Spoilers are a path to the dark side. Spiders lead to anger. Anger lead to eat, he leads to suffering. I sent many spoilers in this podcast from our galaxy far far.
Away in the series Star Wars Visions on Disney Plus, so beware of that.
Also what if. Hello.
Welcome to episode four of x ray Vision, the cricket podcast where we dive deep into your favorite shows, movies, comics, and pop culture and more. Today we are covering the first three unbelievable episodes of the new anthology series Star Wars Visions on Disney Plus, Disgraceful Plus news recaps, and of course, the endgame. But first, let's welcome back to the show one of our co hosts, Cody Ziggler Zig.
How are you, sir?
I am thriving. It was a great topic to talk about.
I'm currently on hiatus from my writing shows, so I have been speeding through all the Star Wars movies in chronological orders, so this is a perfect episode for me. I'm glad to come back for marrying my love of anime and my love of the Lightsabers and Star Wars.
I can't wait to talk about all of that.
Zake, of course, as a podcaster, writer of both comics and TV, including Rick and Wardy, The up Becoming She Hulk.
Let's get into it.
In today's previously on, Let's start with the shocking adaptation of a Marvel property, Hit Monkey, dropping November seventeenth on Hulu.
Ten years ago.
When I read the Hit Monkey, if you told me that it one day would be a property that would be adapted, I'd be like, what if you told me two days ago that it would have been a property that somebody plucked out of the Marvel canon too adapt I'd be like, what. Hit Monkey follows the adventures of a jap these snow monkey and Macaque voiced by Fred Tatoski or assisted by the ghosts of an American assassin named Price voiced by Jason sidikis, also starring George Takai as shiny Olivia Munn as a Kiko.
Sci Fi War describes the series. It's this.
Hit Monkey was originally one of four Marvel shows greenlit at Hulu, alongside Modoc Howard, The Duck Tiger and dazzlart Men. What a Slate Folks dropped the strain from that particular pitch meeting where all that stuff got green lit because I want it.
Hater, it couldn't be done. Hater said they couldn't make a show about a hitman monkey. But now it's here. I love to hear it. What a perfect time to be a comic book nerd. I can't believe, like you said, like when I read Deadpool versus Hit Monkey or whatever, like fifteen years ago, I never would have pinged that one as the one that they get the show, And
now I'm completely stoked for it. And the animation looks dope as fuck too, Like the trailer looked like like, oh wow, this is like an action like an action animated show. I can't wait for it.
Now, everything but mo Doc obviously, and hit Monkey got axed.
But here we are Hit Monkey. The trailer is out. I am.
I still can't believe we live in a world the flex is unprecedent Number one. Cool that they're using Hulu as like the place where you can see people get decapitated.
And stuff, like in a Marvel property.
It's gonna be like they're more adult, kind of more reverent, non cannon world where you're going to see this stuff. But still, I can't believe that this happened I have not checked in on Hit Monkey or dead Pool versus Hit Monkey in twelve fifteen years.
Whatever it is, Well, who has really? I mean who?
Yes?
Yeah, I mean as you're saying, like I do like the idea that Hulu is like the Marvel Nights or the Marvel Max line right, like, no, we have Like you know, Disney Plus is pretty obviously they don't. Really they really sort of stick like the PG thirteen but
really PG for most of their stuf. So it is nice getting it out that we can see these like more eccentric characters go on more eccentric and centric adventures and stuff, and also show a little bit of blood, show him do get his arm mipped off, show a monkey, air the clip out like, I'm all for it.
So for those of you who are like, what the fuck is hit Monkey? What is it about? Just off remembering going through the foggy archives of my brain from
a decade plus ago. Hit Monkey is a Japanese snowmacac who comes into contact with a dying assassin who like was ambushed or something, and he wanders into like the mountains, comes across this tribe of monkeys, who then take care of this assassin but then hit Monkey disagrees with this, but like learns assassining from this assassin, and then much like John Wick or like the Frank Castle backstory, hit
Monkey gains these skills of assassining. But then the assassins that tried to kill the Hitman come to the mountains, they kill his whole tribe of monkeys, and so now hit Monkey, bent on revenge, goes and eventually kills them and has these adventurers.
He dresses in a nice suit.
Yeah, that's what It's important.
Part.
He has like a little monkey textedo that he walks around the world in.
Like where does this open?
Now?
I does that comport with your memories of Hit Monkey the series?
Yeah?
I mean my introduction to hit Monkey was through Deadpool. I think there was a run or there was like maybe a one off series called Deadpool Versus Hit Monkey where Deadpool just getsh to act to whip by this little monkey.
From four issues.
I was like, okay, like sign me up, because, like I mean, I'm a huge Deadpool stand like he's one of my favorite characters. Like when he's getting fucking his ass waxed by a little monkey taxito, I was like, all right, this is a character I need to follow like that that tracks for me from what I remember reading a decade and a half ago.
So wild.
So I'm excited for this, I will say. Let me just I feel the need to say this. Okay, it's been a tough time for Asian people just getting murdered by hit men who are angry.
That isn't happened a lot. So hopefully this is done. It'll in a tasteful way.
And I get it, like he'd hit Monkey is also is Asian. That said we can do more than just be bodies that get dropped. That said, I'm excited for hit Monkey.
Yeah I was.
I watched Kate recently on Netflix and like like, man, this this white lady just hurting everyone's feeling into Japan. This seems kind of crazy, like this is this is wild, Like she's taking it out. Yeah, kuza like this. I mean, I mean, okay, maybe that's me. She's a trained assassin, but yeah, I was like, oh this is a wow. They just she's got bought, he's got numbers over here.
She was running up the score. Mary Elizabeth, a fan. Yeah, but I had to turn the movie off. Let's talk
about what if. Episode six What if kill Monger rescued Tony Stark uh in which Eric Stevens, otherwise known as Killmonger in the in like the depths of his run of Mongering kills, rescues Tony Stark from the Ten Rings attack in Afghanistan, goes on to become his buddy, basically blows up Obadiah Stains spot as Obadiah's in the midst of trying to betray Tony Stark, gets Tony's trust, gets a bunch of vibranium, and long story short, ends up
taking over Wakanda. This was it feels like this is going to lead directly into the episodes that are that are coming or some other second part episode, because more than any of the other episodes, this one felt like there is a sequel somewhere.
Yeah, yeah, this one, This one in Marble Zombies felt the most like, oh, this is setting up for either there's a two part or later in this season, or like, I don't if they get another season, maybe they're going to do.
The things we'll just have like sequels stitched in that.
But like so, I came into this having just seen Black Panther aut the Hollywood Bowl where they have like the live orchestra and stuff, like I was already like I was completely prepped for it.
I think this would have been if there's a second part.
M hmm.
There's parts of this that were my favorite episode.
First of all, Killmonger, I think is I would argue at this point maybe the best villain in the Marvel Yeah cinematic universe canon, because what is the saying, like, uh, if the villain has a point, that's probably a good villain. Yeah, Like I don't know who has a better point than Eric Stevens.
Yeah, like not even my Hotep friends, like all my black friends. When when when Black Panther dropped, Like yo, Killmuk was talking that talk right now. I mean he went about it and maybe not the best matter, but like he speaking of truth to power right now. Like I'm kind of rooting for him and like even for this, Like you know, Thanos is such a big character, Like it's hard to like wrap your head around the idea of like someone will sixteen, which half the fucking universe.
Like yeah, like when you get to trillions, like you can't even comprehend that number when it's like yo, yeah you don't pay me what you owe like I can make to that, like I can won it percent relate to the kil Munger.
