¶ "The Flash" Movie and Halloween Fest
Welcome to the Obrother podcast with hosts Dan and Mike Smith , brothers from the same mother with different opinions on movies , tv , video games or more , plus celebrity interviews . Get ready , get set it's time for the Obrother podcast .
Welcome to the Obrother podcast . I'm your host , dan Smith Long . Sign me , as always , my brother from the same mother , mike Smith , how's it ?
going . Hey man I can tell it's Mike Smith , because it says Mike on my mug .
That's right . Yeah , I'm surprised you didn't do the last name , because every now and then it seems to escape you . But yeah , these guys personalized mugs . You know these aren't really up for sale . There's only four in existence . We sort of you know . Look , we went that way , we've been there , done that . Nobody gives a s*** about what you're hocking .
Right .
Don't dilute yourself , don't kid yourself into thinking Anybody wants your merch . They don't , right , right .
Even bigger size .
I personally have about nine of the Obrother mugs I have at least four iterations and how much do you owe the bank at this point for all these mugs ? A lot , none of which was sold to anyone .
I've bought 40 mugs 40 mugs . Yeah , that's four and the first superfan , mug , went out , but I won't .
I'm not even going to say who it is . Yeah , superfan . Yeah , well , we'll you know . Anyways , we'll come back around to that . So here this is an interesting . This has only happened maybe one or two other times , maybe Once at least I know we get on , mike , you had no idea . I don't know what we're going to talk about .
You know what we're going to talk about Now . As we're recording this , we're deep in the throes of Obrother Halloween Fest , which , of course , nobody does it like Obrother Podcasts or Halloween Fest . It was celebrating all things Halloween , all things horror , doing a lot of movie reviews . We've got a lot of first looks .
You know , we're looking at a lot of Halloween horror genre trailers , right , and I want to say , don't really know when this is going to air as some sort of bonus episode , who knows ? Right .
But I do want to give a shout out to our , our street team , the Obrother Street team , alyssa and Hannah , a couple of our production assistants , who , again , as of this recording , had just launched a new Obrother podcast feature which , mike , is called Obrother on the street , right , and it was just fantastic . I'm loving this . We've got one episode so far .
I cannot wait for more .
They're at my first call age . Yeah , I was just loving it . They're engaging with all these these throwback . Yeah , all these youngsters .
Was it Alexandra who you know , threw some shade on Halloween ? I mean , it was a little bit painful , little harsh . I'm not going to lie .
Well , my favorite part of that was Alyssa's reaction .
Alyssa's reaction was classic it's price .
She just had , like this stuff .
Look clearly , she was looking to us like right , because she knows that I mean , look behind me , it's pretty evident , right . Look behind you , it's pretty evident , right . But you know , it's interesting because when , when this , of course , new Obrother podcast fan now was responding to that question , she was , she had explained right . She gave a rationale .
She said I preface this by saying I know it's going to be unpopular , kind of controversial , but I'm not a big fan of Halloween , that franchise , because it's the same thing over and over and over again . Now she is a big fan of Saw and we're coming up on Saw X , saw 10 . And I'm thinking , isn't that a lot of the same thing too , isn't it a ?
lot of the same thing .
It's like come on , get into a trap , get out of a trap . And , mike , you know the Saw franchise . I saw them all . I'm getting ready to dive into the Saw franchise . I'm excited . I did see a lot of the first one , but you know that's about where it ended for me . So , anyways , so , mike , we're back . You don't know what's going on .
I told you .
All I said was let's do this episode .
I'm not going to tell you what it is , you don't need to know . You'll be able to . You know , you've got a . You've got a memory like an elephant . Is that right ? Is that the right where you never forget ?
things Like really good retention for things right .
Not happy about the elephant thing , but you know , Is that a honeymooners thing , I don't know , but no , no , no , no , I think that's a king of queens bit , but anyways , so all right , mike , this is going to surprise you , it's not , it's already surprising you .
But first of all , that I watched this film and that we're going to be here talking about it has nothing to do with the Halloween fest , although it can make a connection .
A very short bacon connection .
