Latest / Nerds of the Old Republic: The Drinking Person’s #Scifi Club / Sipping Sake and Diving into 'Ghost in the Shell'

Transcript

Sipping Sake and Diving into 'Ghost in the Shell' · Nerds of the Old Republic: The Drinking Person’s #Scifi Club

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Music.
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Hello and welcome to nerds in the old republic the podcast where
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we drink well anything and everything and we
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talk about nerdy fiction i'm adam i'm sean
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and i'm mike and we are here getting ready to talk about the 1995 cult classic
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ghost in the shell i hear it's a cult classic not just because of the android
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nudity but we'll get to that i suppose classic is probably about the highest
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praise you can give it yeah i've got some stats on it that i was pulling up
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for notes and And it's interesting.
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But before we get to that, if you've never listened to the show before,
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besides partnering with, uh, partnering the media conversation with some sort
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of beverage, which I'm really looking forward to, got something very different
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that we've never done on the cast today, to the best of my knowledge,
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right? We've never done this.
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We have not. Don't think so. No. Actually, now that I think about it.
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We found a brand new liquid. Yeah.
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And, uh, I know, right? We're running out of options now.
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But, you know, also just want to say, uh, since I seem a little distracted,
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the Bills game is on in the background.
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So i'm sorry if i'm a little bit distracted go bills yep go bills
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we are absolutely running towards the
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playoffs yes the game does not matter at all for playoff
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seating but but nevertheless it's a bills game we
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watch yeah and you know i like seeing our fourth stringers get some field time
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especially joe andreason no we have buffalo joe get your time man get your time
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get that roster spot so firstly let's dive into our beverage that which i was
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alluding to the this is this is Totally new. And was this you, Sean?
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I roamed the halls of my local wine distributor looking for a Dornish red or
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an Arbor Gold for our previous cast.
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And then realized, well, Adam's already got that one covered with ale.
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Yeah, I wish it was easy brown ale. And it was just delicious, by the way. It was.
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And I decided once I walked past a certain section to go, wait a minute,
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that looks Japanese. That is Japanese.
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That'll work. and i know we've done asian and
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more specifically japanese works before on the cast but
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i don't think we've like you mentioned i thought we did but i guess not we've never
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done never done a sake so
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i got the cheapest sake i could find in buffalo that is totally fine it's important
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yeah i mean i have a bottle i would be stunned if there was a sake distillery
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in the area and i will not be able to tell you the difference between quality
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and cheap sake so i'm going to keep the bottle to show my daughter who there
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you go is like learning japanese but it says.
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Which looks kind of like,
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Fucky. It's the finest Japanese sake. 100% produced and bottled in Japan.
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And alcohol by volume, 16%. All right. Okay, it's a fortified wine. Pour us a pint.
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We'll drink to you. Let me just see. There are some tasting notes, bitches.
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Are you ready for this? Yes. Should I do it in my most racist Japanese accent? No.
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We don't have any listeners in Japan, but that doesn't make it better. Fukusaki.
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Fukisake is produced by cold fermentation. I sound like Mr. Sulu.
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Hang on. You do. That was not intentional. Damn it, Jim. I'm a doctor.
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Fukisake is produced by cold fermentation and made solely from sun-nurtured rice and spring water.
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We remove the rice's outer husk or polish it so that it is crystal clear and
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has an extra smooth taste,
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Try our premium Fuki sake served warm into traditional style chilled on the
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rocks or in cocktails product of Japan.
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You know what that kind of reminds me of is Bill Murray again,
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front of the cast in Boston translation. He's doing that.
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Like, is it, I think it's like a Japanese whiskey that he's like schlepping
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for and he clearly doesn't want to. I remember that one. Yeah. Yeah.
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Sitting on a leather ottoman or some shit like that.
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Basically doing the same thing. clearly with a voice or a
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face that says i don't want to be fucking here yep but what
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i love is that those weren't even tasting notes really as
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much as it was like the the process of making the
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explanation of the beverage and can one tell me if it's not sun nurtured what
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is the is it like hydroponic rice grow rice hydroponically i guess you could
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do with your grow light and your you know in your superintendent's closet that
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got i mean that got real other things using my grow lights right now.
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They got very technical in that.
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They're like, first you remove the outer husk of the rice.
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It's produced and bottled by Godou Sushai Company Limited Japan.
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Imported by Sazeric Company Incorporated Matari Louisiana.
