The Kristian Harloff Show - Should Lost Be Rebooted? with Dominic Monaghan

Episode Date: February 7, 2022

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Don't pay too much for car insurance. Drivers who switch and save could save hundreds. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates, potential savings will vary. What's going on? Everybody, welcome back to Big Thing. I'm pumped, man. I haven't had a chance to talk to Dominic Monaghan since shit when I was doing Collider Live.

And then Collider, we did one-on-one with Christian Harloff. And he came in and we talked. And it was funny because he had brought up last time about, I had done a Star Wars show. He knew I did a Star Wars. He's like, next time we need to talk to Star Wars. And then we were going to book it and he gets booked in episode nine. And we never got a shot to, we never talked about it since.

So he's coming on. And we're pretty excited. I'm excited about it too because he has a movie that's out right now. It's called Last Looks. It's out in the theaters and you guys can check it out. But we're going to talk to him about that. What he's been up to. I'm just going to shoot the shit, man.

You know how it goes. But before we do that, I need everybody to show a little bit of class, all right? Just show a little bit of class and subscribe. Hit that top left button or notifications. And just show an ounce. That's what we're asking for here. Patreon, you know how it works. Sign up for it, Sien Live.

We get three of them per month right now. And don't forget about podcasts. It is Apple Podcasts. It is Spotify. It is wherever podcasts are found. You know how it works. Let's do it. No more me talking.

I want to talk to Dominic Monaghan. Let's do it. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to the big thing. All right, as I mentioned, the last time I talked to him, a little while ago we geeked out. Let's kick out again. It's Dominic Manahan.

What up, dude? What up, man. How are you, where are you right now? I'm in Los Angeles. Oh, you were. Okay. I thought you were out of town. You were just out of town for a while. Yeah, I was. I was in Dublin for about five months making a show. And then I went to Costa Rica for, let me see if I'm bringing this chair up. I went to Costa Rica for Christmas and New Year's surfing, hanging out. And now I'm back. That's the way to do it. That's the way to do it. You're working on a movie I haven't had a chance to see yet, but it looks awesome. Last looks. your role looks pretty fun man tell me about it yeah i um that was kind of what was that two or three days shoot for me something like that it happens sometimes now in my uh in my career

where we'll just kind of get a very last minute kind of like hey this thing's happening they're shooting next week they asked about your availability uh do you want to do it i've kind of I mean, obviously I know of Charlie Hunnam. And we've kind of bumped into each other a couple of times over the years, not in any way friends, but always been kind of friendly with each other. And I've liked what he's done. And they were like, it's a Charlie Hunnam thing. It's shooting Atlanta.

Are you free? And I was like, yeah, let's do it. And I got to kind of play a slightly outrageously dressed, outrageously acting lawyer. you know honestly I've not seen the movie either but I don't think I've seen anything that I've done for probably I don't know 15 years or so so it's not that uncommon you know is that something I mean you hear a lot of a lot of performers are that way right they do a thing they know what they did and they don't want to watch it some people for different reasons do you do it because you don't because you did it you know the material you're out or you just don't like watching yourself it's a combination of all those things

really. When I do it, I'm 100% committed to the day and to the scene and to the moment. So I don't necessarily feel like I need to squeeze any more juice out of that. Whenever I've been happy with what I've done at work, I think it's only really 65% happy is absolutely delighted, you know, because it's, it's an artistic form and it's always, you can always improve, you can always try something else you can always do better because you're never finished with that type of thing so when i'm on on the day if i give myself whatever a b plus or an a minus if i watch it it always slips back down to like a c minus or a d plus because you can pick holes in it so also also maybe a slightly ego maniacal thing of like why are you now choosing to sit and watch yourself

do stuff. Like it just, I don't know how much that serves me, really, you know? Yeah, I get it. I get it also because I think for me doing stand-up comedy is, was where I started, where I, where I lived,

the comedy store. And I, and I remember recently, because I'd gotten back up at stage and in order to do so, I was watching stuff from like 99. And I was like, that is just atrocious. You're just like,

oh, how did anybody even let me into a club when I was doing stuff like that? So I absolutely get it. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure I would feel that way about my earlier work for sure. It's interesting because I can watch myself a little easier. You know, I did a nature show that was me. Yeah, I watch me.

I do a podcast every week. We have to give notes on that podcast. I can watch me being me and not feel so strange about it, but me play in a performance. I don't know. I'm just not that interested in you know. That's fair. I mean, I think that's more than fair.

And it's like you said, and it's, and it's no disrespect to it. but it's your work, right? You've done your job. You do what you do, and it's, it's off to the next gig. But what I will say about that, because you're, you're kind of a gig like myself, and whether it's, whether it's games or whether it's Star Wars, or whether it is, I remember last time you came on, before you even left, you were supposed to leave and we wound up talking about Star Wars for, I think, an hour before you even got out the door. So, but are you that way? Were you that way about Lord of the Rings going into it? Because I asked that, because they have the new show coming out.

