The Horror Returns - THR - Ep. #81: Star Wars Spectacular (Re-upload)

Episode Date: July 8, 2022

Denny Luis and Jay Black join us to talk all things Star Wars! Thanks for listening! The Horror Returns Website: https://thehorrorreturns.com THR Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thehorrorreturns THR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thehorrorreturns/ Join THR Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1056143707851246 THR Twitter: https://twitter.com/horror_returns?s=21&t=XKcrrOBZ7mzjwJY0ZJWrGA THR Instagram: https://instagram.com/thehorrorreturns?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y= SK8ER Nez Podcast Network https://www.podbean.com/pu/pbblog-p3n57-c4166 ESP Anchor Feed: https://anchor.fm/mac-nez E Society YouTube Channel https://youtube.com/channel/UCliC6x_a7p3kTV_0LC4S10A Music By: Steve Carleton Of The Geekz

victims for those of you delight and dread who fantasize about fear who glorify and go welcome you have found the place where the horror returns listeners beware this podcast contains major plot spoilers in the foulest of language Join us in celebrating the old and the new, the best, and the worst in horror. What are we doing this week, Eddie? We're doing Star Wars, nothing but Star Wars. And we got Jay with us as well. What's going on, Jay Black? More Star Wars.

What's happening? And as always, Brian. No singing from Brian, though. No singing from Brian. But if we're lucky, which is ironic, because he's been referred to as the Barry Wide of the podcast before. Exactly. But we might have Philip in for the second movie.

He's got family stuff going on. Who knows what the future will bring, right, guys? Who knows? They may not join us for the main movie, but we'll use some... I may not even join you guys for the main movie. We'll use some four-letter words. always. So we're good.

Shit, let's jump right in. We got a lot to cover. We're going to record two weeks for the shows tonight. So I guess we'll start out with our guest here. We got Denny from After Midnight. I know that you're... Something tells me. I predict that at the end you'll tell us all about after midnight.

But what else do you guys have coming up on the show? Are you mean like new topics coming up in the 2018? Yeah. Like what are your plans for the new year? First of all, where can everybody find you? Well, we are the After Midnight podcast available on iTunes, Brian Stitcher, and BeyondPod. We delve into the conspiracy theories, the unexplained, the supernatural, and the paranormal, and the unsolved mysteries. We analyze these stories.

We try to see what makes them creepy, what makes them scary, and if they're real or not. And we have a little fun doing so along the way. This past week, we did an episode on... We did a film commentary for The Force Awakens with Jay and myself where we break down the movie and then kind of go into our predictions for The Last Jedi because obviously it hadn't been released yet when we recorded it. This upcoming week we are doing our Christmas episode focusing on the Shroud of Turin and hopefully for 2018 we're going to be unboxing some conspiracy theories that are going to be a little too controversial like Sandy Hook, Las Vegas. Okay. We're going to look at these CIA documents that were released about the Kennedy assassination and one that they just happened to drop about Hitler surviving World War II.

We're going to focus on some episodes on medical marijuana, the war on drugs, all that stuff. We're looking forward to getting all this done, doing a whole bunch of research and doing so. So hopefully 2018 we're going to be able to get the show back up a little bit more. a little bit more frequently because we've been missing a few episodes here and there. Unfortunately, you know, I do have an outside job that's not recording. And that seems to be taking up a lot of my time lately. Yeah, sounds like 2018. You guys, if anything, are going to get a lot more ballsy.

I hope nobody disappears. Maybe Denny Lewis might actually disappear and might be replaced by someone else. Who knows? Okay. Well, we'll keep our eyes open for you, man. So I mean, it was Denny. Exactly. We might even be doing one on the Clinton family on Hillary and Bill.

So I just want to put this out there right now. I have no plans on ever killing myself. So if you guys... No suicide in your future, huh? If you guys find me with 14 knives in my back and know the police say I killed myself, you know my stance on that. All right. Well, I don't know.

14 step. Maybe you just couldn't get the right spot. You know, it took you 14 times. because getting to your back is kind of hard. Do you ever hear this story about the, there was this reporter who apparently somebody had buried him alive to kill him?

Yeah, this was like from a couple years ago. Apparently he killed, he, somebody had buried him alive to kill him and the police actually said it was a suicide. Wow. I think this dude was somewhere in, I think somewhere in California. And then there was also, I believe,

Gary Webb, another reporter who kind of kind of broke a story on like, I think the drug war. And police found them like two gunshots to the back of the head and said it was a suicide. Flexible guy, man. Yeah. That yoga, that DDP yoga doesn't want their show, by the way. First shot didn't work, huh? Exactly.

All right. Well, listen, you guys know how the show works. Jay, what's the coolest thing you've seen this week, man? Amazon Prime, which turned me onto a show called Bosch. Have you guys seen this show? Bosch. I haven't even heard of it. Yeah, it's about a detective in L.A. or in Hollywood.

It's a pretty, pretty damn good show. Turned me on to it was a guy I work with here. He was an L.A. PD during the 90s, you know, during like right in the middle of, you know, like the Rodney King and the, and what's his name, O.J. So he was kind of like right in the middle of that. And his words to me were like, this show is legit. I mean, just the mannerisms of the cops, the language that they use.

He said even, you know, where they film is an exact replica of, you know, of the precinct in Hollywood, whatever. But it's a really good show. It's really down the earth. It has this, the cop is played by Titus Welliver, I believe. Welliver, yeah, he was in Deadwood. He was in Lost. I think he was the man in Black and Lost. Sure, sure.

So it's, yeah, it's real good. It's a real good show. At first, when I saw Previous Ford, I thought it was. It's kind of like, you know, one of those cops. He's kind of like half a bad cop, half a good cop, kind of like shield. No, no, this guy is like straight, straight good cop. And, you know, he has like family issues and stuff. And then he's dealing with, you know, each season is kind of its own story, only its own case.

But it's, it's, in my friends of words, it's legit. It's a damn good show. Damn, I would say I'll have to check that out, but I don't have Amazon. So I guess I'll have to listen to what you have to say about it. Sounds good. Bosch. What are you checking out, Denny? I got a couple of cools of the week.

Last week, or I was earlier in the week, actually. I went to go check out James Franco's disaster artist. Oh, yeah? Had a great time with this movie. I don't know if you guys have ever, any of you guys ever seen the room? Many years ago. Brian. Okay, so basically.

It's a while. So for people don't know, this is basically based on Greg Sostero's novel, a book, I guess, memoir of making the room. It was called The Disaster Artist. And basically, the day, I could tell you guys this story. The day that James Franco bought the rights to actually turn this into a movie was a day they were actually screening the room in Montreal. And Greg Sestaro was an actual guest there.

Oh, wow. So he was there for a Q&A, and he was actually the one who gave us the news that, yes, Yeah, you know, Franco bought the movie earlier this afternoon. They're going to be looking to make it into a movie with him and his brother. Right. And he was hoping that he was going to be able to get a little role in the movie. Unfortunately, he didn't. But it was a great little movie.

This is what I love about certain comedies, especially like with this and Popstar. Not very long. Less about 90 minutes, which is a perfect length, you know, as soon as the movie feels like it's starting to drag a little bit, it's done. so it kind of ends on a high note. So I had a really good time with that. Also got to check out three bullboards outside Ebbing, Missouri. What a great movie this was. I love that it was a little more comedic than I thought it would be.

But the jokes don't come at the expense of the story. And great performances all around specifically by Francis McDormon and Sam Rockwell. No shit. Really good. And outside of that, that still listening to, you know, in October, Liam Gallagher came out with his first solo album, as you were, still listening to that. It was such a great album. And, you know, his brother, Newell, comes out with a solo, another solo album a month later. And it's like, okay, well,

who's going to win this one? And damn, Noel comes out with another great album. So I've been listening to these albums, you know, back and forth for the past weeks on end. I think I got most of these songs memorized. and another great album that I got, somebody hit me to that I just started to listen to last week. I didn't even know well, first of all, I didn't even know who this dude was, Harry Stiles. I only knew this guy from Dunkirk.

Okay. He's a singer. He was in some boy band, one direction, I think. Harry Stiles? Yes. You sure you're not thinking of Harry Knowles from Ain't it cool news? No, isn't he your best friend? Didn't you guys go to the same comic book place together?

Yeah, from Austin, right? But yeah, I checked out his solo album. Another great, also very great, too. A lot of good songs, a lot of songs that you wouldn't think would come from somebody who was in a boy band. You know, really good stuff. So if any of you guys still like enjoy, listen to music, go out and do people still go out and buy CDs outside of myself? I don't know. No.

Very few. Very few. Well, I went out and bought those CDs. So there you go. Check that out. Outside of that, nothing much. I'll tell you what's uncool. the Montreal weather and leading to my cold that I'm coming down with today.

That's not good. Brian may have you beat on the weather. What else is cool up there, Brian? It's definitely not the weather because we've had nothing but rain and ice for the past week. I've never fallen as much in the past week that I had in my entire life in the past week. Yes. But my cool of the week would have to be. off of a Phillips recommendation from last week,

the Exorcist TV series. Yeah? I binge the first nine episodes and definitely loving it. And it's a nice continuation from season one, and I think there will not be no issues on whether the show will get renewed for another season. I'm almost confident in that. So you think it will get renewed for another season?

Yes. I don't think there will be an issue. like last time with season one. I just, I don't think they thought the show was going to take off like that with the, with the viewers. I don't know, I know nothing of this series. Is it, is it, the same characters or revolve around same characters

from the initial movie? Or is it all just the first season? Okay. Does the first season just kind of retell the original movie? No, it takes place after. Oh, okay. Yeah, don't, don't want to give it away. Yeah, don't want to give it away because there's some, some twists and reveals.

Oh, gotcha. Gotcha. I haven't seen either. No, I've seen the original movie, but I haven't seen either season one or two. Is it the exact same characters, or is this going to be something like an American horror story where it's completely different characters every time out? There's a character from the movie that shows up in season one, and the story revolves around that. Okay. But there's an overall story going on in the background with the, with the,

you know, demons. It's kind of hard without spoiling it, but there's a lot of people in higher places that are not who they're supposed to be or who they claim to be. Interesting. You mean like this goes all the way up to the Pope? Possibly.

Whoa! You're blowing your mind. Yeah. As the season goes, it gets a little deeper. But I have not watched the finale. I believe, I believe they're only 10 episodes season, so but I'll

have more on that. And the other thing I think I watched that you watched two, Lance, was Netflix is dark. You know what? That's, for the first time ever, that's my cool of the week and my uncool of the week, because I have no fucking idea. Three episodes

in. Can you help me out? What the hell's going on, man? That is why I brought it up. I wasn't going to bring it up, but I seen that you were watching it. I am probably four or five episodes in. Okay. By episode two, I was, by the end of episode two, I was intrigued.

Yeah, I'm intrigued. Yeah, well, the way they ended episode two. Yeah, but overall, I have no fucking idea what's going on. This is the weirdest show ever. Have you guys checked it out yet? No, I haven't, I've not seen it. Man, I, there's time travel and there's, I don't know. I don't know how to describe it.

Is it, would you, Brian, would you say it's kind of like a mixture between it, Stranger Things, the O-A? I mean, do you see elements of all those in it? Yeah, it's a mismash of different shows. And it's on Netflix?

Yeah, and it's, I thought it was going to, I was going to be fine with it, but the dubbed voices is kind of distracting. It's distracting, isn't it? That's the problem. See, it's in German, and I've been, I tried watching the dubbed version,

but it's like, you know, the voices are so off from the facial expressions and stuff like that. It's like really, I think I'm going to go back and start it over again, but I'm going to, I'm going to just, you do subtitles. Yeah, I think of them. Plus, anyone who speaks German can't be bad.

Yeah, I think so. I don't know. I don't know, one bad, German. It's some very horrible people in this show. I don't know. Not say it because they're German, but... I think he's saying it because they're German. You hit the nail on the head when you said intriguing.