I think that's why that villain sticks around so so much.
I completely agree.
You know, it's like to your point of I might disagree with the methodology. You know, kill Monger is like, hey, y'all owe us, and the world is like, okay, well let's figure out let's figure out a payment plan. It's gonna be a multi step process. It'll probably take like half a century to maybe a century to like actually work it all out. We'll spend the first thirty years to fifty years just like discussing whether or not we actually owe anything.
And kill Mongers like, just now, forget all that.
I'm not trying to skip that Twitter discourse. Let's get right to it, b Let's get right to it.
That part is what makes him so absolutely compelling. I will say, I love this entire episode. I have one note. My one small note is Michael B. Jordan needed to go harder in the Pain on the Waconda. Like I don't know if you like, if they missed it, like if they like clearly like Michael B's a busy guy.
They probably only had him for a very limit did time.
But when he recorded that line, it was like someone was sleeping in the next room doing it on like the Apple Voice memo or something, because he was just like whatever it was.
It's like he was about to step into like his uber black to go to the airport. He's like, you know, when I gotta knock this ad R request un forever? Alright, great check.
You know, like when you put it, when you put it in the back of your neck and pretend that you're screaming like a fake falsetto or something.
It's like, man, he was walking out of the video booth and yelling it into the mic as he was like leaving, leaving the session over.
Man, Yeah, I needed that a little stronger. I'm excited. Of course, this is gonna.
Come out the day that the next episode of What If is coming out, which has been teased to include thor that we can let's what are you expecting for the end of the season of What If?
You know, it's it's such a it's such a mixed bag, and that being a good thing as far as, like you know, these are mostly standalone episodes so far. I really do hope that they sort of start wrapping, tying things into other stuff that's happened, because it's like, you know, and the Doctor Strange episode, like that's the first time that we acknowledge that they, like people can interact with the Watcher at least people that are like that have
cosmic scenes, cosmic you know, intuition or whatever. So like I'm hoping that at the home point that you know, the Watcher gets brought in and like has something that as affects the universe, like he needs to break his code. Like that's always the thing with the Watcher, Like you wait for him, You're wanting, You're waiting for him to break his code, and like I'm curious to see if that happens or what that thing is. Like I'm wondering if they're gonna tie in King to it all, Like
what's the King of it? Since that's the person that sort of kickstarted all this whole, all this whole multiverse conversation. So like I'm hoping that it becomes a little bit more canonical and also that we see some like we have a more active.
Watcher like he was in the Doctor Strange episode.
Yeah, I agree.
I think that I said this on last week's episode with Rosie, but he I think that we're going to see the Watcher break his code obviously.
I think that that is going to.
Take the form of him being like the cosmic Nick Fury, assembling the Guardians of the of the Multiverse. Obviously they don't know about each other. So the Watcher is gonna be like, Okay, the multiverse. You know, I'm out of a job.
If the multiverse goes, there's nothing to watch.
Therefore, I'm gonna have to put all of y'all in contact with with each other. Like I know this Hero, I know this corrupted Strange. I also know this kill Monger who is bad but maybe you could use him. I also know this T'halla who is star Lord like. And then he's gonna start plucking people from these various multi I know this Captain Carter, and he's gonna start putting them in contexts with each other, and that will be the finale in which they take on you know, Infinite Ultron.
Yeah, that is my theory.
That's a solid theory. I'm with that. When I want to read it, I want to watch it.
Let's get into Star Wars.
You've been guided by the four since you were.
Born at last, the moment arise.
We're back today.
We're stepping out of the airlock and into the Star Wars universe has never seen before. In the new anime inspired Yes you can say inspired, I mean it's just anime, straight up an anthology series Star Wars Visions. We're gonna be covering the first three episodes, The Duel, Tattooine Rhapsody, and the Twins. These are man all very very different, and all very very cool. Let's start with the Duel
by Kamakazi Duga. In a remote village, a mysterious Ronan duels a Sith bandit leader while droves of armed bandits attempt to pellision plunder a town. Ultimately, it becomes clear that our wandering Ronan is also maybe a failed Sith or just a Jedi who didn't go through with his training. Whatever the case may be, the duel is exciting and ends with the death.
Of the bandit leader.
The Ronan is voiced by Brian t Sith bandit leader by Lucy Lou and the village chief by Jaden Waldman.
Directed by Taknubu Mizuno. Just totally cool.
There's gonna be a standalone novel based on this. It's great that they started with this one because it is the one that makes the most obvious nod to the original Japanese cinema influences on Star Wars the films of Kurosawa's kind of like black and white, rainy texture.
What did you think of this episode?
I'm gonna saying this a lot for every episode, by this exact shit that I wanted, Like like you're saying, like you know, it's like it's very much like you know, it's it's seven Samurai, It's the hidd and Forth. It's like you know, it's it's a classic. It's a classic Samurai chan bar or Western. We're like, oh, a drifter comes into town and they have to see them from the bandits, And like I also love a running thing that's throughout these episodes.
Is that the idea of like the gray Jedi or like.
The Gray Sith, And like, yeah, I also love that they finally completely married, Like yeah, the Gatanas are just like sabers, like they keep them in hilts for whatever reason, and like whenever my boy draws out his sword to like get into that first dance, like I'm with it, Like I also love that they have the callbacks like other like I love like the little Suboba guys driving like the little little droid racer, Like I love that the uh they do with the mini gun's like that,
you know, the assassination robot, Like I loved all that shit. I less all love that, you know, just the the the art direction as far as like the bandits like all like they had like the Stormtroopers maths that all like sort of held together with like you know, duct tape and spit Like it's a perfect introduction like to what this status caol that this series is trying to stay as far as like we're gonna go in a gay so that's far for away and we call it
the space. We can have like fetal Japan planet, we can have, you know, Miyazaki world, we can have like Robot a.
Extro boy planet.
Like it's the perfect worked episode to like get you primed for this world and what you're gonna be watching.
Yeah, this is exactly what I wanted and it was the perfect way to open it. The vibe when the Sith Bandit leader arrives, so the village guards the chief of the village as a child flips the script on the bandits who have rounded up the villagers out come the hired mercenaries that guard the town, and it's like, as you said, like one of them is like a bounty hunter droid with a huge minigun. Another is like
a bosque like trandosan with like two huge swords. Another one is like the Imperial spy drone from Empire.
S breaks back with like Samurai swords and they just like wipe out these bandits.
And then the Sith leader come out of her ship, surveys the destruction and just says very quietly disgraceful.
And then.
And then the music kicks.
It like look whenever the boss comes out and they say, they say one word like mediocre, like someone's asked is about to get fucking whipped, And like she pulls out that she has like her like special lightsaber umbrella that like has like eight different spindles.
I'm like, yo, yes, sign me the f up boy. This is this is exactly the ship that I want.
Yes, it was just so so cool, you know.
I just like I said, I just rewatched all the Star Wars movies, like seeing that sort of take on, like the Anakin Obi Wan fight on, like the lava, like Mustafari on, like the log going down the river, and like.
It was.
It was.
It was such such a fun like re like reimagining of what we we all the notes that we're used to seeing in these movies.
I agree, And I found myself thinking about the like globalisation of like pop culture influences and how you know, it must have been weird and disorienting, but also exciting to be like a Japanese person watching Star Wars and picking out all these influences and seeing how they were mashed together when you you know, when you saw the first Star Wars trilogy, similarly to watch these two and you know, speaking about the duel right now by Kama Koza Yuga, and see the way all the Star Wars
influences are just thrown together in a way that is very it's very purposeful, but it's also like not bound by the quote unquote rules that would happen like if it like if if this was an adaptation done by a Western studio or an American studio, they'd be like, well, you can't do this because yeah, where is this planet even and this character was not around, and like how would they have gotten a forget that. Let's just throw all this shit together and it's cool. Yeah, I love that.
