The Smark Avengers - Vol 3, Ep 31: The Smark Avengers Talk Knightfall (Part Two)

Episode Date: September 27, 2024

Jean-Paul Valley crossed the line, Bruce Wayne is healed, and Bane is no longer in the picture. As Jean-Paul's mind continues to slip into the System, Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham to reclaim what he voluntarily passed on to Azrael. The issue is... does Azrael give it back? Join Corey, Dylan, and Jon as the Smark Avengers head back to Gotham for part two of their look back at Knightfall!

Hi. Do you guys like chocolate? There we go. What kind of chocolate? Well, I'm asking me if you like it. I like Snickers. Okay, cool. I'm on board. Corey, what do you think? I am allergic. Do you Snickers or to chocolate? To chocolate. Oh, no.

Everybody has that same reaction. It's fine. It would kill me. No, it wouldn't kill me. make me sick. I was going to say, how did you find that eye? Because the way you find that eye, surely. No, no, I am allergic to chocolate and nuts. Oh, so you fucking hate Snickers. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and peanut butter is really bad. Like a Reese's cup. Fuck it. Oh, well, dude, I'm going to say this. Mark, this is controversial if you wish.

Rees's, not that good. Yeah, I've never been blown away. Not that good. So there you go. Ries is puff. Now, maybe that's like me and John as the UK contingency. You know, people might think, oh, you're from the UK, you don't know. Here's another fact that me and John can agree on. UK chocolate, better than American chocolate. 100%.

It's a fact. Every European says that to the point that, I mean, I can't eat either of them, so I will trust you on that. Oh, it's 100% true. If you buy a bag of ammonyms in America and then buy them over here, our ammonyms are so much nicer. Mm-hmm. Because Morgan chocolate is kind of bitter, but ours are like real, like, proper milk in it. Yeah, yeah. It's lovely.

It's a lovely sweet treat, you know? The way God intended. The way God intended his chocolate to be, Corey, that you'll never experience because God... God hates me. Doesn't like you. I don't want to say hates. I don't want to say that. I thought that was rude.

Because I don't know what God thinks. He doesn't tell me anymore. He stopped talking. I don't think we're working out I don't think we will I made a big mess up there you know he was pretty angry

this feels like a sitcom setup I made fun of his son for playing baseball bodily he didn't like it I'm like well what position did Jesus play he couldn't hold the ball properly it hurt his hands

I was gonna say where the holes in his hands you know what you mean you couldn't grab it properly I'm like that's not my problem you did this, really, you did this. This is your fault. You in the moment. You fucking did this.

And then he got a, he can't get on me. Like, don't swear in my house. I'm like, well, you know. We had a whole whole thing, you know, don't worry about it. So I don't know. I haven't, he didn't send me a Christmas card this year. So I don't know what's going to happen up there, you know. I'd like it if we could patch it up.

But, you know, sometimes things this are meant to be. You know, you move on. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway. So we're moving on. That's an intro. There you go.

So everybody, welcome to Smart Avengers. My name is Corey. And with me, or Dylan and John. And today is going to be part two of our coverage of the 1990s Batman storyline Nightfall. Now, in case you have not listened to part one, that came out last week. So by all means, feel free to. If you don't mind the spoilers,

I'll give you a very brief recap. Essentially, Bruce Wayne is in a place of psychological or psychological and physical vulnerability as he's getting pressed further and further against his limits by newcomer villain Bain. In the meantime, he has taken on a new ally in the form of John Paul Valley, whose secret identity is Asreal. and John is dealing with some very deep rooted brainwashing that turns him into an assassin for secret religious order. Batman faces off with Bain. Bain breaks his back and paralyzes him from the waist down, forcing Bruce to choose John Paul Valley to succeed him as Batman. As Bruce goes off in a world's order to do some business and eventually get healed,

John Paul Valley becomes his own version of Batman that is more violent and more mentally unstable. And when we last left off, John Paul Valley was responsible for his first death as Batman by letting a serial killer fall to his death, dooming his captive hostage who is being held in some hidden location that now no one knows where it is. Was that a succinct recap? Pretty good. Okay. So we are now entering Act 3 of Nightfall, which is Night's End. Now, this is the, of the arcs, this is the only one that is not split into two parts.

This is the third, very final arc. So at this point, John Paul Valley is certifiably gone. At this point, and the system is in total control. The spirit of his father is continuing to push him forward and demands that he eventually. his death. Now, despite his father's murderer already being apprehended months previously, John's mental health is at a point where he rationalizes that a weapons manufacturer in Gotham is the man who killed his father, and that becomes his new primary target. Meanwhile, Bruce Wayne has returned to Gotham, a healed man, and meets with Tim. And although he's disappointed to hear

that John disobeyed his orders by going after Bain, Bruce is impressed that John was able to beat him and decides to retire permanently and allow John to continue on his Batman. That lasts about a few seconds because then Tim tells him about what happened to Abattoir. So needing to see this for himself, Bruce sneaks back into the Batcave and demands that John stepped down.

John, however, refuses and tells Batman to never come back to the cave again. The time has been injured, has dulled Bruce's senses, and he knew that he was in no way fit to attempt to fight John in his current state. So Bruce Wayne does what everyone in DC Comics does when they need to learn how to fight again. They make a deal with the deadliest woman alive, Lady Shiva.

Do you guys know who Lady Shiva is? No. I do not. Okay. So Lady Shiva is the be-all, end-all, deadliest woman in DC comics. She is deadlier than Deathstroke, Deadshot, Lobo, Shadow, and everyone else who gets paid to put somebody into the ground. Quite frankly, she is the world's greatest martial artist and can kill you any number of ways. She's very, very good.

She is Cassandra Kane, who's a character that is introduced a few years later from this point in Nightfall. Her mother is Lady Shiva, and that's how Cassandra is so adept at fighting. So Shiva reteaches him and then sends a wave of trained killers after Bruce. because she has framed them, or framed Bruce for the death of their master. So the deal in Shiva's mind is simple. She can call off the killers at any time until, but will not do so until Bruce chooses to break his no kill belief.

Because Shiva always believed that that was the thing that was holding Bruce went back from being a better fighter. Eventually, after surviving several of these attacks, Bruce seemingly gives in and kills a man with a blow that Shiva had taught him. with their deal honored sheva promises to fight batman one-on-one to the death some day and leaves robin and nightwing who had been brought up to speed about everything and really wasn't happy about any of it secretly had followed bruce and witnessed him commit murder though bruce does tell robin and nightwing that the man he struck only appeared to be dead and was actually fine what a coincidence right how did he know did they choreographed that ahead of time yep it practiced it out exactly hit a Canadian destroyer. Guy popped back up, hit Bruce with a Canadian destroyer. Bruce popped up, gave him a Canadian destroyer.