I mean, it's definitely weird enough that it's going to make me keep watching it. But I think I am going to do that. I think I'm going to go back, because I'm only three episodes that, I think I'm going to go back to number one. I'm going to watch it in the original German, but with subtitles and maybe it'll make a little bit more sense. I just don't know what to say about it yet. It's weirdest thing I've ever seen.

Yeah, I'm definitely going to, because my wife caught a couple of episodes, and she had some questions, and I just can't answer really anything, because I'm not quite 100% sure. But I think I'm right there with you, Lance. I think I'm going to restart it, possibly with the subtitles. All right. What did you guys think about? Has anybody else seen, now that it's done with its first season run, anybody else seen, the Orville?

I like the Orville. I don't, I'm probably two, three episodes behind on finishing it. But no, I love the Orville. It's sort of half serious, half comedy. It's not just a goofball, you know, screwball type of thing that you would kind of expect from from McFaroline some of those stories are they're kind of they take this shit a little serious but it's like um I think you and I were talking last before it feels like they got characters from this timeframe and just throw into the future because they make so much references to nowadays and you know pulp culture and all that but you know there's no way McFerillan's ever going to get away from that that's just that's just the way he is so I don't take it too serious. as I would Star Trek. I don't put it up there where, you know,

I expect the characters to be as developed as them or whatever, but I'm actually having fun with Orville. Yeah, I'm almost tempted to say it's the best Star Trek show on TV right now. Paid or not, right? Yeah, I hate to say that, but I'm loving it, man. A lot of the, they don't always follow the prime directive, but then again, which Enterprise crew ever really did. Yeah, exactly.

The storylines to me just are so much more Star Trek than, with storylines in Discovery so far. Yeah. You know? I don't know that's a weird thing to say, but... No, no, I'm with you. I'm with you on it. Discovery seems to have, it's like one long,

just one story. Sure. Where Orville, it's episode to episode. It's something new every time like Star Trek was. Correct. Yeah, very next generation, wouldn't you say? Exactly.

Exactly. All right, Brian. Well, I know it's probably a short news week because of all the movies we're covering, but we got any stories, man? Disney buying 21st Century Fox. Talk about the Empire, huh? Yeah, jotted down a couple quick notes.

They purchased it for $52.4 billion. Do you say $52 billion? 52.4 billion. Now, if I remember when they were doing, I guess, their due diligence and seeing how much all the assets were worth. I think they said Fox was worth a $60 billion and now, you know,

Disney only buys it for $52. How did they? Because Fox will retain, Fox will retain Foxx. Fox is retained in Fox News, Fox Broadcasting, and also Fox Sports 1 or 2. They can keep, right?

Yeah, yeah. Let's just say Fox knows how to do news their way. But the good thing is they also kept Fox Sports because we see that Disney does not know how to handle a sports channel. Now, they have ESPN and ESPN is sinking fast. Okay. Disney also receives the Fox Film and TV Studio Library. Wow.

Which includes properties such as Fantastic Four, X-Men, Deadpool, Avatar, the Alien franchise, the Predator, the Predator franchise, Planet of the Apes, the Simpsons, and they get the original theatrical version of Star Wars back. Awesome. So they completely own Star Wars, which my son will be happy about it because we watching the original trilogy, he had a lot of questions of some certain CG aspects that was popping up in the movie that even he knew didn't belong in the movie.

Right. I got a quick story on that. And Denny and I talked about this on his podcast last week. I was at a Goodwill maybe three, four years ago. And they had, and I didn't have a VCR at the time. I do now for whatever reasons. But they had the original Star Wars movies on cassette, all three for $5. Oh, wow.

And I didn't buy it. And I keep every day I punched myself from that. Last weekend, we went. to an antique fair in Sacramento. I'm walking by and I see the exact same set. There it is. Sitting right there. So I tell the guy,

it's like, all right, how much you want for it? He said, $20, but I can do 10. I said, how about five? He said,

how about eight? I said, how about five? He said, all right, five. So fucking, yeah, I grabbed it. Handing my $5.

I'm walking away. I'm talking to my daughter. I'm like, okay, I'm like, okay, let's see if he was kind and if he rewind. Right. So I pull out,

new hope, it's rewound, fine. and I pull out the box for Empire, nothing in there. I'm like, oh, you fucking get me. So I took it back, gave his $5 back, and he said, just come next week or,

I'm sorry, three weeks, so they do like every three weeks. He said, I'm going to find it. I'll still give it to you for five bucks. So fingers crossed and see if I can get them for $5 again, and I can show my daughter's the original versions. Now, these were the remastered for tape, but it was before the special edition. So it is the originals.

So, so these were big, No CGI Jabba that Hans Solo is walking around and stepping on his toe, right? No, no, this was prior to them coming out when these tapes came out, yeah. This was basically the laser dick, laser disc conversion. No, that's the Baba Dick. These were the laser disc conversions from 94-95, basically. So you're just going to get like a little bit of a cleaner look at the original movie, which as I promoted, I think.

we talked about it on the show if you just look for the Star Wars trilogy, the specialized edition for you could get those for free online. Somebody basically took all the Blu-ray versions, converted them and stuff like that and took out all the added scenes that were, you know, added throughout the years and basically made the original untouched movie, but cleaner looking now. And since he doesn't own those movies,

he just gives him away for free online. Interesting. Awesome. A couple of things here also Disney also They also get in a deal FX The channel's FX and FXX

And one thing that I thought No more F words on the FX shows then huh One thing I thought was really interesting Because we had talked about Disney starting their own streaming service Right They have also obtained 30% of Hulu Which they have already own 30% So with the 60, they have controlling stakeover Hulu.

Oh, so instead of creating their own, they can just throw all their stuff on Hulu then probably, huh? Yeah, a lot of people are saying they might just go with the Hulu name or just rebrand Hulu. So. And Disney Hulu. Instead of basically starting from scratch, their own division, they'll just basically be like, okay, we'll just take Hulu and it's now officially ours. So we'll just, you know, put everything there. Okay. That makes sense.

And Jack is now at Disney. princess. Right. The monopoly man is back in town, huh? Everything old is new again. We're back to 1920s economics again, huh? Yep. Well, this is going to be good, I guess. And net neutrality is dead. Oh, yeah, yeah. Everybody got their wallets handy? Well, I live in Canada, so it's fine. I'll be okay. Okay, well. This will be good for, I guess.

for a lot of people because everyone's once this happened no no not net neutrality but the the buyout but because a lot of people already going nuts for this X-Men Avengers crossover and you had Hugh Jackman coming out saying well you know if we ever you know if we could ever forever allowed into the Marvel

universe I'd be willing to come back and yeah I think they're just gonna redo X-Men though I don't I doubt they'll bring you know any of the old guys they'll let that die on its own they'll probably just revamp their own X-Men just maybe just like slide them in to the Avenger movies or something like that. Okay.

Yeah. Who could play Wolverine? Tom Hardy? No. Much better. You got it, Brian. Oh, yeah. I'm sorry.

Yeah. Duh. I missed that. Wolverine with a Keanu voice. That guy is a versatile actor right there. He's going to do it all. There wasn't really much news. I thought we just bring that up.

So, yeah, that is all the news. All right, Jay. You ready for us to take our little trip? All right. Let's go back to where I used to live when I was a kid. Down to the trailer park. What's the first new trailer to talk about, Brian? First one we're going to talk about is Alita Battle Angel.

This stars Rosa Salazar, Issa Gonzalez, Jennifer Conley, Michelle Rodriguez, Ed Screen, Marshal Ali, Jackie Earl Haley, Casper Van Dene, Jeff Fagy, by Christoph Waltz. Casper Van Dene, where did they find this guy? You haven't seen this guy. I haven't seen a Chasper Fagin.

This will be directed by Robert Rodriguez and produced by James Cameron. Okay. Now, I didn't see this one, guys, but you got my attention, so what's this all about? Anybody want to take this? Because I believe this is based off

anime that I'm not too familiar with. Definitely looked like it. I actually caught this trailer this morning with The Last Jedi. It looked really good. I'm taking it. What was it Gloria Salazar? Rosa. Is she actually,

is she actually that character CGI or is she based on the real girl and how she looks? I do not. I'm not familiar with the actress, but I know there was some questions that Robert Gregory. Rod Riegas was asked about why the character's eyes are so big. He wanted to keep that look of an anime character with her. So not sure if she looks like that. Yeah, because there was some moments where it's like,

I didn't know if it was a real person until you kind of get to see like an up close look at her face. But the premise does, it does seem pretty interesting. Are these supposed to be like robot cyborgs? Like, was that Ex Machina movie? I'm assuming. That's the kind of vibe I got, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It looks really well made. I mean, and you got James Cameron attached to it, so. Does it bother anybody that the main character does look CGI while everybody else is real? I mean, they didn't go real, like X Machina, where, you know, they just CGI'd the body parts and kept the real face. But here you can clearly tell it's that, um, that motion capture. Capture. Yeah, yeah, you can clearly tell. I mean, it looks like the actress just with bigger eyes.

So I don't know if they felt maybe if they just did the eyes, it would look weird like Superman's mouth and said, you know, fuck it. Just do the whole face. Yeah. It definitely looks interesting. Like I said, I want to know. I'm not all the way on board because I don't know what the story's about, but it has a great cast. You definitely, yes. we got a release oh go ahead no so with this going on what's what's the story with uh the isn't he

supposed to still do escape from new york or something um the last thing i've heard is that he the script is done or at least close to being done and uh john carpenter is okayed the script well that's probably all we need to hear right what about machete is he still doing those movies probably not since the last one bombed. Okay. I mean, personally, I would like to see machete in space. Right.

But that's, that's just me. But is Carlos Esteva is still going to be in the next machete movie? Ah, he's got to be, man. Good old Carlos. Alita Battle Angel will be in theaters

July 20th. I would check that out. If nothing big is coming up against it, and it's a cheap Tuesday, I want to watch something, I would go check it out. Right. Yeah.

Now, you, Indy, you guys don't have movie pass in Canada, do you? No, we don't. Basically, they just give us the scene program because technically it's like

only really too big movie chains here. We got Cineplex Odeon, which is like the oldest one. Sure. Well, technically it's a conglomeration because, like, you used to have Cineipa, Odeon and something else,

famous players, and then they converged and now it's just basically Cineplex and Guzo. And I think I mentioned this last time, Guzo was one highly questionable because it may be run by a specific Italian-oriented stereotype people, if you know what I mean?

In Canada, huh? Yeah, so basically it's those two, and like they just offer us like, like, like, point system. So it's like if you buy a movie ticket, you got 100 people. point. It's basically every 10 movies you get to see a free one. Okay. That's cool.

Keep it simple. Yeah, so I have like 4,000 points saved up. I'll probably use them all on over my vacation to see The Last Jedi or something. I don't know. And I got to say 4,000 of those points probably come from the Force Awakens, right? No, I already spent all those points. It's like they, they, they, I cashed in, I think the last movie I cashed in for was like Ghostbusters. Because I definitely wasn't paying to see that. Yeah.

Well, you kind of did. Yeah. I paid in seeing that in more ways than one. Yeah. Because that was two hours of my life I didn't get back. Can't get that back. Our next trailer we're going to review is the second trailer for Ready Player One. This stars Ty Sheridan, Olivia Cook,

Hannah John Kamen, T.J. Miller, Ben Mendelsohn, Simon Pegg, and Mark Rylance, directed by Stephen Spielberg. Oh, I was very happy to see our boy Orson Krennick in another movie again. But outside of that, all these gibronies can go go fuck. The movie looks all right, but like, I literally have, like, I have no interest in seeing this movie whatsoever. I read the book. I enjoyed it. But, like, literally with this movie, I have no interest in seeing it. I do. You know what this movie seems to me? And you look at everything you see, you see the Iron Giant, the Back to the Future Car, you see all these other things.

