The Ringer-Verse - 'Monkey Man' Instant Reaction | The Midnight Boys

Episode Date: April 5, 2024

It's time to fight for the people! The Midnight Boys give you their thoughts on the exciting Dev Patel action epic 'Monkey Man' (04:41). They get into the nitty-gritty of the actor's directorial debut and give their thoughts on what they think about the star's filmmaking chops. Hosts: Charles Holmes, Van Lathan, Jomi Adeniran, and Steve Ahlman Senior Producer: Steve Ahlman Additional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopal Social: Jomi Adeniran Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Brian Curtis from The Ringer, and I want to tell you about the Press Box podcast. The Press Box is a podcast for anybody who likes news, whether it's about sports or politics or pop culture, and wants to understand how that news really gets made. We have new shows every Monday and Thursday. We have long interviews with everyone from John Crackhour to Joe Buck. Your social media feeds are bursting with information every day. Let us help you sort it out. Join us on the press box.

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Yeah, you'd be pretty happy about those WeatherTech seat protectors. So just to be clear as the mud, you're inevitably going to step into the sun. summer, you don't need weather tech unless you plan on doing summer. Visit weathertech.com today. Welcome into the reverse. This is, of course, the ringer's nexus podcast feed for all things. Fanda, we are Steve, the architect, all new builder and tinker of things. We are.

Jummi, explainer, dinner on. You've got questions. He's got answers. We are. Kyle Polk himself, old man van. He of the receding, resurgent, hiding it hairline with the, Cowboy had we are the big brain himself, Coke baby Chuck, the 24-carat clothes are also known as my

Brach Honey. We are known as our Midnight Boys. All right. Follow us on socials, instant, Twitter, safe book, Facebook, Safebook, save Jome's job. Jomi, how did things over on the old fucking socials? How's it going there? Things are great.

Great. I think it's going really, really good. Thank you guys for follow-up. Yeah, you like that shit. I do. It's time to get the program reminders. Now, listen, you guys, we've been taking the program reminders as a mini-pot,

not going to do it this time. All right? Programming reminders time. You say that every time. It's how we get cooking. Today on the House of R, they will be giving you Captain America Winter Soldier, top ten moments,

another House of R coming at you on Monday. Midnight Boys are back on Wednesday. On today's show, we give you our instant reactions to the latest action flick Monkey Man. That's the fastest program of reminders we've ever done. That's a hell yeah, buddy. We're ready to get into it. Monkey Man, before we talk about it,

the three black guys on here, does the name of this film make you feel at all insecure? I will say there are times when I was just like, even if I want to tweet about Monkey Man or some shit, you know, I got to like double read. I'm just like, oh, man, somebody reads this too quick. hot water. Oh, I don't want to ask,

Jome, speaking of tweeting, Jome, my blue check came back. Congratulations. You're a show for Elon. What, what? No, man, this is crazy. I was about to say that you didn't pay for it. You got to specify you didn't pay for it.

I didn't know. I don't believe you. I don't believe you. Got to get them checks. Got to get that money. I understand. I understand. All I can do is tell you guys the truth.

What you believe is up to you. Believe in yourself. rest is up to you. Who said that? I thought this was supposed to be like a short programming reminders. Believe in yourself, the rest is up to me and you. Who said that? We can be here all day. We can be all day. I'm not going to tell you guys. Believe in yourself, the rest is up to me and you.

Who said that? It wasn't Jake Cole. I'll tell you that. It wasn't. All right. Well, we are, I got to be real. I'm going to hang back on this podcast a little bit. I think light skins are taking up too much air. in society right now. And I just don't want to be a part of this. You're 100% correct.

You're 100% correct. I don't want to weigh in. How's that sound? No, you were up on the East Coast arguing, bro. I was just like, they go to sleep, bro. I was drunk. I went to Waleighamania. Bro, I went to Wallymania.

Went nuts. I was drunk. That's when you don't want to catch me. You don't want to catch me because normally you said, fuck you, Van. And I'm like, hey, man, thanks for listening. You catch me. I'm like that.

It's like, how about it fucked your grandmother? How's that sound? A piece of shit. Jesus. I mean, it doesn't help that the disc record is really bad. Just really bad.

It's not. It's bad. Hey, hey, we'll, you know what we'll do? After Monkey Man, quick, quick,

Charles Music Corner of the men. Seriously. After Monkey Man, quick Charles Music Corner. All right. We're talking about Monkey Man today. Of course,

new film with Death Mattel, Spoiler warning for the movie. If you haven't seen it, Steve, give it to me. We're getting ready to talk about Monkey Man. You're listening to a reaction podcast. The spoilers are coming. Have to get in the need to know.

To put you in the need to know. Let's put you in the know, should I say. We have to get in the know. To put you in the know, should I say, the only person they can do, okay, we've got to do this all over again. All right. How to put you guys in the know?

The only person that can put you in the know is leave it all in, is Chuck The only way to do that is the midnight manifest, Chuck, take it away. All right, this is your midnight manifest for Monkey Man directed by Death Patel, written by Patel, Paul Angu-Nuwali, and John Colley. Kid, a revenge-filled backdoor brawler known as Monkey Man, is in the midst of a bloody revenge mission. It's a child who witnessed a corrupt police chief,

Rana Singh, and religious leader Baba Shakti, burned down his village and kill his mother so they could steal their land. Kid infiltrates a hotel. hub of Rana and Shakti's illegal exploits, laying the groundwork to take out their operation. Inevitably, the initial hit goes wrong. Kid is labeled the terrorist and falls into a river where he's on the verge of death. Kid is a nurse back to health by Alpha, the leader of a group of trans women and other marginalized people cast aside by the oppressive government. Alpha inspires Kidd to fight for something more than his pain, while Kid inspires the outcast to fight back against Shakti's regime.

The film culminates with Kid killing Rana and taking down Shokty's operation before he succumbs to his own mortal wounds. And that has been your midnight manifest for Monkey Man. I am very interested in the reactions to this film. I think that when the trailer dropped about this movie that I didn't really know much about in terms of its production and it's pre-pro. And there wasn't a lot of heat around it before. But when I saw the trailer, I was instantly interested in this waiting for it and anticipating it. Charles, you saw it? No.

His reaction started with you. Yeah, I think that this movie is good. lives in a space really where to your point, I think we got the trailer and almost overnight, it's like, wait, Dev Patel is in a martial arts movie. He is the main hero and he's directing. Oh, shit. Like, I have a lot of Deppatelle stock, a lot of love for that man. And I think that I was looking up the budget because after the movie was like, how much did they make this movie for? And it was, I think it's like 10 million. And I think it does have that quality of this is obviously, an insanely talented actor making his directorial debut in a genre that I think is very, very hard to pull off.