Just chopped each other for 20 minutes. They both acted like they were wobbly and then fell down at the same time while the crowd chanted. This is awesome. That Sheba one was like, well, these guys are talented. Five stars. Unbelievable. I might break my own rating system for this.

It's incredible. And then Batman killed him. That's the only way this could possibly have ended after such a vicious fight. Unbelievable. We rated very highly. Match of the year. Booker of the year. There you go.

And the Batman's like, wait, what? What? You're talking about it? I killed a guy, please. Have some compassion. But it's dead. You know? I was going to say something, but I got caught up with a...

You got to come up in your knowledge. That's fair. Forget it. That's fair. I'll remember later. Okay. So Bruce returns to the Batcave. and dons his original Batman costume.

Along with Robin and Nightwing, he tracks John down to the weapon manufacturer's penthouse. Catwoman is also there to confront the same weapons manufacturer that John is tracking for her own reasons. So as all of these parties confront one another, it's a massive fight that breaks out that ends with a helicopter crashing into a bridge while John and Bruce are fighting basically on it. Why? John falls.

Because, man, the weapons manufacturer was attempting to get away. John was hell bent on killing him and Bruce was hell bent on keeping John from killing him. I wonder because I'm like are they just having a fight and the helicopter guy was like I gotta get closer

I'm gonna see this fight Yep I'm gonna see all the chops you know And then he got too close He crashed into the bridge We've all been there There are helicopters

There you go Don't that Oh dude John How many helicopters have we broken Just getting close To watch the two bombs Fight on the street I've lost count

So many And I don't know why people Keep letting us fly them It's irresponsible of those guys. It's ridiculous. Really. It's their fault. Absolutely.

Yeah. Oh, dear. So John ends up falling into the water below while Catwoman and Bruce save the weapons manufacturer and his thugs before the helicopter can explode. That's good, man. You want to see if the weapons manufacturer. That's who you want to save. That's the guy, you know. How are we going to get our weapons if this guy dies?

we're fucked we can't make him but letting him die is what made John Paul Valley a bad Batman and Bruce is a good Batman so he's not going to let him die but he just killed a guy apparently a moment ago

no he didn't though because that was again but the implication was that he did he made Lady Shiva think that he did yes okay so now she's out of the picture he's like no more killing ha ha ha ha who

yeah yeah because that's the thing about Shiva is like no one ever enters a fight with Shiva expecting to win. The expectation is, oh, fuck, I'm about to die. Like when Tim Drake was getting trained to be Robin, he was basically sent to go train under Shiva. And unbeknownst to the people who are responsible for Tim's training, Shiva did the same thing of like, all right, we're going to fight to the death now. And Tim managed to win the fight by drugging Shiva the night before because he realized

he would be fucked if they bought. I don't know if that coins is winning Oh no he absolutely cheated And it was completely adamant about it Fair enough And she was like you got me Good That's a good one

Yeah Fair enough She was like she had no revenge She wanted to take She was like no that's fine No no she called him clever And then said one day she would They would finish it

She has more She gets more amused by people Like Another Denny O'Neill comic is the question, and I love the question. That's another one of those, like, series that ran for a good bit of time. But that one, basically the first issue, starts with Shiva essentially killing the question, and it's just amused by it. And, like, part of his storyline is at that point training to be a better fighter.

I mean, yeah, but I'm hearing a lot of stuff about Shiva going, oh, good one, you got me. But someday, I'm going to kill you. And like, we're just killing you. He lazy? She's in no rush. She's got an all time in the world near her mind. Fair enough. She's more of that, like, I want to fight you at your best kind of, kind of deal.

Not when I'm drugged. Yeah, exactly. You drugged me with, like, you drugged my tea. How dare you? Yeah, but, like, if they fight again, can he just drug her again? I mean, I would imagine she'd be prepared for that next time. Ah, with the anti-drugs. Yeah, anti-drugs.

Very clever, Sheba. You got me there. So, um, so yes. Catwoman realizes that this is her Batman because he made the decision to save these obviously guilty men instead. And Bruce attempts to use the Batmobile to locate John. John, however, has rigged the Batmobile to explode and it detonates. So everybody's under the assumption that Bruce is dead. Nightwing attempts to fight John one-on-one to avenge Bruce's death and absolutely gets his shit rocked by John Valley.

to the point that if it wasn't for some intervention by the police, Nightwing probably would have died at that point. Because at this point, John is completely unhinged. He is completely given himself to the system. He is kind of formed this new identity as Batman, the Avenging Angel. He's even, like, changed the color motif. So now instead of, like, blue and gray, he's wearing, like, red and gold, which is, again, more the Asrael costume than,

the Batman costume. So yeah, he's completely given himself over to the system. So John escapes to the Batcave and is shocked to find that Bruce is there waiting for him. Bruce notes that he's impressed with the trap, but he probably would have gone with something a little less lethal. And thus, finally, back to basics Bruce Wayne, Batman does battle with the technologically advanced armored anti-hero John Paul Valley Batman. So knowing that John's mental state has left him in a frenzy. Bruce outwits him by forcing him into narrow passages of the bat cave that forces John to remove parts of his bulky armor so that he doesn't get trapped. Finally, Bruce is able to blind the night vision sensors on John's helmet and forces him to remove that.

So as John's vision returns, he sees Bruce Wayne dressed as Batman standing in front of him like an angel. This completely shatters the remainder of John's psyche as he admits defeat and claims that he was never Batman. Bruce comforts John and allows him to leave the Batcave, to wander Gotham homeless, essentially, and as opposed to turning him into Gotham Police, because

basically all of this is Bruce's fault. Like, he should have never allowed a vulnerable John Paul Valley to take on the responsibility of Batman. True. That part's probably true, yeah. He shouldn't be allowing him to wander the streets as well. He should be sending him to, like,

get psychological help. That's what I was going to say. I agree that he shouldn't have put that guy in that position to begin with. But for him to go, all right, now I'm Batman again. Fuck off. And then the guy just leaves. As like, as you've already established, broken mentally. Yeah.

Completely broken mentally with nowhere else to go. He's like, see you later, bitch. And he just leaves. Yeah. Like that is also like, I mean, yeah, I get the no killing thing. but also like, that's a bit, you know, morally that's not great. You know what you mean? That's the thing about Batman is it's good to have that moral, like, I'm not going to kill anybody.