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Sazeric. Alright, anyway, let's do this. Alright.
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Finest of the fun. Love that cork sound. Oh, yeah. Look at that.
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The finest sake is from Screwtops. I have to compliment that Mike and his little
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clay jars that we're using again. Yes. Things are fantastic.
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Yeah. I looked, I looked on Google. I'm like, how does one serve sake?
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And it said small glasses and I clicked images and many of the small glasses were clay.
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And I was like, well, fuck, I have that shit.
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That's right. We are drinking it chilled, which was one of the options on the
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back of the bottle. I have had sake warm.
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Actually, the most sake I've had is when I go to a hibachi restaurant and they spray in your mouth.
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So that's not really oh yes that's not the same no well I got a spray bottle
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if you guys want to do you have to call me sake daddy though because that's
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what they always say alright guys well shall we yes let's do cheers cheers,
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that's sake that's better than the stuff in the bocce restaurant well that's
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cooking sake this is this is sipping sake this is real sake with the outer husk
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removed yes it's polished that's the difference right there actually though
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like I don't mind this like no this is Good.
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Yeah. It's not bad. I, I have had sake before, but it was like 15 or 18 years ago.
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And also I was going to say, this is not as chilled as I expected it to be after
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like an hour of sitting on ice.
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I wonder if the bottle, the bottom of the bottle, the way we,
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I have it set up there, it's like very chilled.
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And then what we're drinking is fine. Yeah.
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It said it could be served this way. So this is perfectly valid.
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I am really enjoying drinking out of this like little Winnie the Pooh honeypot.
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I do love that. This is fantastic.
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I bought these i think i said this last time we used them on the cast but we went to,
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portland maine and they had everyone's like you got to go to this mexican
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restaurant there and we're like really in portland maine it
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seemed like such a random suggestion yeah and then
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we walked by it because it wasn't far from where we were staying and from the
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outside it looks like this tiny little mexican restaurant and we're like like
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damn the food must be really good there if everyone's recommending it so we're
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like whatever so we go in and it's huge right it's deceptive because like Maine
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is like, you know, it's like on the bay there.
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And so like the ground falls away and the restaurants built like down that.
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Right. So it just opens up and it becomes huge. And then you go out the back
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and there's these massive like patios that go out overlooking the water.
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Gorgeous. Right. So we had already eaten. So we didn't get any food,
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but I ordered, they had a mezcal flight option.
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And I'm like, I'm like, fucking give me that. They're like, which ones do you
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want? I'm like, give me the smokiest ones you have, you know?
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And they brought it out and they serve them in
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these like little terracotta clay but they were like flat almost
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like a more of a bowl than than this so
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anyways i was like on amazon at the
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same time as i was like these are so fucking cool i gotta get these
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i'm on amazon i couldn't find the bowl kind but i found these
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and i ordered them and then i was reminded that i had
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ordered them when they showed up at the house i love that
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when i like buzzed amazon buy something and then
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on saturday which is our Amazon yeah I'm like oh hey that's
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right which vinyl record did I buy when I was in my
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cups the other night I know I called it like I wanted to poo honey pot but it's
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also more of like an Egyptian vessel for like your eyeballs to go into the afterlife
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with you yeah my liver is gonna go as well that's a small ass liver man well
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it's gotten very little left also eyeballs are bigger than you think you probably
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get one eyeball in this though yeah.
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I'm going to not ask how you know that. This is where my tape work is for the airfield. There you go.
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I can tell you how I know that. Because my father told us this story many,
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many times when we were children, because I guess that's just what my father
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thought was a good story to tell your children.
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But before he became a police officer, he worked on an ambulance.
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And I think a person had died or something like that.
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And he said he actually saw like the eyeball had to be removed for some reason
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for something they were doing and he he said he never forgot how she was shocked
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how big it actually was because it actually is like yeah do your little socket
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right right yeah so anyways that's exposed to the world yeah little six-year-old
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mike never forgot that story.
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Yeah i got more yeah top me off before we start talking about you actually i really do like me
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too man i was like i don't mind it speaking speaking of uh
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eyeballs and parts of human bodies let's
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get into uh ghost in a shell yes ghost in my shell so
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i will readily admit that
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i was an anime nerd in my school slash
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still am and i was absolutely aware of
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this series but i was not i never watched
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it so this was a brand new watch
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for me even though i'd watched like you know i mentioned kawaii bebop and
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a lot of like the adult swim is pretty much where i saw any
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anime which was you know cartoon networks late
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night programming where they put whatever violent sort
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of mostly nude sort of thing and i
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can readily admit that the hentai eyes and the nudities what drew 16 year old
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adam to that but i stayed for the stories eventually that's what i'm gonna say
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yeah yeah yeah i read it for the stories sure sure well i mean that's what happens
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with any kind of you know like i wonder if he eventually does fix the cable
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you know yeah does that pipe.
