The Watch - ‘Echo’ Is Another Marvel TV Miss. Plus, ‘White Lotus’ Season 3 Casting and the ‘Mandalorian’ Movie.

Episode Date: January 11, 2024

Chris and Andy talk about the news that among others, Carrie Coon and Parker Posey have been cast in the next season of ‘White Lotus’ (1:00). Then they talk about the news that there will be a ‘Mandalorian’ movie and what that means for a potential Season 4 of the show (23:36). Finally, they discuss the newest Marvel TV show, ‘Echo,’ and how—like many other Marvel shows before it—it struggles to strike the right tone (34:51). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Producer: Kaya McMullen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Stand up and walk now. Hello, and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com. Joining me in the studio, he hears Bangkok is lovely this time of year. It's Andy Greenwald. Chris, we got a lot to talk about today, but I was wondering, yesterday a lot of the great lines of the sports world stepped down.

I got to say, there was a, I don't know that I was, I would say I was emotional since Bill Belichick is a demon. Yeah. I don't really have like much of an opinion about Pete Carroll, I guess. Seems like a cheerful guy. Nick Sabin probably can. killed my interest in college football just by his just utter dominance. Yes.

But, you know, it is one of those things where you're like, man, getting older. That's what I mean. These guys are all in their 70s. We're all in our 40s, you know? Should we address the rumors? Because I feel like when people were... I'm stepping down. Yeah, I feel like people are like, oh, something's in the air for the great legends. To take over the University of Alabama's men's football program? No, no, no. I think that people were worried that, like, much like Belichick's

championship run, that, like, you know, a good thing has come to an end and people were looking to you and be like, are you stepping down? I'm always going to be here. Yeah. I mean, it's been... Here in Studio 6, just podding away. It's been 12 years. It has been.

Is this the anniversary? Something around now. I don't know, later January. We're not sticklers. I'm not really stickler for my anniversary with my wife either. There's a fluid date there. Really? Well, we started dating in the early 2000s.

I remember. But we didn't get married until 2015. Right. So, you know, when do you call it? You know, I still remember. I was in California for the winter break, and I remember talking to you on the phone. Yeah.

And you were like, you were like some news. This is before Twitter. But you still spoke that way. It's a personal news. It's a personal news. And I was like, wow, that's great. Yeah. I hope it lasts.

Genuinely. I didn't doubt. Yeah. You were really supportive. I was the one that believed. Andy, today on the show, we're going to do some news at the top. We've got a special announcement from, I wouldn't even say watch productions, but I guess it is kind of because it's a, if it's featuring you and it's produced by Kaya McMullen, it's your new podcast venture.

Thank you. Yes. I do want to be clear for legal purposes. Kai and I have our own venture now. Oh, did you guys start an LLC? Yeah. Yes. Yeah, where is it? It's located. The LLC stands for lots of liability. Did you see the laundromat? Do you know where it needs to be located? Yeah. Yeah, we're launching something. something new. I think this is fantastic. So tell people what it is. So, um, launching a new little podcast journey. It's called Stick the Landing. And every episode, I'm going to be talking to a friend, colleague from the larger ringer sphere podcast pals. Each episode will be focused on a different

series finale. Yeah. Of a, uh, beloved or contentious or what have you, television show from throughout history, not just, not just recent history. Yeah. And do a deep, on that episode, on the context of that episode, and consider it how it was received in the moment, and then also take the opportunity to be like, well, what do we think of it now? And how, what can we learn about where TV is going from where it's been? Primarily because, as we've talked about many times over the years on this podcast,

the whole idea of ending something was never, ever part of the calculus for TV for many, many decades. Yeah, it was like, let's hope we don't have to, right? Like, let's see how far we can get without worrying about, like, how this is going to wrap up. Exactly. And that has very much changed, obviously, in the streaming era. But so far it's been fun. We've banked a bunch of episodes. We're going to premiere them on January 17th on my favorite feed. The Prestige TV podcast, yeah. Maybe we'll throw one up here.

Yeah, I think that I am not, so currently I'm not on this show. You know, I'm talking to your people. And what's that been like for you? Lonely, frightening. I mean, thank God, Kai has been here with me. That's been, she's been my rock. And the only thing that she's really had to do is like sort of calm me down because I'm always like, let's schedule more. Let's work harder. Let's do more episodes. And Kay is like, hey, hey. Let's start earlier in the day. Yes, let me get here on time. That's kind of always my thing. So I appreciate that. So no, we're still trying to find, you know, Kai and I, when we sort of, you know, when we sort of go offline and we talk about stuff, we're like, how can we fit CR into this? Should we? You know, we're not afraid of asking the hard questions. I think I'll probably be appearing on Stick the Landing.

I can't wait to listen to that. When is that from here again? January 17th. 17th. Yeah, so far we've got a good group of episodes and shows. Yeah, that's what they tell me. I just didn't know if you were going to drop the binge like Echo. Oh, well, it is similar to Echo and that this is the Ringer's first TVMA podcast.

That's right. I also did do a second audio feed in chalk towel of the show. It's very big of you. Yeah. So today we are going to talk a little bit about Echo. We're going to do some news at the top. We're also going to spin the hype cycle a little bit for two shows that are airing on Sunday night that we're really excited about. And we'll be talking about extensively throughout their seasons.

