The Ringer-Verse - ‘She-Hulk’ Episode 5 Reactions

Episode Date: September 15, 2022

Ben Lindbergh is joined by Joanna Robinson to discuss the fifth episode of ‘She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.’ They dive into Titania and She-Hulk’s court case, the legality of trademarking a superhero’s name, and more. Host: Ben Lindbergh Guest: Joanna Robinson Associate Producer: Jonathan Kermah Additional Productional Support: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, everyone. This is Chris Ryan from The Ringer. As many of you have heard by now, we lost a treasured colleague and friend over the weekend. Jonathan Charks passed away on Saturday. John was 34. He leaves behind a wife and a son, and we are obviously mourning his loss and sending all of our love to his family right now. If you go to the ringer.com slash Jonathan Charks, that's J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N-T-J-A-R-K-S. You will find a memorial page for John, which has links to his GoFundMe that benefits his family. family, and the amazing writing he did throughout his experience. I encourage you to go there, and if you can, please support the Charks family. Briefly, I will just say that John was among the first people that we hired to work for the ringer, so he was instrumental in defining the voice and perspective of the site. He has as much to do with what this place is as anyone else. And throughout his experience with Cancer, John communicated eloquently about the challenges he was

facing, both through his writing and his podcasting. You could never stop John from talking about his passions. It's one of the things I loved about him. Over the last few months, you know, whenever we would talk, whenever I would reach out to see how he was doing, I would try to keep it very John focused, and the next thing I knew we would be talking about James Hardin or Better Call Saul. He really loved this stuff. He loved talking about it, celebrating it, debating it, illuminating it. We're going to keep putting out our pods and writing while we grieve, but we wanted to let folks know that John was in our hearts and that his family was in our thoughts. Thanks for listening.

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This is egregious. But you said you didn't like the name Shehulk anyways. I don't. Okay. It is just what people have decided to call me. It's not who I am. I'm still Jennifer Walters. She Hulk is just a thing that happened to me.

That is a really good perspective to happen. I do admit, though, there are parts of it that I enjoy. Okay. You're not done. amazing hair, no hangover, being able to walk home at night with headphones on without being afraid. Everyone in the drink. But it's not like I'm a different person who needs a different name.

Okay. And welcome into the Ringerverse, the Ringer's Nexus podcast feed for all things fandom. I am Ben Lindberg, a senior editor at The Ringer, and I am joined in a joyous reunion by Joanna Robinson. Hello, Joanna. Hi, Ben. I've heard you refer to yourself as like, Was it the Great Lake Avengers is what you're calling this? Yes.

But do you know what I saw on Twitter? Someone suggested that you should call this sequence Lindbergh and Associates, and I really love that. And I loved me back on a legal show with you. Yeah, it feels a little presumptuous to name it after myself. But if someone else suggested it, then I can take the suggestion. Yeah. For the past few weeks, I've felt like the pirate radio of the Ringerverse. The show is not named, not branded, not trademarked.

titanium could swoop in at any time, turn me into a beauty tonic. It's just off the book's bootleg podcast to be named later, but now you're here. So it's like an actual Avenger has just joined the Avengers. I feel like I've gone legit. So thank you for lending some credibility to these proceedings at long last. Happy to be your iron friend, I think, is the Avengers version of Iron Man. Happy to be there. Well, you and I had the distinct pleasure discussing Better Call Saul season six. earlier this year on the prestige TV pod. And now I feel like all along, we were just preparing for this podcast because we are old hands when it comes to TV shows about lawyers who go by more than one name. So maybe Jen Walters will win the Emmy that the Academy is keeping from Kim Wexler,

justice for Ray. I mean, at least Tatiana Musslani has an Emmy. That's true. So I was second chair council on our solpods, but you very kindly let me take first chair today. So let me dispense with some housekeeping. This week we are talking about Shee Hulk episode five. We are past the halfway point of this season. But before we get ahead of ourselves, let me run down a few programming notes for our audience because we've got a busy slate, almost no off days on the ringerverse feed right now. So my podcast partner today, Joanna Robinson, will be back on Friday with your friend in mind, Mallory Rubin, to break down the fourth episode of the Lord of the Rings, the Rings of Power. I'm coming around on this show, Joe. I was not sold initially. And that makes me so.

happy. I'm thrilled. Last week was a personal turning point for me. I'm not sure if it's better. I'm not sure if it's because episode three was better than the others or because I was watching with the masses instead of on a screener, but I was suddenly sold on the show. This is very inside baseball, but when you have a show that is all about the visual splendor, and instead of getting to enjoy every last dollar of the Bezos budget, you're watching on a version where half the screen says Your name in really large letters. And then the other half says, do not leak this, or we will find you and thrust you through the door of night beyond the walls of the world into the timeless void.

And I'm just trying to look between the giant columns of text. It kind of takes me out of my Middle Earth immersion. I think, yeah, I think of all the watermarks, again, inside baseball, but I think of all the watermarks on screeners, the Amazon one is the most aggressive. Very aggressive. Hashtag press problems. Okay. A special edition of Mint Edition is coming your way Saturday on Harley Quinn, season three. And then you can catch Mal and Joe again on Talk the Thrones on Sunday as they give their reactions to episode five of House of the Dragon and try to help Chris Ryan cope with the fact that he's going to need to know the name of another dragon now, probably. Yeah. Five. the ones that are already there.

Then the world's most prolific podcaster, Joanna Robinson, will be back on Tuesday with the house of our hot D deep dive on Tuesday, then followed by the Midnight Boys on Andor on Wednesday. Andor, Endor is coming. Ben and I haven't seen it. Yeah, we haven't seen it yet. We're very excited. So excited. It's Star Wars season. It's everything else season.

The hype on Andor is very high. Very. Yeah. And after the midweek, Midnight Boys. We will start the cycle all over again with a She-Hulk pod next Thursday. And Mint Edition, we'll be back for that. So Steve and Jomey will be bringing you double-min next week. So could episode six bring the long-awaited She-Hulk debut of Matt Murdoch?