So , mike , the other day , a few days ago , one movie did I pop on and watch on max that you've been talking about and saying I think you should check it out . We had planned to do an episode and then it kind of passed us by . And then , you know what , I carved out time to watch the film . I think I know . No , what is it ? Flash , the flash .
I was right . So here we are , mike , we're going to do an episode of the flash .
Okay .
All right , now let me set this up a little bit . So the flash came out June 16 , 2023 . It hit theaters . Now it just hit streaming on August 25th . It's on max , which is where I saw it , and it's now on .
Did you see it in the theater ?
I did , yes , okay , so you saw it in the theater , which I want to know about that experience .
It's now on 4K and Blu-ray as well , or DVD .
Do you have it ?
already no , but you're going to get it Until it .
Okay .
Like the sales went . I'm waiting for that to go , yeah , all right , let me do the usual .
Let me set this up a little bit Now . This is the 13th installment in the DCEU , as they call it , but we're big fans here of the DCEU , as everybody that listens to the show knows , right . Well , sorry , kazim there which we know what happens when we do that , directed by Andy Muschetti Muschetti , I think , is how he says it .
I'm probably butchering it , but anyways and here's the connection , because he directed the first two it movies . Okay , I don't know if you made that connection , I did so there's some relevance back to how we .
And I've seen both of those movies as well .
Yeah , written by Christina Hodson , who also did Birds of Prey and also Bumblebee , which I really liked . I thought that was a good . And Birds of Prey Isn't that a Harley Quinn movie ? It is .
Yeah , it is Correct yeah .
All right . So let me run down a little bit of the cast , just a few of the main players . Ezra Miller , of course we'll talk about . Michael Keaton , of course , right , lot to talk about there . Sasha , is it Callie ? Or Cara Zorell ? Right , as her alien name Ron Livingston . And there's a story behind that , because he wasn't the original as the dad .
Right , which he was not the original .
Which he wasn't in the yeah Right In the last DC . It was Billy .
Crudup Correct .
Yeah , and Billy Crudup was a star of .
Aliens Covenant right . Billy Crudup was in that movie , Was he ? I know him from almost names . He's a great character actor .
Yeah , and when you get a character of that stature you figure he's going to stay in that role .
So I don't know what happened , but I think , honestly , it was just Because and Mike , you can probably tell the audience more about this than I can , or most people which is all the delay , like this , goes back years to trace the lineage of the making of this film .
I'm not even sure I was alive at the time , quite honestly , when it started , but I think it ended up being just scheduling issues . Billy ended up tied to some other project and couldn't do it .
Probably .
All right , then the last ones . I want to be Maribel Verdu , barry Allen's mother . Yeah , nora , I believe Nora Allen . Then , of course , michael Shannon reprises his role as General Zod Right .
In this moment From man of Steel Right .
His sidekick there is back too In the film as well . So budget of $200 million Mike , I know you're going to talk about this a little bit Opened at about $55 million .
Which was a disappointment .
Underwhelming to say the least . Grosst US to date about $108 million . And worldwide about $268.5 million . That's where we're at with this film , so it is a box office bomb Right by the numbers .
As big a bomb as there's been this year .
Yeah , and projected it was about a $200 million loss for Warner Brothers , or Warner Brothers Discovery now as they're known . That happened in the middle of the night .
Yeah , exactly those two . That means a new fee for streaming somewhere . Exactly A lot of new fees coming . Yeah , for streaming .
And maybe towards the end of this episode , mike , we cut another , we have another conversation , we have to talk about the D23 announcements , so we'll come back around to that , because I know it's irrelevant but it's very relevant , so anyways . Mike , I just want to say right up front I like to film overall and here's what I got to say .
Mike , that might be controversial , but you and I talk about this all the time in the podcast . I think you'll back me up here . I'm really surprised , really curious , to see what you say Now
¶ Ezra Miller's Film Performance Discussion
. We've talked a lot about separating the art from the artist , correct , and I think Ezra Miller's performance in this movie was really really well done . It was great . Quite honestly , I cannot deny them the performance in this film . It was really good .
It suffered in a lot of other ways , especially when he played two characters , he played himself in the past . That was really funny , I mean .