There's like an into the energy of that is so fun because I honestly like the childhood energy of Star Wars to me is just being like, oh my god, what is that is that? Who is that person that was in the background for two seconds? Yeah, it's like what is that like? And this captures that because it's like it's just like all these little details that you want to know more about everything.
Yeah, well it's like you know, Boba fav was like, Oh, that's the dude the cool helmet that says nothing in the Second Empire strikes Back and like and even Musk like he just you see his toes and you see his face, like that's all that he does in those movies.
But you're like, oh, this dude looks cool, Like I want to I want to do this, and like I think that Another cool thing, as you're mentioning, is like the idea of like, since this is going to like Japanese studios, which are like obviously influence these movies, it's like they're being distilled down and reinterpreted by the people
in culture that originally influenced. It's like they're able to have those those like those tropes and cliches like and not even cliches in a bad way, but it being like they can they can like really hammer those home. Like when Lucy Lou pulls out her lightsaber and the
dude catches it with his hands with this force. I was like, that's my shit, Like that, that's such a classic clean trope in like any like you know, Samurai anime or it's just Semai movies in general, and like seeing that applied through the Force and like just seeing that like little tweak reinterpretation and how they apply it to Star Wars was like such a ret of fresh.
Air about the standalone novel It's gonna be written by Emma Mikocandon. It arrives October twelve, spans the story of the sith Ronin. According to Star Wars dot Com, James Wah, the VP of Franchise Content and Strategy, says quote, out of all the shorts, the dual felt most rife for an ongoing story in a novel. The team at comic because Douga, We're very generous and obliging our interest in continuing the storytelling had a ton of ideas to lend
in the creative process. The author Emma says, quote, I love that Visions as a whole is a grand recursive experiment, a fairy tale of a fairy tale, a myth built upon modern mythology. It makes the most sense in terms of it's the most disconnected from other stuff. The other episodes take place like in particular worlds that you will recognize, So this is it's the perfect.
One to kind of like stretch their legs on.
Yeah, it screams like side story, and that's what I think. That's that's a big offering that this particular episode, or even though like this micro universe can can really expand.
On next Tattooine Rhapsody by Studio Coloredo toin Engine, a former Jedi Padawan becomes the singer of an aspiring rock band very subtly carries his microphone slash lightsaber like got his belt just like as it there. The band's name is Star Waiver, and they ultimately come into conflict with Job of the Hut and Boba Fett because a member of their band is Jaba's son.
And Jaba wants him back.
The cast is Jay played by Joseph Gordon Levitt, Geezer played by Bibby Mornihan Boba Fett, Timora Morrison K three p. Forty four as Shelby Young, and lan Mark Thompson. This was super fun. This is the one where you're like, if you start to think about where and when this possibly could have taken place in Clone Wars, You're introduced to Java Son Jaba Son as a child. At that point, it's not clear that it's it's not the same person. This is like completely different. This takes place on tattooine
like in the pod racing arena. Yeah, super fun, like music based.
It's the most like anime of it all as far as like we're gonna have a bunch of fun. It's gonna be a slice of life music anime and like we're gonna just we're just gonna map Star Wars over it. Like I love that Geezer is like his dirt bag son that has like he has like hair transplants and like a noseby he plays space bass.
Yes in his garage garage man, Like, I mean this is perfect because like one of the music in Star Wars.
Bands in Star Wars.
Is such a under explored part of the in world reality like obviously that that you know, there is the band on Java's barge, there is the band in the canteena. There is like music all around, but this is the first time we ever really explored it in a way
that like centers it. And just like you know, in the world of Star Wars, other than the animation stuff like just from the movies, you don't get you don't very often other than the music, get a sense of like culture, popular culture, what people talk about, like what people go and do as like entertainment other than pod racing, and like these little snippets of like a musical adventure.
That's why I love this.
The idea that there's like this band that's like on the on the rise out here in the galaxy is so fun.
Yeah, I mean that's when you say that because we get those snippets of like people like going to bars, going to canteenas, they like doing death sticks. But like that's really all that we have as far as like what people do when they're not like in war.
Yeah, it is like it's a such of fun.
Like this is the one that I also want to seek a sequel too, Like I just want to see that world blown out because like it's such a fun niche thing that could only happen in this universe. Like you're saying, like, yeah, what are the what are the dudes that play the space flutes do in the Containa man?
Like what are the influences?
Like what are there like Miles Davids that got them into like playing space jazz? Like I want to see, like I want to see like the Space strokes, Like what are these guys turned into?
You know?
Yeah, I love that.
I love that Jay's pitch to Jabas Like, hey, how about you become our our first sponsor?
What about that?
Yeah?
What a perfect Like you know, us wars are so heavy, like you know, good and bad must come together and face each other blues. And this was like, you know, we need money for a new Space fan. We would love if you didn't kill our bass player and we can make you a lot of money in the end.
I mean, look at this, like we filled the pod racing stadium.
People are going fucking ape shit Java, Like do you want a part of this? Also, don't pretend that I didn't see your tail tapping to the beat.
Yeah, my guy, Yeah, yeah, I felt it. Yeah, yeah, we the slap's job and we see you slapping with it. B better we get Kendrick on the track Game over Space Kendrick, I.
Would say, my one My one note is like maybe we should have brought in a pitch singer for Joe. My guy was like a full step and a half flat for the entire versus chorus.
I got to feel that versus chorus, and I.
Didn't feel it quite as much as I needed to, but still it was super fun.
He committed to it.
He committed, admitted, committed, and he also committed like this little my favorite like anime notes, like the like all that ye shuff like.
He went hard, like he went hard in the way Michael b needed.
To go hard.
Say what kind of forever?
Yeah, because he like screamed the screen really really really fun.
One.
If people are feeling these first two animes, what would you say, are like the comps to like go out and.
Oh boy and watch?
Yeah, I mean the first one definitely, I mean this is live actually, but Yo Jimbo, like that's obviously seven Samurai, but like anime wise, I'd say basilisk, it's a fun like Samurai anime it's like a ninju scroll like. Those are two ones I think are very fun. Cops that are think oh and sort of the Stranger Like, those are three that I think really compliment to compliment this as far as like Tattooed Rhapsody is funny because I don't watch that much like musical anime, but like there's
like a nice like slice of life. Like I think if you like just google any like modern comedy anime, like that'll be a fun one to jump into. Any like anything that's like that looks bright and happy and weird. It has like weird like character proportions, like you're going to be into it, And I think that will be a perfect compliment for Tattooed Rhapsody.
Next up is The Twins, a really really fun episode that really explores like the duality of the force through twins twins Bread and Groom to harness the power of the dark side. Guess what one of them decides that they don't necessarily want to do that anymore, then you get a fight. The cast is care was by Neil Patrick Harris, I'm Alison Brie and B twenty n Jonathan Lippbow,
directed by Hiroyuki Imaishi. Justin Leitch, CEO of Cubic Pictures, said at the Anime Light Expo of the Twins quote subverts the idea of Luke and Lea and imagines a brand new set of twins born into the dark Side and how far the brother will go to save his sister. Finally we saw a humanoid general, grievous, multi armed, Yes, Sith with lightsabers.
That's all I want.