And I think I was hoping for maybe a great martial arts movie. And I ended with, I got a solid martial arts movie. And I think a lot of that just has to do with the fact that Deb throughout this whole run is like, y'all, look, I almost died making this film. This film almost got shut down. I broke my arm on the first day. it was this. And I was like looking at the screen and I was like, either he's a really great actor or I can tell you almost died making this movie,

which adds another layer of like, oh shit, like you are, this is something you needed to get out. So I think it's like, I don't know if it was a slam dunk, but I definitely will say it has that thing where I'm just like, oh no, I want to see your next movie. I want to see what you were $25, $30, $50 million version of this because I just saw a lot of potential in it. Just some of the things I was like, just like a,

like a smaller movie. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. Movie worked, right? Absolutely worked. I had a great time. Interesting that the thing that worked the best for me is Def Patel as a director. I think the thing, I just thought that it, aesthetically, at least, it looked beautiful.

Yes. It was very close in, which movies that are low-budget films tend to be a little bit more intimate. Like, every character is up against one another, but I also think that there's some cultural choices there around putting you in India and how it might feel to be there. I got an insane sense of culture in this movie, which is so gratifying and rewarding. and I was literally in the world, which as a director, that's a hard thing to do. Like dropping you off right in the middle of the world where you don't feel like you're in somebody's imagination of a place.

You feel like you're in that place. The richness of it, the smell of it, the feel of it, all of that. You're right there at all times. It seems like you're surrounded by culture really, really, fantastic. A couple of times the story loses itself. That's to be expected. It takes a lot of experience or writing simple movies to write a simple movie. And I don't think he intended this movie to be simple. I think he wanted to make a high-paced, high-octane action film that really said something about a people, about a person, about trauma, and about a lot of issues that exist

in that part of the world that we might not be familiar with, the push-pull, the classism, the usury, the exploitation, all of that stuff, and how you could fight against that. And that's a lot, a lot to try when you're still getting your pen wet and when you're still trying to figure out how to become a filmmaker. But for the most part, he executed it. And when the movie gets going, had less action than I thought, actually. Less action. But when the action starts,

it's like, oh, shit. Like, come on. We're cooking. Yeah. I mean, if he had wanted to do a more sparse, even more sparse, sort of Indian John Wick movie from opening credits to end credits, we're just killing people for some reason could have done that.

and the movie probably would have been a little bit easier to digest for a lot of people. Didn't do that. Gave it a little bit more. Gave his hero a little bit more motivation. Gave everybody a little arc. You kind of feel how people are going through stuff and you want to see them break free.

And it worked about as well as I feel like it could have worked for the constraints that they had. Mint boys. I liked it a lot. But to your point, man, of you liked him more as a director, I liked Dev as a leading man in this movie. I thought he brought a gravitas and a very, a very, like,

cool, cool energy to this film that worked, like, 10 times over. Like, every time he was on screen, there was an action scene, where there was dramatic scene, I thought there was an energy there that I feel like, man, where is this been? Like, why don't we see more of Dev Patel,

like, in more leading movies as of late? You know, and I think, and I'm hopefully thinking that this springboards him into a different class of actor. When people start making calls about, all right, who do we want to be the leading man this movie? They go, ah, Def Patel's on that list because I thought he was just incredible this movie. It's less John Wick than, like, advertised, I feel like, but I still think the story worked for me. And like you guys have said, the action, when it's there, it's there. I mean, the scene in the elevator when he's putting the knife in the guy's neck

and it's not going, so he just uses his mouth it puts it all in there. Even the act scene, I was like, god damn, when he bites that motherfucker's nose off his shit, I was like, dog, y'all are cooking. When it turns on, it turns on. And so, yeah, like, it's not a perfect movie by any stretch of the imagination,

but the stuff that it does really well, it does extremely well. and I want to give a lot of that credit to Dev Patel as an actor. He was incredible. I would likely agree, Jomey. I think my biggest sentiment coming out of this movie is like, man, we need to have Patel doing more stuff. We need him

and more things. Like, he is a star that you really can't ignore. And the reason that he even made this movie is because, like, he felt a little ignored. And it was like, I'm not getting the action-esque leading man roles that I want. And so I'm going to I'm going to fuck it. I'm going to do it my own way. and I'm going to make it my own movie. And I think that makes me respect this movie a lot more

and give it a lot more of a pass than I think I would give most movies because I can see a lot of stumbles. I can see a couple more stumbles than I would probably like in a movie that I usually go for. But this is an enthusiastic, inspired, and really talented first-time director in Dev Patel,

wanting to tell a completely immersive story and do possibly like everything that he could ever want to make in a movie it will have, he will attempt to make it dramatically impactful, sad, action-packed, cathartic, all of those things that you would ever want a good movie to be.

And for the most part, it works. A couple of stumbles are more or less there, but I still had a great time with him. You know what I'm thinking? I want to translate real quick. Steve didn't like it. So I just, I thought we walked out of the movie here.

Steve was not higher. Steve was not having it. I just want to translate real quick. He wasn't having. None of guys so we can get through the bullshit of all that word salad stumbling. I give him like, Steve didn't like the movie. It's okay, Steve.

Why are you doing? Like, look, look. Now he's searching. Look where his eyes went. His eyes went up to the right. You didn't fuck with it. It's okay. Like, what do you?

You didn't like, There are moments of this movie that I genuinely do like. I'm not going to, I'm not going to say that I didn't like parts of this movie. I think on overall, maybe I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have wanted to. No. You know what? Here's a thing. Here's a thing.

Like, as a fellow hater, I support you, Steve. You know what I'm saying? Even though I did like this movie. But I just want to call you out. You're like, yeah, there's just a few parts where it stumbles. Dida, did it die? Muffogh was saying that shit about Invincible, X-Men 97, all this shit. What is?

What are you doing? No, it's always like, nah, nah, no, no, okay, it's like,

what are you going to accomplish here? I don't like, bro, hey, Charles, I need, what, you know what April's going to be?

April's going to be the month of Charles decentering himself. Charles? Decentering myself. Yeah. Decentering myself. Yeah,

yeah. Decentre yourself. Fuck out of here. I'm the nugity center of this fucking podcast. Like, like, why are you, why are you?

It has nothing to do with what we're talking about. Maybe Steve, like X-Men 97. Maybe Steve like invincible more. When it's IP shit, when it's IP shit, y'all move the goalposts. When y'all have a nostalgic feeling for these characters, y'all move the goalpost. And when it's some original shit, y'all like, damn, they stop. I'm like, yeah, he's stuppled a little bit. That shit costs $10 million.

Motherfuckers fucking up a $250 million. Can I be honest with you? Can I be honest with you? I like X-Men 97 better than I like Monkey Man. What you want me to say? I like, what you want me to say? You have no taste? I don't know.

What you want me to say? What you want me to say is a monkey man is, I liked monkey man. I thought monkey man was great. I thought the way I look at it, it's not like I gave him extra points because it was his first film. I can see why it being, I can see places where it being his first film, where things dragged a little bit and where things, where he was being ambitious in ways that maybe he doesn't have the experience to pay off.

But I tell you what, this movie was. fun and good. And I felt, I felt for him, I felt for the friends he made along the way. I cheered when the villains got killed. And I was legitimately...

Wait, did you actually cheer? I did. That'd be seen. When they got rid, when he started kicking the shit out of the chief of police, I was happy. I was to get his motherfucking ass.

