The Watch - Our 2019 Anticipation Index and Why Amazon Is Keeping ‘Lord of the Rings’ Under Lock and Key | The Watch (Ep. 331)

Episode Date: February 22, 2019

We break down the TV shows and movies we’re most excited for in 2019, including ‘Triple Frontier’ (6:11), 'Twilight Zone' (10:18), and ‘City on a Hill’ (23:40). Plus, why is Amazon keeping the writers' room for ‘Lord of the Rings’ under such strict lock and key (33:07)? Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Guest: Jason Concepcion Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Liz Kelly and welcome to The Ringer Podcast Network. This Sunday night after the final episode of True Detective, we'll be going live for our last flat circle after show with Jason Concepcion and Chris Ryan. You can stream that live on YouTube, Facebook, and Periscope. And while you're there, make sure to subscribe to our channel at YouTube.com slash The Ringer as we near 100,000 subscribers. Hey, everybody. Thank you for listening to today's episode of The Watch. Greenwald called in and we talked a little bit about a bunch of the movies and

TV shows that we were anticipating for the rest of 2019 kind of takes us up until the fall. And there's a bunch of cool stuff there. We gave each thing a rating. It called it our anticipation index. And then second half of the show, Jason Concepcion, joined me to talk about this funny story that came out about the Lord of the Rings show on Amazon and people having to give fingerprints to get into the writer's room, but also just the way that that show is sort of being developed in public as a Game of Thrones competitor or as a game of thrones competitor or a Game of Thrones replacement. And then we also talked about what we're looking forward to and questions that we want

answered as we head into the season finale of True Detective on Sunday. Obviously Sunday is Oscars night, but we are going to be doing the Flat Circle live. After the finale of True Detective on Sunday night, you can find us about 15 to 30 minutes after the episode ends on YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook. And if you are watching the Oscars and you're invested in that, don't sweat it. You can catch us on YouTube afterwards. place to find us. And while we're at it, Sean and Amanda, Sean Fantasy and Amanda Dobbins will also be doing live big picture stuff after the Oscars on Sunday night. So we have tons of stuff coming at you

on Sunday night. It's must see TV. It's must listen to podcasts. So let's get into today's episode of The Watch. I need sports to have to clear the room. Stand up and walk now. Now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com and calling in live from the pink room. It's in at Greenwald! Yeah, you don't last long in this room, but what an entrance. Yeah, seriously. What an entrance? Watch out behind you.

Watch out behind you. What's up, Greenwald? It's Thursday. We've got you for a few minutes. As you carve out time and your busy TV production schedule has everything going. Good, not production. This is all technically pre-production, I think. Well, it's all part. It's all producing dreams, isn't it? It is.

We're having a great time. This is my you've got to come by and visit. It's the Frozen Tundro of Los Angeles episode. I don't know if people know this, but we got a little bit of a cold snap going in L.A. And I know that conversations about weather can be boring to some. And for anyone living in the polar vortex, you're probably telling us to go fuck ourselves right now. But I got to tell you, every day I get up and I think about who I want to be, how I want to present myself to the world. And I like go into my closet and I pick out some threads.

And then I get to the office. Can I jump in? Just one second, because I got to paint the picture here for you. I just want to know if this is before or after you have the toast because people from last week are hanging on the toast. Well, what do you mean? People are disagreeing. Like they're caught up on my breakfast plans?

No, you just were very, very honest about your breakfast plans. And I want to know when you wake up to make yourself who you want to be. I'm sorry, I blew up your spot here. I just want to know, does the toast with bananas? Is that part of this? The onion you toast in bananas because your cutting board is not clean. I realized that. I found out how to clean the cutting board.

So that crisis has been averted. You just had to rub it down with lemon. so now my bananas taste of lemon and you know but I come to work I'm in Los Angeles where it's never going to be colder than 60 it's always going to be sunny and it is so cold here and none of these buildings are prepared for this cold and our building in where we work here has had some heating problems

and by about 1130 a.m. I would say I look like a character from Manchester by the sea. I'm just standing around with a hooded sweatshirt and a carhart on doing janitorial work on Route 1 in Massachusetts. Can I paint you a similarly frigid picture, which is that over here at the production center offices where we are, we have a lovely suite of offices. We're having a wonderful time. We're so grateful to our hosts. However, this building was constructed for Buster Keaton, and I believe the walls have the same bone density that Buster Keaton currently possesses. Yeah. He's like the Grail Knight in Last Crusade.