That's True Detective Night Country. And Monsieur Spade. Yes. How's my French on that one? Pommel. Okay. Mr. Spade is on AMC. And it is about Dashel Hammett's famous detective Sam Spade, who is the...

the sort of hero or anti-hero or protagonist, at least, of the Maltese Falcon, one of the great detective films of all time, one of the great detective novels. And it's from Scott Frank, who did the Queen's Gambit, obviously, but is one of the great screenwriters of the last 34 years. And Scott Frank directed all the episodes. He did this show with Tom Fontana, who did Oz, did Homicide Life on the Street, is one of like the sort of bedrock television creators over the last couple decades. And, and, and, and, you know, And they came up with this incredible idea of what happens next to Sam Spabe. And it is putting him, it places him in France in the 1950s and 60s.

And it is of what I've seen so far, fantastic. I can't wait to talk about it with you. We're going to have some special guests over the course of the season to talk about it with us. And I hope people check it out. And then True Detective Night Country, as I've alluded to, is a fucking banger. And we have, we'll come to you guys live, not live. We'll come to you Sunday night. I'll be here live.

Andy will be here live for the Saga Awards. Andy's going to come on Sunday night. Yeah. We'll have our breakdown of the first episode and a special interview with Issa Lopez, who created this season of Night Country, directed the episodes, and was one of my favorite guests we've had in a long time.

That's awesome. A dynamite interview subject. So we can do some of that. But let's talk a little bit about some of the news. Should we just, just one last thing, just one last plea for Monsieur Spade. since we probably won't be covering it in detail until next Thursday because the Monday show Sunday night Monday show will be true D.

I love Monsieur Spain. Yeah. I love it. It is an absolute joy to watch and I'm so excited to talk about it. It's TV writing on like a really high level. It's beautifully acted and it is I think that sometimes you know you and I have like kind of settled into our ways and we know exactly what we like. But this is exactly what we like. it's a detective at a farmer's market.

In France. Yeah. It's true. You know, I used to, when I would go to my therapist's office in New York and talk to him, he's an older man. And no matter what time of year, no matter what year, he would always have like an 800-page book about Congress. You know, like just like, like, and I'm not just talking about like the Robert Caro books. I'm just like, whatever the hot new congressional book was, you just be like getting into it. I'd be like, I guess when you reach a certain age, you just get in your bag.

Like, you have your thing. And now I'm beginning to understand that. But I would argue that this show is just so beautifully crafted that even if our bag isn't necessarily yours, you should give it a shot. Yeah, if you're not using a mesh or rope bag at the farmer's market, maybe you will, you know, after watching Mr. Spade. Okay, so we're very excited about those shows next week. And I think also on Thursday, I'd love to hit the end of the curse. Yeah, and Fargo ends next week, right? And Fargo.

And I am caught up in Fargo, but it felt weird to jump in. with an episode to go. I would also say that Fargo, this is an observation, is certainly saving a lot of resolution for the end of, for the finale, it seems as though. And I have had mixed feelings

about Fargo this season. I think I really loved the way it started and have enjoyed elements of the second half of the season, but found that they're sort of like, basically it's like they're letting a lot of eggs hatch in the finale, it seems like. Yeah, I think that's the right move.

So I thought it would be good for us. to talk about it then. You know what? For season two of White Lotus, which was a huge success for HBO. Can I ask you one thing about season two of White Lotus? Don't look. When did that air?

2020. When? Summer? December. Really? I had no idea. I couldn't, I wasn't sure what year of the show here. No recollection.

Yeah. Okay, go on. Season two became, I think because of season one's success and it's sort of, it's, it's kind of became this iconic show, especially of the pandemic. Season 2 casting wish fulfillment became a huge thing. And maybe a little less so for season three, just because I think everything has kind of gotten back to, everything is back on track for the most part.

But people, I did not notice as much like make Timothy Shalaman Zendaya happen for season three of White Lotus wish casting. That was your detective season four, wish casting. But we do have a cast for White Lotus season three, and we have a location. I don't know if I agree with your assumption there. I feel like people were angling. I think people were excited to see who is going to get brought into the machine.

Well, you and I are on different forms of social media now. That's true. You're on Facebook. You're on meta. You're mostly reading comicbook.net reports about Jeremy Renner, possibly picking up the bow and arrow again. And I'm on God's platform. True social. Yeah.

Anyway, the White Lotus season three, cast has been announced, it's Carrie Coon, who is seriously like in the running for HBO MVP of the last 10 years between leftovers, Gilded Age, and now this. Parker Posey, seems like a match made

honestly in heaven. This is what I'm saying. This is what I'm saying that I wish that, as you know, I do not understand betting or gambling whatsoever. But if there were like fan dual odds on who Mike White is going to cast in White Lotus, I feel like I would have

and sew in on Parker Posey and Leslie Bibb. That just feels like... That's just so obvious to me, and I'm kicking myself. And by the way, this is a good thing. This is... Thank you. Thank you for uplifting Parker Posey into this show.

So we got Parker Posey, Leslie Bibb, Jason Isaacs, Michelle Monaghan, and then returning from season one, Natasha Rothwell. So... I need her on this show to wash the taste of Wonka out of my mouth. Is she in Wonka?

For some reason, yes. Oh, who did she play in Wonka? a lady. Do you want to get some Wonka takes off your chest? I'm not going to see it. I can't. I'm worried that... A free hit.