But then the rest of the shit, you can't just like, you're total asshole and not kill anybody. Like that, you know, you can have a little bit of responsibility. Like, you shouldn't have put that guy in that position to begin with, but you did. So you're going to have to take some kind of responsibility. boy, right? You know? He kind of doesn't. Right.

Because he's a rich billionaire. Yeah, yeah. So basically, like, he's like, uh-oh, I fucked up. I took this guy who, you know, at this, no, context here. John Paul Valley is a graduate student at Gotham University when he first finds out that he's as real, meaning he's probably 22, 23 years old. So imagine being 22, 23 years old. You find out that your entire life has been a lie.

You have this brainwashing in your head that every now and then makes you want to kill people. And you're in the greatest fucking hero in Gotham is just like, hey, guess what? You're Batman now. Try not to fuck this up. And then you do. But yes. Bruce Wade just lets Gotham. Whoa, whoa.

We're still stuck on this one second. Yeah. It was a bit like Bruce Williams. Bruce Spina's like, yeah, I really fucked up. But then he doesn't do it. Again, just admitting you fucked up isn't good enough, right? So. You what do you mean?

Just be going, oh, yeah, I shouldn't have done that. Like, oh, well, great, problem solved. You're not going to jail, you know? So post-crisis Batman has to be given a weakness. And his weakness seems to be an inability to process his shit correctly. Ah, okay. Because like, because he's still fucked up about what happened to Jason Todd, which while it's not necessarily his fault, he did put Jason Todd in the position that allowed that stuff to happen. Kind of what happened here with John Paul Valley.

He didn't do any of the shit John Paul Valley did, but he put John Paul Valley in the position that that stuff could and did happen. So like much like the Jason Todd stuff, he's like. I'm just going to cocoon on this. I'll just let this eat me up on the inside for a while. Yeah, I'll leave this alone to see what happens. Yeah, exactly. I was bottled this up. That's healthy.

This couldn't possibly come back to bite me in the ass the way that it absolutely bit that guy on the ass. Yeah, right. So that's how nightfall ends. Bruce Wayne has reclaimed the identity of Batman. John Paul Valley wanders off into the streets shattered psychologically. and basically just catatonic at this point. And all's well that ends well.

Okay. I mean, I will say this. Like we established last episode, we're like, you know, at the start of this whole storyline, being was a big thing, and then they got rid of being pretty, like, not quickly,

but like early enough in the story, you know there's a lot more storyline to go. Yeah. And then with this as well, early on, they got, they, Bruce Bean obviously disappeared. They had the new Batman. For him in this second part to like, also disappear, you're like, that's, that's so interesting because the first third, the first part of the story was being in this new Batman. And then when you get to the second kind of part and just, I don't want to say resolve both

do those things because, you know, they haven't, they clearly haven't been resolved. But like, they've kind of been cleared up in, in terms of the story. They're no longer in play, shall we say. At the moment, it seems. So, like, that's a very interesting way to, like, approach things. You know, if I, if I were to draw a parallel, I will say it's a little bit like in the clone saga, hi, right off the bat, the jackal. was a very important part of that entire storyline.

But by the end of it, he wasn't a factor at all. And I think probably about halfway through, you know, towards the end of it, they got rid of him as a character because they were like, he's not going to impact the rest of the story. He's an early game, mid-game villain. He's not the end-game villain, you know? Yeah, in a lot of ways, Bain was kind of a red herring because they did spend so much time building him up and hyping him up.

I think people think of that storyline as like all Bain whenever we've established. Bay is like the first third. And then this new Batman comes along and he's out by the second third. Well, yeah, because like first of all, Bain gets established by breaking Batman. But then that basically establishes Jean-Paul Valley as well because then he's the one that beats Bain. So it's wrestling logic again. But then Batman beats Batman by breaking him mentally. Then he's like, well, who really wins?

I mean, it's still real winner. It's established. Yeah, I mean, it's established in a later issue that Bruce knew that even if he was at full strength, he couldn't go against John, that John is just too strong and too quick. And there's an explanation for why. John has that weirdness to him. So the aftermath of Nightfall takes place over a series of story arcs and launches a few different new series as a result. The first big story arc that falls is called prodigal or projectal. Prodigal storyline starts with Bruce making amends with Tim for pushing him

away during the Arkham Asylum breakout and by not listening to his concerns about John's mental state. Because that's the thing is Tim Drake was trying to fucking wave the flag before Bain even showed up. He's like, hey, something's not right with John. John kind of like zones out for a period of time. He's really kind of awkward. Like, I

don't know if this is a good idea. He's got a flaming sword, you know? He's got these two blades that come out of the front of his hands and they also light up and fire. Like, it's a lot of sharp weapons and fire for us to be doing non-lethal stuff, you know? He built a new basement in his house, and sometimes I'm pretty sure whenever I come over to his house to be Scrabble, I can hear screaming coming from the basement. And he says it's not screaming, but it sounds like screaming.

So, Batman ultimately decides to step down as Batman temporarily and allows Dick Grayson to fill in for the role as he reevaluates his health and the actions he would take towards his recovery moving forward. John's time as Batman created a substantial rift in the relationship between the Gotham City Police and Batman. And even though Jim Gordon knew that Dick Grayson was neither his Batman or the violent replacement, he still struggled to trust Batman, learning that basically he shouldn't put blind faith in a costume anymore. The rest of the project of storyline centers around Dick as Batman, rounding up the remaining Arkham escapees, forming a closer bond with Tim Drake and recognizing all of the hard work and sacrifice Bruce as made as Batman. So like I said, that is, that's a whole story pretty much condensed into this was, here's some of the outcome of nightfall. Then there's a one shot called Nightwing Alfred's return. Nightwing Alfred's return is simply a one shot where Dick Grayson goes to England and convinces Alfred to come back to Gotham. Because Batman needs him.

Batman's trying to make amends with everybody and Alfred has always been the one day you're going to get yourself killed and it damn near happened. It ultimately ends with Alfred returning home. The next storyline that has a bit of fallout is called Troika. The Troika storyline is centered around Bruce Wayne's change and approach to being Batman. So instead of wearing gray and blue like he had been for decades, he opted for a solid black costume made of Kevlar with a gold symbol on the chest that looks basically like the Tim Burton movie costume. Additionally, he gets a new state-of-the-art Batmobile, and with Alfred's return, Bruce makes amends with his longtime friend and father figure, re-evaluates his approach with his family and friends, and begins to deal with the consequences of his decision to make John Paul Valley his replacement. So at this point, about six, eight months have passed, and now Bruce is getting around to the, oh, I got to deal with this whole John Ball Valley thing that I did.