It's like when you're a little kid, right, and you said, okay, I got my Star Wars figures, I got my He-Man figures, G.I. Joe, I'm all going to put them in the same world, and I'm going to play with them as in one story. That's what this movie seems like to me. It seems like you just took all your Voltron. You just took all your toys and you just mashed them together. you had G.I. Joe Meet Star Wars and all that. And this is, and this

reminds me of playing as a kid like that, and I'm fucking so down to see this. Wow. Great. And I like the fact that they're CG, so when you go into the oasis, it's not that you're seeing an actual person. They're CGI people. So it's, it's like

this, this battle angel, this last one, where, you know, she's the CGI with the real people. You actually, you get that inside. And I think that's kind of a cool move. instead of just having a new actor play the same guy when you're in the oasis. I like that idea. Yeah, well, there's only one oasis I respect then. What is that wherever Ray is?

Oh, I guess there's two oases. Okay, there's two oases. Yeah, I love the book, and I'm really looking forward to it. I thought the trailer reminded, visually the trailer was pretty much what I pictured reading the book. And any time that happens, I'm like, I'm on board. What about you, Brian? I just bought the book. I haven't read it yet, but I'm definitely, I'm into it.

I have heard that there are some issues with the main character does not look like how he's described in the book. Yeah. Is he fatter? Yeah, he's overweight and pimply and all that good stuff. Yeah, you know, I mean, well, Ty Sheridan, isn't this the kid that was in mud way back when? Or am I thinking of somebody else? The one with...

Yeah, that's it. Yeah, mud, that's him. He's also... Yeah, he's also... Yeah, he's also Cyclops in the X-Men movies. Oh, really? I got no problem.

He's a pretty decent little actor, man. Yeah. Yeah, I'm cool with it. And how cool was the shot with King Kong? King Kong, we got nothing on Ty Sherry. You guys catch Chuckie in there? I missed it. Is that who that was?

Yeah, he's in there. Oh, no. Okay, I know who you're talking... As soon as you said it, I know what you're talking about. Yeah, he's like, I don't know, it's like a quick glimpse. I don't know if he's like spin kicking somebody or something. Yeah, yeah, he's doing something like that. Yeah, yeah.

I'm all in. Yeah. You said, Chucky, he's in. Yeah, no shit. Release date of March 30th. So, uh, not too far away. Yeah. Which is also, I think, isn't it, um, what's the big release in April?

Isn't that supposed to be Avengers? Avengers, yeah. Avengers is May. Oh, okay. Oh, is it May. Yeah. Avengers, I think is May. I thought something really big was coming out in April.

Is Solo? Is Solo coming out? Solo is in May also. Solo is Memorial Weekend. All the thing I can think of is that New Mutants movie. I know that comes out in April. Yeah, because normally April is a Fast and Furious Month. Right.

In February belongs to Disney's live action cartoon classic. What's coming out in this year? Is anything coming out this year? it Aladdin? I think we talked about this before. I thought it was pretty weird that, you know, Disney took Han Solo, took the Star, like, Han Solo off of December to minute it May, and they're replacing it with Mary Poppins returns.

Oh, fuck that shit. I thought that was very weird, too. It's like you already established this as a Star Wars month in December, and it's, you know, you're going to replace it with Mary Poppins, like, a character like nobody has seen since, like, the 60s? Okay. Well, isn't Star Wars going back? Going back to May?

It's going back to December for episode nine. Oh, it is. The Han Solo movie is only coming out for May. So actually, Han Solo is coming out in about five months from now. So when the Last Jedi comes out on Blu-ray, Han Solo comes out in theaters. The big April release is Rampage. Oh, come on, dude. Moving on.

The next trailer we are going to talk about, actually, is probably the... Yep. If you didn't watch it as cool, I kind of threw it in there at the last second. It is the new trailer for the Alex Scarlin directed Annihilation. Dude. This one, definitely my most anticipated movie here. Yeah. Go ahead.

Go ahead. I was just going to say, this has another great cast. Natalie Portman, Oscar Isaac, Tessa Thompson, Jennifer Jason Lee. Gina Rodriguez, Benedict Juan. Yeah, I was going to say has Poe Damron messing around with Old Man Anakin's wife. That's right.

And they got some... So it's Natalie Foreman and Tessa Thompson. Who are the other chicks in this movie? Jennifer Jason Lee and Gina Rodriguez. Gina Rodriguez. Isn't that Jane the Virgin? Yeah. I believe so. Okay.

So they got some nice chicks in this movie. Yeah, yeah, definitely. yeah i i am i'm i'm all all in on this movie it it looks great and it looks like it's going to be a very like the story like i already want to know what what is this thing because everybody that goes into this area where you're not allowed to go into no more people neither go crazy or die of cancer or you know something different happens to every group that goes in there and it's got it's got me hooked i'd definitely want to is it is it kind of like a different reality sort of like a like a Stranger Things type of thing?

I'm not sure. Yeah, it's kind of got that vibe. Right. Yeah, because somebody, I think I watched it with my son, and he was asking me, is this even on the same planet? Huh. Well, it looks like something. On one scene, it looks like a meteor or something, it comes to Earth. So I wonder if it's like opening or creating a sub portal or something like that.

And those type of movies, I really like that. That's why Stranger Things is good. where you have kind of like that, that alternate window to another world. You know, it's those one of, like insidious movies. That was one of the things

that I really liked insidious where he kind of transferred over to the, to the ghost world and stuff like that. I love that shit. So yeah, I'm definitely on board for this movie. Yeah,

and then you got the images of the, it looked like they used to be people, but they're like plants or something. Yeah, yeah. The guy was like all red and shit, huh? Yeah, so definitely interested. And you got a little aliens type of stuff. where that monster comes out right next to Natalie Portman.

So, yeah, that's cool shit. What's the, hey, Denny, let me ask you this one, man. What, I don't know how much you guys have, if you've covered this on After Midnight or not, but what's the theory that, uh, I think it's been proven that like the molecular movements of one atom somewhere in, in one place can affect Adam and Adam somewhere like on another side of the universe or in another place or like you, you must have us confused with like, science podcast or something. There's a theory here, and it has to do with the force, too.

So it kind of goes in with our Star Wars theme here. But there's a theory that every atom is connected to each other, like, on a subatomic level. Okay. We haven't covered this, but I believe I did read about this because there was an article that said that the possibility of the force may be real. Okay. So this is kind of – that's the impression I got with annihilation, is that it's like in the same place, but it's different places at the same time. It could be.

I guess I'd have to go back and watch this trailer. Yeah, I mean, I just, to me, it just, it seemed like it had a lot to do with some of the scientific theories that I've been, you know, hearing a little bit about lately. But I don't know, whatever it is, it looks cool as shit. Well, our last scientific episode we did was the Hollow Earth. So, yeah, that was a good one, man. I don't know if we could, I don't know if we could actually label that as science.

I don't know, but I like the theory. I really do, man. That was actually one of my more favorite after midnight shows in the last couple of months. All I could say is just wait until we get to the moon. Yeah? Ooh, I'm looking forward to that one. Because we got some crazy stuff lined up for that. Nazis on the moon?

Nazis on the moon? Is the moon actually there? Oh, okay. Could be just like a light, huh? A projection. Okay, you're freaking me. You're blowing my mind. Annihilation.

This one's also coming soon, February 23rd. Cool. Not too long to wait. And that is our last trailer. All right. Well, this is the part where we would normally have Philip do listener feedback, but we're going to,

because of how many movies we're covering in the Star Wars saga, we're going to push that back a few weeks and jump into our featured attractions. Yeah, Patrick Quillier, they're not going to read your 14,000 feedbacks this week. Sorry about that. Yeah, it's going to be a big one in a few weeks. You guys ready to start out with the Force Awakens? Oh, yeah. All right, Force Awakens directed by J.J. Abrams.

Of course, as we all know, also known for 2009 Star Trek and also Super 8. the writers were J.J. Abrams with help from Lawrence Kasden. Larry Kay. Now, this one, you're going to like this one, Denny, because we've talked about this movie before. In a real-life parallel to the film, you remember fanboys? Yes. Mark Hamill and John Boyega successfully lobbied J.J. Abrams to allow Star Wars fan Daniel Fleetwood to see the film before its official release. As Fleetwood had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and he was not.

expected to live to see the actual theatrical release. So he got shown a screening at his house, and he died on November 10th, 2015. Now, this is interesting. I want to know what you guys think about this. Before Adam Driver was cast as the infamous, as we now know, to be the head villain, a couple of other people were considered. How do you guys think this would have worked out? What about Michael Fastbender?

Um, that, he's too old. He's too old. And his, his dick is too big, apparently, to be, uh, Kylo Ren. I don't know. That's what I heard. All right. How about, how about Hugo, wee? I would go for Samara weaving, but how about Hugo weaving? Way too old. As Kyle Ren? That makes no sense. Yeah, that, yeah, he's a little too old for that. Oh, you're like the same age as, uh, Hans Solo? Yeah, unless Kylo wasn't, wasn't their kid in, in the initial concept.

That's the only way. Any of those characters make sense. That makes no sense for those guys to be playing a young Kylo Ren. That would make sense. That would make sense. All right. Final piece of trivia before we jump in. Harrison Ford cried after seeing the film for the first time.

Him and the rest of the world. Maybe he cried because he realized he's going to miss out on those Disney paydays after this one. Oh, no. All right. Actually, another piece of info. I didn't even know about this. until a few weeks ago. And I think I posted it somewhere online,

but Sinertia Ronan of Brooklyn and now Lady Bird fame was actually... Oh, yeah, Hannah. And Hannah was the finalist for the role of Ray. It was actually down to her and Daisy Ridley. Wow. I love her, but I'm sorry, Daisy Ridley's perfect. Well, that's the thing. It's like I loved Sinertia Ronan in Brooklyn.

And it's like, it's very tough to imagine. imagine her in this character role and how things would have worked out if it was like if it was her would you know because they're they're I guess you could say both their careers kind of took off around the same time because I didn't know who Sinertia Ronan was until Brooklyn and they both came out around the exact same time yeah I uh I don't know I think they chose wisely in all cases here I don't think I don't think they could have cast this movie much better oh yeah I agree with that totally this this was uh uh uh this I didn't really even know who John Boyega was before this movie either.

And, you know, I don't know who else it could have gotten to play Finn in this role. All these, all these, all the casting here was, was top notch. Right. Well, Jay, you want to, why don't you get it started, man? Tell us what you thought about this one. Ooh. Force Awakens not really a big fan of this one. In the grand scheme of things, when you, when you line up all the Star Wars movies,

this one ends up lower on the totem pole for me. It's actually my favorite. Yeah, I know. That's where we really differ. Wow. There's a lot of subplots that I didn't like. The super weapon, how easy it was to dispatch, pretty much everybody in the world. That was one of the pet peeves of mine.

I just didn't. I thought it was just too easy, too clunky. The character, Phasma, was not one of my favorite. it's the fact that she actually gave up everything for every, just because Han had a gun to her head. Okay, I'll drop the shields and you can come and kill us all. It's like, you're a warrior. You should give your life for the fourth order.

That's how you really presented yourself. You know, the real, that character who Fasper should have been said, pull the trigger, asshole, you're not getting in. Your friends aren't getting in. They're going to come in and they're going to get their ass handed to them. So it just, it just, I, I like characters. I love the Ray character. There are a lot of things that I love.

Han Solo, the best Han Solo I've seen since Empire. I actually liked this Han Solo better than I did, Return of the Jedi. You can tell Harrison Ford was having so much fun with the character. He really enjoyed the part and playing the part and all that. Aside from that, it just didn't give me that wow factor like the original Trilly did and like Rogue One did. I just walked out of it, not sure. I went and saw it another two, three times, and I still wasn't.

