'm really excited to hear your conversation with them, are really good at shifting tone

and being able to smash together really big blockbuster set piece stuff with very wink-wink meta commentary comedy. And they do that here. And I would say that this is why you pay Ryan Reynolds. This is why there are certain people who are really able to kind of like sew through that line.

And I think Hemsworth can. And for as much as I love him, I don't know if Teller can. Yeah, I think Teller is actually... It's interesting because Teller and Kaczynski, now this is the third film that they've done together. Teller has given really good performances in the two previous films that he made with Kaczynski now this is the third film that they've done together um Teller has given really good performances in the two previous films that he made with Kaczynski and he is playing a character that I can kind of see in the outline which is like it seems like maybe he's from the south

or he's from like a lower middle class background he's kind of like kind of like a good old boy based on what we see from him he's got a little bit of a mullet in this movie and so he's playing something like I don't know if it's I'm not sure necessarily how to describe it, but I get a sense that he's creating some sort of archetype, but I don't really buy Miles Teller in that archetype. Hemsworth, on the other hand, is playing this sort of Machiavellian big tech figure. And he's really good at it.

He's actually a pretty talented comic actor. And this is, he has way more comic beats and there's something kind of smarmy and slithery about this persona too that he's really good at and he's the movie kind of rests on his shoulders in a lot of ways and when it really goes off the rails in terms of the story like it's all it's up to him to make that work and your mileage may vary on whether it did i i did i liked it i again i just like you, it's sort of like a BB plus movie, but it did work for me. I didn't really mind the mishmash of styles

or genres where like at one moment it might be pretty like, pretty violent. Then it's like, pretty broad comedy. Then it's kind of like, idiot man,

Coen brothers comedy. Like there's a lot of different stuff. They throw you, I think that I kind of like, tailed off as it became like a movie movie and it's like are the you know what what is like what are the moral ramifications

of what the chris hemsworth character is doing to these people and i was kind of like yeah well i mean you're not really engaging with the real world so i don't really know if i can really make the connection between spider head andead and like life, you know? Yeah, I think there's two things about that that are interesting. Like the movie doesn't seem super interested

in the idea of confinement, like what we do to people in terms of prison, but it does seem very interested in the idea of like kind of like mood altering drugs and pharmaceutical companies.

And that's a little bit of a soft target. I think most people post dope sick you know opioid era realized that like our culture has really been manipulated and gamed by these corporations and so you know the story is over 10 years old at this point and at the time it might have seemed a little bit more cutting edge x what yeah exactly and now we're sort of like these corporations wreak a lot of havoc on society and they really hurt people and the people who are in charge of them don't really think about the human cost.

And so that aspect of the story maybe is not as effective in the movie may feel a couple of years too late. But given given that is like the structure. I think that there's some like some really interesting choices. The fact that this movie is like very smooth and controlled and sterile at times very purposefully and it's sort of like surrounded by this mid-century you know ex machina-esque architecture and that the white room where the experiments take place is this sort of like antiseptic space cut against you know a really kinetic actor like miles teller and jerry smollett also very kinetic and the supporting cast is very is pretty exciting and also this yacht rock score

that is constantly making you go like oh this is sort of the sonic version of what these drugs are meant to do to us like everything's gonna be okay it's a dissing technique in the movie itself because you think you're watching something pretty harrowing and then some sort of loggins and messina jam comes on and you're like oh now i'm out of it you know and i think that that's it's funny you should mention the the dated nature of the story because i almost feel like that trick of putting soft rock or easy listening up against like a kind of um a much more like disturbing visual you know kind of, for me, starts with the ear scene in Reservoir Dogs. But it's been done a lot of times

so that even though I was like, this is certainly a choice and I'm kind of vibing to it, it was like, I don't know if it was always appropriate for the film itself. It's funny you mentioned the kinetic performance of Miles Teller. Can I quote you back to yourself?

Sure. After this movie, we walked out and you were like, it's so interesting that Kaczynski sees Miles Teller as this really stoic guy. Because I think that there's a version of Miles Teller from Spectacular Now and

what was the party movie, Project X? Project X, yeah. Obviously, he was basically playing himself. But there is a much more charming, smart-ass version of him. And he, in the Kaczynski movies he's been in, has been much more tight. Much more, everything's under the surface. Everything is very stone-faced. And you were saying it's almost like he sees him the way

Steve McQueen was in the early 70s or something i think i actually did say that i think i might have said exactly that it was yeah uh well i listen to you and i treasure our conversations yeah you don't watch movies but you do listen to me which i i'm grateful for honestly it makes you a great partner for my next move is to start um basically just taking your takes and regurgitating them to you but pretending like I didn't hear them on the big picture. I look forward to that. Yeah, I think what I mean by kinetic is maybe just that Teller has movie star presence, right? Yeah. He definitely can hold your gaze even if he's not perfectly cast in a role, but it's true.

He doesn't have a lot of dialogue as Rooster in Top Gun Maverick. He doesn't have a lot of dialogue in Only the Brave. He is acting physically and with his face, which is what Steve McQueen famously did when he would always tell filmmakers, we don't need this line of dialogue. I can do it all in my face. And Kaczynski definitely sees that. Hemsworth's character is sort of the opposite of that. He's a motor mouth. He's nonstop talking. He's literally talking through a glass window to the characters in the film, throughout the film, which sets up another interesting contrast. It's a funny movie.

You know, you and I got a chance to see it on a big screen. Alone. Alone. And that was wonderful. Thank you to Netflix for hosting us. I think they heard that auction episode and were expecting something a little different out of you. Maybe they were expecting you to start crying when it started.

I don't know. Anyhow, most people are not going to see this movie in a movie theater. Most people are going to see it on their home screens. I watched it a second time actually at home. And it's different, you know? Kaczynski is a big canvas artist. You know, this movie really, like you said, there's those big drone shots and there's this big composition in mind. And it's different on your television, even if your television is at home.

And frankly, most Netflix movies have opened widely at home for people. And I thought this would be a good way for us to talk about the Netflix original movie issue. I'm not sure if it's a problem, but it has evolved quite a bit over the years. We've talked about Netflix as a movie entity many, many times, but it feels like we might be at a turning point. There's rumors that Netflix is now thinking it needs to put its movies out widely in theaters because the idea of bottom line profits is top of mind for a company

whose stock price is struggling and that is enduring some layoffs right now. And there's a lot of debate about the binge model in general and the way that it delivers content. And there's also been a lot of debate about the quality of the work that they put into the world. Their movies in particular have a pretty spotty track record. So I pitched this to you. What do you make of this moment for them? And

when do you think this really started to become an issue? Yeah. Well, it's funny because I think Netflix is relatively new in our lives compared to, say, Sony or Paramount or Warner Brothers that we almost describe a degree of personification to Netflix as if it's like, obviously we know of some of the people who work there and some of the people who make decisions there, whether it's like Ted Sarandos or Scott Stuber or whoever. But it is kind of interesting that as these streaming services develop, we almost are like, what's their plan? What's the aesthetic? What's their taste? And it's a bunch of shareholders and ones and zeros. There might be some old studio thinking going on there. But for the most part,

they're going to do what makes them money. And I think for a while there, they were comfortable running into the red and splashing the pot and being the big player in town and starting to change the paradigm in movies. And for a hot second, it maybe seemed like due to the pandemic, this was all going to go in this direction too. And that these studios were going to start doing what HBO Max was doing with the Warner movies and everything. But now it almost seems like we've come out on the other side of that top gun maverick is out these other big movies are coming disney's disney's got their movies in theaters like we're having like a more traditional movie year and netflix is kind of putting out these movies that kind of kind of hit with a whimper you know that even if they have a little bit of hype going into

them they are pretty much gone 12 hours after they were released from the consciousness of the public. Now, how do you determine that? I don't know. If you're asking me when I thought things changed for them, because I guess it's worth sort of painting a broad historical arc for the Netflix original movie plan, there was initially this feeling that they were slowly getting into this business by doing what independent studios or artsy prestige shingles of major studios would do, just go to festivals and get in business with a bunch of indie filmmakers or distinguish your tours and be like, what do you want to make? And for a couple of years, they were really doing that while also

grinding out some B movies and genre stuff on the sides. And I kind of, when I was looking through the list of these films, identified a moment where I feel like that sort of changed. And it's at the end of 17

when they put out Bright and the beginning of 18 when they dropped Cloverfield Paradox after the Super Bowl, which I do not remember because that was the Eagles winning.

