The Greatest Generation - Deep Deep Dimp (Crimson Tide - Bonus Episode)

Episode Date: April 15, 2022

When one of Worf’s ancestors seizes control of some of the photon torpedoes' ancestors, Commander Hunter gets an on the job audition to work for one of the toughest sub captains in the navy. But when his Von Causewitz term paper comes back with a bad grade, the conflict between them becomes an inferno that the stream from a Jack Russell terrier cannot put out. What’s the punishment for stealing shots of a nuclear submarine? Is the navy seriously going to look the other way on Hackman pointing a gun at a sailor? Was it Kurt Jurgens or Hardy Kruger? It’s the episode in which supporters from MaxFun Drive 2017 helped us establish that Crimson Tide IS canonical Trek!

Hello, this is Ben. Hey, this is Adam. This is a very famous episode from the bonus feed that we have presenting today in the main feed for free. For fun. We went into our cloud drive with one of those backhoe excavators and we've pulled the coffin out. Yeah.

We've reanimated this episode for mainstream consumption. Yeah, and this is mostly a thank you from us for all the folks that listen to the show and also a heads up that the Max Fund Drive is coming right up. And if you enjoyed this, this is one of many, many bonus episodes that live behind the paywall for Max Fund members. And if you would like to become a monthly supporter of our show, the Max Fund drive is the best time to do it, and it's very, very close, so get ready. It's sort of like a reward if you think of it one way or a threat if you think about it the other.

Support for the greatest generation makes episodes like these possible. Yeah, and well, we just really appreciate everybody that listens and supports. And whatever way they can, and we hope you enjoy this special freebie from behind the paywall today on the greatest generation. It's a good one. I love this episode. A theme song made by Adam Riggusia. Yeah.

It's got the works. Turn it up. This one's got everything. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm. I'm sorry. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm Welcome to the greatest generation. The Star Trek podcast. You ever want Star Trek? By two guys who are a little bit embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast, who are today doing a Crimson Tide podcast. I'm your host Adam Pranika. I'm your other host Ben Harrison.

Crimson Tide is canonical track, right? You ever want Star Trek? I think in a number of ways it is, Ben. Star Trek! You know Star Trek and USS Enterprise. The one way that Crimson Tide really departs from Trek is that the characters have interpersonal conflicts. Yeah. One way that the movie is almost exactly like next generation is that we have just as much concern about female characters in both. But I think we'll try and do as much of a greatest gen as we can on Crimson Tide.

Yeah, I mean for a long time our regular podcast, the greatest generation has been sort of an ad-junct Crimson T side podcast. Yeah, there's probably not that many clips from this movie that we haven't worked into. Sound drop or two on on greatest gen. Yeah, Ben, one of the things I wanted to ask you is why you like this movie so much because I I love this movie and I've watched it dozens and dozens of times. But Simpson Brookheimer were cranking these out for a period of like a dozen years. Like the Coke-fueled Simpson Brookheimer years of like Machismo and fighter planes and submarines and like some really gung-ho military fun. This movie and many of these Simpson,

Brockheimer joints to me really feel a lot like Star Trek the Next Generation in that it's like getting into a pair of sweats at the end of the day and like just tucking into something that is comfy and you know exactly what it's gonna be. I mean like for a long time Star Trek thec Generation was just kind of my background noise. Like if I was sitting around the house doing nothing, I would just have an episode on

and I might be like also playing a game on my phone or cleaning the house or cooking something. And I like wouldn't even be able to see the TV, but it would just be kind of my nice comforting background noise. It is, it's to you what Grey's anatomy is to my wife. Yeah, exactly. I have this movie and hunt for red October on my iPad at all times.

And if I'm ever on an airplane and I'm not, that's about the Inflate movie selections, I've always got a great fallback, you know? I am and I have been for a long time over physical media when it comes to movies. Yeah. But Crimson Tide is a blue ray that I own. One of maybe the 10 blue ray movies that I own physically.

And I think there's a good reason to, like, man, this film is 20 years old and it looks amazing. It looks great. It is beautiful, the sound is awesome. It totally achieves what it sets out to do, I think. You can knock the Simpson-Bruckheimer over in a lot of ways, but I think what you can't do is knock Tony Scott

because there's a timelessness to his storytelling and his way of doing it that I think is, like it looks as contemporary as ever. It totally flies today. It looks like a modern film today and I think that's a credit to him. Yeah, like the color and the crispness of everything is super modern feeling.

It almost pre-visages the way movies are shot now. It's funny you say you own the Blu-ray atom because when I sat down to rewatch this for our pod today, I was shocked to discover that the copy that I owned was the SD version. So I upgraded to the HD version before watching it today. But I think that's also a credit to how good it looks. You know, like a really good looking movie doesn't necessarily need to be the highest resolution to hold your attention. And I think that

is very true of this. Well, it's important to have the HD version been because as you can see from the movie poster, you have your Denzel Washington name above the title, your Gene Hackman name above the title, and the word sweat above the title. Yeah. The three triple threats of this movie. This is the first and only nomination that sweat has gotten as a supporting character. only nomination that Sweat has gotten as a supporting character. You want to get into it, Ben? Let us get in. Alright, well here we go.

Let's set condition 1SQ for Crimson Tide. What they call us is trouble in Russia. What they call us, little ducks. The opening of this movie is like the most bonery text on screen of all time. It's like the three most powerful men in the world. The president of the United States, the president of the Russian Federation, and the captain of a US nuclear submarine. You know, we talk all the time in Greatest Gen about like the pre-credit sequence, that cold open.

They use that cold open with varying degrees of success, right? And I think we praise it most of the time when it's efficient and shocking and attention grabbing. And I think Crimson Tide does it really well here. It's super efficient. We've got the text on screen, but we also have this Richard Valeriani on the ship doing his hit for CNN.

Right. And in three minutes, we know everything about the story. It's great. Yeah. If there's a lot of setup to this story, it's very high concept. There's like bad ultra-nationalist Russians doing bad stuff. And one of them has like seized a series of Russian bases.

And there's like a real nuclear threat going on. And like we get that all set up and we smash cut to kids at a birthday party, which is like the most done Simpson Jerry Brookheimer smash cut, perhaps in the entire done Simpson Jerry Brookheimer of is a smash cut from the scariest news in the world to kids at a birthday party. the scariest news in the world to kids at a birthday party. Yeah, and what preserves the continuity is the hazer in the room for the magic show. Like, it still looks real moody. Oh, man.

Yeah, when you're filming indoors and you use the smoke machine to just fill the space with what is like this. I mean, I would say that if you want to knock any imagery in this film for being radically dated, any everything that happens before they get into the submarine has some of that going on. Because there's also like a meeting where the, you know, all the station chiefs

and the captain and an admiral meet up in a ready room to go over what the threat is, what their mission is gonna be. Commander-in-chief has directed US military forces to set Defcon for. And it looks like they bounced all of the lights in the room off of the surface of a swimming pool. No, that's it. It's like, why? They're in like a classroom.