Maybe, maybe so, exciting times. And today is also exciting because we are discussing episode five of She-Hulk, Attorney at Law, mean green, and straight poured into these genes, directed by a new valia, and written by Dana Schwartz. So let's stick with what's worked. Follow our time-tested trial-style format here, which means we'll start with some opening statements on a few big-picture thoughts about the episode before we delve into the detail. So first takeaway from this episode for me

is that this is the most, I guess, we might say, restrained episode of this series yet, by which I mean much more of a standalone case-of-the-week-style episode than we've become accustomed to. We went a week without a real in-person MCU character crossover or a celebrity cameo. We didn't get a ton of Easter eggs until toward the end of the episode. No obvious development of an overarching plot or Big Bad, though maybe some subtle signs we'll get into that. So this was not a week when Jen needed to address the audience and remind us whose show this is and no Twitter armor from Wongers this week.

So just as episode one was different from the next few, this one was different from those. And now that we've seen it, what do you think this series looks like with She-Hulk largely on her own, seizing the spotlight? I mean, this is, I liked this episode. It was my least favorite of all the ones we've seen so far. And that doesn't mean it was bad. It's just sort of it felt a little light. It felt like it might have been paired really well with episode four. Like, there was so much crossover material from, like, the app dating spree into this episode that I'm like, oh, if these two had been sort of smished together, that would have been, like, one really good, solid episode.

I don't think you need a cameo. I think Tatian Musleni and Jen are, like, perfectly capable of carrying their own show. But I will say in this episode, I was, like, Nikki and Pug really helped. The B plot, as it were, really helped sort of bring this episode up. I love those characters. I think they're fantastic. They work really well here. Agreed.

Yeah. As I've said all along, I haven't been bothered by the constant crossovers. It's felt fun to me. It's consistent with the character in the comics. It's a lighthearted series. It's kept things fresh from week to week. But I'm kind of with you because I felt like the series has been getting better and better and finding its voice more and more with each episode.

And I wouldn't say that this episode continued that trend. I wouldn't say it really lost a lot of ground. I have a football analogy. I don't know why I'm making a football analogy. because I'm the second least likely person to do that on earth after you. But I feel like the show was driving down field. It was picking up yardage. And last week you get the big first down.

Everyone loved episode four. They're heading for the end zone. Then this week felt to me like just getting stopped at the goal line. It's fine. It's not a turnover. It's only second down. You're probably still scoring the touchdown. But you just didn't get to spike the football yet.

This is just a teaser for when the ringerverse expands into sports. sports talk. So I understood all of that. Absolutely. I knew that you would. Yeah. And on the whole, I really, I like the low stakes nature of the series just as a change of pace. But this was the first time where at times I kind of felt the lack of conflict, right? Like last week's episode set up the trademark case. Then that case consumed most of this episode. And I don't know about you, but I was not in a ton of suspense about whether the titular character of She-Hulk would be able to keep calling herself She-Hulk. You know, it didn't seem likely that the final four episodes would just be about beauty products.

So they found a way to connect last week's dating subplot to tie up this week's trademark case. But I like the dating subplot on its own, even without the connection to the case. So I guess those things kind of intertwining conveys the dilemma Jen faces as she tries to synthesize. as she tries to synthesize these two sides of herself. But I'm with you. Yeah, walking out of the episode, walking out, like not going anywhere in my house, out of the episode, I was, I was like, was this the least amount of non-Hulk Jen we got? And then I rewatched.

I was like, no, we get that long sequence sort of when she goes to the Expo, like she's there as Jen. But like, yeah, got to save some CDI money somewhere. Right. But I think in general I much prefer her as Jen, like, because I don't want to hammer the CG on this show. Like, plenty of people have done that. But I think, I think what I will say is I think it's inconsistent.

Like, sometimes I think it's, you know, I know they farmed out to different VFX houses. And sometimes some weeks, I think it's better than others. I thought this was kind of like a down week for the VFX. And I just like every, and I think part of us she's supposed to look kind of like off and frumpy because she's going to get this like whatever glam makeover, I suppose, in the next episode. So I think that's part of it. But I was just like, I want to spend time with Tatiana. And speaking of which, can I just.

Can I just say, the premise of both last week's episode and this week's episode, here's the most unbelievable thing I've seen in the MCU. Oh, I know what you're going to say. Canadian cutie pie, Tatiana Maslani, is somehow not able to get a date or is going to be rejected in public. Like, come on. Yeah, I mean, there's no accounting for taste, I suppose, on any individual level. But, yeah, I can't imagine that she would have a hard time on the apps. It just doesn't check out.

Anyway, we're nitpicking. I think we still really like the series. This is fine. It was fun. I'm not mad. Please don't put in the newspaper that I got mad. I don't turn on most sitcoms expecting some earth-shaking plot revelation from week to week. So to some extent, I'm just fighting my Marvel conditioning here to expect that sort of thing.

But I like these characters. I like spending a breezy 20-something minutes with them each week. We got Mallory Book getting some good screen time this week. We got Jen fighting for the name that she had initially rejected, which is a pretty important development on a character level. It just felt like a little lull between the Wong's and daredevils. And I do kind of feel like I have Wong withdrawal. Like, I don't want to overwork Wong. We need a little load management to make another sports analogy.

But what are Madison and Wongers watching now? I want to know. I feel like I'm too removed from their lives now. Maybe they're not in this episode because they have moved on for the Sopranos to The Good Wife. And it would be too reality-breaking to have Renee Lise Goldsbury who played a lawyer on The Good Wife also here playing a lawyer. So they had to do it off-screen. But yeah, I miss Madison a lot. And I hope we see so much more from her.

And I mean, I guess that's the point is that, like, she, like, I love Jen. I love Tatiana. I think she's doing a great job. But, like, this show is really knocking out of the park with the side characters, right? Like Madison, and we already mentioned, Nikki and Pug, like that comedy voice is so strong on this show that I'm just a huge admirer of it. And I think also the show is doing such a good job of, I was so glad to hear Jody talk about some of the stuff last week. But the idea, it reminds me a lot of one of my favorite shows, Buffy, which I won't get into super detail about. But one of the genius points of Buffy was that the creators took high school problems and made them like supernatural and frustrating, right?