So I was not, I did not go home to watch Cloverfield Paradox if I remember correctly. But that was the Eagles winning. So I did not go home to watch Cloverfield Paradox, if I remember correctly. That was your best movie of 2018, the Eagles Super Bowl win. Yeah. But that is when I kind of feel like these things changed.

I think that they started to get more into the, what could we buy off of a studio that needs to get blockbusters off their books? And what's the path of least resistance to put a blockbuster-esque movie up that maybe is undercooked? And I think if you look at some of their big, big movies, you would most times than not ask yourself,

are we sure this movie was finished? I think you nailed it i think both that time frame and that very specific issue is what has plagued its reputation as a space because prior to this you might say well beast of no nation wasn't really totally there as a best picture contender but you know it was people trying to make a thoughtful piece of work and you know this is a studio in development and, you know, Focus Features or Fox Searchlight also, they release 12 movies a year and four of them are just okay. And so Netflix is kind of figuring it out as it develops as a movie studio.

But once it started to imagine itself as a mainstream entertainment center for movies that could theoretically create ongoing IP in the movie space, you could see that they're way out over their skis. And that what Disney has built over the course of the last 70 years is incredibly difficult to do. And in fact, to supercharge it, Bob Iger needed to acquire new properties to continue to power that machine. But so what you get now, as they continue to put out movies like this, and Spiderhead is sort of in the middle ground. It's not exactly one of these movies, because you can see that this is not a $180 million movie.

It's probably more like a $60 million movie. But the number of big tent or attempts at big tent movies that they put out over the years is really fascinating, because you won't find a ton of ardent supporters of any of these movies, despite the fact that they seem very big. And that includes Red Notice. That includes The Atom Project. That includes Bird Box, which hundreds of millions of people watched. But did anyone think it was good? It became kind of a meme, but that was about it. Yeah. I mean, The Old Guard, I think, could be considered on that list. Army of the Dead, the recent Zack Snyder movie. Six Underground, which you and I had a great time with,

but that was critically reviled and it didn't seem like it caught much of a wave. Chris Hemsworth was last seen in Extraction, which is a solid action movie, but I wouldn't say it's not likely to be found on the rewatchables in 2042. No, but let me ask you a question though. So one of the reasons why I think that I have a love-hate relationship with Netflix as a product is because while, especially with the TV stuff as it initially was sort of coming out in the posthouse of cards era up through Mindhunter, I was very enthusiastic about the kinds of chances they were taking. I was very into a lot of their international offerings. I thought they were doing a lot of really great work bringing TV from countries I would never ordinarily get to watch television from that was just like right next to Stranger Things. It was like a

pretty amazing flattening of the delivery system. But the problem with the binge model is that it really annihilates the ability to have a long-term conversation about a piece of popular culture. And so the fact that there is no sort of organizing principle around episodes or when people are watching these things is why we get like a 12-hour Stranger Things season and Mal and Joe do three pods about it, you know, and it's pretty much, that's a wrap. You know, like that's really difficult to keep up with.

The thing that I always wondered about those Netflix shows was maybe we're just doing it wrong. Like maybe people don't care our podcast, care about our blog posts, or care about the reviews, and they'll watch Stranger Things at their own pace and love the hell out of it. Is it possible that that's the way people watch Bird Box and Extraction and they just don't care what we think and that these movies are actually the biggest movies in America? Well, you raise an interesting question. One, we're speaking in broad generalities, right? There's no homogenous human experience against Netflix. Some people love the binge model still. And while it is not necessarily helpful if you are, say, managing a podcast network, the thing that is different is being in the conversation does have power and being on a weekly schedule does have power. And the movie version of that is lifespan in theaters and then into, I guess, a public discourse, for better or worse,

a kind of social media slash water cooler conversation. Top Gun Maverick is the first movie in a long time that has been able to do this because we saw the news, you know, in its second week, it only dropped 30%. In its third week, it's only dropping 50%, 60%. Those are extraordinary numbers. We don't see that very often these days,

but people are still showing up to see Top Gun Maverick for the first time and having conversations about it. Yes, Strange and Maverick legitimately feel like the biggest movies of the year. No question. People have seen them. You just still see them on marquees at movie theaters. People are still writing about them.

People are still talking about them. But one of the things that, you know, there is a kind of insidiousness, I think, to box office reporting and to organizing the entire industry around what did your movie do over the weekend. But it also does keep movies in the conversation. And Netflix, because it has had this veiled approach to data and analytics, and because some of the data that they share with journalists is either confusing or frankly difficult to believe at times that doesn't have the same stickiness the same way that top gun maverick made 180 million dollars this weekend does and so there is just more conversation about a movie that is measured in that fashion the other thing is just top gun maverick is just better and it's kind of

like that speaks to something that you're talking about which is that a lot of these movies that we're talking about here these big tent temple movies they just feel a little bit underdeveloped they just feel like they're not at the finish line spider head is actually a rare movie of this brand where i'm like whether you like it or not it feels finished to me it doesn't feel like they just kind of like punted on the vfx at the last minute or like didn't go that eighth draft on the script but the thing is is like this is a lot of very seasoned people on this project who have had big projects before you know reese and wernick kaczynski teller hemsworth these are very very experienced filmmakers and so it's not surprising that this one feels a little bit sharper than say I don't know bird box for example you know what I mean where it's like that was an experienced

filmmaker as well but not necessarily in that genre they'd never really taken on a film like that before for Sandra Bullock it was a little bit outside the genre realm that she's used to working in it felt like a swing and a miss in a lot of ways and bright is a whole other story bright it was just like everything about this is off the filmmaker is off the tone is off the performances are off the makeup on the characters like, everything about this is off. The filmmaker is off. The tone is off. The performances are off. The makeup on the characters is off. None of this is working. And I don't know if that speaks to the apparatus of production

that they have at Netflix and the way that the development process works. I'm not totally sure. But even in the times when they've tried to break up this thing that we're talking about, like Fear Street is an interesting example. Yeah.

