The Ringer-Verse - The Animation Awards | Mint Edition

Episode Date: December 4, 2023

Jess, Jomi, and Steve are back to celebrate the world of animation in 2023! Listen as they move through the awards for best animated movie, favorite animated tv series, and more! Hosts: Jessica Clemons, Jomi Adeniran, Steve Ahlman Producer: Jonathan Kermah Additional Production Supoort: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Yossi Sallick, and I'm the host of Bandsplain, a show where we explain cult bands and iconic artists by going deep into their histories and discographies. We're back with a brand new season at our brand new home, the Ringer podcast network, tackling a whole new batch of artists, from grunge gods to power pop pioneers to new metal legends and many, many more. Listen to new episodes every Thursday, only on Spotify. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matter. Tramphia offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tramphia is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks. If your doctor decides that you can self-inject trumphia, proper training is required.

Tramphia is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis, serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections or lower ability to fight them, and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine. Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tramphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Trimfairadio.com. This episode is brought to you by WeatherTech. Everyone knows winter is the MVP. and make it a mess. You don't need weather tech floor liners in the summer, unless you hit the

beach or go camping. Then you'd want a cargo liner. Or a road trip goes sideways, ketchup goes rogue, ice cream drips. Yeah, you'd be pretty happy about those weather tech seat protectors. So just to be clear as the mud, you're inevitably going to step into the summer. You don't need weather tech unless you plan on doing summer. Visit weathertech.com today. Hello and welcome into the ringerverse. The ringer's Nexus podcast feed for all things fandom. Welcome back to Mint Edition, the once-and-a-while podcast about all the latest fandom that you just can't live without. I'm Steve Allman.

I'm Jessica Clemens. I'm Jimmy Diner on. And today, we are going to be talking about some of the best animated things that happened in the year of 20203 with our Animation Awards. It's a wonderful award show. Kerm, give us some applause. Wonderful, beautiful. Give us some slight booze for all of our Spotify raps, and thank you.

We're all terrible people. Before we get into all that, some quick programming reminders before we begin. Today on the House of Our Feed, Mal and Joe have given you their latest deep dive into the next Doctor Who special. This Wednesday, the Midnight Boys are going to be giving you their blue-eyed samurai impressions.

Jomi, we ready? I'm locked in, brother. As always. And on Friday, come back to the House of our feed and dive into Hio Miyazaki's latest masterpiece Boy and the Heron. Good stuff.

But today, we break out our year-end animation awards to honor the best of the animation sensation that's caused for great celebration as the three hosts who go in a slight rotation and put on the best show for our mighty Mint Nation.

Okay. All right, bro, he's in the lab cooking. He's in the lab cooking. you put up rhyme.com. You was out there. The stories. Okay, I see you. I really did Google things that rhyme

with animation. Yeah, that's okay. We tried. It worked. No, it worked. Spoiler warning for pretty much every prominent animated thing that came out this year, but we'll be giving you

fair warnings for each of the things that come out. Let's get into it. All right, we're going to break this down for each one of you. Some wonderful categories that each one of us are going to do. We're not going to be coming to exactly a consensus from Int Edition here, but we're going to be giving our individual awards for each one

of these categories. First category that we have is a big one, but it's also kind of an obvious one that we're all going to be, you know, quickly moving aside from. It's best movie. A lot of great animated movies came out and a lot of great surprises came out from this year. But here's what we got to do this. The best animated movie came out this year was Potter First. Yes. That's, that's, That's my pick. That's Joni's pick. That's Jessica's pick as well, correct? Yeah.

So, like, let's do one the best animated movie that wasn't Spider-Verse. Well, then, okay, but before we get to that, how about we talk about why it's the clear winner and why it's kind of like, well, we almost have to, like, reluctantly give it the top spot on the movies. Because, like, this was fucking incredible. Reluctantly, not for me. It was awesome. Of course.

But, like, we feel like this is kind of a cheat code. Because whenever a Spider-Verse movie comes out, it clearly is the best thing that happened that year. To be fair, it's also, yeah, it was a remarkable movie regardless. Yes. The year of movies this year weren't as big as they normally are. Like the Academy Awards for Best Animated Picture will be kind of like, oh. Spider-Verse and whatever else. And so I think it was just like the timing that makes it like, yeah, of course it's going to be this year. If there was like, I don't want to say bigger competition, but it's just like, yeah. That's why it's Spider-Verous. Because not only that, but it's like the standout film of this year. It was

beautiful. It took a lot of hands. It took very long. A lot of ruling hours from the poor animators. A million different art styles. They went in with their actors. The worst acting was incredible. Sound was the only note that everyone came for. And then they fixed it by removing

lines from the actual movie. They just gave us like three different versions of the film. We're like, go see it and you might see a different version. Did you hear that they edited it out Miles saying, nah, I'm going to do my own thing? Yeah. Bro. That's just... Which is insane because that's like one of the biggest things from the movie.

It was, so I've watched it like now four times on Netflix at the house. Don't worry about me. I'm doing fine. And like the first time I was like, you're supposed to say, now I'm going to do my own thing here. I don't know. And then I went back and watched it on DVD. And like, it's weird. Like, I think it's the same movie, but I can't be sure because I've seen multiple scenes be different.

Like online, like on TikTok, on YouTube. I don't know what the, like, final version of the film is. I guess it's the one that's on Netflix and on DVD, but it's just, like, weird. It's kind of cool, though, because, like, you know, like, in theaters, you definitely, like, the first version we saw in theaters is not the one we have at the crib right now.

Right. So it's definitely, like, interesting, but at the same time, it's like, what? I'm, I'm, I'm, there was this weird quote from Christopher Nolan when the Oppenheimer Blu-ray was coming out where it's like you, like, you kind of have an obligation to buy this on Blu-ray so that no evil streaming service can take this away from you.

And I, like, I weirdly agreed with him because now the physical media gang is making a pretty strong case for things like this because random small things in movies can just, like, be swapped in and chain, like, any, any studio can just be like, I'm a fix wolves and then just take something away from... Fix wolves is crazy.

And, like, and just take away something that you thought was good anyway. And I get really annoyed when those small little changes are taken away. And you kind of have to be a bit of a steward of the stuff that, like, once it comes out in its pure form, they can't take that little thing away from you. Because Spider-Verse is like an amazing, amazing achievement. Yeah. And who knows what things can change or, like, alter come the third installment. Yeah.

Nah, it's, I mean, I remember those, it's not an old podcast, but there's a podcast that, uh, I think he's had the discussion about physical media versus, you know, digital media. And you say, like, physical media is kind of like winning right now. It's already won, brother. Like, there's no other way. Because if you really love a movie, if you really love a series, it could be on streaming tomorrow and then be gone today. You know what I mean? Like, they could just decide, oh, we're getting rid of it.

Like, it's gone. You can never watch it again. If you want to buy it, you got to pay, like, whatever for seasons on Amazon. or iTunes, whatever. Like, just buy the Blu-ray set on, you know, on Amazon for $75 bucks. It's probably expensive, but you probably, if you watch it a lot, you'll probably save money, and they can't take that away from you. That's the one thing.

They cannot basically come to your house and take the DVDs. Like, they just take stuff off streaming. Right. So if we really love a show, if you really love a movie, like, I have all the Spider-Verse stuff, like, at home. Like, as soon as those out there on Blu-Row, I was like, I need it. Because I don't know when it's coming to streaming. and I want to be able to watch it all the time.

I was a dummy and didn't get a disc drive PS5 and now I'm really kicking myself. Well, here's the thing. I bought it like the very first time that you could and the disc-drived ones were sold out. So I'm like, well, I need to get this. I was in the lurch, brother. I mean, I haven't talked about it on the podcast,

but if you followed me back in 2020, I was fine for my life. You got a fucking quest for a PS5. And it took me like a month to get it because I was only in for the disc version because I was like, I can like get a deal. I can like borrow a deal.