I mean, I was happy, but it was like, our theater was, I think our theater was more quite than expected. The only time we really got like a, what was the fucking note cutting the throat cutting scene where everybody was like yeah when he puts the knife in his mouth and goes to the thing

that was fucking crazy don't get me wrong don't get me wrong monkey man has some bruckie man has some bad ass action in it and some really good beautiful shots bro really really good this is what I also think is like you can tell that a first time director like they're going to be fine

like where they go off when it's like, all right, what do you do with limitations? And I do think that like, there are a lot of things that this movie did where I'm like, okay, you probably didn't have enough time,

enough setups or whatever to make this fight longer or whatever. So Deb does a very, very good job, sometimes being like, all right, artistically, aesthetically,

what are we going to do in this fight to set a mood and make you feel like you're getting more than you are? And that's what I actually liked. And I think this movie looks for, this will be, this movie's budget is $10 million. It looks phenomenal.

It looks great. And I really don't, I really want to emphasize that like I, while I might not have liked it as much as I wanted to, the good faith that I have coming out of this of like how much I really feel good about Dev Patel as a director, an actor, and an overall creative, that carries me throughout any like minor gripes and stumbles that I would actually have about this movie that brings it down. Because ultimately, I'm not mad at it. I'm never mad at it. Let's get to the minor gripes and stumbles real quick. What are you, what are some of your minor

gripes and stumbles, Steve? And it's okay, Steve. You don't, I think it overall, it's got, it's got a problem with tone and pacing. Uh, I could feel that this movie has been edited down from something that was a lot longer and that probably was even a bit more meandering in some of its tone, which met, which in the end makes it a bit of an, of a weird pace. I think the soundtrack was a bit off at times. I think when the

big finale fight happens, in that VIP room were going from like Spanish guitar to like heavy metal disrespect your surroundings and I'm like I know that's dope I was like the needle drops

were crazy in this movie Oh no I know the JID one I was like all right come on I like that shit I was like come on I'm like the gym drops were crazy Rick Ross

the Rick Ross one I was like but look though but look though I honestly felt like there were things done in the film to make sure that the film which is very culturally authentic to also make sure that it was palatable

to the taste of worldwide action fans. Still feels uncompromised though. Does not feel compromised in any way. It's not compromised at all, but I thought that he walked a great line there. He walked an amazing line there. I think the needle drops were a big part of it. I mean, so I want,

I think my biggest issue with the film is more so a pacing issue. where it is like, I think the way the movie was marketed in terms of like, oh, this is going to be action, martial arts, nonstop adrenaline. And then the movie we got, I was just like, oh, y'all need to get people into the theaters,

which they did. Our theater was packed out at 9 p.m. on a Thursday. But I think the movie was trying to do too much. I think with a lot of the political stuff, I like the political parts of this movie. but sometimes I felt like they did not have enough time to congeal and really get their point across. When Deve is saved by the trans woman who's leading kind of like that whole, that whole sect of like outcast that has been pushed to the margins, I was like, I feel like there's more scenes that I'm missing. Like how he's connected, the feelings that he has for this group, how they're mentoring him, this,

new teacher figure. It felt like there was a longer version of this movie. Whereas like, they're like, oh, we saved you from a bullet. I'm going to give you an inspirational speech. Now we're doing the training montage. And hey, the training montage of him punching the rice. Great. And like the guy.

I loved it. That was awesome. That was so dope. I was like, that's great. That scene is awesome. It was like, even if it was like we got there in a, in maybe an in elegant way, it's still like, it gives me that energy when he's punching the bag where I'm like,

Because everything that's happening outside of him training and, like, powering up, quote unquote, like a lot of world building is regulated to newscasters explaining what's happening while other characters are doing something else. We're being told a lot of what's happening rather than we actually feel like why all the, why this main bad guy, why this religious figure is like an actually bad, bad person other than him being like, okay, I put the hit out on your entire village. And now we just, you know, wiped out the whole four. us.

How much more did you need? What's that more? I mean, no, not much more. Yeah. I mean, it's pretty bad. So I'll say that they do kind of introduce the actual big bad of the movie. They pepper him in and you start to, they do a thing in films. And sometimes it's, when it works, it really works when it doesn't, it doesn't.

Like, you've seen this before to where somebody's on the billboard or somebody's on TV and you like, that character's important. Like, why am I seeing a commercial for this? Yeah. Why am I seeing this? They like that, like, almost like they plug it in and that character's important. That character's coming around. When I first saw him in the car, I didn't make the connection that that was the same guy from the thing. I didn't, he comes back in the next scene.

So we know that the exploitation of the people, which is the main driving theme of the movie, which is a hero of the ordinary people of the lower class of people fighting back. The reason why what they were fighting back from was this. fake guru who was levying political power and controlling them for all of the reasons and then feeding them and selling them lies and like Monkey Man is the truth

so he's fighting through that. That was all cool. Introducing him when I thought it was going to be the police chief throughout the... That's just once again if the movie was longer maybe you had more story to tell

but Jordan Pell of course produced looked at that stuff and goes maybe you don't need it. I think the biggest victim of that was probably CETA, his friend that he meets at the lady that's at the spot. Which was clearly supposed to be a love interest of some kind. Right. But like, I mean, she's like,

want to see more over, huh, Jones? I did. I did. She was beautiful. I mean, who would? She was absolutely gorgeous. Wait, I was sitting in the middle where y'all bricked up again in the movie theaters, men boys?

Stop it. Can y'all stop? Y'all can't sit next to me anymore, bro. Barity in the movie, which is the point. It's like they have one conversation and then they see each other at the spot. Like they don't talk again for the rest of the movie after the conversation outside with the dog.

That's it. That's the only time they exchange words. You don't need to exchange words when you look in deep in your wife's eyes. Yeah. By the way, the fact that he had to be her love interest it's kind of a almost quaint heteronormative way to look at the movie I'm not saying it that it needed to be that way I'm just saying the movie like clearly is like it seemed like it was suppressing some kind of thing between them

am I wrong did I read that wrong I mean the only way I read it is that the closer he got to her the more he saw that she didn't have any agency in the world that she lived in she tries to tell him hey you're not going to be able to work here her little character changed. I could tell what you guys are saying about the fact that she probably was in the movie. Because her character changes because she actually tells him not to have hope. And then he keeps feeding the dog and we think that it's hope. It's not because he changes.

What it actually is is him using a dog as a little weapon. And then he learns that it's not all about his trauma, his revenge, It's about a whole bunch of people that need his help. That's probably where, in my opinion, not to minimize you guys, but that's probably where I felt like you probably need a little bit more and need to be a little bit more deft just because it works. He changes, but the fact that he goes from someone who is helping on repairing his own trauma to someone that becomes a part of a community and sees that people need him,

it worked, but that part of the film could have been a little bit deeper, a little bit more fatty to me. I agree. I think that's one of the strongest points of the movie because, like, he's doing all those, like, bare-knuckle underground fights, and he's not winning any of them. And then he tries to make his move on the chief of police, and that doesn't work. And we're sitting around like, all right, cool, this guy's a loser with what's the point? And then he has that realization with the women at the... the commune and it's like, look, it's not about you, right? Like, it's not, you're not saying for your mother.

