Latest / The Whitfield Report / TWR Monday | A Year-End Reflection with Ryan Permison

Transcript

TWR Monday | A Year-End Reflection with Ryan Permison · The Whitfield Report

• 0:01
  The right to offend is not some pesky little part of freedom of
• 0:05
  speech that we have to put up with.
• 0:07
  It is the heart and soul and lungs of freedom of speech.
• 0:11
  It is the coursing lifeblood of human progress.
• 0:14
  It is the instigator of liberty and modernity and science and
• 0:18
  understanding. What a laughing stock today's
• 0:22
  student leaders are that they can so casually dismiss the
• 0:26
  right to be offensive without realizing that their lovely,
• 0:30
  enlightened lives are the gifts of individuals who gave offence.
• 0:36
  Offensiveness is not just something we have to
• 0:38
  begrudgingly accept. Offensiveness is the motor of
• 0:42
  human progress. Now broadcasting from the Right
• 0:46
  to Offend media studios in sunny South Florida, bringing you the
• 0:51
  latest in politics, current events, art and pop culture.
• 0:55
  This is the Whitfield Report live with Sam Whitfield.
• 1:00
  But giving offense is good. In fact, it's essential.
• 1:11
  And welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the final Monday
• 1:15
  edition of the Whitfield Report for 2025.
• 1:20
  I am our host Sam Whitfield, joined here by one of the show
• 1:27
  favorites for the year of a fan favorite of the show and one of
• 1:31
  my favorite people just to talk to in general, Mr. Hein
• 1:36
  Fermiesen of and I quote that Channel over on YouTube and this
• 1:42
  will be linked to that Channel now as well.
• 1:46
  I I understand I've done a few times, but now I guess YouTube
• 1:50
  channels can collaborate with each other on videos.
• 1:55
  Brave New world since I've been reinstated to YouTube, but you
• 2:00
  know, it's it's a blasting back as I've said.
• 2:03
  So Ryan, welcome back to the show.
• 2:06
  How is your well, First off, Mary belated Christmas and how
• 2:11
  was how were your holidays so we're.
• 2:14
  Good thanks for having me Sam. It's good to good to see you
• 2:16
  going to be back on this program.
• 2:18
  It's good. It's good.
• 2:19
  It's always good to be it's it's funny though, because I'm so
• 2:21
  used to being the host and producer.
• 2:22
  Now everything has been turned upside down like the kids are
• 2:25
  suffering from on Stranger Things season 5.
• 2:28
  No spoilers. I've never seen the show.
• 2:29
  I don't know what happens in that show.
• 2:31
  I've heard certain things about it, but I've never seen it.
• 2:34
  Sorry to disappoint your audience, but no, my holiday
• 2:36
  season was great, man. You know, I spent time with my
• 2:38
  family. We opened up gifts.
• 2:39
  Everybody was happy with all the gifts they got.
• 2:41
  And, you know, I was happy with what I got.
• 2:44
  And I got a whole bunch of books from the zon coming soon in my
• 2:48
  batcave so I can continue reading and getting and getting
• 2:52
  better at reading, getting better at writing and supporting
• 2:56
  fellow indie authors out there, you know, through the zon among
• 2:58
  other things. But yeah, no, it was, it's a
• 3:00
  good holiday season, man. We just wrapped up our last
• 3:03
  episode of And I quote for the year with romanticy author
• 3:06
  Rebecca Parcha, who's a wonderful person and she's got a
• 3:10
  lot of great things that she's put out recently with her books,
• 3:13
  and she's got a lot of plans for 2026.
• 3:15
  So my hats are off to her and her romanticy books that she has
• 3:20
  out right now. And she's got even more planned
• 3:22
  for next year. So it was a fun episode, man.
• 3:24
  It was a lot of fun. So romanticy so so that sounds
• 3:28
  like a, a new genre of sorts, a, a, a cross between fantasy and
• 3:33
  romance. So I'll definitely have to check
• 3:36
  that out. Yeah, yeah, sure.
• 3:39
  Yeah. If you want to check it out,
• 3:40
  Romanticy is a combination of both romance and fantasy, but
• 3:43
  it. But that genre has been around
• 3:44
  for a number of years now. We're just, you know, some of us
• 3:46
  are a little behind the times, you know, some of us are a
• 3:49
  little behind the updates or not getting the company memos.
• 3:52
  But yeah, I, you know, I, I look forward to learning more about
• 3:55
  it. I'm actually going to give her
• 3:57
  books to try Fangs of Fate, which I believe is the first
• 3:59
  book in her series. So look forward to reading that
• 4:03
  and see what happens because not granted I respect the genre of
• 4:07
  fantasy, but I've never really read anything romantic, you
• 4:10
  know? There's been hints of romances
• 4:11
  in certain books I've read, but not straight up romance before.
• 4:15
  So this is going to be new for me as it is for the audience
• 4:18
  member who may be watching listen to this right now.
• 4:20
  So stay tuned. More to come.
• 4:22
  And as soon as I read the book, I will drop that review like
• 4:24
  it's hot on Goodreads. Well, Speaking of things that
• 4:28
  are are new, it's interesting that you bring up like new
• 4:32
  entries to the genre because you and I were both published in the
• 4:37
  Veritas Western Roundup that volume, Volume 1 along with
• 4:44
  James Dawson and quite a few other people who have been on
• 4:51
  both our shows. And I had only read like, a few
• 4:58
  West Western books, but as far as, like, writing them, I hadn't
• 5:03
  really, you know, done much writing up until Night of the
• 5:06
  Vigilante came out, you know, earlier this year.
• 5:09
  And then also, you know, with, you know, my short story in the
• 5:15
  Veritas Entertainment things. So, you know, I'm curious now,
• 5:21
  since we're both published. I mean, how has that been for
• 5:27
  you, you know, being published now officially?
• 5:32
  You know, it's kind of surreal because if you had told me 20
• 5:35
  years ago that be become a published author in 2025, I
• 5:37
  would have said you were crazy because I have autism and I'm
• 5:41
  very good at expressing my thoughts and what I'm feeling
• 5:43
  verbally. But I'm not always good at
• 5:45
  putting them down on paper or punch the keys, you know, for
• 5:48
  God's sake, you know, punching them on that keyboard, Sam
• 5:52
  computer keyboard rather, not the keyboard, the inside.
• 5:54
  I'm sorry, but I haven't been always good at that.
• 5:57
  But now it seems because you and I and many others have joined
• 6:00
  this thing called this discord server called the men's
• 6:03
  adventure fiction Discord server.
• 6:06
  You know, when I think of fiction, men's adventure
• 6:08
  fiction, something comes out of me, which is the meme that
• 6:12
  Grayson just posted in our chat earlier today, which is
• 6:15
  hilarious, by the way, hilarious.
• 6:17
  Well done, Grayson, well done. The fact that you took a scene
• 6:21
  from Heat with Pacino and De Niro and, you know, paraphrase
• 6:25
  it and twisted the words and put it in your own spit, you do put
• 6:28
  it in a blender and you put out your own meme about it.
• 6:31
  That scene between Pacino and Hank Azaria, if I remember
• 6:34
  correctly, is pure genius. So yeah, no, ever since I joined
• 6:39
  the Discord, my creative wheels have just been turning like
• 6:42
  crazy. And I'm writing down ideas for
• 6:45
  stories that I want to write or, you know, subplots I may want to
• 6:49
  put in. What do you call them?
• 6:51
  Future stories of mine, Short stories more specifically.