I can like, you know, get a discounted thing. Like, you can't do that. You have to wait for sales on the PlayStation store versus like, hey, my homie, he's not playing Spider-Man no more. Like, come up off that disc, my boy. You know what I mean? Like, that type of stuff. So, yeah, but, so we're doing the best movie that is not Spider-Verse.

Right, because the best animated movie this year was clearly Spider-Verse. Steve, what's your pick? Okay. There was a lot of great, like, surprises this year that I, like, genuinely loved. Like, I, I can't think of that many that were over the moon as impressive as Spider-Verse, but I think that it's like a clear, a clear winner for me was Boy in the Heron. I had seen that, like, a bit of a recency bias like a week and a half ago. But this, Haya Miyazaki, I fucking, I hate this man.

I hate this man, and I love this man. first of all, he was going to be introducing this movie no promo and just putting it out because it's his last, his reportedly last movie. You think he's Beyonce? He can just like drop a random movie like that?

This guy can. This guy can. And he also does not care. Does, oh my God. The absolute generational numbers of not give a fuckery this man puts up is incredible. Never known a man that hates

and loves his work as much as No, but no, it's his like I will put my animators and producers through grueling hours and absolutely terrible work and they'll all be like we are very proud of this and we will be happy and I think he's maybe the only person that gets away with it nobody deserves to get through that type of work

I don't endorse that but Boy in the Heron I have to say that like it I do not think this is his best movie but I mean like it is certainly in the upper half like it's kind of like starting to rank Pixar movies at point because there's the catalog is so vast and the quality is so high that you've got to start have to start nitpicking at certain things. The best thing that I can compare this to for anybody that hasn't seen it is it's kind of like a spirited away, if you have seen that of his,

where it's about a boy that kind of gets introduced into this magical world after a big life event happens to him. And it's very much about like moving on in your life and like coming into like a sort of like coming of age tale. It's a bit muddled with its messaging while also being entirely beautiful and fantastical and very emotional. You'll always find our man making some incredibly merchable cute little guys and goddammit

if this isn't the case here because there's little like little spirit sprites that looks so goddamn cute and I want a plushy of them so bad. I just think it's gorgeous. I have not yet yet. seen the American English dub version of this

but he's also like gotten a reputation of like since Spirited Away days like he's gotten amazing casts for his English dubs and it's kind of the one of the

only few like filmmakers I would recommend a English dub too if you kind of just want that ease because it's always been great so Boy and the Heron it lives up to the hype

uh Hyo's probably going to be retiring three more times before like he'll be in the ground and I'll be like all right so when's the next movie coming out. Jess, what's yours?

If it wasn't across the Spider-Verse, the boy in the heron is very close to this one, too. I think I would give it to Mutant Mayhem, turtles. And the reason I give it to that is only because first off, the animation is very fun. I think it's very different, and

it's very, it reminds me of, like, some sort of 90s of, like, of just grossness. It's that, hey Arnold, like, beautiful, ugly. It's like, that beautiful, ugly. It's like, that beautiful, ugly that I really, really love.

Yeah, but it's right, because all of, like, those human characters, like, there's something wrong with their faces. They're all, like, a scantz. And it's, it's, it's like, asymmetrical and wrong. Yeah, it's a little off. Yeah, it's gorgeous, it's hypnotic. Yeah, it's, I'm obsessed with it. And, but it was like with the Cross the Spider-Verse too,

that did a really good job with the voice acting and having these people play in a room together. I really love that they did that with Mewen Mayhem. And this is like one of our first, where we're seeing actual teenagers. Mutant Ninja Turtles. And it really struck me when I was watching the movie.

I was like, oh my gosh, I want four boys. But I was also, I was like, I want four sons immediately. You did the Peter Parker and Spine. Do I want kids? I immediately was like,

this is so good and authentic and this is like these boys being stupid, bad boys. But they're being silly and they're growing into themselves and they just want to go out into the world. And we don't really see

those in the teenage mutant ninja turtles because we get them in so many different ways from people wanting to make them really badass or just really cool. and weird looking. And this way, I love the writing. The joking was just in the kids being kids.

And I was like, this is the first time, in a very long time, I would say, that I noticed that voice acting really, really, really matters with chemistry with the actors that are in the room. Right. And that will actually lift your project higher. It will make it sound better

and it will be so authentic when you have them together in a room recording. Fire. No, I love that, love that movie. I'm going to go with my best movie Namona I put that in my list I put that in one of my list

So Nomona is a Netflix movie And it's based off a graphic novel That was written by N.D. Stevenson He's also the creator of Shira The Princess of Power I know the Princess of Power What?

It's fire. Y'all should check it out Yes But Nomona was one of those things Where it hops up on the Netflix And you're like All right that's cool that's kind of interesting.

Like, let me, I'll tap in, you know, why not? I got, like, you know, an hour 45 to kill. Let's do it. And by the end, I was like, I have tears in my heart. It was, like, just a beautiful movie about, you know, like acceptance and, you know, what did it means to, like, be yourself? And it was, it's just so much fun. Like, the animation is great.

The story's fantastic. Chloe Grace Moritz, who, like, you know, talented actress. you know, I, you know, really, you know, I'm not like, man, she's the best person in the world. Like, I don't really lower like that was incredible. As Demona, like, her performance was just, like, otherworldly. It was legitimately one of my favorite things in 2023. Like, I had an absolute blast watching. It's an incredible journey that movie goes on because that, another movie that was in, like, development hell for quite a while.

Yeah, like, it was, like, thing like, Dreamworks? It was Dreamworks, and it was passed around a couple of times and then it landed, Netflix. Mm-hmm. And we have another category that, like, kind of, like, praises the animation and art style a couple of times. But, like, for Namona and a couple of other things that we're going to mention here today,

we're not going to be like Charles Holmes and, like, fully shit on the integration of CG and hand-drawn animation styles here, because in certain cases, that works incredibly well. And Namona is an amazing, an amazing example of that. Charles Stray is crazy. Crazy Strait. It's true. He says it, though.

It's crazy. for Chuck, bro. Nah, so it was originally a Blue Sky's Studios production, right? But then once it was bought by Disney, it was just delayed forever. And then Annapura pictures picked it up, revived it, and then Netflix acquired the distribution.

Yeah, I mean, like, Chloe Grace Moretz, Riz Ahmed is also in it as the main guy. Like, it's just one of those films where it captures your heart, captures your soul, It's just, it's an awesome watch. If you haven't tapped into Demona, I would, I hope you check it out because it is incredible and awesome.

And you're going to love it. If you don't love it, then, then you have no heart and your soul is, it's empty. That's really, it's really, it's all I can say. That's entirely true. The perfect assessment from Jomey and Denner on here. Want to support your gut health? Take Activia's gut health challenge by enjoying two Activia yogurt. today for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. With billions of probiotics and 20 years of

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Learn more at clinickids.com slash 100KK. That's ClinicK with a K. Clinic Kids is registered 5.01C3 nonprofit. This episode is brought to by NOS Energy, introducing new NOS Energy Grand Prix Guava. 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 NOS Energy Grand Prix Guava. Hit the street. Grab a can and get after it. All right. Next category. Best animated series. TV show, mini-series, so many things. There's been a lot of it.

Jummi, why don't you start off with this? Let's go back around. Let's go back around. Let's go back around. My favorite TV series, Not going to shock all of you. You already know. Talked about it a lot. It's Velma.

Especially it's 2023. I tried to. Great. You know. Come on, man. Nobody felt for that. Jessica just quietly quit the podcast in her mind. Everybody felt a vet.

But why, Samurai. Come on. Let's be for real. That show was fire. Again, we're going to talk about it on a midnight boys. But I, every single second of that show means something. like the art is incredible the action is awesome

like I'm telling from like the opening scene I was like I'm gonna love this this is gonna this show was gonna mean something and at every single point not only did it like increase my excitement and increase my anticipation

for what was gonna happen next it was also like oh my God oh my God oh my God how can they top this and they continue to do that over the course of eight episodes. Right. Right.