Is that something that interest you? You're like, no, same thing. the past and now moving on other stuff? I mean, I'll certainly watch the, have a look at the new show, and if it's good, I'll continue to watch it. Of course, it's a mythology that I like, and I'm intrigued to see what they do. Going into the original trilogy, the Peter Jackson trilogy of Lord the Rings, I wouldn't say I was as much of a geek about it as maybe I became, but it was something that I knew. My dad had read the books when he was younger, when we were traveling backwards and forward,

on road trips. We would listen invariably to the Hobbit radio tapes, to the Lord of the Rings radio tapes. So we knew about Gandalf and we knew about Frodo and Bilbo and people like that. As soon as I got involved with the books, obviously being around, being immersed in that mythology, got you to a place where I wouldn't necessarily say that I'm an expert now, but if I was doing a pub quiz and the subject was Lord of the Rings, I would probably say to most of the people in the party, okay, you know, this is this is more in my wheelhouse than it will be for most people. Just simply from osmosis, from being around it, you know, we, we were consistently challenged to read the books and delve into the books, which we did, but also like artwork and,

and, you know, all the other, the Silmarillion and the songs and the poems and all that kind of stuff. I'm okay. We're actually having a Lord of the Rings expert on my podcast, the friendship on you next week and I want to see if we can stump him with our questions because he claims to be one of the best Lutherings experts on the planet. So we want to see if we can find questions that he can't answer. Oh, dude, I would love to listen to that. I want to, yeah, I want to learn more about your podcast actually too. And have you ever had, did you have Colbert on there yet?

We had Colbert on, yeah. Okay, you're going to have to, yeah, for sure. I got to listen. I got to listen. I got to listen. So let's just, like I said, like it was very similar to the last time you're on, what's ever interesting. I want to hear about it. Tell me about the podcast. When did you start up? Did you have,

how long have you had the podcast? We've been doing the podcast now for about a year or so. It's called a friend Spani, myself and Billy Boyd. I've been a podcast fan, excuse me, probably since kind of the heydays of Ricky Javas' podcast, you know, kind of mid-90s to late 90s type thing. I'd been asking Billy for a long time to start listening to podcast, to get into it, because I thought it was a medium that we could work in. And then our friend Michael Rosenbaum wanted me to do his podcast for, I think, the third time. And I said, well, what if I come on with Billy Boyd? And he liked that idea.

So Billy and I came on. And then we asked Rosie if he could keep his studio space open for an extra hour. And we could record a pilot episode of the podcast, which we did, shot that around, sold it. I think we're getting close to the 50th episode or something like that. Oh, dude, I didn't see, I'm glad I had you on. I'm gonna, you got a new listener. I'll be, I love that. Oh, dude, yeah, for sure.

I love you guys. And the fact that, you know, what's funny also is that we've been shooting for our, the movie trivia show that we do. We, um, we shot at, um, the scum and villainy canteen. And I know you guys were in there at one point. And, and that's why I think that I started to hear mumblings about stuff like that. You guys were doing something. And I'm glad now that I know exactly.

what it is. So that's awesome, man. So you had Colbertar on, you guys are just doing your thing. But blending in Star Wars and Lord of the Rings for a second, I got to ask you a question. Do you, do you talk to do you keep in touch with Peter Jackson at all? Yeah, yeah. I mean, obviously when Get Back came out,

Pete and I are massive Beatles fans obviously. Oh, yeah. Pete and I went backwards and forwards via email about Get Back. You know, we obviously send each other Christmas messages and send each other emails to see how we do it. He's obviously very busy and there's times where he's so busy that you don't tend to hear too much back from him.

But he always knew that I was a massive Beatles fan because we talked about it back in New Zealand. So when Get Back was on its way, we started talking a little bit more. Yeah. It was a phenomenal, phenomenal. I mean, I was, it was so good. It was so good. But the reason I bring him up is that I guess you just answer the question is how busy is, but why is he not doing Star Wars with TV going on right now and with a full series?

I would die to see a Peter Jackson series. Yeah, I would love that too. He's a master filmmaker and he could make anything great. I don't know. I wouldn't want to put words in Peter's mouth because I don't know his feeling. I just wonder if maybe over the last few years of him doing documentaries, which, you know, he did, they shall not grow old and then he did get back. I wonder if maybe Peter thinks, you know, I can work from my home.

I can go into a studio. I can, you know, kind of not need to travel so much. I don't need to be on set. I don't need to be pulling crazy hours. I mean, you know, Peter Jackson is not old by any means, but he's not a spring chicken anymore. I just wonder if maybe 12 weeks on a movie set for him nowadays, he might think, well, why would I do that?

What's the benefit of that? It's true. And he also, you know, a lot of directors or artists in general try their whole careers to do with that guy did like that with the movies that you guys made and everything he did in the empire that he built wet out and everything that he was able to do so you're right i mean if he wanted to he could sit back i just think creatively i always wanted i always envision because i know there was one point he was going to do like a halo series produced or something whatever he was going to do and i remember just

not being so excited to see that just in producing like district nine and i'm like oh man what would a star wars like series look like from peter jackson so maybe it's a pipe dream but it's just something that I would love to say. Yeah. Yeah, maybe at some point in the future, who knows? Who knows? Who knows? But speaking of Star Wars TV, I mentioned, as we were going over some stuff in the, before we went on the air, Book of Boba Fett, Mandalorian, you haven't been watching Book of Bobafet yet, but did you watch Mandalorian? I watched Mandalorian. I watch Mandalorian. Mandeloran is the greatest example of a TV show where I would watch it and think,

almost every episode I'd think, oh, okay, this episode's okay, but it's not as good as last week. And then in the last like 90 seconds of that episode, they do something where you think, oh, it's the best episode of the season. Right. And then you go, okay, but they can't be that. And then you come into the next episode and you go, well, okay, it's not going to be as good as last week.