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Did you guys have any, like, is this a watch? Is this a rewatch for you guys?
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I was the person who suggested it. Why?
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Well, we already know where you stand. Yeah. I remember knowing of it.
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I remember watching isolated parts of it here and there and never watching the
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whole thing straight through.
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I think the part that I saw was when she's attacking the tank at the end and
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me going like, what the fuck is this? Yeah.
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And like being like drawn to it, but then never actually following up on watching
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it, but being aware of it.
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And this is my opportunity to finally like cross that off and say like,
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okay, I've seen one of the most influential animes of all time.
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Between this and Akira, we've taken care of both of them. I think those are
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the two big pillars, right? Of mainstream anime.
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And yeah, that was where I was with it. And I've never seen the live action
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or any other stuff. Like this was. From what I've seen, you shouldn't.
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Yeah. From what I've heard, you shouldn't. Even Scarlett Johansson can't save that turd.
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I have very little to zero experience
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with anime which is kind of interesting because you're the cyberpunk guy
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like you brought stevenson to the cast for us yeah i mean and gibson i've read
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a couple of times and i don't know i'm a big fan of the matrix if you want to
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call that cyberpunk or whatever i i love the aesthetic of it but i've i've never
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like it's just not it wasn't something,
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you know i guess i'm kind of uh late in life nerd
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and anime was something like as an adult i
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wasn't ever gonna just go back to and decide
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to get into as an adult which is probably why i
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missed the boat on a lot of that stuff but i i'll say about this i think very
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if i remember correctly these were my exact same thoughts that i had for akira
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which is i loved certain aspects of it i i did not love the story at all because
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I could barely understand it.
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And I was, for me, the.
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I would, I wish I would have watched it in the original Japanese with subtitles
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because for me, like the English translation or narration or whatever just is, is jarring.
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It doesn't work, you know, right? Like right from the beginning when he's like,
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I demand diplomatic immunity. And it's like, that's not how people talk.
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That's so fucking weird.
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You know, like I think you're like an aesthetic choice. You can tell. Right.
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And I think it's, it's probably an aspect that the more of it you watch,
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you get used to it and you don't notice it.
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But when it's not your normal, you know, viewing experience, it's very jarring.
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And so I didn't dig that. And I didn't dig, like, like I said,
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the plot was so fucking convoluted and shit. It was like, it was like diplomats
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and corporations and all this fucking shit.
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And I'm like, dude, fucking, I like my literature complex, but like, slow down.
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Let me like figure out what the fuck is happening here. right yeah but
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like there were many things that i did like about
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it though i mean it's one of the things i liked about akira i
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liked about this too is like the very urban noir-esque feel
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to it you know and it's yes it's all it's it's
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dark you're like most of it takes place at night like i i honestly
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i thought the soundtrack to this was fucking awesome man there was so many parts
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where i was watching i was just like the music's really cool you like that weird
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godzilla background music or like yeah well there was some but it wasn't as
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bad as akira true akira was like There was a moment where I remember staring at that man-child baby,
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and that screechy sort of thing was happening for probably 15 seconds.
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At least Ghost in the Shell had much more orchestrated soundtrack.
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It did. It did, and there were moments where there was no music.
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It was just percussion, and the percussion was very cool.
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Right after the part you're talking about, it settles into her waking up in
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her apartment or whatever.
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And it happens slowly and she gets up and
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looks out the window and walks across the apartment and it's literally just like
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a drumbeat in the background that's very cool the few scenes where
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she's got a top very few very few scenes yeah
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so i mean i thought the soundtrack was great i loved the
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whole like nighttime in the city like new rs aspect
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of it there were there were a lot of times where i just thought what
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i was looking at was very cool like they go through all
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these like abandoned buildings and like you know
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city landscapes and stuff i was like you know in terms
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of just like the visuals on screen i thought was very cool so
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i mean i had mixed feelings about i i will not sit here
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and tell you that like i loved it and i think it's a classic or
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i understand why it is a classic but i didn't hate it either yeah
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and so all of those things are kind of
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the reception you see if you go back and like look at how it was received so
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debuted 95 why it didn't like tank at the box office um because it was like
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a traditional theater release but it It wasn't like they recouped their money
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and that's probably all they did, maybe a little bit more.