Mm-hmm. And finally, a new series launches. Asriel. So Asriel is a comic centered around John Paul Valley, written by Dennis O'Neill, and begins with Batman finding a homeless John Paul Valley and gives him the financial means to travel the world to find himself, just like he did when he was starting out as Batman. These travels lead John to Europe, where he discovers more about the Order of St. Dumas and the system, before returning to Gotham and rejoining the Bat family as an ally. in total nightfall from the lead up to the beginning is told through Batman Batman Legend of the Dark Night Batman, Batman Shadow of the Bat, Detective Comics, Catwoman, Robin, Justice League Task Force, and several other one shots and miniseries and other things that came out about it. And much like Death of Superman, the objective was to always bring Bruce Wayne back to being Batman, but also to make people believe that the change was going to be permanent.

Right. So as stated previously, Nightfall came out shortly around the same time as funeral for a friend, which was the second arc of the Death of Superman saga. Other DC characters would go on to have their own jarring days of bad news ahead of them. And these might be future episodes where we do something similar. So examples of these were Green Lantern Hal Jordan being driven insane and replaced with Kyle Rainer, a new Wonder Woman being appointed by Hippolyta, Aquaman losing his hand. and magic hand oh yeah eventually leading to the magic hand

and green arrow dying in a plane crash as his long lost sun takes over the role essentially the 1990s was a rough time to be a heavy hitter in DC comics well for anybody really yeah really I don't know man 90s were that bad here

99% in an office well we established for like you know Spider-Man not so good for him um What happened with the other Marvel stuff? Fucking Legacy Virus? Legacy virus, onslaught

ruined a lot of the Marvel characters. Ancient Apocalypse. Yeah, Agent Apocalypse already fucked stuff up. Yeah, you know what? Not great for everybody, really. No, it was a rough time for comics world. So, IGN, ranked Batman Nightfall Part 1, Broken Bat, as number 15 on a list of the 25 greatest Batman graphic novels,

stating, quote, What Makes Nightfall Part 1 so memorable is not the actual. actual snapping of Batman's back, it's the quick fall into despair that proves most shocking. The ending is a foregone conclusion as Batman is worn down both physically and mentally. The Batman's spirit is broken before his vertebrae, and that's a feat you'll never see accomplished anywhere else. Right. I like that.

The idea that his mind is broken more than his body. Yes. That's really, because that's really what led to Bain's victory. Bain had thoroughly dissected Batman's psyche Yes, which is an important part of like If figuring out who Batman is Like then you were able to play at both sides Because you know

Everybody knows that Bruce Wayne and Batman are The same person But like They're two different psyches, right? Two different sides are the same coin And so To play in the both is the way to do it You know

If you know who both of them are it's easier to beat them. And that's been kind of established with anybody who knows your superhero identity. It's easier to beat you if you know who you are. Because you can attack different ways, you know. So I'm going to apologize for the next section

because I'm going to be condensing about 30 years of story very, very quickly. It's very funny. Have you ever apologized for anything that we've ever done this show? This is a momentous occasion then. I would say it first and then see if it's worthy of apology. Okay.

So the question now becomes where are they now? Batman. Post-nightfall saw Bruce Wayne be more open and willing to lean on his allies. The black costumes stuck around through Grant Morrison's run on JLA, but switched to a gray and black motif later. Bruce is seemingly killed by the new god tyrant of apocalypse Dark Side in an event titled Final Crisis, which led to a story called Battle for the Cowl, where multiple people attempt to take the mantle of Batman after his death, including Tim Drake, Jason Todd, and surprisingly Two-Face,

before Dick Grayson ultimately took on the identity of Batman once more. Dick's second tenure as Batman saw him take on Bruce's son, Damien, as his Robin, become a member of the Justice League and raised his profile on the superhero community. It was discovered that Dark Sides Omega Beam actually sent Bruce back in time, and once returning to the presence, took up the mantel of the mountain, of Batman once more. This time, seeing the benefit of sharing the role with Dick Grayson, he started Batman Incorporated, an organization that saw to install a Batman in multiple cities across the world. This was in play until Flashpoint when the post-crisis continuity was

rewritten. In the New 52 continuity, there is another period where Bruce steps down as Batman when he gets amnesia during a fight with the Joker. This time, it's Commissioner Jim Gordon who takes on the mantle with the aid of a mecksuit called the rookie and a stun gun as as Gotham City Police affiliated Batman. Oh, I don't like that. Bruce ended up redownloading his memories and returned to the role shortly after. Since then, Bruce has only shared the bat mantle once more with Jace Fox, who we discussed in our previous episode of big momentous changes that didn't stick around.

Why didn't we talk about Commissioner Gordon being Batman for things? he didn't stick around um there was just honestly that was a two-parter as well it could have been a three part because nobody you have a fuck yeah it was a very short storyline it only made sense because in the new 52 they had de-aged commissioner gordon so he wasn't as old and he gave himself a military haircut shaved off his mustache and looked absolutely nothing like the character did previously fair enough yeah suit had bunny is as well for some reason. Yep. Gunn bunny.

Gun Bunny. There you go. It's Gun Bunny going to be a new character on the show. It's going to be a new character on the show. It's going to be. Gun Bunny, armless tiger man and baby juggernaut. What an assortment. What's the arc going to be for this one? Gun Bunny for no reason. All right. Bain. After being locked away in Blackgate, Bain went through withdrawals from Venom, but eventually rebuilt his body and kicked his addiction for the time being.

After escaping Blackgate, he assisted Bruce Wayne and fighting off some thugs who had found a weakened version of venom. Once the fight was over, Bain asked Batman to leave him alone and that he had no interest in Gotham anymore before leaving in the country to find his father. While tracking down leads to the identity of his father, Bain encounters Raz al-Gul, who is impressed with Bain's intellect, strength, and skills. Raz declares that Bain would be his heir and becomes engaged with Raj's daughter, Talia. However, another encounter with Bruce Wayne sees Bain defeated, and Roz ends the engagement. Bain pops up here and there for the next few years, attacking Asrael to get revenge, but ultimately losing, attempting to take over Gotham once more, but eventually losing. And around this time, Bain gets two recurring tropes. One, getting addicted to venom again, and two, breaking people's backs.

Love that shit, dude. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it's addictive. Yep, yep. Once you pop. almost as addictive as the drugs have pumped through my skull. Yep.