• 6:54
  So it's been very, very good to me.
• 6:56
  Men's adventure fiction. Very, very good to me.
• 6:58
  So it's. Yeah, yeah.
• 7:02
  It feels great to be a published author.
• 7:05
  But, you know, when you get a taste that you get a taste of
• 7:07
  victory, Sam, you want you want to get that taste again.
• 7:09
  You know what I'm saying? So I mean, look at you.
• 7:12
  Look you, you've published like 1020 books and I'm sitting here
• 7:15
  with 1 short story on my resume. But you know what?
• 7:18
  I look forward to writing more short stories.
• 7:20
  I look forward to getting more of them published next year,
• 7:23
  whether it's through a Veritas anthology or my own short story
• 7:27
  anthologies and putting them out there in the world for people to
• 7:29
  read and experience and enjoy. Fasten your seat belt, Sam,
• 7:34
  because 2026 is going to be 1 heck of a wild ride.
• 7:37
  I mean, 2025 was something. 2025 to me was a year of self
• 7:40
  discovery for me. You know what I'm saying?
• 7:44
  I discovered that, hey, I'm good at critiquing films.
• 7:47
  I'm good at quoting movies better than anybody in our
• 7:49
  Discord hashtag. Those are the facts, Grayson,
• 7:51
  because you, you, you tweaked the quote from Heat a little bit
• 7:55
  and I had to correct you, all right?
• 7:56
  I had to correct you because I know my quote, son.
• 8:00
  Don't mess with me, Grayson. Don't mess with me.
• 8:02
  I still love you, brother. I still love you.
• 8:03
  I'm always going to love you. But yeah, no, I, I it's it's
• 8:08
  great to have that taste of victory, but I want to get it
• 8:09
  again. So I look forward to seeing what
• 8:10
  2026 brings me. And now I know what I'm capable
• 8:13
  of, Sam. I know I'm capable of writing a
• 8:15
  beginning, a middle and an end. And I'm also know that I'm
• 8:17
  capable of writing an actual story and putting it out in the
• 8:21
  world and for people to experience.
• 8:22
  I actually got a message. I don't know if I told you this
• 8:26
  story or not. Here's one for you.
• 8:27
  You like stories, right, Sam? So of course, I mean, everybody
• 8:31
  loves a good yarn. So I got a Facebook message from
• 8:35
  a reader, a complete, I don't know who this guy was, but he
• 8:39
  sends me Adm on Facebook and he says, hey, I just want to let
• 8:42
  you know, I read your short story, you know, that Wolf of
• 8:44
  the West that you put out in Western Tales volume one.
• 8:48
  It's really good. I really like what you did
• 8:50
  there. And not only that, you drop your
• 8:52
  audience in the middle of a story that's already, you know,
• 8:55
  kind of developing or already going on, you know, dropped in
• 8:58
  the middle of the situation. And the way you did it was just,
• 9:01
  I'm paraphrasing here, but it was so well done.
• 9:03
  It was so well done. And this is from a complete
• 9:06
  like, I don't know who this person is, but for this person
• 9:10
  to tell me that in a Facebook message, OK, Facebook Messenger
• 9:14
  picture that for me to hear that and see that with my own 2 itty
• 9:20
  bitty little beady eyes, I thought, wow, I really did do
• 9:23
  something here. This, this is cool, right?
• 9:26
  This is, this is exciting. You know, that was fun.
• 9:29
  Let's do it again. Seriously, let's do it again.
• 9:31
  Let's let's write more stories and put them out there.
• 9:34
  Because the one thing that that aspiring writers, 99% of them
• 9:40
  don't get a chance, don't do is finish what they start, you
• 9:45
  know, yes, And I finished what I started and I got stories that
• 9:48
  I've written. I'm going back.
• 9:49
  I got to edit one of them. I got to finish write in another
• 9:52
  one that's, you know, got the first two acts, you know,
• 9:54
  written out. Sam, I just got to write out act
• 9:55
  three, you know, finish it off. But it's it's there and it's
• 10:01
  going to get done one way or the other.
• 10:03
  Yeah. So, you know, we're, you know,
• 10:06
  for those of you who write a story and you finish it, you're
• 10:08
  already ahead of the curve. So there you go.
• 10:10
  See what I mean? And I and I, I would full, I
• 10:13
  would fully agree. Like that's the that's the
• 10:16
  number one thing that I always get asked by all these people
• 10:20
  is, you know, people like, oh, Sam, you know, you're so lucky.
• 10:24
  You get to, you know, interview all these great authors on your
• 10:27
  show and you get to, you know, read all these books, you know,
• 10:32
  in advance. But you know what, what's your,
• 10:35
  you know, what's your big secret?
• 10:37
  And I always tell people out about everything.
• 10:40
  It doesn't really matter exactly like when you write, but I at
• 10:46
  least try and write daily, or at least if not daily, consistently
• 10:50
  at least and get a schedule down because there are so many people
• 10:55
  I know who they may write a book or they or they may start to
• 11:02
  write a book or they may start to write a store or something.
• 11:07
  And then they're like 1 chapter in and then they just, you know,
• 11:12
  forget about it because of work, no life or whatever, or, or
• 11:18
  they've just lost interest. And then for some reason that
• 11:22
  they get jealous of, you know, success that you or that, you
• 11:27
  know, or even I have. We're relative nobodies in the
• 11:32
  world of, you know, you know, public shot.
• 11:38
  There's not to say that we're that we're nobody's completely
• 11:40
  but you know, like we're not, we're not famous by any.
• 11:44
  We're not Stephen King. Yeah.
• 11:46
  No. We're not Stephen King, we're
• 11:48
  not Jack Carr or Lee Child or who was the other one we were
• 11:52
  talking about Michael Connelly, you know, but guys like that.
• 11:55
  But look, we're making our own headway, man.
• 11:58
  We're, we're paving our own roadway.
• 12:00
  We're paving our own highways. You know, we're, we're building
• 12:03
  our own streets. And it's, and it's and it's
• 12:05
  because of it's and it's because of consistency.
• 12:09
  And, and yeah, I mean, like, we might not be, you know, I might
• 12:13
  not be, you know, close to Michael Conway or, you know, or,
• 12:17
  but I, I can also tell you that, you know, like I interviewed
• 12:22
  Kyle Mills on my show who wrote, you know, the Vince Flynn books
• 12:27
  for a number of years. That that's kind of my thing.
• 12:29
  If, if you had told me like 10 years ago when I was first
• 12:32
  reading Vince Flynn, if you had told me that I would be, you
• 12:35
  know, interviewing the guy who took over for Vince, like I, I
• 12:39
  would have thought you were crazy.
• 12:41
  Again, That's, that's persistence and the fact that,
• 12:44
  you know, I guess someone thought I had a good enough of a
• 12:48
  reputation to, you know, interview him.
• 12:51
  And I'm very, you know, humbled by it.
• 12:54
  And it was, it was a great conversation.
• 12:59
  Yeah. So.
• 13:04
  And yeah, your, your short story was great.
• 13:08
  I mean, also getting like compliments on my short story,
• 13:13
  you know, from Night of the Vidalinity that that spin off
• 13:16
  short story. That was incredible too.
• 13:19
  And yeah, I, I also get DMS from people I've never interacted
• 13:24
  with on Facebook or Instagram and always kind of like it
• 13:29
  always, you know, humbles me a bit.