Yeah, I love my dark side wife. Who I can save her? I can fix her.
Uh, she's problematic, but she just give me time with her.
Yeah, she's my problematic fave. We'll get a couple of therapy, will fix here.
Us speaking like coming off that the Joseph Gordon Levitt going for it, Alison Bree, you fucking went for it in this as well, went for it hard like she was.
She went hard the.
Motherfucking paint I think, I mean, this is the this is of the ones that we were today, Like this is the one that is the most like bombastic anime like that could only that could think things that could only transpire in animation. That lends itself to this, Like I just took jump straight to it, like my dude making a hyper lightsaber out of a special crystal and then jumping in front of an X wing and going through hyper speed to like cut a star story in half.
Is the most hype shit I've ever seen.
And also ship that could only get away with by Studio Trigger, the production company that made this, when like that's their bag, Like they do bombastic, hype ass hyperkinetic animation and they completely get away with it. Now, if I'm asking myself, why does the droid have a space suit on?
At the end, I didn't even care. I was like, yeah, I chalcol I chalk it them to the force.
I mean, why does like Cara have an X wing like on an imperial ship?
None of it, It doesn't it doesn't matter, don't worry about it. It's interesting because when I was I spent all weekends just like reading histories of anime and there's some really good economic papers about you know, just like the movement of pop culture in the twenty first century, and how anime is an example of a market that was the spread here in the United States is an
example of a market that was purely fan driven. Like everybody who tried to make this happen on a popular on it from an actual professional corporate level failed.
In numerous ways.
Either the Japanese studios couldn't find a partner that would honor their material, that wouldn't just like cut it up and dub like wild shit over it, or they couldn't find a distributor who understand what they were about. Similarly, meanwhile, the fans were just like, send these tapes over, we will translate them on our own, and we will disperse them on our own, and we will do that because nobody is feeding this market. Literally, nobody else is doing this,
and it is super fascinating. And one of the things that was driving this was that, to your point, there was a level of bomb bast that was just not seen in American slash western animation, which is.
Primarily for kids.
Like in Japan, the tradition is the manga tradition is this is popular storytelling for everyone.
Like you see adults reading this.
Similarly with anime, there is no like age cutoff for this shit like adult themes, incredible violence, like if you want to know, you know, what's a short cut to like universal storytelling, stylized violence, incredibly stylized violence in which like like ships containing a million people get blown up or cutted half.
You know that that is the shit you will see in anime.
And that was the thing that really hooked people in the late seventies and eighties because they were like, oh my god, what the hell is this?
I've never seen anything like this. Yeah, and that was what The Twins felt.
Like to me, yeah percent, because I was thinking of that, like, you know, we would had like gi Jo's and Transformers, which were like, yes, nothing really happen. It's like, you know, there's no stakes to like what you're watching, Like there's like a roadblock. I'm assuming that a character named rod Block that sounds like a wrecker like whatever, Yeah, Roadblock's not get gets leg blown off in episode one and then have it not be their episode two. Like they're
just no stakes. But for this is like one is like you also like everything is dialed up to fucking twenty five, so like the emotions are super heightened, like the like it's just like also it compacts everything down, like you get the Lea in Luke story and like was it like fifteen minutes? Like you get all that compacted really to one sequence in like a fifteen minute.
Things like alreadily like you're you're fucking speeding through this a one hundred miles per hours, like you're on edge, and like you want to see how it plays out because also the animation is so kinetic.
En diowed up to twenty five.
Yeah, to your points.
As a fan of Gi Joe as a kid, it used to annoy me so much that every time Gi Joe and Cobra would get in like some scuffle since you know, a big set piece battle. Yeah, at the end of every episode, may be blowing up each other's jets, big explosion as the jet gets shot down. You know, the pilot wait a jet and you see the parachute and they like gently drift to the ground. To let all those kids watching at home, don't worry nobody.
This is a huge.
Battle between two multinational security forces. Uh and like a wild high tech terrorist outfit. But actually nobody died in any of these battles. Don't worry about it.
Yeah.
So you know I had anime COVID into my life at that time, I would have been like.
Yes, yeah, you would have been scarred there.
I remember the first time I but the first AIME I ever watched was the show called Robotech and like there was a there was a show that was serialized and like one of the main characters bites it like episode eight, I'm like, wait a minute, is he going to be here like next episode like no, he bleeds to death in his hospital bits like he's gone. I was like, oh wow, I'm not used to this. I'm used to like Optimus Prime coming back the next Saturday or whatever.
I mean, Like, you know, for for me, one of the most scarring moments in Childhood Animation is Optimus Prime dying. I was like, what how can you do this? How dare you?
Yeah?
You know.
Meanwhile, in in anime, people are dying, getting there, getting cut in half like all the time.
And it mattered.
Yeah, they don't.
Also, they don't get graceful deaths, like they get fucking murked by someone that they loved, you know, they get killed in the phone booth and you're like, oh wow, no dignity in this death.
Uh So when you watch Robotech, were you watching the original Japanese Robotech or you know, watching the dubbed version.
Or I watched I was watching the Harmony gold dubs, So like I'm a tunami stand like that's what that fucking changed the game for me. I was like twelve or thirteen, and like that was the first like anime I ever saw. I was like, oh wow, this is one Like it had robots.
I love robots.
But also it was the first show that I be cognitiant of being like, oh, this is serialized, Like what happens in episode one is going to affect episode twenty seven, which is going to affect episode thirty two or whatever,
and like having those stakes happen. Also having like characters that you attached to and then having them die was like, oh wow, this is like this is this is real, Like I've never seen that type of stuff and like that's what fucking unlocked the gate to like the nerdom that I currently find myself yelling about anime Star Wars right now, one big snowball baby.
So, of these three, which is your favorite? And why?
Man?
It's the dual Tattooing Rhapsody and the Twins.
I you know, I think aesthetically I think aesthetically distilled down the duel is what for me is like what I think Star Wars is when it comes to like the influences, the action, the the subtle stuff as far as like you know, good bad and even having the idea of like the gray like this. Also the Twins covers the idea of like someone turning to the light,
like I love all that. Also it's in and out, like you get a taste of like these worlds can be whatever they want to, Like you said, we can have feudal planet, we can have you know, we can have rock garage, rock planet.
Like the Dual hits all that stuff.
And also you see all the love letters like your Jimbo seven Samurai, Yeah, all those things is still down that. I think the Duel just like really captures like it's what It's the perfect pilot for what you need right off the gate for this series.
Yeah, that was my favorite one as well, I think. Then followed by the Twins.
You know, the Duel.
There is something perfect and circular about like closing that loop and like uh acknowledging original influence of Kurosawa's pictures on Star Wars, you know, famously Hidden Fortress. You know, Lucas openly took a bunch of plot points from that movie and used it to build up the early drafts of Star Wars. Like at one point, the character that became Darth Vader, was named General Akira. You know, there's a bunch of stuff in there, and so acknowledging that
was super cool. And then just the textures and feel of it, like taking animation, putting that like dirty film, black and white, gray film, grain, but then having the lightsabers have these pops of color, the laser beams be these pops with blasters, be these pops of color.
The explosion on his wrist.
Like yeah, to call his to call his R two.
The way that it took like the archetypical essential story beats of a Star Wars story, right, the battle between good and evil. These lived in high tech, futuristic worlds where you can imagine people just like working and going about their day, incredible duel droids like all that shit together in basically like under thirteen minutes.
I think it was just it was the perfect introduction.
And I think, you know, for me who is not as versed an anime, there is so much Star Wars there and it's so upfront with its influences that it just you feel like it's like a great syllabus to be like, I want to dive in further.