And it was . You know , it's amazing . Now , mike , we think about you . Go back to like double impact or whatever with Jean Claude .
And the two heads . The two heads .
It was so huge , it was the one scene and I think it's double impact where he's hanging on the side like the passenger .
The truck .
The driver's side door of the truck . One head is this big .
Yeah , it's just crazy .
Really bad . But the technology now and they're doing this thing called volume capture where right , it's basically an acting double sharing the space . But they're CGI-ing Ezra Miller's face , but it's so well done , it's like you believe he's got a twin or something .
You know when it really began was with multiplicity , with Michael Keaton Interesting . But if you go back to episodes , I do say it wasn't Ezra Miller , even though he's going to take the blame . You did say that I said it it's not because of him that it tanked .
Right .
It really . There was a meeting in Hawaii with all the heads of Warner Brothers , and of course it had to be in Hawaii because you know , right , you know you got to get away from all the distractions , right . And at that point in time , they could have replaced Ezra Miller .
And that was the meeting , and their decision was let's go heavy on Michael Keaton , let's get him in this , and that was the decision they made , which we talked a lot about , because you know and you can read this on Wikipedia or whatever on the internet .
But I mean , clearly it was obvious to see , just prior to its release in the theaters , all of a sudden , like , is it a Batman movie ? Correct , is this ? You know what I mean . It was very heavy on the Batman . The poster was more .
It was basically Batman it was , although I didn't like Keaton as an old man and I thought Well , but he was very spry and right the way he played . It was very comical Right , and you've got to remember that he goes back in time to Ben Affleck's Batman . Not , that's right , not the Batman of 89 . Whatever , and this is that was set .
You talked about this on a previous episode too , which was the way that , and it was cool to see it because you'd already described it how Keaton , as Bruce Wayne describes the multiverse , with spaghetti with spaghetti noodles , and it took what ?
Five minutes or less .
Less than that . Less than that , yeah .
And Dr Strange . Multiverse of madness is so confusing .
But is this really ? I mean , I guess it is a multiverse concept , right ?
I guess yes , because as Ramila goes back and he's warned by Ben Affleck's Batman don't do it .
Right and the whole impetus is that Barry Allen's mother is murdered and he goes back to try to basically change history . And he tells Ben Affleck , I can say so , your parents too , and anybody that's ever seen back to the future knows you don't mess with the space time continuum Correct .
Right , I don't care if you've got a flux capacitor or what the hell you got .
That joke went on a little too long . The Eric Stoltz joke , I liked it .
You know what I mean . I mean I loved it , and talk about what ?
that is , for people who don't know .
Well , Eric Stoltz was originally cast as Marty McFly . And back to the future . In fact , most of the movie was already filmed before they made a switch in . The short story is that Eric Stoltz is a great actor .
We love Eric Stoltz . We like Eric Stoltz .
He just wasn't bringing the comedic element that they were looking for and Michael J Fox . Of course you know America's , you know everybody's in love with Michael J Fox .
Right At the time , yeah .
And still today . Like who doesn't love Michael J Fox ?
But there's the irony there . Ok , there's two ironic things that I wonder if they were on purpose . One was at the very opening sequence , when first of all , the opening sequence I thought was horrible with the babies . Thank you .
But because , really , mike , that it's about 20 minutes . Yes , 20 , 25 minutes . I clocked it . That's really the only issue I had with the film , right , if I'm being honest , once they survive that , cut that out , mike . It's a two hour film . Let's go home .
And that's right , and it's probably the best DC film since . Yes , chris , nolan's Batman , can you give us a little ?
You know , it wasn't so much that it's the yeah it's actually running .
Remember when he did the running in a circle ?
Yes , and it was just like it was so goofy , it was funny . It was hard not to chuckle a little bit .
But the issue was , ezra Miller had all these off off movie issues . And he makes a joke about mental health at the beginning and says Now talk to me about that , Mike .
So I was very surprised . You're right , there's just in that first opening sequence .
First opening sequence .
