The Daily Zeitgeist - Zeit Trendocide 5/15: Netflix, 'Passion of the Christ', Walmart, Americans Broke AF, Sunday Scaries

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

In this edition of Zeit Trendocide, Jack and Miles discuss Netflix using AI to "marry products with content", the long awaited sequel to 'Passion of the Christ' (and America's 2004 torture boner), Walmart: Everyday Raised Prices, how most Americans are broke af, a cure for the 'Sunday Scaries' and much more!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart podcast. Hello, the internet and welcome to this episode of ZytrendaSide. Courtesy of Nick Semprich-Turanis on the Discord. Was it written parenthetically to the tune of sweet Carol? Oh, wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Sweet Caroline. Now, when I hear sweet Caroline for the next week, I'm going to be thinking of why genocide.

Bop bop bore. Yeah. Bore, bore. As Grok has instructed that I do going forward. Talk about this story on tomorrow's episode. Yeah. But my name is Jack, but over there is Mr. Miles Gray. Hey. Hey.

Hey, call me Gray Man. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Hey, it's me Gray Man, dude, I'm out here. It's the Gray Man. Exactly. CIA fucking snuff artist. We got some exciting news for those of us who are excited to figure out how AI works

into a operational earning model in the world of. Operational, yeah, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. Tell them, tell them. So Netflix just did their up-fronts. This is an exciting time for those of us who work in digital media. And they're basically gonna start using AI to let advertisers marry their product

with quote, the shows and movies that they're streaming. Wow, wow. So like literally generative AI commercials are going to be shoehorned into the show itself. Like you remember, did you see those? What is it? Cerveza Crystal? Crystal. Yeah.

The Star Wars beer. Yeah. If anybody missed that, there was a Chilean beer company. I assume this was like happening in the early 80s. This happened in like the early aughts. Yeah. But they were airing Star Wars with like Obi-Wan would like go and open thing to get a fucking lightsaber out.

But they would insert a shot of a beer cooler opening with a crystal in it. And like somebody wearing what Obi-Wan was wearing so that it looked like it was in the thing and then it would go serve a crystal with like a guitar sting. It's basically like that. But without without the fun or soul that is involved in that, those just be like, you know, whatever, like a lemon daddy dot com ad in the background of a fucking stranger things episode.

God lemon daddy. Is that a thing outside of Los Angeles? That's the thing that's you're talking about the car insurance thing. Yeah, the car insurance. Yeah, yeah. Don't pick whatever white NBA player plays for the Lakers and puts him in an ad sitting on a car.

It's always weird how they're like, well, we want the white Laker. Right. We maybe because they're the most affordable. Right. I mean, you know, I mean, not Luka. I don't know how you can get Luka. Yeah, they're definitely not going to get Luka. You can get Austin Reeves. And I think it was somebody else before that. Maybe not. Maybe. I remember being like, Oh, Austin Reeves is getting his local ad money on. But anyways, these are billboards around the LA area. And they just always, they started out with Austin Reeves when he like started being good. He's like the third best score on the Lakers. And then that recently this year, like the Lakers drafted a white rookie and suddenly he started showing up in the

ads. Wait, this is so fucking, this Google AI is so fucking stupid. You search lemon daddy Lakers and it says it's a, it's a play that the Lakers run called lemon daddy. Did are you, am I completely out of the loop here? Is this something? I'm not familiar with that, but maybe they did like do a self-referential play. I Think what they're doing is like they're taking like they're saying the reference point is like the Laker film room podcast had an episode

Called lemon daddy and it's just like presuming that they run a play called lemon daddy. Yeah Google AI is never wrong Yeah, I don't know, Google AI's never wrong about anything. It's generally a play where Reeves, with the ball in his hands, drives to the basket. He can either shoot himself or more commonly, throws an alley-oop pass to James, who is positioned near the basket. I could see them naming it that

because it is a pretty iconic ad. And they're just like, we're gonna call it Lemon Daddy. So that everybody knows exactly what we're about to do. Lemon daddy, lemon daddy, lemon daddy. All right, awesome about the drive and then lob it up to LeBron. Right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They demonstrate an example that placed the image of a product over a background inspired by one of its shows like Stranger Things.

So, wait, okay. So then it would just be like, here's a fucking logo in the middle of a of a scene, basically. I don't know if it's going to be in a scene or if it's because one of the things they've started doing is on the ad supported model. When you hit pause, an ad plays. Sure, sure, sure. So I don't know. But maybe maybe they're doing that.