And then the last 90 seconds, they do something else. So, yeah, I was all in on the Mandalorian, love the whole vibe, the whole design of it, bringing back characters that we know that are canon. Yeah, I loved it. It was, so when I was doing that Star Wars show on Collider, and this is, and this is no offense to any of you guys who made the movies, but I had said it's before the movies that even come out.

I said, I'll watch a Star Wars movie every time it comes out. No problem. But I look, I'm going to be looking forward to TV more so for Star Wars than movies. And everybody thought it was crazy. They said, why? Why would you? There's so many different reasons. And I wonder how you feel as, as an actor inside of this, this reasoning, too,

is that you get to spend so much more time with the characters. You get to develop more as far as trying to cram in so much more so much mythology in two hours or two hours and 15 minutes and all the stuff that you have to do and trying to connect it to another director's vision and all that as opposed to one plan all the way through and if you don't like an episode as opposed if you don't like one movie you got to sit there for two or three years and you got to hear about it forever as opposed to one week and like you just said I don't like that episode the next week you just knocked you off your couch and you just forgot about the other one yeah I mean I love that too you know I I I

obviously have had great opportunities in television and in movies. I think it's ludicrous when you hear from actors that say, you know, they come off a successful TV show and they say, I'm never doing TV again, I'm only doing movies. And you think, why would you even say that? Why would you put yourself into a headspace where you've taken half of the cake off the table, you know? Television's extraordinary.

It does incredible things. Excuse me. My favorite kind of media that's out there right now, whether it's, games or movies or TV or any art form. My favorite thing out there right now is Euphoria, which plays on HBO, you know, and that's TV. So TV can do really powerful things. And like you said, you get to spend so much more time

with these characters that you start to really love. And instead of, you know, two hours in a movie, you might get to spend 8, 10, 12, 22 hours with these characters. It's pretty. We know there's nothing like the feeling of riding a motorcycle with your crew on the open road. It's a primal wild freedom. A feeling that would be impossible to recreate on the radio. Until now, hit it, sound effects guy.

Hmm, no. You know, we really lost a stride at the end there. Get 24-7 roadside assistance with Progressive, America's number one motorcycle insurer. Progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates, roadside assistance subject to policy terms and limits and may require comprehensive coverage. It's great, and I think that that's, I think also streaming, obviously, has changed that and made that so much different because directors aren't and storywriters and actors. They're not as handcuffed as they were in the past with television. I mean, this has been some great television that was on network for sure.

And you are a perfect example of that with Lost and what you guys were able to do with that series. But that was so kind of ahead of its time in general of what Lost was able to do. Do you ever think, though, looking back at how streaming has changed, like how what you got, what Lost maybe could have done, I mean, it did so much anyway, but what it could maybe more, less limits from like network if it was on streaming nowadays. Yeah. And, you know, all of those type of things. Like, you know, if social media was around when we did the Lord of the Rings and then

lost, I would have 25, 30 million followers on Instagram. Yeah. I've not even got half a million followers on Instagram because people like, wait, the guy from lost, the guy from Lord the Rings, that was 20 years ago. That was 15 years ago. So obviously it does change things. I think maybe if Lost was streaming, they'd be able to do a few more of the edgier things. We were tied into a network.

I think Damon did the best that you could to try and make it as cutting edge and daring and edgy as possible. But that's the other thing about television specifically is things move on so fast because there's so much content. It's being dropped consistently all the time that it's very easy. to look back at, you know, two years ago of television and think, oh, that's past safe now. You know, that's kind of, it's become cliche. Like, it's become way too safe. So everything's on fast forward nowadays with the way that we get our media. Yeah, it's true.

Do you, speaking of, and with loss and with streaming, it seems to be we're in a phase, we always go through phases in the industry, right? Whether it's 3D or remakes. Right now it seems to be like a nostalgia thing is the big thing that's going around, whether it's no way home or there's a lot of these movies are coming, and TV shows are nostalgia. Cobra Kai is an example, right? You think you're going to get that phone call about Lost?

They're going to want to do this thing again and bring it back to streaming to see what they can do? I mean, I don't think they would bring back any of the original cast or maybe one or two. If I had my Druthers, then I wasn't one of the producers of Lost, and it's funny because people asked me that. all the time. I do this, I do this Q&A on Instagram and people say, bring back last, bring back last. And I say, that's like asking Huckleberry Finn for Mark Twain to write new books. You know, I'm a fictional character. I have nothing to do that. But I think they should reboot it. I think they should have the same island vibe. They should have an isolated island, a plane crash or a ship that capsizes.

people are all locked together and it's different personality traits but in terms of original cast I mean by the time they would reboot it again some people I would argue would be too old to actually work in those roles again and I think a lot of people would say no

I personally would probably say no I mean I don't know it's like lost is like playing in a football game and scoring a hat trick. And you know, you've had your best game ever. You've performed at a high level.

Everyone's seen you perform at that high level. And you've done a good job. And then 10 years later, that team call you up and say, do you want to come play again? And you think, I'm going to ruin that entire legacy by being involved with something that's diluted. It's not as good. So for me, you know, I would never do a Lord of the Rings thing again.