Eventually, he becomes a main character in the Gail Simone written book, Secret Six, and his story there focuses on being a father-like figure for Vandal Savage and kicking his venom addiction once more. In the New 52 and Rebirth, there isn't a lot of change there aside from the Forever Evil storyline where Bain Dantz's own version of a Batman suit as he attempts to take control over Gotham. and during the city of Bain's storyline where Bain forms an alliance with Thomas Wayne, a Batman from the Flashpoint continuity,

and kills Alfred. Bain faces his death after the event, but keeps a low profile, until he discovers that he has been partially cloned to create a daughter named Vengeance. Bain's attempts to recruit her go sour, Ashiops to align herself with Asriel instead. So Bain doesn't have the most fun run at that point.

he's somebody who I've seen stated like he peaked in his first storyline yeah yeah it does seem like the way we've talked about how much I like Gil-Simone on the show but I've seen I've seen snippets of her take on Bain and as much as I love her it just doesn't seem like Bain he seems like a teddy bear kind of figure yes he doesn't seem like the the monster that you want him to be.

Yeah. It's a little bit like the, if I may, if I may go back to Rastey for a little bit because we're the smart Avengers. Whenever people would talk about a guy like Keith Lee, big and posing motherfucker, and then would talk very eloquently and you're like, it's hard to take him that seriously as a monster whenever you're being very sweet. and eloquent with your verbiage. And I felt

like that when I read Gail Simone's being, it's like, he's still bane, but there's something off about it. He's being a little bit too vocal. You know, a little bit too sweet. And I know that you want to add

wrinkles to the character, obviously, and give him something else. You know, if you think about a big monster, they're usually very one-dimensional. Obviously, you want to give him layers and character. But I always thought that Bain did have if you think about the big monster

characters in comics, Bain did have a logical backstory with the character to it. You didn't need to add that wrinkle to it, you know? Out of all the people you could have picked. Do you what you mean? Yeah, Bain was like the

one that did have stuff you could tell and kept on his character and you didn't have to do any of this stuff. You know? You could have been able to. somebody else. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I mean, the Secret Six book, a lot of people really liked it, but I kind of felt like a lot of those characterizations were off like Silver Banshee. And I do think she nailed Ragdoll 2, though. Ragdall 2 was sufficiently creepy and gross,

so well done on that one. Okay. All right. So, Asriel. John Paul Valley's Asriel comic ran for 100 issues between 1995 and 2003. Pretty good. Pretty good. Pretty good. The storyline mainly focused initially on discovering the truth about his past in the order of St. Dumas, with writer Dennis O'Neill equating it to an Arthurian quest for the Holy Grail. Eventually, John discovers that he had been born in a lab and that his unusual strength and stamina was the result of gene splicing with animal DNA. So after returning to Gotham, John slowly but surely regains the trust of Bruce and Tim before eventually being welcomed back as a regular ally member of the family.

John is killed in the final issue of his comic, and despite it being ambiguous due to his body not being recovered, he is resurrected as a black lantern in the Blackest Night event comic, which I think will be a future episode, maybe in October. So a decade passes before John appears in the new 52. storyline Batman and Robin Eternal, this time is a more active participant in the order of St. Dumas before coincidentally beating Bain again and joining the Bat family. In Rebirth, he's featured as a team member of Batman's group in Detective Comics before going off into space to track down the source of voices in his head in Justice League Odyssey. Justice League Odyssey was a team book made up of Cyborg, Starfire, Asriel, and Green Lantern Jessica Cruz, as they were pulled into space by dark sides machinations. After that series ends, John resumes his duties as

Asriel in his more traditional costume, which is very identical to his 90s costume, essentially, but is shown to be a little less mentally stable as he is more prone to assume the identity of the avenging angel. He was given his own mini-series again called Swords of Asriel, that further explores the origins of the Order of Saint Dumas, as another member of a similar religious sect named the Poor Fellow, attempts to create a new Asriel as John is deemed a failure for not embracing the role. John is last seen working with the clone of

Bain, Vengeance, and his adoptive brother, Father Valley. Note, the Asrael version of the Batman's suit comes up multiple times throughout all of these stories. He can't get away from that suit. So, Asriel had a good run.

His solo comic, I have the entire solo comic run. I have not been reading them, but I have them, which has been a project of mine to eventually start reading through all 100 issues of it. So how many issues have you got through so far? I've gotten through two. Wow, it must be a real good, real good read.

I have not been reading current comics lately because of how interesting my life has been as of late. Fair enough. So there have been, Nightfall has been touched upon in a couple of different ways. there have been alternate versions of Nightfall. For one, a few years ago, there was a one shot called Tales from the Dark Universe Nightfall, in which John Paul Valley viciously defeats Bruce Wayne in their final confrontation instead. The storyline jumps 30 years into the future where John Paul, now calling himself St. Batman,

uses Venom to maintain his physicality, possibly to compensate for his aging, after killing all of Gotham's villains. St. Batman also has Gotham burnt down and, completely rebuilt as he isolates it from the rest of the outside world, which is hinted to have fallen into chaos as well. John Paul keeps Bruce Wayne alive, but only as a head and torso in Wayne Tower linked to a life support system so that he can attempt to sway him to his way of thinking every year on the anniversary of his defeat. So very dark for that story. A few years ago as well, there was a miniseries called Batman Curse of the White Knight in which John Paul Valley is a former member of the military who's dying of cancer and is manipulated by the Joker into believing he is truly Gotham's protector and that he must destroy Batman.

This version of John is older, trained in heavy ammunition with no scruples about using guns alongside the flaming sword, and is accompanied by two of his fellow mercenaries known as Michael and Gabriel. The storyline mainly revolves around a secret history of this version of Gotham, but Asriel is displayed as a genuine threat as he kills Bain, kills Commissioner Gordon, and multiple others before nearly killing Bruce. himself. In the end, Asriel discovers he had been manipulated and dies from his injuries after acknowledging that the Wayne family are the true protectors of Gotham. So there's your dark versions of the same story for the most part. So this story has been somewhat adapted. And I mentioned this in the previous episode. There have been attempts to adapt it. It just always seems to leave out one very crucial element and that's Asrael

so they adapt nightfall but they completely ignore arcs two, three and part of arc one right they just focus up Bain and Batman exactly

so the character Bain was quickly added to the roster of villains in Batman the animated series because at this point Batman the animated series is in on the air as this storyline is coming out but it was such a big deal they like put them in immediately, if you can.