What I want you to know is that in our writer's room, there are currently three space heaters, and the other six writers have one. What I want you to know is that in the same manner in which a slice of bread in your toaster is made crispy with the dual heating method, that is how I sit in the writer's room every day, because I am now an old person. Yeah, you're like Don Amici, just like kind of with like five power. powerful suns, like, blazing on you. But, but, you know, this is as good as segue as ever to turn towards the entertainment of the warmer times of year, right? Is that where you were headed? Yeah, so basically what I wanted to do with you today, because we don't, like, we've talked about True Detective recently, we've talked about Russian doll recently, we've kind of wrapped a lot

of this stuff up. If anybody wants to get kind of the lay of the land for Oscars, I highly recommend checking out Fennessee and Dobbins over on the big picture feed. That's coming up Sunday, and you and I will talk about. that next week as well. But this is that moment before the storm where, you know, we've been talking about Roma versus Green Book versus Bohemian Rhapsody for a few weeks, and we've been talking about True Detective for a few weeks. But the floodgates are about to open. There's a bunch of stuff coming in the next couple of months and throughout the rest of 2019. And I thought it might be fun to do a little bit of an anticipation index of stuff that we're really looking forward to in the next

couple of weeks. Really, the game starts in the first week of March about when Triple Frontier and Captain Marvel come out, which one of those really appeals to my interests. And then, but we've talked a lot about those things. Can I just jump in quickly and say, there is no least credible time in Hollywood than the two weeks between when the first Twitter reactions to a Marvel movie come out and the movie itself comes out. That said, unsurprisingly, the Captain Marvel early reviews are gushingly positive and nothing would make me happier. than for that to be true. But here's the one red flag I want to just mention now,

which is that from what I've gathered, from my scientific 45 seconds of skimming Twitter responses, the cat is getting too much burn. Well, cats are big right now. Because oatmeal, the cat from Russian doll, apparently already has like a three-picture deal. Yeah.

He's got an overall deal at UCP. Wait, wait a second. I resemble that remark. Yeah, cats are huge. you're talking about the cat that I'm concerned about the movie. Yeah, but like Widows was an amazing movie and a lot of people had a lot of good things to say about Olivia. I'm not saying, what I'm saying is that's easy. Like the cat or the dog should be good in these movies because they are literally trained animals.

And people love them no matter what, you know what I mean? Like there could be a serial killer arrested and the serial killer could have a dog or a cat and people would be like, no, the cat was cute though. Right. Right. If you're talking about a Brie Larson vehicle and the comments coming out are the cat is great, there's cause for concern. I hear you. Please note that is not the same if you're calling out the raccoon in a Marvel film.

Because in that case, you were talking about future multiple Oscar loser Bradley Cooper. And that is a different deal. Yes. So Triple Frontier, you're all in on. Of course. Yeah. So what I want to do is when I'm going to tell you about these projects, both films and these are films and television that we're looking forward to

in the next couple months. You give me a one, one being my bot army is already refreshing the Arklight ticket page to get into this thing and that could be for TV2 but just like that's your level

of anticipation and five being save it for airplane Andy. And just to be clear as we get into this because we're doing this cold, when you say you tell me about projects,

you literally are going to be telling me about them for the first time I imagine, right? Like that's the margins we're working within. I think that you've heard of some of this stuff. Okay. We'll find out.

All right. So Captain Marvel, you're going to go what? You're going to do your number two, right? For Captain Marvel? Well, that's a tricky one because Captain Marvel, like, I'm going to see. So it has my money, but in terms of my anticipation, honestly, or like 3.5? Okay.

That's around where I am. That's where I'm right. It's probably an opening weekend thing for me, not an opening night thing. And I will be easily I will be easily influenced by other people's reactions to it. but I got to see it for the canon, you know? Yeah, of course.

Okay, Triple Frontier, that's a one for me. I've already in the jungle for that movie. Like, I've just been doing like SpanCon for it. Do you, what do you call it? I feel like you would know the term for this. Like, you know, what is the term for when, you know, when you're in the shit, Chris? You know what I mean? Like, when you're in the army and you wear the swamp around you?

Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. You're wearing like the, you're wearing like the Pashmina. of leaves. Oh, sure. Like when you're a sniper and you have like all the,

yeah, like you have like the leaf coat. Yeah, I guess that's just like immersive camouflage. I don't know. Oh, okay. If anyone out there is currently a sniper or as a sniping experience,

I am curious what that is just fashion-wise. I think we have a pretty, pretty big church. You'd be surprised to you listens to the watch. Okay, so Captain Marvel 3.5 triple frontier. I'm going to go with a one.

Twilight Zone. So Twilight Zone. Can you ask me. Oh. What's your triple front? I'm right here. What's your triple frontier number? Three, but if you get me some branded content leaf cloak, it moves up to the two.

So what I'm going to do then is when you come home late at night one night, I'm going to pop up out of your yard in a sniper outfit. Okay, three, Twilight Zone, which had its trailer premiere, I believe today, its first full trailer. There had been a teaser with Jordan Peel just sort of doing the Rod Serling bit, I think during the Super Bowl. But we got to actually see some footage from the CBS All Access reboot of Twilight Zone. It's executive produced by Jordan Peel.