I would never do Lost again. It's just as an act as a repeat. How about Star Wars? How about Star Wars though? Well, maybe with Star Wars. I might be a little bit different because the thing with Lord the Rings is that story's been told. You know, Mary retires in the Shire. He has some kids and he does his thing.

And with Lost, you know, I mean, I don't think it's really a spoiler alert anymore because Lost was 15 years ago. But, you know, the Charlie story's done with the character that I played in Star Wars. Beaumont, Kinn, you really didn't know anything about him. And his backstory is really fun. He's a highly intelligent codebreaker, broke away from his family that did not want him to go to university and join the Rebel Alliance.

He did it. He left the universities with the highest honors from anyone else in that year, joined the Rebel Alliance, spoke a whole bunch of different languages, is one of the best code breakers for the Rebel Alliance. So I think there's, I think there's great talk stories to tell with Beaumont.

So I'd be interested in that phone call happening. But honestly, Kristen, I don't think that's happening. I think in the climate that we're in nowadays, I'm not sure if they're telling stories of mid-40-year-old white men. I think they're telling stories of, quite rightly, females and people of different ethnicities, you know. It doesn't mean that that character can't show up in a series, though. And so I don't disagree with you.

I think there are new ways, the new things are going to be telling even look like the acolyte series that has been announced, right? There's going to be something very different about that series in general. But I'm glad you brought that up, though, because the backstory that you said right away, and that goes into that conversation we had about how much more time you'd have to develop and knowing your past work and what you've done, you know that you're going to be able to, just look at what the evolution of like Charlie and what you learned about Charlie throughout various episodes of television.

That's the same thing you would learn with Beaumont. And there's a slight little moment in Rise of Skywalker that you see a bit of him. And he's like a good guy. Like, Chui's all bummed out. He's like, come on, man, we need you. Get it. And it's like, it's that motivational thing that he's got. And I'm like, I'll be honest with you.

You don't have to say it. I was bummed. I thought you were going to be a night of Wren. I think they should have used you more personally. I thought you were going to be. When I was talking to you, I said, they're going to use doubt. I was doing predictions of everything I thought you were going to do. And I was like, it was good.

the role, but I wanted to see him do so much more, and I would love to see you in a series. Well, thank you, Kirstie. I mean, look, I always want to work more in projects. I'm not sure if directors and producers feel the same ways as me, but I want to be in every scene. I want to affect every storyline. We shot more than was used. Obviously, I've been friends with JJ for a long time. When JJ was editing those films, you know, he called me up and said, listen, you know, this is a story where we're trying to conclude the stories of Daisy's character, John's character, Oscar's character, you know, trying to put a bow on what's happening with Chewy and C3Po and R2D2.

And he said, unfortunately, there are quite a few things that you did that are not going to make it into the Final Cup. Of course I understood that. I just wanted to be involved. It's funny because when you and I did that your podcast back in the day, I already knew that I was doing Star Wars, but I couldn't say anything. So we were sat there talking and I remember saying to you,

the next time I see you, we should chat a little bit more about Star Wars and I knew we can then chat about me doing Star Wars. I know because I think I emailed you afterwards too because there was the, it was, I think a week later when it was announced. And I'm like, oh man, that's why we were talking about it for sure. And we never got a chance to just geek out about it. But you said something to me on that show that always that I remember

and it was how you got into acting and what you did and when your dad took, you to see Raiders of the Lost Ark and seeing Harrison Ford and looking at him and saying, you know, hey, how come Hans Solo's playing Harrison Ford and your dad going as an actor and it clicking in? Like all of that was just there's there's something about that and there's something about those movies and there's something about in general like the, just the love of, I don't know, it's, I don't know, maybe I'm just a nostalgia. I'm turning into, I'm back of my day, but there's just something about 80s movies to me that just play, man. I show my daughter. My daughter is

10 years old and I'm showing her 80s movies and she's got and and her first concert is Rod Stewart for God's sake. Everybody else is going to see. Everyone else is going to see Taylor Swift and this kid's seven. What was your first concert? Rod Stewart. For me, I like that. That's phenomenal for her. Who knows? Yeah, I mean, look, I think maybe there's an element of nostalgia in there too. Like you said, I grew up same as you. I'm sure, Raised of the Lost Dark and Beverly Hills, and Goonies and Labyrinth and Dark Crystal. and obviously Star Wars was almost like a fulcrum. It was almost in its own group, Star Wars.

You had all these other things going on, but you always had the backdrop of a New Hope, Empire and Jedi. It's the reason I became an actor. Probably not my favorite movies, although certainly kind of in my top 10 movies of all time, but they're certainly the most influential movies because they put me on this path of being an actor. So I'd been giving JJ a hard time about it,

lightheartedly for years. And then, you know, he just kind of said, look, I think there's a way that we can do this. You know, it might not be exactly what you want. You might not be, you know, front row center, but you'll still get a chance to come play in the sandpit. And I said, you know, that's going to be the best crack of the whip that I'm going to get.