• 13:32
  I'm like, wow, you know, here's someone who I don't know from
• 13:35
  Adam, and yet they took the time to just, you know, write to me
• 13:41
  out of the blue. So.
• 13:43
  It's great. It's great getting feedback,
• 13:45
  whether it's from somebody in your circle or somebody outside
• 13:48
  your circle, you know, or, you know, just a random audience
• 13:51
  member saying, hey, I stumbled upon your book on Amazon or I
• 13:53
  stumbled upon it on this blog or whatever it was.
• 13:56
  And I really like what you wrote here, you know what I mean?
• 13:58
  And it's like, wow, that's, you know, people get discovered in,
• 14:02
  you know, the most unexpected places.
• 14:05
  You know, it's just, it's just this is one of the things that's
• 14:09
  great about life is that you never know what's going to
• 14:11
  happen. And the greatest moments of our
• 14:13
  lives happen when we least expect it.
• 14:15
  You know so. So I actually have a question in
• 14:21
  regards to podcasts that you and I are like, you know, in that in
• 14:26
  that world to. Wound competition.
• 14:28
  No, I'm kidding. We're not, no.
• 14:31
  Have you ever had that? Have you ever had that same
• 14:33
  experience of, you know, interviewing someone and being,
• 14:37
  you know, either shocked by just the interviewee or, you know,
• 14:42
  just by the reception of of the interview that people have?
• 14:48
  That's a you know what Sam? This is why we pay you the big
• 14:51
  bucks around here. That is a good question.
• 14:53
  I wow, you know, I've gotten feedback on some episodes of
• 15:02
  anti quote that I've done over the years.
• 15:03
  Don't get me wrong, I'm trying to think of the one that stood
• 15:06
  out, the one that got the most, or not the most, but just a
• 15:08
  comment that stood out from the rest, you know what I mean?
• 15:12
  That's hard. I'd have to have to check my
• 15:15
  records, you know? Well, or, or is or is there one
• 15:23
  for you, I guess where like you know, you thought the interview
• 15:26
  would would go one way and then went completely the other
• 15:32
  because I I've had a few of those.
• 15:34
  Yeah. You know, for me, I mean, well,
• 15:36
  here, let me put you this way. None of the interviews I've done
• 15:39
  went. They did go a certain way that I
• 15:41
  thought they would. And then sometimes we would go
• 15:43
  off on tangents on certain topics or certain things that I
• 15:46
  brought up or there was a question that I posed to my
• 15:48
  guest and they would take it in a bit of a different direction.
• 15:53
  So that has happened a few times, not a lot, but one
• 15:58
  interview that stands out. And this is one I thought was
• 16:03
  going to go one way and kind of went kind of went another was
• 16:07
  any time I interview an indie author from a genre that I don't
• 16:12
  read in or I don't, I haven't really gotten into it, you know,
• 16:15
  respectively. I'm always fascinated by the
• 16:18
  things they say about their genre or how you learn about it.
• 16:21
  You know, because we were kind of joking around the other day
• 16:24
  about romanticity with Rebecca and myself.
• 16:26
  And you can see this in the tape.
• 16:27
  It's on the tape. It's in the interview and I
• 16:30
  thought, Oh yeah, romanticy. That's that's kind of, you know,
• 16:33
  sort of kind of newish. I just like, no, no, no, it's
• 16:35
  been around for years. And I was like, oh, OK, because
• 16:37
  I'm familiar with, you know, Dragons and vampires and all
• 16:40
  this other stuff. And I'm familiar with, you know,
• 16:42
  fan. Obviously when I think of
• 16:43
  fantasy, one of the first things I think of is movie wise is
• 16:46
  never ending story or, you know, you think of Lord of the Rings,
• 16:49
  right? You think of Lord of the Rings
• 16:51
  and she's like, well, there's elements, you know, that I was
• 16:52
  inspired by, by Lord of the Rings and this, that and the
• 16:55
  other. And I'm like, oh, OK, makes
• 16:56
  sense. And then she's like, but there
• 16:58
  is romance and my story is hence the reason it's called romance.
• 17:00
  It's like, OK, you know, yeah, you know, there's certain things
• 17:02
  about fantasy and romance and how you can combine the two that
• 17:06
  I wasn't previously aware, you know, aware of previously.
• 17:10
  So it was, it was fun to. Basically what I'm trying to say
• 17:12
  is that no interview I've had in my 5 years of doing this is
• 17:16
  really gone. Like completely in the left
• 17:18
  field side of side of the game where I expected to go in right
• 17:22
  field. I know that's a baseball
• 17:23
  tournament. I don't even play baseball, but
• 17:25
  still the interviews very, very good to me.
• 17:27
  The guests are very, very good to me.
• 17:29
  I, I, I cannot tell you and I can't wait to interview
• 17:33
  everybody in 2026 because I got a schedule packed out until
• 17:36
  probably July or August already. So this, this, there's going to
• 17:40
  be so many different people, so many different great and great
• 17:43
  guests that we're all looking forward to having coming to the
• 17:46
  table. I mean, whether it's romanticy,
• 17:47
  whether it's or in sorcery, whether it's, you know, pirate
• 17:51
  type stories or whatever, you know, just all kinds of stuff
• 17:55
  that that's the beauty of. One of the best things about
• 17:57
  being a podcaster is that having a guest on every single week,
• 18:00
  you get to meet somebody new every week and you get to learn
• 18:02
  from them every. So like I learned a couple of
• 18:06
  things from Rebecca Parcha. We're giving you a shout out,
• 18:08
  Rebecca, because we because I like it.
• 18:09
  You're awesome. And I thought, wow, OK, I didn't
• 18:13
  know this about, you know, this kind of story or this type of
• 18:16
  genre or this subgenre or whatever it is.
• 18:18
  And in the words of our good friend Spock, fascinating.
• 18:21
  So, you know, it's it's great. Podcasting has been great.
• 18:25
  Five years I've been doing and I quote we're up to 268 episodes
• 18:30
  of the show, which is insane. So in two more weeks, Sam, I am
• 18:37
  we're going to hit 270. That's a big deal.
• 18:40
  Not many podcasts can hit those kind of numbers.
• 18:43
  No. So that's going to be fun.
• 18:45
  And then once we reach 5000 subscribers on the channel
• 18:47
  overall, then we're really going to throw a party.
• 18:51
  And yes Sam, you're more than welcome to come by You're you're
• 18:54
  more than welcome to come by the live stream and say hello to
• 18:56
  everybody. And you have a, you, you will
• 18:59
  have a chance to plug, plug, plug, plug, plug, plug all your
• 19:02
  50,000 books that you've written.
• 19:04
  Because my gosh, man, how many books did you come out with this
• 19:08
  year? Like 45678910, whatever.
• 19:11
  Like I look at your Amazon page and I'm thinking to myself, Oh
• 19:14
  my gosh, how many books can this guy turn out?
• 19:18
  Because you're kind of, you're kind of putting Terence and and
• 19:21
  Nate to shame over here. Well, it's, it's something that
• 19:24
  you say that I, I actually, I actually was talking on this
• 19:28
  with James Dawson the the other day.
• 19:31
  I I've put out. Good friend of ours.