It doesn't stop. It doesn't like, it gives you a second of like, oh, cool, things are calming down. Nope. Just kidding. It gets even crazier. And from an animated show, especially, because again, with all the work that's to get done in terms of, you know, drawing the stuff and make it all happen, the artistry, like, I mean, episode five.

Episode 5. Right. The Bride and the, and the, uh, the, uh, the bride episode. Fantastic. One of the best things I've watched in a long time. The Bride and the Ronan. One of the best things I've watched in a long time. It's so good.

Again, we'll talk about more on the, on the Midnight Boys next week. My main takeaway from Blue-Ead Samurai, uh, it's not in my best series, but I have to say that, like, the dedication that they put in to, show like this is kind of unreal. And one of my favorite things in the world is watching an animated project that I love, any behind the scenes footage from it. I'll just eat that up. Every time that they talked about how they want to storyboard and kind of like build out

the action in that show, they didn't, it's not, it's not rotoscoped, but it's basically like coordinated with a stunt team that recreates the main action of that show. And then it's flourished by animation. And seeing those scenes play out from like a stunt team and then it being reflected in the show is actually incredible because very little changes from that stunt team's perspective. It's great. There's some just great design philosophies

that I really, really enjoyed from Blue-Eyed Samurai. And the fact that the show's not afraid to take its time when it comes to building a world and making a story happen because we praise the action for it, which is incredible. But there's a lot of heavy, like, good, great themes going on there, which I just love, but it's a very commendable show. Jess, what about you? I put the same thing.

Because it's hard. I think I also has the Across the Spider-Verse effect where I was like, this is really gorgeous, this is beautiful, the writing's really great, it's perfect. What am I, to compare it to anything else this year is kind of crazy for me. So even if I was like, I liked, if I liked even another series personally more, I'm still like if this is a best of category, I think I'm giving it to Blue Eyes Hammer. That's a completely fair choice.

Well, I will compare it to one because it's not exactly on my top spot for Best Animated Series. Mine goes to Scavenger's Rain. And I know that Jomey did not particularly like this. Okay, I want to be very clear. Sure. Folks, because they're going to be mad.

I'm like, Jomey, you like A's Shield. How could you not like Scavenger's Rain? Listen, I'm on two episodes. Put me to sleep. I'm going to finish. Maybe it's fire. Maybe last eight episode go crazy. I will finish it.

Don't worry. One man's boring is another man's vibe. I'm not saying it was boring. Like I'm interested like, all right, they bring the ship down, right? I'm only through two episodes. They bring the ship down, right? That's the plan of the two people who went to the cave and the old lady almost died. But I'm trying to, I don't, it's not really like, it hasn't hooked me yet.

That's what we're doing this. That hasn't hooked me yet. Like, I hate to tell you to, like, stick with it because it gets better because that's not exactly the great way to sell a show. But for the way that that show got me, it's because the animation's entrancing. It's great. It looks great. I could just watch that thing go. That could be a screensaver for me.

The world is incredible. Beautiful. Yeah. I like the idea of a very slow and methodical and very vibey space, not even adventure, but like a marooned space space. story where it's basically like the Martian meets like 2001 a space odyssey with the amount of hallucinations and like crazy shit that happens with it.

I can understand that it's like a bit of a slower burn for a lot of people, but it hits so hard. I really, really, really love it. The amount of times that I was just stunned with the amount of creative leaps that happen with that story is really, really interesting. Again, I know you haven't gotten too deep into it, but I can say that it does get better

and it does ramp up with the amount of things that become very clear with what's happening. Scavenger's Rain was just like a great, great, like, meat-on-the-bone show for me. And it's just, and it's something that, not to say that any one of these shows or anything else that we mentioned, a live-action show can't do,

but I've never seen a live-action show do what Scavenger's Row. I mean, a live-action show can do because like the characters, the creatures that exist on that planet. Amazing. Just otherworldly. Like, I literally feel like I'm another world. Like, for me, it's not that doesn't look beautiful

or it's not interesting. It's just like, cool, get to the, it's got to grab you in some way. It gets to stuff. Like, let's go. What are we on? Let's go. And I get that.

And I can see that that doesn't work for some people because it is just like a cool looking thing that's just kind of like floating you along from scene to scene. I promise you it gets better. It gets so much better. I'll lock it, don't worry. All right.

Next award. Best animation. Many things look really good, but what looks the best this year? And we're not counting across the Spider-Bers. I mean, here's the thing. Every category could be what's the best blank that the Spider-Verse didn't do. It's not a series.

But when it came out with a part two in time, we could. Right, it's fair. If you pieced out Spider-Verse into six episodes instead of a movie, it would be the best series. Yeah. I will take across Spider-Vers away from this series. Right, that's fair. All right, but yes, best animation probably is not Spider-Verst.

Okay, thank you. Jess, what do you got? I put Jiu-Kais in season two. Because it's remarkable. Any one thing in specific, because I've seen a lot of fights, again, I've not heard. It's the fights. Well, it's so funny because go back and watch the first season

and compare it to this season. I mean, yeah, it's like, of course, they're like, let's go up a little bit, like, and budget and stuff. So it looks completely different. Maybe I got a better TV. I don't know, but I don't think that's the case. Because there are zoom-ins and close-ups of their faces that you can, like, almost see their pores. And I'm like, this is weird. Why would they pay so much attention to detail on this?

And then the choreography and the fight scenes are so well done that it's just fluid. And it looks a painting, a moving image, like a moving image. a moving painting. And I love it so much. It looks so gorgeous and it's so horrible what's happening to a lot of characters

in the show right now but it is still so vibrant and God, I don't know. I just want every cell that they drew or whatever on my wall. I think animation-wise

it takes the cake. It's also like, yeah, of course in anime can take the cake for like because the fighting scenes are so... It really depends because sometimes

it's a it's a tough thing because some of the best animas that I've seen occasionally don't have that high of a budget or like they grow into popularity and then justify a bit of more of a lavish season because that's a big spend and like a lot of man-hours to put into something that looks as good as JJK's fight scenes. It's so gorgeous.

Arguably if Demon Slayer would have came out like the first season this year, I probably would have said Demon Slayer but it's because they have like fire, like fire technique, this technique. So it has to look so gorgeous. But Jitsu Kaysen's second season is just phenomenally. So real quick, I haven't locked in to the season two of Jujikazen. Like at first season, I was there. I was, I was outside.

I wasn't outside because it was pandemic times, but I was like in my house on the country roll. But the Shibuya incident, they were spinning. They'd been going crazy. Like, how much better is season two than season one? Ooh. That's a hard question because I love Jiu-Curston a lot. I think it probably maintains the same amount of quality.

I think it just becomes... Maybe it buys into its own height more. Not in a bad way, but it's just like, hey, we're fucking back and we're here. And it's... I don't know. It depends. I also think it depends on the person because it's a lot more tormenting than the first season was. The first season's like, follow the journey of these boys or these people, these kids.

And the second season's like, hey, they're teachers. Now we're following them. and they're doing crazy things at the start. And a lot of death is happening. And people are always warning people about watching the show now. And it's, but like I feed into those things. I'm like, oh yeah, kill my favorite person.

I'm like, go ahead. Show me that you actually will do it. I blame stranger things for this. I'm constantly like, I'd love to see you kill someone that's important. And then did you guys in season two is like, okay. Say no more. Say no more.

Say no more. So I think I like it a little bit more, but I love the first season. That's cool. Yeah, I got to get back into Dutti Kuyahisen. I'm never getting back to an attack on time. Like, it's just not. I mean, brother.

Wait, when did you, wait, when did you cut bait? Cut bait? Well, I saw the first season, like, way back when it came out. You've only seen season one? Yeah. You need to go back. You need to go back. And then I remember, no, no, so here's the thing, right?