This trilogy of horror movies that was released last year, which I was mixed on, some of which I thought was interesting and successful. And I certainly thought it was a cool idea it was a great idea and it was a great idea to do what you're describing which is extend the conversation and release three movies over a period of three weeks even still did you have much conversation about fear street 1666 i didn't no i mean here's the here's the thing is that like i think that

this is kind of a microcosm for the problem with movies right now in general which is the disappearing reliable middle which weirdly spider head is like a perfect reliable middle movie uh there's a three month stretch in 2017 before bright comes out where netflix put out, they put out two Macon Blair movies, I Don't Feel at Home in the World and Small Crimes. I mean, he wrote Small Crimes, and then he did I Don't Feel at Home in the World. They put out that Charlie McDowell movie,

The Discovery. Yep. They put out Win It All, a movie you and I love. Yep. And they put out War Machine and Okja. That's like... Pretty cool.

That's a fucking great three-month run for a movie studio now are those movies all-time masterpieces and classics no but you get a brad pitt movie you get you know you get you get these like b-movie genre indies and then you get like a thoughtful weird vaguely sci-fi charlie mcdowell movie like that's the stuff that I wish they still did on top of Six Underground. Yeah, it's tricky. I've tried to organize this in a couple of different buckets.

So obviously the movies that we hear about the most are those big theoretical audience drivers, but there are other movies that people are watching on the service. And you can tell just based on the engagement online and on their top 10 and a number of other ways. The movies that people are watching on the service and you can tell just based on the engagement online and on their top 10 and a number of other ways. I mean, the movies that people are actually watching that there's not really a lot of

conversation about, but if you just track their top 10, it's like, it's the movies that they didn't make that people think they did make. Yes. You know, like the gentleman, the guy Richie movie has been floating in and out of the top 10 on Netflix for

weeks. Yeah. Because, and I think people just think that's a new Guy Ritchie movie with Hugh Grant that's on Netflix because that movie didn't do big business in theaters and it's something new that they can fill. And you see a lot of Gerard Butler movies

filter their way into the top 10. A lot of Liam Neeson movies filter their way into the top 10. That is the middle that you're describing. These kind of, these actioners, these down the middle, kind of this really would have worked in 1997 kind of movies.

I saw that Brahms, The Boy 2 was trending this week on Netflix. That's a STX movie that was made three and a half years ago that most people didn't get a chance to see. And so they're checking it out now on the service. There's also, you know, you mentioned the B movie stuff

and the genre stuff that they were doing years ago. I think horror is still a pretty reliable strand for them, as is like the holiday movies, the Hallmark style movies that like there's not a lot of critical discourse about for obvious reasons but that you can tell people engage with around the holidays and then the teen rom uh the teen movies and the rom-coms too they've created a nice little cottage industry around those things they definitely don't feel like they're at the pinnacle of

clueless or nor ephron films like they're not at that level but they are accomplishing some of what those movies sought to do which is like kind of narcotize us you know just like make us happy and calm for 90 minutes and so that stuff is working it's just that's not that stuff is one not in a huge interest set for me personally so i don't pay as close attention to it and, it doesn't feel like it's necessarily contributing to like the bigger discourse or narrative around movie culture. So we don't pay it

as much mind. And then there's documentaries, which their documentary business is killing it. I mean, they changed documentaries forever in my business.

Business is a booming. Yeah, there's more documentaries than ever. And they've won Academy Awards for their work in the space. They've frankly introduced the idea of watching short documentary films to mass audience, which I think is an amazing accomplishment.

And there does seem to be genuine engagement. A lot of that engagement is around true crime. And that is becoming a significantly overworked subgenre in the space. But they do a lot of really good work there. They've made a lot of films that I really like. But that does raise an interesting part of this conversation, which is the awards plays in general. And those,

you know, the distinguished auteurs that you mentioned and the, the, the story that came up a couple of weeks ago about how Netflix is no longer going to be writing $200 million paychecks for people to make their dream vanity projects, quote unquote. Yeah.

Noah Baumbach is the last one. Yes, for his $140 million white noise. Noah Baumbach, the last guy off of Spiderhead. I mean, the number of movies that they've made in this vein, the list is long. You know, Roma and Marriage Story, speaking of Baumbach, and My Beloved Mank, and The Power of the Dog last year, and The Two Popes, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Don't Look Up, Mudbound, Dolomite, The Five Bloods. The list goes on and on. It seems like most of these films

were greenlit in part because I think that there are people there who really like good movies. And so they're trying to make good films and they care about film, but also to win awards and to bolster their public reputation and to bolster the value of the company in a lot of ways. The Academy Award can do that still. And the idea of pulling back from that is really fascinating to me. What do you make of what's been happening in that space the last couple of weeks? Is it something as simple as just like Apple came and took their lunch? I wonder. You might be right. And like Apple can afford to because like Apple can't even spend the money that they have. You know, they buy MLS rights for a decade and it's like, yeah, we make that in like Right. And like Apple can afford to because like Apple can't even spend the money that they have.

You know, they buy MLS rights for a decade and it's like, yeah, we make that in like six weeks, you know? That would be a pretty brutal long-term L for Netflix if in fact Apple ate their entire business because it's not just that they're making TV shows and it's not just that they won

Best Picture with Coda in a very short period of time for original films for that company. It's also that they're making Joe Kaczynski's next movie, which is an F1 drama starring Brad Pitt. And it's going to be in theaters for a little while too. That is, that really is what they have been aspiring to with the red notices of the

world. That's what they want to be known as. They want to be known as mainstream entertainment with movie stars. And so one thing though, do you think like Jimmy Netflix, who is listening to this podcast right now over at like on Sunset is like, you fucking idiots.

Red Notice is so much more fucking popular than this imaginary Brad Pitt movie. Yeah, I think it's a question of where do you live? Do you live in Hollywood or do you live in Tech Utopia, Silicon Valley? Yeah, yeah. And they're like,

the impressions are off the charts for this. And it's like, yeah, but like, dude. Ironically, Netflix is a Hollywood-based company. I know. And Apple is not.

But Apple has a chance to win a Hollywood war and Netflix has a chance to win a Hollywood war and Netflix has a chance to win a Silicon Valley war, which is like engagement and hours watched and all of that stuff. They'll be able to get it on the board because they were a first mover in the space. They've got hundreds of millions of subscribers.

They're global. All of those reasons. You could tell me that 350 million people watched Red Notice. I'm willing to guess that less than, that more than 300 million of them didn't think it was very good because it isn't very good.

Or didn't finish it. Right. Or took six days to watch it or whatever. Yeah. And that is really the issue is it's a branding issue and it's become a real issue for them over the last couple of years.

That doesn't really necessarily affect the awards play movies. You know, I think Roma is Roma. Like you can't, even if you didn't like Roma or thought it was boring, you can't be like, that sucks. It doesn't, that's just,

that's not, it's not possible in the discourse. Unfortunately, when you're trying to do all of these things at the same time, it makes it more challenging to control the way you're considered. But we've been dumping

on Netflix a little bit here. And I feel like Spiderhead actually firmly falls into a category that we don't really like celebrate enough. They do make a kind of movie. Now they made more of them in 2017 as you said but And they seemed a little like less expensive and

they could take a little a few more chances but yeah. Yeah but I mean they still you know we love Triple Frontier here. They did make that movie after being in development hell for like seven years. They did ultimately get that movie off the ground but they're also they bought and put out

The Lost Daughter last year, a literary adaptation from a first-time filmmaker that was terrific. You mentioned Okja, Bong Joon-ho. They were early on the Bong Joon-ho

in America train, no question about it. There was something sort of, I'm sure, fascinatingly bittersweet for them watching him win the Academy Award for Parasite instead of Okja.