How do I get there.
Yeah, it's a great like cultural bridge. We're like, all right, this is we're going to bring fans over to anime. We're gona bing anime fans over to Star Wars and like we can all have them populate and find some more gems in both of those those mediums of storytelling.
People wanted to get into some of these The studios that created these Kamakazi Duga Studio, Trigger, Twin Engine, do you have like a some movies that they should check out or some.
Yeah, Studio Trigger Studio Trigger is one of the best in the game. Like what what you saw for the Twins is a great encapsulation of like their style when it comes to like character design and like action and like also humor. I highly recommend Kill a Kill that was probably like one of the most well known first series. I think it's on Netflix. All the seedents are on there or Hulu, one of the two. And also feeling for like a feature that they did pro Mayor I think p R O M A R E. That's on
I believe Amazon. It's a It's a fantastic, fantastic feature with like some amazing animation, uh and some crazy character designs. That's also like that their style. If you notice, like they don't do a lot of like borders for their stuff, Like they'll have like outlines for characters, but a lot of their like background is just like the paint.
That's it.
You don't get any like bard R and stuff like. That's a really cool film to see that through it like a whole future. I highly recommend both of those.
This has been so fun.
I can't wait to have you back so we can talk about the rest of the season. Up next, I crack open the Omnibus. Welcome to another chapter in the Omnibus where Laura, analysis and understanding come together. Today we explore the life and work of director at Kira Kurosawa, his influence on Star Wars and the globalization of anime, which set the stage for Star Wars Visions, a series
that we are watching and talking about today. It makes sense in all of this to start with The Hidden Fortress director Akira kurosawa is nineteen fifty eight classic about a mismatched pair of commoners who bumble their way into a mission to rescue Wolf Princess from.
The upheaval of a civil war.
Is the most famous example of the influence of Japanese culture on Star Wars. Whenever the film comes up in conversation, someone will mention, hey, George Lucas was inspired by that to make Star Wars. Indeed, George Lucas's early scripts for a New Hope hewed so closely to Fortresses that, according to John Baxter and George Lucas a biography, the director briefly considered purchasing the film's remake rights.
Quote.
Hidden Fortress was an influence on Star Wars right from the very beginning, Lucas says in JW. Rinsler's The Making of Star Wars.
Fortress is known as a Jedi jecki, a genre of action adventure usually set during Japan's Edo period, which is thought to be the phonic source of the word Jedi.
In the first draft of Star Wars, the villain who became Darth Vader is named Akira Obi Wan Kenobi would have hit different if the actor playing him was the Hidden Fortresses star and frequent Kurosawa collaborator to Shira Mafuni and Lucas explore the possibility of casting Maffuni before settling on Alec Guinness, and of course, the Jedi themselves are essentially space Samurai Akira Kurosawa casts a death star size shadow over American popular culture and international cinema nineteen fifties.
Raschaman won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and launched Kurosaw at a global acclaim. The movie occupies an interesting cultural space. On the one hand, it's only been officially remade once nineteen sixty four is The Outrage starring Paul Newman. On the other hand, since its release, every story which has come out, every movie in which a single event is examined from multiple points of view
owes something to Raschiman. Rachaman has since become a synonym for the subjective nature of reality and the punchline for a very very funny joke on The Simpsons. Basically, Marge is like, you liked Rashaman, and then Homer is like, no, I didn't, and then they remember this one situation very differently.
Cursawa's nineteen sixty one film Yo Jimbo and its sequel Sinjuro introduced the trope of the mysterious protagonist, later popularised by Clint Eastwood's character in Sergeio Leoni's A Fistful of Dollars trilogy. The Man with No Name would later influence Logan's look and vibe in Frank Miller's four issue Wolverine
limited series. Another major influence on Star Wars Cursawa's nineteen fifty four masterpiece The Seven Samurai is credited with creating the team of specialists on a mission trope, which spawned any number of movies and stories.
That you can imagine.
The Fast and the Furious, Marvels, The Avengers, The Ocean's Eleven, The Remake, and almost every heist movie of the last sixty years.
The Town.
Akira Kurosawa was born in Tokyo in ninety ten to a family descended from Samurai. The youngest of eight children, Akira wanted to be a painter. His father, however, a former military officer and physical education teacher, encouraged him towards the cinema, which was just then emerging in Japan. In nineteen thirty five, Kurosawa answered an advertisement from PCL Studios and was hired on as an assistant director the next year.
During this time, Japan was reaching the culmination of a decades long program of rapid modernization in the late eighteen sixties, Japan was a fractious collection of feuding states with a weak military a pre modern agrarian economy hamstrung by extortionate trade treaties forced on the country by Europe and the
United States. Fast forward in nineteen twelve, and Japan has a strong central bureaucracy governing the country, which enjoyed a burgeoning industrial based a highly educated population zipped around the country in a modern railway system. Once preyed upon by colonial powers, Japan, behind its modern army and navy, had itself become a colonizer after prying the Korean Peninsula away from China in eighteen ninety five. The lasting effects of
that continued to this day. When Russia, one of the so called great powers of the era, began encroaching on Japan's Korean holdings. Japan in nineteen oh four launched a surprise attack on the Tsar's fleet, sparking the Russo Japanese War. Japan's defeat of Russia, it's fair to say, shocked the world and elevated Japan to a first world power. And it is really hard to fathom from a American perspective what the effect of this rapid tectonic change had on
Japan and its culture. In the Asian influence on Hollywood action films, Barnard William Donovan writes of this period, quote, Japanese society, founded on centuries of reverence for tradition and a very powerful sense of cultural identity, would now begin to struggle with the question of how modernization, industrial development, foreign contact, and the need to attain the status of a global power could at the same time remain compatible
with their insular, traditional japaneseeness. Krisawa's career as a director took place during and immediately after World War Two. Under Japan's wartime censorship regime, films were, as Leonard Epp describes in The Oxonian Review quote anti western and preferred representations of devoted and unindividuated workers who were subordinate at least to a social goal, if not also to received and semi feudalistic notion of an authentic Japan, which was under
attack from Western influences end quote. During the American occupation, the Americans put in their own censorship regime, and in addition to managing what American and European movies could be shown in Japan. During this time, Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat, for instance, was denied because it depicted a Nazi captain briefly in
control of the fate of the lifeboat's passengers. Nineteen forty five, As of Metal for Benny was not allowed to be shown due to the film celebration of the protagonist's killing of numerous Japanese soldiers during wartime, probably a good idea, the bureaucracy demanded that domestically produced films break with Japan's feudal past and should criticize Japan's wartime actions a cure. Kurosawa's nineteen forty five film They Who Tread On the Tiger's Trail was denied release because it was set in
twelfth century feudal Japan and promoted Japanese feudal values. It was released later in nineteen fifty two after the Treaty of San Francisco, which reinstated peaceful relations between Japan and the United States and ended the American occupation. But by then, of course, Rashaman had won Kurrosawa international recognition and set his career on a path towards the most rarefied levels of influence, respect and a claim that an artist can reach.