For 40 minutes , the , basically the climax , the resolve , the resolution of that sequence . It includes this statement you're talking about this line where he says , basically he's saying , yeah , dc hasn't really figured out how to support their actors in the mental health department . Correct , something that's that effect . How did ? Was that a they must have ?
Was that like a pickup shot that they did ?
I don't know , and that's why I said there's two ironic things , and that was one of them . I'm like was that in there before ? I was scratching my head , I loved it . And then the second irony was the whole Eric Stoltz .
Yeah .
Because they they had that same exact meeting about Ezra Miller , yeah , and instead of replacing him with Michael J Fox , they rolled the dice and thought , okay , michael Keaton can carry this , yeah .
Now I hope that and I don't want to make light of this right , because in all the things that I've read and kind of prepping for this conversation with you , because it would be easy it would be easy for us to just take shots right and be insensitive and all these things , and I don't want to do that because we are talking about a human being who does
clearly , you know , is struggling with some mental health issues . Here we are as we're recording this . It's suicide prevention month , so point that out there . But you know , I do hope that they are able to overcome these things , become well , make amends , all this stuff , because I think they should be able to carry on in this character . That's how well .
I mean , I'm shocked that I'm even hearing myself say this , but it's true , from what I've heard , that ship has sailed .
he's done .
I really don't .
The decision right now is do they eliminate the flash or recast ? So I'm pretty sure that ship has sailed and you and I I don't want to recast it . Yeah , you and I , so we're likely not going to see the flash . If that's the case , I mean listen , the flash was never .
No , I was never a huge fan of that character . I didn't like hate the character , it just wasn't like okay whatever , the flash , but again , I just he , they were great at this Right , there was more to lie , you cannot deny the . And there you know , we just talked about this , mike on In Red Eye , we did an episode on the movie Red Eye .
We were talking about Rachel McAdams and the arc and the emotional arc that she goes through right and in a much shorter span of time , and the movie yeah right Time-wise . And Ezra Miller goes through the same thing in this . I mean there's a couple of scenes in here that'll rip your guts out . It's that good man yeah . It's pretty acting .
Like I said , the opening sequence was silly and stupid and I thought and it was , I didn't like it .
It was an overuse of CGI which was one of the problems I had with the film . There were some great effects , don't get me wrong Really amazing visual effects , but here and there I just thought they just went , you know , one step too far with it , right , and that was one of them .
And the baby in the microwave was supposed to be funny . I know how am I laughing at that ? You know that just what happened with that . I was just puzzled by that choice .
Yeah , to even use that as humor . Now switch gears a little bit . Let's talk a little bit about Sasha Kali , who's actually from Boston . She's a Boston native . She was getting a ton of praise . She was and I loved her . I thought she was really good and she was in it just enough
¶ DC Universe and Character Endings Discussion
.
Yeah , see , that was my issue . I didn't think she was in it too much I wasn't willing to go out on that limb and say she's great . She's fantastic because she wasn't in it enough . That's fair . That's fair . That was my take .
Yeah , so you're kind of like indifferent to the whole thing , yeah . I was kind of I thought she was fine , but I want to see more of the character which we will . I think she's got what it takes .
She's got the endorsement of Cavill , you know , and Henry Cavill and I think this eliminated two Batman movies with Michael Keaton the Brave and the Bold , which people who know the animated Batman know that already . And then there was another Batman movie that Keaton was going to be in and apparently those are gone because of this .
Now , I had no issues with Michael Keaton , no , I loved seeing him back .
Yeah , for us , as so many people , to not just be on nostalgic for that . I mean , if you watch , there's a lot of documentaries you can watch on the making of the film . There's one that was like an hour and a half or something .
Oh , have you seen that ? Yeah , oh , ok , because you know I am going to get the disc for this .
Which I have ?
I have Suicide Squad , I have the other terrible movies .
You don't need to make apologies . This is right . All in all , this is a good film and right . It's suffered from things that were certainly , you know , to a certain degree , I say outside the cast control . It was more about I mean , can we , can we have flash go back and maybe a race when James Gunn was part of this whole universe ?
I mean , you know he , he had his fingers on the button so well it's a whole .