Like you said, I had tiny little moments with chewy, little moments with C3PO, little moments with R2. You know, I got a chance to be on those sets. and life moves fast, you know. I could have said to JJ, thanks so much for the opportunity, but I, you know, I would rather wait and do something

that's a little bit more chunky and then 20 years go by and you're done and you did not get a chance to play in Star Wars Galaxy. So I'm so happy that it worked out the way it did. Yeah, it's the gamble. And like you said, being that kid and walking in there, I'm sure it was very surreal looking around and seeing the Falcon and seeing all this stuff

and just be in there. I can only imagine. And, you know, there's just, just being part of the lore, and you can say I'm part of the Star Wars universe. So I completely understand that for sure. But, you know, Star Wars being the sci-fi fantasy, like Mecca, the, like the top, the top thing everyone strives for. There's also science, like, I'm a big science fiction fan.

I just had this whole conversation released on a show about like parallel universes and things have fascinated me. But the science fiction, what really most recently blew. me away. I'm not a, I'm not a massive animation fan. I like animation, but I'm not going to go out of my way to watch unless I hear some great things. You had mentioned before we start shooting that you are playing like League of Legends. And right away, what I, the, why I'm familiar with that at all is because of Arcane. And dude, this series blew me away. I, you talk about storytelling and just emotion and what a night. And this is, be some spoilers for some people if you didn't see it.

just to, if you, I'll put a time code and then you can move on, but I've already done on spoiler talk. And I know that, that Dom has watched it before. So we want to talk about it. But man, those first two episodes when they really tease the two sisters and you look like you're going into that time period. And then that the moment happens and then you shift into another time. I was like, I couldn't stop watching it. Yeah. No, it was, it was brilliant.

I remember saying to someone at the end of this year that it was my favorite animated show of the year. And then I stopped myself and I was like, actually, I think it was. was my favorite show of last year, period. Awesome. It was so good. Well, I mean, obviously you said that you don't play League of Legends. I don't think it's necessary that you need to play League Legends to enjoy Arcane because you obviously did. But what's really fun if you play League of Legends is the sheer amount of Easter egg vibes that they're throwing out there for the game players.

And also, you come into that situation, knowing who Jinks ultimately is in the game, who Vi is in the game, how they behave their gameplay style, all that kind of stuff. So even though it starts as powder, you think, okay, powder's going to become jinx. You can kind of see how they're building this character to get into these places. You know, same in Star Wars. The first time a character picks up their iconic weapon and you realize they've created a relationship with it. I was the same as you.

I thought Arcane was extraordinary. The animation style was so beautiful. They switch up the style great. the score is incredible the character development when i went to costa rica went on my own for christmas and uh i gave myself the treat which is that if i had a surfing session that i thought demanded a reward i would go back to my room and watch an episode of our king there's only eight so uh that's how much i loved it but yeah it was incredible billy boyd and i who i do the french squadron your podcast with he and i both went to the riot campus recently and we got a chance to kind of

them a few spoilers and questions about season two of arcane and uh and that's on that's on one of your podcast no no we just went on our own we talk about it a little bit on our podcast but obviously we were told to not reveal any spoilers but we did ask them a lot about riot and uh about arcane and the fact that they set the bar so high and they said look you know season two we're going to try and keep at that same level i can't wait for season two the animation i'm glad you brought up it it was mind-blowing and what to remind me of you know when you're walking around Comic-Con and like you just get these amazing artists who who paint these pictures and you're like oh man I wish I could see that like in animation you never see it that was arcane yeah those the things that just pop off the screen and it's just

you can't believe that it's moving and I show my my brother who I told about he didn't he had never heard of it he's not a gamer he just he's like what is it and I and I and he trusts my opinion on it and he was just hooked from start to finish it's it's just brilliant storytelling I love it too. There's a huge amount of love and affection for the game and everything else that they create at Riot. And I think that's what happened with the people creating arcane. These are people that play the game. They love the game. It's kind of their ride-or-die game.

And it shows in the final product. Yeah, I thought it was incredible. You said you were shooting a show. What show were you shooting while you were out? Can you talk about it yet or not yet? Yeah, yeah. I was doing a show called Moonhaven based on the moon. in the future where Earth has become kind of an uninhabitable place.

So they have a community of people on the moon who are all very cool and groovy. Everyone looks after each other. Everyone's kind of evolved in that way. And then suddenly a murder takes place, which has not happened for generations on the moon. And I'm a detective that has never needed to solve anything like a murder. I bring cats down from trees and help hold women across the road. So it spins the whole moon on its axis a little bit.

And yeah, it's a fun show. All based in Dublin, but obviously the place that it is actually based will be the moon. Be the moon. And do you know when release date and stuff for that yet or not yet? No, not yet. It's AMC. Oh, cool. AMC are building their own streaming library, as all of these networks are.

So AMC Plus will be out soon. I would think it would probably be coming around the early part of the summer, maybe June or July, we still don't know yet. It seems like there's a shit ton more opportunities now because there's so much stuff, whether it's Netflix, Disney Plus, HBO Max, all these things. Do you find this act that there's a lot more auditions, you know, opportunities, things that have been popping up more so than, say, 10 years ago? I certainly think there's more projects. I'm in an interesting spot really, Christian, because like I have to, be mindful of the quality control, whatever I think that might be for me, which puts me in a place of, unfortunately, not being able to do everything that's out there. So, you know, I do think there's more projects because like you said, it used to be network television and then movies. Nowadays,

it's network television, all of these streaming services and then movies. So I do think actors can go to work if they don't necessarily have a high level of quality control of what they want to do. The thing with me, which is always a challenge, is if I do something, I have to be conscious of the fact that, well, how many people said no to this before I said yes? Am I the first person that they've come to and said, we really like you, we want to offer you this thing? That seems quite attractive. But if 12 people have turned it down and then I do it, why would I do it? So it's a strange thing as the journey of an actor, I mean, everyone's at different places, but the real challenge for me now is I would love to work all the time.