It is ironic, then, that Kurasawa's reputation in his home country at the time and now is decidedly mixed. In the early nineteen seventies, new wave Japanese directors reacted against Kurrosawa's reputation and his perceived cinematic authority rights Leonard Epp in The Oxonian Review. They rebelled against what they saw as an American style which was overly individualistic and too directly influenced by Westerns in the style of John Ford
end quote. Kurrasawa was always open about his admiration for American films and Western literature, and most notably the work of director John Ford. This, along with ironically his acclaim in the US, was used against Kirosawa by his critics and contemporaries, who derided his work as old fashioned, elitist, arrogant, and shaped by the biases of a Western audience, pandering
two American audiences. Essentially, by the nineteen sixties, Kirosawa found himself at a step in Japan, but with the standing of an auteur in Hollywood. In nineteen sixty six, Twenty Century Fox hired him to direct The World War II epic to Tora about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. After working on the script for two years, Korrosawa was either fired or resigned two weeks into shooting. The rumor has it that he was too authoritarian with his American actors.
If that's the case, there was surely some kind of like culture misunderstanding there as well. That said, I think it's fair to say, if you read anything about Krosawa that he was quite imperious with the people he worked with. Let's put it that way. I think it's fair to call him arrogant. In nineteen seventy Do des Kaden, Krissawa's first color film, was savaged by Japanese critics, and it later flopped at the box office. Krosawa fell into a
deep depression and in nineteen seventy one attempted suicide. In the last decades of his career, the filmmaker would find it impossible to finance his projects in Japan. George Lucas, Coppola, and Spielberg used their clout with American studios to raise funds for Kagamusha in nineteen eighty Ran nineteen eighty five, and Dreams in nineteen ninety, writes Barno William Donovan, Kirosawa's dip in fortunes was ironically in part of failure to
react to the rise of television in Japan. Japanese film studios never recovered from the shock of television. While younger directors adapted to the new age by making cheaper films are working for television, Kurrosawa refused. Ian Buruma wrote in a nineteen eighty nine article about Kurrosawa, Japanese television's ascent was fueled ironically in part by the domestic audience's hunger
for a new form of entertainment anime. The transnational pathways of globalization that led us to Star Wars visions just wander off and really really unexpected directions when you dig into it. In the nineteen seventies, new consumer products invented and mass produced in Japan, notably the Walkman, but in particular for our purposes, the Betamax, and most influentially, the VCR, the video cassette recorder, made culture portable in a way
that was simply impossible previously. Americans in Japan, many of whom were members of the military based in the country, began recording Japanese broadcasts of shows like Ashraboy and Starblazers off Japanese television and sent the tapes back to the States. In May nineteen seventy seven, several Los Angeles area anime enthusiasts founded the Cartoon Fantasy Organization CFO, the first anime
fan club, and the organization quickly spread. The Cartoon Fantasy Organization will meet from ten thirty am to five thirty pm today behind the Bank of the Hills on Research. Features will include Grandizer, Danguard, Danguard, Ace, Space Ketters, Starvengers, Brave Raiding, and Astro Boy. The group meets on the second Saturday of each month. End Quote reads an event posting in the September twelfth, nineteen eighty one issue of
the Austin American Statesman. The October twelfth, nineteen eighty four edition of the Philadelphia in Choir ran a bemused coverage of the Philadelphia chapter of the cfo's second anniversary meet up. Quote a little unusual as CFO is, but definitely original.
While other Philadelphians are cruising Saturday night hotspots trying to look like Michael Jackson or Prince, the club's members are searching for artistic and creative merit in and science fiction shows that the rest of the world might find terribly strange.
That's nineteen eighty four, folks. A rather good profile of the CFO appears in the November nineteenth, nineteen eighty seven edition of the Chicago Tribune, which states that the CFO at the time had thirty chapters with several thousand members in Chicago, Denver, Dallas, Houston, San Francisco, and other cities.
In a two thousand and four paper, Progress Against the Law about the spread of anime in the US, cultural globalization and copyright theft, which I'd urge you to read if you want a great history of anime up to the mid two thousands, MIT Sean Leonard writes that anime fan distribution networks quote represented prostalyization commons or spaces where media and ideas could be freely exchanged INWD to advance a directed cause, which I think is a good description
of the Internet. In twenty twenty one, an examination of Japanese and American popular culture across pollenization reveals these dizzying meta textures details that surrounds It's not often clear who pollinated whom Up Next? Alisha Lutz joins us for the Hive Mind Welcome to the Hive Mind, where we dive deeper into a particular topic with the help of a guest panelist. On today's episode, Actually Vision is happy to
welcome writer Alisha Lutz. You can find her most recent article on Vulture, which features an interview with Ted Lasso's Phil Dunster.
Alicia, Welcome, Thank you so much for having me. Jason, it's a thrill.
Let's talk about with the release of Star Wars Visions, it's worth unpacking the role that the movies now play in the overall firmament of the Star Wars universe. I guess we could boil that time down to does it matter if the Star Wars movies suck or not? The most recent trilogy, I think the general contensus it was disappointing.
But it feels like with Star Wars Visions, with the Mandalorian, with all the various Disney Plus shows that are coming out, with Star Wars Rebels, with the finale of Clone Wars, it kind of doesn't matter because we have so much stuff. Let's talk about it, Alicia, start with you. Does it like where do you think what is the role of the Star Wars movies now with all this other Star Wars content.
That is out there. Well, you know, it's interesting because I think that.
Lucasfilm and Star Wars thought really big, but they got themselves stuck in a trap by sort of repeating old patterns and thinking that they're getting.
It's a trap.
Sorry, I I know, I thought about not doing it, but then I felt everybody listening to this doing it, so that I had to do.
I'm sorry, continue, you know what, It's fair, It's absolutely fair. But yeah, no, I think that it's just they set themselves up for failure with the most recent trilogy, although I am somebody who does like a lot of what was being presented in The Last Jedi, even though that there's very constructive and valid reasons why some of the things in that film didn't work. But what I think Ryan Johnson was trying to get at in that was
that the Force belongs to everyone. And I think that we're getting to see that in Star Wars Visions, and we're getting to see that in you know, Clone Wars and Rebels, and you get to see these other parts of the universe that have so many different stories to tell, and it's just such a deliciously verdant breeding ground for all of the different types of stories that can be told in this vast universe.
Like it's galaxies, it's not just one family just doing the thing over and over again, you know.
Yeah, I think it was Karl Marx who said that we must seize the means of producing the kyber crystals and socialize the force for everyone. Yeah, I like, you know, I feel the same way about the about the the most recent trilogy, and that there's like a lot of stuff to admire. Honestly, in all the three moves to the Last Year is my favorite of those. There was good stuff in all of them, but on the whole it felt a little bit like movie making Bike Committee.
Whereas the Mandalorian Rebels and now Star Wars visions there is a reason behind them existing and there's something that.
They are saying, Oh totally, zig, what do you what is?
What are your thoughts about like where the movies stand in the in the current content offerings.
I mean, both of all are spitting straight facts right now. I think that one is having just just telling Jason, I had just rewatched all the movies in chronological order, because I'm very unimp at the moment. So my my big takeaway rewatching the first the Newest trilogies is that like there's not a lot of fun in them. Like the first like Stars and Star Wars Awakens is like the most fun. We're like, oh, we got wacky jokes and stuff. But like even watch the original trilogy, like
it's it's it's like a watching it. I mean, it's obviously made for kids, and like that's something that like sort of perminates about all of them. But like the Newest trilogy where like you know, you're you're you're wristling with like the light and dark stuff, which is interesting, but like it's also like so heavy, and like the second, like the whole third act of like the first one
is just like so not fun. Like so like there's this whole like mystery box stuff, which like you know, I'm not a big fan of that in general, Like there's no real mystery and the original it's like you don't wonder who Luke's parents are, Like you don't care.
You're like, oh, this is a kid.