And so what I love about She-Hulk is that they've taken these frustrations of the modern working woman and made it part of like the superhero narrative. So I love that like when she's getting her super suit, it's from a like Edna Mode-esque Italia and not like, you know what I mean? or like where someone's going to like shame her for how she looks or that her adversary in this episode is like an influencer who's part of the whole patriarchal machine like it's all sort of you know and that like the bad Tinder dates like it's all it's all in the mix and it's all like thematically related to the experience of a of a woman working through the world so right and don't worry we will see Madison again I have confidence that Madison's like I mean I'm not guaranteeing I mean I don't know anything I'm not spoiling

but I'm just saying everyone wants her and marvel's in the business of giving us what we want, right? Yeah, I just hope it's like this season and not like five movies from now. Right. She's sort of like Madison is to She Hulk what Agatha was to Wanda Vision maybe in a way, kind of the breakout character that you just want to see more of that person. So I don't know whether that means she'll get a spin off too. But we haven't seen the last of Madison. Okay. Second question, and you just alluded to the influencer.

So can we do a little vibe check on Titania? Is this character working for you? Not, I mean, it depends what she needs to be, I guess. Yeah, which I still don't know exactly, which is maybe part of the problem. Yeah. So, like, I wouldn't say that she is, like, leaping off the page for me, but it depends how big of a deal overall she's going to be. Like, maybe this is the last we see of her could be. Probably not, Jamila Jamil, like, probably not.

But, like, maybe. What do you think? Yeah, comics Titania in her history with She-Hulk goes all the way back to Secret Wars, and they're constantly tangling, though they're in a pretty good place these days on the most recent She-Hulk run. But on the show, I don't know whether she's filling that same purpose of the constant antagonist and the recurring nemesis type. It's like she's kind of caught between comic relief and nemesis so far.

When we meet the character, she's Kool-Aid Manning into the courtroom and almost killing the jury. Like, what was she doing there? Like, we still don't really know what she was doing there. Like, how do we square that with her being an influencer now who's selling snake oil cosmetics? Like, is the trademark case motivated by a grudge against Shehulk from that first episode? Or does she just want to make money? It's not totally clear to me, at least. Like, we don't get much sense of what she's thinking or what her motivations or feelings about she-hulk are.

I mean, we're going to talk about later on some, like, bigger picture theories of what's going on, but I almost wonder if she's like a red herring, big bad, you know. Yeah. I'm not saying we need a full Mary McFerrin Titania origin story episode or that she needs to be working for Dr. Doom or anything. It's just that introducing the character in a very violent way in the premiere, which seemed to set her up for that role. and maybe that was a misdirect, but then having her disappear for a few weeks and then come back in this context is kind of confusing to me. And maybe it's just a product of the episode order being rearranged because of orders from Feigey and co. I mean, if the first episode was just intended to be episode eight at one point, then maybe that wasn't the way we were supposed to meet Titania. I like the legal battle taking the place of a brawl, which is her usual way of fighting Shee Hulk.

but I have questions beyond that, so we'll see if she recurs and how. So third thing, because we've been grousing slightly so far, I just want to say something completely positive, which is that She-Hulk has been, I think, a perfect compliment to the rest of my media diet at this particular time. I'm watching, you're watching, How's the Dragon, Rings of Power, we're about to dive into Andor. we are just drowning in sweeping serialized stories with a lot of lore. And I love the lore. Don't get me wrong.

But I am so sated by these big budget dramas. There's so much to digest that when another course is served, it's kind of daunting. Like, I'm not sure I have room for dessert here. I'm watching too many things. But you always, in the end, make room for dessert. And Shehulk just goes down easy, you know, every week. And it's like the perfect aperitif or digestif, you know, to like stimulate the appetite or finish off the meal. So that's what She-Hulk is doing for me right now.

And I guess Star Trek lowered decks too. They're just kind of coming up clutch as the delicious little snacks that just tied me over between the big fantasy sci-fi shows. It's just nice to sit back and loosen my belt a bit and just down this thing every week. Yeah, I mean, I stayed up till, and I hadn't done that yet because I had watched the first four episodes of screeners, but I stayed up till midnight because I knew I was going to talk to you this morning to watch it last night. And I was just sort of like, oh, I had fun. This is probably not a show I need to stay up until midnight for, but like I had a great time. And to use your like, you know, giant banquet metaphor, yeah, I think of it as like the little sorbet, the palate cleanser between, you know, the really heavy, yeah, dishes. That's a, that's a smart way of looking at it. So that takes us to the evidence stage, the little episode recap that we tend to do here. And this episode was on the shorter side. It didn't have as many moving parts. So we can just maybe hit the highlights here. So Jen is dismayed to learn that her old acquaintance, Titania, has started a skincare beauty and wellness line called Shehulk by Titania, which does sound like something that could exist and potentially sell well, IRL. I need to look up exactly what it is. But I have been served.

constantly on Twitter some sort of Sheeulk makeup line like not as like funny marketing but like genuinely I keep getting Twitter ads for like some sort of Shehulk eye shadow palette or something like that and also there's a

really popular TikTok filter right now that like turns you into Shehulk turns you great and gives you like beautiful makeup and stuff like that so like it is happening like it's not just could this happen it's like it is happening Yeah, I hope they have the trademark for that. So she sees the commercials on TV.

She spots a billboard while she's driving. It's everywhere. She hears an ad on a podcast. She is not listening to Scott Lang's podcast. She's listening to a law podcast, which I think is a real show. So Jen Walters confirmed podcast listener, Jen, join us in the ring of verse. And Jen and Nikki go and confront Titania at the Grove. They get shut down, so they decide to take her to court.

And here's where we see Jen's kind of continued ambivalent relationship with the She-Hulk name and persona. There's just all along been a real love-hate push-pull dynamic here. But as we saw at the end of episode three, she's drawn to the upsides of superheroism. And I'd mentioned this on some earlier episodes, but this is a central theme of the comics, of the character. Going back to issue one of Savage She-Hulk where Jen says, I'll learn to live with it. from now on, whatever Jennifer Walters can handle the Shee Hulk will do. Or later on, she says, I thought I could handle everything and anything as the Sheihulk, but I see that just as Jen needs me, I need Jen, sort of the flip side of that duality.