It's part of the reason why you see spoiler alert here , so put up a spoiler . If you haven't seen the flash yet , go watch it . Come back and watch this episode of the O Brother podcast , but it's why you see George Clooney show up at the end of the film .
Right , right , that's just one of the influences are in , but now I wasn't as critical of that as I've heard a lot of people .
Oh , really no , I wish you that at all . It was funny .
I love seeing George back , because you see this .
And he knows , I thought it was Affleck .
He knows his Batman gets on all the time . Right Now he's not the worst of them .
No , you got Val , you know let's you know , you know , I didn't have a problem with him , but that movie was awful . You know that the two shoe marker and RIP was that ?
was that with the one with Mr Freeze ? Was that with Arnold ? That was the fourth one .
Okay , that was the one with Clooney . Yes , okay , when they opened on ice skates .
Now this one . You know you talk about screen time and characters . What ? Not mean I mean , you know we there was . There was certainly at least one different ending .
You know that we were going to get here , but you know , all this confluence of events I don't know how much you can break it down , but we're like with Gal Gadot and , and even Affleck and Cavill , of course , that was the first one that was out there and then there was a big announcement that was shocked the world . Right Like right .
Cavill comes out on his own Instagram account announcing he's coming back , and just before you know it , James and even though I think this kid that they've got slated to come , maybe able to bring the goods , but I just I will always love Henry Cavill . I think everybody does .
But he deserved at least the second movie right , but they all got basically written out of the universe because yeah , and was a Peter Saffron or whatever . They want to go in a totally different direction .
You know , the irony of that was the final sequence where anybody that played a character , starting with the original George Reeves , who did Superman on the TV show , nicholas Cage Nicholas Cage ends it .
One of the great nods to a Superman we never got , of course , right which was going to be Tim Burton .
And first , you know whatever reason they . You know this the studio hated Batman Returns because it was so dark and he wanted to go darker .
For the third Penguin's a tough character . It is a tough character , but he's a penguin , a human penguin , and when you see Danny DeVito munching on a raw fish , but I think you've- but I think you've seen , with the movie the Batman right , that you've seen how it can be done in a different way , in a way that could be a little bit more .
But you know , it's Tim Burton , he's over the top , he's fantastic .
You know it's , that's his one . Oh , it was funny because he was slated to do three . He shows up and he said he , you know , read the room . It was clear they did . They were like Tim , don't you want to do something more light , like you know , one of those Pee Wee , herman things and and Burton's kind of like .
Maybe you guys want to go with someone else One of his first films , didn't ?
he did Pee Wee , he did Pee Wee Top , or whatever . Right yeah .
Yeah , that was one of his early films , not his first . Wasn't Johnny Depp scissor hands before that ?
I think so it might have been . I'm not sure .
Yeah , with Winona Ryder in it .
Now this one goes back . I mean , this was in development way back in the early 2000s and the flash , yeah , the flash . And you know you like James Wan speaking of our Halloween festival , like you're a big fan of James Wan . You're always giving him his props .
Yeah .
Yeah , and he was attached to this at one point , and you know all this stuff is happening and he ends up choosing Aquaman , which maybe not James's greatest decision , no One of the worst films ever , in my opinion , as I've said on the show before , and I stand by that and we did get an appearance from Jason Momoa at the end of this as well as Aquaman ,
right ? You know , one of the cameos I loved the best was his father , arthur Sr , or whatever , played by Tamara Morrison , who , of course , plays Boba Fett in the book of Boba Fett .
Oh , OK , I didn't know that was his dad .
Prequel series . Yeah yeah , and so he's in it too . It's a couple of funny . I mean , there's so many nods in this film it's hard to keep up . I'm sure I missed half of them too .
Yeah , the whole ending was just a nod to every character you could . That was in the DC universe .
Things like this . This is the stuff I love . Ok , first of all , seeing the Batmobile , the 1989 Batmobile was just mind blowing . The cave they built for this film was amazing , right and the .
You know they even had a reference at one point that was a callback to the laugh of Nicholson the Joker , the bag that had the little yeah , correct , yeah , yeah , yeah . It's like unbelievable . Yeah , so they did a good job of paying homage to a lot of that Right .