I'm just worried that my daughters will, for the first time today, given some interest in this podcast and listen, and then they'll know that I've been lying to them about Wonka. Oh, do you lie to your kids about your takes on things? It's one thing. I try not to, but they... I see this happening, and I remember this from my childhood, too, that sometimes when they love...

something. And they saw Wonka in the theater with their mom. And then we watched it. They really wanted me to see it because they loved it. And I had a screener. And so I could feel them watching me watch it. And I didn't want to be like, this is pure aisle. Like it is to be, you know, my, my guy made Paddington. You grand is great in it. Like I respect all the people involved. Shalemay really goes for it. Yeah. I thought it was awful. Like really, really awful. Okay. But you didn't, You tried to keep that from them since that might be their favorite movie of all time for all you know. And they want to listen to the songs. And, you know, again, shout out Neil Hannan, the Divine Comedy,

definitely someone who was in the NME a lot when we were reading it in the 90s. He wrote the songs for Wonka? Yes. Wow. Get the bag. Yeah. Bag full of treakly candy. Yeah.

Anyway, I'm happy for Natasha Rothwell. I prefer her performance in the White Lotus. Me as well. I said she's incredible insecure. I was wondering whether or not. So at the beginning of relationships, I remember the beginning of my relationship with my now wife. There is a period that I would describe as a cultural honeymoon where you just are so into this person that you're like, I will not only watch whatever you want to watch, but seem passionate and deeply invested in it. And be open to it.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe this person whom I now hold in such high esteem will introduce me to something. Or I can see things through her eyes. And now, in retrospect, knowing my lovely life the way I do, I know now that that was an act. For her or for you? For her. Oh, you mean, like, being interested in your things?

Yeah, like, when I was, it was like the fourth night I spent over at her apartment and I was like, do you want to watch a movie? And she was like, sure, what do you want to watch? And I was like, have you ever seen Slapshot? What a, what a romantic. Well, there's like, there are couples in Slapshot. Set the scene for me. were like handles lit and you were staring at each other's eyes.

Did you hold it for a beat and be like, my darling? Like I could have said anything. Yes. You know what I mean? And now this is the early 2000s. So, you know,

it was, I don't know what like, what would have been my like truly like dog shit crime movie I could have shown her. Right. But I remember we watched like Slapshot, Miller's Crossing a couple of like either sports or violent movies or both in case of slap shot.

Because you guys took like a long holiday together that first, that first. No, no, no, no. not a way, but like you guys just like left the world for a few days and watched movies and stuff. We left the world behind, as Barack and Michelle might say. It's true. And, but yeah, like I, I definitely got all my movies in that.

And then like one day she woke up and she's like, I don't want to watch Goodfellas. You know, like, you know, I got the real person. Has she ever seen Heat? I think she has. Yeah. But I don't remember it. I definitely know that she thought it was too long. My point being, I was wondering whether or not.

kids get the same cultural honeymoon. Like, at what point will you turn to your child and just be like, I hate this? I mean, people who listen to this podcast know this. I'm not very good at hiding my feelings. I generally... You really aren't. No, I have very strong opinions. So I think the older one sees through it.

Because I'm like, she was like, what part did you like? And I was like, so many parts. so many parts I can imagine you turning into Richard Brody as you talk a billion percent but I was also like I was like I liked

Willy Wonka's costume a lot oh what a fine coat he wears you know I was it was it was not my best why do you sound like you're in Mary Poppins

because I was trying to distract him with a reference to a movie we all like it was it was rough it was rough but in fairness, in my defense,

there is no cultural honeymoon for things I like. True. They could not care less. Nobody understands what it's like for middle-aged white men. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah.

Yeah, no, not interested in movies or music that I like. So, you know. Do you ever try to put on like a band in the car and you're just like, maybe you guys would like this? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, partly because I can't wait to hear your take on this on what you would do with your ward, the 15-year-old that you're going to bring home.

As I'm digging him to travel baseball times. Time to learn about hardcore on this drive to Bakersfield. No, part of me thinks I don't know how to walk the line, right? Because I am the child of someone who had my father's very strong opinions. And he was and likes things very much that he likes, but was not very generous with him. So not to say that I would have become a great fan of the English composer. Ray von Williams and he had been like,

here's his third sonata and why it's moving to me. But it is notable that he was never like, son, this is my music. Yeah. You know? So I don't want to do,

so I'm trying to walk the line of being like, I want them to develop their own taste, but I shouldn't just be silent. They shouldn't be like, dad didn't like things. Yeah, dad was this just opaque

kind of like unreadable. He was always quiet in the car except for some guy talking about basketball games all the time. And dad never watches the games. He just listens to this man talk about them.

That's weird. And the man kept trying to send one man from another team to another team. Yeah. And referring to this man, the piece. Yeah. Whoever that man is. He kept calling himself Picasso. Yeah, it's weird.

That's weird for them. But I don't know what the correct line is. Like, do you feel, did you get, and I think we should open this up to Kaya, too. Like, did you feel like you were handed a, you know, a manifesto of like here's the meaningful culture as a parent? I think I was given the palette and the paints, the canvas was mine. That's beautiful. So there was a lot of culture on in the house, and it was not necessarily mitigated for, like, my tastes. Sure.

But because of that, I wound up seeing or reading or hearing things early in my life that I think were pretty formative, I would imagine. Like, I am curious. Yeah, to our Mr. Spade conversation, I saw Waltese Falcon when I was like 12 or something. That's cool. That was like, if you like cop shows or if you think Miami Vice is cool, you should watch this. And I was like, I do think Miami Vice is cool. Thank you, sir. Wait, so that, but I think that's interesting, though, like, in terms of building a taste being like, I see that you're interested.