And I gave it its due. I mean, I've watched this movie quite a bit. I wanted to like it so much, but I just, I can't get past it. What? You didn't like the battle with Kylo Ren and Ray at the end? No, I did. Like I said, there's certain things. There's certain things about the movie that I like, but it's just the whole,

as a whole, it just didn't piece together for me. It really didn't. Well, shit. I kind of didn't like that battle at the end. Yeah, because it just for him to have been trained under Luke and then Snoke and how he was easily bested by someone that never picked up a lightsaber, I understand what she's going to become. That's just how powerful she is, man. Yeah, but I don't know. It was too quick for her to.

Medi chlorians, come on. I agree with you to a degree where she, I think it had more to do with him. And when he killed Han Solo, you know, this guy is, and I really like the Kyle Loren character. I really do. He's very conflicted.

He really has no idea where he is. It just reminds me of a line from Indiana Jones and Raiders Lost Art. And when she said, what do we do next? He's like, I don't know. I'm making this up as I go. I kind of feel that's how Kylo Ren is doing it. And so when he killed Han and he's, he's realizing that she is powerful, he's really stuck. He doesn't really know what to do,

and it's really throwing him off his game. So that's why I'm okay with the lightsaber battle between them two and her getting the upper hand. It's just that he's not ready. He's not emotionally stable enough. He's not that one track like Vader was, like Darth Maul was, they can just go into a attack and kill mode and put all emotions aside. He's just not that yet. So that's why that battle was so balanced and then turned to her side. Denny, what did you think about Ray, man? I hated her. No, I just okay.

I love this character. This movie, man, is just, it's so weird to think this movie. What would have happened to this movie if these new characters didn't work? Right. You know, and like, thankfully they all do. And they all like work perfectly, you know, because, you know, Ray is just so, she's so lovable in this, in this movie. And we kind of discussed this on the episode that Jay and I did for After Midnight where we did the movie commentary. It was the little, little nuances in Daisy Ridley's performance.

And I talk about a few scenes in this movie that just sells me on the character. And the first one is, you know, where she and BBA8 are talking at. at at the market and she's talking about like how her parents will come back for her someday you know and she gives like this little smile like she's trying to convince herself yeah they will someday you know and when you see that it's like it's such a great character moment that it's you know you just fall in love with these characters and it's the same thing for you know for po when he he kind of gets excited when he sees fin and then just stop shorts like hey you're wearing my jacket you know it's these great little characters and it's these great little characters. moments. And with Finn, it's, you know, it's, it's, um, it's, it's, um, it's, it's, um, it's that scene, you know, where he, where he kind of breaks Po out and he's telling him, I'm breaking you out of here. And then Poe kind of calls him out. It's like, you need a pilot. And he's like, yeah, I need a pilot. These are all great little character moments that like, they, they, they endure you to the characters quick enough that you buy into. And the fact that you got the older characters in there, like Han, he's

giving the rub to, you know, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, he's in fin. I, Leah is giving the rub to pole. These are all wrestling terms, by the way, for people. People don't take them out of context. Like, hey, I don't remember Han giving, like, Ray a massage on the fountain. What's going on here? But it's like they're using their star power, their equity with the fans to pass it on to the newer generation. You know?

And the reason why I think these characters work is because of who you cast in them in the first place. because that's where we kind of get into it's like, well, what would it happen if you had Cynar Sharonin playing Ray? Would you have still had that same chemistry? Would you have still bought into it? It's very tough to say. But this is actually one of my favorite. This is like my second favorite Star Wars movie of all time,

right behind Empire. And, you know, this movie to me is just, you know, I still remember the first time I saw it in theater. and when I came out of that theater, I was just like flying. I don't even remember how I got home that night. You know, but I just remember I...

Apparently, I kind of do remember how I got home, but I remember like it was like, my friend Jeff and I, and his wife were all in the car, and I literally could not shut up talking about this movie on the way home. And I was like, every time they were talking, I was just like waiting for my turn to talk,

Like, I was like, like, my friend Jeff kind of like looked in his rearview mirrors. Like, okay, talk now. We know you got something to say. And I was like, I got this movie so amazing. And I'm still like to the state. I've seen this movie so many times now. I saw it like 11 times in theaters. Plus the amount of times I've seen it on video.

And it still holds up. There's not one, only one scene in this movie kind of bothers me. And that's it. And that's the scene with the Rath-Tars. still feel it, it just feels kind of out of place. Yes, definitely. The movie comes so a bit of a screeching halt because of it. But it happens so quickly that you're kind of like, it's there and then it's gone and

we're moving on to something else. You know, especially because it's like, it's so weird because I enjoy the lead up to it with, you know, the Kanja Club and all that stuff like that. And then getting the Falcon to take off at warp speed. Yeah. It's all great stuff, but it's just that little stuff with the Rath Tar in between that just kind of it just kind of annoys me. It was the plot just to get everybody in the falcon and get the hell out.

Exactly. It was just that plot point. It could have been done a little bit differently. You could have easily even just had that done with just Kanja Club and the wrath, without the wrath thards. You could have had Kanja Club come in, start wrecking stuff, and they got to kind of get their way out of there onto the falcon because, you know, it's a ship and a ship in a ship.

Yep. And a little trivia there. Anybody, are you guys fans of the raid movies? I've seen them. Yeah, those dudes were at the raid, yeah. Yeah, they are the Kanja Club. The cast from the raid was them. Yeah.

Oh, same group, huh? Yeah. Still one of my favorite lines to utter out from the movie. Even like when I'm outside and somebody's like, tell that to Kanja Club is still one of my favorite things to say. Yeah, for me, the first half of the movie was great. The first half of the movie was great. I just, I did not care for this.

second half, you know, except for a few. It really did. You do have some great parts. You do have the emotional death of Han Solo. Spoiler alert. That was good. The fight between Kylo and Ray, for me, for the most part,

it's Adam Driver's acting. It's just his emotional, just unstableness is such a great thing. Those really stand out for me. Not a lot of space battle in this. I don't think there was really any. I think most of the fighting took place on the planet, and then they probably, you know, at the end,

toward the end, they kind of zoomed away from the planet as it was blowing up. So for Star Wars movie, there really wasn't any space battles. Right. And that kind of threw me off as well. I was okay with that, man. It was a lot more about introducing the new characters. You know, like Denny said, bridging the gap from the old generation to the new. Yeah.

I mean, for me, it was a lot more of a, character-based film than a space battle film and I was okay with that. The whole purpose to me of this movie is to get these new characters over. And like I said, I believe they did because especially with Ray, and I know it's an online joke with all you guys with my love for Ray and stuff like, but it's the fact that like towards the end of the movie when she's starting to do all these stuff, I no longer question I'm like I'm in for the ride because I have that connection to the character. I couldn't agree more.

Jay and I talk about it on that show. When we see the lightsaber come to her in that final battle, I don't doubt it. I'm like cheering for like, okay, let's, I believe in it. When we see her at the end of the movie in the pilot seat of the Falcon with Chewy, a lot of people would be like, oh no, that's Han ship, whatever. She shouldn't even be in the pilot seat. To me, when I see her in the pilot seat, I bought into whatever. I was like, okay, this is Ray's ship now.

This is Ray's movie. This is Ray's series. Let's go from here. Couldn't agree more, man. Couldn't agree more. And as for the battle with her and Kylo, we kind of also go into it there. There is an explanation for it in the novelization where, you know, Snoke tells Kylo that if he kills his father, he's going to become even more stronger in the force.

But when he does kill him, he becomes weaker. Now you can take that as maybe because he becomes weaker in the force? No, I think he actually becomes weaker because of the guilt over what he just did. And because he's become so weak, because of that, and plus he gets shot by Chewy, that's the reason why Ray was able to defeat him so easily. Because he's not in the moment. Could agree more. If he were, I think it probably would be a completely different story.

Brian, any special scenes in this movie that stick out to you or any scenes that's going to wish they hadn't put in there? Well, ones that I love is definitely when you get the first shot of Han and a Chewy. That just instantly was just Star Wars. All this nostalgia feeling for Star Wars was just right there for me. And I really, you guys touched on it earlier, the, them going with Daisy Ridley and John Boyer, I think was a fantastic gamble right there. Just going over, like, their filmography, like, they, they was no, now I want to say there was nobody's, but, you know, to the public,

nobody knew who they were. I mean, John Boyega was probably, I've only seen one film. Yes, that's the only movie I've seen. Daisy Ridley, I've never. Yeah, same here. Yeah. But Star Wars is famous for that, taking. Yeah, yeah.

And then bringing in other people like, Oscar Isaac, Darmal Gleason. I, again, have a problem with the Gwendolyn Christie, like, yes. They built this character up so much to the point where I know that

after the movie it came out, people were returning like toys and figures. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, because they felt, they built this character. I mean, it has a cool look. She has a cool look. You know, she's a captain of the first order. And, you know,

Plus, her role on Game of Thrones, you know, she kicks ass on that show. And it's also tough because when you cast someone as distinct of looking as Gwendolyn Christie and hide her in a costume and you'd never see her, it's like you expected more. I expect at some point we would have seen her without the mask. But for her limited time on screen, it's kind of like, well, hmm. Yeah, and I just thought that was, I was definitely let down by that. And another little bit of trivia. Captain Fasma's name comes from the Fantasm movie. Yeah.

Which J.J. Abrams is a big fan of. Also, by the way, I think we talked about this also on that episode is that the concept art for Fasma's costume was originally supposed to be for Kylo Ren. No shit. But I believe Kathleen Kennedy liked it so much she wanted to use it for another character. So her costume only was done out of like concept art. Now the whole point of her not being able to do anything in this movie is because they weren't actually able to get the functionality of the costume to work by the time filming started. So that's why we don't actually see Fasma do much in this movie because apparently according to a lot of people, Wendy and Christy wasn't even able to get her arms up to a certain degree in that costume.

I think we got to see it. They should have just CG. Well, yeah, they should have just CG her costume. Yeah, I mean, we could say, oh, they could have CGIed it, but, you know, the whole purpose, or the whole selling point of Abrams and the Force Awakens was the majority of it was supposed to be practical. So everything that you saw on screen outside of like maybe Mos Kanata and the ships was all, you know, practical.

Well, if they could have done Moss Kanada as a complete CGI, I think they could have gave her at least five minutes of CGI fighting, you know, not even five minutes, three minutes, something. It could,

but I'm guessing maybe with the, with the fact that's like, okay, well, we only have this character in for so long. Yeah.

Yeah. I have a question. Do you guys think it's a waste to cast a high profile actor or actress to do a voice and they're barely even used

because, I mean, before this movie, she was, she won the Academy Award, Lipidia Nyango. Right. She won the Academy Award

for best actress for 12 years of slave. No, no, I'm okay with it. I was okay with Max von Seidel with his small cameo. I was okay. I'm okay with Lupita Nyango in this movie. Right. For the amount of time that she didn't,

then the next movie we'll be talking about, I guess, next week, with the amount of time that she's in that. Okay. Well, actually, we're going to do that next. And I guess we probably should move on to scores because Phillips just about ready to join us for the next episode.

So you guys ready to move on to score? As much as I love this movie, I could talk about it all night, but we got to move on to the big one, guys. All right. So who gives the score first? I think you went first, right? Yeah, well, I'm going to go like six, six and a half. Oh, brutal, man.

Yeah. Yeah. That's bad. All right. Next, I don't even want to hear why. with the amount of times that I've seen this movie and haven't memorized this movie for me personally 10 on 10 I love this movie too much wow wow is it me or you lent go for it man I'm gonna give it a 7.5 um okay I again another Star Wars movie that I had a lot of fun with I just had a couple of I don't know it's just I feel like there's no set when it comes to the four there's no set guidelines on what the power powers are sometimes i feel like they go they just add

them as they go on okay i i don't know i maybe we'll learn more about that in the next movie yeah maybe if there was backstory on what she knew what the jedi was and what they what their powers set was maybe i would be okay with her like knowing what to do as fast as she could knowing what to try what to what to attempt to do, you know. Yeah. But overall, I really enjoyed it. You know, they introduced us to John Boyega, which I've seen other movies outside of this since he's came out in this.