And some people didn't like that ending that showed all the different characters . I thought it was fine . I thought it was cool . It was very colorful and with each color kind of came a new character Right .
I had no problem with it and the whole the dark flash , that whole story Right . Like I bought into it , I was with it yeah .
And I'm like who is that ? You know , like right , you don't know right till the end of it .
Yeah , what's going on there ? I like Sasha , uh , callie , you know a superwoman like her . You know , given where we find her in the in the early part of the film when we first come upon her right , she's been held captive and all this stuff and , and they think they're going to rescue Superman , when , and I couldn't tell who it was it they look like ?
what's his face from ? From Lord of the Rings , a golem ? Yeah , what was going so dark ? But what I liked about her portrayal , as you said , and what little we may have gotten in the film right arguably was .
You know she's , she's playing it as , and , of course , if you go back into the sort of comic history you know storyline where she's actually grew up and krypton like she grew up , right , she , she identifies herself very much as an alien , as opposed to Superman , as Clark , who very much identifies with the human species .
Correct , right , because he came here as a baby and so she has this just incredible anger built up in her . Well , I mean , she was seen or turns odd was amazing .
Yeah , she was tortured for years and they were trying to get because they're cousins , right ? She's actually a man's cousin , that's right . And they're trying to get her to give his location right and she won't give it up . So she gets tortured until they break her out .
And they think they're breaking out Superman and the kind of gag is like that's not him , who's that ?
right , she can kick some serious ass though .
Yeah , and Mike Shannon another character wasn't in it enough ?
No , he wasn't , and you know I had that was another one little money or little , like his voice as odd , didn't seem quite the same as , yeah , his original portrayal of it , I don't know .
But you know what I love and we should never look past the fact that , like we're great worth , we should be thankful that these actors are still healthy and well , not that it's been a hundred years , but right , even going to man of steel , it's been how many years ?
Right , and you're still here and he's able to come back and I was great , yeah , yeah , look , great , yeah .
And you know Michael Keaton obviously you know they either died is here or you know , he looked whatever they did to make them look them older .
Yeah , and see , I didn't pick up when I was watching it that there's I mean they , there's references to , you know , his actual original , the Wayne Manor the ancient back in there with the floor , the tiles on the floor right member , where he has all of those . You know what is it ?
the Armor , mm-hmm , you know those armor , whatever yeah , who's the comic that was in it that I hated in ?
the oh yes .
What's his name ? Robert ?
Robert wool boom nailed it , see together .
It's why we make it's the other podcast .
You get the first , I get the last you know that you know the history of Cyborg in relationship to this whole thing and right talk about , talk about DC going now we're good , right , right , this guy , this guy , this actor tries to take a stand and like I'll come back if x , y , z's got all these terms . They're like we're good , good .
I'm sorry , right , which I never cared for that character anyway .
No , and I didn't know him from the comics now . I did , I did .
I didn't care .
That's what's gonna happen to Ezra Miller . He's getting that treatment now and I think .
I hope that's not true because , first of all , now 2022 , I clearly was not a good year for Ezra Miller . I mean , if you read all of the incidents
¶ Film Failure and Controversies Discussion
, it is . Longer than the lineage of how this film came to be yeah a long ways . Yeah , and if there's we saw some of it on TMZ , of course , of course , and again I you know I want to be sensitive to it , but you know we haven't really heard anything from them recently , certainly . Now there was a quick Didn't they appear ? But then they weren't .
They didn't do press but they appeared at the premiere , I believe , of the flash he was at the premiere but Just kind of gave a hello yeah , enjoy the film . They kept him off the mic . They've issued an apology .
They , from what we know , are seeking help , and you know from from you know little experience I have and just everything I've read . Yeah , we're dealing with some very serious issues , it seems like , and yeah , but you know what else we're dealing with .
Is a guy , let's say you know 68 chomping a cigar going . We lost a hundred million dollars in that thing . There's no question , kid , but he isn't the reason why no , I agree , he's the reason I said it back then .
Very , you know , I was interestingly like let's , let's real quick . I wanted to pull this up , so let's talk about this . So rotten tomatoes .