I mean, I'd like to be on set 300 days of the year, take two month-long breaks at the start of the year and the end of the year, and that would be my entire career. Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that because the stuff that I need to do is few and far between, and I need to be mindful of protecting the back catalog, you know? Of course, because, and look, you've done it right so far, man. I mean, look at this stuff that you, I mean, your resume alone from whether it was working in, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Lost, Marvel movies. I mean, you've got it, you've got it in your rep, and that's, and that's why you, your resume, and that's why you can do exactly what you're talking about. I've done this, this, this, and this.

And I think you've, you've gone on you did your own nature show. You have your own podcast now. Like, putting those, it seems like you have continuously, you know what you do and you know how to kind of map it out and plan it. I'm sure that a lot of it's frustrating sometimes, but I'm sure that there's also, do you, so recently, the, the, the, the reason I say that I do the same thing, right? I'll have, I had an idea recently and I was like, oh, man, I was, it was kind of in a bummed place.

And I didn't know. I was like, shit's not going the way I wanted it to go. And I said, well, just stop worrying about it and know what you want to do. Take your moment. And something popped in my head recently. It came up with an idea and it changed my whole entire focus. And I think that you got to have that, that roadmap, right, in order to know exactly what you're comfortable with. And I think it comes with age, too, as you, as you know yourself better.

Yeah. I think most actors, certainly myself included, are a little bit more angsty in their 20s than they are in their 30s. There's also so much of this business that you just cannot control. You know, there's nothing you can do. You can be the best actor for that role, but you're two inches smaller, and it just doesn't work with their lead actress or their lead actor, you know.

So there's a lot that you just have to let go of. I think the journey for actors, nowadays in the modern world as being able to diversify like you had said, you can have a podcast, you can have a nature show, there's certain things that you can put a little bit more of your footprint onto

and it gives you the control that maybe you don't have in your acting career, you know, but I think we all get frustrated. I mean, DiCaprio is probably at the top of his game in terms of the acting world. I'm sure DiCaprio comes into his office and chats with his team and says, you know, this is really annoying, why can't this

happen? And I need to do this and need to do that. You know, I think it's just natural in our career to fall short of the goals that we have good intentions to try and hit. But at the end of the day, being happy yourself is the key because no one can take that thing away from you. I think that's what I struggled within my 20s. I was like, well, if I'm working on something I love, then I'm happy. And that's something that you can't control. So you need to be happy. And then if you end up doing something you love, hey, it's a bonus.

Right. Like it adds to the happiness, but it's not, it shouldn't be the one driving. And I, I agree with you 100%. Speaking of that, like what, so, so you mentioned surfing a handful of times. You mentioned League of Legends. You mentioned these things. Is that, so when you want to just chill and you want to just, you know, you go out to the beach, you surf, I mean, that's what everybody says who's in surfing.

It's just a very different kind of Zen experience that it can be frustrating, honestly. But it's, so is that, is that for you primarily what you do? You go out and you surf to kind of clear your head? I do like surfing, yeah. I mean, going on surfing holidays. I probably prefer, to be honest, than surfing in L.A. I live on the northeast side of L.A., so it's about 40, maybe even a 45-minute drive to get to the ocean.

If you get there any time after 7 or 8 in the morning, it's busy. It's a tough place to park. The ocean's not great. I would probably rather wait and go surfing, you know, to Costa Rica, to Mexico, to places that are much more chill, Hawaii, or something like that. I'm close to finishing off a scuba diving qualification that I've been doing for a couple of years. It takes a lot of stuff. It's a dive master qualification.

So you have to volunteer at classes and do a whole bunch of rescue divers stuff and CPR stuff. So finishing that. I mean, a normal good day for me when I'm not working in terms of being on set. You know, I like to wake me in the morning, a little meditation. And then I have a relatively big garden, which always needs a little bit of. care and attention before it gets hot in LA. So between the hours of, you know, seven and maybe nine in the morning, I might go pick up around my garden.

Then I'll go to the gym, do some jobs, do some chores, buy some food, come home, make sure my house is all kind of taking care of, play some league of legends if I've got friends around. And then the great thing, like we said, with all of these streaming services, is there's usually something about to drop or something you've not seen, something that you have to catch up on. So like I said, I mean, I love Euphoria so much that I try and have a Euphoria episode in the bank at all times. So I've got less Sundays episode sat there waiting for me.

Maybe I'll watch it tonight. It just depends. But that one scares me. And it scares me because I have two daughters. And all I hear is, if you got daughters, be careful. And I love Zendaya. I think she's great. I think she's great.

I just don't know. I don't know if I can get into that one. Not because I don't think it's a great show. I hear phenomenal things. It's just there are certain, like I mentioned, especially over the last two years, I wanted some more feel-good stuff. That's why I love COBRA-Ki. Like, I can't get enough of a COBRAC.