• 19:33
  I've put out three this year, plus the, the short story in
• 19:42
  the, in the, in the Veritas, which by the way, like I, I've
• 19:45
  told people like I, I submitted that and I, I did not like, I
• 19:53
  thought it was good. And I, you know, I, I, I
• 19:56
  submitted a great piece. I'm like, you know, if it it
• 19:59
  makes it in, great if it, but you know, if it doesn't, that's
• 20:02
  fine too. And so I was kind of pleasantly
• 20:04
  surprised that that they picked, you know, at the story, but then
• 20:10
  like I also submitted a story for the the noir November, which
• 20:15
  is a little more up my alley. And I I thought that one would
• 20:20
  get in for sure. And, you know, and it, it
• 20:23
  didn't. So, you know, I'm not that I'm
• 20:27
  too, not that I'm too disappointed, but you know, like
• 20:30
  Pete, there were other people who thought, well, Sam, that's
• 20:32
  kind of your, your genre. And so I, I guess what I'm
• 20:36
  saying is like, you know, the western, that wasn't really my
• 20:40
  genre at 1st. And yet like I got published in
• 20:43
  that, you know, in that volume and then the volume that people
• 20:47
  kind of expected I would get published in.
• 20:50
  I, you know, I didn't get published, but you know, I, I
• 20:55
  did read the short stories and they were all pretty really
• 20:58
  good. So, you know, different
• 21:03
  expectations for, you know, different folks.
• 21:06
  I guess so. Yeah, I mean, that's true.
• 21:09
  That's true. You know, I, I, and I was bummed
• 21:11
  too. I missed out on Veritas Noir.
• 21:13
  I really wanted to submit something for that, but just the
• 21:15
  timing, the scheduling, yeah, didn't work for me at the time.
• 21:18
  And things were, I mean, things are always crazy, but I love
• 21:22
  noir. But I've never written a story
• 21:24
  in the noir genre. But I it that's not to say I
• 21:27
  don't want to take a swing at it.
• 21:29
  It's just didn't work out this time.
• 21:30
  The good news is Veritas, for those of you watching, I did
• 21:32
  order a copy of Veritas Noir from from the Zon.
• 21:35
  OK, so it's coming to my house, Sam, and I'm going to sit my
• 21:39
  keister down on that couch and I'm going to read that because
• 21:43
  I'll be honest with you, the Veritas books, and I've been
• 21:47
  reading several of them the last couple of days before I jumped
• 21:50
  on this with you, man Pull. What is it called?
• 21:54
  Pull of the tide, Fantastic. Longwood Trail, awesome.
• 22:00
  You know, cherry blossoms by midnight was was really solid.
• 22:04
  I mean, my gosh, Veritas, like they're just killing it, man,
• 22:09
  everybody. Yeah, they they really are.
• 22:12
  I mean, I'm, you know, I feel humble enough to kind of be in
• 22:16
  on the ground floor of this along with, you know, you and
• 22:20
  Luke and they and, you know, Jake and Brina and Rebecca and
• 22:27
  Grayson and I mean, Terence, I mean, we, we've got so many
• 22:32
  people writing now. It's it's, it's fantastic,
• 22:36
  really. So I mean, I, I the one, I guess
• 22:41
  bummer this year was kind of, you know, in Luke's talked
• 22:45
  openly about this. So I'm not, you know, divulging
• 22:48
  anything private, but, you know, it was kind of of of a bummer to
• 22:51
  hear about, you know, his health, you know, scare a bit
• 22:56
  And man, I mean, like, you know, I have a disability and people
• 22:59
  people think that I'm brave for putting, you know, up with what
• 23:03
  I do. But man, I mean, like not being
• 23:06
  able to walk is way different than, you know, potentially,
• 23:11
  like, you know, your heart giving out at any any day.
• 23:16
  That's, you know, that that's some heavy, that's some heavy
• 23:21
  stuff. And the fact that Luke remains
• 23:25
  so optimistic, you know, in spite of everything he has to
• 23:31
  deal with, like that dude is my inspiration, you know, with
• 23:38
  everything he's gone through, so. 100% yeah.
• 23:41
  He's our Rocky Balboa, that's for sure.
• 23:44
  Because he won't. Because every time we mention
• 23:46
  Luke, you got to mention Rocky. Because as we all know, Luke is
• 23:49
  a big fan of the Rocky franchise and he won't shut up about it.
• 23:52
  So. No, and it's great.
• 23:54
  It's great. So, yeah, he's our Rocky Balboa.
• 23:56
  He's the eye of the tiger. He's the, you know, he he's the
• 24:00
  general. He's the soldier.
• 24:01
  He knows what he's doing. And you know, Luke more, you
• 24:04
  know, listen. And Luke, I know you're gonna.
• 24:06
  I know you're hearing this. You're the man.
• 24:08
  Just keep pushing, Keep grinding, as you always do.
• 24:11
  Put out as much as you can, man, cuz.
• 24:14
  Now, Grant, I haven't read these yet, but I'm telling you if, if,
• 24:16
  if the stories I've read so far from Veritas are any indication,
• 24:20
  guaranteed I'm going to love Fire in the Tall Grass.
• 24:22
  It's almost guaranteed. I'm going to like Gun.
• 24:24
  Was it Gun Law? Blood Lands.
• 24:26
  I mean, what is it? What's the other one you wrote?
• 24:29
  Viper and Red Viper and Red Rocks.
• 24:30
  I mean, gosh, I can't wait, man. I can't wait.
• 24:34
  I mean, I've been reading all these Veritas books the last
• 24:36
  couple of days and they've been just stellar, and I can't wait
• 24:39
  three more of them. Even his, even in his words, his
• 24:44
  bad books, quote UN quote, which is frozen math.
• 24:48
  Frozen math is I'm, I'm sorry, I, I know that you and I will
• 24:52
  argue with this, but like frozen math is actually a, a, a great
• 24:56
  book. I know he I know he doesn't like
• 24:58
  it because it's, it's like darkened, you know, somewhat
• 25:03
  nihilistic. I don't think, I don't think it
• 25:06
  necessarily is. I, I definitely think that, you
• 25:08
  know, when I read that book, I see, I see young man who was,
• 25:12
  you know, going through a lot of stuff emotionally and had to put
• 25:16
  that, you know, all down on the page.
• 25:21
  I, I don't think had, had he not written that book, I don't think
• 25:26
  we would have gotten the other books that we got that we have
• 25:30
  now. Still a really good, good book
• 25:35
  too. So and yeah, I mean, that's the
• 25:40
  other thing too, is like they're there are podcast episodes and
• 25:45
  never with a guest I've had, but just like saw shows on my own
• 25:49
  where I'm like, man, that episode sucked.
• 25:52
  But then I'm like, you know, well, you know, in the bad
• 25:56
  episodes they have their merit, merits for podcasting.
• 26:00
  You know, I wouldn't consider these bad episodes, but anytime
• 26:03
  I have an episode of anti quote and this is kind of a
• 26:05
  self-conscious, you're about yourself kind of thing.
• 26:09
  When I don't get any comments during the live feed because
• 26:11
  every show I do particularly is a live show, Sam.
• 26:14
  So when I don't get any comments, no one's liking the
• 26:17
  video, no one's giving us heart emojis, whatever, because I can
• 26:19
  see that on the screen. I can see it on my side of the
• 26:22
  fence. When I don't see that, I'm
• 26:24
  thinking to myself, OK, is is, you know, and by the way, I'm
• 26:29
  not judging anybody who does this.
• 26:31
  It's like, is the football game really that important that you
• 26:34
  can't TuneIn for like 10 minutes to watch a Saturday afternoon
• 26:38
  show? Or is the Comic Con you're at so
• 26:40
  crazy busy that you can't take 5 seconds to look at the like, You
• 26:44
  know what I mean? Because some days, and I'll be
• 26:47
  honest with you, certain Saturdays, people are tuning in
• 26:50
  watching it, commenting like we had a great.