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It wasn't until the direct to home. So Blockbuster essentially made it because
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that's when people started watching it and like rewatching it and it became
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a cult classic in that way.
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Well, I guess that's how most cult classics happen, right? They don't happen
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at the theater, they happen at home.
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So much so that it was nominated for seven worldwide animation awards and won
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five of the seven that it was nominated for.
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I can see the aesthetic, artistic merit.
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Yeah. There's a lot of beautiful scenes.
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There's a lot of weird ones, but there's also a lot of real pretty stuff.
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But it's like Mike was saying the storyline is
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I don't even know if listening to it in the original Japanese
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and reading subtitles would have changed the fact that it's extremely I
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don't want to say convoluted because that's even giving it too much like half-baked
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I think would be the better way to put it sometimes yeah right and they're trying
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to use this political intrigue and all this to basically get to the idea that
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no it's an existential story about what is a soul right yeah which is where
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I was going to get to it after we talk about the plot sorry I jumped No, you're fine.
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We're on the same page. It's essentially the same thing.
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It's not the most well-written thing. The voice acting on the English version was pretty terrible.
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But the animation, except for the parts where I kept noticing like,
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oh, they're saving money by
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just having a still frame here and maybe a little hair blow in the breeze.
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Oh, the character, Major, never blinks.
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Did you notice that? Well, she's an android. But that's the thing that's really unsettling.
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One time, she closes her eyelids there
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once when she's looking over to the side and that's it in the entire movie
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she never blinks and it just makes the whole thing so like
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what it's like creepypasta like what the fuck am i looking
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at and that horrible haircut and just like
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she's like androgynous but she's got great set of tits i
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mean like just the whole thing
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was just and okay let me ask you this she's got this thermo skin or whatever
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that makes her invisible right which i thought was dope like it's cool it reflect
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reflected yeah no it's like the predator it's super cool but then she's got
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guns in like stockings because all anime characters wear like thigh highs those go,
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invisible too and she has to take everything else off yeah i wondered about
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that except for these cool things that make her look like some kind of like
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dominatrix right well thanks for blowing that up but wouldn't you wouldn't you
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i thought about that too like wouldn't the stockings and the guns be like floating
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in air maybe i don't understand the technology here but no no It's the aesthetic. So...
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Two things one you're right because there is a
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character in the first 10 minutes who has the same technology and
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that's when they're like oh shit there's some real problem going
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on here that someone's got this other technology but they
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had a cloak on they had like an entire like yes cloak and hood right and that
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gun floated yeah so you're right there's a plot hole there right sure she just
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looks cooler that way she just looks way cooler with well i agreed but so just
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to kind of close the circle for a sec. So it won best animated feature.
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No, I'm sorry. These are the Annie Awards. It was nominated for.
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So the Annie Awards are like the worldwide animation.
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Nominated for best animated, nominated for best directing, nominated for best
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production design, nominated for best writing.
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Oh, must have been a thin year. Nominated for best producing.
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What did it win? Anything? 96 nominee
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the catalonian international film festival for best film
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fantis porto winner international fantasy
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film international fantasy film best film
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and special mention in a different category the
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gerendomer film festival special mention
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world animation collection winner best theatrical
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feature best director of an animated for a theatrical
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film feature film winner yokohama
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film festival best screenplay so it
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won some international awards but it did
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not win any annies that it was nominated for okay but
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yeah it's interesting though that you know
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like you said it had a mixed theatrical reaction and was
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nominated for a bunch of awards and yet this is considered one of these seminal
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works of anime yeah it's right out there with akira and i got the same vibe
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so like obsensibly it's just a cyborg policewoman and her partner looking to
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hunt down a hacker who's taking over other cyborgs or actually other internet,
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though they didn't use that word, internet connected things,
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because there's a whole bunch of stuff that a hacker called the puppet master takes over.
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That on the face of it sounds very straightforward and easy to follow,
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but I absolutely struggled, like Mike said, to follow a lot of it.
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I think it was the presentation for me. Like, like you said,
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convoluted does it too much credit because that makes it seem like there's actually,
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you know, like describing, I don't know, inception or something, right?
