Deadpool and Wolverine Trailer, X-Men Movie Coming Soon, Kraven delayed to December, and more!

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Superhero Slate, the show we run down the latest superhero entertainment news. We love TV, movies and superheroes. So let's talk it all out. My name is Chris. And my name is Mike. And this week we have the Deadpool and Wolverine trailer. Like we promised you guys last week in, drops on Monday. These Monday trailers really undercutting the podcast that we rerecorded a day before. That's right. It's giving us some time to digest and chew on all that good stuff.

So what we're we'll talk that out in today's episode. X-Men The movie will announce the writer soon. We are in as as you like. So non subtle, titled Mike the Mutant ERA of Marvel. Right now. It's here, it's here. And we're still curious if it's going to be part of a marvel reset or not. We don't know. Yeah. Nobody knows. We don't even know. But we're excited for it.

We'll talk about it, towards the end of the show, including, the movie and the X-Men 97, we're all up to date on that Kraven the Hunter is delayed to December. Mike, I know I can feel the tears coming off your face right now. It's like when you don't. Success. Madame Web was. It's like when you don't invite somebody to a party, and then they text you saying, oh, I'm going to be late. It's just like, I don't want you to come anyway. Like, what's happening?

Yeah. Yeah, right. I mean, yeah, I'm going, I'm late. And hopefully at the end they just don't show up, right? Like, maybe straight to streaming them. And that's all we all really want for Kraven. But, we got some news about that at the end of the show. We're going to riff on that a little bit. And more Mike and more. Yes, Chris is fresh off of, a baby shower that he has returned from. Not my own, a different one. So, Chris, I believe you told me you just came straight from a brewery.

So is that what our guests should be expecting? They shower. Yeah. Yeah, over the next hour. Oh, I came from this baby shower. It was like a coed. Like a joint baby shower. So it was like, oh, we're not doing the gains. We're just like, here's some snacks, here's some camaraderie. He's at a brewery. literally this brewery, I'm going to tell you, Mike was an adventure to get to because along the way to get there, it was, at the end of an industrial park looking at all this industrial.

Park, I knew you're going to say that, like, everyone loves to open breweries in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. So I literally I felt like, did you put in the right address? And she's like, yep, I did. I'm like, okay, let's let's go. And we get there and it's the end of the industrial park. It's not even in the middle to the end of it. So that's fine. When I walk in this, this brewery is split. It's just a big open building. Right. Split into two. There's the bar area in there, party area.

And then another part where literally since 1 p.m., they've been practicing line dancing. Mission to country music. So literally you can see all these people, dozens of people doing line dancing over there, and they they shut down. Around 230, a live band shows up with a fiddle and everything MC and they start playing country music. And guess what? The line dancers get right back up and start going.

I don't know if they were practicing for this concert or if it was just a happenstance along the way, but boy howdy did my 90s country Rain Man kick in here in some of these songs. Like how very Indiana. How very Louisville of you. that was Indiana. This is Indiana. Me. So. Hey, you're you're close enough, though, right? Where are you? On the border. Or were you, like, driving up to Indy? when we were in Indianapolis or Indianapolis? We were in Indiana. It was about half an hour from us.

So, where we originally started the podcast, where my my apartment was, we were right down the road from that apartment, from ten years ago. So I wouldn't say it's necessarily Louisville, but I could probably find one of these in Louisville as well. Yeah. You're right. So Chris is going to be channeling the line dancing energy, on the podcast this week. And. And also I tried everything on the menu. I tried everything on the menu pretty much.

So they had their, so like, they actually had a drink there. so they had a banana sour. I don't know if you're a sour fan or not. Mike. this is for the adults of show 21 plus. So they had a banana sour. It didn't taste really banana. But yeah, I like a good sour. I'm like, I'll try it. But what they had not on the screen but on tap was a bomb pop sour like a very sweet bomb pop sour. And I love a bomb pop flavor. So that was delicious to me. I don't know if that's up your alley or not.

I mean, I didn't even know, I thought sours were kind of the opposite of sweet beers. but I guess they're starting to hook around the corner and come back into it. it was it was it was sweet and tart, like like like like I wouldn't say, sweetheart, even though that said that, but, like, it was a sweet drink, but saw that tartness on the end of it. So it's not like an IPA. You're not getting the hop in the bitterness of it. It was. It was pretty, pretty sugary, I think, all around.

But yeah, it was very summery, right? It feels like that good summer kickoff here at the end of the day. So had a good time. So yeah, you can expect that out of me for the rest of the show. I've got a White Claw here to complement me on the way. So he's keeping the party going folks. That's right. You know, I'm here to celebrate. We're all here to have a good time. let's jump into it. Mike. you know, at the end of the show, we'll talk about.

Well, I got to watch this week, which was fallout half of the half of the series. Wink, wink. But, Mike, you were able to watch some other stuff. And I'm really, really super curious about the second one, because it sounds like you may have been watching some adult material. Great. I'm, I'm I'm so glad you don't know about it because I just learned so I can fill you in.

But first off, I have to come back around and say, I finally finished watching the most recent season, season two of Tokyo Vice, which I brought up on the show a few weeks back. It's on HBO Max and stars Ansel Elgort. who else is in it? I always forget his name. Ken Watanabe. He's in it. And it's just a great, like, kind of like, hardboiled journalist detective show set in 90s in Tokyo. at, like, kind of like the transition between, like, newspaper and the internet. The Yakuza.

so I wanted to wait to give my official recommendation until, like, I kind of caught up on everything that's out there. So there's two seasons out. the show creator has plans for a third, and hopefully they'll get a renewal, because I'd love to watch another season of this show. So this is my, urging of you to go out and watch Tokyo Vice on HBO Max. Because it's great. It's awesome.

It does require a little bit of your attention, though, because it ebbs and flows between English and Japanese, because there's English speaking characters and obviously Japanese speaking characters, because it's set in Tokyo. So you know, it. It commands your attention. So you'll have to kind of put the phone down for the most part, which is even hard for me these days. So check it out. Tokyo Vice on HBO Max I don't know, the second season I'm just wrapped.

I want to be honest, I honestly thought this was an anime like the name of. It sounds like an anime before I looked it up. No, you're not, you're not wrong. I told my wife I my I had been watching this show, you know, on and off for like the last couple of weeks, and my wife hasn't caught any of it yet. So I when I finished it, I was kind of like describing it to her. And she was just like, oh, is this an anime?

I was like, no, no, no, this is all live action, which is kind of weird to say, oh, it's live action. No, it just it is a TV show that just happens to take place in Tokyo. But you do bring up an interesting point. We don't really get a whole lot of kind of live action Japanese representation kind of in the United States. It does seem to be primarily animated, right? Yeah. Well, I would also say I just looked it up and the actress, Rachel Keller, I believe she's in this as Samantha Porter.

I just, Wikipedia in itself. She was in Legion as. And the girlfriend of David David Keller. Oh, okay. Yes. Even so. She's a main character in the show. That's great. Yeah. So to bring it back to superheroes, we have a Legion reference in here. But, but continue on to this title that I. I'm just. Yes. I can't wrap my head around it. Let me know I can. I can not take credit for plucking this obscure gem from Amazon Prime.

It was recommended to me through the TikTok algorithm, and I took the algorithm up on its offer. And it's a movie called Hundreds of Beavers. That's right. It's called Hundreds of Beavers came out this year. Oh, because the best way to describe it is it's like a black and white silent film. in the in the vein of, like, Looney Tunes and Monty Python.

It's like a small crew that went out into the Wisconsin and wilderness in the winter and made this slapstick live action cartoon, for lack of a better term, about a man who is vengeful against Mother Nature that took his apple cider farm away from him. So he goes out on a rampage to exact revenge on all the woodland creatures that have wronged him. And the best part about this is all of the woodland creatures are all people essentially in mascot costumes.

So when he's trying to hunt down a rabbit, it's just a person in a rabbit like costume that you would see, like in Madison Square Garden or on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. the beavers are, you know, chewing down the forest to build, like, this gigantic wooden coliseum on a frozen river. And it's all these giant beaver mascot costumes. It's just absolutely hilarious. The density of gags is out of control.

Like, there is some, some, some sort of wacky thing happening, like every 10s, it's a, a labor of love for sure. And the budget of this movie is only like $150,000, which is basically, a nickel penny term penny of a movie budget. And I was happy to see it. It's made double its money back through the box office, which like $300,000. Not a lot, but this is for sure going to launch careers of the filmmaker, for sure. This is going to be a cult classic.

I went and I looked at their Instagram and it looks like they're kind of touring the movie around the country. So they did like a Great Lakes tour and they toured it around there, and it's just so much fun. It's technically, I mean, when I say it's not streaming, I mean, it's not streaming for free. If you go like I'm sure it's on like Apple TV, we rented it on Amazon Prime. Maybe it's on like YouTube as well. You can rent it there. But we got it. It's like it's like five. It's a $5 rental.

We had, you know, delay your Amazon shipment for a day or two. You start to rack up some of those like digital coupons. So we got it for like three bucks. It was amazing. We had some friends over last night and we watched it. And it's just it's just hysterical. It's like so weird. it's relatively family friendly. I mean, there's a lot of cartoon violence in it, but it's just it's so funny. It's so weird. You got to go check it out. Hundreds of beavers. wherever you get your VOD content for.

For those who who may or may not believe in mix, claims, here it is, sitting at an, 95% on Rotten Tomatoes and, and 80% on Metacritic. So obviously, generally favorable all around. But I do see a review here that says an overstuffed live action homage to the golden age of animation that's bursting with ingenuity and personality. So, absolutely. We'd love to see this. How long do you think this movie is like, offhand? Is it like, so in the minute kind of thing?

So I do have to say this is my only critique of the movie, and I didn't even really want to critique it at all on the show because I don't want people to have a reason not to watch it, because I think it's worth watching it no matter what. But it is like a little long. Like when I say it's like a labor of love, you can tell that the filmmakers are just like, we're not pulling anything out. We stood out in the snow half naked, the real snow to get these shots. They're all going in the movie.

So I think it's like a hundred and then it's like 109 minutes somewhere around there. Yeah, I that's. I think it's. I think it would have been better. Better nestled around like 85, 90 minutes personally. But still it's fantastic. It's it's great. Gotta check it out. Awesome. Fantastic. Well I want to go ahead.

And Mike, since you brought up some stuff, I'm gonna go ahead and prep everybody because we have the disadvantage of recording on Sundays, as we'll talk about in our first topic with Deadpool and Wolverine, but also, at the end, the things that happen on Saturdays. We'll talk about what next Saturday, literally is Star Wars Day and Star Wars Celebration is, if I remember correctly.

And with that, on Friday, I my forgot my wife has that I have tickets to see The Phantom Menace in theaters again on its 25th anniversary. I'm pretty excited about this. I'm excited to go see it. And I did know that a couple other, I think all the other Star Wars movies might have like a one off kind of thing that that Saturday or that weekend in theaters. So if anyone is looking for things to do, watch a movie, there's nothing new out you've already seen hundreds of beavers on streaming.