So you hit pause and then whatever scene you're watching there has an edge inserted into it. Can we try that? I'm sure there's no ways that this is gonna go wrong or look horrifying or embarrass brands. No, no, no, I mean, especially with everything you're reading about the evolution of AI, right? Chat GPT is moving forward and forward and forward,

nothing to see here, everything's good. Yeah, it's actually accelerating. I actually just got a push notification is moving forward and forward and forward. Nothing to see here. Everything's good. No. Yeah, it's actually accelerate. I actually just got a push notification from the New York Times saying, is the apocalypse near? Because we're not ready for what's coming from the AI world.

Nope, nope. A story that has been spread around by Sam Altman, whose company just released an AI product that was too shitty for people to use. And they had to- That's just like your opinion, man. Take it back and be like, psych, we're sorry about that. And we are sorry that was bad. Anyways, so but I have no doubt this will probably be a AI product

that people like a way for people to make money off of AI. I also don't really give a shit if they're using AI to make like, like, cause ads are already bad, you know? Like it's like- I don't already ignore them. Right, yeah, yeah. But I would be pissed. It's bad because it's like replacing humans.

So that's- Yeah, yeah, but obviously like the human replacement part and I think, I mean, while I don't care about ads because my brain just completely turns off when I'm seeing like an ad. Yeah, I think there's just like the part of the visual being interrupted with some weird shit to be like, hey, man, check out fucking these big pens. Like, no, fuck all that. It's too too like back to the future. Every time it's just like a guy coming out from under the screen, being like, Hey, man, you watching back to the future? Check out these big pens.

Well, it looks like it's all bendy, right? Hey, man. What the fuck? You need childcare? Check out bright horizons, man. Why is this? Why do I keep putting this guy in? That's my cousin.

Slow down! Check out over here! Looking for some good childcare? Check out Kindercare. How you do that? How you do that? Anyways, while awaiting this fun new innovation, go watch the Chilean Beer Company ads.

Yeah. They're fun. Or the Passion of the Christ sequel. Oh, the Passion of the Christ sequel. We got one of those coming. Yeah, it feels like they're really, like this has been talked about for a while, but now it's officially taking shape. We have the company that's going to make it,

distribute it, it's Lionsgate, the same company that made the first one. Oh, right back, they're back at it again. Back at it again, baby. It's Lionsgate, the same company that made the first one. Oh, right back there, back at it again. Back at it again, baby. With the savior. Gibson and Lionsgate together. Now you know you're in trouble. I think you know what's about to happen.

Gibson, I'm hoping next year sometime. There's a lot required because it is, I'll just tell you this, it's an acid trip. If he's still on whatever he was on when he was on Rogan. This is an acid trip? It's an acid trip, man. What the fuck? Yeah. Yeah, man.

What, some fucking, like they open, what happens at the end? Do they open the cave and he's not in there? At the end of the New Testament. No, no, no, at the end of the first, the passion of Christ. So I think end of passion of Christ. Or he just gets murked. I believe he, no, no, at the end of the first, the passion of the Christ. So I think, uh, and the passion of Christ, or he just, I believe, I believe he, no, he dies, they go back and then I believe, no, nobody goes back.

In fact, I think we just see him emerge from the tomb and he looked mad. Kind of like, yeah. Wow. He looks like retelling it and he's Jesus like, so you really just let them do that shit to me, huh? Fuck all of you. Wow. And then just starts killing everybody with his Jesus powers.

It's, super producer Victor pointed out he does have a machine gun. So I think he's like, this one is going to be Jesus goes to hell and like goes on this spiritual journey. Oh, wow, wow., uh, he's, uh, Mel Gibson's like on this next level, trad Catholic, it's all about the pain and suffering thing. Um, our writer, JM made a really good point that I want to acknowledge here.

He pointed out that as they announced Passion of the Christ 2, which I think is going to be called Resurrection of the Christ, sort of a Dark Knight Rises type situation, but with the Christ, they announced that the next Saw movie was deleted from their schedule, like at the same time. So Saw Eleven disappear, Passion of the Christ 2 appear on the schedule. And so it's almost like this is a replacement, which is interesting because they are basically the same genre. They're both torture porn movies, you know? And they were the company behind, I think the soft franchise, and they were the company behind the first passion movie. So I'm wondering, there's got to be like a meeting at some point because the first passion movie came out in like 2004.

And then like all these torture porn movies came out. I wonder if they were like, our numbers are telling us that people just wanna see somebody get tortured. Because the first Passion is one of the most inexplicable like massive hits that I've ever seen. Like I've watched it in theaters and I was like, what the fuck? Like I've never, this doesn't even seem like a movie.