I believe watch favorite Gregory Yatannis oversaw a lot of the production and the sort of the visual look of this show. It stars, I mean, it's an anthology series, but so far I know that Adam Scott and Jacob Tremblay are in various episodes. Sonalathan, Tracy Morgan. it's interesting to kind of be that this is finally here I would say that I am at like a three on this one like I'm pretty interested in it but and I as you know

because I watch Survivor in bed and Survivors back I already have CBS All Access so I'm all set there where would you put would you get CBS All Access to watch this? No now let me say I like a lot of the people involved you mentioned a whole bunch of them obviously Jordan Peel Lily Amirpour who directed the Briar Patch pilot directed an episode which is pretty awesome

so I'm Tracy Morgan Adam Scott like Kumail is in it Stephen Yun like this is a great great cast a great group of people I am fond of the original Twilight Zone like I did my I did my semester literally probably in high school watching them and haven't and I've thought about them since

but have not revisited I think that oddly this not oddly like this is a reboot that makes a lot of sense for the culture in terms of the types of stories people like to see and also the vehicle for telling the stories and that it's an anthology series. It all makes a lot of sense.

CBSLexis continues to not make sense to me, but I'm going to give it a molligan on this one. I guess I just not sure. There's something about this that I'm just a little suspect of and maybe what it is and this is definitely not a reason not to check it out. But the feeling I get from it is that the Twilight Zone vibe,

the type of stories that to my mind are the Twilight Zone, and this new version seems to be quite reverent of the original stories, if not outright, influenced by them. It seems like that has become part of the culture to a degree that I don't know if we need this show anymore to provide it. Does that make sense? Yeah, and I also think that it's, I think that the way that Black Mirror has kind of fused Twilight Zone narrative

tricks with technophobia, it'll be interesting to see how much technology plays a part in the new Twilight Zone, right? Because that just seems like something that's really well done right now. I agree. And I think it's also part and parcel of this crush of reboots or re-imaginings of classic IP at a time when the influence of these original things is already so deeply felt and understood. And it might, you know, and it's the same thing that gives me slight pause, not just with the Amazon Lord of the Ring series, but also with the upcoming or now announced foundation series based on the Isaac Asimov novels that I love when I was in high school, or, you know, the suddenly undormant adaptations of William Gibson stuff. Even some, you know,

Grant Morrison, the comic book writer we were talking about on Monday, like if something like the Invisibles, which was hugely influential on a lot of things, including the Matrix, like they, it's almost as if some of these original things have just become the minds that have already been stripped bare for all the stuff that we now know and love. So it'll be interesting to see when the old stuff comes back if there is a new way into the old stuff or if it feels overly familiar just because it's already been stripped for parts. So I am I'm at a four. Okay. Yeah, I'm going to go 3.54 right there for me. Fossi Verdon, we've talked about a lot.

That comes right after Twilight Zone on April 9th. So Twilight Zone is April 1st, predictably. Fossi Verdon comes on FX on April 9th. You and I are both in the bag for this. It's Sam Rockwell and Michelle Williams. It's this new take on Bob Fossi and his life, and it just looks fantastic. Today we got, and I forwarded you, the key art from the series,

like the poster of Rockwell and Williams, and I'm back up to a one now, just from the way it looks. It's pretty exciting. Avengers Endgame comes after that on April 26th, which we had a lot of fun with the post-super Bowl show and the fact that they've spent a billion dollars to make this the most expensive episode of The Leftovers ever. Where would you put your number at?

We don't have to get too deep into that. Look, I'm in the tank. I'm a one. You know, I'm really excited. I'm excited because the stakes for this one are the highest they've ever been for a Marvel movie since the first Iron Man. not because it's the leftovers and not because I'm desperate to know if Spider-Man survives

because I'm fairly certain that he does and he has a European vacation to go on, shout out to the Griswolds, it's that they have said basically they are ending. I mean, it's right there in the title. And of course, there will be more Marvel movies, you know, one or two months later. But just in terms of the stakes of the franchise

and what's going to happen next and also the fact that we put in all this, like, blood capital and time into watching and talking about this And finally, I hope it doesn't actually run three hours. But you know who loved Infinity War? This guy. I loved it. I had such a great time.

So I am looking forward to saying it. Yeah, I'm going to go to one as well. A month later, where there's this capstone on this sort of long-running IP with Avengers Endgame, we'll get something a little bit new and original and really interesting while also obviously owing a lot to some of the great sort of science fiction that's come before it. And that's James Gray's Ad Astra, which comes. comes out May 24th, and it stars

Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, Ruth Nega, and Kimberly Elise. And James Gray is one of my favorite filmmakers. He made Law City of Z a couple of years ago, which was a movie I've seen multiple times. If you haven't had a chance to check out Law City of Z, it's really a remarkable film. And at Astro is something I've just been really looking forward to

because I think, usually with space movies now, I think that we're starting to like kind of like use them almost like westerns where you can do a lot of different things with your sci-fi movie set in space. So we've got like Claire Denise, High Life is coming out, but you've also got stuff like interstellar and gravity a few years ago. At Astra, Gray has talked about being influenced by 2001 in Apocalypse Now, which means he has my money already. I'm just fascinated to see this is basically Brad Pitt's father, played by Tommy Lee Jones, goes on a mission in Neptune. and disappears and Brad Pitt has to go look for him. So it just, that's a one for me. How high, and I'm pretty interested in this,