Like, for me, it could be like, I see that you're interested in shows about talking dogs from Australia. Yes. Have you thought about watching Road Warrior? Or Colin from accounts. Yeah, yeah. Dog doesn't talk, but, you know. Yeah. Yeah.

Was there a lot of, in the McMullen house? No. Did Kyah call the shots or did your parents? Were your parents like, check out the Beatles? That was a tell, by the way. I think my dad pushed me towards a lot of like Nirvana-esque rock. My dad is a big, like, serious lithium radio guy. Wow.

Her dad is our peer, by the way. Does your dad want to come on the pie? Other than that, like, as far as, like, movies and TV goes, like, not really. Okay. Just, like, push towards, like, Scooby-Doo and, like, Cartoon Network. Has your dad heard 60 songs that explain the 90s? I don't think my dad doesn't really listen to podcasts but one of his friends did reach out to him and was like

hey I listened to this podcast from the ringer and then my dad was like do you work on this and I was like I don't and he was like okay happy new year talk to you next year I don't even remember where we are white lotus cultural honeymoons etc white lotus let's just stay there have you do you have much of an interest in Thailand

huge as a as a destination for your own travels or just in terms of it's like... That's a loaded question. Be careful. That's true. My bad. I have traveled to Thailand.

Have you? I have? Yeah. When? In 2011? I remember writing things for Grantland from my hotel room. No, you did.

Yes, I did. Why did you just take a vacation? You're one to talk. Come on. It was all still kind of tenuous. I remember contributing to some like staff roundup of things we wanted to see. I don't know.

Yeah, I've been to Bangkok and I've been to the south, like where I think they're shooting this season, Sukkosemwe. Oh, wow. Incredibly beautiful. Good shoot. I love books. There's a couple great novel series. John Burdett's mystery books set in Bangkok are awesome. And Timothy Halanin has a series crime novels said in Thailand, read them all.

You never cease to surprise me. I try to cease, honestly. I want you to know everything. But I'm a huge, huge, huge fan culturally. I love it. I'm excited about this. Don't have like a huge Thailand bug. I've never been like I got to see it

I'd love to see Vietnam but I've never been to Asia so Well that's where we're bringing the pod next Kyya what's our listenership in Asia What are our growth markets? Yeah but specifically like what's the demo Do you think it's like Do you think the people in the south of Thailand

Listen to the end of the podcast or do they mostly drop off after the first Why are you so obsessed with this? I mean if you guys want to do a watch sponsored trip to Thailand, then I think we can pump those numbers up. Yeah, we can. All right, Casey, get out of us. Why am I worried about that? Because I feel like we just drop, we just scatter gems throughout the podcast.

Well, maybe people are saving it for later. You never know. You know, so your take is, this is a bad idea. You're out on season three. No, I was just like, I obviously, I'd been to Hawaii. I love Hawaii, and I don't think I've been to that specific part of the Mediterranean, but I do love it. And that is just this is the first one.

one that I've never been to. That's all. It's not even a really particularly interesting thing to say. The connections to the first season will be interesting Natasha Rothwell's character, if people remember, was going to start her own spa based on seed investment from Jennifer Coolidge, who then reneged on that. And we know what happened with that whole thing. I don't want to spoil season two of White Lotus, but I'm curious to see how he continues to build up the sort of continuing character mythology of the show. Just phenomenal vibes heading into season three. I think high Q rating, everyone's happy. It's not going to be bad.

It's probably 25, I would imagine. I think they've confirmed that. Okay, so 25 for that. Another thing I wanted to mention to you was the Mandalorian movie announcement. Oh, yeah. Okay, so this came out a couple of days ago with seriously some of the funniest art I've ever seen was like attached to. I think it was like on the Star Wars site.

And it's just a painting of the Mandalorian flying away with baby Yoda and his arms from an exploding spaceship, which is kind of how I imagine myself waking up every morning when I jump in the car to drive down sunset. Is Grogu, is that your takes then, like your good ideas that you're cradling? That's right. I guess I would just mention two things.

One, I would imagine that this now takes the place of a season four of Mandalorian. Maybe. I would imagine that whatever story, John Favreau, who's going to be directing this, and Dave Faloney, who I think is going to be writing it with him, wanted to tell. They've decided to do it on the big screen. The thing I am most fascinated about is

we spend so much time wondering what actually marks success for a streaming show. Because it's so hard to understand the numbers. Each platform, each service seems to use different metrics for, hey, this was successful, or got this many hours, or this many starts, or this many completed episodes, or whatever it is. I have no doubt that Mandalorian,

the Mandalorian, is probably the most successful Star Wars thing since Force Awakens. But it will be interested to see it against the box, like just the hard data of box office numbers. And I would argue anecdotally that the Mandalorian has been declining in casual interest among fans

who are not like I'm hardcore into the Faloniverse. I really care about this era of storytelling. So this is interesting also because I think last year, Favreau was talking about sort of mapping out season four as they finished season three.