You're like, I gotta get him. Don't forget, Star Wars is coming to theaters next weekend. and Star Wars Day, which is May the 4th be with you, Mike? which, you know, and people you I want to I want to I want to get ahead of that rather than being on the back end of it on the on the other side. So I'm pretty excited to revisit The Phantom Menace in theaters.

I remember, Dan, we've talked about this till till we're blue in the face, the toys, the promotions, the Taco Bell promotions, everything about The Phantom Menace, like the biggest toy craze known to man when The Phantom Menace came to theaters. And I feel that in my bones every day. because I grew up in a place where none of the stuff was.

So every time we went out to Walmart, which was a 30 minute drive, where we went to Taco Bell, which is 30 minute drive, I would I would be just the, I don't know, enveloped in all this marketing material for, for Star Wars and The Phantom Menace. So I just. I of. The plastic Pepsi can carrier that is like the giant tank in the first movie that carries the, little ten. Yeah, it's, it's it's a droid. It's a joint carrier that is a cane cooler. Yeah. I just I just want it.

There's no, I'm not going to spend any money on it. Please, please do not send me eBay links. People saying it's right here. It's just $800. Like it's so I. It's not $800 because this is actually saved in my eBay already. My don't worry as I say, because I told my wife I'm like if I ever came across an actual with of cash or I got a bonus or something, I would probably buy one to have in my to have in my basement because my, you know, my basement is an experience.

It's not just, hey, go to the basement, it's an experience. So I would love to have one, but it's not something I'm like I need to have. It is more of a want to have at the end because it is. It is cool. matter. I always remember the Pepsi vending machines that had the Anakin and the pod racing, so, you know. Yeah. so if I was like, oh, if I came here and Pepsi vending machine downstairs, I just carried a shout out to the listener. Jason.

We carried a 200 pound television down my stairs this week, and I want a vending machine down here. Hell no, man, I have talked myself out of anything heavier than that. That tube TV, forever. Because it was a nightmare. I'm not trying to talk you back into it, because I do not know how heavy a vending machine is.

I'm sure you have done or will do your research if it happens, but me and my wife did just add a a smaller side, deep freezer to our kitchen because the, little tiny drawer freezer that came with our way to expensive new refrigerator is, like, too small, which is just really annoying to spend a lot of money on a new fridge. It's like, why is the freezer so dang small? So we got a deep freezer on Amazon for like 100 bucks.

And this thing is like the deceivingly light, like it makes me think, like, how does this is even going to get cold? Like I'm able to pick it up just with the force of pushing my two hands together. I'm not even gripping on anything. So, I have a feeling, canned vending machine will be much heavier. Indeed, but we'll be saying it could be deceptively lighter than a big, giant TV. Well, Mike, as someone who lives in the Midwest, I got a I've got a garage deep freezer already, buddy.

Don't you worry. I'm already. I'm already selling that, but I, I, I maybe I might just talk to myself rather than I can dispenser Mike I might just settle for like a I an under the counter soda dispenser. Oh, yeah. Three sodas. That's the right answer, Chris. I'm glad. Yeah. So so I might go down that route later. down down the road. I'm looking at this. I'm looking at this droid cooler right now. Chris, sorry to cut you off, but no, I know. This is great.

I love this is where the podcast really comes. I keep forgetting that it's actually a cooler. I always think of it as kind of like a novelty. Like carrier, but there is indeed a small little reservoir that you can put in it that you can put liquid in and freeze, like it's not going to be like probably the best cooler on the planet. But like, if you. Don't drink, these are the same day. They're not cold anymore after that is is done. But like I said.

And listeners, if you don't already know, it's not just like the the vague shape of a carrier. It also has like little droid heads that you can put on top. You put them on the cans. You have my my wife calls them Roger Rogers. They're not just George. She calls him Roger Rogers. No, that's so you can have a whole a whole army of Roger, Roger, cans on there. Because you don't have to do Pepsi. You don't have to do Mountain Dew, because those are the two problems.

But, like, you know, you may be sipping on your doctor Pepper coconut cream with a droid topper on top of that. Mike, it's why. Would that be? Now? That would be really cool. I know these things. I'm looking off on TV. There are hundreds of dollars, so I mean, no one might want to take a chance on it, but imagine taking like this cooler into like an auto body shop and be like, can you hit this with, like, the pearlescent, like tan paint job?

Like because, you know, like because it's just form plastic. So if you're really trying to go accurate to life, I'm sure the real life droid carrier movie had a little bit of a paint job on it. You know, I'm well. Obviously it was all CG back then, right, for CGI, but what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna actually redirect you. I'm taking you out that antibody auto body shop. I'm putting you in the Warhammer 40 K shot. Oh, we got us. Guys know how to paint plastic.

Are you gonna. Are we gonna plastic those are it. if we weathered it and kind of put, like, some, like, slight laser, like a couple blaster bolts? Oh, man. Oh, this is this is sounding more and more likely my buck. Mike, you might have sold me on this. If, if anyone out there is in the live stream chat on any of the places that we currently live stream this show, please pressure Chris to buy one of these because I think he like we like we stated he is he's fresh off a brewery.

he's drinking a White Claw. I'm impressed. We are. We're trying to get him to spend hundreds of dollars for the podcast. I sold my pinball machine this morning, so I've got space. And this. This one is $450, and it ships from Japan, which I find really, really funny. So I don't know if this is a product of Japan or if it has any, like Japanese, like writing, like molded underneath it. That would be even cooler, to be honest. Yeah, they probably they probably Star Wars is not this big over there.

Probably. So this has been sitting on I waiting for for some idiot like me to buy. I've had a few mini drinks, but we'll see. We will see. But it's Star Wars Day coming up. celebrate, Star Wars Day. How do you celebrate them safely? with no real lightsabers. Those are dangerous. But. But have a good time. Watch. Watch your favorite Star Wars movie or show. Let's shift the gears, Mike. This is where the show come to life. We had a Deadpool and Wolverine trailer. Mike.

The official Deadpool and Wolverine trailer, right? We had a teaser before and it was very teasers. It kind of gave some plot points with with Deadpool, but this is where literally Hugh Jackman shows up for the first time in this, and I think you correct me if I'm wrong. He's probably a main point in this trailer throughout the whole thing, dealing with not only Wolverine's journey and his trauma and coming to deal with it, but also, you know, you having to deal with Deadpool at the end.

Yeah. To set the record, I believe this very first teaser trailer dropped during the Super Bowl, if I remember correctly. Yeah, so not too long ago, but long enough to where I had forgotten that Logan was not in the first trailer. We only see his silhouette and his claws, retract. So he is all over this trailer. I this kind of goes maybe to lean towards the fact of, before we weren't entirely sure.

Like, oh, is this like a Deadpool movie where, like, variants pop up, you know, we see some, Wolverine cameos. Or maybe he, like, shows up in, like, the third act or something like that. And then we got the entire reveal that is called Deadpool and Wolverine. Okay, well, that solidifies a little bit more. And I think this trailer goes to show you all this feels very like buddy cop, you know, Wolverine, Deadpool. We are going to have a lot of Logan in this. It feels like. Right.

And he is the, how much like this show he is the dour, sad, you know, person who's dealing with it. Mike like you when you we talk about movies and you're just sad and all over it. And then there's, Deadpool who? Yes, he's trying to save his world, but he is just driving Wolverine nuts. He's just driving them up a wall. It seems like there are some some clips in here. If you slow it down, you can see it looks like they're fighting right in a car at one point.

you know, he's got him in a leg lock and he. He shoots Wolverine in the the ribs a couple times. So it looks like in this movie they're gonna, you know, be they're gonna fight a bit, but they're going to have to be buddies along the way as well. in in that words. But yeah, one of the, Yeah. Go ahead Michael before and we'll, we'll jump to the next bullet.

Point going, oh, I mean, I was going to say I've really been diving into the comments and kind of just reaction to the trailer overall because like, I feel like I'm like on the like the metagame side of this, right? You know, what is this going to do for Disney? What is this going to do for the MCU? And Marvel at large? It's the only Marvel movie we're getting the entire year.

You know, hopefully this is enough to kind of satiate the audience that's been kind of trained on just a plethora of Marvel content every single calendar year, and it seems like people are hyped. I've seen people saying, finally, yes, I'm ready. I'm finally excited again. Like, I haven't felt like this in a while after watching a trailer. Oh yeah. I haven't really seen really any dissenting opinions at all.

Like one random person I saw on threads was like, oh, this is going to like dishonor the legacy of like, Logan or whatever. if. It did, well, if it did, Hugh Jackman wouldn't come back like he would end on a high hat if he thought that was where he wanted to end. It. Exactly. And when Logan came out, we weren't really on to this whole multiversal kind of pivot for the universe to.

So now that we know, like, literally anything's possible out there with all of these different universes, it's just like it was never just Logan. And actually two, if I remember right, it's been a while since I've seen Logan. Even that movie postulates that that movie itself is kind of its own universe. Right? Because it it takes its own twists and turns to give us that version of Logan where. We pick up the, I would say, the X-Men universe continuity is, it is okay at best.

But like when you like, look at like if you look at first Class, Days of Future Past and Apocalypse, 30 years of movie and the kids only look like they aged two years, like it's pretty rough along the way. Anyway, Fox didn't care about this stuff. So you can say any of those movie any any Fox Men movie could be its own universe at the end of the day, and Deadpool has always played with that, right?

Even the end of Deadpool two, where he goes and takes cable's teleporter and goes to all the different universes and times like he even he deals with Green Lantern. He deals with, you know, what was the X-Men origins Wolverine? He it's always been kind of like do do with with do with this as you will. There is no real concrete time or universe along the way. Right? But you mentioned multiple universes and I'm a this is the next word I literally have. And this is costumes.

We get to see Hugh Jackman in a comic book slash X-Men 97 accurate costume for the first time in 24 years of him playing the character, rather than just a tease at the end of Not Logan. What was the one before that? The Wolverine, right where they showed it in a briefcase. So, absolutely. Could be a Hugh Jackman from a different universe. obviously he's dead. And Logan, maybe this is he pulls him out before it dies. We don't know.

We want to we want to see this in July when it drops like everybody else. But I think the trailer does a good job not giving away many big story beats. And I would say not giving away any huge cameos, as have been rumored upon rumored upon rumored. Thousands of people will be in this movie, but I really don't think they will at the end of the day. for that. And then lastly, my last word on this is cuss words. It's very R-rated, so hallelujah.

Yeah. The, the, cocaine, the cocaine bit is there right at the end, I think, Oh, yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Wait. Right. he says fake. He says we can do anything but cocaine. Yeah. And, Leslie Uggams goes through every other street word for cocaine. And I feel I feel like that's like, just, signal out there to the audience. It's just like, oh, yeah, we are allowed to do whatever we want.