And I think he's an underrated actor. And, yeah, they brought back the originals, you know, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford. And, you know, that was amazing to see, especially in the screen for the first time. All right. Well, I mean, for me, this is like the crowns. jewel of the entire Star Wars saga so far. I'm giving it a 9.5.

Wow. It's far and away my favorite of the Star Wars movies. So far, but I'm hopeful Chapter 9 is going to be even better. Or maybe even the one after this, which we're about to find out. So yes, ready to move along? Let's move on. That's warp speed. All right.

All right, cool. So guys, that means now it's that time for the moment. You've all been waiting for The Big Movie. And, of course, The Last Jedi. And guess what? Philip was able to make it for this last part. Phil, how's it going, man? Good, man.

We're doing Christmas with the family. Sorry, I couldn't make it for the rest of the show. But I really, really wanted to talk about this movie. So I'm glad I can make it for this part. Well, let's dig in then. So we got director and writer was Ryan Johnson, also known for Looper and Brick. Some little bit of trivia here.

Mark Hamill, I'm sure Denny has a lot more for us on these, but I'll cover the couple I found. Mark Hamill told Ryan Johnson after reading the script for the film, quote, I pretty much fundamentally disagree with every single choice you've made for my character. Now, having said that, I've gotten it off my chest. And my job now is to take what you've created and do my best to realize your vision.

Strong words from Luke himself there. Definitely. Joquin Phoenix turned down the role that eventually went to Benicio del Toro. Oh. And a final piece of trivia, as we all know, the film marks the 40th anniversary of the Star Wars franchise. So actually another piece of trivia, by the way. This is Benicio's, I believe, second attempt because he... He was offered a role in the prequel trilogy that did not go his way.

No kidding. Yeah. I'm not mad at that. I'll probably like him better in this one. Yeah? Which role was it, Denny? They didn't specify. They just said it was he was just up for a role in one of the prequel films.

And basically, it just didn't go his way. So could have been maybe some Jedi, I don't know. Most likely. Yeah. Jedi number four, huh? Yeah. All right. Well, Denny, you've been our guys so far, man.

So you want to go first on this one? So let's just pull behind the curtain. This is like what? The third day the film's been in release, technically second. I've already seen it now three times and three days, twice within 12 hours of each other. And after the third viewing, this movie still holds up to me. And I really like this movie.

I love that it was bold enough to try new things, even though for some people they feel like it didn't really try anything new at all. It turned things on its head. It took as a fan. And I know what bothers me the most right now is when I got home, I was so high off this movie and I had friends sending me messages telling me how much they hated this movie. And the reason why they hated it was for the exact same reasons that I loved it. Right.

And that's the fact because we all went in with our own preconceived notions on what was going to happen after the Force Awakens. What's going to happen with Ray? What's going to happen with Luke? What's going to happen with this big meetup? And it basically took all that and just turned it on its head and it went in a new direction. And a lot of people did not like that. I, on the other hand, did because it kept me guessing. And it was just like within the first, actually, you know, after that first,

battle scene that we saw, I was already completely hooked into that universe again. I was along for the ride. And for a two and a half hour movie, didn't feel like two and a half hours at all. Actually, maybe the middle portion kind of did drag a little bit, but didn't really feel that long at all. Yeah, I'll agree with you. That opening scene, that's, that was epic. That was, and that was a good thing. That was a good thing to have that because then it grabs you and you're automatically, like Denny said, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're for the ride. You're locked in. It definitely was a completely different feel of a Star Wars movie. And I've only seen it once. And it took me some time to actually really contemplate and think about that. And did I actually like it? You know, when I first came out of it, I really wasn't

too sure. And I think because it was so different, unlike Rogue One, when I stepped out of Rogue one, it made me feel like a kid again like I was watching New Hope again. And it was that whole Star Wars adrenaline, fast-paced. This movie definitely is not the fast-paced, the George Lucas. What was his term? Faster more intense. Yes, definitely was not that really different feel to it. A lot more comedy than I think a lot of people, and they made through them,

because I think everyone's perception was this is going to be a dark movie. And honestly, it really wasn't. It was very light, hard. Now, it did have its moments. It has dark moments for sure. It does have its dark moments, but I would say the general feel of the movie is more lighthearted, a little bit more comedy than I think I would expect from a Star Wars movie, not saying that I totally disagree with it. It's very different. I think people need to watch this a couple of times.

I think they need to think about it before they get their thumbs working instantly as soon as they see the movie. Yeah, I can see where a lot of. people think that it's maybe too much comedy. I think they did a good job of throwing it in as comedy relief and not necessarily it's not

Thor Ragnarok, you know, it's not a comedy. I agree. The comedy and Thor threw me off, if you remember guys. I thought here it was perfect. It was just the right amount and at the right moments. Well, and I love Thor Ragnarok, but I went into it looking at it as a comedy. This obviously is not.

Man, I loved it. I loved it from the get-go. there was it did keep me guessing the whole time which kept me engrossed in the film I thought maybe some of the CGI was a little hokey but that's really my only gripe

There's one CGI scene here and I noticed it like right on the first viewing that kind of bothered me but we'll kind of get into that in spoilers Yeah and I'll go with one right now those little bird things that I'm sure they created just to sell toys.

I think that they, I mean, they look like little stickers. I don't, I don't feel like they, if you're going to create it to sell toys, and don't be wrong, it's pretty cute. But man, it was super CGI. No, those were majority practical, actually. Really? They look kind of two-dimensional to you, Philip, huh? Yeah.

No, yeah, they were kind of weird. I mean, I know they were just kind of thrown in there for sort of a comic relief thing. and you know what into the movie when you see the toys and you kind of see the little previews you kind of think oh these things are going to be annoying

they're going to be the super comedy relief yeah they weren't I didn't mind them at all any scene with them was I was like okay that's fine they didn't overdo it yeah they did Johnson yeah yeah it was very good

paste on those guys well that that was the good part about the porks you we see them they're there but they don't don't really play a factor into the story. You know, it's not like a port comes in and saves the day for everyone that kind of leaves everybody like, oh, okay, that's not.

Well, that's ridiculous. But it's like you see them, they're there, but they don't really factor into anything. They don't jar it up. Exactly. And the only, the only character that I really am not, I'm still, he was okay, Finn. I'm not a huge fan of that dude. Come on, man.

He's okay. I liked him better in this one than I did the Force of Wake. Benz are every man. He's like you or me getting thrown into this universe, man. Yeah, I guess that's true. But I don't know. He's just not doing it for me. There's a scene in there that I can't talk about where I thought he was, I was like, okay, all right, now we're doing something.

So we'll talk about that a little bit. Yeah. Brian, what were all your thoughts, man? Coming in this, I was really high on this movie. and I might have to watch this on a second viewing. I had a few issues coming out of the theater. There was a few CGI issues, and there was a few plot points. I was just kind of like, what?

Yes. I'm with you, Brian. But overall, I had a lot of fun with this. You know, the atmosphere in the theater, it was straight Star Wars. I don't know about your guys' theater. It was a madhouse. my theater. Oh, yeah. Yep. Definitely.

I did like the new edition of characters like Laura Dern. Yes. Benicio del Toro. I thought I really enjoyed his character, getting more than that. I liked Rose. He was, yeah.

Rose is great. Benicio, he was quirky, and I liked it. It was something different. Yes. Benicio, the character of DJ really, really, really did rub me the wrong, the wrong way. And I don't know how Benicio came to that. Oh, I guess it kind of revealed. It was

a really a spoiler. I don't understand what was the deal with the stutter. Yeah. Was he was he porky pig? Was it slow or something? It made it, I didn't see any reason why this character needed to be like, you know, I think that he, they wanted just to make him unique or maybe it was his own thing. he came up with, but I think he was just trying to be, like you said, the corkiness, trying to develop that corkiness a little bit more. Let him really stand out between your, you know, your normal heroes. You could have found another way to make him unique without having a speech impediment. Well, that's why I wanted, when we get into spoilers, I was going to ask you, because I know, Danny, you've seen the animated series. There was a lot of rumors that his character

might possibly be somebody else. Yes. Really? And we're pretty sure that that's not the anymore. That which kind of was one of the things that a lot of people were bringing in their own baggage with. Like, oh my God, DJ is this person. Well, we find out he's not. Oh, this person is this person. We find out they're not. And it means nothing, really.

So it's kind of like, we're just going to take all your preconceived notions and we're just going to show, we're just going to do it our way. Right. But yeah, overall, I had a lot of fun. This is a nice continuation into the story. And I'm definitely looking forward to the next

episode. Yeah, I knew I was going to enjoy it, or I had a good feeling I was going to enjoy it. I definitely like the other films that Ryan Johnson has done. And it's another one. We talk about this all the time, guys, how they take somebody who's done, you know, mainly lower budget, more independent movies and start giving them bigger budget stuff to work with. And it seems like from the way it was filmed, I got the impression that he was able to

maintain quite a bit of creative control over it, which. I really liked. I fucking love this movie. I really enjoyed it from the opening frame where it was like, okay, I'm back in the Star Wars world again, and then, of course, you had the scrolling, which you didn't get in Rogue One, but you've, of course, gotten in every other movie,

and I was immediately back in the universe. And then in that first scene, I thought, God damn it, Poe Damron, he is absolutely my favorite Star Wars character. Right? And then we'd get to Ray, and I'm like, raise my favorite star you know they did a lot more character development

with Poe in this one I liked it I love it man I know he did and I love the fact that he was dressed a lot more like Han Solo like Han Solo yeah definitely I thought Gleason did a great job of hamming it up as

General Hux I love Hux in this movie from the beginning if anything there's a couple of characters that I'm going to say got short shrift we can talk about that later but yeah guys for the most part

I mean you know this is one of those I'm ready to go out and watch it again like right now I'm ready to see this one again over and over and over again great movie all right scores yeah Phil if we know you gotta move on right so well no we'll go on order

you can stick with us Phil through the spoilers right yeah I can stick with you I can do some spoiler I'll start the spoiler conversation but let's roll through scores real quick All right, Danny, what's you got, man? After the third viewing, like I said, this still holds up. I didn't even say if I loved it or not.

I actually really did love this movie. Upon walking out, I would give it a... I think I scored it about a 9 on 10 walking out the first time. And after the third time, it does drop a little bit because of that whole middle portion, which we'll get to in the spoilers. And it doesn't even drop by much. I would probably give it like an 8 and a half. It might go back up to 9 with even more viewings.

but this movie did really need to be, I think maybe about 15, 20 minutes need to be cut out of it and it would have been a very, very, very tight movie. Right. Agreed. Oh, my turn? All right. Yeah, I agree with Danny. Yeah, 20 minutes. Definitely, there are some scenes in there.

I think the whole movie could have done without. Upon, I definitely have to see this movie again and I hope to do it this weekend. First viewing, just because I need to watch it again. And I think there's a couple of subplots that I may have missed that I'm not understanding. And maybe we can get into spoilers. But right now I'm going to go 7.5.

7.5, okay. Yeah, hoping that on my second viewing, I'm going to get up to an 8. No, so I think that's, I think that's great. I think that's somewhere what, like a B minus somewhere. And that's his first viewing. Yeah, that's solid, man. It's hard to score, you know, walking out of the theater. Dude, I love this movie.

I was trying to come up with negatives. and that's where that whole last review came from. But I loved it. I think that it may rival some of the best Star Wars movies out there, like the original trilogy to me. I agree. I'm going to give it right now a 9.5, and it's probably only going to go up from there.