It just see, we're just watching this dude get the shit beat out of him for an hour. Yeah, I think, oh yeah, well white people needed to see a movie where people that look like them got tortured. Yeah, yeah. I think too. And a historical like. Oh man, we love it, man. That was their like, amistad or 12 years of slave.

Yeah, yeah. Look what they did to him. Look what they did to him. Us. Us. Us. Us. You're like, you're Christ for this purpose? Yes. This one's for who? Us, us, us.

Wow, North Carolina. Brian is pitching titles. Brian the editor, to Christ, to Spurious, as to the Christ to dead christening. Dead christening, okay. Or the final christening. I'm liking it. Christen impossible.

There's, but I do just wonder if they were like, this is where the, like if we didn't realize it, but the first big torture porn movie that all those torture porn, like horror movies were based on where they were like, did you see passion? That movie's fucked up. Like, I'm wondering, we should start making horror movies were based on where they were like, did you see passion? That movie's fucked up. Like, I wonder, we should start making horror movies

but by this freak, Eli Roth, who seems to have a fetish or something. Wow. That's wild though too. I mean, like, cause it's funny to take like a movie from a guy who's as anti-Semitic as Mel Gibson, who's like trying to like, the Jews are killing G. Like that's his whole thing.

And then Eli Roth is like, ah man, he's got it. the torture stuff's pretty good. I guess yeah, I can ignore all the terrible shit about Mel Gibson I don't even know why like why they do you think this is gonna do good? I just don't know I don't think so. I think I don't know I'm sure there will be like a big campaign churches will like buy tickets for people, you know, that sort of thing. It will get like culture war a five. Yeah, that's like, yeah, that's what I feel. It was the first movie that was like culture war bait that at a time like before anybody before Trump had even like realized, Oh, I can be openly racist and a bunch of people like that, that because it's such a racist, shitty country. Like people are going to like clamor for that.

And so he was like, this was a movie where, like, I remember this is when I worked for ABC news and like around the release of this, there was an interview with, like on the show I worked on where they interviewed Mel Gibson and were like, so you're anti-Semitic, right? Absolutely not. Absolutely. But like, so your dad is anti-Semitic. You believe a lot of the same shit your dad says. Oh, yeah.

You've been on record saying these kind of anti-Semitic things. Why are you not? And then like just denied, denied, denied. And then like, I think a couple of years later, he got drunk and started. Yeah. Letting it all hang out. Let it all hang out. This swastika flag fly. Yeah. OK. Mail.

Gibson, if that's your real name. Hey, meal. That's what I think. So when it's coming out September 20, because the party was like, shouldn't it be Easter? I'm like, well, not if it's an acid trip that's meant to just incite people's outrage. But it should be Easter. This is spooky.

But September 26 is your season. OK, acid trip, spooky Jesus resurrection. But they haven't even started shooting this. So I don't know what it's going to come out. And yeah, they haven't fucking shot this yet. No. And it's supposed to be like a like super expensive, like psychedelic. It can't be this year. No, it's got to be September 26th of like, yeah, I don't know.

There is some weird trippy stuff and like the final books of the New Testament. So maybe, maybe it'll be interesting. I wonder if there's going to be a part where Jesus comes back to kill Pontius Pilate and Pontius Pilate's hair falls off and it should turn out he had a wig. Oh. Like Mark Wahlberg in Mel Gibson's latest movie. What was that called? Like plane? Air sickness? I don't know. Turbulence? Turbulence. Flight risk.

Yeah, yeah. It was Some very vague aviation term. Flight risk. All right. Walmart. Yeah. Raising prices and they might actually say that it has something to do with, and we're not pointing fingers here. I'm not going to blame it all on 9-11. But it might have something to do with the immigrants. Oh no, tariffs, tariffs, tariffs, tariffs, tariffs.

Yeah, yeah. The Walmart CEO just told analysts on an earnings call, quote, we will do our best to keep our prices as low as possible, but given the magnitude of the tariffs, even at the reduced levels announced this week, we aren't able to absorb all the pressure given the reality of narrow retail margins. Yeah!

Did he just wanna get a call from Trump so he was he was like watch I'll get this motherfucker on the phone? I'm going to say I'm going to have to tell people that it's about the tariffs. He said quote, I'm concerned that the consumer is going to start seeing higher prices. You will begin to see that likely towards the tail end of this month and then certainly much more in June. That was what their CFO said to CNBC today. So, I mean, again, I just like, obviously it's the tariffs and I just wish the media, like I hate the way they don't,

that they don't frame any of this that also exposes corporate greed. Like, yes, the tariffs are obviously going to cause prices to go up, but like, and also just letting them be like, but our margins, you know, rather than being like, how much money did you make in profit last year? Okay, are you not able to like absorb this cost to help your fucking customers that even buy your shit?