and this is something I was not checking for until you mentioned it, but how high is the Solaris factor at play here? Solaris being Soderberg's remake of the classic art science fiction film, and he remade it with George Clooney. I consider, I mean, I haven't seen it since probably 2002, but I consider it a fascinating and no-whole failure. And are there elements of that here, which is to say only Brad Pitt and God Bless him for doing it

can get a highly ambitious, no doubt, highly expensive science fiction movie helmed by James Gray made? And that's terrific that he can. But are we so far down this road of segregated culture, right? where like this will be so highbrow that it will lack the sort of the fun or whimsy or adventure or punch that many people

myself included want from space movies. I'm fine with that. I think one thing that you're trying the it you're trying to scratch there is if a movie asks unanswerable questions, is it the movie's responsibility to answer them? And that's sort of the problem in space movies is when you kind of are saying, when you're presenting

these ideas about man's place in the universe and all these other things. And then you say to, you say, okay, well, we're, you know, the kind of agreement you're making with the audience is that you're, you're asking them to go along with you as you investigate these questions and you can't answer them because no one can. Sometimes it leaves people a little bit unsatisfied. Now, 2001 is an example where they kind of, Kubrick sort of made the entire end of the film about the unanswerability of those questions. And people have been studying it ever since because of that. So if he leans in, you know, he's,

into the, hey, I'm throwing my hands up at, like, the power and the scope of the universe, then I'm all into it. Well, I love that. And in, like, I was being a little devil's advocating there because I love that sort of thing. It does feel like that's a line, though. It's a needle that Brad Pitt seems interested in fretting in his career, and I'm very glad about that. You know, it was, it's why he wanted David Fincher to direct a World War Z sequel. It's like trying to have highbrow and lowbrow all at the same time.

Honestly, from the description you've made of this movie, it sounds like the thinking, person's interstellar, which is a movie that I think would have been more successful if it hadn't tried to make sense or tried to explain itself. So yeah, I'm cautiously optimistic, 2.5. Okay. So we're going to skip ahead a little bit here. That takes us up to the end of May. There's a bunch of stuff that's like very interesting that I kind of, I'm curious about what you're thinking about it, but it doesn't really have release dates yet. And that's two Netflix projects. One is the last thing he wanted, which is derecise. is this adaptation of a Joan Didion novel

about arms dealing in the 1980s in I believe Central America and this is starring Ben Affleck and Anne Hathaway and D. Reese of course directed Mudbound a few years ago and I've seen set photos for this and it just makes me, I'm pumped and jacked for this.

Well, also, as you noticed before I did that my guy Eddie Gathagie is also Yeah, you got to get some scoop for me here. Co-star of Briar Patch, I will get some scoop. Look, this is, I know nothing about this project other than to say, for me, this remains the dream of Netflix that they hear that D. Rees wants to do this. And I hear the name, I hear Joan Didion and I see this cast and particularly like this is, this is, this is Chris Ryan Katniff, this plot. I'm not far behind you. Shout out to oatmeal the cat. This is the dream of Netflix. That they would just say, sure, green like that. The word salad of all the things you just said would not be on the menu anywhere else at this. particular moment in American cultural history, and I'm glad that someone is making it.

So having only just learned of it, it's a two. So it's a two for me. And the other Netflix project that you and I are keeping our eye out for, obviously, is Mindhunter Season 2, which we assume is coming at some point this year. But as so far, I haven't even heard anything about it. And if there was anybody who was got to hear about it, I would hope it was one of us. But I'm... Seriously.

You know, I mean, like, I'm sure there's some people who work on Mindhunter who would probably hear before us. But Mindhunter's season two, directed by David Fincher, but also this time directed by Andrew Dominic, who did the assassination of Jesse James and killing them softly and this incredible Nick Cave film that came out a few years ago,

and it's reported to circle on the Atlanta childlers. And Carl Franklin worked on Mindhunter's season two. So you've kind of got, you've kind of got like three massively talented filmmakers working on this. And I think that Mind Hunter is going to be the kind of thing that gets better as it goes deeper rather than regress.

Absolutely. I mean, I think it's been interesting talking to people, especially other TV writers, about that show, because I think it was more contentious than I thought. And I think that a lot of people, again, this is totally there, right, but checked out earlier in the season, certainly than we did, because we saw the whole thing and loved it. But it is the rare show that begins with some very broad strokes,

but recognizes its broad strokes, owns them, and then interrogates them. And so by the end, it's just sort of a fascinating, smeary line. And I do think that it will continue to get better, right? I mean, I think that it was noteworthy, how interested in its own cliches the show was. And I think the sign that it was aware of that from the beginning was casting Jonathan Groff in this sort of what in previous eras would be understood as the straight white male straight guy role. and then letting him process things in real time, things that maybe we've become a nerd to

from generations of entertainment, honestly, like Mind Hunter, and seeing what actually dealing with and wrestling with the broken perversity of the world. Yeah, the depravity, yeah. And I could be more excited, because plus, look, at the end of the day, like Fincher, Dominic, and Franklin directing something, you have to at least.