It makes no sense. You know, this is gonna sound cutting, but it's all production designed to death. Like, there's so much thought in every composition. There's nothing neutral about any scene. And you get this a little later in the submarine too, like a submarine is a series of straight lines. But all the angles are dutched. Like all the movements are angular.

Like they really do a great job in keeping the composition exciting and fresh every time. Yeah, and like one thing we'll often criticize about TNG is when an episode kind of doesn't stand on its own convictions. It is a great show, but it is occasionally a little bit melee-mouthed about the point it wants to get across or the choice a character is making, and that never happens one single time in this movie. Yeah, I mean, you remember when nationalism was bad? Then it's a good thing we got that fixed.

Yeah, this is, yeah, this is like, I mean, like Bill Clinton is president in this movie. Like the US Navy is doing something that is scary, but like kind of what we want them to do, you know? Yeah. Like we want them to do, you know? Like we want them to be a deterrent for bad, bad people, doing bad, bad things. And like that's what the ship is for,

but it's also described by Gene Hackman as like the most lethal killing machine ever devised, which is not an untrue statement, I think. Yeah, and I think a lot of the divisions in the crew really fall on either side of that line. Either you bristle at the idea or you welcome that idea into your life, you know, as someone who serves a board that ship. Either we put on this condom to fuck or we put on this condom so that people would be scared we want to fuck. Yeah, that's, uh, that's how that line of dialogue went.

Yeah. Uh, if that, if that character had been more toquivocal in a TNG kind of way, maybe he would have said it that way. If Ben Tarantino had written that piece of dialogue and not Quentin, that's how it would have gone. Yeah, that is, I was joking with our buddy, Law Threaper on Twitter today, that you can almost see like, Quentin Tarantino's face just pop up

in the lower right hand corner of the screen every time a piece of Tarantino dialogue happens. The glass, the glass, the glass, these glass, the glass, the glass, the glass, the glass. Yeah, like MST3K style, he just like, there's that episode of South Park, and they just count how many times they say shit in the episode.

And I kind of just want to have like a, like a Tarantino's face and a a counter like this should be like a DVD special feature where you hit a button and this can come up and it's just Tarrantino's face and a little counter every time something he wrote is uttered. Who played the German sub commander in the enemy below with Robert Mitchell? Was it Kurt Trigger's a hardy Kruger? Sir, rock and answer! Drop that and give me 20!

You know, in many ways, for a long time, Quentin had the best job in Hollywood, where he would get punch-up duty on stuff like this. Well, I said that the Kirby Silver Surfer was the only real Silver Surfer, and that the Mobius Silver Surfer was shit. And I think you and I have talked about this as it pertains to Star Trek, like, I don't necessarily want to be in a writers room full time, but Lordy, wouldn't it be great to just do punch ups on scripts? Oh man. It would be fantastic. It would be good stuff. We call that system, we call that system, we call that system, ducks, we're going over there. Breathe, we'll speak no killing machine ever divine.

This high bow, bow, bow. This magic scene in the beginning is all about establishing how close, hunter and webs are. And, and webs is played by Vigo Mortensen. A young, iron jaw, steely Vigo Mortensen, who is no less than movie star than as he is now. It's amazing how much nobody realized what a movie star he was.

He has a small but pivotal part in this movie. And I feel like he just fucking dominates every frame he gets in. Like he looks amazing. Yeah. He chews on the edges of the scene. It's a real tour de force. dominates every frame he gets in, you know? Like he looks amazing, he, he chews on on the edges of the scene. It's a real tour de force. And I don't think I realize, like I think I went back and watched this movie

after Lord of the Rings came out and I was like, oh fuck, you know? Yeah. Oh, there's that guy. I think it's a credit to how great of an actor he is that he's so great he doesn't stand out. Like he just looks like he belongs at all times. One of the ways I felt like he did attract maybe some wrong attention is like he sort

of takes over the magic show and then like smokes a cigarette out of his mouth but also a cigarette out of the dimple in his chin. That was weird. That is one deep chin dimple bin. I mean, you can just, you can keep a spare cigarette in there if you want. It's a deep, deep dim. If you were, if you were gonna smuggle something up or a nuclear submarine, you want a dimple like that to hide it in, you know?

If Vigo Mortensen ever had to go to prison, like they'd have to do the butt check, but I think you also have to do the chin check, too, on him. Contrabant. There's more than one cavity search on Vigo Mortensen, but that way. The TV is on in the background at this party, and they've got like CNN going, and there's that classic like Vigo goes to Denzel. Is this bad? Is it looks and the phone rings and Vigo's pager goes off. Vigo looks down at his pager and it just is boobless. Like that is such a 90s plot beat that it's almost... It's like they watched Navy SEALs 20 minutes before

and they're like, well, that's a good open. Why don't we just use that one? So they get the call and it's like, it's not super dissimilar from a fire department getting the call, like they're being scrambled, essentially. But that can't happen before Denzel officially gets hired. Because he's an officer and he's up for an exo position, the number one of a nuclear submarine.

But I guess the Alabama, the ship that this takes place on, lost an exo to appendicitis. And so Captain Ramsey is like looking for somebody to fill in. And Denzel's name is on the top of the list. It was a short list. So they do that perfunctory sort of job interview. And we've got in the room Ramsey, Hunter, and then Cobb, who sort of stands at the corner of the desk between them.

I probably had to watch this movie 20 times before I realized that Cobb is an acronym. They only recall him Cobb. Right. There is some tension established right here in this interview because Denzel is a lettered officer. He's done a nappel, he's done Harvard, he has a certain pedigree, and I think that Gene Hackman's character Ramsey is you know impressed by that, but I think also a little bit threatened by it. Like he definitely sees Denzel as being part of a new generation of officer in the submarine corps that is distinctly different from him.

Rick overgave him my command, a checklist, a target, and a button to push. All I had to know is how to push it, and they'd tell me when. They seem to want you to know why. I would hope they'd want us all to know why, sir. And it sees him as the new guard that is going to wipe his guard away. Yeah, and I think he sincerely believes that his own Harvard was war, as one of the few remaining submarine captains with wartime experience. Like, I think he's impressed to the point of intimidation a little bit.

I also feel like he is confident in his abilities as a veteran submarine captain that he's got some of his own shit too. Yeah, he went to the School of Hard Knocks. He took neck classes. Like he's not fucking around. There's no like weakness in his position. But you know, like he sees, he's, he's the writing on the wall. You know, he sees where's the writing on the wall, you know, he sees where

the navy wind is blowing and so you know what it takes is his little dog to sign off on Commander Hunter for Captain Ramsay to feel really comfortable with Denzel coming aboard the boat. Did you know Jack Russell's were born black? It's a weird scene because they spend a good portion of it talking about how dumb horses and high school girls are and how smart Jack Russell's are You really pick your side in that scene. Yeah, you also see the The Tarantino head pop up and count up a couple of numbers, you know I'm glad they didn't mix their metaphors there like Farley and Tommy Boy about getting a good look at a butcher's ass. He's like, the thing about a jack Russell Terrier is they're dumbest rocks, but they know every high school boy wants to fuck them.