So the homie, me and the homies, shout out to Isaac, shout out to Arvardo back in high school. They were like, yo, you got to watch a tag of time. I was like, cool. I'm not really in the anime, but these are the homies. I'll tap in, right? watched it. It was cool. Right. Aaron Yeager. That was doing anything. You feel me? I go to Chipotle. This is like

2019. Where is this going? This is like a couple years ago. See some dude with a shirt. It's like, oh, cool, a tag on tying shirt. He was like, bro. You know, season four, part one, episode two, point five is coming out. I was like,

what? So hear me out. What are you talking about? Hear me out. I watched part I think it was three and four. Like literally this morning. It's worth the journey. It gets super dark. It's so sad.

It gets super dark. There's some beauty in it. Definitely, you know. You could hear Kerm's voice quiver as he's talking. He's like, oh, it's really dark. I don't know, man. It's so many, man. It's quality TV.

That's all I'm saying. We all needed to hear it. Okay. All right. I mean, maybe, you know, like, we'll see how much free time I have A and B, like. Open space in his heart. Right. Open space.

My heart. I don't know if I can handle. Apparently, Joseph Kyson is also, you know, heartbreaking. So, like, I don't think

might have to take some time. To be fair, I think a lot of the animated things this year are all really sad. They're all, like, two-truthers. There's a sad streak,

Kevin. I think every movie I cried in. To be fair, I'm a very sensitive baby, but, like, I cried in all of my picks. That's fair. That's fair.

Uh, I'll go. I think best animation for me is actually the last part we did. Scott Pilgrim takes off. Okay. Good job. I really rocked with it.

I'm not, like, I haven't read, like, well, it's been a long time just like I read a Scott Pilgrim comic, right? Like, I haven't been like a lot. I'm not like, man, every year I got to read the comics. But they have a very distinctive art style. And I think the show did a really good job capturing it, you know, with the, you know, brand new story and all the fun gags. Like, from the live action stuff, they did, like, the thing with, like, Waller. you know, like all the stuff that was Wallace's, all the stuff that was Scots.

And then just bringing that comic book to life, I thought it takes a lot of work and takes a lot of like, you gotta be like really, you know, deliberate and careful when you do things like that. And I thought they did an excellent job bringing that to life. So I think I'm going to go to Scott Pilgrim versus,

or Scott Pilgrim takes off. Plus the world takes off because he disappears for four episodes. Steve. Spoilers. Spoilers. All right. I want to get the consensus for everybody first.

Is it a cop out if I take an animated short? No? No, you can take it short. Okay. How short is it? It's like 15 minutes. It's pretty long. That sounds long?

Okay. It's long, yeah. Did we all forget that Star Wars Vision season two came out? Oh boy. Yeah. You're going to make me mad right now. Turning to the Darkhead. That's the best one.

That's the best animation that that season came out with. that's the one where to go to the to the like this a dude and he like she's not a Jedi she's a pilot yeah yeah that's the best way that's the best one all right yeah yeah yeah right yeah right right right right right right that was a good one

I was like you got yourself excited as you were saying because I was max it was like he put like something like something like the tubio or something like that no no no no well so blah blah he put him no no it's that that animation is it was like staggeringly good even like even like I thought the story was fine, but I couldn't not be, like, absolutely gobsmacked at how gorgeous that thing looked.

The studios that they had for season two all over for Visions were, like, great. I, like, it's not, it wasn't my favorite short by far, but it by far was the best looking one. I couldn't, I couldn't argue with it. I wanted 12 episodes of that. Oh, yeah. I wanted a whole. That would have been best series, for sure. 12, 13 episodes with that animation, with that cast, with those characters,

because it just looked and felt like, oh, this is like real, like, Star Wars anime. Like, this is what it will look like, and it looks awesome. Like, why don't we have this? Like, why isn't somebody, like, working on this right now? Well, if it's based on how good the animation look, it probably gets wildly expensive if you were to do that for, like, six episodes. Man, it got, Star Wars got money, bro. like that Indiana Jones, Brad Lucasfilm.

Like, come on. I understand. I understand. But if you want to have like 4,000 people animating that show. Lock in. What we do? Start paying your animators. Right?

Yes, yes. And let's get that thing going. What's up? Very true. Very true. All right. Next up. Best story.

That's not Spider-averse. Just like animation awards that aren't Spider-Verse. Yes. Yeah. It really gets there quickly. But yeah, no, best story. We had amazing stories. I love the way that animated stories work out.

Jess, give us your favorite animated story. This one's I'm very passionate about. This one I'm very passionate about. It makes me choke up. I cried this morning watching it. So I will argue, yes, I understand that Bluey was in that came out in Australia, yes, but once it came to the U.S. Yes, yes, yes, yes.

And specifically, I think Bluey overall, in general, has the best episodes and storylines because it's an Australian show that was able and capable to transfer to a child's mind really big world problems. And I think they did a really good job and it's actually really hard to do that

and they somehow were able to find an algorithm that worked. And specifically, I am talking about Bluey Season 3, episode 32, go to Disney Plus and watch everybody. It's entitled Onezie and it's starring Rose Burn. Rose Brin? Rose Burn. Rose Byrne.

Rose Byrne. playing the sister to the mom, and she's infertile. And it was a really hard episode because she hasn't visited the family for four years because she can't look at that family because she's sad all the time because she can't have babies. And they had to talk about it in the episode and translate it to like, you know, this toy that you had that you really love that doesn't work for you but works for your sister. Some people just can't have these toys. Some people can't have it.

But they go on and they learn to live with what they have and we make do with what we have. And I'm saying it in a jumbly, bricked up way. but they made it so fluid and so beautiful that any child or adult could understand it. And it's a situation that we don't get to talk about these things in animation that often, especially in the States because they're too afraid to. But in Australia, they were like,

let's actually talk about it because there's people that exist in this world that are different. And I think the stories in Bluey are so incredible that those writers need to go on and write books individually. And then I will read all of them. So I think for Best Story goes to Bluey, season three, episode 32 entitled Wednesday. That's beautiful.

It's such a great. It's also a nine minute episode, so go watch it, everybody. It's a good show. I can wholeheartedly recommend Bluey. I only watch Bluey because, A, I don't want to watch it alone. And two, I have a very best friend. Shout out to my buddy Jay back in Chicago, who has three kids and a lovely wife, and they love Bluey.

And whenever I'm over, we watch as much Bluey as we can. and I'm blown away with the amount of heart and insight and overall care that that show puts into talking about anything and everything. And it's also fucking hilarious sometimes. It's genuinely like something that's truly special that I don't ever think that I've seen have children have access to in my lifetime. It's a perfect show. It's so easy to, it's so easy to, they make it look easy to translate. I'll say that first. Yeah.

As someone that has a little kid in their life now, it is very hard to like come off on their level. And this show does even a good job for someone that has a teenager. And I was like, oh, this is perfect to watch. And there's episodes, this was a very sad episode. There's episodes that aren't sad. I cried again this morning at a different episode called Sleepy Time where they just realized, they translate their family to space and the mom is the sun because she's warm and always. is there and she's the center of the children's universe.

And I was like, oh, this is this is O-WI! And then my mom called me. I was like, no! And it's all a good show. It's a great show. I'm obsessed. I can't talk about it more. I do watch it kind of by myself. Don't do that to yourself. It's nine-minute episodes. It's very quick and they're very cute. And it just, it helps me personally just be like, oh, this is a good way of talking to children. And I'm a jumbly mess when I talk to most kids.

So this helps. No, that's, I mean, great. I've only seen Bluey through, like, TikToks, really. That's enough. You know, look, it's just monkey singing songs, mate. Don't think too hard about it. You know what I mean? Like, love that quote, you know.

But shout out to Keith for Fujimoto. He's got three kids. He would try to put me on to Blueie for a minute. And now with that, I got to check it out now. It's perfect. It's a great show. I got to lock in to some Australian dogs, apparently. Tap in.