• 26:52
  And by the way, thank you to everybody.
• 26:55
  Who was? Tuned in to every one of our
• 26:57
  episodes, especially if we can't see or if you don't post
• 27:00
  anything in the comments or we don't like because I can see the
• 27:03
  numbers of who's watching us live.
• 27:04
  Every time I'm doing a live show, I can see the numbers.
• 27:07
  Thank you to everybody who's done this.
• 27:08
  But Rebecca's show that we did this past weekend, there were
• 27:12
  like 5-7 people watching at one point.
• 27:14
  And there was this one individual, James, who was just
• 27:17
  commenting all these questions for our guests.
• 27:20
  Rebecca at this time, by the way, Sam.
• 27:22
  And it was fantastic. I'm like, OK, wait, this this is
• 27:25
  what I this is what my guests and I can feed off of.
• 27:27
  This is good. This is momentum.
• 27:29
  Yeah. But nine times out of 10, Sam,
• 27:32
  I'm not getting that on Saturdays at 12:00 Eastern.
• 27:34
  I'm not getting that at all. It's only in it's only like once
• 27:38
  in a blue moon or when you catch the audience at just the right
• 27:41
  time, at just the right moment that they will TuneIn and watch
• 27:45
  your show or comment down below. And the other thing is I post
• 27:48
  about these shows 24 hours in advance of them going live on
• 27:51
  the air, because if you post something a week before, they're
• 27:54
  going to forget about it in two seconds.
• 27:56
  But if you post it the day before or the day of, like a
• 27:59
  couple hours before you go live and hit the red button, Sam
• 28:01
  there, people are going to get the memo.
• 28:03
  They'll be like, oh, this guy over here has a show.
• 28:05
  Oh, this lady over here has a podcast.
• 28:07
  I want to see what she's talking about today.
• 28:08
  So I have my strategies, but nine times out of 10, it doesn't
• 28:13
  seem to pay off. It only seems like every other
• 28:14
  time does it pay off and people are actually tuning in and
• 28:17
  commenting and all this other stuff, which is great 'cause I
• 28:19
  feed off of that the guests. Feed off.
• 28:22
  That they love that, but when we don't get it kind of makes me
• 28:25
  wonder, does anyone really care? But then when you check the
• 28:27
  numbers 24 to 40, more specifically when you check the
• 28:30
  YouTube numbers, for me anyway, for me anyway, this isn't for
• 28:33
  anybody, This is just for me. 72 hours later, my video went from
• 28:37
  one view to 75 in three days. And I'm thinking, OK, people are
• 28:41
  actually going back and watching the replay.
• 28:46
  Yeah, great. The the replay, what do you call
• 28:48
  the what do you call it? The replay factor is very, very
• 28:52
  good to me. It's very, very important.
• 28:53
  That's. But it's better when you're
• 28:55
  actually watching it live and asking us questions live because
• 28:59
  then we can actually answer them.
• 29:00
  I don't mind going into the comments section and answering a
• 29:02
  question after the fact, nor do my guests.
• 29:05
  They don't mind doing it either because they're used to it.
• 29:07
  But it's just it just it just bums me out personally and
• 29:12
  professionally when people don't TuneIn and comment live during
• 29:15
  your live broadcast. But then when they go back and
• 29:18
  they watch the replay and then they comment later or they post
• 29:21
  about it on their social media after the fact and say, hey,
• 29:23
  this episode was really cool. You guys need to see this.
• 29:26
  I'm not I'm I'm thinking to myself, OK, good.
• 29:28
  We've we've done something, we've conquered this mountain.
• 29:30
  We can move on to the next one. Fantastic.
• 29:32
  Rebecca's episode went from, we had seven people tuning in
• 29:37
  yesterday, so that was great. Now 24 hours later, it's gone up
• 29:40
  to 46 views. And I'm thinking to myself, OK,
• 29:45
  I put in the right hashtags. People are going back, watching
• 29:48
  the footage, watching the tape. And when you post YouTube
• 29:52
  Shorts, that's another thing that gets you attention.
• 29:55
  Yeah, yeah, that's actually one thing I wanted to mention too.
• 29:59
  I, I know, I know I mentioned to you like right, you know, before
• 30:03
  we got it airs the Whitfield report, the YouTube channel was
• 30:10
  banned for like 3 years and then YouTube realized that they that
• 30:16
  they made a mistake and they reinstated the channel, which
• 30:19
  I'm, you know, I'm, I'm glad coming back.
• 30:22
  It's been a completely like new experience though, because like,
• 30:26
  like you said, what I'm starting to figure out is yeah, the the
• 30:29
  live, the live use, like if I get like 7 to 10 viewers when I
• 30:35
  do the Wednesday Night Live show, like I I'm happy.
• 30:40
  But then like, you know, 24 to 48 hours later at live stream
• 30:48
  that only got maybe you know, 1020 views Maxwell live.
• 30:55
  But you know, it's, it's getting a Hun, it's getting 100, you
• 30:59
  know, to 200 views, you know, like 24 to 40 hours later.
• 31:05
  And so what's weird is like YouTube's algorithm.
• 31:12
  I don't know how it, I don't know how it works.
• 31:14
  I don't think anybody does. And that's part of the part of
• 31:17
  the problem. But I don't I don't think they
• 31:20
  promote live, you know, content as much as you know, they they
• 31:29
  used to or just in general. Yeah, maybe they don't care.
• 31:32
  I don't know. I it's.
• 31:34
  And you're right, the algorithm has been fidgety for years and
• 31:37
  years and years and. Years, yeah.
• 31:38
  I don't begin to understand it, nor do I want to because I'm
• 31:40
  just focused on what I'm doing and what the kind of programming
• 31:43
  I want to put out to my audience and let them know, hey, if you
• 31:45
  guys want to hang out with us and talk with us about, you
• 31:48
  know, geeky topics that we talk about every single week, you
• 31:51
  know, feel free to do it. I mean, the movie what?
• 31:53
  And this is another funny thing too, that's happened with me.
• 31:55
  I don't know if this has happened with you or not, but
• 31:57
  with the movie Watch Alongs that I do on Friday nights, you know,
• 31:59
  those 35th, 40th, whatever anniversary we're doing.
• 32:01
  Yeah. Certain movies will get big
• 32:04
  numbers after after it's already aired, after we've done the live
• 32:08
  feed of it respectively. And then when I go back and look
• 32:10
  at the more recent movies we've done, these are very popular
• 32:13
  movies that aren't getting many views.
• 32:15
  We did watch alongs for Home Alone that have barely reached
• 32:18
  105 views. We just did one for Force
• 32:21
  Awakens. Force Awakens turned 1010 years
• 32:24
  old and it's only gotten like 67, maybe 7080 hits.
• 32:30
  And I'm thinking this is Star Wars, you know, this is Star.
• 32:34
  Now Grant, I know people have their issues with the sequel
• 32:36
  trilogy, don't get me wrong, but Force Awakens is one of the
• 32:39
  better films we've gotten. Yeah, from Star Wars that it was
• 32:44
  a 1-2 punch in the beginning. And I've said this on my other
• 32:46
  show and I'll say it again, Force Awakens, Rogue One was a
• 32:48
  great 1-2 punch right out of the gate. 2 great films after that.