Like, I wonder how many times they botched the line reading in that scene before moving on. Yeah. You can get a good look at a high school girl's ass by sticking your head in a Jack Russell Terrier. There's so much setup in this movie. It's almost unbelievable because there's like another scene where Denzel has to say goodbye to his family. And, you know, this is a pretty important beat in a war film, which is like show who they're fighting for, kind of a deal. Yeah.

But then they cut to the scene where Captain Ramsay is just giving this like totally insane grand de laquant speech in the pouring rain with like sparks raining down behind him and the boat, like, you know, rimlet in the rain. Where did the sparks come from? Are they still putting together this up? I think it's just like one of those Jerry Brookheimer tropes. Like it totally reminded me of the fight scene in Conair,

when Nick Cage is using his hands that should be registered as deadly weapons to beat up the thugs outside the bar. And there's just fire in the background for no reason. So there's a couple of notes on this scene that I think are germane to some of the choices that were made for this scene. The sub they use is a 50s era decommission submarine.

Really? That did not have a conning tower on it. And so, the reason that they couldn't shoot with or on a real submarine was because the Navy was not a willing participant in this film. And the reason for that is because the production crew, including producers, Tony Scott, and a few others, Simpson and Brooke Heimer, went and asked the Navy for a ride-along, like much like you can get a ride along

from a police officer in a squad car. And the Navy was like, sure, that sounds great. What's your movie about? And Tony Scott's like, get this. The movie is about a submarine captain who is in command of a sub, and the computer takes control of the missiles, and the conflict is about how you shut off a sub with a mind of its own.

And then they'd be like, well, that's interesting. That could never happen. Come on aboard and like, see how we do shit. So they go on right along. They film a bunch of stuff inside like for scouting. Like they sort of do a like a bulked up text scout. It sounds like they check it out. They're capturing footage. They're interviewing people. Like it's a really like a fully developed couple of days. So they go out there. They do all this research. They come back and then he starts talking to the Navy again and the Navy is like, great, did you get everything you needed? Tony Scott's like, sure thing. That was awesome. By the way, our movie is about a captain and an exo

fighting over a strategic nuclear missile launch. And the Navy's like, long silence on the phone. Navy's like, yeah, actually, we're not really interested in helping you tell that story. That's not really a good look for us. And Tony Scott's like, dude, I made Top Gun. Like, I recruited personally 50,000 people for the Navy. Like, do me a solid here.

And the Navy's like, no, I'm sorry, we can't help you. So Tony Scott's like, well, Scott and Simpson and Brutkheimer are like, we are fucked. Like, we have a submarine movie to make and we need a sub. So, this is fucked up, Ben. They're like, what we need more than anything is this submerging sequence. How do we get it without the Navy's agreement?

We need the submerging sequence and we need the scene next to the sub. They're like, okay, well, we got the sequence in the rain with the sparks. We're gonna find a decommissioned submarine that's been sold for scrap. And we're going to build a conning tower on top of it. We're going to shoot outside of that.

Great. Like check that box. We got that scene. But this emerging scene, they looked into the legality of shooting a active Navy submarine going out of controls and submerging. And they're like, well, there's actually no legal reason why we can't go out in helicopters and speedboats. After a submarine that's left pearl and shoot its emerging.

So that's what they did. They went out in helicopters and film boats and stayed like a safe distance, but they shot with telephoto lenses and shot a live submarine submerging and that's what they used in the film. Holy shit. Isn't that fucking crazy?

That's bonkers. So all of the externals on the sub look amazing and beautiful because a one of them was stolen really. And two, the scene in the rain with the sparks is so obscured by everything else on set that like it totally reads. Yeah, it's a miracle that they got footage as great as they did because they didn't get to like get second takes, I imagine. But they shot a couple of different subs and like part of the knock on that scene is like, yeah, there's the it's the wrong type of sub and they show two different ones. But for the production constraints that they had, like, there are such small scale things that you and me run into as video producers that would just kill a production.

And I feel like one of them would be the main physical actor, like the setting for the film, being unavailable would be a really big fucking problem. And the balls of text to just go, you know what, we're just gonna go get it. We're gonna go get it, and that's what they did. We feed my commands, so we don't know what this message means. Our target package could have changed. Mr. Hunter, I made the decision. I'm captain, I'm captain, I'm captain, I'm captain of this boat.

I'm chet the fuck up! The Alabama, the submarine in question, is putting to see amid this Vladimir Rachenko's uprising in Russia. And what's happened is Rachenko has taken control of a submarine base and a, like a Nike site, or whatever the Russian equivalent of that is. So he's got like 25 missiles with 10 warheads a piece that he can launch.

And they're being extra cautious because they don't think that he has the launch codes for these missiles, but they don't want to run the risk of having their pants down if he compromises those launch codes. So they put the C and they're basically, they're basically being told like, be ready to shoot.

Like, you are not going out here on a pleasure cruise. Like, you may in fact need to launch your fucking missiles. And so like, the captain has a lot on his shoulders. And the first thing he does is call a missile readiness test. Con radio, we are receiving flash traffic, emergency action message, recommend alert one, recommend alert one. Right after there's a huge fire in the galley. And if I had to call out one of the best scenes, I think this is one of them. I think this is one of them. It takes a Simpson-Bruckheimer trope and turns it on its head, which is,

in almost every done Simpson-Bruckheimer film, there is a chase scene, like a car chase or something like that. And there is always intercut between the action of the chase scene and some peaceful thing that we know that the chase will inevitably upset. You know, like in speed, it's like a lady pushing a baby carriage in the enemy of the state.

It's like a wheelchair basketball team crossing the street. Like, there's always something and we're like cutting to it and we're like, why are we cutting to this peaceful thing when this exciting car chase is happening? And then the car chase goes right through the middle of it. The bus hits the baby carriage, turns out to be cans. In this movie, it is Lieutenant Commander Ron Hunter using the ship for a jog. And it's intercutting a crazy galley fire.

Like the whole fucking galley is fully on fire The the galley fire is a big deal and I guess as Exo like he is in charge of like making sure it gets dealt with so he like puts on his His firefighting gear and does like a shoulder roll over one of the metal tables and hits the button that turns on the flame retardant spray. It's they're like they're like just wiping the sweat off their brow when the captain calls this missile drill. One of the guys who was in the mess hall during the fire. He's not doing so great. Yeah, he's a little bit coffee a little bit gaggy.