And he said he viewed the Mandalorian as one long story. But he said that they also had this responsibility and this is a quote to understand what's happening on other shows, even skeleton crew, which is death to air. That's the Jude Law show. And they all take place in the same Star Wars period. So there's a lot more things that we have to keep in mind and stuff that we've built up from

previous seasons of the Mandalorian as well. What do you make of this jump to the big screen? I have a question. What is a movie? Genuinely, what is a movie? For sure. This, to me, seems so cynical and lame. Because on paper, this is every corporation's dream. Do you need actors for this movie? Because how many days on set is Pedro Pascal legitimately going to do unless he breaks his armor

in the first scene and has to actually be there which is not the case Grogu is not sorry earmuffs if you care about this is not a actual living baby Yoda it's a puppet I still haven't confirmed

that my wife understands that that's who I was thinking of about earmuffs but luckily we know she doesn't listen to this podcast she's famous whatever for saying that the only two guests that she would ever really care about being on the Bill Simmons podcast

would be Timothy Shalame and Baby Yoda. And I said, you do understand that one of those things is in play. The other just can't happen. And she wasn't sure which is which.

And she was like which one is. That's fair. Yeah. They don't need to reserve any locations or build sets, right? Because, so what is it?

It's just a 90-minute episode that they would shoot in Manhattan Beach. on the volume anyway. You know, I find the whole thing really dispiriting, frankly, because as you said, like, the show launched, the first season of the Mandalorian is very, very good because of its casualness. Because it's gunsmoke. And because it's just low-key, fun, week-to-week television show. Very quickly, it went the way of most branded IP entertainment in this day and age, which is, oh, now we have to know about the Dark Sabre and Boataton and the history

of Mandelor. And by the end, it's like, I guess Boba Fett was its own show, sort of, although it just became the Mandalorian

midway through. It's so up its own ass and then, or I guess up its own Sarlac pit, that now they're going to be like, no, no, now it's for everyone.

No, it's very clearly not. It's just very clearly the next chapter in something that has, I believe, limited appeal. And I am still, I don't really

have the scar tissue built up about what's going on with Star Wars that I ought to. Do you mean to have some fun with it? You're like mad about it? I'm a little mad about it. That they've had all these years to be like, what should we do with this hallowed property?

And they're like, we'll do episode 10 and season four. Right. That's our plan. I would just be interested to see them convert something to the big screen in general. It's been a while. There's been some, you know, obviously like they had the Beniof and Weiss flortation. There was going to be more Ryan Johnson action. There's a Tyca thing.

Like, you know, like they have not. There was a faggy movie. They haven't really... Roak Squadron. Yeah, Roak Squadron. So there's been a lot of stops and starts. It seems like the one person who can turn the engine over there is Faloni. Well, now he's been given the keys.

And he's been giving the keys to do that. So my hope would be is if they were going to do this on the big screen that they would tell a story that wasn't just chapter, 11 of 12 in a story of this kind of scope. And that also that there was, they took advantage of perhaps a larger budget and a wider, like a bigger canvas, you know, like make it feel more important than like, oh, that was on on Thursday night, you know? I just feel like, and I recently rewatched not to, I was about saying not to be cliche,

but come on, we're in year 12 of this. Like I watched a new hope, Star Wars recently with over the break. yeah, with my daughters, who were willing to give it a shot again. And first of all, good movie. Yeah. Really holds up. Do you know what's good about it?

Harrison Ford. Harrison Ford is good about it. We are now 46 years into them being like, people, I think, want more Muppets. I think that's what people like here is Muppets. As a child, as a child, I was intrigued by the Muppets. Yeah, but it's a nice balance. Yeah, but I was very intrigued by the guy in the vest

it was funny. Yes. Was that Harrison Ford? Yes. Right. Yeah. When's the last time you watched A New Hope? Pretty recently. But you so you know, and I'm sure listeners know this as well, is that like the canonical streaming version of that movie is the one that has the let's draw a weirdly pygmy Jabba. So that's the one that's on Disney Plus. That's the one that's watching. The Lucas version. But it's like there's this one scene that makes no sense where Jabba's kind of human size because they were drawing him over an actor they cast and shot in the 70s. And he's just like, ooh, da, solo.

Like, okay. What's up? You're fluent in Java. It's called, it's called, no, actually, I don't know what it's called. What language it is? Oh, man, I wish I had that. I just had that in the bag.

Last one news thing that I was just kind of noting is just Tokyo vices coming back in February. And I think if you gave people 100 guesses of shows that came out on HBO over the last two years that would get another season, this would not be in the top half. Yeah, surprising.

But I thought that this first season was excellent. I had Michael Mann on The Watch when we did, we talked about the pilot episode, which he directed. That's amazing. It was still very, just can't believe that happened. But I thought the whole season was excellent. And it's really cool that they're doing it. And it makes sense because this Jake character,

who's the Ansel Elgour plays in the show, there's no reason why he can't go on to another story, which is essentially what he's doing. reporter. Yeah, and then the Yakuza and the cops that he knows are going to be a part of it, and Ken Watanabe is so good in this so. Have you an Ansela Elkort squashed your beef, do you think? I've had no contact with him.

That's notable. Yeah. Our beef is, to me, it's over. There's the statute of limitations. That's what I wanted to hear. Can I just let you know that while you were talking, I was on my computer. Filling an application for the New York

England Patriots head coaching job? Yeah, I think I can at least get in the door. He just wanted an interview. He speaks hutties. Okay. But I was interested that my... Job of the hut. Job of the hut.

So you're not Ansela award. Yeah, well, he might. But when you start to type, what language did J, the auto fill is Jesus? Uh-huh. What language do you speak? Hatties. Can you do just give me a little bit of Jesus doing Java?