Wow, that was beautiful. Steve, you want to try to top that? I'm certainly going to top it, but I don't know, Scott Pilgrim takes off was really great, and I enjoyed that. Curb turns around. No, I loved Scott Pilgrim takes off. I genuinely loved the film. I love the comics. And that story took me by surprise in a way that I was really moved by because it turned, like turning the idea of flawed people deserving love on a thing.

head in the way that Scott Pilgrim did when it first came out and then flipping it on its ear to talk about Ramona is it moves me in a way that like I think almost moved me more than any other iteration of the story has and I think I genuinely like the ending I loved pretty much everything that that story did for its characters both to either reinvigorate or or give some sort of catharsis to that wasn't given to them in any other form. And I just, I loved that story. I thought it was great and hilarious and fun and beautiful. Yeah.

I love it. It's good. Mine, I'm going to go with the Adventure Time spinoff, Fiona and Kay. Yes, my babies. Nice. I, you know, when I first watched Adventure Time, it was a, let me say, not the best part of my life. How old were you when you first got into Adventure Time? Oh, yeah. Were you in elementary school?

26. Oh, yeah. You're cooked, buddy. My bad. So here's the thing. Like, I was a regular show guy, and I would watch regular show on Cartoon Network. And then Adventure Time come on. I'm like, I'm not watching that. They all work together.

It's perfect. I'm now, I'm like, looking at myself like a child. Peanut Butter and Jelly. I'm like Matthew McConaughey at the end of Venethe when he's yelling at the way. No, Murph. Watch Adventure Time, Murph. I'm in a bookshelf.

Like, the show is, was incredible. And like, so, like, little background. Like, the first two, three seasons of Adventure Time were just vibes. You know, like, they just go on adventures, do bag of things. And then later in the series, like, there's lore. You start to learn a lot of stuff about the. character as Prince's Rollgum kind of sucks. Marcelline has been like fighting for our life for like eons, you know, and it kind of like, you know, like adapts and grows in a way that you're like,

you didn't expect from the show. And so the end credits role in the last episode, I'm left tears my eyes. I'm like, I'll never find love again. This is the worst day of my life. Fiona and Kate comes out and, you know, they had like episodes. where, you know, Ice King would, like, basically write fan fiction about, like, characters named Fiona and Cake bass, and basically off Jake and Finn from, from his life. And the show does a couple things that are, like, incredible. One, it grows up with its audience, right? Like, they start cussing, which is, like, you know, like, it's kind of silly,

but also like, hey, man, like, hey, I'm going to know that cuss, too. What's up? secondly and i think which is actually like really important it tackles like real like real stuff about like being an adult with no direction and how do you find meaning in that like how do you find meaning in knowing that like hey man like none of this stuff kind of means anything and you know we're all we're all fictional and you have to like find your purpose you know and and it just it just again like it's the perfect continuation from where adventure time leaves off to to right now and it's a fantastic story you know shout out donald glover you know he's in it as uh marshal lee the vampire

uh prince and it's just it's awesome uh one of the better one of the better things i watch this year and like I said if you like the original Adventure Time you're gonna love this it's awesome I never got to the point in the Adventure Time story where they started cussing

that sounds horrifying they start cut bro Fiona so it's like no it's not that bad it's not like it's not something crazy but even if they say so much

it's like oh shit I'm like wait what it's never it's even that bad but like I'm trying to say I think they say like ass yeah exactly

exactly I'm like what even then I'm like horrified at that I did I love it. Well, I think they read the room and they were like, there's a lot of adults watching this goddamn show. I mean, sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.

There's a bunch of jommies going around, like tapped in. That's why I'm surprised you didn't. You were like, I'm not going to watch Adventure Time. When, like, J.G. Quintel and the guy that did Adventure Time and then the girl, Rebecca Sugar, they all went to, like, the same school, all worked in the same writer's rooms all the time. I've seen the graphic. Yeah.

And there's basically, like, I think it's like King of the Hill. Yeah. Is it? Is that where they all that? No, then we'll, like, so it's kind of like, it's like a coachist tree for everybody listening where like, you know, like Bill Parcells, he coached Bill Belichick. Then Bill Belichick, you know, coached John or Josh McDaniels, Matt Patricia. And basically like the line of succession from like one show to another and like bringing it down. I think it's like Gravity Falls, regular show, adventure time, amphibia, owl house.

Like every single animated show over the last. like five to ten years that we've all been like, wow, these are like really, like, these shows changed how we think about animation or these are really beloved animated shows that they all go back to, I'm pretty sure it's King of the Hill,

I might have to look at it out. It wouldn't surprise me. It all, it all comes back to there. So it's awesome. And you were like, because as soon as I was like, oh, the guy from Flapjack is now working on this show, I was like, I'm going to go to this show. Also, I love their, what they're doing now

where they're like, I'm just going to do adult content. So they went from Adventure Time to Fiona and Cake and then a regular show to close enough. And both those storylines are just like adults that aren't adulting correctly, but they're making it work. Right. They're like, we're working together on this.

But it's not as like, because again, there's a fine line of like having like the sort of like child sentiment or a even adolescence to that show that like carries over to different generations of audiences. Whereas to like, I would never recommend that a, child watch the likes of like what a bojack horseman or something like that but to know that those stories grow up from certain types of uh lineages of writers and creatives it's profound because

to know that the adventure time saga goes on and kind of become something even a little different after all this time it's fucking cool so i found the family chigas found it it is not King of the Hill. It is Flabjack. Flabjack. So Trump Van Orman created Flapjack, which employed J.G. Quintel and Pellington Ward, who the creators of regular show and Adventure Time. And then

Alex Hirsch also worked on Flabjack, who's created Gravity Falls. And then Rebecca Sugar worked on Adventure Time, who created Stephen Universe. And then Matt Burnett and Ben Levin, works at the TV Universe, created Craig and the Creek. I don't know if you guys are into that.

But then Adam Muto worked on Adventure Time. He did Adventure Time Distant Lands. Dana Terrace, who did Gravity Falls, created Owl House, Matt Braley, amphibia creator. All that. Because one dude did Flapjack. All these heaters. Joe Me is like that always sunny meme

with the whiteboard and just pointing off just like, oh, Carol, I'm just saying like, that's kind of cool how that works, right? Like, this kind of, that's kind of fun. That's the best. They're perfect. They're perfect. They're perfect in every way. That years of Cartoonetwork

has stolen my youth. Or, well, my adult or youth. I think I was over. I think I was like, oh, I was in like high school during Adventure Time, but Adventure Time lasted so long that I was like, I'm like 10 seasons. 10 seasons, like 200. There's one episode, there's one season,

I think it's season five or four or five. It's like 50. episodes. I was like, I'll never get through this. That's what they were doing. That's what they were doing? That's what they were doing here? How are they doing this?

What's going on here? I love it. All right, well, let's go on to the next one. A category that Spider-Verse was definitely not going to win. Yeah, yeah, no. Biggest surprise. You guys on shock? That Spider-Verse was awesome.

Spider-Verse surprised literally nobody that it was good. Biggest surprise, Jomey, what took you, what absolutely blew your hair back? You're gonna be mad at me. So, one of the first anime's that, like, I, like, watched fully, right? Like, again, I started to Tech on Tyne, but I was like, cool, like, this is whatever, right?

One of the ones that, like, really got me was Neon Genesis Evangelian, right? Messed me up. Like, could not have watched it at the most worst time of my life. First of all, you're saying this, you're saying this because it surprised you at how good it was, or there was a certain twist? Well, no, I'm getting it. I'm getting to the show I'm going to talk about, but I'm saying, so what I really wanted to watch was a show about kids being in mex suits,

having a great time. Definitely not that show. And that is not what the-Jetka. That is so not that show. It is, let me just say, you need to be in the right state of mind to watch that show, and end of Evangelian. But a show that kind of scratched that itch for me, and I went in going,

man, well, this will be probably terrible, but, you know, who knows? But I actually had a great time enjoying or a great time watching it. Metcadets on Netflix. Oh, I haven't watched it. I know what you're talking about, though. I was like, yeah, I've never been burned by a show about kids being in flight suits before. This can't be any, you know, worse. And it was a pleasant experience.