Yeah, he's a little bit coffee a little bit gaggy. Mm-hmm. They're checking him out. The comms guy, Zimmer, triggers the missile drill on the captain's orders and he and the, and one of the other guys like walk their emergency action message about the drill up to the captain and Hunter is like late to the party because he's racing from the galley fire back to the control room and like you know stripping all his fire fighting gear off it as he runs and he gets there just in time to like help authenticate the message. I agree. Messages off that. And they're like running this drill and he keeps trying to kind of like inject

into the into the conversation like, hey, by the way, like we're not totally out of danger, W slash R slash T galley fire. So let's keep let's keep an eye on that. And the captain is fucking pissed that he's doing this. And then and then six bay radios up to con and they're like, we've got a medical emergency down here because the guy we saw before who was struggling after the fire, he actually has had a heart attack and we're given them the paddles right now. It's not great.

You know how there was some foreshadowing about that black guy? Yeah. We need to have the black dude die first because this is the 90s and this is Jerry Brookheimer. The black guy has come home to roost. It's a fucking racist. Like even in a fucking Denzel movie in this era,

the black dude dies first. Yeah. It's fucking crazy. At a certain point in the 90s, Denzel became the number one American movie star. And has, in my view, retained that title. I've been told. Yeah, no one's taken the belt from him.

No way, like he's the top. There's an entire podcast about this. Yeah. And I can't imagine Denzel didn't have some feelings about this. Like, there's a story on IMDB about him having words with Tarantino when Tarantino visited the set about the way Tarantino depicted black people in his films.

Yeah. And specifically calling Tarantino out on overusing the N-word, which is like calling another artist out on something that you find inappropriate is not an easy move to make even in private. And he basically did it like in front of the whole crew on set, like Denzel put him on blast in front of everybody. It's an interesting time in Hollywood because you are rightly calling attention to this trope

at the time. It's happening at the same time where Denzel is sort of realizing, you know, like an apex actor moment in his career. Like he has ascended and he is the man. he is the best actor in this film, and it's not close. Yeah. Among other great actors, even. And it does make me wonder if he had an opportunity or an inclination to as easily call out this moment as he was able to call out the moment for Tarantino. It's an interesting choice, and the upshot of it is that this dude buys the farm.

There's also a pretty amazing scene where all the officers are having dinner in the officer's mess and some Von Klauschwitz debate takes place. I think when you are in high school and you want to start, and you want to sound smart when you're talking about war matters. Drop in Von Klauschwitz is the way to do that. Sure. All you gotta do is read like the first two paragraphs on the Wikipedia entry and you'll probably have

something to say. This is a great dinner scene. You get the captain, the exo, you get Zimmer who is played by Matt Craven, who is like a recognizable that guy. Vigo is in the room and also James Gandalfini. A Svelte, younger, James Gandalfini, and another reminder of the breadth of his career. Who, I mean, who was in a number of Simpson, Bruckheimer movies? He sure is, yeah, he's in,

this reminded me that he was also in Tony Scott, slash Quentin Tarantino's true romance. Yeah, yeah. As a similarly psychotic character, like, and I think that maybe this movie, he plays it a little more psych psycho than I might have wanted. Yeah. Like his character is by far the most unhinged, but he is so charismatic.

And it's no surprise that he had a long and illustrious career after this. They make some choices with this character that are so much more than just bit character choices. Like you get that scene on the bus where they're loading in to board the submarine and Gandalfini just owns this scene. Like a younger crewman gets on the bus and like is a little too casual with Gandalfini and Gandalfini just like tears into him.

How you doing? I'm fine, thanks. Adjust me as soon as you speak to me! Stand in the attention, Seller! It's a great scene for a character that we will really not know throughout the movie, but we'll know him just enough. Yeah. Like little moments to shine, I feel like are what Simpson,

Brookheimer films are about. They give six lines of dialogue to a minor character and you just know who they are. Yeah. This, this dinner scene is super tense. Like it is piano wire tense. And the conversation is basically about the difference of opinion between Denzel and Hackman over what they're there to do. And it centers around this quote from Von Klaus Schewitz, who was like a, I don't know what, like the 19th century warrior slash philosopher. Yeah, he's like the Patrick Swazie from Road House of War Scholars. Yeah, he says that the true nature of war is that pain don't hurt.

He says the true nature of war is to serve itself and this leads Denzel to reveal his opinion that in the nuclear world the true enemy is war itself. This is really like the inciting incident of the film. This is where their discord begins. It's also where you begin to see the split among the crew. They're on two separate sides of the table. You get some shots of everyone involved and their relative agreement or disagreement

with that line. It's all wordless. And I sort of want, like, hackmins is by far the most nuanced, wordless performance in this scene. Do you think that what he is putting out is I disagree based on who I am and what I do, but deep down, I'm worried you might be right.

I never saw his thinking as that nuanced in this moment. I thought he was sort of running a bit on the XO. I think he was trying to draw him out in a way that perhaps the job interview was incomplete and the interview continues while on the boat. Vigo does something really interesting here in soft focus in the background as Denzel Washington delivers his line about the enemy of war.

And he nods in agreement. Like you can see him just barely, but you know what side he's on in that moment as well. And that's a moment that will be revisited later on. That's something for for the dozens of times I've watched this movie. I didn't notice until this time. Yeah. Do you think one of the ways this movie is canonical Star Trek is because the unhinged Russian antagonist has the last name, Roshenko? Yeah, I think that's probably that's probably part of it.

Do you think that... Explains a lot. That's a that's a warfan cester. It would explain why the rebels have such a hard time opening up the launch bay doors for the missiles. Hahaha. Hahaha. Hahaha.

Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. Chetapaka. You know, like the Captain and the exo have a little conversation about how much they disagree about the muscle drill being run during all that. They get an EAM. It says basically like the Russian They get an EAM. Conradio Receiving Emergency Action Message, Recommend Alert 1, Recommend Alert 1.

It says basically like the Russians have the codes like shit is fucking melting down up here. Moscow inflames, missiles headed toward New York, film at 11. We're going to DEF CON 3, be ready to shoot them off basically at a moment's notice. With this in mind, they first encounter one of the Russian attack subs. So like if Red October is the Atlantic Ocean Russian submarine movie, this is the Pacific Ocean,

Russian submarine movie in my mind. Right. The deal basically is that this is a missile boat, so it's like a big fat boat. You know, and it can defend itself, but mostly it's there to carry around huge missiles that can take entire cities out. And attack subs are a lot nimbler and more maneuverable. So if you're in a situation where you've got one missile boat and one attack boat, you probably don't want to pick a fight if you're the missile boat, right?