It's not your fault, right? You have to dig deep and think about everybody else that also needs this. It also needs you. And then it flips around and he like, he just, he turns like 180 and he goes into the bare knuckle box and he kicks that dude one time. He knocked, he's dead, right? And then he goes and he completes his mission. I think to Van's point, that's the heart of the movie, and that works so well.

I like that. I like that part of the movie a ton. I think that works. Can I ask a silly question? How much of the gambling winnings was spent on the costume change for everybody to storm that VIP room? See, I think they had that. I think they was locked in on there. They had those clothes.

Wait, no, because they all was in matching. So they all told me. Matching, they had the masks on. Yeah. He bought a suit. They could probably make those. I don't think they went and bought that. Can you imagine if they needed, think about that.

Can you imagine if they needed the money to save their land? They just spend it out. They get the bread and then they go out and they blow it. They go to Spirit Halloween? This is some of the most niggerish shit I've ever heard. Yo! What? Bro!

What? What? Like, that's the only type of shit. So y'all, you mean to tell me, for the black people, For the black people here that lend money, you ain't never been in the situation where your homie didn't be like, hey, bro, I give you an example. Oh, I'll tell you a story.

Quick one, quick one. Condense podcast, condensed story. I once had a homeboy that was parking his shit at my house because they was going to come repossess his shit. So he hit me up, he'd be like, hey, I'm just going to be real with you. I got to park the car at your house tonight. I'll part the car at your house. And I'll be like, why?

He was like, they're going to come repossess the car. I know. They're going to come repossess the car and I'll part your shit. I told my dad My dad was like, all right Tell him to park it I tell you what He's like they show up

I'm gonna cut that motherfucker on And drive it out there for him I need to pay y'all motherfucking bills Y'all little boys ain't got no sense Anyway, he parked it Four nights in a row And then my dad goes Okay, come over here

We gotta figure this out Because you can't keep parking your car here Like how much do you go So whatever he was He was back whatever whatever We came together and gave him some money The next day this nigga came through

we had some brand new Tommy Hill figure shit on. Oh, hell no, man. Yeah, so, bro. I wouldn't rest that shit all. So, what's this? We give them the bread and then we go into Memphis, right? We go into Memphis. And so, like, we're going to chilling Memphis.

And I'm like, all right, cool, we're going to, like, is your car straight? Can we take your car to Memphis? Is your car straight now? Can we drive up there? And he's like, nah, man, I got one more thing. I got to do registration or play them. so make sure that I'm legal and everything because I let some shit run out.

And I'm like, okay, cool. I'm like, Nick, what's you got on now? You bought new clothes for the trip? And he was like, nah, I had got this before. I'm like, all right? Okay, now. So what I'm saying? That's why I don't know why I'll happen you.

The next time, they're going to take your fucking car. Don't park your shit over here again. Y'all know how this goes. And basically Steve is saying that those people are my homeboy. Good for you, Steve. I didn't say that. I asked how much did it cost. Obviously, this is egregious, Steve.

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As Beth and Rip build a future together, peace will have to wait as they face corruption, danger, and a ruthless rival ranch, willing to protect its secrets at all costs. Legacy is a beautiful thing, but only if it survives. Dutton Ranch starring Colehouser, Kelly Riley, Annette Benning, and Ed Harris now streaming on Paramount Plus. This episode is brought to by Nass Energy, introducing new Nass Energy Grand Prix Guava for those that want to be fueled up and fired up with a hundred-bound hour tropical tasting power.

Ignite your taste, start your engine, shift your flavor to high gear with new Nass Energy Grand Prix Guava. Hit the street, grab a can and get after it. Let me ask you an overarching question about super badass people movies, right? Right. Because when you think about the genre of super badass people, we've always had these movies, always super badass people movies, but they really got popping with John Wick. Some people dispute it.

Some people say they got popping with Taken. I mean, yeah. I don't. I think, I think, yes. I think that's a fair. I don't know if I count Taken as a super badass people movie. I think that was a bit of a memeification of the Liam Neeson is old and still an action star kind of a thing.

and then John Wick made that believable. Wait, but, like, there was, there was still, like, so is Kill Bill not one of those? Like, no, she wasn't washed. Like, she wasn't an old woman. I'm not talking about super badass people, they don't have to be washed necessarily. I think Kill Bill is, I guess it's kind of one, but it's such a, it's such a big movie. You know what I mean? And there's, it's almost like a saga more than a super badass people movie.

It's like a lot going on, but I guess it could be. John Wick is the quintessential one because we don't know shit about him except for what everybody else says, and you don't have to know very much about him. All you have to know is that his wife died and then everything else you see. You don't know where John Wick got his training from. You see a little bit of it in John Wick, Chapter 2. You don't know where John Wick got his training from.

You don't know why he's so good. You hear whispers about him and then you see it on the screen. He's so bad, he's this, he's that, and they do a really good job at it because the movie has very little dialogue, and it really tells the story through action. It's tough. You have that, you have the Equalizer, super badass person movie,

closer to taking, but still, you have Mr. Nobody, they've made a whole bunch of them. There was one a couple years ago with a dog and a guy who was a Nazi. Did you see this? And the guy, the Nazi, the guy was against the Nazis,

and he had, he found the gold. C-Soo. So they've made a bunch of these. They've made a bunch of them to a point to where now, I feel like people are expecting more from me. them? Yes, it's up John. People are expecting

Mr. Nobody, all of this. People are expecting more from these movies. In the realm of super badass people movie that single-handedly through karate and stuff are going to save the day. How well did you feel like this movie came off?

We really don't know where his training where he got his training. We don't know why he's so good. We don't know there's not a lot that we know about the character, but there's a lot that we know about his world. Does it work?

Does it, does we, do we have to know more? I, I, I, I think even, I think it's even limiting

talking about Monkey Man in the context of John Wick, because obviously, like, Dev is very, very smart. He is, like, he does know,

like, he's a Hollywood actor. Like, he knows the landscape. But he's even talked about where he's just like, no, like, I get that John Wick is the easiest comparison, but he was bringing up,

you know, Korean martial arts films and the films that inspire John Wick and I think the thing that's difficult is like we don't get that many martial arts movies anymore in America where it was like you know you used to get white action stars being like all right you know

this motherfucker all of a sudden knows Kung Fu or whatever and I think the issue with what you're bringing up with these big badass shit is like they're all we can't because John Wick looms so large we want all these movies to kind of give us what John Wick did.

But, like, you can't really replicate that. Kiyahu was at a specific point in his career. He's a specific type of actor. It's like, we hadn't really gotten any of those films. We were still in that MCU bubble. And it was just like, oh, shit, this is going back to, like, an 80s, 90s way of making movies. And I think while Monkey Man, that trailer was just like,

John Wick, the actual movie is not that. it's way more politically It's way more than that. Yeah. And I don't... And that's the thing though. That's what I'm... Essentially, you put it better than I could have.

But that's what I'm asking. It's way more than that. And it's almost as if either movie is easier to make. The simpler movie is easier to make and the more complex movie that actually isn't a martial arts movie about this. But can you make a complex? Can you make a complex?

