The Prestige TV Podcast - The Mighty Ducks Are Back and They’re Still Fun

Episode Date: March 26, 2021

Danny Heifetz and Megan Schuster discuss 'Mighty Ducks: Game Changers' on Disney +. They discuss what it’s like having the series return 20-plus years later, and how it is different from the movies. Hosts: Danny Heifetz and Megan Schuster Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You know what me and Evan are going to do? Well, you guys are busy training your little hockey robots. We are going to go to a store, and we are going to buy all the cheese puffs we can friggin' find, which I lied, contain no actual cheese, and we are going to go home and sit on the couch and eat them. These are children. This is a game. You're telling my son, don't bother. You don't bother, sir. You don't bother. This episode is brought to you by Sweet Cream.

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Now through May 6th, Exclusion supplies to homedipo.com slash price match for details. Hello and welcome to TV concierge, the ringer's guide to the crowded streaming landscape. My name is Danny Haifitz, host of the Ringer Fantasy Football Show, and I am joined by my editor, the one and only Megan Schuster, to talk about the Mighty Ducks, which is a cinematic universe now, I guess. All three movies are on Disney Plus, but there's also a new TV show with The Mighty Ducks. Megan, what is the deal? Are the Mighty Ducks like the bad guys now? Danny, we have so much to discuss. Just truly a plethora of Ducks-related information right now. But yes, We are primarily here to talk about the Mighty Dext Game Changers, the new series on Disney Plus, which came out Friday.

To answer your question, yes, the ducks are the bad guys now, which is a revelation that truly broke my brain and ruined a good portion of my childhood memories. But we're dealing with it. We're moving forward. Our once lovable youngsters have broken bad. This series is set, you know, sort of 20-ish years after the first series. So, you know, you don't get the same normal kids. kids that played out on the ice in Minnesota from back in the day. These ducks are like legacy team ducks.

They are arguably worse than the hawks in terms of their level of evil. Wait, what? So is this show just about like growing up and becoming everything you hated as a child? Essentially that is. Yes. Oh, my God. This is not a spoiler, by the way. This is all like fully available in the trailer.

So this is a spoiler for free episode as much as we. we can do that. But the ducks have fully broken bad. They are still playing peewee, but they are now a full-fledged organization with their own home rink, their own jerseys, their own, you know, sense of coaching staff. They have cuts now. They are, it's a really, a really tough cell, but the spirit of the show remains alive throughout a few other characters. So don't worry. It's still very fun. So you're from Minnesota. You're a huge hockey fan. You're a huge mighty ducks fan.

How did this feel? Like the fact that this just exists, what does that do for you? The show existing is amazing. I, you know, truly, like you grew up in the 90s. You don't really expect those cultural properties to, like, kind of come back through when you're, you know, nearing 30, which is a terrifying thing to admit on a podcast. But it was also just really exciting to see the ducks back on the ice. even though they're like evil now.

It's just so much fun to be back in that world and back in that universe and just oddly comforting in a way. Well, it's like, because all these things that are being brought back, you could say, zombieified or whatever, where they're just going through IP and just resuscitating all these old franchises. From afar, it's exhausting. But when it's your thing, it's absolutely thrilling.

It is. And I really respect that they didn't try to do the same thing over again. You know, as much as I hate the conceit of the ducks being evil now, it's a nice change of pace from these reboots that just basically try to do the exact same thing over again with the same characters and the same arc and all of that kind of stuff. The nice thing about the ducks is that they bring back a few familiar properties. Like Emilio Estevez is back in this, which is phenomenal. I think they bring back a few of the old characters as adults later on in this series. but the main kids, the main adult characters in this are totally new, which is nice. So we got Emilio Estevez's back.

I saw the trailer. He's just like doing his Zamboni and doing the ice. So he's Hans now, basically. Basically, with a little bit of Gordon Bombay still thrown in there. He's still the Minnesota Miracle Man. You can never take that title away from him. We'll always have that. We'll always have the Pee We State Championship.

We'll always have the Junior Goodwill Games. You know, you can't get rid of those kind of cultural. cultural landmarks, but he is back. He is running an ice palace, basically. An ice palace? I'm not like, I didn't grow up with hockey in my life. What is an ice palace? Just sort of an indoor ice rink that has a fan. Just checker. I don't know if it was like a Superman situation. No, no. Trust me that this place is really nothing special. But he is running that. That is sort of his full-time gig these days. And it becomes a very important setting for the show, of course,

because that's where Emilio is. You have to be around. So he is, you know, still Gordon Bombay, extremely still Gordon Bombay, even though he has, like, real sort of stunt doubles doing his skating for him now.

Well, I was going to say, did they only exclusively cast really short people to be around Emilio Estaviz? No. Because he's like 5'7, right? He's like Dustin Padrella. Yeah, they, they, so I've only seen the first three episodes.

and they mostly shoot him at a distance for many other people. He's kind of thoroughly now. He's like, you know, a little bit weathered. He's seen some stuff in life and has, you know, has gone through his trials and tribulations and is a little bit standoffish. So he's filmed primarily distant from like Lauren Graham, who plays a central figure in this show and some of the kids. So the kids are all different.