I enjoyed it. Met cadets. Yeah. It's on Netflix. Got a season one. Probably won't get a season two. Definitely not. We'll get a season two.

But don't let them deterred for watching it because it's got a lovely story about a kid who just wants to, you know, fly a mex suit. He's not able to until, of course, he is. And the troubles that come with that and, you know, the competition within the ranks and it's like, you know, about family, your friends and what it means. to, you know, try and save the world. And again, like, it's real simple, like, what, 10 episodes, 30 minutes. It's not going to take too much out of your time.

But I legitimately had zero expectations. I was like, this could be terrible. And I'll still enjoy it. But it was great, and I enjoyed it. The leaps you're willing to take on certain, like, I'm just looking, at first glance, just looking at this, I'm like, this looks not great. Exactly. Exactly! Exactly!

And you're looking at it like, I don't know. I don't see it. Approved. And exactly, right? Exactly. Well, after watching it, I was like, man, I would love to see where this goes. Like, come on, Netflix. Like, lock me in.

Netflix, I know you're listening. You guys are big fans of the Ring of Versman Edition, especially. Like, Steve's your favorite Ringer podcast personality. Very true. Greenlight season two of Mechadets. Let the people see it. You know? What's Buddy up to?

love to know, you know, like lock me in. Nah, it was just one of those things where you put it on, you're like, huh, this could be bad, this would be good, we're going to find out. And it was a good time. Like your last anime, that was me with Netflix's The Cataro lives alone. I was like, oh, it's just a little boy doing adventures. And it's the saddest story. You're like, wait, why is he alone?

Wait, where's his parents? Wait, he takes care of himself? He's Matilding? And then it just gets worse. I use Matilding, making that a very important. I just, you know exactly what I mean when I say he's doing it. The neon genesis is Evangelion of all, like, not to like harp on it, but it's depressing as hell. Right.

It's so sad. Yeah. And for me to come in going like, it's like Power Rangers, right? That's what every child is on Netflix doing. Please. Please let it be like Power Rangers. I'm like it's Power Rangers. And for like what?

Maybe like six episodes it is. And then it suddenly isn't. Yeah. It very much is not. It very much is not. And again, like, I was, I was unemployed, man. I ain't no bread. I was down horrendous.

I was already sad. And then it's just the evil nature of all things. And I'm like, damn, does, like, I'm like, shingy in the chair. I'm like, what does it mean? What does it mean? Why am I here? Like, what's the point? Right?

I was already in the ground. No, but it was good for mechadet, like, watching Metcadet. because I definitely was like, this is what I'm talking about, man. Again, neon-in-avigilian. Nealajolian. Leon or Lily. Evangilian-Livigian. Invegian-Lillian.

Like, the Mekadets scratch the edge where it's like, this is not the present show about kids and MECs. It's fun. It's like, there's definitely like, you know, danger, obviously, you know. But again, from having zero expectations to loving it, my big surprise, it's got to be Mekadet's. Right.

Beauty. I did Elemental. for biggest surprise. And I did it for like thinking within the box, not thinking outside the box, of like, we saw that trailer and we did not expect that movie. And we just thought

I was a love story between water and fire. And then it was a lot more when we went and saw it. And I cried so hard. I knew I was going to see it regardless because I was like, it's Pixar. I'm going to cry and I'm going to go see it.

Every time now I go into most Pixar movies, I go, the question I have is, how are you going to make me cry? How is it going to make me cry? And I did not know what it would do in Elemental to do it because I did not get anything from that trailer. And then I went, oh, I don't know why I'm crying. And I bawled my eyes out.

Because he gave her the big bow. I was like, what? Love this. I was like, she finally realized. He also realized he's not being an idiot. But yeah, I think I'm going to put Elemental. Surprise me, made me really sad. I can't watch it without crying.

Yeah. I'm the cruel-hearted SOB that kind of thinks that Pixar is like low-key cooked, but elemental was good. Whoa, whoa, what do you mean low-key-cooked, brother? I think we talked about this. We did talk about this where we're like, they fell a little bit. Felt a little bit. Damn.

Y'all see what a... Don't worry. Look forward to Toy Story 7. Like, hold on. You'll see what Bob Barker said? Not enough executives. No, no, no. Hold on. I'm... Bro, I think it's like, I don't know if it's a new quote, but he was like, we got to get these sequels out of here.

Yeah, we're not if we can't do sequels for just random doing sequels. And then he was like, we can't do all that pandering stuff. Yeah. Oh. All that stuff for the woke. Bro, they're getting back to basics, dog. They're going back. Real American values are back. That is Steve's favorite part of Pixar.

Yeah. Pixar's back, baby. Steve said, all that real stuff, all that woke stuff. All that making stuff for POC people and for women, get that out of here. After the strike, Bob Hager said, now back to basics. Back to basics, brother.

We're going to lock y'all in. Y'all thought it was bad now. Oh, just you. Five beats a day for three summers. Get in the lab. No more of that weak stuff in my house. Cut Tim Allen his check. Oh, my gosh, bro.

And I thought David Zazlov was the guy. Nah, you thought he was the real sicker. Yeah, I thought he was the fucking freak. Bob Iger's looking back. We need back to nuclear family. All right. A wife. A husband.

and two kids. And you better make sure it's an older sister and a little brother. A white picket fence. All right. That's we're getting back to the OG stuff, man.

None of this stuff. All the stuff, you know, hey, man, you know, we're trying to celebrate LGBTQ people, all the black people, man. All that content we make that celebrates everybody.

Get that out of here. It's crazy. Going back to the stuff from white men only. That's the content we want to make. And then he ran out of the office and jumped on his yacht. He did a donut in his yacht. That was the most insane quote I've ever seen.

He was just like, yeah, man, we don't really want to do all that stuff that for, you know, for the other people. The crazy thing is like, yeah, you're the headhead, but everyone below you, like literally the people that are right below you, Bob are like, why is he, why is he in the place? Why is he saying these things? Why is he doing this? Because he's talking reckless now that strikes over now. He's like, what I'm like, hey, ink's on paper. We got to get this done. Nuts.

Bobby I. I was a little, okay, I was really surprised at how much I love Teenage Mutiny Ninja Turtles. I'm not going to lie. Really? Here's the thing. I was very, very excited to see that we could get a good Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. I did not, I genuinely did not expect to love it this much. I think I was, like, surprised at how whipsmart that script was, how the emphasis

on teenage and how the chemistry between all of those kids genuinely shines through to where there's no way that you couldn't have had them in the room the entire time. That they are like living and breathing off of each other in every single way possible. And

Ice Cube saying big booty boy races will just take me the fuck out. Every time. Every time I was genuinely reeling in the theater being like I didn't know that a movie could do that. I didn't know that Ice Cube could say big booty boy races

and I live to see it. That's so funny. I'd be in there. I'm ready. I think that there's like some genuine spirit that like I did not know that could exist and shout out to Seth Rogan and Goldberg

for making that come to life. That like I was so blown away. Like yes I was placated to I love Teen Age Mutiny Digital's turtle so much and my bar was in hell for what We got for most movies, and this was the breath of the cleanest, freshest air. 100%.

I couldn't have been more happy. All right. Let's do a quick, quick, most anticipated for 2024. Yet again, another category that Spider-Verst can't win. Because that shit ain't coming out in 2020. It's coming out. That ain't coming in 20-27. I'm going to be old man.

Yeah. I'm going to have great gang kids. Like, we never seen that. That's the thing. It's more of the fact that we just know the Spider-Verse isn't coming out in 20-24 is why it won't win. So here's the thing. I know what it's coming out.

Guys, I can tell you right now I know what's coming out. It's coming out when Spider-Man 3, the video game come out. Check this out. 2018, Spider-Man came out, the game. And until the Spider-Verse came out. 20-23, Spider-Man 2 comes out. Across the Spider-Vers came out. All right, so we have five years.