And then there's the big declaration in sensational Shehulk where she says, I'm Shehulk almost all the time because I want to be because it's exciting. Or the theme of the Charles Sol run, no one is only one thing. So she's still kind of coming to terms with this. And I had thought that that brawl at the end of episode three might have been the big milestone moment for her, you know, where she recognizes the power that she has and she looks at her reflection in the mirror or in the car window. And it seems like she's embracing who she is, but she's still fighting it a little bit, right? And that feels familiar to me, like one step forward, two step back on, like, you know, how you're feeling about your confidence level or your progression through life. And I think again, this idea, I know we're going to get to it in a second, but like this idea of, you know, her, the clothing is so important.

And it, and it feels dumb to say so. But, like, the fact that she is not dressing for the reality of her body, but dressing to, like, hide who she is a She-Hulk in these baggy suits. Mallory had such a great line about that, right? Like, was it like an NFL player admitting to a DUI or something like that. So the fact that, and again, I haven't seen anything. I only know from like the trailers. There's a shot of her in like a form-fitting glittering gown. Like the fact that she is going to be like really embracing the physical realities of her body feels like another important step forward for her.

Meanwhile, in the B plot, Pug and Nikki are getting some time to themselves. We learned that Pug is a sneaker head. So he and Mal would have a lot to talk about. He's excited about the Ironman threes, which were first invoked on episode two, but when you've got a good joke, might as well use it twice. And Pug's got a guy Alonzo who has the hookup for his clothing and accessory needs, a drip broker. Is this a real profession? Why would you ask me? Why would I know about a drip broker?

I could desperately use a drip broker. I may be beyond a drip broker's help, but it sounds like a really useful occupation. Okay, even at the ringer way longer than I have. Who at the ringer do you think has a drip broker? Oh, wow. I mean, it seems like Mal does most of her sneaker hunting herself, I would say. Yeah. Gosh, Sean Fennessey's a pretty well-dressed guy at times.

He has a lot of ideas about the things that are appropriate to wear in the office or not. Yeah, it's no shorts is one of the rules, hard and fast, ironclad. It's been a while since I've actually been able to appreciate our country. co-workers fashion with the pandemic and working from home. It's hard to tell through the Zoom. I only see people from the neck up. So I could be fashionable for all you know. I'm not.

Anyway. Yeah. Yeah, I would say, I like that. I like the idea of fantasy being like the most likely suspect. So we'll ask if drip broker is a real thing. But I like the idea of it being like the answer to the power broker from Captain Falcon of the Winter Soldier, like the drip broker. Yes.

I loved it. If anyone knows a drip broker, please put me in touch for all my t-shirt and sweatshirt needs. So then we get the interlude at the Boba Cafe. The proprietor secretly is selling knockoff cap shields and avongers Avengers merch, which I believe is borrowed from the comic and which I've seen a lot of people tweeting that they would buy. So I imagine Marvel is already rolling these off the assembly line in time for the holiday season. Of course, yeah. Yes.

Holloway back at the first. is not happy with this frivolous lawsuit. And so a science, Mallory book, known in the comics as the face that never lost a case, and she will not lose this one either. So sometimes depending on the book, she's a rival, sometimes she's a colleague, sometimes she's a boss. So it changes over time. It even changes over the course of this episode a little bit. And there's some good lines. I think this show and the humor is often at its best when it's just making light of the MCU kind of poking fun a little bit. And so when Jen is saying, you know, did Dr. Strange have to trademark his name? Did Thor? Mallory points out, you chose two examples of people who use their

real names. And she just hangs her head in shame. I like a lot of that humor. Just kind of taking the piss out of the MCU, you know. So they counter sue to establish that Jen was using the name Shehulk in a professional capacity before Titania trademarked it. A little later, we'll get into the details there. Titania shows Jen denying the name, Mallory shows Jen begrudgingly accepting it in her TV interview. She has to show that she was using it. Meanwhile, Pug and Nikki get She-Hulk an audience with Luke, who, as you said, is sort of an Edna Mode-style fashion designer

to the superhero stars by lying about She-Hulk being an actual Avenger, which, of course, she teams up with the Avengers in the comics, but she's still a new She-Hulk here. then we get a chance encounter with Todd, who was one of the worst of the daters from last week's episode, and that leads to a little eureka moment. Now, people were speculating last week that Todd was connected to the mysterious boss in some way because of the creepy questions he was asking. Is this some sort of fetish situation?

Or is he asking whether a needle can pierce her skin for a more pointed reason, so to speak? Now, it could be that he's just a creepy guy. And he comes back here conveniently to give Jen the idea to use her dating profile as she Hulk to prove that she had a pattern of using the name. But you have a little theory, a little speculation about Todd. Would you care to share? To be clear, I know nothing about what's coming up. Actually, and I do want to say really quickly, like, because I knew I didn't have to cover the show, have to. I didn't get to because I was doing House of the Dragon and Rings of Power.

Because I knew I wasn't covering the show, I had been watching it in such a casual way that when I heard you and Daniel Tyn talk about like, oh my God, did you definitely think that the seven soulmates were the Thunderbolts? I was like, man, that didn't even occur to me. Like, I wasn't thinking about it on that level. I wasn't like speculating week to week. I wasn't doing any of that until I begged you, Ben, to let me come on this podcast. Because it kind of felt like I was missing out.

I'd have friends, like, message me and they're like, oh, Oh, this line was so funny. I was like, man, I watched that show and, like, a quick, like, little mini binge with those four screeners that they sent us. And I don't feel like I'm part of the conversation. So thank you for letting me come on here to, like, dig in. And now I have theories. And, again, I don't know anything. But, like, John Bass, the actor who plays Todd is, like, has been in things.

He was in Baywatch. He's been in, like, a bunch of stuff. So, like, he's the more well-known actor of the various people who went on dates with Jen. His name is in the closing credits, which is always a clue that someone might be important. It's very convenient that he shows up at her law firm. And then what he says is he says he's one of the biggest clients that her law firm has. And this is a huge fancy law firm in L.A., which means he's got to be like, you know, if not Tony Stark level, like something in that realm.