• 32:53
  I'll leave that up for another discussion for another time, But
• 32:56
  the first two movies are solid and then other movie watch
• 32:59
  alongs we've done earlier this year.
• 33:00
  Sam, it amazes me how these videos have not gotten nearly as
• 33:06
  much views as the ones we've done six months ago.
• 33:08
  I'm thinking, where has everybody been?
• 33:10
  Yeah. What is going on?
• 33:12
  Like, listen, I know we live in a crazy, mixed up world.
• 33:14
  There's a lot going on, don't get me wrong.
• 33:15
  But the movies we celebrate are fun to a certain extent.
• 33:21
  I mean, some of them are dramatic films, don't get me
• 33:23
  wrong, you know, But we like to have fun on these shows and we
• 33:27
  do that every single week. And it doesn't.
• 33:29
  And it seems that more recently, within the last three to four
• 33:31
  months, no one really cares because the videos, the views
• 33:35
  aren't really showing. You know what I mean?
• 33:38
  You put out your content or excuse me, you put out your
• 33:40
  videos and you hope it gets views.
• 33:43
  And some of them will. But others, you're thinking to
• 33:46
  yourself, how can this movie that just turned 25 not get at
• 33:49
  least 1000 views? Because this is a movie that's
• 33:52
  been around for 25 years and people have had 25 years to see
• 33:54
  it, and they still do to this day because a lot of movies are
• 33:56
  streaming nowadays. So I'm curious, since we ended
• 34:00
  the year not so great, great on the views when it comes to the
• 34:03
  movie Watch Along as we've done in the past, Sam, I'm looking
• 34:06
  forward to seeing what the numbers are going to be in 2026
• 34:08
  because we've got a killer lineup for 2026.
• 34:11
  I've already put out links to the first four shows that we're
• 34:14
  doing for Movie Watch along next year.
• 34:16
  We're doing one for Twister with Bill Paxton.
• 34:19
  We're doing one for Muppet Treasure Island.
• 34:21
  We're doing one for The Rocketeer, which is a pulp
• 34:24
  movie, and we're doing 1 the week after that for The Phantom
• 34:28
  with Billy Zane, because that's another pulp movie.
• 34:31
  So I'm hoping we get in an audience.
• 34:34
  We'll see. And once again, once we get
• 34:36
  closer to the air date, I'm hoping that some of the members
• 34:39
  of our Men's Adventure Fiction Family Discord will want to be
• 34:41
  panelists on those episodes for Rocketeer and The Phantom.
• 34:45
  I will definitely, I, I will definitely be a panelist for the
• 34:50
  for the Phantom. There you go that.
• 34:53
  Problem's already been solved. I saw.
• 34:55
  Yeah, because I, I saw. Well, first I saw that when I
• 34:59
  was like a kid way back when. Kids, Sam.
• 35:04
  Loved it, but then I I saw again recently and like yeah, it
• 35:08
  holds. It holds up in.
• 35:11
  A movie. It's probably holds up like
• 35:13
  better than some like more contemporary superhero movies.
• 35:18
  Well, the other thing is this movie is more truer to the
• 35:20
  source material. Yeah.
• 35:22
  Which is another, what do you call a factor within its favor?
• 35:25
  Because a lot of people have said over the years about comic
• 35:27
  movies, oh, they don't stay stay true to the origin story.
• 35:29
  They don't stay true to the comic books or whatever.
• 35:31
  You know, the original property. Well, the Phantom is one of the
• 35:34
  few that stands out as being true to the property.
• 35:37
  You know, for the most part. I mean, Brandon, there's a
• 35:39
  little few creative liberties they have taken with it.
• 35:41
  But then again, Hollywood's been doing that since the beginning.
• 35:43
  Of the talk. But it holds up, man, and Billy
• 35:46
  Zane loves to cheer on that movie every time you see him at
• 35:49
  a convention. Well, and that's one movie too
• 35:52
  that like, I wish that like I wish we had God like.
• 35:56
  Two more, maybe three more. Yeah, yeah, at least at least
• 36:00
  one more sequel, right? Because.
• 36:02
  I'd love to have seen it, see the torch passed on to his son
• 36:05
  or something like that, like that.
• 36:07
  Would you know Billy Zane's son? That would have been awesome.
• 36:09
  Yeah, or even like, or even just because.
• 36:11
  Like not to not to like, you know, dissent.
• 36:16
  One who loves Batman or Superman.
• 36:18
  But it's like, it's like, you know, everyone knows, everyone
• 36:22
  knows the back story of, of Batman and everyone knows the
• 36:25
  back story of, you know, Superman.
• 36:28
  But there are all these pulp heroes like the fandom from the
• 36:32
  30s and 40s. Rocketeer.
• 36:33
  Yeah, or the Rocketeer, who, you know, nobody.
• 36:40
  I, I shouldn't say nobody, but they're a lot.
• 36:42
  They're a lot more obscure and so.
• 36:44
  Very obscure. Yeah, we have, you know, we have
• 36:47
  niche we had we had one movie of the Phantom, but it's like,
• 36:52
  well, I want to know more about that character.
• 36:55
  And so, you know, like, yeah, I I could go on Wikipedia or
• 37:00
  whatever, but like, yeah, the some of those more obscure,
• 37:04
  obscure heroes I think would be great for, you know, for to be
• 37:10
  made movies on especially, you know, we talked like superhero
• 37:14
  fatigue. Now what?
• 37:15
  I don't want to, which I definitely agree is a thing.
• 37:17
  I don't think it's necessarily that we have super fatigue.
• 37:21
  I think it's I think it's the fact that we're seeing the same,
• 37:25
  you know, superheroes over and over and over again.
• 37:28
  And I think we got some like, you know, lesser known heroes.
• 37:33
  I think that could, you know, maybe regenerate some interest
• 37:38
  in the genre. I think, I think all three of
• 37:40
  them should come actually, you know, I mean, there's many of
• 37:42
  them, but all four of them to a certain degree can come back.
• 37:45
  Dick Tracy, Rocketeer, Phantom, The Shadow, bring them all back,
• 37:49
  bring them all back, reboot them.
• 37:51
  Pass the torch on to a new group of heroes.
• 37:53
  Or, you know, have Billy Zane pass the torch on to his son.
• 37:56
  Have the Rocketeer actually, you know, figure out what he's what
• 38:00
  his role is going to be in the new world.
• 38:01
  Or you know what the shadow is ripe for reboot.
• 38:05
  I mean that you can take that character in so many different
• 38:10
  directions. I mean, whether it's post World
• 38:12
  War 2, you know, pre war would like whatever it is, there's so
• 38:17
  much you can do with these characters.
• 38:19
  I mean, look to the source material, look to the comic
• 38:22
  books, look to the novelizations of these characters and you'll
• 38:26
  see that there are storylines that can be adapted or what do
• 38:30
  you call it? Sam cherry picked from and use
• 38:33
  that. I mean somebody somebody posted
• 38:35
  in our discord a couple weeks ago a poster of all the pulp
• 38:39
  heroes coming together as one giant like Justice League, you
• 38:42
  know, super squad. And I thought that is cool.
• 38:46
  I mean it would be very hard to do, but it would be awesome if
• 38:50
  we saw Dick Tracy crossing over with shadow the phantom teaming
• 38:54
  up with the Rocketeer, right? You know, you have what's
• 38:57
  another pulp? The Green Hornet can team up
• 38:59
  with somebody. You know, there's, there's,
• 39:04
  there's a lot you can do with certain properties, if you know
• 39:06
  what I mean. Even someone like taking
• 39:12
  speaking outside the hero genre, though, like someone, someone
• 39:16
  was saying that, oh, you know, we need a, you know, HBO needs
• 39:21
  to do like a season of True Detective that doesn't suck.