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Like where it's like, there actually is a lot to unpack there.
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This, it seems like at the heart of it is actually probably a simple story,
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but like, it's just, it's the way it was presented.
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And maybe I wasn't in the right frame of mind when I was watching it.
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I don't know, but it would, they would just be like, oh, this diplomat and he's
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trying to get out, but they want to stop him in district six.
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Well, you know what I mean?
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It's just like, whoa, like too many, like, you know, organizations and people
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and motivations all being thrown into like a couple sentences of dialogue.
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The whole point is basically the idea that a soul isn't necessarily only belonging
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to a human being. Right. Right. And they just wanted to tell that story.
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And that was it. It's a fascinating theme, by the way, you know,
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and anything that gets into like those kinds of questions, existential questions
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where like, you know, they kept talking in this movie about how like,
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well, isn't isn't memory really what defines you?
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And then what happens if you can like fuck with those memories and things like
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that? And, but then I, that, that also led me, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here.
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You can stop me if I am, but like, I felt like the ending was very unsatisfying
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because it didn't, it was sort of like at the end, it didn't really answer any
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of those questions or anything. It just was like, well, you could become a new thing.
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And she's like, ah, that sounds great. And like the movie ended,
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you know, like, well, there was no acceptance. Like it just, they got sniped. Right.
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And then you find out, oh, he put her in a school girl body.
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Right. Which is really troubling.
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Yeah. But I guess it's a child of the two merged beings. She's not the same.
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She's not the major anymore. Not the puppet master.
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It's the major master. I think that's probably what they were going for.
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They don't give it a name, do they? No. The symbolism of youth is probably why
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they went with that imagery.
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Yeah, but we all know what that was really about. Yeah. Yeah.
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But at the same time, we all know that anime had... But I was just unsatisfied with how they got there.
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Because it was like literally the puppet master is like
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well if you know she's like why would i
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let you do this and he's like well then you'll just be the same thing you always
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were and she's like great point and then she wakes up
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in like a new body and she's like a new thing and it's like that's just
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bad writing and that character motivation i thought was very thin because on
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that boat it just came out of nowhere correct the major has that like weird
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philosophical thing about like what is the nature of the soul blah blah blah
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and like okay so i get the person's driven maybe by that, but it's not really clear.
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And then I have to merge with this thing. I have to dive in to the point where
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she rips her arms off trying to open this tank up where the thing wasn't even there.
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The whole thing looked really cool, but it really.
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Made no sense at all for the character's actions. There's better ways to, to, to go that way.
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I mean, let's go to the matrix, right? Like, you know, she, she's like,
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you can get out of the car right now, but you've been down that road before
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and you know exactly where it ends. Right.
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And it's like, oh, okay. So he's going to stay in the car because like,
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if he does that, he's going to have like a new adventure, right?
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He's not going to become like a totally different thing, but he's going to have
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a new adventure. That's more believable.
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Right. Or the red pill, blue pill thing. That's another good way of,
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of presenting that crossroads moment.
23:07
But to me, like having her body get hijacked by hacker intelligence entity and
23:15
his only way of getting her to go along with it is to be like,
23:18
well, aren't you kind of bored with what you are?
23:20
Like, you know, and she's like, yeah, yeah, that sounds cool.
23:23
There's a subtle implication too. She can never have a child of her own.
23:26
This is her way of having a child that was like throwing it at the end.
23:29
There's never, it was very, I think I might've missed that too.
23:33
I think i think it's just bad writing that's what i thought it was you
23:36
know it's tough to tell if it's bad writing or it's the english dub well that's
23:40
a whole but the english dub still has to stay fairly true to what
23:42
the intent was of the character dialogue yeah well you
23:46
know i don't as somebody who watches a watched a
23:49
lot of 1990s anime maybe like
23:52
you're saying like i'm just used to that yeah i'm kind of like fill it
23:55
it's like a cipher like i just fill in the blanks of what i want to see yeah i
23:58
did see a bored character like even in that first scene
24:01
where she's like or they're diving
24:05
backwards to you know go into that
24:07
action moment that's such a like a boring way to do like it's a cool way but
24:14
it's such a like non-plus sort of like okay fine i'm gonna drop backwards into
24:18
this thing and fine whatever i'll just shoot it out as i go like the character
24:21
always seemed bored to me despite being titillated by their body shape when I was 16.