Yeah, and it would seem that if you're the attack sub, you're harder to detect, and if you're the missile boat, you're so much larger that you're like trying to evade this sub, but they're going so deep that they can't receive radio messages anymore, essentially, the ocean is too much interference. And this is an intense scene because they've gotten their orders to set condition 1 sq which means like fuel up your missiles and shoot them like you have a target package go ahead and shoot and and basically captain ramesy is like is basically what he's basically waiting out the attacks of until he can get to launch depth one of the characters we meet in this moment is Ravetti, who I feel like is one of the emotional

cores of the film. Like, he sort of teaches the audience when to be scared, when to be excited, when things are dangerous, and when they're safe. Which silver surfer is the good one, and which one is the bad one? Well, I said that the Kirby Silver surfer was the only real silver surfer, and that the mobile silver surfer was

shit. Right, we're learning a lot from him. Yeah, he's the sonar man, he's telling him, you know, when torpedoes are in the water, what's going on with that Akula Class sub. And meanwhile, Denzel is like, What do you think? We received a bit of a message that has something to do with the order that we have to launch these fucking missiles. And I'm really am curious to see what the message is. And Hackman is not in. Like, he's like,

I think there's nothing on this. Let's launch the missiles first, and then we can find out about your radio thing. But right now, I have an attack sub breathing down my neck and orders to launch. May I suggest that we float the buoy so we have enough cable. I should give us enough reach to receive the EAM transmission. They float it. Chief of the watch, float the buoy. Booy starts making noise and attracts the accula. They have a little torpedo fight with the accula and they're like, they barely get away with their buoy fucked up and all of their radios blown when Hackman is like, let's

launch these fucking missiles and get the fuck out of here. And Denzel is like, no dude, we have a half printed out piece of paper that says there's somebody trying to tell us something at strategic command. Let's figure out what that is and then maybe launch the missiles or probably not. Now it's our duty not to launch until we can confirm. At this point, we realize that the radio

might be the second most important device on a submarine. Yeah. Besides the thing that makes the air, you know? Yeah. It is so like crazy to think about something with this destructive capability being cut off. Yeah. And like keeping its fangs in that scenario. What makes the conflict so great is the rightness of both characters. Like they're both arguing sides of this issue that seem completely reasonable.

Captain Ramsey is like, We're all very well aware of what our orders are and what those orders mean. They come down from our commander in chief. They contain no ambiguity. One thing that he deep down understands is, like everybody on this ship has basically been asked to be a party to killing hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people, if the ship does the thing

that the ship is capable of doing. And that's a big ask. So let's make them feel like grownups are making that call and they can feel 100% confident in them doing the right thing if the ship actually does launch. He's saying, yeah, but he's like, yes, by the book every time is the way we should do it. But the asterisk on this has to be the mission that we're being asked to do. It's not like we want to break protocol to change course of the boat. He's trying to make the case that, you know, in certain circumstances, you should want to quintuple check this instead of just quadruple check it.

He even makes the argument like, like the target package could have changed. Like we don't, we don't know what this message is, you know? What if it's everything goes to Moscow because like they're shooting them out of the sky and we just need like strength and numbers right now. Yeah, and I think that's important too. It's not that Denzel Washington has got cold feet about the idea of killing the enemy. It's that the mission may be flawed. This scene gets ratcheted up to 11 on the tension scale and Hackman really like breaks. Like his character stops being the

the confident and measured captain of the submarine, and he really like flips out. You repeat this order, I'll find somebody who will. Basically like with this emotional boiling over, Denzel's character determines that Hackman is no longer really fit to command this submarine under the under the circumstances. And like, and the reason he's boiling over is he's saying like, you need to confirm my thing and like turn your key and and like, this is expressly why your command must be repeated. If it is my assent, I do not give it." And Hackman's inability to acknowledge the validity of that,

they're feeling our missiles! We don't have time to fuck around! It causes him to go completely ape and so he accuses Denzel of mutiny and Denzel's like, I'm not doing mutiny, I'm doing my job and I am gonna have to relieve you of command because you're Completely out of line captain Ramsey's under arrest Lock him in a state room. It just explodes. It's good stuff and it ends with Denzel asking Cob to take Hackman under arrest No, Cobb a couple of

Blue jumpsuits grab Hackman and take him to his state room and lock him up. And they have one of those great action movie exchanges. Like, what are we doing, man? Get the fuck up, get the fuck up! So just as Ramsey goes under lock and key, the attack sub shows back up. There's a pretty great submarine combat scene where they like tangle with this attack sub.

They evade a bunch of torpedoes, manage to fire back and take it out. But not before the attack sub gets off one last shot. So they're not destroyed, but they are badly disabled by this last torpedo. And they've tried to dive till I get out of the way, but one of the things it does is knock out their propulsion. So the ship is sinking, and it's approaching a whole crushed depth as they scramble to get the holes plugged and the propulsion back online.

I think this is a scene where Cobb really shines, and the actor who plays him makes some great choices. This is a moment to freak out, and there's an almost like resigned, sobriety to the way Cobb reads the the increasing depth of the ship. Until finally once they reach crushed depth like he's almost just numb. 1825. This dude is such a good character actor. Only surpassed by Jean Hackman in what he does wordlessly in this film, because so much of the time he's just kind of caught in the middle when Hackman and Denzel are arguing, but they always get his reaction shot, and it also always speaks volumes about what he's

going through. So like, this is the scene where Denzel has to order somebody to like seal up the hatch and Steve's on takes a metal plate to the face. Yeah! Come on out, yeah! Goes down in the water. Like it seems like every scene, every turn, you're finding another either actor on the cusp or like rookie brought up to the big league style actor. That's just starting their career.

Like, you got your Steve's on. Man. Ryan Philippines in the movie. Is he really? His first film. No way. Yeah, he's the guy at the fish tank. Oh man.

He's also in the background of a number of scenes. Yeah, yeah. I mean, Zon really does a lot with the small, small character that he has. And yeah, like I, he might have three lines in the film for, um, totally makes an impression. Like in everything Steve Zahn does, you can't help but love him. There's like an inherent humanity to the way he is that just works. Yeah. Do you think that this movie is more or less real time after the first EAM is received?

It's very relentless. And so like, the rest of the movie is this kind of series of back and forth square. Like Denzel takes out the Akula and then Gandalfini like breaks Hackman out of the brig. They get a bunch of guys together and they convince Vigo to join them and they like take the ship back over and Denzel gets locked up. And then Denzel has to take the ship back over.

It's like, it's a little bit of a cat and mouse thing, I guess. You know, it sounds derivative when you describe it, but when you watch the movie, it doesn't feel that way at all. No. And I think Vigo winds up having the most to go through because he's recruited by the take back over the ship club. We gotta have Webs, he's the key. And then Denzel kind of re-recruits him to the, let's not launch these missiles until we know what's going on, side.

Webs, listen, don't do this. Don't do this. Once you launch, they cannot come back. They cannot come back, Webs. And you know the repercussions are real wrong, God damn it. The moment that is almost as tense as Hunter relieving Ramsey of duty the first time is when Denzel Washington looks at Vigo Mortensen after being sent down to the mess hall, that look he gives him, like the, I thought we were buddies.