Wow, that's... That is high. It was solid. I left feeling like that buzz and goosebumps, and it was great. I loved it. hard to go up from 9.5 I agree with what everybody said as far as the positives, but

like I said, I had an issue with how they handled some of the characters in this movie, and then there was a couple scenes where the C.G.I was just really wonky and kind of funny looking. I don't know. Maybe maybe it's going to, my perception is going to be different on future viewings, but

I did have fun overall. I mean, it's Star Wars. So I'm going to give it a strong eight. Eight? Not too bad. I'm going to say that I had no problems with any of the effects at all. I had no problems with any of the CGI. I thought all of the acting was completely on point.

I think Ryan Johnson's direction, it needs to be given a lot of credit here. Because I really think these characters interacted very well together. I really love the way that they gave everybody their own story. line. They did, like I said, there's a couple of characters that I would have loved to see more of, but I mean, you know, it was already two and a half hours, like you guys said, so what else are they going to do, you know?

I liked this movie a lot better than I thought I was going to. My favorite Star Wars movie of all time thus far is not going to be this one, but it is

going to be the Force Awakens. So, needless to say, I love direction that Disney's taking these in, and I give this a good, strong nine. It's easy, easy, easy, easy, top five of the year. Wait a minute. Your greatest move, Star Wars movie, is the Force Awakens? Force Awakens, I give a 9.5, man. Oh, what do you give Empire? Love it.

Well, Empire, we'll get into that on our next show, but we're going to talk about that then. Oh, fuck. No, I'm going to give, I guess we're playing time travel here a little bit, but yeah, I would probably give Empire probably eight and a half. Okay, yeah. Maybe nine. See, this ranks up there with Empire for me. All right, let's do

spoilers real quick. I got about five minutes. There's some parallels to Empire with this, but I love the way that they offshot from those parallels. They set you up for expectations that never happened because it didn't exactly parallel it in the way that my mind thought it was going to. I thought it was genius.

Yeah. Well, and parallels are going to happen. I mean, it's, it's, that's sort of the point of the whole Star Wars franchise, you know? It's all about the force and the balance and things are going to happen that mimic other movies. That's sort of the point of it. So I don't understand why people get so upset about that.

But yeah, let's do spoilers. So here's our spoiler alert. This is a motherfucking spoiler alert. You've been fucking warned. This is a motherfucking spoiler alert. You've been fucking warned. This is a motherfucking spoiler alert. You've been fucking warned.

My, my, my, my, my, my, my, my only real gripe about this is Snoke. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like a bitch. Yes. Well, because not, not the way that he went down.

I'm totally okay with that. I understand. I know that there's a big question out there. Why did Kylo Ren kill Snoke? Because that's how to grab the power. Man. I don't know if it was to grab the power. I don't think so.

I think Snoke was. right on par when he he was criticizing him like he was his little bitch right right yeah because let's forget oh go ahead he's right he he is very conflicted Kyle has no idea what he's doing

absolutely no idea what he's doing super emotional yes yes he's torn between Ray he's torn between Luke he's still torn between Han and he obviously has anger management issues exactly so in that moment I really thought that that was a sincere moment moment with Ray.

And when, I don't know about that. I think it was more sneaky than that, man. No, I agree. It was sincere. I think it was sincere. And then when Ray rejected him, his strong emotions took over again.

And that's when he grabbed the power. He didn't even want anything to do with the first order. Remember, he said, you, it's just, Ray, says you and me, let's get the hell out of here. Fuck all these people. Let them do what they want to do to each other. And let's get the hell out of here. See, how cool.

What was that scene? That was. It's, yeah, but like you said with Snoke, it's, my problem with Snoke is if he would have been more of the wizard behind the curtain, really no power whatsoever, just manipulating the shit out of, out of Kylo.

Sure. I would have been okay with that, but he was so powerful and he really didn't go anywhere. I get the twist. You want to add like, oh, this guy is so powerful. He's like the emperor, but no, now he's gone.

Yeah. So maybe I just need to think about it more and discuss it with you guys more, watch it more, but because he was so powerful and he went out so quick, it wasn't how he went out. That would have been the perfect way

for him to go out. It's almost a Darth Vader-esque style. Yeah. It's just you never got anything out of the character. Exactly. Once you finally see him, he's gone. I was like, never find out who he is.

He's such an interesting character, and there was that big question of who is, who is Supreme Leader Snoke, you know? Yeah. And you never find out. He's nobody. He's dead now. Yeah.

Yeah. Denny, what are your, what are your theories, man? The other thing I loved about this scene was, well, first of all, with Snoke and Wren, you know, Kylo does it. Because as soon as Snoke tells him, you know, I, the reason, I guess we can really reveal this now, there was a connection between Ray and Kylo, where they kept seeing each other through the force. Yes. And we find out that Snow. was the one who's manipulating it all. And Snoke tells Ray he did it because he was able to manipulate Kylo's

insecurities and show him to Ray. And when he says that, you could see, like, you see Ray's reaction, but in the background, you also see Kylo's reaction too, which he doesn't like. And then when Kylo's tell, when, when Snoke tells Kylo, I sense there is resolving you now. The conflict is over.

So he tells him to, he tells her to kill Ray. I got the sense, like on the third viewing, when he says the con, like I sense the conflict gone in you, in Kylo's mind, he's already resolved. Yeah, my conflict is gone.

I'm going to kill Snoke right now. Yeah, he made up his mind, right? Oh yeah, definitely, yeah, yeah. And Snow probably thought he meant Ray, right? Exactly. I think Snoke misread that.

Perfect sense. It does. Who Snoke really is, like, like Phil said, it doesn't really matter now because he's gone. And that was like another thing

that a lot of fans are like, well, who's Snoke? You know, what's his important? importance to all this. I don't mind that Snoke is gone because by doing this, you now firmly established Kylo Rent as your number one heel in this. And once you do that, all of a sudden, Kylo completely changes and becomes unhinged. I like him way better in this movie than the Force

Awakens. And that's what, like, is a mean motherfucker. He's crazy. Yes. And what Jay says, like when he reaches out to Ray and he's sincere, he's telling, hey, let the old things die, you know, we can, we can start this. So by the way, I love that scene. because it mimics everything from Revenge of the Sith when Anakin does that to Padme saying, hey, we could take over the galaxy and make it our own. And the fact that Ray turns him down

and his reaction is like, you're still holding on to these old things. He becomes unhinged. And then you see him like he just starts to fall apart. And once you get unhinged, that's your number one bad guy in this movie. And the fact that Ray, that's what I really loved about this movie.

At the end of the movie, your number one baby face these are all wrestling in terms of it but your number one baby face and your number one heel are now clearly defined clearly yeah absolutely yes and then I know another issue was uh is going to be Ray's

origin and that she came from nobody I love that yeah oh my God I love that it doesn't have to all just be the bloodline you know yes but since I got to be anybody since I got Jay on online here We did a show last week where we did the

Force Awakens movie commentary on the After Midnight podcast available on iTunes Stitcher and Beyond Pod. Not Brian Stitcher, but the Stitcher podcast thing. But we were talking about this and we discussed Ray's parentage and I told him if she's not Luke's daughter, I'm going to be very disappointed. And now that we know for certain that she's not, I could fully say I was completely 100% wrong.

Because the fact that Kylo's like, your parents were nobody, you're nobody, you have no place in this story whatsoever. And then at the end of the story, she is now the beacon of hope. Which is awesome. For the new generation. It was amazing because it shows you that even a nobody can become the guiding light for a new generation. And there's a little. He's a last Jedi right now, yes. She would officially be the last Jedi, yes.

Yes. And that anybody can be, did you guys catch that on the very last scene with that little kid? Yeah, he's walking and he just, and he forced grabs the broom and you're like, fuck, I'd love that scene. Did he force grab it? He forced grabbed it. Okay, my wife was saying that. And I didn't, I was like, no, he didn't. He was just holding it up and it was supposed to mimic a lightsaber.

I didn't know he forced grab it. That's awesome. The broomstick kind of meets him halfway because his hand is not even completely, it's like a few inches. away from the broomstick and you kind of see it move towards them. Well, he must have a high metaclory encounter something, didn't he? No, I don't know what that means. All right, guys. I got a jet.

Sorry. All right. Thanks for joining. Those were my points I wanted to hit. Love this movie. It may be my favorite in the next couple of years here. Cool. All right.

Later, guys. Later, man. Yeah, see, hey, guys, I was equally convinced. I knew in my mind that Kylo and Ray were brother and sister. that's how fucking convinced I was that she was that she was his sister so I'm really glad that neither of those two theories turned out to be right

yes yes I love that she comes from nobody and they in fact that they impressed that she was even sold by her parents oh that is even better for a bottle of hooch on top I kind of didn't really like that lay out they sold you off so they could buy some more booze sure yeah which conflicts kind of with the story

because he says they're buried on the on Jacu just in some unmarked grave or something like that. Doesn't he say that? Yeah. Then who was the ship that was flying away in her, in her, in her, in her, in her, it probably could have been them. They went to go drop her off and they were drunk and like three seconds later, they probably crashed that.

You think so. All right. Okay, now let's, can we get into Luke Skywalker? Yes. Luke, do you want to get into the major thing at the end with Skywalker? or do you want to kind of touch on the island first? Hey, you guys are a guest,

whatever you don't want to do. Let's start with the island. Go ahead, Denny, go ahead. Okay, so one of the things, one of the little problems that I had with this movie was the little, there was a little too much comedy

in it for my taste. I agree. When I was watching it for the third times, I realized, okay, there are certain jokes I would have pulled out. Yes. And the first introduction of Luke Skywalker where he does toss the lightsaber

over. I would have completely got rid of. Oh, you know what? I whispered over to my daughter, Danny, you're not going to believe

he's going to throw that thing and sure is shit. She just looks at me and gives me like, what the fuck? You could just look at the way he was looking at that lightsaber.

He wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. I don't know why I had a strong feeling. I had the force feeling, but I knew he was going to toss that goddamn thing, but not like he did over his shoulder.

I thought he was going to like toss it to the side or something. Exactly. I was, The toss over the shoulder to me was like comical Where I would have had him just like Just like drop it on the ground and leave Or just toss it like he did in Jedday right?

Like he's I'm done with this. Yeah, like that. Yeah, okay. I can agree with you on that. That did get a lot of laughs though in my theater. You guys think they went a little too over the top with that one. Yeah, there was a little too much comedy. There was.

There's a lot of comedy stuff in here that I didn't really like. I enjoyed the comedy at the beginning with Hux and Poe and stuff that. But then with like the little wacky things were like that with Luke. And I think there was like another one later on with, um, um, uh, on like the, uh, on the cano bite stuff. Like the whole, all this comedy stuff with, with DJ, to me was kind of pointless. That whole scene, one-liners and whatnot. That is that, the, the canto bite, the whole casino planet.

For me, I think that, I think that, I think that. could have done without it. I think I lost me on that one. No, I agree. I had fun with that. A lot of the stuff on canto bite to me should have been trimmed out

because it was a lot of it was pointless. I hated, I hated this whole subplot with, you know, where like they go in release like the, those racing animals.

I didn't agree. And then they start racing them throughout the city. I thought that was so pointless. No, it was fun, man. It was just. so weak. You could have trimmed that out. And basically that whole subplot is

pointless because they're sent there to go and get a specific decoder. They leave with just a decoder. And basically the whole point of getting him, they don't even accomplish that mission. At the very end, so like what was the whole point of that subploid? Hey, wait a minute, though, guys. Aren't you, don't you think it's possible?

Benicio del Toro was the guy that originally had that emblem on and maybe he lost it in a bet against that douchebag guy? Yeah, you know what? That is a possibility. That was my first thought. I mean, they never explained that, but that would make sense to me that was the guy they were originally after in the first place. It's possible, but I didn't really take it that way. I thought Justin, that was the actor Justin Therow who was playing the original decoder that they were looking at at the casino. When they announced that they had casted him in the movie, it's like, oh, who's Justin Thoreau going to be?