Have you watched it yet? Yeah, I'm saying that. I'm saying that there was joy. I love it. It gets such a kick out of it. And I think that Williams Zapka is just on another level with this comedy right now. But so like those types of things that I love. And like I mentioned, Arcane, I got into, and there's some, a few things.

I've been watching because we've been doing a rewatch series for this channel and we just die to watch Batman and Robin last night. Oh. Brutal. Yeah. That's that's the only film that I walked out of the cinema in my entire life. I was just like, it's brutal. It's and I remember it being bad when I saw it. I haven't seen it in 20

years or whatever it was and I remember same thing. Just as I'm never going back to watch that night. It felt it felt like someone was trying to hurt me. Yeah. It's like strangely not. a movie, right? It's like a ton of fluorescent light and product placement and explosions and lines come out of nowhere and nothing connects to anything else. I thought it was absolute drivel. You put them on ice. It's like all that stuff and it's just, it's just, yeah. Come on. He's put it because of a diamond. And it's all of it. And it's not, I don't blame Schumacher

for it. I really don't. When you hear his interviews and everything that he was, they basically went from Burton and Burton had this, this, you got to remember that the, the 1989 Batman when it came out cost $35 million to make. It made like $500 million in 1989, right? So that's incredible. And then they left Burton on. Burton decided instead of making half a Batman movie, half a Burton movie, he made, for the second one, he made a Burton movie and Batman just happened to be in it. They did very well. It did okay.

But then they switched up. They put the biggest movie star in the world with Jim Carrey in there, you know, for Batman forever. And then they decided to do exactly what you just said. Commercials, the bat card. I mean, just and putting everybody, Coolio's in the movie. He just shows up and he's just in it for some reason because Cooleo was on top of the charts at that time.

But dude, it was not, it's something you do. Like if you ever get into like a fight with somebody, just send that movie to them. That's great. Speaking of which, Matt leaves Batman looks extraordinary. That's why we're doing this rewatch. because we want to go we're leading so thank god we got a pallet cleanser we got we're doing the nolan movies next and then that that leads into this movie and this movie looks i love matt reeves i mean

the i mean andy circus the king he's one of my i mean obviously i had an opportunity as you know better than anybody that i had an opportunity to sit down talk to andy just one of the sweetest humans in the world and having him come back to work with matt reeves but then matt reeves taken over the Abe's franchise first. I was like, oh, I don't know about this. And then I said, shut up, stupid. Donna of the planet was one of the best movies ever. This movie looks like seven. This movie looks like

the detective story one from Batman. I'm pumped. Seems like you are, too. Yeah, it's, like you said, seven is a great shout. It's almost as if the entire world has been like dipped in grime and then like slowly dried in the sun.

Even Bruce Wayne is like kind of fetid with this like awful emo depressive vibe which ultimately you think well how is that an interesting movie

but obviously he's going to try and journey his way out of that we're looking at a very troubled Bruce Wayne Colin Farrell looks incredible as the penguin like what the hell a lot of times back in the day

when you see a lot of prosthetic you see someone trying to perform through the prostate but with Colin Farrell he just looks like like he's living in that. That's him, you know. The music looks great.

The collar palette looks great. Catwoman looks great. I'm more excited about that film than I think anything else coming up this year. I actually asked JJ about it. I said, you didn't Matt Reader's will show you an advanced copy. And he was like, yeah, probably. And I was like, oh, you've got to let me know what it's like when you see it. Yeah, man, I'm very excited about that.

And, you know, Patterson, as an actor, you're always watching how acting. is make their moves. Patterson was in the Twilight franchise, which obviously was commercially very successful with kind of 12, 14 year old kids, mainly girls, but whatever, they go to the movies and they still have to buy a ticket. But critically didn't do anything.

And both him and Kristen Stewart really struggled with being in those moves. And to give them both their credit, they have made the much harder a roundabout journey to get respected in the game. And I think both of them make great choices. But especially Robert Patterson, I just think his choices have been fantastic.

And he's a different Bruce Wayne. He's not a – I mean, obviously he went to the gym and he looks a lot bigger than he used to look. But he's not Christian Bale big. He's got more of a contained angry physicality as opposed to a brutish, bullish physicality. to you know. Fantastic point because when that movie,

when the Twilight movies come out, you know, and then let's say a month after that movie comes out, they announced Pattinson as Batman, people riot. And you wouldn't be able to see it. You wouldn't understand it. You wouldn't believe it.

But he does Rover, good time. He does all these movies, right? And when, and I, it's funny because on Collider years ago, when they were looking for the casting,

my co-hosted Roxy Shrier at the time, we had said, Patinson would be a great Batman. People thought we were nuts. And the reason why, is because I had just seen Rover, which is a phenomenal film, but it's exactly what you were talking about earlier in this show.

And that's mapping out your plan, right? And understanding and being selective on what you do, even if maybe sometimes you shouldn't or you can't because, you know, times are tough. And it's hard to come out of that. Well, I mean, you got, I think that it's for you as well, right? You're in Lord of the Rings and you're in, it's an Oscar winning film.