Like he's got to have a lot of money. And he says when he went on that date with her, like I went back and watched the scene and like the questions he asked her. And as you mentioned, like, he's asking you about our skill set. But then he goes, God, you're just so powerful. What a specimen. So, like, it feels like he's a rich guy who wants to turn himself into a Hulk, a superhero. Like, that's the best theory that I can come up with.

And it feels thematically relevant to this series that, like, the bad guy would be, like, a shitty beta male who wants your power as a powerful woman. Like, that seems on par for me. What do you think? Yeah, I like that theory. I had not made that leap this week, at least. I kind of thought maybe it was sort of a soulmate's situation. And it could be, but I like your theory, too.

It would make sense. I mean, do you think that he's going to be unveiled as someone whose name we know, or is he just Todd? A Todd? It's just kind of like, you know, taking us down a peg when we're looking for this character or that character, the Mephisto of this. series might actually be Mephisto last week. Maybe he is the Mifist. Or are they just poking fun at our tendency to do that? And it's like, no, actually, the big bad is just this kind of creepy guy named Todd. I'm going to start calling him Mephistod. It works better written, I think, than that out loud. Mepistode. Anyway, yeah, I think, I really, like, I think that these writers, like Dana

Schwartz, who wrote this episode, is really steep. in the world of shows like Buffy and stuff like that, where often you will, like, seed in a big bad, sort of hiding in plain sight that the superhero interacts with and doesn't realize is a threat to them until later on in the season. So I like the idea that we've got, like, Titania sort of, as you said, Kool-Aid Manning through walls, like very big and obvious. We've got people like abomination that we're on the lookout for.

But Todd, who's paying attention to a Todd? Don't take your eye off, Todd. Yeah. Okay. All right, so quasi-sensitive hunk from last week confirms what we learned, which was that he was not into Jen. He was only into She-Hulk. I feel vindicated in my argument that he was actually the worst of the daters because he, on the surface, seemed like a good guy. So he hurts her ego, but hands her the victory, kind of a Puric victory in that it does hurt her feelings a little bit.

But the motion is granted for summary judgment. Titania has to recall her product. like stop using the She-Hulk name, which means it's all Jens now. She did not choose it, but she has chosen to reclaim it now. And she says, I need to schedule several sessions of therapy, but we won. And Mallory tells her, I don't know of any other lawyer who would humiliate themselves that way to win a case. Wait, can I go back to the hunk really quickly and just say that I love Jody's theory that he's not a real doctor? Oh, yeah.

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doctor about Tramphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Trimfair Radio.com. All right. That takes us up to the cross-examination stage, our crossovers and references segment. So this will also probably be a bit briefer than it has been for the past few weeks. So I know the credits included a look at Pug's sneaker collection, his extensive Marvel-themed sneaker collection. So one of those themes is Deadpool's, which got people excited about the prospect of seeing She-Holk and Deadpool break the fourth wall together, probably about as likely as we'll. Wolverine showing up this season because Jen saw some clickbait about a man with metal claws being in a bar brawl. But a lot of other interesting shoes. If you want to do a freeze frame and check them out, there's a Dr. Doom shoe. There's a Cyclops shoe. So, you know, X-Men in the MCU confirmed, I guess, because we've seen the Cyclops shoe now. So that's a fun little treat. The thing shoe? Yes, the thing shoe as well. If you could pick from like the ones you saw, like which would you buy? Man, I kind of like the Spider-Man shoe, I think. The Scarlet Spider-Spidey shoe? Scarlet Spider, yeah. Yeah.

I'll go with Hawkeye. I like the Hawkeye shoe. And I would probably buy some hot guy merchandise from the Avonders-Avinders guy because I love a Matt Fraction joke in Avondres Avengers merch. You also have some prominent bat nipples on the breastplate, the part of the costume. that Luke, the fashion designer, reaches out to touch. There is an obscure character named Luke Jacobson, same name in the Dakota North comics. Not sure if this is the same person or if anyone would care if it was. But I think also kind of interesting, maybe the whole trademark case is kind of a meta nod to just the origins of She-Hulk as a character.

because even though She-Hulk has gone on to be a fairly storied character across decades in the comics, She-Hulk was created really for trademark reasons because in 1980 you had the Incredible Hulk TV show on CBS, and Marvel was worried that the network would beat them to a spinoff, basically, by creating a female version of the character. And then CBS could have just made their own spin-off TV series, starting the original character with a show. out paying anything to Marvel because they would have just owned the rights to that. Interesting. So Stanley sprang into action. And, you know, there was precedent for that because ABC had made a spinoff of the $6 million

man called the Bionic Woman. So it would have been easy to do the same thing for the Hulk. And so they thought, we will create a She Hulk. And then you can't beat us to the Hulk because we will have one. And I guess there are a lot of examples of that kind of thing, you know, whether it's like Captain Marvel and Superman and, you know, trademarks expire. And so you have to keep using them, right? You have to keep, like, making new movies or keep making new comics so that you don't

lose the rights to those things. So maybe it's a little nod to that. But obviously the headline here in this episode as far as MCU connections and Marvel connections in general is the daredevil mask. Do we say daredevil mask or daredevil helmet? Helm? Helmet? Helmet?

Melmitt. Melmitt. Sort of straddles the line between the two. Anyway. Melmitt's really just as good as the fist Todd, so I can't get mad at here. So apparently Melvin Potter out of a job. Luke is giving Daredevil his new yellow look. So many questions.

Yeah, a new mechanism for crossovers, I guess. This is a new way for Jen to meet superheroes. They don't have to sling ring into her office and ask. for legal help, but she can just meet them because they get their costumes at the same exclusive store. So what do you make of the yellow melmette, which we knew was coming? But I'm going to make that a thing. We'll make Melmette happen.