And then they're still making, you know, High Flying Bird and the 40-year-old version and all of these movies that these sort of Sundance darlings slash the indie shingle at a major studio kind of films. So I don't want to underestimate the fact that they're contributing positive work to the movie culture. It's just easy to forget that when Red Notice and The Atom Project sit at the top of the frame all day long.

It's the same thing for their TV offerings. There was a while there where it felt like they were in the similar business to HBO, where they were trying to work with the most talented, most groundbreaking creators out there and make a new kind of TV. And it seemed, when you watch, say, the first season of Ozark, and it feels legitimately like, for better or for worse, a five-hour movie or a 10-hour movie, it feels very revolutionary in some small ways. There's stuff that happens early in the Ozark first season where you're like, oh, nobody ever thought to cram an entire season into the pilot and then see what happens next.

There are feelings, there's a feeling around their TV offerings that it's gone from that to let's just throw as much floor as lava, as much like reality, as much fast and cheap stuff as we can. And then every once in a while, there's a stranger things, but I don't, I don't know. I don't know if they're going to do another Stranger Things. You know what I mean? I don't know what the next kind of signature thing for them is. I thought the best thing that they've

done in years was Squid Game and I guess that's a good point. But the news story that's been going around this week is that they're of course developing a real life Squid Game which feels like a parody. Yeah. Well it was also like a real um without no pun intended a really stupid self-inflicted wound because it was like you just announced that season two is

coming like let that breathe let that be the thing people are excited about and instead you you sound like a bunch of people who didn't actually watch squid game yeah um my impression of that was that season two is like years away but so maybe maybe they're trying to fill in the 2023 slate with something that can be branded squid game so that when it comes in 2024 the people won't forget i suppose but um yeah i mean it's it's tricky the company is so big It's gone through so many changes, machinations, controversies. It is increasingly difficult to talk about. I'm obviously most invested in it as a movie studio. And the idea of them abandoning the quote unquote vanity project, and for anybody who calls the Irishman a vanity project, like fuck off. That's my take on that. I think that's a little bit disheartening, but also it's not... I don't have to worry about the Netflix stock price. That's not up to me. And they're obviously taking new things under consideration.

If you were Jimmy Netflix, if you were the guy in charge, what would you do? How would you manage this studio? What kind of movies would you want to make? So one thing that they've never really done, at least in the forward-facing consumer product, like sometimes if you listen to their podcasts

or look at the To Dumb, which is now I think no longer with us as an editorial project. But on the app, they have these very algorithmic genres like British women in trouble. And that's seven movies and three tv shows you can watch like that but they've never really tried to do in internal shingles or verticals of stuff that they are like this is what the netflix brand of horror

stands for i don't know if this would necessarily even like raise an eyebrow or or get Ted Sarandos out of the bed in the morning. But doing something like acquiring Shudder or moving into that horror space where I think you can make those movies pretty budget effectively. You can do those relatively cheaply. And they have a very, very, very reliable floor of viewer.

And I think every once in a while you might come across, why aren't these guys looking for the next paranormal activity? Why aren't they looking for the next huge horror sensation that they develop and put out and make it one of 15 things that they release in a year? Because I find that I go to Shudder more than Netflix now, when it comes to stuff like that. And I guess my thing other than be like, oh, what if they just bought Shudder would be, what if they started to develop some stuff

inside of Netflix that felt like, this is where you come if you want to see this kind of movie or this kind of show, essentially channels. I think it's smart. I think there's been a lot of conversation because Jason Blum wrote an editorial about how Netflix's model doesn't really empower creators because they

basically buy out your back end. And the idea of Netflix shifting its business long term to potentially put, say, movies that are supposed to come out at the end of this year in theaters, I think will change some of the dealmaking structure that they do with talent, which would be really fascinating. And Blumhouse, of course, they are famously a little tight with budgets, but allow talent to participate long-term. There's a Blumhouse movie that we're going to be talking about in a couple of weeks starring Ethan Hawke. And I'm sure one of the reasons that the movie is called The Black Phone, I'm sure one of the reasons why Ethan Hawke is in that movie is because he's had a relationship with Jason Blum for many years now and been a part of other movies that they've made. And so they've been able to tell this story across sinister and across the purge and that is talent friendly in a very

specific kind of way i'll be curious to see if they get into sub brands i think sub brands are going to be an interesting challenge not just because of movies and television but because they're trying to get into gaming and yeah netflix games there's going to be a natural suspicion about them but if you can be um a konami inside of or an activision inside of netflix that would be fascinating but that necessitates like making a company that is somewhat siloed at times even more siloed this is also like where you get into like us having podcaster brain versus somebody who's just like i turned on net Netflix at the end of a very long day on a Friday and now I want to watch a horror movie

and I don't need to know about the culture that they're building inside of their horror vertical. But what you're, and I think you're right to keep returning to that, which is like, holy cow, a lot of people watch what they make. Yeah. And so how can we be wrong

if we have this much engagement? But you can be wrong if you get to a point where that ultimately doesn't mean anything. And it feels like right now in the culture, it doesn't mean a whole lot. Having a Netflix logo on your film's poster, on your TV show's poster does not really connote anything other than you can find it on Netflix. It doesn't mean it's good or bad. It's just kind of, it's like being on CBS. You know, it's like, maybe this would be good good but it's probably just going to be kind of like quasi-managed mainstream stuff it just seems like the best thing about it right now is the ux it's it is the like ease of use it's the oh yeah like when i do it it goes um and then it goes on into the show and the

next one starts immediately and it just has a very like fluid ability like like i i think it's a it's probably the best product out there you know i i whether or not that that that can't be what they're known for though yeah well okay so here's an idea i have um obviously disney is well situated with um pixar and with Star Wars and with Marvel and with all of those attendant properties. Warner Brothers has DC, it has Harry Potter, it has a number of other things. Netflix has attempted to get into that universe by acquiring the rights to the Roald Dahl catalog. I think a better course of action is to just pursue well-known stories in the public domain and try to attach as much talent to them as possible.

Now, I can't recall if Bram Stoker's Dracula is in the public domain, but I think that it is. And, you know, Karin Kusama was- I hope so. I'm currently working on several Dracula adaptations. Mostly like, you know, a film version of the Jason Segel musical

from Getting Sir Marshall. Right, but you're taking the songs out. Yeah, it's not musical. Yeah, this is sort of, it's like a reverse My Fair Lady is what you're doing. That's right. It's exciting.