Huh? Like, can you? make, like, of course there's like complex martial arts movies. That's not what I'm saying. But in like 2024, what makes John Wick work is like John Wick is a point A, point B, point C movie. It is like, there's not a love interest really in the first John Wick besides the dog and his wife, but they're dispatched within the first 30 minutes. So it's like it's all forward momentum. And that's what I think a lot of these movies need to be now. And Monkey Man is not a forward momentum movie at all in terms of it's like to because i think joe me or steve you you brought it up

it's like he's not that great of a fighter for the bulk of the movie like he can fight but we're like motherfuckin you get your ass kick more than you win in and then it changes and that's when it becomes more of what we know is like the wickified martial arts movies were you guys disappointed that he didn't have the monkey man mask on for the for the for the last fight yeah especially when turned white when he when he bleached it white i was like no that's not i knew they cut the movie up because i was just like you was supposed to be wearing this longer bro yeah no i i think to your point the way that this movie might be trying to bite off more than it can chew is because the premise of this a revenge story about killing your family and killing your mother is very simple like obviously

that's a very emotionally resonant and expected thing and believable thing for a motivation for a character, especially somebody who's like dedicated their whole lives to just fighting and killing this one person. But knowing that it's wrapped up in this sort of like political, emotional battle between not only him, but a bunch of other people that he represents. This gives him, like, oh, I'm not just going to fight for myself. I'm going to fight for other people. That will money the emotional waters a little bit more. And then the more and more complex that you get, you got to make sure that you hit all of those emotional beats and cover those bases for your characters so that it makes the most sense.

and that it makes like, so that it makes a more cohesive hole. And I think that as it gets more complex later on in the movie, it starts to muddy those waters a little bit, where it can be simple and direct into the point, but we kind of don't really believe it just yet. The movie does try to do a lot.

But I think in the context of an action, you know, movie with, there's a bad guy and, oh, it's not, Yes, the bad guy who you think is a bad guy is also the bad guy, but there's also somebody on top of him. It's like one of those, like a buddy cop movie, right, where you think you've got the guy, but it's not him. There's another guy on top of the guy.

It's really this guy. Like, we've seen this stuff before. And I think, like, again, while it's not perfect, a lot of the stuff that they do, stuff that works, I think if you, it's, I don't want to say like, take a microscopic look, but honestly, like, maybe the like,

like, maybe like 10, 15% more care and change. This movie is like, like, almost perfect, you know, like really, really, really good to a level of holy crap. We can't believe this is the first time. I don't, I'm not as down as Steve. I do agree. Like, yeah, there could be some more polish. But when you like really look at it with everything it tries to do

and everything it does do, it doesn't miss by much, at least to me. I mean, honestly, and also we have to give a lot of credit where credits do. We see so many dog shit fandom movies that have 10 times the budget of this and worse fights. Where I'm just like, for $10 million, when they do be scrapping, I'm like, oh shit. Oh, no, the fight scenes work. He loves this shit. The fight scenes work. He, as proof of concept of DeF Patel as an action star, couldn't have been a better performance.

He moves fluidly. He looks amazing in a suit, especially when he's being active. He sells a fight really well when he is in that fight with the way that he's able to move and act with his body and with his face. He's got the physicality. Obviously, he's not a big guy, but he's lean and dangerous. and he's able to tap into something that you guys, it's not that easy for a lot of actors to tap into. Who's a good actor who was bad at selling a fight, then,

if you could think of one. Orlando Bloom. Ooh. Chris Pine is pretty bad. Chris Pont. Orlando Bloom is good as Legolas. I know that's what you're thinking, Steve. But he doesn't really have to fight close.

The Pirates movies, he was doing pretty good? Nah, that sucks. Nah. Really? That first Pirates is still great. Orlando Bloom is great. You love those. Every time I say something about them, you talk about the Pirates movies.

You don't know if the Pirates movies did. The first Pirates movie is awesome. And then they made a bunch of other ones. And I'm only talking about the first one. Ooh, that's what I'm talking about Steve. Sassy. Sassy Steve. I'm not talking about the 80th one.

Sassy Steve. What was the best action set piece in this? I think the final battle. I don't know. I think the brothel might have been it. I think the brothel was probably. The brothel was the final battle is in the brothel. Is it not?

No, no, no, no. The final battle is in the hotel. He's getting chased. He's getting chased and he escapes the police truck and then he goes into a brothel and then like the main brothel guy with an axe is like. Oh, the first time. Yeah. In the brothel.

But that was also when the guy came out with the axe, I was like, this is. some martial art shit because I'm like, you just go straight for the axe motherfucker like, you don't even I'm like, who is? Because you could know, and the reason that I love that is because there's so many things that go, that could go wrong with a fight like that because you think you're like,

oh, he's just going to like bob and weave out of the axe's way and he sucks fighting a dude with the axe. Like the first time that like the dude comes down on him and like chops at like his shoulder, I thought he just chopped his shoulder off. And like the axe was so close like right next to his face.

I genuinely thought that he actually got hit. And I was like, oh, fuck, that's it for him. But seems like the brothel scene, and you're talking about the brothel scene, I was talking about when I said brothel, because there's two brothels, right? There was a low-class brothel and a high-class brothel. Yes.

Oh, yeah, I meant the low-class one. The low-class one, right? Things like that are the parts of the movie that really impressed me. Because that's really well-directed. That's really well-directed, and it's ambitious. normally say, hey, we're going to fight. We're going to fight in the kitchen.

We're going to fight downstairs. We're going to fight upstairs. We're going to fight here. You're not reinventing the wheel. Bathroom fighting. You've seen that before. Mission Impossible. Fucking true lies.

You've seen that before. But there's some of the shots that he's using, the way he's using his camera, he made his movie more expensive to me with the look and the feel of it and the way that it was directed. He took a $10 million movie and made it look to me

like a $50 million. Now, if they had $50 to me, because even before we get on here, I was like, God damn, they made that for $10 million. Now, if they had $50, maybe some things to Charles's point would have been a little bit different. You know what I mean?

Can I ask you, can you really quickly, just for the audience, describe what $10 million can get you for a movie? Because I don't think, like, many people would be like, oh, 10 million's a lot. And I'm just like, not for an action, martial arts movie at all. It depends on what you're trying to do, right?

So if, I mean, if you're going to tell like there's a film that we're that we have in development right now that 10 million is more than we need right okay it's more than we need because it's very contained it's about people it's about a 16, 17 day shoot and we don't even need the 10 like you could get it done for five you can probably get it done for two

but if you got 10 million bucks now they did shoot this in Indiana I'm not sure how much how long how long that takes you how far that money takes you over there. I'm not quite sure. But if you got $10 million and you got a lot of stunts, you got crazy camera work, you got a lot of, that can get,

that can balloon real quick. He talks about the fact that he got injured on the movie. He had to grit through it because you can't, you don't have enough money to have down days on your production and stuff. Sometimes you'll be doing stuff and a lot of stuff that you would be doing

if there's a lot of action. It might be second unit stuff and all of that. Listen, everything gets more. condensed when you're talking about having $10 million. Now, a lot of the badass people, movies that we're talking about, they're smaller films. John Wick was a smaller film. Yeah, like, it was not a super like, you know.