I think, Shawn Levy also was in an interview or something recently, and he said that you do not have to be like, like, an aficionados of the entire MCU. You can be like a novice. You can just come right into this movie and watch it and have a good time. So that that's good, too, because that is something that Marvel needs, right? So much of this stuff, especially since the Peck explosion of Make More Faster like Marvel has really started to feel like homework.

I mean, we are lucky in a sense of like, we just kind of eat this stuff up and we'll watch it. Even if we don't end up liking it, we'll still watch it. But we are in the minority. Chris. Like, the general audience, which is going to fuel those box office dollars, does not have the the time in their day to, go back and watch all of these movies. So I think that's a good sign. Yeah.

For all I think the only thing from this trailer that I would say you had to watch in Marvel literally, is Loki because of the TVA, right? Like, that is the only thing I think that is from Marvel proper MCU Marvel series where you have to watch his Loki is what it looks like. And even if you don't understand Loki, it looks like they are. Watch Loki. They looks like they are breaking it down pretty simply for the audience, even from the like.

I can't say the movie the finality, but like, it's like this is a TVA, this is what we're doing. This is what you have to. It looks like the literally holding our hands to explain that to us in the trailer along the way. For those who didn't watch Loki. Right. so that's a plus, I will say, based on, you know, just watching this trailer in the few cameos you do see.

Boy, I hope you have a good memory of the Fox movies because they are pulling stuff out of like, X-Men two, X-Men First Class, you know, kind of along the way to, to get to this point because there's like a little you can see Lady Deathstrike and you can see, Azazel, from, from first class and, and I think, but they're both outside man's helmet. So if you have watched Civil War or any Ant-Man movie, that's going to be a fun little Easter egg for you along the way, right?

But you don't have to understand what a giant man is to understand why that big person exists in this universe. Yeah. It's funny. I mean, obviously the cameos to previous, X-Men, movies are great. toads in this, trailer. Or if he's not there was, like the actor or something was out there on social media, like confirmed. Yeah, he's in it. And then I saw these, like, people in the comments are just like, whoa, Toad's back. And I was like, no one's excited about to, like, stop pretending.

I mean, obviously we're all hype for this movie and we can be, excited for cameos, but it's just toad, like, he didn't. Did he die in the first X-Men movie? I don't remember. He got he got struck by lightning, by storm. Because storm says, you know what happens when a toad struck by lightning? And it's like, yeah, I don't remember if she even finished that line. I was like, this is the stupidest line I've ever heard. Yeah, I don't remember 30,000. Yeah, but it's like, it's very it's just toad.

So I do think it's funny. It's like, okay, settle down. It's just toad, but it's a nice addition. You know, this feels like, remember. 24 year I sent you the photo. My 24 years of X-Men movies, ten appearances by Hugh Jackman to get to this point. Along the way. And it doesn't feel like ten, does it? When you think back on it at the end, they kind of blends together. one of the cool things I will say, I sent you this, I screen recorded this, Mike, because I needed you to see it.

There's a the sequence where Wolverine is swinging a Deadpool in the void, and he's like dodging its lines up to the Spider-Man ones fight, where he was dodging Flash Thompson's punches from the original Spider-Man one. And I thought that was a really cool homage. That doesn't mean Spider-Man's, and it's just fun to have that stuff along the way, right? Like that's a little the cool Easter eggs. A normal person like other fighting, I get it, I don't need to watch it.

But like, first I was like, oh, that looks just like Spider-Man ones. Fight scenes. That's really fun to me. And they're looks like they're having a lot of fun. Everyone's energy's there. There is some serious tones in this, but like, I, I'm in love. Mike I don't know I don't know if you're feeling it from the trailers yet. It sounds like you are, but I want to make sure you know I'm not. I'm not off balance. Well, you'll have to.

Everyone will have to stay tuned to the podcast, because my child is expected to arrive here on this terrestrial plane with the rest of us right around this movie releases at the end of July, so we'll we'll see what happens here. Mike's watching the cam. Yeah, we'll see what happens here on the podcast for sure. Maybe the spoiler category we review. There could be, crying child in the background. I don't know.

I, I will, I guarantee listeners out there, I will never put you before my family, but, let's. Yeah, I think I would. We'll see. I think I would time out. I love you, listeners. I'd put you first. Well, now, but I will say, you know, despite this trailer coming out, you know, there are still always some quote unquote reshoots taking place to me for this movie.

the news for this movie, the rumors that, the quote unquote truths are out everywhere the past two weeks of, like, it's almost an explosion. But, you know, some some things in May, if they're filming some stuff in May, my guess is Mike probably some deep cameos that they didn't want. They don't want spoiled right before the movie drops. Right. Like things you film last minute. So there's a very tight crew and a very tight editing thing. Yeah, I mean, the the movie at the.

End, I mean may that is, that is so quick. It makes me think they're either just trying to get some super quick pickup shots, you know, something that you literally just drop into, like you're like assembly cut already, you know, and it's good to go.

I mean, if it's special effects wise, I mean, Jesus, that team is going to be well, actually, if it's special effects wise, that they could have already started on them because there's probably more computer generated stuff than you just slap the live action played in there. or maybe it's even like an after credits scene or something like that.

You know, those are usually kind of like second units, you know, that kind of hint towards the end, because usually, like we get to after credit scenes in these Marvel movies, we get one that kind of hints to the future of that movie that you just saw. And then sometimes you get one that hints to the future of the MCU at large, and we haven't really gotten something. Well. I was I would say maybe you either get one of those two that you just mentioned or a funny one.

There's always a funny one, right? One that's inconsequential. So maybe it could be the funny one. It could be the future one. I'm going to lean if it is an inconvenience, a future one, because they're still probably reeling from the Avengers five stuff, right? Qing dynasty, the, Jonathan Majors firing and probably not rehiring. So they might be trying to set something up for the future in that endgame. That's our next topic.

Avengers five or Secret Wars, even at the end of the day. So, the last minute reshoots, these aren't bad. They're not fixing the movie this late in the process. They're probably just adding some fun stuff as well. I'm going to say along the way. But, I'm hyped. My my hands are rubbing together. Mike. This is I'm feeling good. I'm loving Deadpool and Wolverine. Someone else, listen to the show. Patrick.

He still thinks Deadpool and Friend would have been the best title for this movie if have friend in the Wolverine font, but you know that. So you have to have Wolverine at the end of the day these days. So so that's our rules. Avengers endgame is celebrating its, fifth anniversary this week, and that also is a reminder that endgame has a five year time jump in the middle of it. So we are closer to the end of that movie than ever before. which is wild to think about.

I also saw Secret Wars are not super secret. What is Infinity War has its six year anniversary, and, I love both these. They're both great. ends to to the Infinity Saga. At the end of the day, Infinity War did something that no, no one thought this movie did by ending out a loss for everybody, right? Like Thanos actually winning, which is wild. But, endgame to come back and kind of end that saga pretty appropriately was was wild.

So I've not I mean, I've revisited some of these over over time, but I think, you know, it might be time to dive back into those big Avengers movies along the way. Mike, even even Age of Ultron has come back around in its, you know, I guess nine year debut to to be something of like, yeah, well, there's, there's some good stuff in here we can pull out of it at the end of the day. If you say so, Chris. If you say so.

I would like to see maybe Ultron pop up again at some point in time, just because I always thought the character was so cool. James Spader, his voice was awesome, and we see him a little bit in the world of series, but it's just doesn't have like the same gravitas. So maybe if there's like a secret Wars movie and everything's coming together, there's like maybe. There's the vision. Like the vision spinoff could revisit him a little bit if there's like an isolated Ultron along the way.

So, since he needs Vision's body was essentially made for Ultron. So there's there's a way to do that. But yeah, endgame being five years ago, that made me feel old. That made me feel real old. Mike older than saying X-Men one was 24 years ago. so, we'll we'll chalk that up to, however, where you guys feel but, in games on its five year anniversary, Avengers five, we just kind of talked about this a little bit. we'll apparently feature a smaller set of characters I know that they're doing.

You know, they're doing some rewrites. Right? fixing the Qing dynasty. It might still have Kang in it. That's perfectly fine, but it's there. The retooling it to feature a smaller set of characters. Most likely people who've been in the original Avengers movies. The first four along the way to to really tighten that group up and give us some time within before they do, what we assume is going to be a reboot, right? In 2028, along the way. And it's pretty it's pretty wild.

I never really thought of that direction. It always just seems so obvious to me. An Avengers movie kind of needs to be big and bombastic, where you bring all of the subsequent movies before it together into this one big fight, but it would be kind of cool to be like a smaller, like, edgier movie with like, The Avengers that we know and love, and they really get to reconnect again and not just, like, fly around, like a sky beam, you know, or something like that.

Yeah. The, the idea of incursions, right from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness in the comic books, the team, the Illuminati, if you will, the Marvel comics were like, we know these incursions are coming, and they didn't tell anybody. And I think that's what you know, you keep that group tight, like Doctor Strange of the incursions are coming, and this is how we have to defeat them to, to stay alive for before Secret Wars.

And he doesn't tell everybody, because if you tell everybody, what are they gonna do, Mike? They're going to panic, right? There's going to be chaos. So keeping a tight group would be a way to kind of work on that without having mass hysteria. before before Secret Wars. So I agree. And and to to the credit of Marvel there, looking to begin filming this 2025, January 2025, in the UK. So, it looks like they are going to commit to the storyline and at least commit to the release date. right.

For that, that May 2026 to get this movie up and going. I like this idea and most people like, well, why do you want to? I don't think they're hurrying. They're still taking their time. But the more they delay in Avengers movie Mike, the less I guess return. We're going to get on them right at the end of the day. Like we've not had an Avengers movie for five years and we're still two, three years away. 2 or 3 years away. So I don't want to wait for an Avengers movie. We need to have it.

And it doesn't need to be the end of the world sometimes. But this one will probably be. But, but let's let's get to it. Let's go ahead and get it out of the way. Solve this King problem and move on to the next big bad along the way. In that same regard, the the production charts are also saying that Armor Wars is, will begin filming in Atlanta in the UK in January 2025. So it sounds like they might be sharing some lot space over in their, United Kingdom space to film this.

Mike, if I told you, do you remember Armor Wars is being made into a movie, would you, would you say, yeah, I remember that. Yeah. Well, quite the journey for Armor Wars. I only internalize this project and I say project because it was originally not a movie. It's just a logo to me. Right? This is just one of those classic Marvel projects. It's like, oh yeah, that was a great logo. What a logo it was. We all had a great time looking at it. Don Cheadle is a great actor.

he got an award for 30s and, Falcon and the Winter soldier. Let's bring him back in. And they put him in. They put him in front of Photoshop, and he was the one that exported it. so he gets, he gets a Webby Award for that. But yeah, we'll see. I mean, War Machine, Don Cheadle, those two characters, I mean, they haven't really never had a chance to kind of become more than just a sidekick. And I mean that by like every definition of the word sidekick, he was always just, teamed up with, Iron Man.