And it's just like, oh, he only has two lines in this movie. Sorry about that guy. Right. Looks like he's like out of the 1930s or something. Exactly. I did like the look of the casino. That looked all good. I love the look of it. I thought it was a lot of pointless. That was very, you know what? That was very George Lucasy, I thought. Oh, yeah, I guess it was.

Yeah. I figured something like that would come from Lucas. Yeah. Yeah. Which is fine. By the way, speaking of pointlessness, what was the whole point of that forced cameo for Mas Kanata? Just to say, oh, you need a decoder and I'm in a trade this union dispute right now. And it's like 30 seconds and then she's gone. It's like, I was watching that's like, did she really, really need to be in this movie? No. No. Not at all.

No. No. The middle. Like, I think we're all kind of green. Maybe different lands who loves every minute of it. The middle was just, it really slowed the movie down. Although the movie was slow pace in the first place, which is again, I have no problem with.

That really, it just, it really stopped the story for the most part. I mean, there could have been a different way for them to sneak onto the ship instead of have that whole cantoe bite. Or even use another character instead. It's like, I was, when I was looking at this and they were like, you need a certain decoder. You'll find them on cantal bite. And it's this guy, DJ. It's like, instead of introducing DJ, this guy who's, to me, was kind of pointless in the

movie, you could have used already an established character. To me, when I was seeing that, I was thinking Lando would have been perfect. Perfect. I thought I saw something like that coming too, man, or a family member of Lando or something. Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. He would have been perfect for that. Although back to your theory, Lance, that he could have been the guy in the whole time, I think that would make more sense.

He would probably be somebody that would have hung out at Mazza's place from Force Awakens. He seems like he would have been in that crowd. So it's possible he was the guy in the whole. time. So am I the only one who thought that Gwendolyn Christie just really got the shaft in this? Yes. No, no, no, you're correct. You're correct. And I think we could firmly establish now that I think she is officially done with this series. Yep. That was a waste of a character. I hated her in Force Awakens. Not the actress, not just the way her character was written. Very poorly written. I would put Jar Jar Jar over her. Jar Jar Jar, I think, was utilized a lot.

lot better the prequels. No, no, I mean, no, I think his character was utilized a lot better than her character was in this. Just so disappointed in how she, her character was written and treated through both movies. And I'm almost kind of glad she's out.

One thing I thought was cool when Finn blasted her and it just bounced right off her, off her outfit. That was when I thought she was going to be a badass. That was cool. Yeah, I just, yeah, I wish she would have been, Turn out to be like Kylo's kind of, you know, attack dog. Well, Kyle doesn't need an attack dog, but. Let's say maybe Hux's attack dog.

Yeah, yeah, you know. Yeah, that would have been cool, some good infighting there, you know. Yeah, yeah. She basically gets like the Han Solo treatment in this movie. We're like, okay, we're done with you. We're going to drop you down a giant hole. Never to be seen again. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, like Boba fit. Brian, what was your, what did you think was like the, the, the, the, the, part of the movie. The whole supposed death of Leia. I thought that was I hated that entire scene. Oh, really? Yes. So that was my thing. Danny, so

I'm glad you saw the movie a second time because I figured you passed out for 10 minutes when that freaking happened. When you saw her just be blasted out the window, I'm like, this movie's been on for 10 minutes and they just killed Leah? Holy shit. I didn't mind that. I didn't mind that her dying, but

her turning into a superhero and flying through space. Yeah. I hated that whole. It just, I don't know. It bothered me. It really bothered me. Here's the thing.

We had actually talked about this on the previous episode with Jay on the After Midnight podcast where I said, I really hope we get to see Leah exhibit some more force power or some mastery of the force outside of just sensing things. Yes. And we saw that and she basically was able to kind of force pull her way back. back onto the ship is what we're seeing. I know a lot of people took it as like the Superman moment, but it's like,

okay, maybe it kind of is, but it's like, okay, now we actually get to see that Leah actually has a little bit more strength in the force than we're led to believe. I agree with you,

which to me, I really like. I agree with you. If you look at Han, you look at Luke, Leia and chewing all them, if there's one person that has more drive to live and to fight, I think Princess Leia,

it beats them all out. You know, Han has his luck. Khan has his skill, but she's the one that has that drive to just fight, fight, bite, punch, whatever. So for her to fight back and tap into that force and come back from there, I was really fine with it. I was actually a little relieved. It was like, I can't believe they fucking killed Princess Leia. Oh, my God, no way.

But it was kind of cool that Kylo didn't do it. He couldn't do it. And then it happened, and I figured that was going to freak him the fuck out. But for her to come back like that, I was cool. with it because it's Princess Leia. One thing I notice is that when on this viewing is like when she's pulling herself back in and you have like

Billy Lord and you got Po Damron at the window and they're seeing this, they don't seem pretty astonish that they're like she's able to do this. They seem it's almost like it's Tuesday for them. It's like oh you look at the door again or something to get her back in. It's like if you if I had just seen this

general who I've been you know following for years do something that incredible, I would be beside myself. I would be beside myself right now. Not be like almost look like I'm kind of bored with what's going on. Especially with Billy Lord and that she has like the acting ability of a mop. She was like... Speaking of Billy Lord, answer me a question, guys.

Isn't that Carrie Fisher's daughter in real life? Yes, it is. Did you guys notice the hairdo? The little mini hair buns, yeah. Yeah, the cinnamon buns. She did, she does look a little bit like her. But I notice every time like Billy Lord's delivery is, it's pretty much like she just seems bored throughout the whole entire time.

And like, I've never seen her and anything else besides this and The Force Awakens. Yeah. So, she's on some show called Scream Queens or something, Lan?

She was an American Horror Story cult. I never saw Scream Queens. Okay. Can you confirm this, Brian? I tapped out of both shows. I don't, I don't remember her from Scream Queens. A cult, I kind of remember.

She was, Lance, Evan Peters is a sister or something. Yeah, she's the babysitter. Oh, yeah. You got to kind of go with it, Danny, because if Carrie Fisher, Prince Leia says, put my daughter in the movie, you put her daughter in the movie.

Yeah, you're, you just kind of got to roll with that. There you have it. So where do you guys think her character goes from here, Princess Leia or general? That's a million-dollar question. Yeah, I don't know. I can only assume, I was just talking about this with somebody else before we came online, and it's like the only thing I could we don't have her for episode

nine unfortunately so the only thing I can think of is that episode nine is going to be a bit of a of a time jump like maybe a couple of years and they'll just explain that you know maybe Princess Leia just passed away

right off into the sunset exactly without ever having without ever having to see her again because at least we don't get to see like her actually pass away on screen and it's you know we see that she's already old so a bit of a five year

jump would probably go it's like okay she passed away from old age or whatever okay so now we're even more inspired to follow her lead yeah exactly okay the last probably issue that I had with the movie was

why were they chasing them at 10 miles an hour for like half the movie why didn't they I must have missed something No, they can't explain that. I just didn't understand the science behind it. Okay, so basically, well, that's the thing, too. I never understood the science of they're able to track them through hyperspace.

I was fine with that. It seems kind of weird. But it's fine, but it's like, okay, they say, oh, they could track us through hyperspace. Well, how can they do that? And they don't really explain it to you. Just say, well, they could track us through the dreadnought ship. And it's like, well, how is it still doing it? But they never explain it.

Star Trek would have done a much better job of explaining it. guys. Yeah. The only reason they kind of chased him at half space, well, half speed was because, uh, the,

the rebellion ship was trying to stay out of a specific, they're trying to stay with, out of firing range. Uh-huh. By maintaining a certain speed. And basically it almost seemed like, uh, the first order,

at least the Hux was like, oh, if they're going to do that and we'll just cut down our speed too and we're just, you know, we'll hit them with shots to remind them they're here because eventually they're just going to run out of power and they'll be easy pick. It almost seems like once. again with his his hubris once again with hubris once again with hubris in this movie got the better

of him because we see that at the beginning of the movie where he's kind of like oh look that little uh x-wing thinks it's going to take on a dreadnought yeah that's funny and you know poe goes in and destroys all their uh their cannons yeah and all of a sudden it's not funny anymore yeah yeah i just i understood why because you needed to stretch out the story you needed for finn and rose to do their thing. You needed for Ray to come back. You needed all this to happen. So I understood, and I understood they wanted to break away from the parallel of empire where the Millennium Falcon is just being hunted and hunted. And it's fast-paced. And it's an extremely fast-paced. And they're always trying to find him. And then he gets hidden again. And then he finds him again.

So I, again, to break, like someone said, break away from the parallel. I get that. I just, I didn't think it was a good story plot. It's like, just overtake him and get rid of him. You have beat down a bit. That was the weird part, too, when you're paralleling it to, you know, Empire. You know, the fact that they lose hyper speed, you know, in Empire, it makes Han have to rely on other skills and it's cleverness. You know, whereas this, it's like, no, this is just a slow speed chase.

And it's like, basically all their cleverness is coming like, oh, let's revert power to this or let's try to do this or let's do that. It's like, but it's still just a slow speed chase. know what I'm wrong. That's what it was. Oh, man. Hey, I love the, I love the big message in this movie, though, of like, you know, stay humble, you know. Oh, yes.

Something larger than you, you know, and you got to understand, you know, your place and all of it. But, you know, that hubris really, really gets you. I guess that's a line through all the, all the Star Wars movies, right, Denny? Pretty much. But I really loved it in this because even, you know, Looberus. Luke, when he's training Ray, I loved when he's, like, that first lesson when he's, when he's teaching her about the force, you know, and she's, and her ideas, like, when he asks her for the definition, she's like, it's the power that the Jedi have.

And when he kind of makes her, you know, meditated, she could see that powers within her. And he's telling her, that's, that's the whole point, you know, the, the force does not belong to the Jedi. It belongs to the people. Beautiful. I love it. Yeah, that was great. And that was a good comedy line is like everything you said in that sentence.

was wrong. And he delivered that twice. I love that. That was such, you know what, I really liked the Luke character in here. And do are, are there some things that we disagree with how we envision Luke would be? Yeah. And I'm sure that's what Mark Hamill was talking about when he wrote it. But Mark Hamill, just like he said in your trivia, he took it what was written and he really created that character to something that we can, you know, we can be on board with. Because Denny, I remember telling me, it's like, most people are here, I'm not going to like Luke in here. Just his demeanor and how he is. And it's like, man, you're not the Luke I know.

And he really, you know, beat that down as like, God, fuck this Luke, you know. And even Ray was like done with him. And I really think that goes into Mark Hamill's such underrated, underrated actor. I think he knocked it out of the fucking ballpark on this one. I could understand people's ill will towards this. but they you know it's so tough because a lot of the fans have had this

this preconceived notion of like 30 something years of what they expected Luke to be and you know the fact that Luke is flawed in this movie and he knows it and not only that the flaw is basically something that we've

already seen in Empire because Yoda tells him about it again you know Luke is too you know in empire he has the force vision of Han and Leah dying on Bespin and he feels the need to go and save them. Yeah. You know, and Yoda tells them, you know, their future is not set yet. Focus on the now. And it's the same in this one where, you know, Yoda tells him you're still focused on the horizon again.

You're not focused on what's right in front of your own nose. You know, and this is kind of, you know, Luke saw what could have been with Kyle, with, with Ben Solo and felt he had to act on it. And it wasn't set yet. And the fact that he didn't act on it, the fact that he had a lapse in judgment. And at the last second, he decided not to do it. Yeah, he decided to pull back. But Kylo wakes up and says, okay, it's on. And not only that, it's the shame that he still lives with it after.