So he appears in the episode Bain as an assassin rather than a mastermind as he was in the comics. He was hired by the mobster Rupert Thorne to eliminate Batman, and in turn, by Thorne's gun, mole to eliminate Thorne afterwards. Bain eventually fights Batman on a board of a boat, where Robin had been kidnapping tied up, but before he could break his back as he did in the comics, Batman thrusts a crumpled battering into the controls that injects Bain Venom. His action causes a rapid uncontrollable feed into Bain's body before Batman pulls out the tube, stopping a fatal overdose of the drug. The United Falls saga is also loosely adapted in the cartoon The Batman episode titled Traction,

and in this version, Bain lures Batman into a trap. Batman overpowers Bain in his normal form, but when Bain unleashes his more bestial side, he severely injures Batman and breaks his back off screen. Believing him to be dead, Bain attempts to take over Gotham City. three weeks after crippling Batman, Bain goes on a rampage through Gotham and knocks out a detective,

and as he's prepared to kill her, Batman interferes wearing a new mechanical bat suit and battles Bain. As Bain attempts to amassed Batman and kill him, Bain uses an electrical wire to incapacitate him. Then, of course, I think there's the biggest one, which is The Dark Night Rises, which I think at some point we'll do an episode

on the Nolan Batman movies. I think so. Yes. So, yeah, the film focuses on Bain's early life in a foreign prison called The Pit. And it involves Alfred resigning as, you know, Bruce's butler. Bain uses a high-tech cannon to start a jailbreak at Blackgate Penitentiary and equips the inmates with firearms to take control of Gotham. Bain deduces that Batman is Bruce Wayne. Bain's in ambushes Batman and forces them into a fight since Batman is two.

weak to defend himself. Bain successfully beats Batman and finishes him off by breaking his back with his knee. So there, there you go. That's essentially the same storyline minus Asrael. Pretty much, yeah. And then it takes some turns where Bain's not that important either. Uh, well, I don't know. I mean, yeah, kind of. Like he basically takes over Gotham as well, like isolates it from the rest of America and makes it his own little kingdom. And I guess that's a little bit of money. Yeah.

And then you have Joseph Gordon Levitt as not Robin. But basically Robin. Yep. In Batman versus the teenage mutant ninja turtles, Bain references this. I had a feeling I'd get up a reaction. Oh, I don't know what that one. Is Gump Bunny in it?

No, I don't think she is, but she should have been. Fulgit. So Bain references the storyline when he boasts that he is the man who broke the bat and he attempts to break Donatelle's back in the same manner. But he's got a turtle shell. Exactly. Turtle soup. Have ever had turtle soup?

No. There's a German restaurant in town called the Mohawk that has a home a recipe for turtle soup because back in the day when the restaurant first opened in early 1900s they used to raise the turtles in the basement themselves.

Wow. Then they fed them to people. Delicious turtles. It's kind of like Cannonburger, I'd be honest with you. What? I kind of have to adjust that for a moment. Wait a minute.

What do you say? The turtle tastes kind of like hamburger. Oh, okay. Well, now then nobody said. That's fair enough then. Okay. Carry on. In the television show Gotham, both Bain and

Asriel make appearances, but are very different. Bain uses his father's name and does not break Bruce Wayne's back because in Gotham, Bruce Wayne is a child. Instead, I think he throws Commissioner Gordon against a... You can break the back of a child? It's actually easier to bake the back of a

child, really, when you think of it. Yeah. There you go. Like lazy. This guy's a big, fucking scary dude. You can't even break their kids back. I can break a kid's back. There you go. I'm not doped up with venom.

You know what you mean? Asriel also shows up in Gotham, but it is not John Paul Valley. He is also just an assassin from an ancient religious order. Finally, they both appear in the Arkham series video games with Bain as a mini boss in the first game and shows up again in the second game, maybe even the third. And Asriel shows up in the second and third game, but it's not John Paul Valley. It is a character named Michael Lane,

who had taken on the Asriel identity in a short comic run in the early 2010s. Not affiliated with John Paul Valley whatsoever, though. Barely affiliated with the Order of St. Dumas. Then, of course, you have the injustice game where Bain is a character, but I mean, it's a fighting game. There's not really any story for Bain and that.

I feel like you've messed out of big. maybe I missed this. I'm sorry if I did miss this, but I feel like you missed a big Bain appearance out. Batman Forever? Well, Batman and Robin. Batman and Robin?

Yes, yes. Batman and Robin, and yes. You didn't match it at all. Yes. Where is that, like, what, 96? 95. So when did this Bian storyline end in the comics, 94? 94.

So by this point, everybody knows Bians. deal. Kind of, yes. It seems to be the case. And they thought, Bain was such a big deal. We're going to make him the

sidekick, Poison Ivy, who herself is kind of the psychic to Mr. Freeze. No, I would say Poison Ivy is kind of the main antagonist of that because she's manipulating Mr. Freeze through almost in the movie.

Okay, but, oh, well, it's been like... Yeah, look, John and I getting up on you on that one. Listen, I'll fight you both. just in the penalty of this. I just love fighting. But also, I've seen that film once.

You know what you mean? That's fair. Because I saw it once and I thought, that's enough. Yeah, that's enough for me. I can't believe I saw it once, you know. But I remember Bain being that film. And I remember being, even at the time, even with my ignorance of the Batman, you know, comic history,

be incredibly underwhelmed by Bain's appearance. Yeah, yeah. So, um, so, Bain and Batman and Robin is essentially Bain in name and vague appearance alike. He's a wrestler. That's it. He's Jeep Swenson, who was a wrestler.

And, uh, if you ever want to, if you, if you're more curious to ever gets a better review, if you just, I think if you search up Jeep Swinson's name in Google image, there's this really weird photo of him and like two women and they appear to all be naked in bed. One of those women's his daughter. How do you find that out? Because I was looking at pictures of Jeep Swinson when I realized he was Bain.

I was like, were there behind the scenes photos of him in the costume with a mask off? Like, what's the deal? Are there behind the scenes photos of him with his daughter naked, maybe? Yeah, that's what I discovered. Jesus. Wow. What a time to, what a great thing to discover. Yeah, wasn't the internet fantastic? You get to find out this stuff. No, it's maybe the worst thing that ever happened.

But yes, in Batman and Robin, Bain is essentially a mute who can grunt and groan. He has no intelligence whatsoever. And he's defeated quite simply once Batgirl and Robin just kicked the hose out of his head, which causes him to shrink and turn into a little guy again. He shrinks down into like, like, like. two foot tall. He's, yeah, the problem with like,

I mean, there's a lot of problems with that, obviously. Like that, I mean, we could probably do a whole episode in that fucking film about how bad it is. Oh, we did talk about it. We did talk about it already. But I mean, like, we could probably devote a whole episode to how bad it is. But, like, it's such a shame that, like,

they demoted Bain to, like, like you said, like third villain. And just like mindless, like idiotic, big muscle guy. Whenever we've established it, like, in the comics, he was quite smart. He was able to dissect Bruce B.Ban and Batman, like, better than any other villain at that time had been able to do. And it's very tallying about that film where they were like, nope. Yes. Or not doing that.