24:28
I mean, I still am, but at the same time, like, I guess that's,
24:32
if i'm going to be the stand for it i guess that's the interesting thing is like this character.
24:37
Has unlimited possibilities they could use i
24:41
forget what they call it it's not the internet they could use computers everywhere
24:45
i think is the the english dub as they
24:48
like get plugged into the ports in the matrix they have ports on
24:51
the back of their neck yeah any of them do yep right they could do
24:53
anything and they're just so bored of always winning or
24:56
they're so bored of like mastering the physical world that they want
24:59
something else yeah so i appreciated the like what
25:02
is consciousness what is right what does it mean
25:05
to be human being sort of dialogue and it gets back to like every i
25:09
guess it's every cyborg movie we've watched right going back
25:12
to what was the first one she stabs him
25:15
in the end oh uh like it's
25:19
the the cyborg movies we pick are always about
25:22
what does it mean to exist right just by
25:25
happenstance apparently no and this one was you know
25:28
partly because anime but it also happens to be that so i
25:31
was here for that and i thought was cool like a lot of the the
25:34
characters are augmented and so
25:37
a lot of the conversation was like how much are they augmented are
25:40
they still a human yeah what are we up against here correct sort of
25:43
thing so much so that the one guy typing near the
25:46
end like he puts his fingers on the keyboard they all expand it's like three
25:50
more fingers right my question about like i'm talking my daughters are watching
25:53
i'm like don't reality this thing but i'm like do you really need keyboards
25:57
if you could just plug something into the back of your neck and you're connected
26:00
to it like what the hell's the point of being able to do that?
26:02
That's because they didn't understand.
26:06
I thought it was like an aesthetic choice. It just looks cool to have fingers.
26:10
And I totally misread that moment too. I'm such a noob to like this movie and
26:15
this genre that I, when that happened, I was like, oh fuck.
26:20
I'm like, he's like a machine. Like then they don't know.
26:23
And then it was like, oh no, they know.
26:25
And they're just, they're all like that. And they're like, they're just standing
26:28
there having a, but I, I did think all that stuff was cool.
26:33
I mean, there's that old philosophical question of, like, you have a car and
26:38
you replace a tire and you replace another tire and you have it for so many years.
26:43
At a certain point, if you've replaced every part, it's become a new car.
26:49
But when did it become that new car? Yeah, I mean, I think that's a fascinating question.
26:54
And like I said, the philosophy and the themes in this movie I thought were
26:57
great in addition to the other things that, you know, I named before.
27:00
Or I just, like I said, I just, I just thought some of the writing was, was not that good.
27:05
My final take, I think on it is that it's a very interesting high concept piece. Yeah.
27:10
And I love subtlety. I'm all about subtlety and literature and storytelling.
27:15
This was a little too subtle. And I think there could have been a little bit more directness.
27:20
And again, that might be an issue with translation, I guess,
27:23
but I just feel like the story itself just needed just a little bit more to
27:28
sell the ideas that they were trying to sell. just to get the character where
27:31
they needed to be or the characters where they needed to be.
27:34
Again the concept was interesting or it could be the the audience
27:37
of origin right like american audiences expect
27:40
certain things even in the 90s so god that was over
27:44
30 years right that blow your
27:46
mind yes it does fuck with me a little 29 years
27:49
ago i think that's what we came out right right oh about 30 90 95
27:52
so 30 years just yeah in 30 years this is 2025
27:55
as of this recording so yeah no
27:58
that does fuck with me firstly but i also think about that you know
28:01
what does an american audience expect versus like
28:04
what does a japanese always expect or like an indian if
28:07
you're watching bollywood or something well and they're very they are very different aesthetics
28:10
i've watched i've not watched a lot of anime as i
28:13
said before but i've watched a ton of you
28:16
know like kung fu movies and i'm a sucker for
28:19
all the crouching tiger hidden dragon and hero and
28:22
all those movies i love that shit but it
28:25
is to the uninitiated a
28:28
very different aesthetic like you were talking about like the weird vocals shown
28:32
before i'm like the introductory thing and but that's not uncommon and like
28:38
you know what i'm saying i mean that's that's a lot of right exactly you go
28:41
back to like the old akira i was trying to watch within the past couple years the akira.