And then at the, but you got to break out of the hobbit. you got to break out of the Hobbit thing you know for and for him he's got to break out of the vampire thing and that's not easy to do yeah yeah no it's not at all yeah i mean you should we should all be so lucky as actors to be involved in the lord the rings trilogy and it will it will be the thing on my epitaph and it'll be the thing that i'll always be remembered for but it was a complete monster of the film and it swallowed everyone whole i mean i think elijah would probably tell you that he struggled to try and get out of being frotto for a long time ian will

always be Gandalf. Orlando Bloom will always be Legolas. They cast the movie so well. It was so well received. It was so well performed by all the actors that invariably you're always going to be those people. But yeah, I think I think this is a Bruce Wayne that we've not seen before. Like I love the car. The whole Batmobile looks fantastic. It looks really good, man. And the music and Michael Chichino, man, that guy. I mean, it's like there's going off that same conversation. lot of times people sometimes people are overused whether it's actors composers and he's used so much but he always stays fresh yeah he's incredible it's he's incredible whether it's lost or dawn of the planet of the apes and now he's doing the batman if you had a trivia question and

someone said who scored this movie even if you didn't know guess michael jrcgkin because you might be right yeah his work on the on the on the pixarine movies. Even if he had just done inside out or just on Coco or up and then he'd be like, wow, he's an extraordinary composer. But he has one of

the greatest resumes in the entire game. That's a fraction. Yeah, that was, you're exactly right. Three of those, you're like, wow, those are really good. And that's like, and that's like 2% of his work, right? Yeah, that's blip. Do we feel like this Matt Reeves Batman is is it leaning towards the year one

book more than anything else? like it seems like it for a lot of different reasons it seems like it's the year one but it also seems like we're for the first time and i i can't compare another one to really leaned into the whole detective batman right and this was what this is i mean you look at paul dano and i've been talking about right this is this is this version of the riddler this is not jim carrie this is a very very different riddler this is john doe seven riddler and that's the kind of stuff that i'm looking forward to all day, especially after having to watch that piece of shit that I watched yesterday when Batman and Robin. So like, you know, when that comes out, yeah, I'm with you. I did a list of

the most anticipated, and that's my number one for sure. Yeah. So before I let you go, I do, I know that you're not watching Book of Boba Fett. And I know that, you know, there's been, you mentioned it, the talk on it is kind of. Middling. Yeah, middling. So what I would recommend to you at the time of this taping, do not go on social media and look at anything of what dropped for episode six. To me, my personal opinion, it is the best piece of Star Wars content since returning the Jedi. Damn. Okay.

You know, I don't say that lightly. Yeah, so we're six episodes deep. Okay. Yeah, I mean, like we were talking just off air before we started the show and you had said you watching Book of Buffet, I'd heard from a few friends that it was just like, eh, it's okay. If you're going to choose anything, I would choose Mandalorian. And I remember thinking, I don't necessarily need to watch a middle-of-the-road Star Wars thing because my quality control is pretty high.

I agree with you. What I'll tell you then, your friends are not wrong about the first four episodes. There's a lot of good Star Wars stuff in there, but there's a lot of kind of like what kind of scratching your head type thing. And I like Robert Rodriguez a lot. I really do as a filmmaker. The problem is, and what I love about Faloni and Favreau a lot, and I've quoted this to exhaustion at this point, but Favreau said this in a galaxy's thing on,

excuse me, on the gallery thing on Disney Plus. He said, we're not making an homage to Star Wars here. We're making an homage to the stuff that inspired Star Wars. And you saw that in Mandalorian with the samurai stuff, the Westerns, all of that. My problem with some of the Robert Rodriguez produced, directed stuff, It feels, I see spy kids in there, I see Alita Battle Angel, I see Robert Rodriguez stuff in there, like full front and center. And I think just pull back a little bit, similar to us talking about with Burton.

But Bryce Dallas Howard's episode on the fifth one, she should be directing as many things in Star Wars as possible. And then Filoni's episode on six, he directed the sixth one. It's the best Star Wars content I've seen since 1983. I will watch it. No question. That's a great recommendation, especially coming from you. Thank you. So, all right, so give the peeps. Where can they get the podcast?

Anything else? And obviously, the movie is out right now. It is. Last looks. It's in the theory. Let me release. You can see it. And I believe that it's on streaming as well.

Yeah, I think it was straight. If it's not streaming at this point, I'm sure it will do in the next couple of weeks. So Charlie Hunan, Mel Gibson, myself. The podcast is called The Friendship Onion. You can find it anyway. you get your podcast on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts. You can also find us on YouTube. That's the friendship on your podcast.

You can find me on social media. That's Dom underscore Monaghan underscore. And yeah, that's me. I'll be doing the same. And then when you do, if you do watch those episodes, then we can finally just do a pure Star Wars podcast. That's what I want to do with you finally. I want to finally just for an hour,

me and you would just talk Star Wars and geek out about it. But my friend, it was a pleasure to see you. It really was. Thank you for taking your time and doing the show. It was great to see you too. It's always a pleasure to sit around with proud flag wearing, badge wearing nerds because that's me too. That's me too. All right, brother.

So Dominic Monahan, everybody. And once again, guys, please show a little bit of class. Will you hit the subscribe button, hit the notification button, podcast, Apple Podcast, Spotify, anywhere podcasts. Do it. and let the English see you do it. All right, we'll see you next time. The Jeep Wrangler 4xE.

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