Or he was like, Like when he was with Nebula. Yeah. And like. Or he like, shows up in, like, cool armor every once in awhile. He's he's always just kind of been, like, a bit or like, sometimes comedic relief. Actually, when I think of War Machine and Don Cheadle, I almost entirely think of him saying something quippy and funny, like he has only really ever been serious, when he's trying to get Tony to stop drinking or when he's literally not that character.

And when he's doing the well, he's doing the military stuff. Yeah. Like that's whenever he's serious. Yeah. I mean, to me, I agree that he's not been given a chance to shine. I think Don Cheadle can carry a movie. Absolutely. and do it himself. And then dealing my, my concern is dealing with the legacy of Tony Stark and Iron Man. How long are we going to drag that out? Right. Like, I get it, he's a huge part of the MCU movies.

He might be a bigger part of this world, but like, can we find Armor Wars a way to make a difference without being like, oh, we missed Tony. Oh, we miss Robert Downey Jr. Like, we don't need to do that over and over again for years and years to come. Like we he's out of the movie. He's happy doing, you know, Oppenheimer, stuff or, you know, being a doctor Doolittle. So we don't need to go back and revisit that.

I think if you give Don Cheadle something to act in and be the lead, we need to make it the lead, right? And and not worry about that. But that's that's my biggest concern about this movie more than anything. It's like we don't need more. Oh, poor Iron Man. He died years ago. Along the way. But I always forget that. I agree with you. It's a logo. It needs to be. They need to have more substance of this. But hopefully saying to you comic cons coming up later this year,

we'll get some news out of that. Yeah. Lastly, for the filming, this is Shang-Chi two, tentatively titled The Wreckage of Time. I think it's a great name. the movie is looking to start filming in the UK of March 2025. So when, Avengers five is not necessarily wrapping up, but like, kind of overlap a little bit there, in that we know Dan, Destin Daniel Cretton will be coming back to this to film it. We know Simu Liu will be coming back to act in it.

if this also takes place in between the two Avengers movies is what the theory has been for a very, very long time. I think that'll be great. I'm excited to revisit this character who has not gotten any love since his debut. Really, in that movie in 20 fall of 2021 along the way. Yeah, I mean, he had a he had a fairly decent outing as Shang-Chi. I mean, some lingering questions that I still have about the universe at large. that he kind of resides in.

But yeah, I think people would like to see that character come back again. I follow Simbu on threads and, he likes to, respond to people, that are just like, oh, I really think we need a sequel to, Shang-Chi. Marvel really is dropping the ball, not announcing this one. Then he's just like, he'll respond and say, oh, I heard the main actor was kind of mid in that. So he really likes to, he likes to have fun with his.

Yeah. And I think I think your questions about Shang, she just need to be answered quickly rather than, you know, again, waiting six years, seven years between movies, right. Like that. That's a concern. I understand we've talked about this before till this podcast is. But half this podcast has been about Bob Chapek saying more content, more content, more content, you know, but, you know, Bob Iger is focusing on the things that work. You know, Shang-Chi worked. It came out.

It had a lot of a huge success in the pandemic. it did not do the simultaneous release that Black Widow did before the Black Widow News later talked about. it came out. They had some great martial arts, had some great stuff. It was a really it was a really fun movie. Surprising at the end of a new character could come out of Marvel and be and hit so, so well. But they should have really brought it back sooner, right? Right. Just waiting and waiting for another year.

2026 release possibly summer 2026. Fall 2026 is just way too long. So we need to revisit them and bring it back. And he's a he's a great actor, right? He was in Barbie, a very infectious actor. I think they can bring it back and have some fun with this. And if it is wreckage of time, and we've also postulated with, news slash rumors of the Iron Fist, not necessarily the one we've seen before, but the new Iron Fist will be in this.

I would love to see some of that martial arts team up along the way. Right. The the that fighting and the Iron Fist fighting and get that together. So we'll, we'll knock on. Well, this is good. But, you know, the fact that they're committing to some filming stuff next year, locking in those lot so they don't lose it like Batman did, that's going to be it's going to be a big win all around. Rumor time. Avengers versus X-Men.

The movie is, rumored to be in development for a future Avengers title post Secret Wars and post the launch of X-Men. So getting this, ready early, you know, getting kind of setting the scene, setting the stage down the road would be awesome. I think. Mike, what do you think about that title alone before we get into the comic book version, if we just had an Avengers versus X-Men movie, is that something that's going to get your get your juices flowing?

Yeah. I mean, 80 X is one of the kind of last big comic book events that I read. You know, I've really kind of dropped off of, like, these big, like, summer moments that they have for comics in a while. But, that one relies on a lot of, you know, history, right? You know, the X-Men are a pre-established superhero team. You have the Avengers as well. You know, they seem like two, like opposing forces. That could be entertaining to watch. Right? The comic was interesting as well.

I mean, I don't know if they're going to, like, bring the Phenix Saga back once again, something that that was really been beating audiences over the head with that Phenix idea. it's funny that you mention that because I read you, when this news, this rumor was dropping, I was reading, I was reading through the articles, the comments. Everyone's like, we don't need another Dark Phenix saga. To hell with that. However, the idea of the Phenix Five, right?

The five X-Men people being powered with Phenix like powers and having to not necessarily off each other, but beat each other to gain the full power, like like a Highlander is kind of an interesting idea of the they rather than just like, Jean gray, he's got the Phenix powers again. What do we do with that? I mean, kind of I mean, the best part about it, because there's no way when this movie comes out and I think it will at some point in time because talk about like, talk about.

Synergy. Pull title movie. They're Avengers versus X-Men. That's going to be amazing. Whatever. They end up doing that. Right? it's going to be compared to Civil War because it's going to be the most logical comparison out there. And the great thing about Civil War is like, nobody was like, body snatched, really. You know, no one is like being manipulated by an external force and like, oh, we just got to hit them on the head with a frying pan and they'll be like, back to normal.

You know, none of that silliness. So it is just two opposing ideal ideals in like Earth of how to deal with like, superpowered people. And it made the story really compelling. So, they'll need to find a way to do that or be better than that when you're kind of remaking the movie kind of, in a way, with X-Men and Avengers, instead of splitting the Avengers in half. And on top of that, I mean, when this movie comes out means everything, right?

You know, I would think in my head like, oh, I don't want to see Avengers for X-Men until the X-Men are properly rebooted. We have like a new, fresh team that has been around for a while. They've had maybe their own trilogy of movies. Then it makes sense to have them fight The Avengers, but also at the same time, like by the time that happens, our old kind of classic Avengers that we know and love on the big screen, they'll all be retired.

So it's kind of like if you force it to happen too soon, it might not earn the story as much. Well, I'm take advantage of seeing, like Chris Hemsworth says, Thor in it. Right. But, you know, if you wait too long, you get you just have to hope that all of the moves and pivots and recast that you done in this new world, you know, people like it. I'm going to I'm going to disagree on the length of time I think you get of them two movies.

similar to how again, Captain America, you know, we had two Avengers movies and then we had Civil War, which is Avengers 2.5, right at the end of the day. But that fraction that led into the events of Infinity War in Endgame. So I think you can do two excellent movies, do an Avengers versus X-Men, and then how the third X-Men movie is the fallout of ABC's right. How do the mutants and the X-Men team deal with the fallout of avian? And that's their trilogy at the end of the day?

so you don't have, I think I think there's a middle ground that you can do for those story arcs to not have to do both without, to not to do all three and then wait forever. That. But you have a kind of a short run, with two movies and then the, the third movie kind of deal for the fallout. So it builds the character story. At the end of the day, I think the storyline will be ignored.

primarily, I don't think we're going to get ABC's, that that relied the comic book relies on, like you mentioned, years, decades worth of knowledge of comic books, the Phenix Saga, the Avengers, including the Fantastic Four, dealing with breaking the Phenix Force into five fragments. The five people who get the powers are Cyclops, Colossus, magic. Namor, and was it Emma Frost at the end of the day? so to build up five Omega level mutants is going to be pretty hard.

So I think, you know, we whatever we do, it's going to probably be, as you mentioned, very, very much similar to Civil War, an ideal. Right? The Avengers are, you know, doing good for good sake. The X-Men are doing good, but they're still outcasts. They're, you know, they're not the same. They're not they're trying to save mutants along the way. which, you know, we'll we'll see how that that happens.

But to me, as again, to agree with what you said, when this comes out, this will be a huge movie and it probably needs to fire on all cylinders. Right? Like, you know, I take a four and a half out of five movie on this with just the title alone. to, to hit that. We don't want to kind of drop the ball like we did one X-Men movie and now we're doing ABCs. So knock on wood, for that success. But I'm thinking 20, 30, 20, 31, that sounds like a long way away.

But that's only seven years now, if you think about it, we're we're farther along than I'd like to admit. sometimes. But, you know what? We need the X-Men. We can't have a without the X-Men movies. And, the news is the reports are saying that a writer for the X-Men movie for Marvel has been narrowed down, and we should now, expect an announcement in the next few weeks, possibly three weeks or so. probably this will release post secret Wars is what I'm thinking, right? This is that reboot movie.

Like, that's that's the question that we talk about all of the time is, it will be funny if it just never happened. Right? We are under the assumption that after Secret Wars, there is going to be some sort of collapse, some sort of, reordering, some sort of like reinforcement of this sacred timeline one. Narrowing it down for the consumer masses. Yeah, we're done with multiverses. Yeah. Restarting it all. it'd be funny if it didn't happen, but that's the expectation we have.

We're expecting one significant mark on this sacred timeline where everything reboots. So is there a way to start an X-Men movie before that? that's the question I have. It makes the most sense to me to do that afterwards. Heck, you could even still do that thing that we talked about back after endgame. When endgame ended, we were like, oh, how are they going to introduce mutants into the MCU?

Like, oh, well, maybe like the blip, everyone coming back, you know, maybe that kind of kickstarted, the mutant gene in people and people are going to realize they're all starting to get superpowers now. Well, that didn't end up happening. I don't know if they even technically could roll back and do it because, like, miss, Miss Marvel is, like, technically. Yeah, that's like, but she's got a mutation. Not necessarily a mutant person. Yes, I me.

But I mean, maybe, we have another cataclysmic event coming up with Secret Wars. Maybe that's what could restart us in a world with mutants. Right. So if if I'm trying to pitch a version of X-Men that starts for some reason before that, right? Maybe these X-Men are living in our current version of the MCU, and maybe they just feel generally, I don't know, maybe more accepted because our current version of Marvel Universe is kind of used to seeing big, giant like people in the sky. Eternals.