Just a little New Testament. I'm going to have to workshop that. Did you see Scorsese as just like, straight up making a Jesus movie because the Pope asked me. Yeah. Well, he didn't ask him directly. The Pope just was like... The Pope put out a...

What, like, changed his status on Instagram? A call for submissions, essentially. He was just like, I think we could use some new content about Christ. About JC? And Marty's like, I got you. I think that's great. And he's gonna be in it? Marty?

Yeah. I'm here for this late period stuff. Like, I'm into it. Are you? Yeah. I love the end of killers. Yeah. Was that up for debate? No, I was just thinking about it.

I mean, no spoilers, but Martin Scorsese appears in the film. Yeah. I love that. Have you fired that up on Apple TV Plus to do a second run through? Where do you find the time? Yeah. No. Are you interested in doing that? I think so. I'd like to see it before the Oscars. I mean, I've seen it, but I would like to do it again.

Did you watch John Mullaney's speech, like opening monologue as the host of the governor's ball? I did. I recommend everyone do that. It's very, very funny. Do the Globes just not pay well enough? I think the issue with the Globes was it's tarnished. And so it was like, why would we, what's the point here? Right.

I don't see the win, you know. It just seems like all of these barely broadcast alternative awards shows have completely competent hosting situations worked out. But the big ones, it's either we can either go Jimmy Kimmel or it's a fucking... Or Anthony Anderson is doing the Emmy's. week. Yeah. Or it's just an absolute chaos factory.

You know, and then like all the other ones like sag and indispendent spirit and Gotham and all these things are just like, hey, you know. Well, Malini and Kroll did. Still like a decent comedian to just do 10 minutes at the top and then keep moving. Because I just want to come. When Malani reads the email, he got from WME inviting him to put himself on tape for the role of young cop. It was very funny.

But the best bit is he finally speaks to the thing that I've been wanting someone to talk about, which is why is Rami Malik in Oppenheimer? It's really funny. It's great. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever have a plan come together out of nowhere and realize you're missing something? Like a last minute beach day,

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Learn more at Wells Fargo.com forward slash active cash. terms apply. Okay. Should we talk about Echo? Yes. I think we've all, I think this is going to be an interesting segment because we took wildly divergent paths. Two paths diverged in a wood. Yeah.

And I took, so I don't, this, this idea was not to be a flippant one. Okay. But the five episodes went up the other night in a binge. The full season went up on Disney Plus. Right. And I realistically knew that we probably weren't going to be able to cover or talk about Echo for five episodes of our podcast. And also, we may not have the desire to do so. So I thought an interesting experiment might be at play here, where Andy took the first episode.

This is incredible retconning, yes. And then I texted Andy and I was like, I'm going to watch the fourth episode. First of all, tone is not communicated in text. Sometimes this is going to surprise people, but sometimes we like to. We like to keep it light in the old I message. You know, we say some stuff to each other that's joking. Like, for example, yesterday we were recording something else, and you woke up to a text from me saying,

I may be late, I've had an elective medical procedure, and it's been under anesthesia since Saturday. You sent it at 7.02 a.m. Yeah, and I sat on it for 90 minutes before sending. You're welcome. And, you know, long-time politicos understand that I was referencing the bizarre situation involving our current Secretary of Defense.

but Chris was like just wrote back question mark but you're like an aging man like it's totally in the realm of possibility that you could have been under general anesthetic but you'd seen me earlier in the week I wasn't at my best to be fair on Monday with Jason but I was here I hope Lloyd Austin is feeling better

me too I root for health generally but anyway so when you texted me I'm going to watch the fourth episode of Echo I was like classic Chris I read Jen Cheney's piece on Vulture about how Echo needs to be watched in totality, or that, like, it's good that it's all up because where it winds up and where it goes is, is really interesting. So I thought maybe you could handle the beginning of Echo, and I will tell you what happens at the end,

or we can just not, well, we don't have to spoil it, but I thought it might be an interesting way to approach this. And frankly, like, I think that it sounds like, I mean, I read about it. I think I understand how it starts and everything, and I understand the relationships between the characters. Are you sure? Because the show isn't sure that you are. They really want to make sure you know. So this was a, I don't want to

like say it's a tarnished or troubled production or anything like that. But there was some reporting around Echo that it was originally supposed to be eight episodes, that it was essentially deemed unreleasable. That was a Jeff Snyder report by Kevin Feige that he was like, can't put this out. And that it was almost,

entirely reshot. And then... Reshot or re-edited? I don't really know. And then brought down to five-episode release. And pivoted from a typical Marvel TV release to something that would be M.A. It's also Marvel Spotlight, which is their designation for things that they don't think you need a ton of other Marvel context clues to watch.

So that you could watch the Echo story and not have to have seen... I would recommend if you were very interested. want to be a completest seeing Hawkeye. I want people to understand and differentiate us as host. I would never tell you to watch Hawkeye. I still think Hawkeye was fine. In the grand scheme of all these shows,

I think it was fine. Hawkeye is to the Marvel shows as solo is to Star Wars movies. That's the way I'll put it. One that you just bizarrely defend? So you basically get, this is a very interesting statement about where Marvel is at, that they have put this up as a binge watch in mid-January.

I don't think they have anything else on the schedule now until Deadpool, either on screen or in the big screen or on TV. And then the only other thing that I think that they have in the hopper for Disney Plus this year is Agatha, but we don't have a release date for Agatha, right? The title keeps changing. Well, I love all the titles, though, so I hope they just never stop. They are good. What did you think of what you watched of Echo? And like I said, we are not trying to be flippant in our approach.