Yeah, that's a one for me. They could just be filming people reading the phone book. I want to ask quickly about two, last things here because I want to let you go. One of them is City on a Hill, which is coming out in late June, late June on Showtime. And I think when I first heard about this, I was a little like, oh, that sounds like interesting. And the trailer, if you watch it, I mean, like, I think that when you get, so the story of this is a set in the 90s, it's produced by Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Tom Fontana. Tom Fontana has done, did Oz. He did the Homicide Life on the street. He's like a sort of Hall of Fame

television maker. And it stars Kevin Bacon and Aldous Hodge in an early 90s Boston setting where Kevin Bacon plays an FBI agent, a crooked FBI agent who helps Alta's Hodge kind of pull out the corruption in the city of Boston with the backdrop of armed robberies happening. And when you watch the trailer, which features like a naggingly catchy song by this guy, Sam Fender, which I actually not heard of before, you're just kind of like, oh, they made the town into billions. And it kind of speaks to Showtime's ability to manufacture prestige pleasure center fair. You know what I mean? You've exactly nailed what's interesting about this. And what I would

say is if this was an HBO show, and this sounds totally backwards normally, but hear me out, if this was an HBO show, it would seem intolerable to me. The fact that it's a Showtime show is the best thing that could ever happen to it because I don't want more of the departed. I don't want more of that Boston shit. And if I am getting it, I don't want it to be self-serious. I don't want it to be somber. Now, obviously, there would be aspects of the show. I mean, look with the people involved, this is a drama. I'm not pretending. This is Black Monday. But I think you've identified, correctly identified the Showtime piece of it. And I mean this with actual real praise. I think Showtime angles its shows more towards the pleasure center than HBO.

And sometimes that can hurt them. But I think in this case, it might be the spark that it would need to not become a slog. That actually makes me more interested in it because we haven't seen crime shows have gotten more and more and more serious, right? And if this is a little billions-e, I'm interested. I have one last one for you. So there's tons of stuff coming out in 2019. Wait, I have one more Showtime one for you that I don't think was on your list. Oh, okay.

How are you feeling about the Halo show? Only because it was in the news. And I feel so, I'm weirdly interested in it. I feel like people aren't checking for it. They're not talking about it. We had talked about all the directors that had run through. Yeah. Well, we also had talked about it years ago because this was, remember, this was a big splashy thing

for the Microsoft Xbox network that was going to exist and blah, blah, blah. And then we started to get more interested in it when it was Kyle Killen, who was the first guest ever on Hollywood. prospectos, I think, back when he was making the NBC show awake. But he is now show running this, which immediately makes it a must-watch for me because I'm fascinated. And then Otto Bathers was just announced as the director and executive producer. And he's done some of the best episodes of Peaky Blinders and Black Mirror. And again, like, this was one of those giant gambles by Showtime that felt like... I haven't heard you this excited in a very long time. You're psyched for the Haley

show. It's a one for you. I'm really interested. It's a one for you. It's a point. It's a No, here's why I'm interested. It felt like an afterthought when it fell to Showtime, and I think when we talked about it last a couple of months ago, we were talking about how it just seemed like everyone needed to make their splashy, expensive Game of Thrones, and almost like Showtime showed up late to the party, and there wasn't much left on the buffet line. But what if their timing was smart? What if their timing was brilliant?

What if they're watching all their competitors, like Amazon, you know, spend, God knows how many close to a billion dollars making an elf show that people kind of already know this I'm about to talk to conceptio about that yeah but what if this is what if Kyle Killen has a way to make space army drama interested I love your confidence is secretly the interesting I love but maybe it is before I let you go so let's put that at a at a zero apparently that's how I'm going to defend myself one more for one more one more one more point which is the Lord of the Rings thing it worries me the same way the Netflix Marvel shows did

because it was a concept first and then they were like well then we'll find writers for it. It felt backwards. Halo is such a blank slate. It's just like a two decade old, now almost two decade old video game franchise. I just think that they handed it to a weird guy. The roads of Hollywood are paved with the bodies of people

who tried to make cool video game shit. You know, it's just... No doubt. Yeah. I wanted to clear out, I mean, this has been great because you've just given me so much in this podcast, but I'm going to ask for a little bit more. There's a lot happening in 2019.

Plenty will happen after City on a Hill happens until the end of the year. But there's one special title, and it's not the kind of thing that you and I usually talk about, but I know it's something that's close to your heart. And I actually took the time to watch the trailer for this,

and I have a lot of questions. Greenwald. Where's your head at with Frozen 2? I can't believe you're teeing me up like this. When did this shit come and turn into Dark Night Rises? That's my... biggest concern. Why is she got to

like skip jump through an ocean and climb out of the like the prison in the middle of the desert with a broken back to go fight Bain? My guy, I every morning, I get into my car with my older

daughter and I drive her to school. And we have all sorts of conversations. And this week, a lot of the conversations have been both math and birthday related where she's like, how old will I be in 10 months? How old will I be in 30 years? How old will you be?