They're used to hearing about superheroes flying around like Manhattan and saving us from aliens. Like, oh, now there's mutants. Okay, it's just another day on Earth. not 616. I forget the numbers for the MCU. Oh six. They call it 616. They call it 616, which is confusing. They really. Shit. Which is disappointing. Yeah, they really should have. You got a different number? Yeah, I'm going to go, you know, not not to to discount you, I think I think it's a good idea.

I think we go the other way and say maybe if they do it before Secret Wars, the idea is maybe like they're doing the Fantastic Four to say the X-Men are a different universe and we are merging them in together, post Secret Wars, and we now have to live with mutants who've they have existed. They have their own history. They've been in a world where they're accepted and universally loved or maybe hated, I don't know.

And then they have to come to another world where like, oh, we now live with these people with powers, and we don't know how they got them or why they're here. And that causes the conflict with with regular people, mutants along the way, because now it's just more of a shock, a system shock that all these powered people live here. And we can't explain why along the way. Yeah. I mean, you just you can't lose the core of the X-Men, which is the allegory for racism. That's, what they were made for.

That's the story that's always been told of them. It's the most compelling part of. It's the. It's the internal driver for the X-Men 97 series. It's so in part of what makes mutants, mutants and X-Men, X-Men that when they when that new movie gets written, that has to make sense in the world that we're presenting the X-Men. And so if that's the main line, sacred timeline, it's like a fractured timeline. That's something I'm sure they're trying to figure out.

Yeah. Well, we'll talk about, but yeah, like the X-Men thing is like, you know, acceptance in a world of, acceptance. Like we are here to do good despite people, you know, not thinking we're we're the same as them. So, Vic said, I hope that the right announcement soon and maybe we'll get a director announcement with that as well. Right. Like, they'll probably have a bunch of stuff. So not going to wait for X-Men news coming up.

I always forget this, and it's not necessarily bad, but Scarlett Johansson is, an executive producer producing a project for Marvel, right? Post, the the Bob Chapek fiasco where they did the split release for Black Widow. so she is working on, what has been, I think, confirmed or mildly confirmed as a Disney Plus series rather than a movie. So what she's working on, I think, is what someone said, earlier this week. So, she's a producer on the project, and she's not starring and acting as it.

So I'm going to think it's like, a focus on Yelena or the Black Widow program. What do you think on that? I mean, that. Would make the the most sense. I mean, it's always interesting, right? When like, an actor kind of moves into more of the creative role. So I'm just curious what that's going to be like, because she's obviously a talented actor. She's portrayed, Black Widow for all of these years.

So if she moves into this realm of being creative, you know, it makes the most sense to kind of like the old adage of write what you know. She understands Black Widow. She knows the character so she can maybe run with that world. And it makes sense. Her sister is the one that go into there's always the part of the back in my head, though. It's like you can never truly unlock and decode the term executive producer in Hollywood, right? Because it can mean so many different things.

Like there are executive producers out there who are the entire reason a show exists. They're the entire reason it's good. They're the ones who are getting their hands dirty every day. They are up late at night, up early in the morning creating this vision. And then there's the executive producer that like, oh, I just have this title so I can get more money because this studio, you owes me for doing all of this work to them, or they just want my name only. So that's kind of what I'm curious.

Curious about. I can always be cynical, with anything in Hollywood and be like, oh, this is just EP in name only to get some extra juice to the Disney Plus series. or it's an EP in the true sense of it. And like a Scarlett is really excited to dive deep into a Disney Plus series. I mean, we we we we will truly never know until there's like a junket and she's there and excited to talk about it. Or there's a junket and you don't hear from her at all.

Yeah, I think they're going to lean on her name. Right. Even no matter which one she is. Or like Scarlett Johansson is involved with this project, this is her baby. This is so on and so forth, even though it may not be at the end of the day, but I think they're really like to me, kiss and ass for that 2021 Black Widow thing. Like, yeah, we messed up. You didn't get your money, you sued us. We settled whatever. You know, whatever the old Bob did.

so they were like, like to make it right to to keep you appeased. We'll give you full producer credit on this and whatever benefits or perks come along with that. At the end of the day. But I love Florence Pugh's Yelena, like, you know. Right. I can watch her eat mac and cheese out of a pot all day, and find it entertaining. What do you. I mean, that's that's what she's known for. But I also want to see thunderbolts and see how she comes out of it. I think, her growing up are changing over time.

Right? We've only seen her in, Hawkeye. And as Hawkeye. What else was she? Briefly. She was, she was in. Oh, God. We are. We are really trying to figure this out. I feel like we were watching. She was in black. We're obviously black Widow, but, like. Also, like I said that Hawkeye, I think she was in a minor league, so really, she needs to come back and kind of bring in.

And as Florence Pugh has become like an actress in Dune and Oppenheimer, she's got more kind of weight than she did four years ago. Right? So she could totally sell a movie or a show on her own. Right? Yeah. So, I love to see I also do not want to go backwards in time, like the Black Widow movie, did I? That was great. It was fun. But, we don't need to relive the the Black Widow program that she grew up in along the way. So, maybe maybe they're able to fix that.

let's shift some gears, into Disney Plus. Animated your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. Do you remember the shows of. Yeah. And and coming out, the, directors of, the so or people who worked in the show, Lisa senior and Sue Livingston, who were directors. Since you are back at Marvel Animation as episode directors for an untitled, unannounced project that they're excited to be working on. Mike. So my guess is it's not more Spider-Man, right?

Otherwise they'd say, we're back for more Spider-Man. What if this is like a follow up to X-Men 97? Like, hey, we're going to do Spider-Man 95 or whatever. Man, that would be so cool. I would love that so much. I mean, they if they have familiarity with the character, obviously, hopefully they have love for that animated show like I do as well. I mean, it's undeniable how well 97 is doing for them, and it makes it would be weird if they don't capitalize it on some way.

so yeah, I could see them returning or something like that. I would and I would say the one thing, the one animated show for Marvel I forgot to promote, like it's not a marvel is Earth's Mightiest Heroes. Avengers Earth's Mightiest Heroes is one of my favorite animated shows, one of my favorite Marvel properties. We've talked about it here, and you know so many times with the King storyline. If you wanna know Kang, they've got Loki storylines.

They've got so much going on in that two season show, I cannot recommend it enough. I would love for that to continue, but it won't fit in this universe and they probably won't continue it. But I would love to see the 90s Marvel animated stuff come back in some form. As we've mentioned before, Spider-Man, maybe a team up along the way, whatever they can do.

But I think the, the grab of people, the Marvel animation continually, you know, bringing in people to see success with, it's going to be huge to the future success of not just X-Men 97, but other animated shows along the way. So, we'll keep you, I suppose if we hear anything from this, they say they will drop it whenever the press release comes out. last bit of news before we get into our, TV show discussions. Is Kraven the Hunter from Sony.

They have delayed this movie, Mike, from August to December 13th. I believe they're trying to get rid of the get away from the Deadpool and Wolverine window, which is not just one week. I'm. I'm guessing that's going to be a month long movie.

Mike, if I was a betting man and, the original The new Karate Kid movie, which features, both Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio from the reboot, and then also the original Karate Kid has been moved, back into May of next year to give time for the Cobra Kai series, a final series, season five to wrap up as well. I know you're a fan of that show. You've watched quite a bit of it, so. Cobra Kai is great.

Craven I'm not very excited for should I be excited for The Karate Kid and said, Mike is one for that? What is shift for Craven? If we were to just look at the history of movie release dates throughout the year and take it for its word, the signs Sony would like us to think is, wow, moving a movie from August to December, that's an upgrade. Only the best movies of all time have come out in December, like Star Wars movies, avatar movies.

I, I think if I remember right, a lot of the big James Bond movies have come out in December, December. That's when families go to the movie, around the holidays. And that's when you get those big box office numbers. Bond movies are also Sony releases. So it's funny you mention because they would probably think that they'd be that dilution. But it's just like Craven, what are you doing? You do not belong in the month of December. That is hilarious.

Especially I'm not saying every movie that comes out in December has to be coated in the holidays at all. But this is like a man in the jungle who gets the power of a lion. And it's like, what are you doing in this month? That is insane. I honestly wouldn't be shocked if it moves once more and it nudges into the following year. Like maybe this is some sort of like shareholder appeasement strategy where it's just like, hey, we moved it to December.

You should all be happy. This is great. This is good news. It's still going to come out in this calendar year. Let's all get excited. Then it's like, oh shit, this movie sucks. let's dump it in July. So I'm going to go ahead and see if. How many release dates do you think Kraven the Hunter has had Mike since this announcement? Well, based on the tone of your voice, Chris, I'm gonna guess more than two. That is correct. Do you remember? Okay, it is. Four is for this.

This is now the fourth release date this movie has had. Do you can you guess when the original release date for this movie was going to be just you? If you can ballpark, if you give me a year, I'll help you narrow down. I mean, based on the vibes of the movie, I feel like this is this is giving me February vibes. This is a February. This feels like a February movie to me. This was January 13th, 2023. I was I was right January all along. Yep. So is January 2023 by the time it hits?

No. December 2024. That's almost two full calendar years. That is 24 months that this movie has had to sit and fester and get infected and boil under our skins for two years. and how long it's been done. So, number one, my guess is they're not they're not fixing anything about this movie. Right? There's no reshoots to make it better. They're not delaying it to say, we want to improve this movie. They're delaying it because they're scared of Wolverine and Deadpool.

And they should be. They should very well be. also, Madame Web boy, did they get beaten at the box. Not like, not just like it wasn't beaten by somebody else. Literally everyone just took a stick to that movie and just to watch it till it was dead. And we're still beating this dead horse months later, Madame Web.

so, you know, Sony is now on a roll with their Spider-Man universe at the end of the day, but can you imagine filming this in like, 2021, 2022, and they're just waiting for it to come out? It's got an it's got, what's this? Aaron Taylor-Johnson is craven and Russell Crowe in this two huge actors, two big name actors, and they're still afraid to remove it or release it at the end of the day. So I am just, I want to watch this because I'm curious more than anything.

Right. We've seen the trailer, the first show. It shows the magic lion blood getting in his body. He can control animals, so it's not a real Kraven story. So I want to know what's going on. how they do the Rhino, you know, how bad is that CGI going to be? Pretty bad, I'm guessing. so my the curiosity is getting the better of me to watch this movie, but, I'm not paying that holiday premium to go watch this in Imax, I'll tell you that right now.

Like, if I have to wait till it's cheap on a Tuesday, during, you know, after Christmas, I'll wait and watch it then. But like, what hype I had, which was 1% of it, 100 is now down to zero. Because of this delay. Right? Like if they delayed it and said we're making things better, it's great, but they're delaying it just to delay it. That makes me even less excited to watch it when we have to. The things we do for this show.

For you listeners at on here, this is it's wild. So, Kraven might be might be my you let me what do you think the death of Sony spum the Spider-Man Sony Pictures universe, of course. Is Kraven coming out after venom three? Well, then, venom three, that's October of this year, so Kraven will be the last venom. I don't count because venom has since seen mild success just because of the character in Tom Hardy. Anything else? Sony, as such, outside of venom, has been dead on arrival.