He went, he goes on an adventure, he meets some weird people and like that's his thing, Like I don't I don't care about how the person got there, and like speaking to your point about like you have this enormous galaxy, which I think the TV shows really tap into, Like you get to see what happens with like the squad of like the Bad Troopers, so you can see what the Mandalorian does, or you can see like what Ahsoka is doing up up to but like this, it
seems the movies seem so contained because it's just two bloodlines, and like the whole thesis for the Last Jedi, which I really enjoyed, was that like who gives a shit, throw out the good the bad, this like it's about starting something over with and like I really enjoyed that, and I felt it was a little bit of an undercut at the end when like the first the kid that we see that gets powers is like another white kid.
You're like I've seen.
That movies, Like yeah, it's like there's like a there's like a there's like a black kid like right there, give it to them, Like there's like a little brown
girl like give that to them. And like the course correction in like the last the last of three was just like, yeah, maybe maybe the films could be sort of a thing where they make these big tents, they set up like more stuff for the world, so like it's a big well and they can go back to like all right, we need to establish that there's like the final order or whatever, like all right, we'll set this up in one movie and then like we can just have that permeate through like the TV shows if
they want to go to that and like tap into these certain things. Like I think maybe doing standalone is the is the maybe the move like where one was great, Solo was was fantastic. In my opinion, I think having small, self contained stories might be the move going forward because also like trilogies are just sort of a going going out of the way, like you know, besides mar of like I don't know ive trilogies is like.
The move for like features at this point.
Story, Yeah, Rogue one is my favorite, and I think part of that is because it is a different angle on the story that you know, it's filling in one, it's answering a story which was like how do they get these plans? You know, ever since uh, you know, you heard about the spy mission to acquire the plans, You're like, oh, how did this happen? So now you get that, which was so cool. And also it just wasn't based. It is no more Skywalkers, like it wasn't.
These were like all new people, and you really felt it when they died. It's interesting because the fact that there that Clone Wars exist, that Rebels exist, kind of for me at least softened the blow of the disappointment of, you know, the new trilogy. The fact that it wasn't that great didn't leave me crushed in the same way that the prequels when they when the first.
You know, when oh the Prequels came out and it was like what the fuck was that?
It really like hurt me because I was like, now it's like, it's unclear that novelization stuff is even canon anymore, and now this kind of sucked, like what are we gonna do? And it wasn't until Clone Wars kind of got going years later that all of that stuff got recontextualized and became kind of cool. But this makes it, This makes it so that not everything hangs on the
movies just being good. I would I do wonder you mentioned Marvel like I wonder if I wonder if they they go for a kind of like Marvel architecture in that they have these kind of like one shots.
We're exploring the universe.
Let's go over here and check out what these rebels are doing over here, Let's see what these this spy faction is doing over here. Let's just go off and check out a weird world. And then, much like the Marvel movies, there's some kind of thing that teems them all up in a later movie, and then and that breaks you out of like this kind of like trilogy architecture, which yes, Star Wars kind of like pioneered, but is feels like old movie thinking.
It's so stale now to do sort of like this. It's very expected to do a trilogy or a quadrilogy or you know, to do these big sort of sequelized stories. But I think that because of the just the financial pressure on a business standpoint of what it takes to make those movies happen, it makes so much.
More sense to have your sort of.
Area of exploration and play be on television, be in these little stories. And I mean we got to see, especially in Visions, just the what happens when you let people do what they're good at and really like let them just play and have fun and tackle some of the themes that Star Wars does so well, but in a completely different from a completely different perspective. I think it's just it's what it's what this universe needs.
Yeah, and even the speaking of that, like the cultural half life is so much longer when like you're releasing an episode every week like YEP eight for two months to two and a half months, everyone talked, Everyone talked about was baby Yoda.
That's all that they talked about. I was, I was.
I was up there with the bill horn yelling about how much I would die for this little puppet. It was like what the movie comes out, you know, you have really two to four weeks of like all right, yo, did you see the new Star Wars whatever?
And then it's like just dead.
But with having this like recurring thing coming out also, you're stacking that so like you'll have Mandela, and you'll have the bad Batch, you'll have whatever coming out. Like it just stays in the cultural zeitgeist so much longer than just a film which comes out and then it's gone in less than a month.
Unless it's like you know, endgame or whatever.
That's a great point.
I was working at the Ringer at the time that the first Mandalorian season came out, and people who don't care about Star Wars, don't give a shit about sci fi or fantasy that worked. There would be like when the subject of baby Yoda came up, like there was a it was like.
You could feel the energy change in the room.
Like my former editor Chris Ryan, like his wife was like, if you get a chance to see baby Yoda, to meet Baby Yoda, to go and see the prop, like you have to take me not a person who like cares about side. And that was like the vibe. There were people who were just like, listen, if Baby Yoda is coming by the office, or if anybody gets to go see Babyoda, please tell me because I want to go see Baby Yoda.
Like that.
I have not experienced something like that in a while, where it was just like this little.
Prop doll baby and a matronic rogu baby fifty years old child, just like it was something that so many people needed And yeah, that was not that was not that's not a thing that could have really happened in a movie.
Koa totally and like I also think the pandemic and it all probably played into that a little bit.
We were all looking for some joy, but.
Like, yeah, again it was it was taking something that we are very familiar with, you know, Yoda, and just flipping it on its head just a little.
Bit, no Bay, and all of a sudden we're all.
Were hurtzalg and we're all like, let me see the baby, let me see the baby.
When I saw him for the first time, I said, John, do you understand what you have done? For the first time, you have captured the energy that was originally put into the world by the depictions of the Madonna and child, the Messiah John.
Sevral chaos raids. John.
Yeah, it was so cool and I want to acknowledge something to Zigwert and I were talking about this, like when we were getting the Zoom started up. Okay, the movies the latest trilogy.
Was a disappointment.
That said, we also grade this stuff on a different scale, which I think is a huge strength for the TV offerings, Right like Kathleen Kennedy JJ Aram's Ettal got to make three movies and we judge them on those three movies. On the TV side, it's like Clone Wars, which spanned one hundred and thirty three episodes, and some of those.
Suck, but we don't care.
You're never going to talk about the fact that some of those I didn't watch Resistance, I watched some of it, it wasn't for me.
I love Rebels.
But like the fact that on the TV side they get all of these they get all these chances to tell a story. And you know what if three episodes here, four episodes there are two episode arc here doesn't hit, we don't. We don't fucking give a shit. But if the movie suck, you're gonna hear about it. So there is an inherent there's a different way that we talk
about these properties. And it's a little bit unfair for for JJ and Kathleen because you know, they only got those three chances where I was on the TV side, they got dozens and dozens and dozens of chances over multiple seasons to get it right or get yeah.
I mean, I will say it would have been nice if JJ and everybody decided to have a plan when they made those three movies rather than just I go in a little willy nilly with it, because on TV they play you plan a lot I feel like they had one.
But again, you can feel the filmmaking by committee in those.
You can feel like you.
Can feel that they're you know, somebody, some executive somewhere was like, there's not enough kids with the force in here. Can't one of these stable hands that have the Force or something? And they're like, oh shit, now we got to rewrite. But and you had to address it. But you felt and honestly the right you know, the last Jedi feels the least of that, but you feel it in all of them where it's like there's stuff in Rise of Skywalker where you like where it hooks up
to nothing else. It's just like a snippet that happens.
It's like that, like, yeah, we got to give fan a love interest because we can't. You can't date a black person, can't date a white lady in the future in space.
Like, so, what are the futures of the movies? Like, one thing that is for sure is that people at Disney are smart.
They may have made three.