Are you starring as Vlad? It's like a one-man show, yeah. One-man show? Yeah. As a film? This is really exciting. What is it called? Dracula Alone. Yeah. this is really exciting uh is what is it called uh dracula alone yeah

what's it what's it called in forgetting sarah marshall um i think is it dracula musical is it dracula musical hold on we need we need the number one forgetting sarah marshall expert correct hold back to fill us in on this one I asked this question because I feel like they should just be making things like Dracula now they made a Dracula like a

two-part series a couple of years ago and I'm like this isn't the way to do this make these movies make these movie universes if these stories are

available to be told pursue them and and get big-time stars and big-time filmmakers who have bold visions for them because there's a much easier story to tell and it doesn't cost you anything. I hope that your next move is to leave The Ringer, go to Netflix. And they're like, Sean, we love your ideas. We love your brain. We think you understand the landscape better

than anybody. And they're like, what's your golden goose unicorn idea? And you're like, bring back the dark universe we were so close it's all about how the productions are managed that's the thing you know the mummy was not managed well that's why it didn't work and that's why we don't have the dark universe we could have had i don't know who was playing frankenstein uh well nicole kipman was broad effect frankenstein right i thought it was angelina jolie oh angelina jolie was uh and then bardem it was javier bardem yeah it's frankenstein and uh russell crowe is uh dr jekyll and mr hyde hell yeah and johnny depp see the wolfman he was and uh who else we got was mel gibson in there was tom cruise still gonna be in the mix from the mummy like was he gonna be

they should have made him the mummy that's the problem with the mummy is it wasn't tom cruise as the mummy that would have been sick that's right um so yeah i think more stories like that getting in the public you know like let's make a fucking alice in wonderland movie you know that's in the public domain right let's just make it we'll make it with um with sydney sweeney right cr i love that you're just bucking you're just like fuck copyright. Yeah. Fuck paying creators. Let's just get,

yeah, I'm a fan of hip hop, you know, recombining culture sampling. That's what we have to do. Happy birthday. That's in the public domain. Let's make a movie. Happy birthday.

The movie. I love it. Incredible idea. Netflix. We're available. We can develop this shit. America. The beautiful.

Is that in the public domain? It has to be, right? It's Bobby's favorite song. Yeah, the Pledge of Allegiance? Colon, America's back? It's just Biden with his thumb up sitting in an F-18. I don't think that would get a lot of engagement.

With Fanboy behind him. What else would you do if you had the keys? I have an idea almost more cynical than your let's raid public domain IP. Why don't you just raid your own? We've had 10 years of Netflix ideas. Why don't we start reimagining some of them? And let me ask you this.

How would you feel about watching a House of Cards movie, like a new House of Cards movie? Not necessarily even with any of the people from that, but like the same vibe, the same sort of general idea, but updated and it's just two hours. Are you trying to sports wash Kevin Spacey? No. Okay, so let's just take it,

take then an Orange is the New Black movie. Why not just make, like do you have these properties already? Honestly, I wouldn't be above recutting some of these series into two hour movies. And a lot of them were some of these series into two-hour movies. And a lot of them were made basically as if they were four-hour movies.

And personally, I volunteer to be like, you can lose season two of Ozark. And we can just... It's funny that you say that because it's obviously been discussed quite a bit that this new season of Stranger Things, the episodes are very long. You know, they're an hour and 40 minutes at a time.

And I fell off the wagon with Stranger Things before season three. I didn't see season three and I wanted to get back into season four, but I knew in my heart of hearts, I wasn't going to make time to rewatch three. If they had just said season four is just a movie, even if it's a three hour movie, I would have been way more likely to dig in. Now look, Netflix probably doesn't need me checking in on Stranger Things. that sounds like it's doing just fine yeah but there there is something to what you're saying which is familiar ip even if you've fallen out of touch with it has a power to draw you back in as a movie as opposed to as a new series um because it doesn't necessitate as much investment now they did this with el camino too yes remember el camino the Bad movie, was a movie on Netflix.

Like, it was not... Yeah. I guess it was related to AMC. It was kind of like on AMC for a night, like after it had already come out on Netflix. I can't remember what the order went in. Yeah. But so, like, there... And maybe that's another spin-off idea to your idea, which is to kind of go hunt for

other properties that didn't originate at Netflix, but we know succeeded at Netflix. Yes. And to support them. I mean, Arrested Development is a similar story, right? Yeah, I mean, they're trying to do this right now with The Walking Dead, where they're finishing that, but there's going to be like three Rick movies

or something like that. There is a lot more of a sandbox to play in with this. I think everybody usually rolls their eyes because they're like, is this just going to be fan service or is this just going to be regurgitating what you've already seen? But like, I don't know.

I'm just saying like, there are a lot of people who really like a lot of these Netflix shows. And, and honestly the reverse could be true. Feel free to make a triple frontier TV show. Like I'm, I'm right here for it. But I think that there's,

there's something to the fact that they've been around for a decade they've launched a couple of really successful things like why not see if there's any meat on the bone there okay we've shared what we think could be somewhat reasonable and even achievable ideas here's ideas that are just I just I just want them to do it like just just make just make all the unmade movies just just make a Confederacy of Dunces get the rights you know cast John C Reilly and use de-aging technology let's get Scorsese to direct

it yeah just fucking make it why don't we do the Nick Cave gladiator to script let's do it Maximus versus God yes Maximus goes to hell right wasn't that it he like yeah he opens with him in Hades fight is Jesus and then he winds up in Vietnam it's a what could go wrong I'm down I'm down I'll never forget I was talking to somebody who works at Netflix and they were telling me about um the new Alexander Payne movie that was going to be at the studio which was it's sort of like a

semi-autobiographical portrait of Carl Van Ouskaard. Is he Swedish? He's Swedish, right? The Swedish novelist and journalist. And it was going to star Mads Mikkelsen. And this movie was going to happen all the way up until like a week before production started. And then they decided,

actually, we don't want to release the rights to this story. And it sounds like maybe now Scarred got cold feet about being portrayed on screen. Maybe there was some sort of snafu in the contract. Not totally clear what happened there, but the production was canceled. But when that story was being described to me, I was like, this is actually what Netflix is good for.

It's the same thing with The Irishman. It's the same thing with Roma. It's the same thing with Marriage Story, where it's like, I've been really wanting to make this really wild movie for a long time, or this new time or this new property or this new concept came to me and I can only really get one place to do it

because I don't feel like Apple is that place now. My take is not like Apple is the solution to all of our favorite filmmakers' wildest dreams. In fact, it's going to be the opposite. I think they have a very clear tone. Very high barrier to entry too. Yeah, exactly. But in some ways ways not to bring

it to neatly full circle spider head should be that in some ways that was why i was a little bit not let down because i think it just did what it was set out to do very well but i was like you guys could have pushed this far more extremely and that then it becomes like the top gun maverick director and Thor and the dude from Top Gun Maverick want to make a weird, fucked up sci-fi jail movie. Like,

crank it a little bit. You know? Like, play your leverage. Yeah. That never seemed to be the intent. Buy GameStop. You know? How is that stock doing for you?

Have you logged into your stock portfolio recently? I check in from time to time. Yeah? Yeah. I have a very conservative approach, as you know. They call these like level four rapids we're going through right now.

You know? I've taken on a little bit of water. There may be a hole in the raft. You just reminded me of another idea. The River Wild 2 starring you in the kevin bacon part who wouldn't watch that um is there any other filmmaker out there who you feel like it's not i don't want to hear like i because we would all say like david lynch or just let francis coppola make megapolis you know but like what's like somebody who you're like why are you guys not in the bigelow

business like why are you guys not in the bigelow business like why are you guys and they are now right theoretically they're making a bigelow movie yeah um to their credit they've been going down the list you know yeah that's true they quarone and scorsese and bong joon-ho and adam mckay and i mean these are people who up and to the point when they made a netflix movie you'd be like, well, that's one of the greatest living filmmakers in the world. And any movie they make would be hotly anticipated. Yeah. And, you know, I still think that there is a younger generation of filmmaker that they have both not been able to develop and not been able to ensnare in their world.

The Greta Gerwigs and the Ryan Cooglers of the world, the Damien Chazelles. They wind up directing Loki episodes. Yeah. I mean, but like, the thing is, is that folks like Greta

and Coogler and Damien are obsessed with the big screen. They are, they are traditionalists in their heart and they grew up

going to the movies and they want their movies to play on big screens. And Netflix might ultimately change its model in part to capture the attention of that kind of person.