Mm-hmm .
Okay for what it's worth , until the O brother rating system hits the airwaves here soon . Right , the critics have it at a 63 and then the audience score is at an 83 right , so the audience likes it as we do mm-hmm the critics and there , but you know and it showed up on on , you know max pretty quick . So what do you ? I don't know .
I don't think this is an ease . I don't think this is a super easy decision for the studio to make . Quite frankly , I don't Well , I think it's already made you make the best point right . At the end of the day , all they care about is the money correct and this thing tanked . It lost a ton of money right , millions of dollars by the projection so right .
Yeah , it would be hard to get around that , but can we think of , can you think of any other example of that where maybe they did continue on after such a A bomb like that ? I honestly , I can't , I can't think of why are we getting an Aquaman sequel ? That was a well wrecked but you know so did it make money ? I think it made money .
Did it make money ?
I think it you know it definitely cleared the hundred million mark , I think in the opening weekend . Yeah and I remember watching flash Numbers and I had seen it Mm-hmm , so I was expect . Even I was like wow , you know what ?
and I think you're right , because , as I look at this , let's see here , I'm very curious .
remember the studio yank this out of theaters so quick Because they had their savior , which was Indiana Jones . What's also tanked , see ?
this is amazing to me . It's absolutely flabbergasting to me like , but help me understand this , please . Okay , so the budget on Aquaman was less . It was a hundred and sixty million estimated . Right . It opens at less than 70 million All right . It has grossed the date us over 300 million . Worldwide gross 1.1 billion dollars .
So look at , look at the international take on this . Now , what do you make of that domestic , you know , is that a super box office hit ?
or no .
That's about what we expect ?
No , but it's you know Well , I have a million dollars easy right at the end of the day they don't really care , they're counting on that overseas money . And flash didn't do it . Now , okay , that's did do better money than it did in the in the United States the domestic take was a hundred nine . Yeah and the international was like 150 right .
But , still , yes , look at Aquaman . Oh , much worse movie , much worse .
Did over a billion , but you would chalk it up to the controversies . Yeah , but , but . But okay though . But hold on , mm-hmm . People went and saw it the spot , or did that prevent people from even going seeing it is , I Didn't well clearly , right , clearly , the second week they yanked it .
They pulled it out of , like it was in 3600 theaters . They pulled it out of 3,000 theaters , right , so there was . It was impossible for it to make the kind of money that it might have made .
It's amazing it took them a couple of months to get it to to to max .
Right , be honest with you , and it got there fast . I mean , it's been at max for a good month , I think yeah , but where was , was it such a dog in the theater ?
He thought it was boom . Okay , and a June .
Let's get it , yeah , well it kind of like that to me I it's taken a long time to get to disk , but that's got to do with production and yeah , you know , getting you know .
There's only so many factories that produce Right blue rays and 4k's but you know , I don't know , I mean I don't think this is the reason in of itself , but you had a bunch of director changes . This thing changed hands more than I mean . It was crazy right before it gets to Andy to direct it .
Well , look at you like , let's use you as an example . You know , no , I'm talking as a fan , right as a movie fan . Right , you weren't out there the opening weekend and really had little interest .
Yeah , you know , it's interesting because if I , if I have to sit and analyze that I , you would think the Keaton bit would have been enough for me Right to go and when we watch the first look Mm-hmm .
And we saw Keaton and we saw him say I'm Batman . Yeah , we were like okay .
Yeah , I can see myself going to that . But again , those that have seen it , I think it's good right . I mean an 83 is a decent rating for whatever that's worth . So yeah , I look there's . You know there's a lot of tentacles .
Yes to this , to a review of more than docock has and we could go on for another three hours , go going into all you know , drilling down and going down the rabbit hole , but I was really , really I just wanted to get on here and put that statement out there for me , anyways , that this thing it's a quote , a phrase we love it didn't fail because of Ezra
Miller . In my opinion , he , his performance was fantastic , and I said it back when I mean thought , think of the complexities of the different personalities he had to play Mm-hmm in this film . And then all the delays , and just you know , I don't know .