28:47
Kurosawa movie which is i think it's called hidden fortress or
28:50
something it's like a i think it's like based on mcbeth
28:54
and it's also a motivation for star wars or like inspiration
28:57
for star wars whatever and you know but there's so much in
29:00
that that you watch that you're like well aesthetically that's
29:03
like that would never hold up in western cinema you and
29:06
i recently watched yojimbo is another one yeah exactly
29:09
and it's another one where it's just like there's stuff there that
29:12
does hold up in western cinema but there's all this other
29:15
stuff that you like no that's a very asian aesthetic it's
29:18
a very eastern aesthetic and you know i don't
29:21
know that's so that's part of it too is like you know how familiar
29:24
are you with the tropes and the aesthetics and stuff i will be interested like
29:29
to see your take on cowboy bebop which is yeah i suggested because it's noir
29:33
right but it's also anime and it's widely credited to have the best soundtrack
29:38
that's ever existed for an anime so i'm setting the bar way up yes you are yeah i'm super interested.
29:45
But i literally i remember watching cowboy bebop as a kid and then going on,
29:52
kazaa wow and stealing the soundtrack to it really listen to it that's awesome
29:57
i have it somewhere on my mp3 player that died while i was trying to tan in
30:01
the i can't wait i'm actually excited about this one oh well shit i hope i didn't
30:05
screw it up but i i look like i've already started re-watching i'm like three episodes in and.
30:10
Uh it builds firstly but secondly
30:13
i forgot like how much of a banger that opening
30:17
song is like the intro song has no right to be that good
30:19
okay so oh man i'm i'm gonna i'm
30:22
in for that i'm gonna make this point to my my daughter who's
30:25
a big time japanese cultural aficionado like
30:29
listens to the music vocaloids and she's learning
30:31
japanese all this crazy stuff loves it gave me
30:34
the side eye throughout this whole movie because i thought she'd like to see this
30:37
too and she's just like this is this is not she didn't
30:40
quite care for it but she's stoked to watch cowboy bebop
30:43
because i saw that on our radar so she's like i want to watch that with
30:46
you mark me down so i know that's something that has some cachet still
30:49
speaking from complete naivete on this
30:52
is is that also like a japanese studio
30:55
that does that or is that like an american studio or
30:59
look i so i i'm not sure
31:02
because there's there's like anime anime and then
31:05
there's like american anime which is like very much
31:09
like like afro samurai or a
31:11
couple years ago i would you remember the old nintendo game castlevania they
31:15
made they made a like it was on netflix and i just ended
31:18
up watching it randomly a few years ago at night and it was it
31:21
was like an anime version of that but it was like an american studio that did
31:25
it and they they do it very much for a western audience like it's it's the style
31:30
of animation but it's an aesthetic that's built for like an american audience
31:34
it was absolutely a Japanese production. Cowboy Bebop? Yeah.
31:38
Okay, cool. Now that I think about it, the theme song, even on the ones that
31:42
aired on Cartoon Network, which were English dubbed, the theme song is in Japanese
31:47
with subtitles. Nice. All right.
31:50
So, yeah. And it's top rated TV. It's number 42 out of 250 on IMDb.
31:55
All right. Have you seen it before, Sean? No, I have no of it.
31:58
I've just never watched it. I'm looking forward to it.
32:00
So just to be clear to your audience, we're watching the TV show,
32:04
which aired from 98 to 99.
32:07
They're 24-minute episodes each. So, you know, book out your time.
32:11
I was telling Mike that the series builds. So, of course, now I'm on the hook
32:15
for it actually being good.
32:17
But if nothing else, make sure to watch the first three episodes and the last
32:23
four. if you can only book out three and a half hours, I guess.
32:27
If you can book out, you know, Lord of the Rings time, do that because those
32:32
are the six that really connect.
32:35
Sean will have the whole series watched by next week. I don't know how you do it. I can't.
32:39
That's too much, too fast. Sean is not only the completionist on the podcast,
32:44
but he's also the non-pro-procrastinator.
32:49
Procrastinator? I didn't say that right. When it's something I want to do,
32:52
I'll do it. That's right.
32:54
See, the funny thing is, I want to do all of the things that we agree to,
32:57
but I still progress tonight, for sure, for sure.
33:01
I've been there my whole life, though. I'll turn the paper in and I'll get the
33:04
A on it, but I did it the night before.
33:07
Says every English major. I hit print 20 minutes before the class started.
33:12
Yeah, you print and the printer doesn't jam, or they still have pages left on your account.