Yeah, there's something, something fun, closures. Yeah, like that moment was, like was so devastating. Yeah, the little time that Denzel has to simmer in the officer's mess is the time when he really kind of unpacks his Thinking on this which is like we don't know shit like we have one thing that says let's launch but we don't really like we have also Reason to believe that they also said something else to us. And if what they said is don't launch act after all, the thing that will happen is we'll launch, then the Russians will launch, and then everybody will be nuking each other because we didn't fucking check our email, man. Nuclear holocaust. Yeah, he gives sort of his treatise on mutually assured destruction.

It's a pretty compelling argument. And like, I think Cobb has been a little bit, like not that thrilled that he is on the side he's on. Fuck you. Because he's a loyal dude, and he's loyal to Captain Ramsay, but he just didn't like the way Ramsay acted in that scene.

And he's like one of the few kind of high status characters that got to see all of what went down between Denzel and Hackman. So like, well, Gandalfini is just pissed that somebody else is in charge of the boat now. Cobb saw why that happened. And while he's not like, he has no major love for Denzel. And so Denzel is like surreptitiously given his skillet and key to Revedi, the sonar operator. And Revedi comes and repunches the guy

that likes the mobius silver surfer and breaks Denzel and Cobb and the other no-too-launch officers out of jail. They put together their own little retake the boat club and they get some guns and they like sneaking around in the sewers of the submarine. And basically get up to the command center just in time for Denzel to yank the captain's firing key out of the computer because Vigo has decided not to pull the launch trigger himself. And so Hackman is frantically opening the safe that the little joystick that launches the missiles is inside of.

Like, he gets it. And he like literally is like pulling the trigger right as Denzel pulls the key out. Such fun editing. Like, oh man, is it fucking tense? This is redundancy again, that is visiting itself on the captain in a super frustrating way. And for the amount of kilotons that this ship is capable of delivering, like, it really makes you think about how easily the enterprise is able to shoot torpedoes at something, or like the service of a planet, like, it is a captain giving an order and a tactical

officer hitting a button. That is it. That's all the thought they give it. If you've ever accidentally deleted an email on your iPhone, like, that's basically how easy it would be for wharf to slip and watch. Fucking torpedo, right? Yeah.

I would love to see the Star Trek equivalent of Crimson Tide. Yeah, to see Riker Trek equivalent of Crimson Tide. Yeah, to see Riker and Picard have the same argument that Denzel and Hackman have in this movie. Yeah, it would be amazing. I mean, I don't think it could be Riker and Picard because it's pretty much a relationship killer. But, you know, somebody on something.

So you're advocating O'Brien and Kiko, have that? Well, they always have that. Yeah, that's every night. So what they call redundancy, I know about redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, redundancy, that's stronger. The Captain Ramsey team heads back up to the command center and they basically have the classic Quentin Tarantino Mexican standoff up there and um and the radio is like just coming back together so so Ramsey says all right um

we can we can sit here for three minutes while we wait to get this EAM smoke if you got them and we'll see what it is and while we get it we can talk about some horses Just give me an old paint. There's a contrast here that I wanted to call your attention to that. I'm sure you noticed which is when When Captain Ramsey hits his analog stopwatch Denzel Washington sort of shoots out his arm and looks at his Cassio digital as another way of underscoring the whole classic versus contemporary mode of thinking. It is such a flashy move on Denzel's part too. It's maybe the flashiest thing he does in the movie. He is such an eyes actor that it's easy to forget his

physicality and little flourishes like that. I think really make a big difference. He is that is a strong as choice as an actor. Like he emphasizes his words with some fists sometimes. Like he, uh, the way he runs, like everything about him, I think, uh, God, he's just the greatest. I have their discussion of lippons on our stallions and, uh, and, I think, God, he's just the greatest. I have their discussion of Lipin's Honor Stalians and the Tarantino counter is just rocketing up

in this scene when Denzel says, and at birth they're not white, they're black. They're intercutting between the chill, Jean Hackman puffing away on his Cuban cigar and the sweaty Denzel sitting entertaining him with this totally idol horse talk and, and Vossler, like panicking trying to get the fucking radio put, put back together. They're like connecting leads and getting, getting something connected and they're, the screen is full of static

and then they start getting little blips of like, oh, there was text there for one second. And we're really, really close. And they get it prints out. Zimmerman and Westergard, like bring the prints out into the command center. They bring the little plastic card and break it up and authenticate the message.

Message is authentic, I concur, sir. Denzel agrees that it is. I concur, sir. And Hackman announces to the ship that they've been told to set condition to SQ, which means we're not new to anybody today, boys. Put the nukes back in the tubes. And he has this great moment where he says Mr. Hunter has the con and he walks and it's like a long tracking shot as he walks past all of these officers that have been caught up in this shit

and walks by himself down the stairs in this puff of cigar smoke that the light coming up from below. He submerges himself, doesn't he? Yeah, man. He takes himself out of the fight. Yeah. It's one of the images that I always remember from this film. They overcrank it a little bit and slow it down in a way that I don't think that they've

changed speed on the film at any point up until now. It makes a little dream like. Yeah, and it's subtle. Yeah, I mean, we've just had this tension and release, but the issue remains. What do they do now as a matter of policy? So we cut to Pearl where we see a very official looking meeting taking place with, I mean, this has been a film that's been full of great actors and we get treated with one of the greatest at the end. The great Jason Robards. Yeah, he's got like a, like a board game worth of ribbons on his chest. He has wooden limbs. He's saying like, you know, like in a lot of ways you were both right and you

were both wrong. And also he's like, I'm going to tell you what this panel has decided and Dendell is like, oh, the I have not given my testimony yet. And he's like, listen, listen, Bob, I've known Captain Ramsay for a long time. if he's saying bullshit, this will be the first time I've ever heard of it. So why don't you let me finish my thought and you can raise a complaint afterwards if you really feel like you need to. And what they decide is like Ramsay is going to retire early and Denzel is going to be given a command.

You could argue that he retired the moment he started walking down the stairs. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, you're cool, fuck you, I'm out. Right, like he, he fucking gambled and was wrong, and you know, like, Hackman plays this character so perfectly, because he really is wrong, ultimately. Like, he's not so wrong that he's evil. He has good reason to believe what he believes, but the way he behaves is wrong. It's the way he deals with the situation that is the mistake he made. He was wrong, but he was so confident in his convictions that he was not humiliated in being incorrect. Right, and I mean, like, this is a character that, like, he's the captain of a boat, and

he was fucking aiming a pistol at one of his sailor's heads. Yeah, I don't think he should have gotten off Scott free for that. I think that's super fucked up. Right, that guy's got to be like, wait a second. Wait, wait. What do you think the trip back home was like for that guy? Like, do you think he ever ran into him in the mess hall or in the corridor? Like, what do you think the trip back home was like for that guy? Do you think he ever ran into him in the mess hall or in the corridor? What do you say?