And even you know , it was so when he , when he's sitting there talking to his parents and he fought , and he first realizes , oh my god , there's another , me here when he sees himself right and he goes and he kind of tackles himself on the front lawn yeah and you really see two different characters . I mean , you do I .
He looked at a friend .
I thought it's hair , it was a whole look Well , that's his add , that's the acting .
Yeah , I think we need to give it up . I it's um , you know , look , I've not gone to acting school . You've had more training in that than I have . I've gone to like an acting class , but that's no small feat . No , my estimation . I just think he pulled it off . They pulled it off brilliantly .
So I just want to go on record is saying it was a really good performance . That is not why this film is considered a flop . And you know , and again this thing and you chop that first 20 minutes . You chop that .
First 20 minutes you got a good movie right , and this started production in like 2020 , early 2020 , pre-covid of course , and it was another one impacted by that , among other things that we've talked about .
Yeah , it goes way back . I mean the television show the flash , which was on the CW . They're the ones that Take all the DC franchises and try to make them into shows . Yeah and you know , usually keep them on the air for like five years too long .
Yeah , yeah but back when they were making that first season Right , this was in production and they did , I think , nine seasons .
And right exactly 2000 to 2007 , 2008 matter of fact , I Believe , if I have it correctly , which again to connect it to something current , which is the current writers and actors strike , right , the writer strike of 2007 , 2008 Was another factor in this whole thing which is , I think , had something to do with James Wan Choosing to go in a different direction .
Yeah , go to Aquaman , you know so .
I can't remember . I wanted you to see it . Just to point out , the Clooney yeah , oh , is it really Batman , I remember is like can I tell you one thing about it ? Yeah , and you were like no , I'll see it , I'll see it .
Clooney still like Drinking from the fountain of youth . Whatever's going on .
Yeah , the dude looks great , I had the white hair go . He's the white hair , but he's a , he's a silver fox . Yeah .
Yeah , so Well , mike , listen , I'm totally down to go haves on the physical slash digital purchase here , cuz there was a digital in it .
This is this is one that I would have no shame and have in the extras are a lot of Batman stuff that I want to see .
Yeah , for sure .
Yeah , you know , yeah Well .
so what do you think ? Was this worth the surprise Episode , or what ?
Yeah , I think so . I mean , I wanted to talk about it way back when , yeah , and it it was off my radar . But when you started saying I saw something that you mentioned a couple months ago , right , I Instantly kind of went there I thought did he see flash ? I think he finally saw flash .
Yeah , so we , we . So you've heard what we think , we want to hear what you think , so have you . If you've seen the flash , drop us some comments on the YouTube video .
Did you not ? Go because of the controversy .
Absolutely . Let us know when you stand with the whole Ezra Miller storyline . You know that'd be very curious to know if that had any impact whatsoever .
And I'm no fan of Ezra Miller's , but I'm not . I thought he did . I thought he did a fine job .
You're not condoning the the personal behavior right in the media , but again . Let's reiterate that clearly . It seems to have been influenced by you know some serious kind of mental health .
Ironically and I don't know if you saw this clip on TMZ he's getting arrested and they're putting his stuff in like a bag , which you know . They take everything off you , right , and the only thing he's freaking out about is his flash ring .
Oh , I didn't know that . You see that I see the cops .
Can you be careful with that ring ? That ring means a lot to me and you know that . You know another irony to point out , yeah yeah for telling perhaps .
Yeah , all right , Well listen
¶ Discussion on the Flash Episode
. There's your episode on the flash from the O Brother podcast . Better , late than never .
Catch it on max right now ?
Right now , yeah , absolutely , and is it ? You said it's out already . When is it hit on physical media ?
It's out already on physical . Okay , all right , so I pick it up on 4k .
Yeah , so I think after this we're gonna talk about little purchase . I'll send you some PayPal , all right , make that deal happen , all right , all right . Well , that's gonna do it for another episode of the O Brother podcast , when your host , dan Smith , longside me , as always , my brother from the same mother , mike Smith , and we will see you next time .
Bye everyone . Well , mike , let's run out of here .
I'm already going .