Five years. Five years. I'm going to be dead by then. I hope not. I am. You got so much more. Blue-year. Watch.

I'm going to be 83. Wow. Jess, you are moisturizing very well. It's all those carrots. Black don't crack, brother. You know what I'm saying?

Let me tell you. Let me tell you. We look good. The most anticipated? I want to go first only because I think I got the least most anticipated. Okay. Okay. Inside Out 2.

Wow. That's a cut. I'm laying down on Inside Out 2. I'm thinking, to be fair, I'm not thinking about series. I'm thinking about movies. and I'm like, what is my most anticipated? Because I want to see what they did. I want to see what they do.

I'm interested. I'm curious to the point that I will be one of the people seeing it, like, opening night. Like, I have to know what they did to this movie. So what they got anxiety? Yeah, which is a new one? Right. Okay. What else?

What other? Well, they still kept disgust and fear all of the other ones. They have anxiety, and I can't remember what the other one is. But even like the behind the scenes, I'm like, I need to know everything that happened. And I just want to see how they're going to do a teenager. I know that like we already have enough, like we have big mouth and other things, but I'm like, no. I need to know what's happened. Steve, you go because everybody knows mine.

Is it Transformers one? No. Oh, are you not up on this? Brother, brother. Just go and you'll understand why mine is the way mine is is. Okay, all right. Well, I had recently discovered that the newest chicken run is actually coming out this year, so that that's not the case.

But I wanted to give a quick shout out to that. If we're going to be shout out to this year, then I'll do what if. Okay, we'll do, oh, yeah, what if is coming out this year? Jesus Christ. We will be talking about that on the reverse. Hope Springs Eternal, okay? Yeah, man, it's going to be great. I'm going to love it.

It's going to love it. It's going to be great. All right, this might make y'all mad, but I, I, I, literally saw this picture of a pair of sneakers the other day. And I really, I really anticipated for Christmas 2024, Sonic 3. And you're not lying. You're not lying.

Sonic 3 might be, making a face. Sonic 3 might be something special. Kerm, don't make a face. Sonic, look, remember when the first thing came out? I'm like, the Sonic is ugly. He's got, what, like, sharp teeth? Yeah, he's got teeth.

Oh my God. Oh, my God. don't release this? And then they were like, cool, we'll just make the best two Sonic movies ever. And then they said, I'm going to fix wolves

and they brought it back. It was great. Kern, get into the mic, what's up? I wasn't outside. You were not. I was used to be,

you remain inside. The only thing that I saw that it looked like had going for it, had Jim Carrey. That was the second one or is that the third one. That's all of them,

Jim Carrey. That's the only one like maybe, but still. The first one has Jim Carrey? The second one has Jim Carrey. Jim Carrey's incredible. Jim Carrey should not be the winning reason for this series.

I feel you, but I love to say. He is a winning reason. He's a winning reason, right? Shout out to our guy, Cyclops. He's also good at it. Yeah, Donut Lord. Great. James Marsden and Idris Elba.

Yeah. And Ben Schwartz. Yes. Yeah. All great. For the newest one, it should be Tales because the original voice actor is there. Yes. But Jim Carrey should not be the reason.

But guess what? We got Shadow Baby 24. Shadow, dog. I'm not going on. like awesome real like if shadow has a gun if shadow pulls out a gun no you got to bro you got to house in the theater dog and watching watching it and it's a post-crated scene like first of all sonic goes like uh not super same but he get all the chaos emeralds right right and he like goes super yeah he does the whole thing like golden sonic yo this is fire man then the post credit scene

come up like yeah we got this old thing from the from the old times yeah from 1950s and he goes to a cryogenic version of Shadow and the audience goes, yo! If you want to see some end game level freakouts, look up the TikTok audience reactions of when Shadow the Headhawk comes on the screen.

I swear to God. I was hype, bro. I was hype. I was like, let's go. Because think about it. Like Ben Shorts is the perfect voice for Sonic, at least like the live action. The Tells voice is the voice of Tales

forever. Iconic. You can't change that. It just Elba as Knuckles. At first you're like, I don't know. Fire, right? They're going to get like Keanu Reeves or like Denzel or like somebody like the dude who did What's his name?

Is this universal? I believe so. Then it's going to be Chris Pratt. I swear to God if it's Chris Pratt. Chris Pratt can't do Shadow. Wait a minute. They're going to get Christopher Judge to do Shadow. It's going to be fantastic.

Can we have a 2024 betting pool of what movie Chris Pratt gets cast in that pisses us off? Other than Garfield? Link. Oh, my God. If he's linked, if he's linked, that's the problem,

that's the problem. Everyone needs to remember that these are the universal property. So if it's universal, there is a chance that they're going to be like, well, we should at least audition him.

Do you think, we should at least throw him to think about it? He'll read for it. For sure, he reads for it. You think they just got like a line to his agents, like his agents is like, oh, so the movies are trying to make this year,

we're going to live action, a Zelda movie, live action, and the Zelda, agents are like, yes. Which one? Yeah.

All of them. Fair amount, yeah. Probably get some, like, crazy voice actor to do his voice. And it's going to be awesome. I'm with Steve. I like the vision. But I can't go with you there, big brother. I can't co-sign that.

What is yours? Fair. Because the reason we're all here today is because there was a point in time. There was a little show airing on a little streaming service called Netflix, a little animated series. Oh, Christ. And it was one of the best animated series of the things. I don't think it's going to come out in 2024. They said it was coming, Jess.

It's not coming. They told me it was coming. That's why I didn't choose it. That is very true. That's very true. They didn't. That's why I didn't choose it. That's why I didn't choose it.

I was like, of course, this is my number one, but I don't think it's going to come out. It's going to come out. It must come out in 2020. Go ahead and say it. See his body language. It must be coming. It must come out. Arcane.

Yeah. Arcane. Like, oh my gosh. We talk about. about shows that, like, taking forever the show, the last time it came out, Obama was still in office. Like, it was, it's so old. That's not true. That's not true. Insane. He got through two presidents and he's like, wait. Bro, it was like, it was a presidential administration ago. The last time, Arcane was out,

like the first time it came out, there was still change we could believe in. Like, that's how long ago it came out, bro. Jomey, what has got to? into you. I'm just saying. No, it's not Arcane. He has been depleted from Arcane. That's what I'm saying. And they said, um, he was coming.

Winter 2024. I don't. Winter 2024. And then, Jess, let me believe. Winter is too much for people to be like, because winter is so easy slip to January.

Yeah, that's so easy slip. No, but they didn't say, they didn't say winter 2020. I allow this because they did say it. They did say it. And it's going to get pushed. And I hope we're all ready for it.

They said, look, November, 24 arcane. Come on now. Like, it's mine. And then they're going to say January 1st. And I'm going to say it doesn't count. It don't count. And then I ask where the shadow on January 6th. We're going to re-come back and redo it. Nah, I

I mean, everybody knows how much I love this show, how excited I was. Like, this is kind of one of the reasons we have this podcast today because we weren't able to talk about it when it came out the first time. And so, hopefully when it comes out November 2024. January 2025? Is that when we finally talk about

arcane? Is that when we finally talk about Arcade? Do we finally talk about Arcade? I think. I think Arcane missed everybody and then we're all pissed that we didn't get to talk about. That's the thing. It came so late. Everybody got so late on the hype train that like everybody's like, oh my God, you're going to talk about Arcane? But it was like three months after it came out.

I watched it immediately because I'm a LOL girl and I watched that shit so quick and I was like, damn, nobody's going to talk about this. No one's going to believe me when I say it's really good. No one would believe me. I was like, no one's going to listen to me. It truly was a word of mouth show. That was like, I was like, I was like, I was like really the fucking leave it like it. Legend show is good.

And I was like, oh, it's because it has like nothing to do with League of Legends. Jack. I have no. I play League for like, oh, like four hours. And I was like, it's not for me. It's the, it's just the settings. And it's not in the settings. It's like some buildings.