No, we're going to make this the most basic-ass Batman we can make it. Can I tell you my favorite image from Batman and Robin is there's like a, they do some detective work and they find a photo of Poison Ivy and Bain like arriving in Gotham at the airport and you see them on like the tarmac and Bain is wearing a trench coat and a fedora but he still has like the big fucking mask and shit on and the hose sticking out of the back of his head. Yeah. Amazing. He was a leechador though. He would keep the, keep the, you got to protect the. the face. Right.

I wonder what his passport photo looked like. He still got that Lucha. What do you think about you? If you're like, like, if you're like, Tiger Mask or Ray Mysterio or whatever,

if you've always worn the Lucha mask and you have to travel to the United States and you show them your passport, do you have to take the mask off? Or is the passport photo with them with the mask on? Right? Well, that's why most mask wrestlers,

their real names are not known. That way they could just go through the airport and show them like their real picture and name. Right, but I mean, like, like... Like, Remasterious name is not Reimisterio. I hope you know that. Yes, I know how obvious his name is his fucking Mystic King, right? We know this.

But like... I know. I just wanted to make sure. But I mean, like... So they show their fears to, like, the one guy. So they... But they would still walk through the airport with the mask on. So at some point, they'll have to take the mask off to show the guy that's them.

You know what I mean? So couldn't other people see that happening? I mean, that's if they, because I think what Corey's saying is if people don't know their real name, they don't know their real face, then they can just travel on the airplane incognito. Oh, so you're saying they don't travel with the mascot. No, no.

Why would they travel with the mask? Okay. Yeah. Gotcha. Gotcha. Cool. Gotcha. Because I think they wouldn't be able to get through security, period, with a mascot.

Yeah. You know, if I walked into, like, airport with a mask on. on and it's not like a COVID mask. I feel like I would be stopped very quickly. I feel like rolling into a bank wearing a ski mask, which is cold outside. But it is cool outside. All right. Well, do you guys have any closing thoughts

on the nightfall arc on Asriel or Bain or any of the other stuff we talk about? So what we've established is that this storyline, brought in a lot of new twists that were really cool to like the Batman lore. Like, they established Bain as a big

fucking bad guy, which is what you... I feel like that's kind of missing from a lot of modern comics is that it's hard to bring him a new bad guy and make him legit. And I think they did that with Bain. He's not their old rogue's gallery.

This is a new guy that you're not prepared for. And then, you know, they kind of folded him on and then as time end on people weren't able to adapt that character the way that he was originally and so we start kind of faded a little bit you know yeah wasn't quite the same as he used to be and the same with like um the new badman what's his name john paul john paul valley jumpal valley is it like they introduced a new badman they introduced like this guy that that had the ability to become Batman, but he's twisted

so he's like a dark version of Batman. You know, like, they could have done like something there, but once the story that was wrapped up, again, they kind of like, well, it's not that. Don't worry about it. And made him, you know. I mean, he did, he did have his own

comic for about five, six years. Yes. Well, I mean, that's true. But like, um... They also did choose to kill him off and not bring him back for a decade, so I understand what you're saying. Yes, that's true. You know what you mean? Like, there were a lot of choices.

And again, that's part of like the big thing in the 90s where like they introduced things that are so big and so epic in terms of the characters. They shake up with the characters they're doing. But like once that storyline is over, what do you do after that? For example, I think we talked about it in the death of Superman. what did they do with Doomsday after Doomsday? Not a whole lot. He came back for sure. He came back. He did stuff.

But it wasn't as impactful as the first time he was there. Yeah, exactly. It's diminishing returns when it shouldn't be. The whole point of establishing a character is that it shouldn't be diminishing returns. It should be an impending threat. And maybe we briefly talked about this regarding the onslaught. If we haven't, we will talk about that in a future show.

But I feel like that's what they've done with Olnstadt in that they established him as a huge, huge character that had, you know, world-changing abilities and things, like a lot of like repercussions. Yeah. After the first time you see him. And then after that, it's kind of like, he gives a shit. And that's not the way you treat people. maybe also like Cassandra Nova the first time she came in it was like holy shit and then after that

you're like nah there she is we'll beat her and there's a lot of villains like that where you feel like you gotta keep the pressure on them if you're gonna use them use them right you know so when we were talking about death's your man

and we're talking about how when the writers had their summit to plot the story out they were like we have to create a new villain because all of the other villains had fought Superman numerous times and had failed. So for this to work, it has to be a brand new villain. So you introduce a new villain who does the thing that no one else has been capable of doing, and that is kill and or permanently incapacitate the hero.

That is diminishing returns. Like, they will never replicate that again. So it's almost like Bain got his big story, but he is now forever cursed with never being able to relive that moment. Right. That's part of it too. Like, how do you, how do you, like, top that? Yeah, you can't, basically.

Yeah. You know, that's a big problem, too. They were very ambitious with what they did, but... They've been hinting at Doomsday's Return in the comics for about two, three years now. Like, they said, they're still teasing it because Doomsday's been trapped in hell. And... This strong guy, the leader? Not quite.

I don't think so. Is it not even Dubestays? Not even Doomsday is the leader of hell right now. DC hell is a little, like, suspicious. I'm not, they don't seem to ever really advertise who the head guy is down there. Imagine be a doomsday who killed Superman, and you're not even the leader of hell.

I mean, he's not in terror. He's also not, you know, he's not a genius or super intelligent. He's just a monster that likes to kill things. But it doesn't have to be. He fucking killed Superman.

He does scare the demons, though. Like, that's a, that's an aspect of the character is that the devil is terrified of it. If you were looking at your resume as a super villain, right, looking at what you could do as a super villain. And the top of your resume was, oh, I killed Superman. He'd be like, all right. That guy, he's pretty good.

I'm not going to lie. Do you what you mean? Like, he's right up there. He killed Superman. Yeah. How many other people have killed Superman? By my point. zero.

No, no, even the new 52 Superman, he ended up, like, being turned into Doomsday at one point, like... I mean, that's weird. Yeah. Now there is... So, he killed himself? What are he talking about? Well, it was like a virus.