But we knew this was coming. It's a different look than we saw on a Netflix show, right? Yeah, I don't love the yellow melmint. But then again, I've never like, I still think Charlie Cox's best look was the like sort of black towel on his head. look. That was like the best that Matt Murdoch ever looked on the Netflix show. I think that I have questions. Like, what is Matt doing in L.A.?

This is a New York hero. Is Matt the kind of guy who would get his melmint from an exclusive Vitale in Los Angeles? Like, who set this up for him? Did Foggy do this? Like, what happened here? I mean, I probably don't need to ask those questions. They're probably not important, but I just, I'm curious about them. And I will say, as far as, like, teases for a character coming in a show, this was so much better than that terrible, weird, fuzzy photo Kingpin in one of the episodes of Hawkeye.

So I was like, I saw the helmet. I was like, okay, that I was like, well, this is so much better than that cell phone photo. So I can be happy about that. What about you? How do you feel about it? Yeah. Yeah, I don't know what he's doing in L.A. He is sometimes in San Francisco, right, home of Joanna Robinson.

It's kind of a home away from home for him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And She Hulk once visited him there in the comics, and they spent some time on the Golden Gate Bridge. So maybe he's just out on the West Coast, and he heard that there's a fancy fashion designer who could make him a cool yellow costume. Yeah, I mean, if I remember, right, he needed the new thread. at the end of the third season of the Netflix show, I want to say, because Bullseye had been wearing the same suit. And so he had to switch. And now some time has passed.

So if he switches to yellow, then that separates Daredevil from Bullseye and also, I guess, MCU Daredevil from pre-MCU Daredevil, which is pretty important as well. And when Daredevil was first introduced in the comics, he had a yellow suit, which was a tribute to his late dad's red and yellow boxing. robes. So I guess it fits, but I read a quote from Jessica Gow to Lifehacker, I believe, where she said, just talking about the daredevil appearance in this show, the one thing that I didn't have control of was the suit. They knew exactly what they wanted the suit to look like. So this was also passed out from on high for whatever reason. I mean, that's pretty part for the corset at Marvel, like that their in-house art team will come up with the design of the character and it's not really up to the director or the writer or whatever.

But the tease of Daredevil here, and also Charlie Cox, I think, said at D23, he's like, the question of like, is this the same Matt Murdoch that was in the Netflix series or not? is something that I feel like they've kind of said yes, kind of said no about. And Charlie Cox was like, this is not a continuation at D23. He said this is not a continuation of the Netflix. This is

season one. This is new. But I still don't know if that means it's the same character or not. But Tenofrio says one thing. Kevin Feigey says another thing. So like, I don't know what the truth is if we should be on the lookout for other things. If this is just like, you know, multiverse

Charlie Cox or what. Yeah, I guess they don't want to do Netflix daredevil erasure and upset people who love that show, but they also do want to establish this as its own thing. So maybe they're trying to straddle those approaches. Have it both ways. Yeah, yeah. Right. Just like the helmet and the mask are straddling the Melmit line.

The famous Melmit line. A well-known concept. A well-known concept. about the Melmit line, you know me. So I think Cox said that he'd be in only one episode, right? Or he referred to an episode, it sounded like. So maybe this Melmit showing up at the end of this week will set up the appearance for next week, the way that Jen getting served at the end of last episode set up this week's court case.

Or maybe not. Maybe it's just a tease and he'll disappear again like Titania did and we'll have to wait a little longer. But he's coming. Will you permit me to talk about a little bit of footage I saw at D23? Sure. Okay. This is not a major spoiler, but if you guys don't want to hear about it, please jump ahead. Like, you know, I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who doesn't want to know.

But they showed us like a tiny little scene between Jen and Matt at D23. And I will just say that there are hard flirtatious vibes between them. and we're seeing Jen in her human form, not in her Hulk form. And so what I like about that is Matt Murdoch as like a potential love interest for Jen Walters is someone who can like meet her in the legal world and meet her in the superhero world. And I think it's an interesting response to this episode where she's like people only like one side of me or another side of me. And then here's the perfect person who can sort of see. in a certain sense, both sides of her, you know? Right. Yeah. That makes sense.

Okay. That's a lot to look forward to. We will move on now to our legal brief segment. So I've been doing this all along. I have a lot of lawyer acquaintances and friends and family members. And I figured I'd try to take advantage of that, having so many lawyers in my life. Love it. And just scrutinize an aspect of the legal procedural part of this series every week. So let's play a quick clip of Cousin Ched, manisplaining.

the concept of trademark to an actual lawyer. This woman, Titania, has trademarked my name. Well, that's dumb. Why would you let her do that? I didn't let her, Chet. Huh. You know, Jen, the way trademark works is whoever gets their first gets it, you know? So if you would have done yours first, then she wouldn't have been able to have done that, you know? Okay, so let's discuss the finer points of trademark law. Sounds scintillating, I know.

What is it for? What does a superhero have to do to stop someone from trademarking or profiting from their alias? So today, my legal counsel was Christine Feller Wilson, who is an attorney for Erent Fox Schiff. And her primary practice is intellectual property, focusing on trademark prosecution and portfolio management. Perfect. This is right up her alley. So she told me that in trademark law, if you're going to trademark the name of a living person, or even their alias, if they happen to be a superhero, if they're so well known to the public that

everyone associates that name with that person, then you're supposed to have consent from that person. So there's the question of whether somebody is so well known that everyone would associate the name with them or whether you're just niche known in your particular area, in which case the trademark might only apply to particular services or goods. Now, because Sheeulk is a superhero, she's probably well-known enough that the She-Hulk name is associated with her, although I guess she's a superhero of fairly recent vintage. Then again, she's the Hulk's cousin. She's been on the news.

She had the big Blonsky hearing. People have heard of her. She's easily recognizable. So the purpose of the trademark is to protect people's publicity rights and the rights to their likeness. And for the question of what she could do to establish her claim to the name, Christine said, she should try to show that everyone associates that name with her. And that could be with social media, some public record that the public associates her with the name. She just needs to have been a celebrity before the trademark, which she was.