• 39:25
  And I'm like, I'm like, well, there are there are plenty of
• 39:29
  like pulp detectives from the from the 1940s Sam Spade that
• 39:34
  yes, like you can you. Could.
• 39:37
  You could do a gritty you you could do a gritty pulpy, like
• 39:40
  new, you know, spin on like Sam Spade, like from the, from the,
• 39:47
  you know, from the 40s or from the 50s, you know, dragnet.
• 39:51
  That's sort of. Just the facts, ma'am.
• 39:54
  Yeah. I mean, HBO could do something
• 39:57
  like that if they if they wanted to.
• 39:59
  Well, who knows what's going to happen with HBO slash Max now
• 40:03
  that Warner Brothers has been bought out by Netflix?
• 40:05
  So, yeah, which is another thing, too.
• 40:07
  That's another thing that everyone's freaking out about.
• 40:09
  And I thought to myself, you know what?
• 40:10
  We don't know what's going to happen yet.
• 40:12
  So let's not push any panic buttons just yet.
• 40:15
  Because this deal between, what is it, Warner Brothers and
• 40:17
  Netflix, Sam has so many moving pieces.
• 40:20
  And the next couple of films, or what do you call it, TV series,
• 40:23
  properties, movies, whatever, that's going to take a while to
• 40:25
  get off the ground anyway. So let's just hold, hold, hold
• 40:30
  your horses. Don't put the cart before the
• 40:32
  horse. And if you want to watch these
• 40:34
  Warner Brothers properties, continue to do so through your
• 40:37
  streaming services or just buy them all on physical media like
• 40:39
  some of us here at the table have.
• 40:41
  Because all my favorite Warner Brothers movies are sitting in a
• 40:43
  box on Diva Da or Blu-ray. I got no problem with that.
• 40:47
  And you know why? Because Lord knows that if
• 40:49
  Skynet takes over and the internet's ruined, how are you
• 40:52
  going to watch your movies? Well, that's what DVDs and Blu
• 40:54
  rays are for. So yeah, all my favorites are
• 40:58
  sitting there. And the other thing is the more
• 41:00
  I watch these movies, whether it's the Warner Brothers or
• 41:02
  other studios, because I'm not saying Warner Brothers is the be
• 41:04
  all end all because there are a lot of studios out there.
• 41:06
  Let's be honest, without these movies, I would not be as
• 41:11
  inspired to write the stories that I'm writing now as I am
• 41:14
  right now. So I have Eastwood to thank for
• 41:17
  this. I have 310 to Huma to thank for
• 41:19
  this. I have True Grit to thank.
• 41:20
  But like all these different movies are so awesome that it
• 41:25
  inspires you to have ideas for stories.
• 41:28
  And then you just put all you got to do is put pen to paper
• 41:30
  and just write it and just write it.
• 41:32
  But the, the most important thing you got to do is if you
• 41:34
  got an idea for a story, write it and finish it.
• 41:36
  Don't just start writing it and stop halfway through or stop
• 41:40
  when you get to the end of the first act, because every story
• 41:42
  is a three act structure, Sam. Every single story is a three
• 41:45
  act structure. So finish it, get it done.
• 41:48
  And remember, the first draft is allowed to suck.
• 41:52
  All right, it's OK. My rough drafts are not the
• 41:55
  best. I mean, I think they're OK, but
• 41:57
  they are definitely not the best.
• 41:59
  But that's OK, That's the point is to draft this.
• 42:03
  That's why they call it a rough draft to begin with.
• 42:05
  It's rough, it's edgy, it's got dirt, it's got filth, it's got
• 42:08
  grime on it. But what you do is you send it
• 42:10
  over to your editor. You're dropping in our, you
• 42:11
  know, in our case, the content for review thread on, you know,
• 42:14
  the the discord and people will give you constructive feedback
• 42:19
  and that matters. That matters.
• 42:22
  Everything they say to you matters and don't take it
• 42:25
  personally either because they're only there to help you.
• 42:26
  I mean, I got edits from, I haven't finished editing this
• 42:30
  yet, like I said, but I got edits from Brina, you know, and
• 42:34
  I'm looking at what she wrote as terms of what I need to edit
• 42:36
  throughout the story. And I'm thinking to myself,
• 42:39
  that's good, this makes sense. This, this is coming to me now.
• 42:41
  You see what I'm saying? So she, she, by the way,
• 42:44
  Brina's, Brina's fantastic. Brina's fantastic.
• 42:47
  She is, she's a great editor, great, fantastic writer.
• 42:51
  There's no doubt. Amazing artist too.
• 42:54
  Oh my gosh, the fact that she can write these stories and do
• 42:58
  the interior and exterior artwork and the covers for all
• 43:00
  of that, that is a talent beyond measure.
• 43:04
  That is what do they say? You are way ahead of the curve.
• 43:08
  Way ahead of the curve. So, and Brina, I know you and I
• 43:12
  have discussed this before and I'm, and you know, already know
• 43:14
  this. I'm very much looking forward to
• 43:16
  reading Marona Grant, The Lost Tomb, Gogotha, and then Marona
• 43:18
  Grant, the Island of Devils. And yes, Brina, I ordered a copy
• 43:21
  of your latest book from the Zon.
• 43:23
  OK, it's coming to the house. I'm going to sit here.
• 43:25
  I'm going to read it. I'm going to read both.
• 43:26
  I'm going to read them in publication order, though I'm
• 43:28
  not going to read it in timeline order.
• 43:29
  All right, so I'm going to read in publication order.
• 43:31
  Sam and I, she is very interested in what I have to say
• 43:36
  about both books. So it's coming.
• 43:39
  It's coming one way or the other.
• 43:40
  I I bought both books on on my kindle.
• 43:45
  You did that's. Smart.
• 43:49
  I'm part I'm part way through the first one and it, it's, it's
• 43:53
  fantastic. Is it so awesome?
• 43:57
  Love to hear that talented people out there, period.
• 44:01
  Yeah, and she she's another one who I'd love to have on on the
• 44:05
  podcast and. Get her on here.
• 44:07
  Yeah, she, she know and she knows that she's that she's
• 44:11
  welcome. I mean, I think that's the other
• 44:13
  thing that you and I both, you know, do well as like I've had
• 44:18
  people who have never been on podcasts before come on podcasts
• 44:24
  and then they end up loving it. Jake, Jake Whitmer, you know
• 44:30
  most no play. Boy, look at the books that
• 44:34
  guy's put out. Who he doesn't quit either.
• 44:37
  He doesn't quit that guy, just hammers him out one after the
• 44:41
  other. And Jake, I got a few of your
• 44:45
  book. Was it 1?
• 44:46
  Is it one or two? Trying to think I got Cartel
• 44:48
  Crossfire. I'm still in the middle of
• 44:49
  reading SO. That one is awesome.
• 44:52
  I I did. It's good so far.
• 44:54
  I'm like 4. I'm like 4 or 6 chapters in
• 44:56
  it's. Fantastic.
• 44:58
  There's no doubt. Yeah, I mean, the, the crazy
• 45:03
  thing with the stuff that Widmer and I write too is a lot of that
• 45:08
  is like based on like current events and whatnot too and.
• 45:13
  You incorporate it into your story, Yeah.