Like disappointing movies, but these are people who think about this ship all the time, Like, so, how do y'all think.
They'll recalibrate in the future?
And how will they approach movies now to work in conjunction with this burgeoning slate of TV offerings plus the comics, plus the books, etc.
You know.
I think that they're going to really use sort of this space that they're creating with television to get a feel for what people are really responding to and really start to understand that storytelling is changing and the way
we tell stories people want more from them. And I think that this is going to be a real opportunity for them to sort of sit back and like take a beat and take a breath and not necessarily have to put out a movie every single year and all the have all of those expectations sort of rolled into it.
They're going to be able to.
Really let the creation of new lore sort of simmer in itself and see what people are really responding to and what really resonates with what's going on cult truly.
So I think it's really important because this trilogy that we just saw it comes from a different culture, like, it comes from a different desire for what movies are and what movies should be, and it was just too much of a reflection of what we've seen in the past, and we're moving so much farther ahead in how we tell stories and the types of stories that we want
to tell. And I think that TV gives them a much greater space of experimentation that I think they'll be able to then sort of let things rise to the top and really explore that in a big budget way.
Yeah, I mean, just especially that last part about the idea of experimentation, Like that's where they can test things out and see what sticks, you know, like like introducing the idea of like force healing in the Mandalorian before it went to the big screens, Like I mean Star Wars.
I mean, all fans are bad. Fantom is bad in general, but like you know, Star.
Wars fans hate when you introduce a new power that comes out of nowhere. But when you think about it, like they like there was no tea up for like force lightning, like propatites, like does that ship and yeah help, yeah, yeah, somehow he came back and he can do force lighting.
But like you know, like that tea that.
Like Gorgo does that in the minimal rate and then like Raid does, Like that's a running theme throughout you know, the Rise of Skywalkers. Like I think that teeing stuff up that like maybe just get like a little a little nugget of like, oh, this is a force power, like this is like a thing of the universe that
we didn't know. And then I think, you know, if they want to test out, like if there's like a if they do, like you know, they have like a Sith show or whatever they want to like, Oh, this character is interesting and I would like to see it makes sense for this to come to culminate in a feature. This is a story that can only be told in a ninety minute like features story act, Like I think our structure that would make sense.
Like, but I don't. I don't know.
I can't see them being like we're gonna do another
trilogy about another good versus bad. Yeah, I think I think an interesting take would see the gray of the world, like the neutral Sith, the gray Jedi, like just seeing like how those people interact, like something that takes place after the fall of the Jedi Order, where it's just like, yeah, there are people out there sort of like kyler Rin who are like sort of okay at being sort using the four, but they can still get their ass beat by people that don't know what they're that sort of
know what they're doing. Like that's an interesting onle just like seeing the rogue one of it, seeing like you know, the the feet on the ground every day, people that are like living in this post glactic or Final chapter, whatever the fuck it was called.
What they're like final order.
Yeah, well that's what I loved so much about Visions, Like the ideas that they get into in those in the episodes are just it's so exciting to see, you know, like a Ronan style story with you know, like a Sith and just I mean the way that the Force they use different aspects of the Force on different planets.
I love that shit, Like give.
Me more of it, like spoon feed it to me, Like.
That's what I what I mean.
Like, you know, as a as a kind of like basic storytelling rule, there should always be new information. And that's the great thing about Star Wars Visions is yes, we're exploring kind of like the core themes of Star Wars, the duality of the Force, you know, droids, a human relationship with droids, cool laser swords, et cetera. But it's also just feels so fresh and new. This has been
so fun up next to the endgame. We're in the end game now, and this week we are playing the Medal of Yavin, in which we will award that great medal that Chewiy didn't get at the end of Star Wars racial basically racial reasons like why didn't he was so important to the to the mission to blow up the death start and then he doesn't get a fucking medal. It's it's honestly insane, and I still get mad about it.
But we are gonna award the Medal of Yavin to our favorite character from the first three episodes of Star Wars Visions. Let's start with you, Cody, who is your favorite?
I got to give award to my boy, to my slug king Geezer, the Hub. He's holding it down for all the fail sons out there in the universe. Garage Space Garage Buck band playing that double bass or double space base. But if they called it, Yeah, I Love, I Love, I Love a good hut that's going through his punk phase. And since they lived for thousands of years, I've imagine Geezer's probably like two hundred years old, So like I Love, Yeah, we stay at a King.
Alicia, I have to go.
This is I have to say this is unusual for me.
I'm not usually like a.
Big SITH person, but the Bandit Leader Lucy Lewis character and the duel she just she deserves a metal just for the crazy swhirling lightsaber umbrella thing, like I'm sorry, that is like one of the most bad ass.
Things I have ever seen.
And I mean I also really the little chief in the in the ronan he's he's actually probably deserves it more than the actual terrible sys O's Like.
She was just so badass, Like I couldn't get enough. She was incredibly bad.
Oh my god, for days.
When she lets her like her hood just like fly her hair was like, yes, I also love the Bandit Leader, but you know what, in order to keep it different, I'm going to pick the twins together carrying in. I'm going to pick them as one person who together kind of embody the duality of the force and the constant struggle between light and dark.
Uh.
And of course for their incredible uh use of hyper stylized violence, massive destruction, and immense power in the seemingly frail bodies of two individuals. The contains so much power and force and it was just it was incredible to watch. I'm gonna they're gonna have to share the medal. They'll figure out a way to do it. Yeah, slice it down the medal.
Those are.
Yes.
I was so that that medals for them. Let me just leave it in a room and walk away. I don't want to hand it to them because I'll probably get cut up into a million pieces.
That's it for the endgame.
Let us know whether you agree or couldn't disagree more or have your own Medal of Yavin winner. Get it us at hashtag x r v endgame. That's x r v end Game, Cody, Alicia, thanks for joining us on another episode of Extra Vision.
Plug plug Plug. Where can we find y'all next?
If you want to find me, yay, physic across all them social media platforms, Baby, that's where I be. Check out Amazing Spider Man number seventy. Yeah, I got I got that dropping out. So yeah, that's that's where.
I be amazing, And I'm at Alicia lots on all the things Twitter, Instagram, not Facebook, and that's where I post all my stories and all.
The silly thoughts. So yeah, you can check me out there.
Join us each week on Wednesday, our new regular release day for your weekly dose to the deepest dives, hottest takes, et cetera. May the Force remain with you, May it be with you, carry it with you wherever you go.
Folks.
X ray Vision is a Crooked Beata production. This show is produced by Chris Lord and Saul Rubin. The show is executive produced by myself and Sandy Geard, Caroline Resident and Carlton Gillespie Or Consulting produces. Thank you to Brian Vasquez for our theme music and editing and sound design. Today, Sarah give Alaska and the folks at chapter four. Sarah,
thank you for doing this from your vehicle today. I super appreciate it and it's been fun to watch over Bye bye Cody, who is the tastiest star Wars Alien Like if you had to give you had to cook him up?
Oh boy, Uh, this sounds great. I mean the salacious Crumb comes to mind because his last name says crumbs, so I feel like he's probably some tasty liver fat going on.
I've I've always maintained that Admiral Acbar like some salt, oh boy, yeah, and some lemon. You sear that bad boy up? Yeah, he's good it tastes. Oh yeah, so fucking good.
Pull out those pin bones, yeah you know, yeah.
I bet him? And what was that the Squid Dude kid Kit bash? Oh yeah yeah we.
Get this cut, the cut those tentacles off and like just like fry those up.
Yeah yeah, like oh fuck yeah there fry yeah,