Which, and the people. Sure. And like, I trust you. What's the lore is to be had? Like nothing. That's what it takes is you reading the books. I used to work at League of Legends. Oh, gosh.

So I was like, I was in it. I was in it. And then I was like, ooh, this is a bad place to work. And I say that on record. Jesus. I said that on a record. All right. I trust.

Hey, whatever you say, boss, I believe it. Hey, no, I need Vine Catherine back in my life, man. Where's Jinks at? Like, Cupcake?

It's been a minute, brother. We're not here for Jinks. I mean, well, we're not, we're not rooting for her. I just said it's been a minute since I've seen her on the screen. I'm rooting for her terrible stuff.

Put in his fortune. Put in Annie. I mean, yeah, like if you know what I'm, you know me, Skow is going to be arcane looking forward to 2024. Yeah, so can't wait. I need it.

It's not coming out 22-5, Jess. Don't speak that language in here. Whatever the hell. Don't bring that evil on me, Ricky-Vy. Go ahead. I'm going to my Ouija board tonight. And I'm going to somehow make sure it relates something to God. Jesus Christ.

This is push it to 2025. Our last bit is just some honorable mentions. Anything that we missed, anything that we think deserves an extra shout-out before we wrap out. Did we mention Spider-Verce enough? No. We did Namona. I've been on my kid shit. and

no one look at me when I say this Nobody look at me Everybody looks at away Or close race Close my eyes My eyes are close Trolls 3 is an okay movie And I think it's great to take a child to

Go have fun Okay So I'm gonna stop the podcast And ask you What did you think of the Insync song? It was so good Really? It's a whatever track

I'm going to show you right now It was the last thing that was playing on my goddamn phone I've been listening to it. I've been listening to it, I'll repeat. That's going to be on your Spotify rap next year. No, we got enough time. Were you upset that InSync reuniting was just a Troll 3 promo and not the actual return of Insig?

Well, perfect timing for Britney Spears' book to come out and me not root for Justin Timberlis anymore. And so that's what I did. And I was like, I don't mind. King of staying in his lane, Lance Bass. King of staying in his lane, Lance Bass. A JC, who is arguably the best. J.C. Okay, here's my take.

J.C. deserved the career that Justin got. He did. He did. And I stand on that shit. I am so aggressive about J.C. being the lead and being the actual good, good, good singer. We'll get into this later. We'll get into this later. See, I'm looking at Kern. Me and Kern, nothing.

My brain is empty. You don't understand. I was not outside. When they were hot, what, like late 90s or early 2000s, I was not outside like that, brother. Stop making me feel old. Nah, what was I was listening to Barney back then, bro? Barney was going triple platinum in my crib Even we knew the party was whack

Whoa whoa whoa Whoa I wasn't a Barney Respect I was a telotub he's grown Respect Barney Respect what was it BJ

Beach The other dinosaur I wasn't rock with Barney Barney's excellent adventure This is a way game for you Joe me Bernie's grand adventure I wasn't locked in with the egg

You can keep saying the name And we're still all gonna No man Big little bill guy over here Oh Really? Interesting And Cayu

Cahue Shout out the ball homies you still need you. Nah, nah, no. I'm just a kid who's four each day. Each day, grow some more. Kerm, rooting for the big foreheaded people.

That's nuts. It'd be like that sometimes. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, he go, forehead. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's crazy. First of all. First of all, wait.

See, no, I didn't say it all right. I don't think he said you have a big forehead. I think you were. He said he was for you. It was not for you. It was not for you. It was not for you. All right.

So now I got to switch back to you Jemmy. Because it wasn't even aimed at me. That's what I'm saying. Like, that's kind of crazy. You pointed at, Joe. You pointed at Kermis that he's talking about you when we all didn't hear. That sounded like a straight to be.

That sounded like a straight to be. That sounded like a straight of me. He's a self-conscious right now. J-M. J-R. I learned my lesson from the Groot comment. I didn't do anything. My honorable mentions, I mean, I had a cup.

I got to pull a mouth here. do some smuggling. Star Trek Lower Dex. Of course. Not new, but had a new season this year. Continually awesome. One of the best,

literally one of the best shows. I tried to keep my list of things that were new in 2020. But Star Trek Lower Dex is always one of the better shows I always look forward to every year. My adventure was Superman. I was talking about this year. Great one. Great one.

Took me about surprise because it's like Superman has been so serious my entire life, basically. And this was the first time in a long time where he was just like a goofy dude, just trying to do good things for people. And I loved it. It was awesome. It was great. That had to get a mention in there. So, you know.

Co-signed with a lot of your mentions, Jomey. I'm only going to give you one. This will not come. I saw this in the theater, and this will not come out on streaming or digital until the next year. But keep this on your radar from something that I saw. It's an anime basketball drama called the first slam dunk. No, bro, you got it. It is all me.

I kind of love this. I read the manga for a while, and Slam Dunk is genuinely really, really great. And this movie is kind of a nuts sports movie where the main game that happens in this movie is stretched out throughout the entire movie. It's only one game that you see, but it centers around one character's life

and it's intercut throughout the game. And it's really, really cool. it's not anime and like being like stylized and over the top with the type of basketball or like shooting that it's portrayed where like they're not going to do like the Michael Jordan in Space Jam where like his arm grows to like 20 feet and he slams dunk dunks like that but it's some really fun drama some incredible animation yeah an actual hybrid of 2D and 3D that I really really liked and it's keep it on your radar the first slam dunk you got it my boy the way he described it was it's a full game you see every possession you see every possession and point played

but like the score is in the low 60s so you don't need to worry about So we watch first of all we watch a 90s hoops Okay right And then it's like one of those episodes of anime Where like it's like one basket But it takes you to do like their life No it's literally the walk hard

Like he's got to think about his entire life Before he makes this three point shot I don't I don't know that might not be for me. It's pretty good. I might have to just trust you on that. Like, hey, brother. One dude's got handles like crazy.

That's funny. Is that it? That's it. Is that everything? That might be it. I think we might have made a podcast, guys. Might have. Just might have.

We just might have. Jury's still out. But for now, that's a wrap on us. Don't forget today, the House of Our Feed, has given you there. Doctor Who's special deep dive, and they are living for it. this Wednesday the Midnight Boys are going to be giving you their thoughts on blue-eyed samurai and on Friday the House of Hour we're going to be giving you their deep dive into Boy and the Heron.

Don't forget to join and subscribe to both. Jomi, where can people find us on the internet? They can find us at Ringiverse on socials, on Twitter, on Instagram, and on TikTok. And if you follow the Facebook group, The Ringiverse on Facebook, join. Talk to all the Ringiverse group people. They really love the content. they really love talking about stuff with everybody. So join it in, you know,

find community. Why was so funny? That was so wholesome. It was so sweet. Yeah. It was really great. We're going to talk about Bluey on the... That'd be fantastic.

On our channel. I can't wait. All right. Thank you, Junior Men so much once again for joining us. We'll be back again soon for some end-of-the-year wrap-up content that we're going to love so much. Thank you all. Jess, Jomi, parting words. Bye.

You even thank the people for the Spotify rap, Steve. Oh, yeah. Thank you for all. Yes, yes. Thank you so much all for the love Spotify rap that you've been giving the ringer verse. House of our, all of us. It's been great. It's really, really, like, moving to see you guys, like, dedicate so much time to, like, us just having a blast.

And it's great. If it's so far, why'd you forget to mention it? Well, you reminded me, and I'm a jerk now. So Jomey, thank our wonderful producer Kerm, and we can sign off and I'll think about what I did until the next show. Thank you guys so much again. It just like truly means the world to see you guys rocking with us the entire year. Hopefully you go into 2024, keep it going.

Again, thank you so much for all. Sharon means the world to us. As always, got to give a shout out to our Trevor, producer, the best man out here to go. Our boy, Kate Kermingham. And we'll see you guys next time.