Yeah, he runs a noom in the corridor in the dog is peeing and then he's peeing. Rams is like, I'd like to invite you to dinner, son. He's like, no thanks. The teen on the Simpsons. Yeah. Hi, my name is Boos. I'm Boos. I'm Boos.

I'm Boos. The last little beat of the film after Jason Robard says, you've both created one hell of a mess. It's Denzel and Hackman outside the, outside the, the like administration building. Hackman is getting his dog back from the guy who's standing on the lawn with it right next to the keep-off lawn sign. And, uh, Hackman's like, you were right, I was wrong. I'm stupid, you're smart, you're the best, I'm the worst.

You're a very good looking. I'm not attractive. Yeah, the rules don't apply even to bear. Smartest dog in the world Adam. Yep. And and what Denzel was right about was that the lip and sonner stallions are born in Spain that Portugal. was that the Lipin's Honor stallions are born in Spain, that Portugal. Hans Zimmer enters from side frame, conducts the orchestra into full swell. I mean, you could say Hans Zimmer is as much of a character in this film as anyone else. Yeah, the fucking score is so good. I mean, it's a great score that's patriotic without being gross about it,

but they also use the eternal father strong to save late motif every time they need like a moment of solemnity, which I think is it's like the that's like the official song of the navy, right? Yeah, and you know whenever a submarine submerges, you're legally obligated to play Russian men's chorus. And, you know. Yeah, the, like, if you don't have some gutter-all dudes singing soulfully, you're fucking up. You know, like, we laugh, but I wouldn't want it any other way.

Like, like, it works because it's supposed to work, it's great. Yeah. And the... Try not to get the chills during those scenes. No, it's impossible. I sand it down. I'll shoot in ensign if you don't get the chills during those scenes. I sanded down the edges of a board using the goose bumps on my legs.

Yeah. Yeah. And then there's this like totally apocryphal note at the end that as of January 1996, priority authority to fire nuclear missiles lies with the president and not with the captain of the boat. Which was like, you know, today, like at the time that was like whoo. That's great and right now like the comparison is like We we we were talking to Dr. Loomis about Jason being killed Yeah, and then we cut back to where Jason's body is supposed to be and he's got it's a horror film ending Can we give it back to Gene Hackman?

He seems a little less unhinged Beckman, he seems a little less unhinged. I would rather the real Jean Hackman be in charge of our nuclear weapons than who we've got right now. Yeah. Good Lord. Yeah. I also just like being married to an attorney who does a lot of like helping people not get themselves into trouble, typework. The decision Denzel makes to hear with the

panel's recommendation without an attorney present to argue on his behalf is just like, oh dude, no, no, no, no. Yeah, bad decision. That might be the biggest leap you're asked to take in this film because he has got to be expecting to be railroaded. He's been railroaded the entire film. Yeah, I didn't learn anything from this experience. Yeah, in order to get leniency for aiming a pistol at one of his crew and he, and as much as he can, transfers his command to Hunter. Yeah.

Like, I guess that makes it okay. Doesn't make it for that guy you had a gun held you as said though. No. Yeah, like then Zell has to walk into, into board of inquiry hearing and look at the like panel of whites and the fucking white guy that he had the huge conflict with and be like,

this is not fair, right? Yeah, it's not looking good. You know, I know why we have to do it for the tension of the story, but you don't get shown any of the crews back in deport or leaving the ship as you got them boarding the ship and man. That's gotta be some awkward times.

I would have liked to have seen some of that. Yeah, like there's three or four days away from home. There's sort of a lot of movie we don't see here. Yeah. I mean, but I think is maybe the most brilliant part of this film. And I think maybe in a lot of ways, the thing that is most similar to Trek is that it lets you imagine

the entire universe that this take place in without needing to show you any of it. Did you like this movie Ben? Fucking love this movie Adam. Yeah, one of my favorite movies. Oh man. It's a, yeah, it's a comfy pair of slippers, man. Like, it's full of great actors. It's it's tip-top filmmaking. It's not too smart. Like, it doesn't feel like

eating your peas ever. It's just fun to watch, you know. Yeah. You know what? I mean, you say it's not smart, but it is a thinker, like the central conflict is intellectual. Yeah, it's not too smart. It's not a, it's not this ain't an art film and it's not embarrassed about not being an art film. And like, I like movies that aspire to more than this and I like watching them, but I don't like rewatching them as much as I like rewatching this. Real treat to see Hackman and Washington together. They both have the careers where they are able to share films with other A-list actors, but this specific combination, really great.

One question I want to ask you, Ben. Yeah. Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Really great. One question I want to ask you, Ben. Yeah. Did you find yourself a drunk Shimoda? Drunk Shimoda! I did, Adam. My drunk Shimoda is the character named Lawson. He's one of the elisted men,

who is probably most memorable in the scene where he boards the bus and Gandalfini makes him drop and give him 20 because he doesn't remember the German from the enemy below. But he has like a number of scenes and he's one of the guys that buys it with Steve's on in the bilge bay when they're trying to get the the leak sealed. But he's got like a great scene in this movie where he's like hanging out in the crew quarters dancing to Martha Reeves and the Vandela's nowhere to run. He is the character that has the most fun in this movie to me and in that way embodies the spirit of Jim Shimoda. He's the Shimoda of this film

there's no question. It's so you agree. I concur, sir. I absolutely agree. I mean, there are people in this film who display some Shimoda like tendencies. Like for instance, the two guys who escort the captain to his quarters and confine him there,

like there's that moment of levity where they're like, where, you know, the moments where you break character or Shemota moments and that was a moment where they like let the guard down and they were like holy shit What are we doing here? Like there's some Shemota in to be done for sure those two guys do it too But yeah, I mean if you have to pick one it's it's him. It's the dancer Yeah, and I get the feeling that they were hazing him for some reason. Like, he was doing that performance thing as an initiation.

Like that might be head cannon to me, but like people are whipping him with the towels. I think that was another reason I thought he was being hazed a little bit was like that seemed to be a little bit locker room hazy. Yeah. He's the character that you can do the most imagining about. I feel like, for all that Steve Zandes to make an impression in this film, I feel like Lawson is a character where you're like, man, I feel like I kind of know what that character is about. I know what his struggle is.

I know how scary this all is for him. Like, and the fact that he is one of the casualties of this conflict is, it's kind of perfect and, and like makes it all the more tragic. There is the moment in every sub-movie where they've got to close the hatch with guys inside and it's no different for this film. It is as affecting as it ever is and it is more affecting because it's him. Yeah. Like like so often it's the anonymous six crew members drowning below deck. And all you get you to hang your hat on is them like banging against the glass that wouldn't be there in the door.

Right, and that is a horror that is terrible, but you don't get the banging in this version, instead you get the familiarity, and that is an even more horrible way to experience it, I think. More effective. Yeah. Well, Adam, this is an unusual and special episode, and I have an email here that I want to read some parts of from one of the many, many, many listeners who helped us float the buoy. Listener Michael sent us an email and he is like a budge with a guy who works on a nuclear submarine

and sent some anecdotes that I think are pretty amazing. Would you like to read some of this? Yeah. So the first anecdote, and I'm not gonna like go through all of this because I don't wanna like, I'm sure that we're going out of nuclear submarines are not really supposed to talk about much.