It was really more of like an experiment since this all went up at once. I mean, I was joking, but I'm genuinely curious what your experience was because I found the first episode of this to be absolutely confounding. Really more of like a what are we doing in the world of entertainment. this is not and I want to be very clear here there are so many talented people involved in this

I think the direction is uniformly very good by Sydney Freeland the action scenes are very very eye-catching they're well choreographed they're surprising they hit hard they're good I think the cast I mean other people have commented on this

there are a lot of people who we've grown to love from reservation dogs showing up on this show like Zahn McLarenden and Graham Green and Devery Jacobs. Tantu Cardinal. And Chesk Spencer, who was in one of our favorite shows

of two years ago, the English has a very big role in this. It's fantastic to see him in it. So what I want to try to articulate is my criticism is of the project, not of the people giving their all to do a good job in it. And again, we said this when we talked about it

when they announced the Switch. Being like, fuck it, we'll just make a hardcore action show. That seems smart. That seems like a smart pivot and hopefully a sign of more of these kinds of like, let's just be honest about what we have here, as opposed to we're just going to try to force something

that we've committed to without a lot of consideration down the audience's throat. But that said, I found it so bizarre that the whole, you know, the bubbling backstory of this was you did not need to know too much to get into the show. The first episode is 58 minutes of cobbled together either retconning, flashbacking, found footage, previously seen footage from Hawkeye, all explaining the entirety of Maya,

aka Echo's life story from when she is a child, up beyond the end of where we leave things in Hawkeye. Right. And at no point does it seem like it was a mandate to be like, just make something good people are going to watch. It's this deep, trudging feeling of homework that is bizarre for something. that honestly just she kicks ass and she's deaf, we get it. Show us, just go, go, go, go, go. I'm not really, I just think generally, and this is both as a fan of watching things that have some momentum,

but also just after a decade plus of the superhero stuff, like, I'm sure they had a tough childhood. I get it. Most characters on television did. Yeah, let's go. I think that that's an interesting distinction to be making is whether or not it's a superhero. show because I think that there's the bones of some really interesting stuff in here,

especially this character who's kind of, you know, it's kind of positioned as an anti-hero at various points, you know, and is kind of on that spectrum of street-level Marvel characters like Daredevil and Jessica Jones that had the Netflix shows in the past. It exists in this kind of gritty New York City, May you and like they go out and fight crime. but also maybe commit some crimes themselves in the process. And taking this character who's, I think, very wonderfully inhabited by Alachua Cox

and bringing her back to Oklahoma and having her kind of get in touch with her roots, but also be kind of fending off her kingpin association at the same time. Like there's interesting stuff there. To me, I couldn't uncouple from knowing that this felt like it was pretty much stapled together. And so your point about the pilot or the first episode

being a collection of footage from other shows and flashbacks and, you know, I also have to say that I think after watching a couple of seasons of Daredevil, watching Hawkeye, now watching this, I realize that I do not like Vincent Donofrio in the role of Kingpin. And I don't really have like a kingpin in mind that I wish it was. I don't know whether it's maybe just the characters, is not that interesting to me.

But I have been watching this guy whisper and beat the shit out of people pretty passively for the last eight years. And I think I'm just good. And I kind of wish this story. I know that Echo is tied to Kingpin and that

it's whether or not she's going to embrace her destiny as Queenpin for him is like essentially what the last few episodes are about. or whether or not she'll repair her relationships to her heritage back in Oklahoma with her grandmother, who's played by Tantu Cardinal, and she's really good.

I guess I understand that, but, like, I really had a hard time just, like, watching Vincent Dadoffrio in the show. One of my favorite things is the reveal that, like, Wilson Fisk, the Underlord Kingpin of New York, has a shipping operation in Oklahoma. Right. What are the odds? Yeah. Wow.

Yeah, I think there's a case to be made. and maybe this isn't the right venue for it, maybe this is more of a ring or verse argument, but Vincent Tinoffrio's performance as Wilson Fiske is probably the most textually accurate performance of anyone in the MCU. In terms of its relationship to the comics? Like he is just doing the comic book in a way that is actually kind of breathtaking,

but doesn't work because it is two-dimensional, I think, in the way that a comic book can be. I also just think that these shows, especially recently in the Marvel TV stuff, they've really struggled with tone, which is an interesting observation, I think, to make, considering what made the MCU successful, even when the movies weren't totally successful,

was the mastery of tone. To watch the first Iron Man again, there's a lot of stuff that's like, really? Like, it's not, it's, when we think of Marvel at its peak, we're thinking of, like, the Russo Brothers run with, like, Winter Soldier, and it's just, it's a well-oiled machine and everything fits. The early stuff was not like that. And when we talked to Joanna Robinson about her great book, like, clearly it wasn't like that

behind the scenes. But they knew the tone and they nailed the tone and the tone won out. And this, like, I said this two years ago and I'll say it again. Like the charm of the Hawkeye comic book by Matt Fraction that they sort of adapted was entirely tone. He was like put upon a human guy who kept getting the shit beat out of him by dopes and track suits. What it became in the show and what's echoed in Echo, this is literally, this is literally, literally the scene is when he's just, he's signing to Maya, like, you and I, we're the same.