And that's basically what she does here with the dating app gambit. So in trademark law, the question is, are consumers going to be confused? It's reasonable to think that a public figure might launch a beauty line. So if you heard about the She-Hulk Booty Boost smoothie, you might think, well, that's She-Hulk, right? That's the She-Hulk, I know and love. So there is that potential for confusion. And when- You don't have to be a Chad to get confused by us like anyone might be?

Yeah. When a product or a service gets further a field from that person's persona or their area of expertise, then there might be more of an argument that it's not related and then they could both keep using the name. So you can be Sheihulk and I can market my Sheeulk product that is not related to Shee Hulk. If Sheeulk is not so famous that people would not automatically assume that the product was related to Shee Hulk. But even if you have a trademark for a beauty product, unless Shehulk is running around trying to sell that product herself, she's not infringing on the Titania trademark just by existing.

You can't make her stop calling herself She-Hulk. She already was She-Hulk. And it doesn't matter. Christine said that someone else gave her this pseudonym or alias. It's what she goes by and what people know her as. So it doesn't matter that she didn't come up with it. And Christine says she should now file her own trademark to head off any other claims like this. And generally the trademark is associated with whatever good.

and services you're providing. So if nobody's paying you for being a superhero, which sure seems to be the case with the Avengers, then you couldn't necessarily trademark your superhero services. But because she practices law as She-Hulk, and that's a big part of her practice, and they want her to be She-Hulk, and they want her to attract superheroes to the Superhuman Law Division, then her persona as She-Hulk is tied to the service that she's providing. and so she could trademark it and she could. So Christine said that Shee Hulk and Mallory have the better argument here, and she was pleased to learn that the judge ruled in their favor.

So well done She Hulk attorney at law. It's checked out. Love it. Yeah. When we were doing our sol pods, I gave a shout out to the late Julia Clark Downs, who was a lawyer who consulted on that series. And I learned that Shehawk has some lawyerly expertise behind it, too. I believe that Barbara Curry, who is a dual threat lawyer slash screenwriter, who used to be a U.S. attorney in L.A. is a supervising producer on this series. So I imagine her handiwork is all over the courtroom scenes.

And that's why, for the most part, they make sense. Yeah, I did see someone say that, like, while Mallory and, you know, Jen should have won the case, they should have won it even faster than they did. Right. Because, like. Yes. It's a slam dunk. Yeah. Right.

Anyway, it gives me an excuse to talk to some high-powered lawyers about She-Hulk. Just the bill of-a-bill hours that I'm racking up here would probably exceed my salary. But fortunately, they're doing this pro bono. But I think in this context, not having seen the show, since she's a superhero, she's probably well-known enough that that She-Hulk name is associated with her. So, yeah, so, you know, trademarking her name under, you know, if that's how she provides legal service. or any other product or services that, you know, as a superhero, she provides, you know, I think superhero services probably aren't in there because nobody pays you for that. But.

Okay. That takes us to our closing arguments. Just a few final questions we could ask here. So we like a lot of these characters, but pick a favorite. Who's your favorite GLK&H workplace proximity associate? That's too hard to pick between public. Pug and Nikki, like, I don't know how to pick. But I might go with Pug just because, like, Sheehog needs a few, like, hashtag not all men,

like, token men who are, like, great. Pug. Pug and Jen's dad and, like, Bruce, I guess, are, like, kind of all we have going for us. So I'll go with Pug. Josh Cigaro who plays Pug is so good. He was so great on the other two. Yes. Like, I'm a big fan.

Me too. Yeah. I was already really attached to him from that show. So he kind of had a lead. This was a strong Nicky episode. But I'm going to pivot, actually. I don't know whether we can call her a friend yet, although Jen does at the end. But I'm going to go with Renee, Renee Elise Goldsbury.

Just like one of my favorites of stage and screen. She's just like a great comic actor. She can do dramatic roles. She's the best singer in Hamilton. Yes, I said it. By far. She could just do it all and is also apparently ageless. So if I can borrow the Bill Simmonsism of buying stock in celebrities, I'm just, I'm buying all

the Goldsbury bonds. So in this part, she's kind of a cross between a couple of her previous roles between Geneva Pine from The Good Wife, as you mentioned, and Wiki Roy from Girls 5Eva, two shows that are near and dear to me. So I'm all in. Good Wife, Good Wife Rewatch pod when? Oh, yes, please. Okay, great.

Hijack the prestige TV feed. All right. Second question, you get your choice of free sample of She-Hulk by Titania, because all these products are recalled, everything must go. She's probably giving it away. So do you take the snake venom lip plumber, the beauty serum, the beauty oil, the beauty tonic, the She-Hulk Booty Boost smoothie, which I mentioned earlier, or the She-Hulk-Foot exfolience. Okay, first of all, I would like to know which one Mallory book would take, because as you mentioned, for Naley School Street. She needs none of them, yeah. is 51 years old and looks like a baby. Impossible, yes.

Wild. But if Mallory decides to not reveal her beauty secrets, and I think she probably wouldn't, have you ever heard of the product Babyfoot? No. Okay, this is a foot. Okay. It is one of the wildest beauty products that exists. And if you are really curious and not squeamish, I suggest people go Google, like

Babyfoot before and after. after results or whatever. So she-hulk foot, I think, could be a real wild ride. So that's what I'm going with. I need that. I walk around barefoot a lot, not like outside, but inside. So my heels, I think, could probably use the foot exfoliate. I will look into this product.

Okay. Third question, so we heard Luke asked, what kind of superheroing do you do? Do you need built-in weaponry, waterproofing, fire resistance? since if he offered to make a custom costume for you, Joanna Robinson, what would the specs be? Yeah, I've always dreamed this in that. I really want some sort of like really discreet camelback situation so that at any given time, and I want it to have, I think, three settings. So like it can pivot between LaCroix, constantly need LeCroix, oat.

Oat milk a lot. I'm a real white person stereotype right now. wipe omoclotte or tequila. Like, have those three. Don't mix. Don't cross the streams. But, like, so that I could stay well hydrated, if you want to call it that throughout the day. How about you've been?

What do you mean? That's a great choice. Well, speaking of Girls 5Eva, there's a scene in the second season that made me and my wife feel personally attacked because Sarah Borrellas' character is wearing these very comfy-looking lounge pants that look a little worn. and Renee Lee Goldsbury's character, Wiki, says, what are those? So Sarah says, oh, my shears, what? You don't have TV pants where you put in so many ass hours.