What's the Doomsday virus? Yeah. But, like, you don't mean, though. Like, like, like, he has such a mistake to him. Like, how could he not be the Lord of Hell? But also, what you're saying was, like, they're teasing by bringing it back, but like, how do you bring

them back in a way that like right off the bat, they killed, they made him killed Superman, like, what can he do after that? That would make him go, I'm still a big deal. Kill him again. You know what you mean? It's, and the problem of the guy that

Dume's that he is, he's supposed to adapt to his um, you know, whatever kills him, he can adapt to that and then come back stronger, right? So like, if, if he's if on the first time you see him he was able to adapt to superman and come back and destroy Superman and then we've seen him six or seven times after that he should have adapted to all of

that he should have adapted to every single thing that killed him so the you know what you mean yeah no mind you they have been very they they have been pacing out like when dooms day returns it's not like a joker situation where every new writer gets to tell their Joker's story. But like Doomsday is kind of he is a little more protected than most characters are. Okay.

Now like I said, going back to Bain though, Bain not so much. Bain always gets a storyline where he like assembles an army and briefly takes over the city and then like it inevitably goes wrong. Kind of like how in John Paul Valley, most of his

stories revolve around like struggling with his brainwashing and dealing with sort of like the responsibility that comes with being like the last member of this weird secret religious order. That's just serial storytelling in a nutshell, there, isn't it? Like, characters will keep going back to the status quo. I was going to say, like, they left a lot of, you know, the writer who wrote like the mini-series and the short story that was before. that left a lot of stuff on the table that, you know, they could follow up on if, you know, DC gives them the go-ahead on it.

So, yeah, I mean, the world, they are using them, at least Asriel, more than they were previously. Like, he's turned up in multiple miniseries and stuff as of late. But, but yeah, for the most part, that was the biggest storylines for both characters, or the biggest storyline for both characters was Nightfall. Mm-hmm. Well, I think that's going to do it for part two of our nightfall episode. John, I think we said that you were going to make up a number of movies you would have presumably watched in a week. What do you got?

Let's see, so I was on 520. So now I'm going to say I'm on 539. I thought you were to say it's 521. What's the one film you saw? on John. I'm planning to go watch Alien Romulus tomorrow, so. Oh, yeah, let me know what you think of it. I had my feelings on it.

I don't want to say too much about it right now. I heard it was pretty good, though. I liked it. I have my criticisms, though. Yeah, you know. Dylan, I would ask you what's going on an expletive place, but you did that last episode, unless you want you to do a recap.

No, it's a whole week later. Yep. I imagine in that whole week, things have changed a lot. so by the time this episode goes up near the end of September yes yes

this would be yeah I think this is going to be towards the end of September I would I would hope that by the time you listen to this show whoever you might be that if you go to Explodeeplace.com or slash YouTube.com

slash I don't know what the thing is Explorety Play at YouTube.com. Then if you go there and subscribe to the YouTube page, you will see episodes of

Animal Crossing going up right now. You're going to be really amazed. You're going to love it. It's going to be amazing. There are a lot of... Is it an Animal Crossing? No, why do I keep saying Animal Crossing? You're just reliving the happy days. It's because I spent an entire

year playing Animal Crossing on that channel. So I'm so used to saying Exploity Plays and Animal Crossing at the same breath. It's not Alamacrosse. It's Pickman. It's Pickman 1. The first pickman But if you want to watch

Animal Crossing, you go to Exploddy Plays and you will see 365 episodes of Animal Crossing and none of them disappoint. Not one. Not a single one of them disappoint. They're all a rip-roaring good time. So check that all. Please.

I think honestly I think my All the Crossing series was one of the most fun things I've done in my entire life which says a lot of them in my life but also I love that whole run

it was so much fun um core you saw something right yeah now I was gonna I've asked this previously so you might have changed your mind have you ever considered

redoing it but playing a different Animal Crossing game I know that you liked this one because you could piss off the villagers so they leave the island. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Correct. Honestly, I think that was the hook about the first one, was that nobody else was playing it.

And it was so, like, unique and strange and, like, of its time. Like, it was the first Animal Crossing game that ever came out. So, like, nobody, like, now it's a phenomenon. But when I remember when it came out, we weren't even sure if it was going to, come out. Because it was so, um, the text was so English heavy that like,

because it was a Japanese game, everybody was sure that it would never come out in the West because of how much text it would take to translate it. Um, and it came out of like three years after it was released in Japan. So like, because Nintendo of America were like, nobody's going to buy this fucking game.

Like, why would they? It's, it's, It's stupid. And now, Animal Crossing is like a culture phenomenon. People love it.

But the reason I played the original one was because people forget how good the first one was. And I think if you look at the new one, it's too streamlined for me. I like the restrictions of the original one. And that goes for a lot of games. But, you've seen the way that the original one works. There's a lot of restrictions,

a lot of stuff I have to do to get a grind other things. In the new games, it's not like that. You just kind of play the game and have fun. But I'm like, well, in a proper game, you need rules and restrictions and things that keep you in check because that's part of the game. If you know what I mean.

It's very similar to like Pokemon and that old Pokemon was very specific about what it did. Even though it was very restrictive, it was very specific about what it did. And now if you play Pokemon, it's just kind of like you just play it. Have fun. and they forget about a lot of the stuff that made it a proper game.

I know that sounds like bullshit, but that's that's games for you. Anyway, so Exploiting Place. Just subscribe to the thing and then you'll see some stuff. If you don't see some new stuff, just watch the old shit. It's really good. Mario 64 stuff was really good too. I really like that. That was good.

So watch that stuff. And then whatever. Oh, the Shantay was really good too. What did you like, Corey? You like Jetsar Radio, right? Yeah, Jetsar Radio was fun to watch. Jets Zidoree was good. I really like that.

That was really good. We had some good times on there, man. Real good times. So subscribe to see some more good times. There you go. you can't subscribe John do we see what your letterbox was I can't remember

we did not but you can find me on letterbox at Big John Bowsky there we go and my other show is called Large Old Cup also on Spotify check that out

stream of consciousness so that'll do it for today Dylan this is the final episode of September So the two-parter for Nightfall is going to take us out of September and lead us into October. Cool. Well, we should have shit up for then. Yeah.

So we will see Wall in October. Until then, behave yourselves out there. Goodbye. Bye. Bye-bye. I should have done it in Bain's voice. Do it. No, I didn't I.

Yeah, we haven't stopped recording yet. Bye-bye. No, that's not right. Oh, what's it? Goodbye. Bye. Put your hand up on your mouth and say it. Goodbye.

Bye. Yeah? Corey? Oh, I need to do one. Yeah. Bye. Oh, I'm saying. Goodbye.

Yeah.