Right. Morbius. Madame Web. Now, this, you know, what was it? Silver and black. The movie or show they were going to film. They cancel it the day they were before they were supposed to be filming. Like, the crew and cast are ready to get their in film, and they're like, no, we're not making it. So, yeah, you're right. This would be after venom three, which is October of this year. So, this might be this might be the nail in the coffin. Mike, this is the Dark Universe for for for Sony.

What do you anything you want to add to. I mean, honestly, again, we've we've beat this dead horse with a stick so many times I don't know what to say. We just. We just let it die. Just let it die on the vine. Please. What? Again? Anything can be good. We've been surprised before, but Sony does not have a track record to make me say. This is going to be good. They don't. So, we're going to be very, very, very not optimistic about this, but we'll keep you posted as we see it in December.

All right, X-Men 97 now. Full spoilers for everything going. We're gonna talk X-Men 97, then fallout, from the rest. So X-Men 97. Mike, you are you're up to date. Correct me if I'm wrong. So you've watched Life Death Part two and now Bright Eyes. And I was able to watch Bright Eyes last night. So we're all on the same page. So let's get into life death part two, which is the episode where storm gets her powers back, which is no surprise to anybody who has been watching this show.

I mean, one way to describe that episode to me, that is the episode where Charles Xavier comes back. I feel like, yes, yeah, that is that's the that's the headline on the front page for that one question. If I am raising my hand here in person, which is not you can't see me, but question for you, mom, are you watching this on Disney Plus? Yes. Okay. Correct me if I'm wrong. In episode one before episode one, they did a recap of the X-Men 94 series. Right? and and then that recap.

They say Charles Xavier is thought to be dead, but he's really living with the the Shire, correct? They they kind of give that away in the in the recap. I don't remember. Were you surprised to find him alive? I don't remember exactly what they said in the recap. I knew he wasn't going to be dead because, you know, we are too chronically involved with, X-Men and superheroes in comic books. People can't say dead.

But, I mean, my, my wife isn't really into the show as well, and I think most people just enjoying the show just as a normal human being, aka not us, are not going to remember the recap from the very first episode recapping an entire series of a cartoon show. so when he came back to life, my wife was like, oh, I thought he was supposed to be dead. So she was kind of confused. And I was like, well, the end of the show. You said he was dead, but he's kind of taken by aliens, so he's still alive.

So I could see that being a little bit of a sticking point for somebody that's just jumping on the X-Men 97, because they do kind of hit you over the head in every episode. Xavier is dead. He's dead. He's not coming back. He's dead. We got to do this on our own. He's very much the Earth. People very much are operating under the functionality that he is deceased and not a lot. Yeah, right. And then that's. And that'll come up in the next episode. We talk about Bright Eyes, but, you're right.

I forget that that life death was. I forgot the Charles Xavier part it completely, which I feel bad.

I mean, the episode does two, does two things really, really well because storm is off on her own and Charles is off on her own, and they both have no idea, through their trials and tribulations that this genocide is happening on Jean OSHA, all of these X-Men, so them both realizing it towards the end of the episode of storm, sees it on the news and then, Charles just perceives it, you know, when Gambit dies because he can feel his X-Men just leaving this plane of existence.

Which is crazy because he's not even in their galaxy. I don't know what galaxies he's in, but that, that really mean sister? I don't remember her name. She was like. The ghetto Milky Way. Yeah, yeah, which was funny to think. Like. Oh, yeah, people could. There is another race that could perceive our entire galaxy is just some sort of like, Terran wasteland, as they would call. Yes. but it was. I mean, it's great. This show is so great. Everything is great about it.

The only episode that I really haven't been super into was the, Life Death Part one, because it just kind of fell incomplete overall. Cool stuff happened in it, for sure, but it just felt like I. I do not feel satisfied after watching it, but these two episodes were amazing. Yeah. Life death part two I think you know, the the episode, the storm episode was split in half, if you will. Right? Essentially, it's one full episode in two different areas.

But to me, after seeing, remember it, it makes sense why the second half was here. Right? This is the we watch, remember everybody. You know, thousands of millions have died and we come into life death part two. And it's kind of a hope like a Charles is trying to bridge gaps with the ship and become accepted with them. Storm is learning to deal with the adversary and get her powers back and become essentially a new storm, if you will like. She has new hair.

She has her new outfit with the wings, which is from the comic books. It's fantastic. So it was a little bit of a hopeful episode, you know, after an episode of just absolute, utter gut punch, you know, rip, rip your heart out kind of thing. So I think that was great. I love I love both of those episodes. It was really interesting to me, for life to the part, part two, the Xavier part the intro. You get to deal with the mean sister and the crew. You get to see the, Gladiator.

The character. Dude, Gladiator was so cool. Like, yeah, it's always great when you can take, character. And then, you know, they're just plugging these iconic characters into their animation pipeline and they're just like, hey, what obscure X-Men character do you want to be the coolest thing ever this week? Oh, let's do it to Gladiator. And he's essentially using all of Superman's powers.

So my assumption is, is when this character was invented in the comic books, they're like, oh, just make him Superman, because that's exactly what he's doing, basically. Yeah. On the screen. Well, the sharing part there's like people like there's a smasher and a couple other people on the team, and they're all imbued their powers when they get that role. So Gladiator, you know, gets a role, he gets his powers. It's great. But to see there's a there's a dude there with his, flaming eyes.

I don't know if you remember this. There's a character. They were flaming eyes who's about to, I guess, execute the people that are attacking the Kree. that's Vulcan, who is the third summers brother. He's the brother of Scott Summers, who comes up in the comic books later. so it's cool to see him in space and, you know, Vulcans. A deep cut for me. And I absolutely love that. So it was really cool to see these deep cut characters.

You know, even in Bright Eyes, morph takes on the role of, Quicksilver for a little bit, which was really fun to see. So I love how the show is able to do a bunch of deep cut characters, but not make it feel gratuitous, like it feels like, oh yeah, this would be here in that moment, right. Kind of thing. along the way, the sheer thing, you know, I think that that that part is forgettable to me because that story trope is, like, as old as time, right?

Like, oh, we want to get married. Were two different cultures. How will you ever fit in with my culture? My sister wants to rule the team because you know, me marrying you isn't right. So that was a trope as old as time, if you will. but the fun part was, Ray Charles is like, I'm going to be a teacher now and teach all you stuff kind of things you use. What was the word he used? He's like demerits. I'm like, oh God. Yeah. For the school teacher. Yeah, he took them. He took them to school.

it was great. but you were talking about how the the storyline did seem a little wrote to the point where my wife and I were, like, yelling at the screen, and I was like, how dare you ask Charles to give up his memories so he can be with you? That's that's changing who he is as a person down to his core. He wouldn't even be marrying the same man. So it's just like, we're almost, like, not mad at the show. We're mad at her for thinking that Charles should do that for her.

And I'm glad he kind of came to his senses. you know, he can't change who he is. But it is. It is definitely a struggle. I could believe a character in this very, unique situation could be struggling with this idea of, like, yeah, he's struggled his whole life, and now he can finally have this freedom and acceptance, but it's he can't even really get accepted around these people anyway. So it really hits their butts. Bunch of old cronies running that show as well that they made it.

Oh my God, the I think the giant gambit skeleton. that was a moment that I had to go back and pause and look at because I was like, oh, this is metal. This is like the front of the album for sure. Yeah. and then the, you know, not too, not too little something the storm thing, you know, coming to terms with forge and he add the character of the adversary who's just like, chomping at her doubts, right? The whole time, like, oh, you're like, you're no one, you're nothing.

You know, without your powers kind of thing. It was it was it was fun to see that and see her kind of overcome that journey along the way. for for that character. I'm glad to see storm, and I love to see her come back in her black outfit. If you are the queen of, the the elements, that's what that outfit is. So that was great. But jumping into this week's episode, Bright Eyes, we come back to Earth. We come back to the X-Men. boy, they get rogue.

Some badass animation sequences here, even with a throwback to her, Marvel versus Capcom kick scenes, right? Like, there's, like a big, a panel with her foot coming down towards the screen there. I'm like, oh, man, they're really having a good time having rogue beat the shit out of these. General Ross's, base, if you will. Yeah. This is this is one thing that I always love about animation or cartoons in general.

It creates a world in which I can believe if a character gets mad enough, their power level will increase like, tenfold. Like, this is like the DBZ coded brain that I was grew up with of. Just like, oh yeah, you give any superhero a reason enough to go fight somebody and they'll be unstoppable. I mean, we kind of saw that with Gambit when he was trying to save, rogue, the love of his life. He put it on the line, and he was able to do the unthinkable and blow up this gigantic, like, Master mold.

and then rogue, when she's pissed off and she believes she's lost two of the loves of her life. she got, like, flying to a secret government, facility, and she can, like, literally slap tanks together, and it's. Oh, yeah, it's amazing. It. Yeah. Well, that and then like, oh, we, you know, they obviously set it up like, okay, we built this base to deal with the Hulk. And then she busted the ceiling and they're like, oh okay. She's she is upset. She is she's on a mission here.

We're not gonna let her let her slow down. So we got to see that, you know, the looking for Henry Garrick, the creator of the Sentinels. that's the whole point of this, right? We're going to find the person who made this big master mold and did the massacre along the way. then we also going to see yo. Speaking of rogue, at the end of the episode, she is she is not for mercy. She is not out for forgiveness. She is out for blood, if you will, life for a life.

And you know, she drops him off the top of the building, which was a cold moment for X-Men. Like, you know, we've seen a lot of them be, you know, humane and forgiving and like, you know, I don't want to do this, but this is what we have to do to be thing. And rogue doesn't prescribe to that, if you will. Right at the end of the day, she she's very much out for, emotional compensation. at the end of the day. so that was it was interesting. It was great to I love every one of these episodes.

Like they all come together in such a great way. They all deliver more than I expect at when I'm watching them. And I can't I can't put my finger on what it is. Sometimes when I'm like, I don't expect you to be this good of an animated cartoon show. I expect the action and the excitement of of seeing flashy colors and funny powers. But you know, there's a scene where beast is talking to the reporter, right?

Telling her, like, you know, you know, kind of saying, like, you know, we're tired of, you know, thank you for your not it's not acceptance, your tolerance. Right. We don't want to be tolerated. We want to save mutant lives and it was interesting to kind of find that, through through this episode, I will say the end the there's two the end of the Bright Eyes six out to me, Mike. And I don't know if you want to talk about anything before we get to the end.

No, I wanted to I wanted to bring that up because, this was interesting because they really lead up to this reveal of, like, oh, who is the big bad that's been pulling the strings these whole time? And I'm racking my brain. I'm just like, oh, what big X-Men villain is this going to be? Is this, you know, who are we going to see? is this going to be like, you know, apocalypse or who am I going to see revealed from the Shadow? And then I was like, oh, it's just some dude. But he doesn't look.