Yeah, they're smaller films. But when you're watching the film, you can always see where they save the money at. And John Wick, they saved the money, setting. They couldn't go a lot of places. They couldn't do it. If you look at John Wick one to John Wick four, look at how much, look at how much, Look at how different the movie makes. But they start by the time, by the time, they fucking ride in camels.

I bet you like to do suits in the movie cost more than it make to make John Wick one. Yeah. I mean, you want to even think about Monkey Paul productions, Jordan Peel. The genius of Get Out is that like Get Out is one house. Takes place. Yeah. And it's like he's using his pen to basically be like, okay, I'm going to write this movie. Like it costs us $100 million.

But for real. And I think that's. actually what hampers Monkey Man a little bit because it's like Jordan Peel can make a great directorial debut, not just because he's a fantastic writer and director and all this stuff. It's like, Get Out is a small film where it's like he can focus on kind of one thing where it's like in Monkey Man, Dev has to be the actor. He has to learn fight choreography. He has to be the director. He's like, I honestly think when I talk about even biting off too much, it's not even just like the story.

It is like, that's so much for one man to do, especially I would call martial arts and action movies probably the hardest movies to direct just because... It's very technical stuff. Fight scenes are hard.

It's a very technical skill. I mean, the, the chat, the guy who directed John Wick, went on to, has gone on to be like a go-to guy because, and you know, he had a long world and stunt choreography and being in actual unit stuff.

Yeah. So, So he knows how he wants that stuff to look and feel, and he did it so well in John Wick, and now he's just fucking out of here. Like, he did it so well in John Whit because he understands that world, and that's a hard world to understand.

And death probably had a lot of people that were helping them out with. It's so interesting what you just said. You know, when we go to watch the bigger superhero movies, the only buy-in that they make you make is nostalgia. Like, right? So that's the only buying and they're asking for you. They go, oh, it's Captain America.

He's going to do something cool. Just wait for it. even when you think about Get Out, get out is an expensive movie emotionally. It's not an expensive movie like in terms of how much it costs to make, but damn, get out costs $4.5 million, reportedly.

Right. But it doesn't feel like we never think about it. It never. You know why, though? Because the buy-in that Get Out ass from you is just the the poultry guy, of race and class and all of that.

All the microaggressions that happen in the movie, all of the stuff that happens in the movie, there's a cost to it all. So you're not going, like you're spending, like you're sitting in things that are making you uncomfortable that are making you have to give to the movie, give to the movie, give to the movie, give to the movie. The more money a movie has,

the more they just put it on the screen, more scenes they can waste, the more they can just do stuff for the sake, of doing it. It's just different. And so, like, when you, when you watch Monkey Man, they make him everything that he has on the film, on the screen, he earns it.

Like, he earns everything. The movie is dragging you with that. It's a brutal film to watch. It's a hard movie to watch. Like, I don't like stabbing. I do not like stabbing. You would rather watch people get shot than stabbed. Without a doubt.

I hate stabbing. Stabbing is so hard for me, bro. Like, I hate stabbing. There's this scene in Game of Thrones. Do you remember that they were all together with, when Brian was with his little group of misfits. Do you remember these kids? Brand?

Yeah, when Brian was like with the kids and the one kid was a wildling, there was a wildling girl, and there was a little guy with the short hair. Remember him? Yeah. Well, there's one part where there's like, like a, somebody's just getting stabbed. Boom, boom, boom, over and over again

because one of those White Walkers is just stabbing one of them. And it's one of the hardest scenes ever for me to watch. I hate watching people get stabbed. Do you also hate the, I hate the sound that happens when it's like they do repeated stabs. It's like, and I'll just like stop. Like that, it's, ugh. I more so hate the surprise of a gun.

Like most gunshots you don't give a fuck about. I hate when motherfuckers do a gunshot and like the whole head explodes. I'm like, all right, guys. we're doing too much. All the guts. Nah, man. Bucky, I don't want to see your brains and shit. Well, that's how it works in real life.

So to be, you know, realistic. You know what I'm saying? Man, what are we giving this on the midnight meter, y'all? That's about to say. I was about to get to it. Before we get to this, before we get to the midnight meter, I want to ask one thing. Monkey Man,

are you interested in revisiting the world? I want to see Dev's second. Like, if Dev becomes, to action, martial arts, thriller movies, what Jordan Peel is to horror, I think that is the best path forward, where it's like, I actually just want to see

Dev make it completely new world with more money versus like, that's like asking like what I want get out to. Not really. I like the fact that we got us and nope, and it's like you keep getting something new every couple years. I think Dev, I saw Monkey Man. Now I want to see, I would like to see like another movie potentially set in India or set in the UK or somewhere else where he gets to be, you know, a John Wigg, Liam Mason type character.

Everybody else? Yeah, I don't think we need to franchise the world of Monkey Man per se, but I think that I could easily foresee a meteoric rise in Dev Patel's directing cachet for this. And I hope that he gets to have more starring vehicles as well because of this, because this is a perfect. proof of concept for both. I don't want to see Two Monkey, two man? I mean, I would. It's a great time

for the monkeys, you know? We got Godzilla and Kong. We got the planet of the apes coming back. We got Monkey Man. It's... Locked in. Come on, bro. I think, I don't know if I want to go back to Monkey Man, like, to see Monkey Man, too.

But I, like I said at the beginning, Deft Patel is an actor. Cast him and everything, man. make a death Patel rom-com movie make death death-petal thriller Def Patel suspense anything I will be there no matter what I think he is underutilized

as an actor and as a leading man and should be people should be calling his number all the time like yo dev we got this role come through you know that's what I want to see from him I think as a director like he has that bag and we've seen like all right you've got you got some talent man we like to see that but for me personally, if I'm being selfish,

I want to see him in all the acting roles. A rom-com will be great. You guys? Yes. There's going, you guys, he's done some of that stuff. I'll let you guys know, you're going to get more Monkey Man. Okay. We're coming back.

We're running it back. We're getting Monkey Man, too. Monkey Man, too. Monkey Man, Tokyo Drift. Monkey Man. Monkey Five. I think they should actually bring Monkey Man. Was this just monkey?

They should bring Monkey Man to the world of the Fassad of Furies. Yo. Yeah. What if Monkey Man joined the family? Dom uses his next vehicle contraption to just plow through the slums of India and picks up Monkey Man. What? It didn't feel right. They do nothing but destroy cities in those movies.

Didn't feel right. You say that. I'm not going to be like usually so positive, Steve. I don't know what you got again. my Indian brothers and sisters, but I literally have nothing again. Didn't, I don't know why. Plow through the stones. And this is why one time me and me and Steve were hanging out.

He's like, yo, what should we get to eat? I'm like, yo, I'm kind of in the mood for Indian food. He's like, absolutely not. Wow. It's starting to make sense. He don't. Steve is the British. Come on.

Steve is the British. Come on. Yeah. Dog, when you watch Gandhi, are you just like, damn? You like, Steve is. Steve, be honest. You know how like when you watch like a boxing fight.