Will you be dead? So it's bright and early good morning stuff. Today, she was like asking me a bunch of different dates and numbers. And she said, what about 10 months? And I said, you'll still be the same age, but it'll be almost Christmas. And then she went, oh, will the new Frozen movie be out by then and will I have seen it? Here's of all the things you said. And a longtime listeners of the watch will know this.

to be true. The odds of me seeing any of them, fair to middling. I will see Frozen 2 multiple times, regardless of quality. And I have seen Frozen 1 many times, and I don't think you could say the same. But I have real concerns

that this trailer is like a Chow Yun fat film from 1997. That Elsa is just going to be like running through hallways, killing drug dealers. Why is Anna just drawing Christoph's sword? Who's chasing her? Why is the dominant theme? Elsa's alone on an island and it's autumn now?

I don't get. Now, I get that they want to make it ominous and cool or whatever. It's a teaser trailer. We don't hear the songs. But is this empire strikes back? What's happening? This is the sequel problem. Because the thing about Frozen, in addition to it being good,

is that it is a brilliantly constructed one-and-done movie. It's a fable. And it works so well. and it's totally contained. And we don't need more. But of course, we're getting more. And so at that point, what more is there to say? I guess they're going to be bad guys now?

Look, I also can get behind the concept that, like, for the young girls who saw the first movie, they're older now, and maybe it's a little bit more of an action adventure, where once again, Anna and Elsa are the action stars and they're not relying on the male characters to save them. And I believe me, I completely support this and love it. But, yo, this shit. It looks really dark. I can't wait to go on this journey with you.

I don't think that's what this is supposed to be. But I need, look, I appreciate the question. I want the Daddington Hive to weigh in on this. For what it's worth, the daughter hive was pretty psyched. It gets a one from the daughter hive. Yeah, some trepidations from Dattington Hive. All right, Greenwald, thank you so much for calling in. We'll be talking to you next week.

You have a safe and fun and non-snowy weekend. Chris, you're always a one for me. Thanks, brother. Coming up in just a second, I talk to Jason Concepcion about Lord of the Rings and True Detective. But before that, let's hear a quick word from our sponsor. Today's episode of The Watch is brought to you by ADT. When it comes to something as important as your family safety, you deserve real protection from ADT. Real protection means the nation's number one smart home security provider is standing by and there for you when you need them. Real protection means having a safe and smart home with everything from video doorbells, surveillance cameras, smart locks, lights, carbon monoxide, and smoke detectors in a system that's custom designed to fit your lifestyle.

And setting up custom automations to do things like lock the doors and set the thermostat when you leave. Real protection means staying safe on the go in the car or when your kids are at school with the ADT Go app and the SOS button. Real protection means 18,000 employees safeguarding you. Real protection means direct connections with first response. bonders. No matter how you define safety for you, your family or your business, ADT is there. ADT, real protection. Visit ADT.com slash podcast to learn more about how ADT can design and install a secure smart home just for you. All right, I'm joined now by my Flat Circle co-host, my brother Jason Ketephti. What's up, man? We can talk a little to a true detective in a few

minutes. We've got to get to the bottom of something here. So Andy and I just got done talking about all these things that we're anticipating in 2019. And you know, at a certain point, Like, there's hard, it's hard to find out certain things about, you know, what's happening with Mind Hunter season two. It's under lock and keys. It's going to be about the Atlanta child murders who can say. Of course. But another piece of pop culture news came across the transom this week. And I just want to, I want to send out an SOS to the people here.

I don't really do, we don't do a lot of investigative journalism or advocacy journalism on the watch. Right. But I think I might have to get one of those PGP keys just for this. Man. And it's specifically for the people, and you guys are, I'm sure you guys are killing it. I'm sure you guys are making great stuff. But the people who are working on the Amazon Lord of the Rings show, because honestly it sounds like you're working in like a failing Soviet state in the 80s. I don't know why the Lord of the Rings writer's room can only be accessed by, you know, like, it's like getting to the knock list in Mission.

impossible. Are we in minority? Are there two twins in a milk bath somewhere who allow you to get in? So here's what we're talking about, right? This Amazon show, like, they've just started the rollout for the Lord of the Rings show on Amazon. They have a quarter of a billion

dollars already wrapped up in this thing. This needs to be a hit for them. I mean, will it eventually matter to Jeff Beezer's wallet probably now? But they need this to happen. Jennifer Salky, who's the head of Amazon, is sort of overseeing this project and she said recently that there's a fantastic writer's room working under lock and key.

Sounds great. They're already generating really exciting material. They're down in Santa Monica. Don't even tell us where they are. Don't tell me Santa Monica. Now I'm going to go to Santa Monica in my Erdogan outfit being like, where are my guys? You have to go through such clearance, and they have all of their windows taped closed. That's what happens.