He doesn't look familiar to me. I did a little bit of googling, and it seems to be a character that exists already within, you know, the lore of X-Men. I am not familiar with the with the guy at all. So. So, the villain comes out to be bastion. Bastion is a character on screen 96, so he would have been created about the time that the animated show was wrapping up, so he wouldn't have had time to be in there.

But he is the culmination of two the combination of two Sentinels, the Master Mold, which you're familiar with. Right. and then the Nimrod Sentinel. Are you familiar with the Nimrod Sentinel? Oh, yeah. Nimrod seen. What do I know, Nimrod from that sounds so familiar. He is like purple and white and has, like, a big, like a upside down diamond kind of statue. And so whatever you like. so it's the evolution of the Sentinels, if you will.

So he is the combination of those two characters in the comic books. And so he doesn't really know in the comics. He doesn't originally know that he's a combination. He comes to find out that he is that so he can create prime Sentinels out of people, as we saw in this episode. Right, with Henry Garrick, whenever he he died in kind of or not died, but he came back as a prime sentinel with the ability to to really take down the Sentinels.

And he's working with Mr. Sinister, which, you know, we've kind of seen, sir, as a as a villain. We thought. I thought he was going to be the big villain reveal, not bastion at the end of this, but they are working together to create sentinels that do take down mutants at the end of the day. Or at least, neutralize the X-Men along the way for that. So we're going to get some at the next three episodes or three parters some really deep sent in the lower.

But the thing that stops them is an electromagnetic pulse, if you will, or whatever it was called by cable, who is officially back in these episodes. Mike Cable, the time traveler X-Men, who is the, son of Scott Summers and Madeline Prior. And Scott knows now because that was revealed in that last episode. And, and, cable doesn't really seem to want to waste time trying to talk to his dad, so definitely some, definitely some parent issues there.

Some family drama happening between the two of them. Absolutely. it's a summers family. It's on summers family. There's no drama. Yeah, it is kind of. It is kind of funny. I wonder, like, I mean, I know this show, you're probably not supposed to be dissecting the timeline so much, but Scott did have an interesting line where because cable has existed in this animated universe already before, he's already been a character that's interacted with the X-Men come and gone.

They've had their own adventures, right? And him going, oh, this whole time it's just been you. So that makes me wonder, oh yeah. Has the cable that we seen at the early version of the X-Men anime series always been Scott Summer sun? Or maybe he has and just nobody knew. So there is no point to bring it up. So, you know, it was a good smart line to kind of drop in, to kind of be like, okay, we get it.

We know cable's been in this show before, but now, yeah, now there's a different reason behind it. Yeah. He's always, you know, in the comic books, it's always been Nathan Summers, always been Scott Summers on. Now, maybe it's not this Scott Summers, but like, they are leaning into it in the show and I think I think that's great. to do that now, I will say cable has the power, to, you know, this the show is very this episode very adamant about burying Gambit.

Right. Having a funeral, putting him in the ground. Do you think cable will bring Gambit back because of, you know, again, a he's a very hugely popular character over the years. and B, to kind of undo this, but like, I don't want them to undo anything. I feel like, you know, death is death. Even they, they bury your body. Right? Like that's the important part. They bury the body. And, you know, Gambit had a sendoff and we were evolving as a world going forward without him at the end of the day.

despite how cool he is. Yeah. And then the reveal of Magneto's alive, obviously, and is getting a shave by, the bashing character at the end of it was kind of wild. Yeah, very, very weird. obviously not surprised that he's still alive. I mean, we saw Gambit as clear as day die and then get buried in the ground, and then we're not going to believe Magneto's dead because he kind of died. The body of death, an explosion. And then there is no funeral.

Yeah, but, you know, I there's a lot to go with these three episodes I obviously like, despite my my knowledge of the comic books and knowing these characters, I have no idea where they're going to go. I'm very, you know, intrigued. I'm excited. I, you know, the end. Also the end. The end of this episode brings everything together, right? It shows Bastian knows, Xavier is alive despite nobody else knowing this. He has Magneto alive in his captivity.

you know, he can turn any human into a prime saint and all that he wants, and cable's back. So, like, literally all these elements turned into this part together for Expo 97. Say whatever you think you know is going to happen. To hell with you. Because we can't. We have all the elements to shake it around and deliver anything you don't expect in the next three episodes. it like says a three parter. I have no idea what to expect. Bryan. I love watching this show.

I love watching X-Men 97 deal with these stories. I love watching a the animation, the quality of it, but also not being are being respective of the traditional animation of the 90s. The storylines, the voice acting, why why is this coming together so perfectly, Mike? Why, how how did they do this in, in, in a vacuum and then release it for us just so. Well, just a lot of care, a lot of attention. And like we always say, like, I mean, the original source material is good.

So it's not so much of a surprise that this is been even better, but it's just nice to watch something that's so good, right? Yeah. It is. If you feel the the reference to the source material, both the comics and the show and, you know, I don't want just one season. I want, I want three seasons. Give me three seasons. I don't need five. Give me three. I'll be happy with three. I think the original one even had four. So if we have to do four seasons, we'll do four seasons.

But, I'm just thoroughly impressed that they're able to make this in a vacuum. Not related to them to you, but still deliver on everything. Marvel and X-Men a long way. And I am here for the X-Men in 2024. Mike. My hands are raised for the X-Men this year, so, cross fingers that this continues to live here for three weeks, and then, Deadpool and Wolverine delivers on some more X-Men to wrap the show up. I'm going to talk about fallout myself.

Mike, you've watched this whole show, so I've watched half the show based on everything, and people may or may not know. My cat has been sick. She's had an ear infection, she's been wobbly, so we can't really sit down and watch it. We've had to babysit, a cat this week. She has. She's doing fine for everyone. Who's going to ask me. She's doing great where we're healing.

So last night, we were able to sit down and binge three episodes of Mike and I just got to the part where Matt Berry was the, voice of the robot. Small. so it's really interesting to see they're really holding back, on the origin of the ghouls as characters, but dripping, you know, no pun intended.

Here. Hints throughout to say, like, yeah, these are people who have had something done to them, and if they don't drink this little potion, they kind of turn revert into like almost come of zombies or like, you know, monsters, of a kind. So I'm interested to learn more about that. episode four is the turning point. I was kind of getting annoyed with the main characters. Goody two shoes shtick, right? Like, she's always like the golden rule, you know, do unto others.

Do what you're going to do. You. You know, I you know, everything in the wasteland is is good at heart and I believe in it. And then she has to fight her way out of the mall, and, she comes out and she's like, she's out of her vault tech suit. She's down to a t shirt and bandages and she's like, look, you know, I'm not like every I'm not going to kill you. Here's the vials. But you know, the golden rule, motherfucker, I think, was her exact words as she walked away.

So I'm like, okay. I'm like, I'm digging this as they're saying that for the back half of this show. But I will tell you and you can and don't tell me if they fix this or not. But my biggest complaint is the dude who took over night Titus's armor. He could have made up a better lie than his squire dying and then getting in the suit on the spot. Like what? Like that. I'm like, how are you going to get yourself out of this, you dumb ass? You've made the best, the worst lie in the world. So?

So obviously you still have, a few more episodes of the show, but you kind of have run into two of the bigger issues I have with the show. Overall, I will state that I do like the show. It's very interesting. I would I would love to watch another season of the show. They're doing a good job putting all of that money on the screen and making something. The world, the world is great. I and the characters in it, you know, are we're watching them literally evolve as the show goes on.

And I think that's great and that's my complaint. I agree with you. My complaints are like things that are going to evolve as the characters exist in this world. But like, boy howdy, like these are really, really, really rookie mistakes. Yeah. The the the yeah. The character that, I keep wanting to call him Nate Titus, even though he kind of takes over Nate Titus, his armor. I just remember the character's name. He's just a very interesting, unique character.

Like, he's kind of wacky and goofy, but also stupid. But is he brave? Is he supposed to be redeemable? I don't really know. He just kind of seems like a dipshit, for lack of a better term. Like so. I don't know if I'm if I'm really supposed to be rooting for this guy overall, because I don't really. He just seems so dumb, but not in a lovable kind of way. But at least I'm being entertained watching it.

So his character is kind of weird to me, because I don't really know how I'm supposed to feel when I'm watching him on screen, but also a very, a very nitpicky thing happens in the episode that you just watch. Chris, that is, a pet peeve of mine overall in any TV show that I watch. Right?

So and it's the moment when she's trapped on that stretcher, when the Matt Barrie robot is about to cut into her and steal our organs, which is, it's a it's a funny scenario to be in when she thinks she's going to be, healed. And he's like, oh, no, don't worry. I wouldn't do any of that to you. I'm just going to take your organs. Very. I'm giving you a finger. I'm giving you a finger, but I'm taking your arm. Yeah. Very, very funny, line there.

But when you specifically take a character in a scene and you back them into a corner that they need to get out from, especially when you don't think that they're going to die, like, oh, this is the main character of the series. I don't think she's about to get her organs stolen, but she needs to get out of this situation. And being a television show that is meant to entertain you, I would like to be surprised and delighted by the way that she escapes. Either she uses a part of her personality.

Maybe she charms the robot and convinces her to let her go. Maybe since they showed her at the beginning of the show, she has all of these extra skills involved. the deviled eggs? Yeah. Like maybe. Yeah, maybe. Yeah, maybe that could have been funny. Way to work. I don't know how they could have done it, but something could have happened there. But, What? All what it ends up happening is she just kicks the robot with her leg, and the saw just happens to cut her loose, from the bed.

And it's just like, oh, this feels a little lazy. Like, well, I think we could have done something a little bit more clever here. That part I'm fine with. It's the, defibrillators is where I get into it, right? Like, why? Why? There's no. You mentioned this. There's no setup for how she gets nothing that's on her. It's all dumb luck, right? She gets she kicks it over, breaks her free. Okay, I can get past that. But then she just happens to grab defibrillators and shocks the robot to death.

That's where I get. I'm like, come on, be more creative in this one scene. Yeah, it's one scene on the whole, and I agree with my show's great. One scene on the whole doesn't ruin the whole thing. But like. But when you know. So many opportunities in the show, you want, we would only watch your ghoul blow through body parts, right? We watched it do get us, like, grind it up to get a metal foot, you know, two episodes before do better than this.

But when you know Jonathan Nolan is behind it and you see what happened in the world of Westworld, where it just, in my opinion, went absolutely off the rails to the point where, Max didn't even want to finish it. Really? there's a part. I mean, that's just like I'm worried, Jonathan Nolan and his long term ability to tell this story.