Boxing is so racist. When you watch a boxing match, it is, bro. You can't help but do the thing. Like, you know, I remember one time one of my friends, my friend Tommy Talley, after Mayweather beat the dog shit

out of Arturo Gotti. If you haven't seen that fight before, that is one of the most fucking one-sided ass-kickings ever. Mayweather beat the shit out of Arturo Ogadi. My friend Tommy, Tommy Talley, Tommy was like, he kind of, he liked Arturo Gotti, right? Because if you, if you're a white boxing fan, you're going to love

like Arturo Gotti. He goes in there and he's splicing his face 175 times. You can't kill him. And then he just wears you down the beach. You got it was a great fighter, rest of peace, all of that stuff. But whatever. Floyd just took him to fuck apart, laughing, talking to Jim Lampley during the thing, a mask of him, and just beat the dog shit out of him. And Tommy goes. I'm looking at highlights from the fight. The absolute top YouTube video just says

Floyd versus Arturo Black History Month in all caps. He just beat the shit out of it. Go watch that flight. Go watch that fight. Floyd could do anything that he wanted. That's when I was, because Floyd was throwing on the rise at that point, that's when I looked at him and I was like,

I mean, that's after Corrales, but whatever. That's why I looked at him and I went, yo, this motherfucker, he had different. And Floyd was just knocking the shit out of him, knocking him out before he moved up. Anyway, my friend Tommy looks at me and he goes, We're watching the fight. He goes,

it is a shame that boxing has become so skilled that the true warrior doesn't have a chance. I'm looking over him. I'm like, if you don't get that fucking true warrior shit out of my foot, not waiting to me that dumbass fucking shit. You mad because it was a white boy

getting his ass teeth off on. Well, to be fair, you know, I'll be looking, now that I'm at the ringer, I'll be on NBA Twitter, and now there's a bunch of white boys that are dangerous. You just see people being like, yeah, you know.

It's daytime. Fuck it. The same thing happened to me. I used to hate on Yokes. It's day time. Now you've surrendered. Let them have their time. Caitlin Clark is your time.

Fucking. Pagebuckers. It's your time. All she does, pagebooked cooking, just cooking people of West African descent. Just busting their ass. You know what I'm saying? Just cooking them. It's day time.

Fuck it. I'm not about to look at somebody and be like, oh, it's a shame that Kaylin Clark, you got so much that she could be, Nah, man, none of that. And I know Steve feel like that sometimes. Steve, I know. I know Steve feel like that sometimes. He'd be watching that shit.

It's like, especially in stuff like this, Steve probably looked around. He was like, one of the white people exist in this world? What are we up to? I don't know. When what's his face? When the racist boxing ring, dude, gave him like, that's the only dude for Steve

in his movie. You know what I'm saying? He took, I'm sure, shout out to him. He must have took the roll on the finger because he was in. that bitch for like four scenes. I thought he was going to be a bigger deal. But he played his role Shalito Copley. Fine. All right. Charles gets us to the midnight meter. All right. The midnight meter is our scale from

110 ranking films and TV shows with the sacred and 11 and 12 reserved for pivotal game changers. Let's start with the Mitt boys. Where are we going? Nah, Steve. Steve, you got to go. Stop acting. Stop acting like a goddamn. Don't talk the fade. See, come on. Write the movie, Steve. Right six. It's a six.

Cool. That's fine. All right. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Charles. Man, you gave Godzilla and Kong a too. Don't you talk to me like this? Some of the most dog shit-ass fucking slop.

All right, man. I don't even like this, bro. I don't fuck all this. Give Godzilla and Kong another two. Why don't you? I'm going to give this an eight thing for DeVito's directorial debut. Does a lot well.

Again, as an actor, just outstanding stuff. And, you know, while there are stuff to polish, I think ultimately, you came out with something that really rocks. And I think people are going to really rock with it, too. So giving it an eight. This movie is the definition of an eight out of ten. Like the definition of it. Completely worse as a movie.

Could have been better. But this is a solid B, the definition of it. And I had a lot of fun with Monkey Man. I am, I was probably, I, like, if we could do points, I was probably like at a 7.5, but I was like, yo, do you round up a round down? And it's just like, well, I want to see more of Dev. I want to see more of his martial arts films. And I was like, you kind of got a round up to an eight because to your point, I'm like, there's room for improvement, but what? My God. What? What do I say? Nothing. I'm enjoying this. Continue. An eight. Go ahead, Charles.

You got to round up to an eight because you saw the potential. I was happy with what I saw. I was like, even when there was room for improvement, I still left the movie theater like smiling being like, oh, like I had a really, really good time. I saw some shit on screen that made me just be like, oh shit, movies special, magic. Let's go.

It's me. Fuck. It's positive Chuck. Oh, fuck. Guys, I've been positive about a bunch of shit recently. Oh, fuck. What are we doing? Fuck.

It's positive. Positive truck. Who the fuck over there? It's positive Chuck. Oh, oh, fuck. It's positive Chuck. Let me introduce you right here. He's positive Chuck.

While it's my time, you know. Retired, music critic, but I have to talk to my black friends and Steve about this. Seven minute drill. We got to be honest. We got to be honest with the people. Quick midnight boys discussion. Midnight music. Midnight music.

Midnight music. Midnight music. Midnight music. Midnight music. And I'm music club. Okay. So last night, Jay Cole dropped.

What's it called? Might delete later. Yeah. New mixed tape. News, news dropped right before the movie started, by the way. Charles immediately was exacerbated.

I like, because Jomey's like, yo, look, Jay Cole just dropped. And I'm like, nigga, put the phone away, bro. I'm about to watch Dad Patel.

But anyway, Jay Cole got a little, got a little feisty. He's finally punching back at Kendra Future Metro. And we got to be honest, man. The light skins need to,

to be stopped. Like, Drake and Cole are down so bad. Seven-minute drillies. The beat, how do you have two terrible beats on one disc track? Both beats, I was like, God, damn. And then this motherfucker, this is what really pisses me off. And I just wanted to, since I have this platform to say it, I never want to hear Jay Cole fans use the dog, dog, it was just a warning shot.

I'm like, because all that means to me is, hey, boy, you'll get them next time. Yeah, you'll get them next time. We know you fucked up. Like, no, no, no warning shot. motherfucker, I can only grade what you gave me. And he spent so much of that time being like, yeah, I know Kendrick was hot and I know we got classic albums and he got Grammys and he won a Pulitzer and he's more popular than me.

But that nigga's short and he sucks and I'm more popular now. And I'm like, get the fuck out of here, Cole. Like take that, take that shit away, bro. Just light skins fucking doing the most making us look terrible. I come on, man. That shit's ass. I thought, I mean, like a couple of things. and like that Ready 24 song

might be one of the worst tracks I ever heard of Montaile life. Ruining, ruining a dipset beat, bro. That was... I'm like, you should be ashamed. That was awful, right? And the thing of... I'm not even joking. I was in my car list and I was like, really? All right? And two, and I think this is like

more macro. Like, do I think to Pippa Butterfly is a classic? No, I'm not there. Not really. But here's the thing. Jake Cole, you can't be the one. saying that, brother. You ain't got it like that, man. Like, if I'm being honest, right message, wrong messenger. You can't be talking motherfucker. I'm like, you can't be like, you can't be like, you know, Tabibba Butterfly is trash and also be the one who's like, yo, listen to my song about the first time I got bricked up in class. Like, no, nigger. Like, shut the fuck up. Like,

come on, bro. No. This is how the game is played. No, man. And meanwhile, Drake at the crib, you know, getting one of his ghostwriters out there, like, hey, man, pulling them out the dungeon. Like, hey, bro, I need some, I need some, I need some bars where you at? We'll see what Drake does. This is a, this is a watershed moment in the history of biracials. It's tough.