It's funny that younger people are holding out for something that older people are willing to give up because Martin Scorsese has been through the wars. He knows that just getting

something made is half the battle. He was going through this 35 years ago with The Last Temptation of Christ. So just getting the Irishman anywhere is a huge accomplishment. But when you're at the height of your career, as someone like Coogler or Greta is, you've got more leverage.

It's a little bit easier to say, I need to be with Sony or Columbia or Warner Brothers or one of these other studios. But I don't know. It'll be interesting to see how they shake things out because I feel like, say, fall festival film season is going to be a little different this year with all the films that they're rolling out and i in the last thing about this chris i don't know if you got a chance to see it yet but this studio is putting out blonde in like three months i know andrew dominic movie you know and it's like that looks great and andrew dominic is an amazing director who you and i love

it's never going to be all one thing or the other. I think that you and I will always find stuff to watch and always be pretty intrigued by some of the decisions that they're making. I think that we're almost lamenting what could have been. And it was essentially like, you know what? Are these guys going to come in and just basically be the patron saints of vaguely indie cinema or reliable B movies or the kind of thing that I was talking about that 2017 was three month run that I was just like, could you guys put out war machine every five months? Cause that would be pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't, you're right. There is a missed opportunity, but also there's, there's a lot of opportunity in the future.

A lot of opportunity to pod with you in the future CR. Thank you for sure. I mean, I need the money. Okay. We'll see you on the other side of Game Thank you for doing this, bud. For sure. I mean, I need the money. Okay, we'll see you on the other side of GameStop. Okay, let's go to my conversation now with Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. Say hello to Tim Selects, Tim's everyday value menu. Enjoy the new spinach and feta

savory egg pastry or our roasted red pepper and Swiss pinwheel starting at only $2.99 plus tax. Try one or try our full Tim Selects lineup. Terms apply. Prices may vary at participating restaurants in Canada. It's time for Tim's. Very excited to have Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick here, two of the most successful screenwriters in Hollywood, the screenwriters behind this week's release, Spiderhead. Guys, this is based on a George Saunders short story. One of my favorite writers, and I assume one of your favorite writers as well.

What drew you to this story? It just really popped for us. The tone, how different it is, how left of center it is. He's a phenomenal writer. He's funny. He writes very dark things, often unfilmable things. And we immediately wanted to do it, but we feared the fact that we were going to have to write past the author, so to speak, in adapting it.

It's a short story and we had to turn it into a film. And so I think that was our greatest challenge and our greatest terror was trying to mimic George Sonners or try to predict where he might have gone had he been asked to turn it into a feature film. So it was daunting from the beginning, but exciting from the beginning. And also the tones, you know, he mixes tones, and that's something that we like to do as well. Just that kind of the swirling cocktail of very, you know, opposing tones that we love to tackle. Had you guys done any adaptation? I was just looking at your credits and it feels like most of the stories are original or at least based on characters, but maybe not pure storylines. Yeah, not. I mean, we obviously Deadpool's an adaptation,

you know, in quotes. We have written things that are adaptations, but it tends to be of comic books or IPs or board games or, you know, G.I. Joe, that kind of thing, as opposed to a start to finish story. This was one of the few times we'd tackled that. And it did give us an appreciation for anyone who asked to adapt something and particularly grow it out. I mean, I think the Game of Thrones example, you just see how daunting it was for those guys to move past George R. R. Martin's books. And we felt a similar pressure here. I read that you spent 10 years working on this. What does that mean? Does that mean 10 years trying to get it off the ground, developing it? Is it actually 10 years of writing? What does that 10 years represent? Lots of stops and starts, I think, more than anything. It was brought to us, what did we look at? It was 2000.

Oh, 2012. It's almost to the day, 10 years. It was brought to us in June, 2012. By Condonast, who owns the New Yorker, and they were looking to exploit some of their material that was in the magazines. And we immediately fell in love with it and the challenge of doing it. And we ultimately pounded out a draft in three months, which is about how long it takes us to finish a first draft. And then spent what? We were attached to direct it for many years,

very early on. We wrote it on spec with the intention to direct it. It was a very contained movie, lower budget, and we thought this would be the perfect first thing for us to wet our feet in the directing chair. And we spent a couple of years in that world trying to set it up, attaching actors and getting financing and such. And then Deadpool hit. And Deadpool kind of took over our lives where we had to pull ourselves out of many things, including directing this. And Joe Kaczynski came aboard. We sold it to Netflix. And then we got such a wonderful cast. And then it was kind of off to the races. But there were a lot of stops and starts in those first, what, eight years, I'd say, seven or eight years, and then off to the races in year

eight. I wish it were the exception to the rule but deadpool took six years zombie land two took 10 years it's just it's a slog it can really be a slog sometimes you know spider spider head is a pretty unlikely production in 2022 it's a it's a fairly big budget genre movie with movie stars not really based on widely known ip you guys work work in a, you know, Zombieland is an original story, but you've become so well known for Deadpool. Can you talk a little bit about kind of the state of the business and what can be sold and how you guys are feeling as screenwriters in 2022? Well, it was, you know, interestingly,

Spiderhead was the perfect, you know, COVID movie in the sense that it is very contained. It took place almost exclusively on a stage. It's claustrophobic and meant to be claustrophobic. But as far as the state of the business, I mean, it's tough, you know. I mean, they're making less and less theatrically, moving more and more to streaming. The fact that this is IP, but not well-known IP, almost cerebral IP, made it a little more difficult, I think. Rat, what would you say? I'm certainly thankful for the streamers at making these mid-range movies.

I mean, because in theaters anymore, you're really only bound to see something massive with a ton of VFX. It just seems to be what people will show up for, and really, in some cases, the only thing they'll show up for. So the streamers do give us the chance to write more old-fashioned things. And I say old-fashioned in quotes, but it's the thrillers, the romantic comedies, the psychological dramas, the things that people probably aren't going to go shell out $20 for, but if it shows up in their living room, we'll be happy to sit there and watch. And so Spiderhead fell into that category for us. And a lot of things we're doing are anymore falling into that category. It's just the nature of what we're doing. And originals,

you know, we're allowed, you know, streamers are much more receptive to originals than the theatrical side. This, this is somewhat different

though than other films that you've had produced. I wonder like, do you guys at a certain point because of the success you've had with a handful of films get typecast to screenwriters?