So we don't even get any Keenan Thompson or Conway or Banks. Like those dudes are all cycled out. and presumably I mean circle of life, lawyers who hate themselves and get DUIs and then have to do community service because that's the circle of duck life or whatever. Exactly. And there has been some news come out that we will get to see a few of our old favorites come back.

I believe like Averman will be back for, you know, a short stint of time. I think Adam Banks is coming back. I don't believe Charlie Conway is coming back, which is like a real dagger to my heart. But we'll get a few of the old ducks to cycle through and see where they're at in life. So out with the old and with the new,

or have any of the new kids like stolen your heart in a spoiler-free way? Yes. So the main character in this is Evan and Alex, his mom, who's played by Lauren Graham. They are the two sort of central like Charlie Conway and Charlie's mom sort of figures of this series. But there's, you know, we get a lot of really fun kids again.

My personal favorite is his name is Nick. And his main passion in life is hockey podcasting. So this is like some true millennial. Gen Z sort of crossover stuff. He's like just fully in on the podcasting realm. This is what he's envisioning his life to be. So we first meet him. He's doing a podcast for the pee-wee hockey circuit around Minnesota.

So he's like, you know, plugged in and all the practices, all this. I don't know if you've ever seen One Tree Hill, but he's like a mini-mouth McFadden from that. who's just like ready to make his career as a sports broadcaster and is really getting started at the young age. So he is like truly a one of a kind character and he has fully stolen my heart. I'm envisioning them being like, ducks don't have teeth. And they're like, you know what? Podcasters don't either.

He at one point like harasses Lauren Graham's character until she gives, not harasses. That's a little bit mean. But they live next door. So he pops by on announce and is like, do you have, can you have a comment for me? on, you know, X, Y, and Z happening. And he sort of embeds himself in one of the teams to, you know, get that inside scoop inside access. So he's very committed to his journalistic principles, I'll say.

That's how we got you on this show. We just kept bombarding you and being like, do you have any comment on the New Mighty Duck series? Any comment today? Come on. It's knocking on your window. I know, I know. So I have a question for you.

Mm-hmm. I'm sorry if this is a little dull, but like, why is this happening? Why is the, like, this was like 30 years ago. Why are they making a Mighty Ducks TV show? It's a great question. It's not a boring question. It's truly good.

I think it's a multi-level answer that I have for you. I think the first thing is that 90s culture is coming back in such a big way. Like, if you just look at all the properties that are getting rebooted these days, like we have animaics that's coming back, the Rugrats is coming back in some like, haunted version that I can't even talk about without. Did not know that. That's incredible. The Fresh Prince, Saved by the Bell,

so many more of those kind of cultural properties from our childhood are coming back. And they're, you know, sort of tapping into that nostalgia vein. But also people from my generation are having kids now. And I think, you know, companies like Disney are realizing that if they bring back properties that

people in my age range loves, they may try to introduce those to their kids to get them to love it as well and just sort of start this generational circle that keeps their properties alive longer. So whether or not that's a good thing, we could debate probably for a much longer podcast, but I think that is sort of my understanding of the reasoning behind it. That makes sense. It's kind of like Star Wars happens and then they make these the next three movies basically in time for that last generation of kids. And then they basically repeat the cycle and now this is all under Disney.

And I guess the exception is Marvel, which will just literally never stop making content. But everything else needs to just wait for the kids that grow up. And again, become Gordon Bombay lawyer and just get some DIYs, do some community service and all that jazz. Wow. So also I have to ask, is one of the coaches of the ducks Riley from Letterkenny?

Yes. So my great shame is I have not seen Letterkenny. And I know as a bit of Stateness, as somebody who borders Canada, like that's just, you know, a really, really terrible hole in my viewing guide. But yes, yes. And he is actually,

plays the evil coach of the ducks who, no spoilers, cuts the main kid Evan, which is where we start our whole journey with this. So he's a bit evil. But he's got great flow, though, truly great flow. So, Megan, last question for you.

Is the show good? it is in a weird way they cast some really cute kids some kids with like high levels of personality i will watch anything lauren graham makes truly in life i think she's just so phenomenal and it's it's fun to watch her sort of play off of amelio estavez and it's it's like watching laurly gilmore try to take on sports which is um that's like my best pitch for you as as to why it's an important and fun show to watch. So it's very lighthearted. It's 30-minute episodes,

and they just really breeze through. It's fun. A podcast is not just a bunch of kids out there to win. A podcast is something you belong to. Thank you for coming on TV concierge. This was a lot of fun. Any parting words?

The only thing I have left to say is quack, quack, quack, quack, fack, gawk, quack, fack, gawk. Okay, great. Thanks. We'll bounce because I actually owe you a lot of words. I have to get to you by the end of today. So I got to go. Thank you ever for listening.

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