That's what Michael Shannon does in bug. You don't have to tape your windows. windows closed. And there's a security guard that sits outside and you have a, you have to have a fingerprint to get in there because their whole board is up for the whole season. I mean, let's say this. God forbid that anybody spoil Lord of the Rings. Guess what? A book series that has been out, oh, like 85 years. And they just got done making six interminable movies about this. Six movies. Also, like, what are you going to do? Put Led Zeppelin's Misty Mountain Hop under lock and key too. Like Robert Plant fucking spoils this story in 1974, guys.

This is the thing is that like secrecy is such a powerful thing right now. You and I are doing the Game of Thrones after show this year. And we, you know, you and Mallory can probably like, honestly, you could probably minority report milkbath the Velasio episode. I think we could get close. You could get close. You could be above the Mendoza line. You could make the big team. Like, I know.

that this is going to be about Aragorn before Fellowship the Ring. I'm not actually even like a Tolkien scholar, but I have like a loose idea of what's going to happen here. And instead it's like, I think that they're using the secrecy to drive interest. Now, I

kind of wonder whether or not we are approaching the end of this a little bit. Like whether or not there's going to have to be a little bit of a turning of the barge so that we can start like sharing shit with people and just being like, you're a grown-up. This is a story you're going to be into.

Here's what it's about. You know, just give us a log line. That's all. You don't have to show me the whiteboard. You don't have to, but like, when you're like, you, I have to cut another person's hand off and use their fingerprints to get into this room. Like, treat me like a grownup. I agree with you that I think that this is how they're building buzz for it.

Like this, listen, our shit is so secretive. I know that you've, like, for everybody out there who's read the Tolkien, who's dived into the unfinished material. who's watched the movies and the animated movie from the 70s. There's some shit in here that's so new, so mind-blowing that you literally have to like give a saliva sample to get out of the writer's room. But how long can they keep doing this?

So let's say we get this end of 2020, which I don't, I have a feeling we might not. I think they want it. I would imagine they would want it for end of 2020. And if they are starting a rollout this far in advance, they must have a sense of when it's coming. Right. But, like, that's a long time to be like, it started with a map.

Right. You can't get into the writer's room. We're not telling you anything about it. It's like, okay, look, like, the difference between Lord of the Rings. Lord of the Rings is something that, like, there are literally people who just, like, major in Lord of the Rings and colleges. Right. They learn elvish. You're just going to, like, the whole point of having this property is to satisfy that.

Like, you can't just be like, what if smog was a good guy. Right. You know what I mean? Like, people aren't going to be. into that. I understand I know what's going on here, but it's just there was something about the way that this was presented that I was just like, why don't you guys just

be like, here's what it's about. Yeah, I think that you're right. You know, there's something about there's something about the way that Game of Thrones was able to capture people's imagination by using shocks that absolutely

completely contravened what you expect from a story, from an action story, from a fantasy story. You know, season one, if you know nothing about the books, you go in thinking, oh, this is kind of like a fantasy procedural. Ned Stark on the case, he's going to figure it out. Right. Oh, no, he's dead. And then you're thinking, oh, Rob Stark, the king, he's married his love and now he's trying to put the alliance back together.

But then he gets betrayed. Everybody is killed. And it's just this constant kind of winnowing down of expectations and subverting long-established themes. I guess you know so I understand the idea of like trying to generate that with this

can you honestly have I don't know I guess I guess we should assume from this that much of the first season of this is going to be

young Aragorn you've never seen this before here he is you know joining the Rangers but is there like the truth about Aragorn that we're like

is there like this idea that like there's something about I mean I know he's like Strider leaves Gondor, right? Like, I'm not trying to get too nerdyer, but, like, I watch those movies. Like, I feel like I have a pretty good sense of that dude's story.

Yeah, I think it's kind of, it's just kind of crazy to be like, oh, man, I hope people don't find out that Ghalom bites Frodo's finger off and falls into the volcano, you know, that huge twist. Like, there's not, all the major twists are just out there. And they've been out there for 80 years. And this is a part of, you know, this is the touchstone of fantasy. literacy literature, English literature. So it's just a weird choice. This made me,

this was sort of giving me Star Wars anthology movie vibes. Where I'm like, I see, I see what they're doing, but I think that part of the reason why Rogue One, I mean,

it was a very successful movie, and I think the problems with Rogue One had more to do with the execution of it rather than the concept of it. But it's interesting to be like, okay, we've got a piece

of this incredibly lucrative beloved pie. what do we do with it that doesn't feel like a retread, but still has this connection to the material that everybody feels so deeply a part of? And in Rogue One, they essentially told a whole movie about a throwaway line or at least like this thing that happens

right before New Hope. And so much so that the coolest part of Rogue One is when New Hope starts and you're like, I can't believe this is coming full circle. I wonder whether or not that is ultimately the trajectory for this show. Yeah, I would assume so. I think, you know, you kind of touched on it obliquely.

One of the weaknesses of an execution like this is just structurally, like, you know, Eric Goren is going to make it to the end. It's not like Game of Thrones, which snuck up on people. And had four heroes. Right. And was, you know, like a best-selling series, but not, but wasn't widely known in the way that Lord of the Rings is. And wasn't so closely guarded that they couldn't have made some decisions.