Do people only approach you for a certain kind of like quippy hero story or do you have a broad range of stories that you get to do? It's interesting. After Zombieland, which was our first collaboration, we got sent probably, what, 15 zombie movies? And vampires and werewolves. it was very, very narrow what they were seeing us as. at least a half step so that we don't get typecast as, hey, you're the zombie guys or you're the, you know, I guess be good to be classified or pigeonholed as the superhero guys. But, and so, yeah, we are very intentional about, you know, the choices we make and- The goal is if you take enough half steps away, sooner or later,

you're a full three steps away and you've got a resume that shows that you can do any number of different things. And then people will take a chance on you doing any number of different things. This is a town that's ruled by fear. People are only really willing to pay for something that has already proven itself. And so it's our burden to convince executives that we can do a drama, we can do a prestige piece, we can do a superhero movie, we can do a horror movie, we could do all these different things. And we've been intentional about trying to widen our resume. We went into a prestigious producer who makes a lot of Oscar films. He won't be named. And what he wanted from us was, hey, I want the big popcorn movie, right? And what we wanted from him was, hey, we want to do a prestige Oscar piece. And

obviously, that marriage didn't work. But you get our point, which is sometimes people want to take that leap. And we're always trying to push those boundaries. Yeah, it's tricky. I mean, it does feel like you guys married those two sensibilities with a movie like this, which is purely kind of entertaining, but it's also kind of loaded with ideas and features some more complex performances maybe than you'll see in your typical big budget movie. One thing I wanted to ask you both about is writing action. I actually talked to Joe Kaczynski a couple weeks ago about Top Gun, and we talked a little bit about your movie as well. And I wanted to know from him what's on the page when it comes to action sequences. And you guys have written a lot of movies that have

a lot of action, but you've also worked with very strong filmmakers who also have a big vision for what the action should be. So when you guys are writing, aside from focusing on character and developing the plot, what goes on the page in those big set pieces? They're very, very specific when we write the screenplay. Sometimes down to the specific punch and the specific kick. I mean, we try not to do too much P&K, as Tom Roppen calls it, with just punching and kicking, because that'll make your eyes roll back in your head quicker than anything when you're reading a screenplay. But we do try to invest personality in our action and make it pop on the page.

When they actually go to film things, things change due to the stunt coordinator and due to whatever ramifications that they want to explore. But for instance, the, the, the scene where Deadpool, uh, confronts the thugs on the freeway and he only has a certain number of bullets to do it. Like we were very intentional about where each one of those bullets was shot, you know, how, how, who he shot it at, whether he missed, whether he hit them, what he said after he hit them, you know, or, or said before he hit them. Um, and, and really, if you go watch the movie, Tim Miller executed it almost down to the moment. It's really cool.

I think there's a little thing online where you can watch the juxtaposition of that scene along with the screenplay and, and see that it is, it is that intentional. Um, the, probably the most fun action sequence we ever wrote was the GI Joe retaliation sequence where they're swinging around on, on ropes through the Himalayas, snake Eyes and Storm Shadow. And that was also super specific, every little moment. No, it wasn't the dialogue in that scene either. No, yeah. It was based on a comic called Silent Interlude where there was no dialogue. So we just chucked the dialogue and we wrote, I think it was 13 straight pages of action. So anyway, long story short, we try to inject personality and we try to have a lot of fun

with it. And then various things change when the rubber meets the road. Tell me about how you guys became writing partners. Because I see your first credit is the Joe Schmoe show. And I remember that. And I don't remember watching it thinking these guys will definitely write Deadpool one day. Tell me a little bit about your backgrounds and how you came together as writing partners.

Well, we grew up together in Phoenix. We went to high school together and then took very different paths. Rhett was a psych major. Yeah. And I was a poli-sci major and I got into journalism. Red came to LA and was a screenwriter. And I was producing news and we were both living in LA and we were sitting around. I had transitioned from news to reality TV. And I was producing Big Brother 2 andett got hooked on Big Brother 2. That's the best season of TV, by the way. So good. And so one night we were watching and we said, you know, we should come up with a reality show. And at that point, again, Rhett was in scripted, I was in non-scripted, and his peanut butter

met my chocolate. And we came up with the Joe Schmoe Show, which was a hybrid scripted, non-scripted reality show. And where we... Rhett, you want to describe the concept? Well, I mean, for those of you... It was essentially the Truman Show in a reality setting. We took a guy and put him on a reality show that he thought was real, surrounded by nine

other contestants living in a house, voting each other off. What he didn't know was that everybody else was an actor performing a parody of reality TV, essentially a send-up of the genre. And he was the only person who didn't know the truth and ended up learning it at the end. And I think actually, bizarrely, it is tonally similar to Deadpool in that we were just trying to be raunchy and outrageous and silly and as funny as we could be. And then get packed with heart. Yeah. And then we wanted the heart there. And it's funny that almost in some ways, Sean, became our brand because what we like to do is we like to, I mean, most often anyways,

we like to come into a genre and make fun of it, but also still be it, if that makes sense. So we're kind of performing parody of an existing genre, but we're still an example of that genre with stakes and groundedness. And we did that with Joe Schmo with reality TV. We made fun of reality TV. In Zombieland, we made fun of zombie movies, essentially. Deadpool makes fun of superhero movies. And yet they are still, I think, reasonable examples of those genres at the same time. And so that became kind of what we do more than anything else, I think. Again, I hate to get branded, so I don't even like to talk about brands. I like to be a shapeshifter. But if you had to label us, that would be our label. I definitely sense that. And it's one of

the reasons why I like the movies that you guys make, even Six Underground, which I'm a huge defender of and I really think is a lot of fun. And it feels like a very self-aware meditation on the insane Michael Bay movie. Yeah, we wanted it to feel like we knew we were in a Michael Bay movie and we knew we were writing a Michael Bay movie, if that makes sense. Thank you for sticking up for that one because you're not necessarily in the majority. I mean, not necessarily. I mean, he's not in the majority. Well, tell me about what that's like because you guys have

obviously had both sides. You've had massive hits and you've had movies that are not as well received. Are you very aware of the dialogue around your movies? Do you read the reviews? Do you care about how people write about the scripts that you've written? Down to the word. It's punishing. It's very punishing. We really do read everything and it hurts and it feels great when it works out. There's so little you can control.

You have to let it go to some degree, but it's tough. Not many professions have other professions where people are paid to criticize your profession, who are literally called critics, right? Not that many people have that person waiting to judge them in public and to try to be entertaining in doing stuff. I think their whole boss is actually red. Well, boss is true. But I guess the point being, it's like, critics get paid to be entertainingly mean or entertainingly praising. So when they get mean, it's hard to read because

they're trying to be clever in the way that they're mean. And it just, oh boy, it can hurt. Yeah, I can imagine that. Tell me a little bit about how you guys collaborate. I love asking writing partners what their process is together. Are you back-to-back in a room kicking ideas around? Do you take a draft and then you take a draft? How does it work? Well, basically, now in the post-COVID world, we're doing it all via Zoom. We're rarely, if ever, in the same room. And when we're coming up with the idea and the outline, that's very collaborative.

We're on, we're, you know, jotting down, brainstorming, you know, filling out cards, a board. There's actual, you know, a physical board that we're laying out. And that's done together. Then, you know, once we get the green light to start writing, we will go ahead and break, you know, apart the scenes and, you know, divvy them up and say, hey, I want to take these two or I want to take this one. We write, trade them back and forth, rewrite each other. And then ultimately, you know, it becomes one script and one voice. And our rule is generally, you know, our creative rule, and it's one that feels like it could travel, you know, beyond just Hollywood, is whoever cares most wins. Whoever's most passionate about an idea wins. And that means if, you know, hey, I really want this in or I really believe in this and the other person, you know, senses that passion and doesn't feel as passionately, then that's how, you know, our creative differences work. And our other general rule is when the other person makes a change to what you sent them and sends it back to you.