Or again, it's because you want to return that in the form of buybacks and, you know and reward the shareholders for fucking sticking by you. It's like, Walmart is on a fucking knife's edge. And it's also really ironic, like back in the day, Walmart's like, made in America. You know what I mean? Was like all their shit, now they're like, bro, like everything's from,

that's all from cheaper places like China, so yeah, the price is gonna go up, man. Sorry, can't do anything about it because I have to keep our margins. We have to keep our margins. I just have no sympathy for these mega businesses, small business. I mean, obviously those are people dealing with

razor thin margins. But something like Walmart, when you have, like what, let's just see. What do you expect us to do? Reduce our stock buybacks and give a earnings report that isn't boffo and doesn't drive line go up like impossible that's we would be that is a dereliction of duty my good sir yeah my god they they're making so billion with 15 billion yeah they're one of the they revenue wise i think they're the top company in america but because one of the, revenue wise, I think they're the top company in America, but because-

And one of the biggest employers too. Yeah, because it takes so much money to run a Walmart. They also have lower margins than an Apple, for instance. Yeah, yeah. It's just like the irony of a small business destroying company like Walmart, then being like, I mean, we're gonna have the tariffs, you know what I mean?

And we're not gonna dip into this war chest of money that we have. It's wild, man. Walmart is like such a clear example of how neoliberalism and like late stage capitalism works, where it's just, they just went around the country, you could just like see it, like all, you know, like when I lived in Missouri,

like the, everything was Walmart. It was just like a monoculture of Walmarts. And then like a bunch of, you know, strip malls and stuff with just like shuttered mom and pop stores in their ways. A grocery store, yeah, a clothing store, a kids toy store, and sorry, that all became a Walmart basically. They just come through and stick a straw in the ground and drink up all your milkshake.

Oh, I like that. You should write that down. Yeah, that's a cool metaphor that I made up myself. That's sick, dude. That's sick. Let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. I found out I was related to the guy that I was dating I don't feel emotions correctly I am talking to a felon right now, and I cannot decide if I like him or not Those were some callers from my call-in podcast therapy gecko It's a show where I take real phone calls from anonymous strangers all over the world as a fake

Gecko therapist and try to dig into their brains and learn a little bit about their lives. I know that's a weird concept, but I promise it's pretty interesting if you give it a shot. Matter of fact, here's a few more examples of the kinds of calls we get on this show. I live with my boyfriend and I found his piss jar in our apartment.

I collect my roommates' toenails and fingernails. I have very overbearing parents. Even at the age of 29, they won't let me move out of their house. So if you want an excuse to get out of your own head and see what's going on in someone else's head, search for Therapy Gecko on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

It's the one with the green guy on it. And we're back. We're back. And we're back. Mm-hmm. And we're back. Wow. Lean into it.

Um, what do we, what do we, uh, most Americans don't earn enough to afford basic costs of living analysis funds? Wow, based on a general analysis of just looking around at people, I know I've just come to this conclusion that most Americans don't earn enough to, like, yeah, and now please. We've done an analysis.

Yeah. And the analysis is in. The numbers are in, baby. It's bad. For the bottom 60% of US households, a quote, minimum quality of life is out of reach. Yeah, yeah. The middle class has been declining.

We just haven't recognized it fully. Chairman Gene Ludwig told CBS Money Watch, it's really dangerous because it's the kind of thing that leads to social unrest. And it's not fair. The American dream is not that it's given to you. It's that if you work hard, you have a chance to get ahead and achieve the things in life that you wanna achieve.

It's not living in a tent, not having to steal. Yeah. I'm sure Donald Trump is very concerned about this. But I do think this is news to CBS news, or like this is the sort of thing that they do, they're like, we have a crazy new report in, guys, that we haven't really been acknowledging is real, where things bad in America.

We thought jobs were good, and everything was fucking skyrocketing. It's like, it always, I feel like we just need, I mean, if I were King, what I would do is you couldn't be talking like on the mainstream media unless you knew actual working people. Yeah. And you were singing that song earlier,

saying that you just can't wait to be King. Yeah, that and when I am King, you will be first against the wall was the other King lyric that I like to sing lyric that I think will be OK, right? Yeah. With your opinion, which is of no consequence at all. Fuck. I had big plans for my opinion. It's a paranoid fucking Android man. Paranoid fucking Android brother that I know that's our weight karma police.