Right. They could have been like, you know what, Sean B. A lot of people like this guy. Let's keep them around for a couple seasons. I mean, you fuck the whole story up if you do that. It's not like you'd be like, oh, I guess Strider does some other thing and maybe the elves do X, Y, Z. So as a method of ginning up hype for this, I get it. It's just really weird, man. You know?

I mean, are they, so from what you know with the Thrones prequel, like, they don't seem to be as like, I mean, I think they're working on it, right? Right. But, well, the thing with the Thrones prequel, as we understand, it's set during the years of the long night. So you're talking after the age of heroes, which is like, you know, anywhere from George has shifted what this is, but anywhere from like 5,000 to 8,000 years before the events of the story.

So you're not kind of, so while you know broadly the historical beats of the things that happen, it's not like, oh, Ned needs to make it to the end of the scene. He can't. Yeah, he's just not there. Right. That's a really interesting distinction. Okay, so quickly, before you go, I want to talk a little bit about your detective. Yes.

I definitely feel like it's been cool to watch everybody. Thank you so much for watching Flat Circle and listening to us on the recapables and watching it on YouTube and leaving comments. It's been very cool to see despite the fact that this has been on opposite like nine major national events. It's like Super Bowl and now the Oscars. And the All-Star Game and everything. It's kind of seemed to have picked up momentum as the season has gone on. People seem really, really, really invested. They, it was, there was maybe some slow trucking in the middle of it.

Sure. Like, dude, there's so much stuff that has to happen in episode eight that I feel like it could be a really exciting finale. It could be a real, real barn burner. I think the really neat trick that they've accomplished with this season is that, you know, we kind of broadly know what happened. Yeah. But it's still fascinating. There's still enough holes in there that we, that, you know, I just. can't wait to find out more.

You know, we, we know that Hoyt is involved. We know that he's had the kids somewhere, like, in his house, and that he was somehow involved in Will's death. But there's just so much we don't know and so many balls in the air, I really can't wait to find out what happens. It's going to be a real referendum on, like, what Pizzolato is capable of. And I've been impressed with it this season, but I think that there's, like, it's pretty much like,

the Amelia stuff has to like have a satisfying conclusion in some way and actually be explained because that's the card that he's been holding back. Yes. She has had, she's unlike a lot of characters. She's, she's really signaled the fact that like she was a different person before we saw her on the show and that she's capable of being different people. And we don't know what happened to her in between 1990 and 2015 that she's not in the 2000. I mean, she's passed away, but we don't know why. and she is probably the most interesting remaining mystery of this season, and it'll be really cool to see how they figure that out.

I think one of the things I'm really impressed about since the introduction of old Roland into old Wayne's life is just, you know, this is something we had talked about off-screen was like, oh, I'm a little worried about what that's going to be, these two old guys. They're going to be like wheelchering around in Arkansas, yeah. Trying to solve the case. But it's actually, there's been just a ton of path. us there with kind of like Roland's natural tendency to want to take in like broken people and strays and then having to care for Wayne who is absolutely shot at this point.

That's been really, it's been really affecting. And I agree with you with the Amelia stuff. Like it just feels like they've hinted at real depths to her that we have not yet been plum. There's a lot of sizzle there. And I really hope there's a stake. Yeah. In retrospect, you know, as this season went on, I think one of the top.

when it really kind of took flight was when it loosened up a little bit from just Wayne's perspective and despite the fact that Marhershal is giving this incredible performance I thought like it got a little bit more live when it was from Tom Purcell's perspective or from Roland's perspective or a little bit of Henry

and like it was just moving around a little bit more and I think that I think that that's going to come into play like I want to know how Amelia saw this because right now we get her and she has like she'll have a fight and she'll have a speech and she'll have like her book and whatever but that one moment

at the reading was really effective and I think it would be really neat to see like what she's, what happens in these intervening years. Yeah, I think it's funny because, you know, season one is so lauded and remembered for just the immediacy of the vibe that was created

between Rust and Marty and Russ Cole being one of the great TV inventions of the last five or six years. And I think that kind of overshadows how vague the ending was and how little was really settled, you know? So it's just going to be interesting to see, like, what happens in this final episode. Because a lot, man, there's just a lot of question marks.

Okay, so you can watch me and Jason on Sunday night. We're going to go live like a few minutes after the episode air. So I would imagine if the episode finishes at like 715, West Coast, 1015, East Coast. we'll be on around 7.30, 10.30. And you're watching the Oscars. Don't sweat it. We'll be there on YouTube for you. You can hit us up with questions that night. We'll try to get some audience questions.

And we're watching along with you. We're just going to try and figure it out. So thank you so much for stopping by the watch, brother. Thanks for having me. Today's episode of The Watch was brought to you by ADT. When it comes to something as important as your family safety, you deserve real protection from ADT. Real protection means the nation's number one smart home security provider

is there for you when you need them. Real protection means 18,000 employees safeguarding you. No matter how you define safety, ADT is there. ADT, real protection, visit ADT.com slash podcast. To learn more about how ADT can design and install a secure smart home just for you.