But I do feel a little bit more, a little bit more safe that, like Bethesda and the whole video game lore and franchise creatives are behind it, like shepherding it along, you know? Yeah. I don't feel like I thought there would be more mystery boxes along the way. If you are Jonathan Nolan and, kind of like JJ Abrams, like they gloss and stuff like that. There's a lot of similarities between the two. I like Westworld, I think it's fun.

even though it goes off the rails, it shouldn't be called Westworld after season two. It should be called something else in season three and four, I. I still enjoy it. However, I, you mentioned, you know, like Todd Howard, the Bethesda people like. No, this is our universe and you have to follow these rules. The thing that they we can't make too much. I did enjoy like I was in episode three, the start of three or the end of two, where she has to cut the dude's head off the main.

Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm like, oh, they're actually like, I thought they were just going to drag him along for six more episodes, not cut his head off at the end of this one and deal with that. And like, that's actually much more different than I expected. So let's deal with that. And I'll also be very on the nose statement of Walton Goggins ego. He's like, I'm tired of all this side quest bullshit or whatever. He says.

Like in episode three, he's like, I have to go do something else because I need my my drink. And we're not going to deal with this head right now. So we're literally doing a side quest like the fallout game. And I was like, oh, that's fun. That's a great, that's a great, segue because I wanted to talk at the top of the show that I've been playing fallout four, and I was lucky enough to get it on sale from, PSN, PS5, or what else you want to play. They're all on sale for anyone who hasn't played.

These are all on sale right now. Go buy them up. I want. Actually, I don't know how much they're on sale now because when I bought it, I did see an end date for the sale listed that was coming up soon. So they could still theoretically be on sale, but they might not be as cheap as, like I got fallout four for five bucks. I got New Vegas for like seven bucks or something. Maybe eight. Yeah, it was like $12 and whole. And I got these two games.

And then on top of that, I got the next gen upgrade, which I didn't even know was a thing happening for fallout four. Yeah. So I think you are you know, more of the details, but like they boosted like the frame rate and maybe the. Other thing it's like a so fallout four came out nine years ago. So it's not by any means an old game, but it uses the same engine, the creation engine, as like Skyrim and I think even Starfield these days. So they upgrade it to 60 frames per second in 4K.

The differences aren't that drastic, but the fact they're still putting some love, some polish on these games that are old from them is huge. That's a big win for everybody. There's a fallout London mod coming for PC that they've, delayed a little bit to get this next gen mod out. So for those who have not died into it, you're going to be playing the best version when you buy it. You know, kind of going forward. Yeah, it's it's and it's been a learning curve for sure.

Because one thing that always, puts me off from video games is jumping into a world that's kind of already been established. The fan base is already all over it, so the developers feel like they don't have to handhold this much. But like, I've never played any Bethesda game before. Skyrim. Oblivion, any other fallout game. So I am like fresh faced baby. Like I'm literally like a vaulter coming out of a vault, like not knowing how to handle this world. And I got to learn.

Not only do I have to learn how, like the story in the world works, I just have to learn how to the controller and the mechanics and the that system works and everything, and it's really intimidating. And there was almost a point where I kind of just like, like, my wife called me, she was on the way home, and I had her on speakerphone. She was like, what are you doing? I was like, well, I'm playing fallout and trying. I'm trying to decide if I like it or not.

Which is funny, because usually, you know, right away if you're liking something, you're not liking it. But I was like, I can't tell if I'm on the precipice of about to learn more of these systems and really enjoying it, or I'm just like, this is too much. I don't want to play this at all. But luckily we had some friends over last night and, one of them is very seasoned in the fallout universe, so I was like, oh great, I'm glad that you're here.

I'm going to ask you a ton of very specific questions because he had. Beat this boss for me. Yeah, he had a lot of info on fallout four specifically. So I was asking them all of these like nitty gritty questions of just like, how often should I be using the Vet system compared to like first person shooter? Like, when do you use that? I'm collecting all of this stuff everywhere. All of the time. I have no idea what to do with any of it. and I'm afraid to get rid of any of it.

And, when will I run out of room and, so he gave me a, ton of info, a lot of context around the game, too, which I think is gonna help me enjoy it a lot more. I'm currently on a mission where I have to clear out, like, this big. Like, I don't know if it's, like, a chemical plant or a warehouse or something. Still very early in the game. And my mission is just to kill all of the Raiders that are there. They're causing us our settlement. A lot of trouble. Just kill them all.

So there's no, like, get to point A and then BCD. It's just get the point and kill everyone. So it's this really big area. So I'm really starting to learn the combat a little bit more. I just found my first terminal where I could figure out how to hack, which is harder than I thought it was going to be, even though it's just basically like a New York Times kind of Wordle situation. So I'm trying to figure that out as well. Yeah. it's just the.

Games are so big and they have so many mechanics right along the way. Yeah, and I hate baseball. I hate base building. That's what caught me off for I don't care to build a goddamn base. I just kind of stopped. I'm glad that you brought that up, because that was a question that I asked him. I was like, I found a menu where I can build a shack. Is this something I need to pay attention to?

Because this kind of seems like something that was added on for seasoned players, and it's something that I can ignore until at least maybe I replay the game. He was just like, oh yeah, I played the whole game without building anything. And I was like, okay, that's good, because this is like a very intense system and I don't understand it. My, my sister in law, rebooted it and started a new game, after watching last week.

And she's she's in love with it and she got the new, upgrade pack as well on her PlayStation. So they're they're loving it. And it's for certain people, listening to the show. Marshall, he message, and he he's our fallout guy in the chair. he he said he was telling me where I was wrong and everything else. I'm like, thank you, because I, I don't remember. I played fallout three in New Vegas when they came out like it was nobody's business on 360.

But like fallout four, once we got into the base building, I kind of just dropped off. But he mentioned, you know, we don't have this luxury on the PC version. They actually have a mod that streamlines all the base building, so you don't have to do it. And I was like, that'd be great because I just I don't like base building stuff like that. But, you know, one of the things I was, I was text live texting. Mike was watching the show.

I think it was episode two or I think maybe three, all the quirky side characters and then like worlds, like levels of the, the, the show hour look, feel like the straight from the game, right? Like all the like the weird dialog and like, kind of odd characters. Like, I forget the lady, I don't know the lady's name. Who was at this shop where Lucy was trying to, figure out who took her dad, but there was like some lady in the back, like a little lady.

And she's the one who put the foot on the doctor, right? I was like, she's, like, very interested about eating some sort of food. I'm like, this sounds like a character going through all the quirky side characters or the, the lady, the guy who was trying to get Lucy to live with him because he's sick and has a, a house with, like, narrators. Oh, he does. I'm clean water. I'm like, this feels just like a fallout character. And I love those moments that don't do anything.

They don't add up to anything, but they feel like fallout. And I'm going to say the biggest one. And pardon my French for anyone listening, but it's the chicken fucker, if you will, the guy who's selling snake oil and he's like, yo, Titus, quote unquote nighttime. So he was like, you know, hey, don't they'll fire him. He's like, I'm sorry, I don't mean to interrupt you, but, you know, I don't I don't want to anybody. But he was having sex with my chickens and he's like, oh, okay.

And then he shows up later in another, episode at the town of Philippi. So I'm like, oh, this is all these weird post-apocalyptic world characters are there, and I cannot wait for you to interact with some of those weird ass people in your game. Like along along your journey. I am joined the show. I cannot wait to watch the back half. I feel, some of the mystery boxes with the ghouls are being laid along the way. Right? There's the two timelines.

The pre, Walton Goggins character who keeps showing up as a as an actor. There's, and who we come to find out. And Craig is, is he the the fallout boy is he. Boy is that why they're taking his photos? Oh, that's a good question. I don't know, because he does the thumbs up and then they cut to the thumbs up, and he's always shooting the pit boy posters along the way. I'm trying.

So I think I. Don't know if it's like explicit or not or if it's just like, oh, it's like a reference of like, oh, I did a thumbs up for a marketing campaign. So now thumbs up is just used within the branding universe of Vault Tech. I don't 100% remember. Yeah, I felt like he was like when they were like, there was a photographer taking all his photos. I'm like, oh, he did the thumbs up. And then they're like, oh, this is the thumbs up vault boy.

So they're taking the photos to animate over him later to be to be Vault Boy. But, I'm excited. I mean, I'm we're looking to finish it this week. We're, we're hopefully going to have a lot more time and knock it out. you know, it's it's about dinner time here. So I'm going to be, knock him knock him on that. And probably eating and watching some fallout. But I'm excited to watch more. Mike. and it sounds like, you know, we'll be talking about maybe next week.

Last week, next week will be the last week we talked about it. But I'm excited to get your follow up for Journey Along the way. Kind of as you comment casually. I'll keep everyone updated. I love the that system. And the last thing I did is here in episode 2 or 3, the western scene, right where you mentioned the shootout with him, where he, literally like, it looks like he slows down and shoots through somebody and into the head of another person, or vice versa, I think.

Oh, that's the that system. I love the that system, the slow down and the explosion of the body parts. So hopefully you're getting that along the way as you play. any anything else, Mike, for follow up before we jump into the end of the show. I think that is a good episode. Chris, you managed to make it through the White Claw the brewery visits. did you end up buying the, the Star Wars? no, no. The problem, the problem.

Mike, is that I run too many windows for this podcast that I can't open up, eBay without losing the time code or something else. But maybe maybe it's going to give me something to think about tonight when I can't go to sleep till I drink too much. Yeah. And I'm like, what should I order? tonight, I will say I ordered a power cord, for my my Sega Genesis yesterday. The Tower of Power. I think we've talked about it for the 32 weeks. The Genesis in the Sega CD. They have a power cord now.

One power cord feeds all three. So you don't have to have three separate power records. So I was pretty happy with that purchase this weekend. But I try not to buy too many frivolous things because, you know, I'm saving for plane tickets so I can come to you. Yeah, but if people don't know what you're up to, what you're doing, where can they find you? At, my friend. Oh, they can find all of my goods and wares at life Rewards risk.com or pickled.

ComicBook.com Chris, if people want to catch up with you, where can they find you? You can find me on Instagram at Vault in 87 Valley Dan, or video game systems of the same name. If people want to know about the show where we're recording, listening, we're live streaming even we've got like five live streams going today because why the hell not? Where can they find us that. All things superhero slate reside in the vault of superhero slate.com?

The best place to find all the avenues we host our show, get our awesome show notes. You can go back in time. 400, almost 500 episodes of the show, and you could just see all the random bullshit that we've been talking about all these years, all chronicled in our awesome show notes that Chris has been putting together forever. Now we love him for that. We're on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, or wherever else you love to listen or watch. Find podcasts.

you can get Merchant Superhero, slate.com, slash store. We love hearing from you. Reach out. Let us know. What do you think of Fallout the universe in general? What game should I play after fallout four? It's probably going to be New Vegas because I own it. So if that makes sense to you, let me know. we love our super fans. If you want to be a super fan of this show, it's also easy to do.

All they have to do is share the show with a friend, share the show with a buddy, and we will be here every week. Folks. That's right, we will see you guys next week. I.