And your hands,, which, no. Isn't that Paranoid Android? Yeah. Anyways, shout out to Radiohead. Also, terrible politics. Nobody's untouched, baby. Paranoid Android. Brian the editor is saying none of that is getting cut

like we wanted it cut. You cut everything else, man. Just make it the us singing that we have to live with our shame every day. It's a yeah, it's bad out there. And I just like think about the fact that they're like, we have some breaking late breaking news, like shit reports like this when they're like, why are kids disillusioned? It must be tick tock. Why, why is populist politics popular right now?

It must be, you know, Trump like has hacked the election. And I was like, no, no, it's fucking this. It's this. Yeah. Everybody's fucking. Well, the system's not working, it's bad for everyone. This article is really fucked up because it's just describing what's happening with no attribution, no causation, nothing. It's just like, and it's just like one says,

the gap between how much low income families earn and how much they need to afford a minimum cost of living is expected to keep widening. Huh. Okay. That's it? No solutions? No solutions.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's going to get worse. And our local meteorologist tells us that this gap is supposed to keep widening. So look out for some stormy weather ahead, folks. Yeah, what a fucking wild time. But finally, we do have a little life hack from, I like to, Miles, when I'm trying to make my life a little bit better, I like to look to the C-suite of big, powerful companies, because these are the people

who have figured it out the most. They are winning, how do I be winning? Easy, okay? So one of the things I struggle with is a little something called Sunday scaries. You ever have that? No. You feel anxiety? No, I'm on too many drugs.

I feel anything. Oh, that's good. Sunday. And if I stop taking them, then I start feeling them. So I don't, I and start to be like, I think I'm bad. You guys, honey, I think I'm bad. I didn't work enough. But we have a fucking solution. The HubSpot CEO. What's HubSpot? HubSpot, yeah. No clue. It's a US based developer and marketer of software products

for inbound marketing, sales and customer service. So doing the Lord's work, saving lives every day. OK, you don't want Sunday Scaries work on Sunday. That's straight up her advice. What a fucking. Scary is just be working on that weekend. You never stop working. Therefore you don't get Sunday. Scaries Sunday. Scaries is just your brain telling you you are a bad capitalist and you suck.

Exactly. Just never turn the engine off. That's right. And you'll be fine. Burn the candle from both ends and everything will be okay. You know that old adage. Yeah. When you're spending time with your family, that's time that you could be avoiding the Sunday scaries. Okay?

I wish. Guilt for spending time with your family is a good thing. And it's an important messenger letting you know. Yep. Be afraid of you know. Yep. Be afraid of your family. Yep, yep, yep. This is amazing, this is amazing. I, like the way these people talk, it's so frightening,

but again, we always say like, you have to have something wrong with you to get to the C-suite like that. Oh. And of course, it's either because- Something right with you in the world of capitalism. In the world of capitalism. Yeah. You're so like capitalism poisoned in your brain

that you're just like, yeah, man, the way like I avoid the work stress of like going back to work is to never stop working. I will only work forever. And that's how I became impervious to any kind of anxiety. She does break on Friday nights and some part of Saturday. So she is fine. I guess the doctors call that sleeping.

But yes, I do give myself a break. I'm not an animal. So I have this app that just converts my emails to audio and just reads them to me as I'm asleep so that anytime a new email comes in, I just have it read to me and I've already processed it in my unconscious mind by the time I wake up. Wow, that sounds like so fucked up,

like email inception for CEOs, where it's like, yeah, I hooked my brain up to this box at night and it's like, I straight up had an email nightmare this week. What do you mean? Like a nightmare where I was like, woke up and was like, oh shit, I need to like respond to that email. Oh, no. And it was just a bad dream. Good God. Yeah.

I'm going to quit the show. So that's where I'm at. I didn't think I was doing a show with a fucking GERB like this dude having email nightmares. Jack, you should try it. You should try just emailing nonstop. Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Send an email right now. I, exactly, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, send an email right now.

And you know what? I'm about that capitalist life because I woke up and grabbed my phone and tried to respond to a dream email. I woke up like this. You're holding a laptop. Thanks, typing. Okay, Beyonce.

Oh no. All right, those are some of the things that are trending on this Thursday afternoon. Those are some of the things that are trending on this Thursday afternoon. Yep. We are back tomorrow with a whole last episode of the show. Until then, be kind to each other, be kind to yourselves. Get your vaccines while you still can. Get your flu shots while you still can.

Don't do nothing about white supremacy. And we will talk to you all tomorrow. Bye. Bye. Bye. The Daily Zeitgeist is executive produced by Catherine Law. Co-produced by Bae Wang. Co-produced by Victor Wright. Co-written by J.M.

McNabb. And edited and engineered by Brian Jeffries. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.