They're kind of clear. They're like partially see-through from the sitting. And then she plops down on the couch with her husband in the shears. And Wiki says, enjoy your crushing mundanity. So I identify very strongly with that because podcasting, writing, editing, culture, consuming. These are all often seated. Seating activities, yeah. They're what I do for much of my day outside of maybe prescribed exercise time that I prescribe so I'm not sitting constantly.

So I really just need something soft with a reinforced seat so that it doesn't turn into a shears situation. So I need my drip broker to just provide a padded bottom, perhaps. But follow question. Like, do you not, Ben Lindbergh own anything with a reinforced seat because you're famously a cyclist as well? I'm sitting on a pillow right now, but I want it built into my pants. But don't a lot of cyclists have like padded shorts that they wear? Not me. I guess I'm not a serious cyclist.

All right. We need to get you some. Padded. Please. Hands and shorts. Okay. Sounds good. All right.

That takes us to our verdict. Any closing thoughts we might have on the episode and the series so far? Any just where you are emotionally with this past, present future? of the series? Well, I don't mean to like, I mean your first chair, so I don't, I don't mean to like, but you did skip over asking what we want for the she-holt costume. Oh, yes, that's right. Yeah. And that's, that's okay. But I just, like, I don't have a lot of needs for it. I just like, if Luke, along with some stretch wool legal suits for Jen has also put a super suit on that rack for her, I don't care what it looks like. I just need the guns out.

Like, that's the She-Hulk requirement for me is that I need, like, sons out guns out. I need to see her arms in action. How about you? I know Jody Walker would agree with that take. Yeah. Yeah, I was interested in what costume we're going to get. You said maybe you saw a sneak peek of it, perhaps, but it has to be just a glittering, fancy costume. Oh, the gown. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Not the one that Luke is cooking up for her here. So it has to be some sort of hybrid, right? He refers to a little something extra. And I don't know, like in the comics, you have unstable molecules, right, which are invented by Mr. Fantastic, which can shrink and grow along with the wearer, which is handy if you're like Mr. Fantastic

and you change shapes and sizes. But Shehulk in the comics, she's often busting out of stuff, or she'll just have different outfits for different contexts. Like, I don't know that she's had, maybe she has, but something that would be double duty that she could wear in her superhero life and her lawyer life. Like, generally, she's wearing some sort of she Hulk superhero costume and then switching into business attire for the office. So maybe we see kind of the classic costume with the purple and the green and the white.

I don't know whether he has cooked up something here where it's just that it will fit her when she gets big and small or also she can like wear it to the office. I assume like she needs a better fitting suit. Like, that's where she went in there in the first place, right? So she can go to court and not look like the NFL player. So I hope he's given her something here that will probably not be as revealing and cheesecakey as some of the comics costumes. But, like, maybe she could wear in every arena of her life. It would be pretty impressive if he could come up with something that would work in a fight and also in court.

Yeah. That's my challenge to him. That's a lot to ask even of Luke. Yeah. All right. So I jumped the gun a little bit, but do you have any closing thoughts just on the series, on this season as a whole? I'm excited to see what's to come. And I think that sort of similar to like the way that the melmint showing up at the end of this episode might have made people be like, oh, like that's all they want to talk about.

Again, it's Jen's show. But like as with Hawkeye, as with a lot of these shows, like if something shows up that feels like it crosses over into larger MCU, people get excited. So I wonder if all it will take is a daredevil episode. for people to be like, wow, She Hulk. But I hope they appreciate all the other things that are this show along the way. I think it's been really fun. And I'm enjoying my little palette cleanser sorbet show.

How about you, Ben? Definitely. And, yeah, I think they've said that the Daredevil episode it's not necessarily going to directly set up the Daredevil series. Like, it might be sort of a separate thing, which is fine. But I do kind of like the idea that they are just sneaking some consequential stuff into this series, which seems very low stakes.

But then, you know, you have the Hulk showing up and jetting off to Sikar and who knows what that will lay the groundwork for. Like, you have the abomination. You have Wong and Madison, the love that will last for all time. I mean, whether it's platonic or not. So there are a lot of, I think, just seeds that are being planted here while we're laughing at the jokes and enjoying the legal procedural that could sprout somewhere down the line, even though that doesn't seem like the primary purpose of this series.

But I am glad that we got an episode that Shehulk kind of had to herself, even though it was not our favorite episode of the season. And whether that is because there were fewer cameos and crossovers or not, I don't know. But it's good, I think, that we got to see what that would look like. Because there was that concern early on, right? Like, are they taking too much away from She-Hulk in her own series? This is her home turf, like, let her cook a little bit. Yeah.

And I didn't mind that they were letting other. cooks into the kitchen as well. But we get the best of both worlds, or at least we get many worlds, a multiverse of She-Hulk series. So keep doing what you're doing, She-Hulk Attorney at Law, enjoying your work. Okay, so the time has come to take our traditional one-week recess. Joanna, thank you so much for being this week's expert witness. I look forward to finding out which lawyer show we will pot about next. Thanks. I'm going to go trademark mailmit before you can. Please do. There really aren't a lot of lawyers in Star Wars, sadly.

Not a lot of lawyers in Westeros or Middle Earth either. You've got maesters. You got masters of laws, maybe. But maybe those worlds are too lawless for lawyers, I guess. They're cops and all of those. But all law, no order. You know what I mean? Right.

Thanks, as always, to Arjuna Ramgapal for indulging Maya and Joanna's desire to reunite today. Thank you to Jonathan Kerma for being our bailiff and court reporter, slash producer today. And please watch this space for much more Joe with Mal on Friday, Sunday, and Tuesday, more Midnight Boys on Wednesday, and Mint Edition on Saturday and Thursday. No Stinger for She Hulk this week and no stinger for us. So that will do it for today. Podcast Court is adjourned. What's the difference between butter and butter made from real California dairy? It's the real California farm families behind it. Real people. real care, real intention.

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