In theory, you're not supposed to change it back to what it was. You're allowed to change it to a third thing, but you're not allowed to change it back. We occasionally do get in the passive-aggressive war where the scripts, the scene silently goes back and forth with the same line appearing and reappearing as it goes back and forth. But that's reasonably rare. I'm trying to remember, what's reasonably one of those audi 5000 audi 5000 i i know i was like look no one's going to get the audi 5000 joke paul like and paul and paul kept putting it back in and i kept taking it out and he kept putting it back in and finally it made the movie and of course placed to complete silence no one laughs like that which is which i feel like is my my vindication and you what was yours? Yours was-

Davis Love III. I made a Davis Love III joke in Deadpool 2. And Ryan and Paul just kept taking it out. And I kept putting it back in. And they're like, look, no one's going to laugh. And then we got in front of an audience of UC Santa Barbara students. And I told them the Davis Love story. And I was like, how many of you heard of Davis Love?

And not one hand in the room went up, basically. And I was like, yeah, that joke wouldn't have worked. There's no question. Ronnie Millsap works. And there's some very obscure jokes in there that work. Did you see Richard Marks' tweet, by the way? Richard Marks tweeted that he loved Deadpool the other day. He finally got to it after five years and he tweeted that he loved it. And his favorite joke was the Ronnie Millsap reference. so every now and then you find your audience uh that's really great so speaking of deadpool you know you guys are working on the third deadpool movie and it's uh it's under a different corporate banner and everybody's got all these questions about how this extremely raunchy um or you know witty but borderline insane evil character you know Extremely violent franchise is going to operate in the world of Disney.

What's it been like for you guys to be working on this now under this different corporate umbrella? Well, they've been great to us. So far, we really haven't experienced any Disneyfication of anything. They've given us the leash to do what we want. I think there will definitely be some sort of challenge on the back end figuring out, does the Disney logo go up in front of this movie? Does it stream on Disney Plus? I have no idea what their intentions are there. But Marvel itself has been very cool so far about supporting our vision and supporting the raunchiness and supporting the meta jokes about Disney and things like that. They've told us, look, do whatever you want. And I think there may come a moment where a specific

joke falls afoul of a new regime where it wouldn't have in the old regime. But it's been a very light touch so far. Paul, you mentioned that you guys had originally developed Spiderhead to direct it for yourselves. Is that something that you both still want to do? You plan on making a directing a film at any point? Are you in the Deadpool chamber for the next 10 years? Yeah, I mean, we're back into the Deadpool chamber. So, you know, schedule wise, it doesn't work. Lifestyle wise, it's a little more complicated too with families.

And it's interesting when we were, you know, early on in our career as writers, you know, we just thought, on the feature side, writers are not, you know, at the top of the food chain, the director is at the top of the food chain. And we thought, oh, you know, we don't want to turn over our script to somebody else, we want to be that person who's pulling the levers. And ultimately, you know, over the course of the last, what, 15 years, and we've been on a lot of movie sets, and we've realized that the directors aren't all the time pulling those levers either, that there are studios and there are movie stars, and that the director doesn't ultimately have the final say, or in most

cases doesn't have the final say, and that they're dealing with the same, you know, kind of, you know, creative frustrations that writers are oftentimes of wanting to do something and not being allowed or not having the budget or not, you know, having a star who says, you know, no, I won't do that. So we ultimately learned that, you know, as much as the director is king, he is not ultimate king. And we just, we've gotten fat and happy and, you know, sitting at our computers and writing and we like our homes and we love our families

and like sleeping in our beds. So at this exact moment, directing doesn't appeal to us, but that may change. That may change over the years. One of the saddest developments in the movie industry was the tax credits and tax breaks that occur in states outside of California because almost every movie now shoots somewhere else. It shoots in Georgia or Louisiana or Canada or Budapest. And so directing a movie, starring in a movie, the jobs that require you to go out to these sets, you sort of start to lead the lifestyle of a carny or a gypsy or something. You have no home. You're away for

nine months. And feature screenwriting is pretty nice. You get to hang out at home with your family, nice hours, and you don't have to spend all your time in far-flung places. So anyway, we may not direct at this point. We might just sit around and enjoy ourselves. We just visited the set of Twisted Metal, which is a TV show we're doing based on the video game on the PlayStation game. And we were in New Orleans. It was 95 degrees. You know, we were sitting on a curb, uh, eating, you know, uh, uh, having our lunch, you know, just looking for any bit of shade. And we just thought, Oh my God, what are we doing? What are we doing here? Um, so yeah, yeah, we've definitely become spoiled. Yeah, I was going to ask you both

if you had any designs even on, because a lot of folks that have your experience and have been working in feature films as writers for a long time are making transitions to not just writing TV series, but like helming TV series, running TV shows.

And that doesn't seem like necessarily something that's interesting to you either. Well, the only problem there is show running is really a full-time job. Like it's about a year job to make a season of TV. And we just said, we'd like to have more irons in the fire than that. So we've been lucky to partner with some phenomenal show runners where we've been involved at a slightly higher 30,000 foot view. We made a show called Wayne that we're so proud of,

a show about a kid from Boston. Oh, actually, it should appeal to the ringer because of the Boston angle, but kid from Boston who's from the wrong side of the track who gets into all kinds of trouble. And we're doing Twisted Metal. But I think what's great about those shows is we can be involved creatively,

but not have to literally run the show and stop out of our lives for a year. And showrun but not have to literally run the show and stop out of our lives for a year. And showrunners too have to go out to sets. And it's again, a far long way away. So we're trying to avoid the show running thing. There may be the perfect thing that draws us into it. A lot of writers are doing it. We did it on the Joe Schmo show, so we know how to show run, but it's probably not in our absolute near future. What we're revealing to you, Sean, is that we're lazy and we're spoiled. I think that is kind of the bottom line of all this.

I have a little daughter in the house, and I get it. You want to be home. You want to be home. You want to be with your family. You've got a great gig where you don't have to go to the 95 degree blistering heat of New Orleans if you don't want to. So keep it rolling. Would you guys ever read anything without each other? Are you bound and stuck together forever?

I don't think so. I think probably at the end, as our career winds down, as we find it difficult to find work, we're both going to be like, bye, we're going to leave so fast. And I think at that point, we might, I don't know, I might, Paul might just toy around with writing something of our own as an avocation instead of a vocation. But I think we're pretty joint at the hip. I don't think you'll likely see too many projects with one of our name and not the other. We've been together partners for 20 years.

We've known each other for 40 plus. So we're family. I think it's signed and sealed on that one. That's really beautiful and pure. Guys, I end every episode of this show asking filmmakers, what's the last great thing that they've seen? You guys seen anything good lately? Top Gun.

I mean, I know it's not like, well, look, it's brilliant. And it makes me feel, and I loved it so much. That was the most recent thing I saw and probably the best thing I saw over the last year. I love Top Gun too. I'll go with Ozark. The final six or seven episodes were awesome. My wife and I both like shows about schmoes who get in over their head in criminal situations, like Breaking Bad is our thing and Ozark is our thing. And I turned to her during the COVID, during the pandemic, and I said, should we just get involved in some really shady stuff just to spice things up? Wouldn't it be amazing if we were like, because we'd be the least likely suspected people, like we're too old

people, basically. And yet, we could have a lot of fun if we started cooking meth in our basement or whatever, started running drugs to Canada. I don't know. So those are my favorite kinds of shows and I'll stick by Ozark. From heartwarming friendship to cooking meth in your basement. Thank you guys. Really appreciate this. Sean, we really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Okay. Thanks to Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. Thanks to CR. Thanks to our producer, Bobby Wagner,

for his work on today's episode. Stay tuned to The Big Picture. Next week, Amanda and I will be talking about Lightyear, the new Pixar film in theaters this weekend, and a bunch of other new movies that are streaming. We'll see you then.