So this is all second hand, take it with a grain of salt, maybe I wrote this myself and it's fictional. But the deal is, he says that hot-bunking is a thing. Like the typical sub has half as many beds as there are sailors. So if you are at work, there's somebody sleeping where you sleep and vice versa. And it says that they play a game called hide a shit where somebody shit somewhere in the in the sub, like somewhere where you might not find it, like somewhere where you wouldn't go very often. And if Word goes out that there is a shit hidden, like it's kind of important to find where it is and get rid of it.

Oh God. That doesn't sound fun at all. Yeah. So here's another game that does sound kind of fun and pretty hilarious, which is called How Deep Have You Jerked It, which is like how deep below sea level have you jerked it? and if you're like new to a boat and in a small room and you realize you're below like a certain max depth that you've been at, you'll be like, hey guys, I gotta run. I'll be on holiday for. Yeah, you're going for the big leagues on that one, right? Yeah.

The most leagues for jerking it? Yeah, exactly. So, here is... It's sort of like the anti-mile high club. Yeah, in many ways it's a sadder and antivetical mile high club. Sadder, a sadder, more homoerotic mile high club. Yeah. So here's the third and final and most horrifying of these anecdotes that

that listener Michael sent in. So there are different types of nuclear weapons on these boats. There are ones for taking out cities and there are smaller ones for taking out more tactical things, I guess like bases or whatever. And the big ones like the city killers are two key deals where like the captain turns a key and the fire control turns a key. And he says that it's like not, like the film makes this stuff up, but he says that it's like not super different from what's depicted.

But the smaller tactical ones, you can just fire if you're in fire control, and you only need the one key. And you train on simulation equipment in port. On dry land, they have the fire control room built in simulation so that these guys can drill on this shit. And there is a law that says that the equipment that you drill on has to be identical to what you would use in service so that like there are no surprises when you're when you're actually in a live fire situation.

That makes sense. He got, and you have to periodically get certified on these things, and he was getting recertified on the fire control computer in Texas. He is given the key to do the fire control on the simulation and walks out with it. And a few months later he's back on a submarine and they do a firing drill and he like tries out this key that he did on the simulation, on the real thing and it fucking turned. Whoa. Whoa.

Isn't that scary? Whoa. Whoa. Isn't that scary? Hahaha. Like, I wonder if you just put that key right on your key chain, like with your car keys and your house key and stuff, like just anonymous and anonymous pack. I have that key. I totally have like one key on my key chain, and I'm like, I think this is from when I stayed at my friends

place in Austin, but it might be something else. I don't remember really. Wow. Yeah. That's amazing. Good stories. Yeah, thanks for sending those in, Michael.

I know you're listening because you helped back the show during the Max Fund Drive. Yeah, our thanks to Michael and everyone else who made this very special episode of Greatest Gen Possible. Yeah, it is an amazing feeling to make a show for people who care as much as the people who care about this show. And I mean, I don't want to speak for you too much at them, but I think it's really changed us as people, you know? Like we have a feeling like we're putting something out there into the world that's like making people's days better and to feel that coming back in this way is a real honor and something we take really seriously.

Like we really appreciate how much support we have gotten from this community and what a great community has grown up in in and around this show like it's it's it's so amazing you're absolutely right. I mean this project hasn't been easy at many points it's still as much work as it's ever been but but every note that we've ever received that said, I've been going through some shit and this and your stupid jokes are a bright spot in my day or week, like it it means as much as as anything else that I've ever personally done and it's you know it's one thing to toil and obscurity on work that you find important,

but it's a real life changer to give us much time and effort to something that means so much to so many people. So I am as ever grateful for anyone out there who enjoys what we do here. So thanks. As I said to my wife recently, this is the most gratifying experience I've ever had. And she says, what about getting together with me? And I say, oh, yeah, you're all right, but you know, this is also great. How's therapy going? It's a very expensive proposition at home.

Don't doubt it. I guess we could do a standard show close if you want Ben. If you'd like to talk about this very special episode, you can always use the hashtag greatest gen. Do we have a special hashtag for this? I guess we do. It's float the buoy, isn't it? It sure is.

It's a hashtag float the buoy. If you've listened to this episode and you want to talk about it, you can use that hashtag over on Twitter or I'm as, I'm there as AtCup for Time and Ben as there as AtBenjaminR. There is a great Facebook group and a great Reddit group that are dedicated to the show, both our greatest Jen. And I should get in the habit of shouting out the wiki, the greatest gen wiki, if you've got a greatest gen.wiki.com Has nothing to do with Crimson Tide as of this recording, but maybe it will now. And we should thank Adam Rigusia for our music. Who else do we want to thank?

The 2001 new and upgrading donors. Yeah, this episode wouldn't have happened without you guys, so thank you very much. The 2001 new and upgrading donors. Yeah, this episode wouldn't have happened without you guys, so thank you very much. Thank you for the vote of confidence. Thank you for giving us an air of legitimacy. Thank you for helping us cover the costs of making this. Thanks for listening to moving almost all of the buyers are more That maximum fun has about our show. Yeah So with that we will be back at you next time with another great episode of Star Trek the next generation and

You know maybe one day we'll also be back at you with another review of a submarine film who knows? Yeah, I like that idea. Let's do it again. Let's do it again, buddy Maybe one day we'll also be back at you with another review of a submarine film. Who knows? Yeah, I like that we float the buoy You ever want to start, right? Little ducks, there's dribbling rushes. So they call us, so they call us. There's dribbling rushes. So they call us, there's dribbling rushes. So they call us, they call us.

They call us, there's dribbling rushes. So they call us, there's dribbling rushes. They call us, they call us. There's dribbling rushes, they call us. Little ducks, we're going over there. The breed will speak though Kelly machine ever divine. Yes. High bow, bow, bow. Triple operation, they call that Slydux. We're going over there. We're bringing more speed-moving machine over the lines. This is high-bow, bow, bow. We need my command.

Just so we don't know what this message means, our target package could have changed. Mr. Hunter, I made a decision. I'm captain, I'm captain, I'm captain. I'm captain of the sport. I'm Chetafaka! Chetafaka! Chetafaka!

Chetafaka! Chetafaka! Chetafaka! Chet fuck up! Check the fuck up! Check the fuck up! Captain, the National Military Command sent a nose what sector we're in. They have satellites looking down on us to see if our birds are locked if they're not. Then they give our orders to somebody else. That's why we maintain one and one sun. It's what they call we're done to.

I know about what we've, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is, we done is High bow, gentlemen! Give me one! High bow, gentlemen! Gentlemen, rush! I suggest that we float the buoy, sir. supported.