33:17
I was just thinking we're recording this during the last regular season game
33:22
of the season watching the Bills in the background and well I mean it's still
33:26
8 minutes to go 8 and a half minutes to go I gotta say put Josh in for a seat,
33:31
our listeners might be listening to this as we're about ready to roll into the Super Bowl so I mean.
33:37
That's if you just fucked us over my friend or not yeah I don't know I'm not
33:45
that superstitious If you believe in infinite universes, so many roads just
33:50
branched off of Sean's comment.
33:53
Which would have been. What are they going to be? What will have happened by
33:56
the time our listeners are going to be like, they got eliminated in the first game by fucking Denver.
34:02
Oh, Lord. I hope not. Oh, my God. I don't want to live in that earth.
34:06
Thanks. So we're doing Cowboy Beba. We talked about another reading piece that we're going to do.
34:10
We have not on air, but Mike has been texting around. True. And he made a suggestion
34:14
that I'm down for if y'all want to do it and sign up so we get people time to
34:19
pick up the book. Which one was that again?
34:21
Yeah. So we're not a hundred listeners. We're not a hundred percent committed to this yet.
34:25
It was just the title that had got thrown out there, but the book is called 36 Streets.
34:30
It's within the last couple of years, it came out and it's sort of like a cyberpunk
34:34
book that's been described as Richard K.
34:39
Morgan. Is that the author's name?
34:41
Who was the guy who wrote Altered Carbon? yeah yeah
34:44
so it's been it's like that author meets that's
34:48
it shoot wind up bird meets apocalypse now
34:51
right those are the three titles and the premise
34:54
as i understand it again just from having read a couple reviews is
34:58
that it takes place in like an alternate universe vietnam that is controlled
35:04
by or it might be korea that's controlled by china and there's a sort of like
35:11
simulation game that people play that is based on the Vietnam War.
35:17
And that's really all I know about it. I'm down.
35:21
Yeah. Yeah. No, I think. Oh, and the main character is a girl who is also a
35:25
gangster. She's like in an organized crime family or something.
35:28
So there was just a lot of buzzwords in there that got my attention.
35:31
Anyway. The algorithm has worked for us. That's right.
35:34
I'm in. Trust the robot overlords. Yeah. Right. Especially if they look like the major.
35:40
Damn, dude. Yeah. Well, I got to bring it back around. all right
35:44
thank you listener for spending your time with us that is it
35:47
for now but make sure to get your hands on 36 streets and
35:50
start watching cowboy bebop like i said the first three the last three you know
35:55
give yourself lots of time it's not too long but you know especially if you
35:59
can get it streaming because there's no commercials so hey 26 minutes instead
36:03
of half an hour but until then cheers y'all cheers cheers.
36:09
I know it's past the holiday season, but if anybody's looking for some books,
36:14
because you're here for books anyways, right? We've got a bookshop.org affiliate link.
36:17
Do a little good for the cast, do a little good for bookshop.org,
36:20
and they source all of those books from your local bookshop.
36:23
So you do have to tell them where you're about, and then they will fulfill your
36:27
order locally, which is awesome.
36:29
Shop local. Shop local. That's right. Thanks to Mike for turning me on to bookshop.org.
36:33
Link will be in the show notes if anybody wants to help the cast out a little
36:36
bit, as well as get your literature on.
36:38
And if you don't, you know, if you don't specify the bookstore or anything like
36:43
that, they still, the money all go, the profit goes into a pool,
36:47
which is donated back to indie bookstores in general.
36:50
So either way, a good cause.
36:53
Yeah. Yeah. You had pointed out the last time we had mentioned bookshop.org
36:56
that there's a like ticker at the top and it's millions of dollars donated to
37:00
local bookstores. That's right.
37:02
Instead of to Jeff Bezos space shuttle, which I think is, you know, the better cause.
37:08
We call him i dare not say his name the wiener rocket
37:11
mobile the wiener rocket mobile on top
37:14
yeah you know what because it doesn't hurt the album or our
37:17
not album our algorithm at all i'm gonna pull a sean here fuck
37:20
you jeff bezos hey fuck you thank you
37:23
you're one wait wait wait oh thank you around here somewhere appreciate that
37:27
that's bookshop.org link will be in the show notes we get a small cut of that
37:31
sale so you know helps us out as we can maintain our uh uh casting yeah by a
37:38
higher quality sake sake yeah not fook ye but.
37:44
You up it'll fook you up that there cut out the first joke leave the second
37:53
please got it appreciate this appreciate it.