Yes. I love that line. He's like, when we finally get the real story about what happened. And Luke is like, I lit my light cyber. And in that moment of clarity, he sees it and when he kind of comes to he sees that you know Kylo is like Ben is now looking at him and he

gives that line of all I saw was a boy who was now disappointed in his master you know because his master had just yeah a scared boy because his master had just failed him right you know and I love that and I love to think that that yes realizes this and this is why he feels like he you know he's not we all

a lot of people went in thinking, oh, Luke went into hiding because the first order beat him down. No, Luke went into hiding because he was disappointed with himself because he had failed his pupil and his pupil had turned to the dark side. Not because his pupil was seduced by Snoke, that was part of it. But the fact that Luke had elapsed in judgment and failed him, pushed Kylo over the edge.

And I think Luke thought he's just going to do more damage, just create more damage if he keeps pursuing and trying, So he basically removed himself from the equation and sort of let the galaxy, you know, fix itself or play out as itself. And cuts himself off from the force, too. Exactly. Exactly. Which why he knew Han didn't die, which at first I thought Luke had a hand in Princess Leia coming back. But, you know, not coming back from the dead, but, you know, rescuing yourself from death.

And then come to find out when he was disconnected, no, that was all her. And I was like, that's what I even liked it more with. her and she tapped in and her fucking stand-al life skills kicked in oh one other thing uh denny just mentioned and super spoiler fucking yodas in this and yes was he practical was that he was awesome it looked very practical it really did and and he was empire yoda he wasn't super serious prequel yoda he was like still in the little comedy for yoda fuck i was cool with you know like like we said there was a lot of comedy in here, maybe a little bit too much in some scenes, but I was fine with Yoda because he's the Yoda that we know and love. And that was a little disappointed. We didn't see Obi-One or even

Anakin, but I'll take what I can get. Actually, their meetup was one of three, one of three scenes that kind of got me a bit misty-eyed. You know, just going back to that, to that old nostalgia with like, like, the first one was when Luke was on the falcon and he sees R2. R2. And R2 shows him. And R2 shows him the hologram of Leia from A New Hope. Oh, that was great. And, you know, Luke has a little comedy line, hey, that's cheating.

That's a cheap shot. It was like a cheap shot. That's what brought him back in. Yes, exactly. And he's watching and you could see it brings him, you know, and then the scene at the end where we kind of see the, quote unquote, Luke and Leia reunion. Oh my God.

I started tearing up just seeing those two together on screen again. And it makes me realize how cheated. Sorry to cut you off you, but it makes me realize how cheated we were to, you know, to not see the full reunion with the original three at all. And now, because we're in spoiler alert,

so super, I'm sorry, episode nine, no Han, no Luke, well, maybe Luke, but definitely no Leia. That's going to be weird, man. there's definitely going to be a Luke as firmly establishes like that last meeting with Leah, he tells us, you know, nobody's ever truly gone. And then he tells, he tells Kylo, if you strike me down, I'm going to be with you always,

just like your father. Oh, that was so great. Great callback. Okay. So Brian and Lance, let's see. Let's see who won. Danny says Luke is going to be killed in this movie. I said he is not going to die.

Who won? because did he really die or did he just evolve and become, I think he evolved become one width of force. I don't think he died. I don't think he died. I still think he died, but he died on his own terms. I kind of wish they hadn't shown him fade out there at the very,

very end. I kind of was hoping he was still there at the island projecting himself. Let me ask you guys this, because I was able to get this on the first viewing. Did you guys really think that Luke Skywalker, Luke Skywalker really was on crate? I did. And I thought these guys fucked up because what's he doing with that lightsaber? He's a he that lightsaber was broken. I was like, uh, oh, we got an error in the movie.

And then when he puts a lightsaber through him and then it shows him just floating there, oh my dude, I lost my fucking shit on that. As much as I wanted to see Luke and Kylo go at it in a fucking fight, just a really nasty. And that's the thing with the prequels that I like about the prequels more than the originals is you get awesome lightsaber fucking fights. You really don't get that in the in the originals. It's the technology. It's a CGI glory.

I get that. And this, Yota, flips. Exactly. But what happened with this, the realization of what he was doing, I'll fucking take it.

I will take it. I thought it was the fucking coolest shit. I absolutely love. That was probably the highlight of movie. It was like, okay, we're going to get to it. It's a good movie.

Then, bam, you get punched right in the face with fucking Luke just doing his, his, his, um, his floating and, you know, his meditating. God, that was so great. I fucking loved it. What, what did you think, Brian?

About, uh, about, uh, about that scene. Yeah. Oh, I loved it. Um, I did, I didn't catch the whole, um, him not being there until. Yeah. But I loved the way he just projected himself and was just stalling just enough time for, for them to find a way out. I really, that was like one of the boats, uh,

Bad-ass scenes in a movie. And really quick, I want to bring up another scene that I thought was badass. Laura Derns, when she went light speed through the ship, my theater went completely silent. Like, they were just amazed. And I didn't know where her character was going to go when you first introduce her. But I like where it ended up and what she did to save everyone. And I just wanted to throw that one out there. yeah the people in the first screening i went to when once uh we and not only that but you

remember like once her ship crashes through the uh through snokes uh dreadnought like everything literally goes silent because they even cut like the sound in the movie yes that was cool you just get that bright light shining and it almost seemed i hate to kind of pair to this it almost it seemed something out of star trek yeah it kind of did it did you did yeah i got it very, this is a very un-star Wars-like movie. It's un-Star Wars, but yet very Star Wars at the same time. Yes.

Completely different pace from it, and it's so odd that it's part of the original Star Wars stories. It's not like a solo. It's not like a Rogue One where it's offset, and those are kind of expected to be a little bit different. To me, Rogue One kind of fits more into the mold of the trilogies than

this one. I'm not saying that's a bad thing either. It's a different take, and for some of the things, I did love because you thought it was going one way, goes the other way. But yeah, definitely, oh, God, that final scene, very parallel to Hoff, of course. And I like how Poe caught on to Luke, Lenny U.S. said that, or as a Brian that said that Luke was delaying and Poe caught on.

I was like, hey, I know what he's fucking doing. Let's get out of here. Follow the ice dogs and let's get to fuck out. That's one of the things I even loved about this movie. Well, one thing that kind of we establish at the end of this movie is that you know, when Luke tells Kylo, you know, the rebellion is not going to die today.

The rebellion's going to be reborn. The war's just begun. Just getting started. And there's, I will not be the last Jedi. We get, this is established who it is now because at the end of this movie, we see that Ray is not, is now the next big Jedi. But not only that, we see

Po grow into the leader. Yeah. That's Leah wants him to be. She sees the potential. She knows that Poe Damron could be like the next leader of the rebellion. The next general. But he's just too hot-headed at first to realize it himself. And it's even nice that even Admiral Holdo sees it herself too,

but she just kind of can't really let him know about it now because they're playing things too close to the chest. Correct. Correct. And he has to learn that lesson from her, from not just her. He has to learn it himself. Yes, exactly. Learn from the actions. Learn from his teachers. Yep. All right, guys. Well, we've still got three more movies to cover because, of course, we're recording our next week's episode as well. So just one more thing before we go, because I had to point this out, I was when when Luke finally comes back on screen and he's talking to Lain and he pulls down his hood, that was like the first telling sign that's like, okay, that's not him.

because I just leaned over to my friend Jeff and I was like, why the hell did Luke cut his hair? Why is it not gray? Why is it not gray? Exactly. It's like, I didn't even notice that.

Well, there was three things because when I saw that, it was like, it was so weird. And I leaned over, when I told him that, I told my friend Jeff, it's like, I hope he's not a ghost. I hope he hasn't been a ghost this whole entire time.

Yeah, because now that you're thinking about it, he was Luke from the, the Kylo Ren flashbacks. Exactly. And then when we see him draw his lightsaber, it's the exact same lightsaber. We saw it destroyed on the dreadnought. And here's the other little thing. I noticed it last night when I was watching.

So when they're battling on crate, every time somebody touches the white salt, we see the red underneath, right? Yes. During their battle, we get to see their footwork. And they do a close-up on Kylo Ren when he does it. He leads a long red streak. Yes. How did you mention it?

When Luke does it, that there's nothing there. It's nothing there. Oh, fuck. Man, you're blowing my mind, dude. And you know what really threw me off about could it be the ghost? Because he looked like when he was fighting with Kylo Ren. But when he was that, he was wearing his white Jedi robes.

And here he was wearing the black outfit. Yeah. So it's not like, oh, like you said, it was him from the past, but his clothes were different. And his lightsaber, because he had his Jedi lightsaber then when he, when he almost killed Kyleo when he was he had his his Jedi lightsaber yeah yeah and here he had his father's lightsaber he had his black Jedi outfit out so it was really that I guess that's why I didn't connect it I just thought

he changed his clothes and they made an error by giving the wrong lightsaber it also adds another layer now because I just like literally thought of it that that Kylo is just so blinded with rage that he doesn't realize that his uncle is using the exact same lightsaber that just was destroyed in his battle with Ray. By the way, my favorite scene in the movie, by the way, because even on the third time,

still made me laugh was that scene where Hux was just about to kill Kylo until Kylo stirred and you have to kind of put his gun away. It was such a great little chicken shit heel in this movie. Man, this movie needs a second viewing like right now. It does. I'm going to increase my rating. I'm giving it a nine on ten now. There you go, man.

Yes. I may jump it up to eight, guys. See, after this talk, man. Yeah, I think I might jump it up to an eight. Real quick, just one scene that I absolutely loved. Fucking Chewy, just blowing that door open. Basically, Chewy's like, stop being a kid. Let's go.

You know, like, Chewy, what are you doing here? I love that scene. Don't forget the scene with the porks, too. When Chewy's about to have supper. That was a comedy band title. I was cool with that. Yeah. Those favorite characters.

The boy. Mine? Yeah. They did look delicious, though. You know, you can't blame Chewy. I will agree that when it was cooked, oh, man, I was getting hungry. That was a pretty funny scene. Okay.

Sorry, guys. Okay. On that, on that note, as always, we want to thank you guys for listening to another episode of the horror returns. We would love to hear your feedback and ideas. You know, where to reach us. You know, where to find us on Facebook. Denny, talk about after midnight a little bit, man. The After Midnight podcast.

It's a podcast all about stories of the supernatural, the paranormal, the unexplained conspiracy theories and unsolved mysteries were available on iTunes, Stitcher, and Beyond Pod. Go back and listen to last week's episode where it's actually Jay Black and myself. We'd like to do movie commentaries every once in a while. And this one was a little bit for myself as we were getting ready for Star Wars and we decided to do the Force Awakens movie commentary. if you stay tuned for this upcoming week closer to Christmas we'll actually have an episode on the Shroud of Turin with Louis Salgado and after that in the new year we got some stuff cooking

hopefully we'll be tackling a lot more controversial conspiracies especially ones that have been happening lately so check us out there and go back and listen to our other episodes with Lance where we talk about Disney Urban Legends the ghost of the San Antonio Railway, the creeper in the New York apartment, and what was the other episode we did? I think we did three of them.

Well, we keep meaning to do a Star Trek episode, but we haven't gotten it off the ground yet, man. Well, that's still in the planning stages, because I've been doing a lot of research on a lot of stuff and trying to get a lot more stuff off the ground. So hopefully we'll be able to do a lot more of this in the new year. Yeah, I think the big one was the, the Disney episode. The first one we did with the local San Antonio stuff was fun, but the Disney, we need to revisit that one, man. We will eventually sometime soon because I've been finding a lot more stuff on Disney as well. And creepy stuff about Disney doesn't include it buying out 21st Century Fox

this week either. Oh shit. That's another story. Jay, you got anything else going on you want to talk about before we sign off and get ready to record next week's? No, nope. I'm good. Okay. I think Yoda's here, though, right? He may be. I saw him floating around somewhere. All right. Well, until the horror returns again? Night good.