You wasn't talking. Van, come on. I need that same energy from last night because I, I walked out of monkey, man. I was just like, oh, man. Van, because here's the thing. Van, you weren't wrong, but they was coming at your name. neck. Jay Cole fans was pissed.

So this is what I'll say. If people think that the Kendrick verse on like that was like a shout out of nowhere, a lot of people say he was responding to first person shooter. When I heard first person shooter, I didn't take it as a Kendrick Lamar diss. I've heard the song a bunch of times,

but maybe it was. I don't know. So I heard, you know, Kendrick getting this shit off. If you get your shit off, you don't get no warning shot in return. You can't retaliate with a warning. To me, retaliation is retaliation, retaliation, revenge, and get back.

Like a warning is, you don't retaliate and say, I'm warning you. That's not a retaliation. That's a warning. So if you're going to come back and do something, come back and make the shit pop. I don't think they have anything on Kendrick. I don't think they can, the way they do the disc tracks now is the T-Session,

and I don't feel like they feel like Kendrick has enough weak spots for them to hit to where they can get a good diss off. And he is not like them. He doesn't really want to be their friend. I'm sure he's cool with them. Like, I'm sure he's cool with them. But he would rather be in first than in friendship. He doesn't want to have friends.

He wants to have people that are beneath him rapping. Like he said that a long time ago. So stop fucking around and just do the wrong. wraps. Like, if you, if you, if you go do the wraps, so what's, whoa, why is there so much trepidation about it? Why is it so fraught now? Just do the wraps. Just do the wraps. We're a long way from no Vaseline. You know what I mean? Bro, somebody rap. I rap against them. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Just do the wraps. Wrap the shit. Or don't. But don't have wrap it. Just, just, just, just, wait, are you

claiming that J-Cole half-wrapped it? Yeah, he half-wrapped it, for sure. sure. He did. He did. He did. It's not like his whack. He half rap. Don't have wrap it. Dude, just wrap the stuff. Say the things. And then everybody, nobody loses. Everybody gets all into it. Even if you take a loss, it's still like, oh, you're part of his big beef. Hove lost to Nas. Now people try to do revisionist history, but Hove lost to Nas. It made everybody's career better. Everybody ended up winning. Hove ended up signing Nas. Anyway. I mean, that was a real win. If we'd be the real.

That was the real question. My last question on beefs is I feel like we already learned this lesson. If you release a disc record and that shit becomes a hit and like that's already a hit, you can't come back with the rapty rap like slow bars about like you only release four albums of 12 years shit. I'm just like, dog, you got to get something popping. You know what I'm saying? When Drake had back to back, I'm like, dog, that shit was a hit.

You just can't come back. Like, all right, I'll ask you, Joe Me Steve. do you remember the name of the Meek Bill response to back to back? No, no shot. Exactly. No shot. Why? Because that shit wasn't a banger.

What was it called? What was it called? Here's the thing. I completely forgot the Meeke was responded to back to back. What did, I think Drake had like energy or something first? No, charged it up. Charged up. There it was.

No, but here's the thing. And here's the thing that's crazy. If Meek just made a decent song, the fact that Meek revealed that Drake allegedly got pissed on by one of T. T.I.'s homies is still one of the funniest things ever. And I'm just like, bro, how do you fuck that up? You got, you caught this man with a ghostwriter

and getting his leg peed on. How do you fuck that shit up? Tough. I'll tell you all something. A lot of people say that piss story is true. True? A lot of people say that that story is true. I got to be real.

I don't know. After that came out, I was like, there's no way that that's true. And I had somebody tell me a whole long-ass story. about why that story is actually true. Good for Drake, man. Shrack was Teflon for the longest time, but them IG captions is not cutting it, buddy.

I mean, just just I love all. Everybody's music has really meant a lot to me, Cole, Kendrick. Drake's music has been really fun to listen to. Like, just rap or don't. Just do the laugh. He on the tour, he's doing a, like, like pyrotechnist at Travis Scott.

No, bro. Get in the studio. Just rap. What are you doing? All right. Speaking of the raps, that's a wrap. Okay. Okay.

Look at that. Look how we did that. Today, the House of Our Fe will be giving you their Captain America Winter Soldier top ten moments. I know what I think the top moment in the movie is. It's the scene, the Nick Furious Salt. Love that scene. Another House of ours coming to you on Monday. The Midnight Boys are back Wednesday.

A little X-Men 97, a little Shogun, no more invincible. We're going to be giving you guys podcast action credits. Our producer is Steve, the architect Alman. Jomi Adirondon is on socials. Hashtaghtagio, Jomi, Texas Eclipse God. Jomi, you're into the eclipse? Yeah, man, I'm going to be in Dallas to watch the solar eclipse, man. You're going to go there to do that?

Yeah. Okay, okay. If you go to Texas, say what's up to Alexis. Additional production. from Arjuna Ramgapal. Chuck Wackettick, take us out. Steve hates Monkey Man. Death Patel is the boss.

The light skins are terrible. A J. Cole is officially washed. You know when it's worse. When you give, like, I used to give my phrases like, dog, dog, you know, your goddaughter's going to be out on the street. I can't pay rent, whatever. Oh, my God. I hate these motherfuckers, bro.

I hate these motherfuckers. Jesus Christ, bro. I'm like this. Bro, bro, bro, oh my God. Bro, I hate these motherfuckers, bro. I hate them so bad. You have no idea how much you just trigger me, bro. Man is like absolutely beside himself right now.

Y'all never been that situation before. I swear to God, I hope everybody's doing okay, and I'm blessed, and I feel good about being blessed. I don't mean to come out in a long way. But I hate these motherfuckers, bro. Hey, bro, I'm telling you, hey, man, if you want your niece to have a good Christmas, go ahead, Charles, I'm sorry, bro. Because here's the thing,

that already makes my blood pressure rise, but then this was at the time when, like, motherfuckers was still lining up for Jordans. So then they hit you with, yo, I need a little bit of bread. And I'm like, all right, but you got to pay rent, bro. Just pay the rent and then get me back. Like, get me back in two weeks.

And he's like, yeah, but here's the thing. I'm not really spending it in on the rent, you know? We're going to wait in line. so we can flip some Jordans. And I'm like, nigga, give me my money back. I'm like,

just give me my money back, bro. I'm like, no, stop, stop with the shenanigans. Like, we're not, we're not doing this shit. It would happen every single time. That's why you gotta leave them.

Hell. I just imagine everybody at the, at the suit store and the clothing store with the bag of money being like, okay, so we got to look sharp when we fight all the bad guys at the final scene.