Really, that's what we're doing? The Daredevil show worked, I think, because of tone, you know, and this show doesn't seem to get it because it is at once trying to be like, hey, we're just doing a pulpy crime show here. It's fine, you know, there's elements of, like a blue-eyed samurai. There's a template for this kind of show, whether I respond to it or not, where I think it can be done well. But the heaviness of this.

I mean, I don't even think you saw that the show begins with an otherworldly, I don't know if it's a flashback or a dream sequence, but something drawn from Choctaw history or mythology to try to take it off of the grounded Earth level. Yeah. These decisions just burden the show in a way that feels like a bummer. And again, it's five episodes. You get what you get. Maybe it's fun to watch people break next. Your mileage may vary. You know what the tough thing is is with the way that Marvel has decided to,

do these series, and especially as they do spinoffs, and I think Agatha will have like a similar, a similar question to answer, if not like a similar issue in its actual production, is sometimes like these characters work as part of a gallery of characters that are surrounding one story, right? They don't necessarily, like, their biography is not, now I would definitely be open to like an echo series,

but I think an Echo series that has to also tell Echo's entire story is tough. And then I think it kind of misses the point of like the pleasure of week-to-week comics and week-to-week television or episodic television, which is a certain economy of storytelling that's just like, here's this person's case of the week, here's this person's obstacle that they have to get across, get past this week, this episode, this issue. and like there's a pleasure in watching a simple thing done well I find that like the amount of heavy lifting that they have to do to connect this to

a show with Daredevil which we still don't know is actually ever going to see the light of day I think they're too committed for it not to but fair enough and they definitely do some work towards the end of the series and towards in the Stinger to like set up Daredevil a little bit but it is just a lot of work to to to kind of constantly be like, you know, tending to all these different fires. And I just wonder whether or not they have now got enough evidence that

the series, the episodic series, just need to be their own thing and the movies need to be their own thing and trying to land Kang in a future trilogy of films through two seasons of Loki and an appearance in Ant Man is just, there's too much at stake financially to,

if that doesn't work out, what happens, you know? Look, everything's, should be born again. Not just Daredevil. Let's just let's see the next couple plays out. I would like for the people who were involved in this show seem like incredibly talented and I would love

for them to have had a better shot at success here. I can't help but feel like this is going to be like one of the final lines in the chapter about and then they rebooted the entire thing. Yeah, because there was a thought and we articulated this. We even advocated for it and believed in it

that Marvel was just going to become a continent of entertainment. Within its borders, there would be room for people, different types of stories and different people's stories, you know? And in that world, like, if they wanted to make a native hero, there are plenty of people whom they hired in various roles on the show who could give an interesting perspective on that.

I'm not saying just like hand it to Sterlin, but I mean, like, there are a lot of people from the larger extended Res Dog's universe and people we don't even know about who are talented enough and creative enough to bring a unique perspective to that story. But this is another example of everything that is brought into Marvel becomes Marvel and what wins out. And who does that ultimately serve? I appreciate the intention of being like we are going to do a Choctaw language version of the show and we are going to be respectful of the heritage that we're drawing from and we're going to be thoughtful about who we hire and how we tell certain stories. And like, that's all, that's just good practices. That's good practices for Hollywood. But ultimately,

what you end up with is a mediocre Marvel show. You don't end up. I would be curious, and I mean this sincerely, if people walked away from watching Echo being like, I have a different appreciation for Native Culture or whatever aspect of it that sought to be highlighted. Or are they like, yeah, it was kind of cool. And I don't know who wins when it's kind of cool.

We can wrap it up there. I think that also the binge release option here of putting this up all at once, I'll be curious to see the completion rate. We're not going to see that, but to see whether or not it remains in the conversation,

say, in 10 days. Do you think it's similar to the completion rate of the watch? Only in Thailand. We're putting up those, Echo is putting up Thai watch completion rate numbers.

I don't want to put pressure on our beloved American fan base, but I understand that our fans in Thailand listen to the show at like slower speeds to savor it more, like 0.8.7. I just started listening to stuff

on 1.2. You did not. I just kicked it up a little bit. So just like how do people sound? I don't know if I like it. I was listening to Rosillo this morning talking about Nick Saban and it just sounded like he was much more nervous about Nick Saban than I think he actually is.

Rissillo has a great radio voice. Yeah, I love it. But I'm trying to get through a lot of titles in a day, you know? You just got to drive more. You just got to take bigger trips. Now, of course for me, with an electric vehicle, that's fine. That's carbon neutral. So for you, I guess you're just being thoughtful.

Drill baby drill. Okay, let's wrap it up there. Interesting show for us today. Did you think? I think so. I think we covered a lot of topics. I'm interested in our burgeoning like parenting corner.

I think that's good for me. For my imaginary teenage son? Yeah, it's almost we could call it parenting corner. And I feel like that would be a unique bit on a podcast from the ring. We'll be back on Sunday night after True Detective is completed on HBO and on streaming. and we'll air our True Detective Season 4, or True Detective Night's Country recap

and our interview with Issa Lopez. If we didn't say at the beginning, because again, I like to spread out the stuff for the end, I'm very excited about this season. I really enjoyed the first episode. I can't wait to talk to you about it. And I'm excited about that and Miss Your Spade on Sunday nights

because I love... You love detectives. That's all you just love... I do love detectives. Yeah, Detective Heel Myself. They're my books about Congress. Kai, I thank you for producing us. We'll be back on Sunday night.