• 45:15
  And so I'm, I'm always like, I'm like, man, can the world just
• 45:19
  like, you know, chill out a bit. Like I'd like to at least make
• 45:23
  one story that is a little bit far fetched, you know, as
• 45:27
  opposed to all unfortunately, all of the chaos in the world
• 45:31
  that isn't, you know, that isn't fortunately all too real.
• 45:35
  So, but well, Speaking of movies, what are your top movies
• 45:43
  of the year that either you've that that you've seen?
• 45:49
  They don't even have to like new movies that that you.
• 45:52
  This is embarrassing. I'm trying to think, did I even
• 45:56
  go to the theaters this year? I don't even think I have.
• 45:59
  I I. That's not true.
• 46:01
  I think I did go to the theater. I only went once.
• 46:04
  I don't think I did I. Don't think I did.
• 46:06
  I'll be honest with you. I don't think I've seen one
• 46:08
  movie that was released this year.
• 46:09
  No, no, no, that's not true. That's not true.
• 46:12
  I did go to the theaters this year once and it was to see
• 46:15
  Superman. So I saw the new Superman movie
• 46:17
  in theaters and that was my only theatrical experience in 2025.
• 46:21
  I'm so sorry to disappoint your audience.
• 46:22
  I know, but I don't. I can't even give you a top ten
• 46:24
  of the year because I haven't even seen 10 films this year.
• 46:26
  I've only seen one. Neither because I was very.
• 46:29
  Yeah, because I was very curious to see where James Gunn is going
• 46:33
  to take this now that he's calling the shots at DCU
• 46:36
  Universe Entertainments, which is what I'm calling it.
• 46:38
  So, James, I like Superman. I didn't love the movie, but I
• 46:43
  liked it enough to the point where I thought, OK, James, I'm
• 46:46
  in. Let's see where this goes.
• 46:47
  Let's see where this goes because I like David Corn sweet
• 46:50
  as Clark. I like him as Superman.
• 46:51
  I like Rachel as Lois. I like some of the other cast
• 46:54
  members being thrown in for good measure.
• 46:55
  And I like the fact that they're already incorporating the
• 46:57
  Justice League into this gosh darn thing.
• 46:59
  So I'm curious to see where it goes, man, which we're going to
• 47:02
  find out because next year, as you know, Super Girls coming
• 47:05
  out. So, so I I have to ask, ask you
• 47:08
  since you're kind of the Superman expert.
• 47:13
  Spoilers. So I guess spoilers for anyone
• 47:17
  who hasn't, you know, somehow seen Superman, but what was what
• 47:22
  were your like? What were your positives?
• 47:25
  And then what were kind of your, I don't want to say negatives,
• 47:29
  but you know, could have done. Right.
• 47:33
  How much time you got? No, I'm just kidding.
• 47:34
  So I'll I'll sum this up as best I can because the last thing I
• 47:37
  want to do, because the last thing I want to do is throw off
• 47:40
  anybody. All right, so spoilers for this
• 47:42
  movie. So my thoughts are this, I
• 47:44
  thought the movie was good, but the weakest parts for me Sam,
• 47:47
  were Jimmy Olsen and his crazy obsessive compulsive girlfriend
• 47:53
  who worked for Lex Luthor. That was insanity times a
• 47:56
  billion. And the fact that she was like
• 47:59
  the missing link in this whole gosh darn thing.
• 48:01
  Like if it weren't for her, Superman wouldn't know that Lex
• 48:03
  Luthor was behind the manipulation of the two
• 48:05
  governments, you know, or the two countries trying to kill
• 48:07
  each other or the two parts of the border trying to kill each
• 48:10
  other or some of the stuff that was going on in the inter
• 48:12
  dimensional gateway, whatever it was 'cause, you know, Lex
• 48:15
  Luthor's tapped into, you know, intermetal gateways.
• 48:17
  I'm thinking to myself, really everything hinged on her taking
• 48:20
  her ridiculous amount of selfies on her cell phone.
• 48:23
  That that's, that's one of your linchpins for this.
• 48:26
  That's horrible. The girl's out of her mind.
• 48:29
  The actress is terrible. Jimmy being a Wiz with the
• 48:31
  ladies. I mean, maybe there was a comic
• 48:34
  storyline I missed, but I don't care if Jimmy Olsen is is a Wiz
• 48:39
  with the if he's a ladies man, I do not care.
• 48:41
  But. I Yeah.
• 48:44
  Yeah, the positives for me are this.
• 48:46
  David and Rachel's chemistry is good.
• 48:48
  David and Rachel together as a couple and working together on
• 48:51
  screen is really solid. And Crypto was one of my biggest
• 48:55
  concerns going into the movie. But he wasn't terrible.
• 48:58
  I don't think Crypto was terrible.
• 48:59
  And the fact that he was able to lay the smack down on Lex
• 49:02
  Luthor's candy ass towards the end of the movie, I don't know
• 49:04
  if we're allowed to curse on the show.
• 49:05
  Sorry, but. Oh, of course we are.
• 49:07
  OK, OK, so the so when he rips Luther a new one at the end of
• 49:11
  the movie, I thought, OK, crypto, well done, well done.
• 49:14
  This is this is good. This is good.
• 49:16
  And the can't one of the things I didn't like and I'm hoping
• 49:19
  that they correct this in the in the what do you call it the
• 49:21
  sequel Clark. Not really Clark believing that
• 49:25
  his parents from Krypton sent him to Earth to dominate and
• 49:28
  kill people. That's not what his Kryptonian
• 49:31
  parents wanted him to do. No, no, no, no, no.
• 49:33
  Lex Luthor took that video and manipulated it to make LL think
• 49:40
  that his parents sent him to Earth to kill everybody.
• 49:42
  But that's not that's not true at all.
• 49:44
  So Lex Luther manipulated the video.
• 49:45
  Everyone thinks it's genuine. No, it's not.
• 49:47
  It was manipulated. It was manipulated with.
• 49:49
  It was it was it was what do you call played around with whatever
• 49:52
  it was manipulated. So callow you better learn that
• 49:54
  fast in movie #2 but him to say, I don't really care what my
• 49:58
  Kryptonian parents think. I only care what my earth
• 50:00
  parents think. It's like hey man, look, you can
• 50:03
  come from Earth and Krypton and still enjoy to both sets of
• 50:06
  parents at the same time. Even though you're talking to a
• 50:08
  hologram in the in the fortress, they're still your parents, man.
• 50:12
  They're. Still your parents.
• 50:13
  Like if I had a chance to talk to my parents through a
• 50:14
  hologram, I would still do it. I would still do it.
• 50:19
  So that kind of annoyed me, but looking forward to see what
• 50:23
  happens in the next one. Oh, Supergirl's cameo at the
• 50:26
  end. What's funny, But my concern
• 50:30
  about the new movie coming out next year.
• 50:32
  Sam, and you've probably, I don't know if you've seen the
• 50:33
  trailer for Supergirl yet, but I just hope that she's not 1000%
• 50:37
  drunk the entire movie and she doesn't learn from her mistakes
• 50:41
  because look, she's been through trauma, she's been through crap.
• 50:44
  And this is based on the most recent comic book series,
• 50:46
  Supergirl the woman of tomorrow. I get that, but don't make her
• 50:50
  drunk for 2 1/2 hours and not learn a gosh darn thing.
• 50:54
  And then and for her to not become the Supergirl, you know,
• 50:56
  the car Zoral that we all know and love from, from Smallville,
• 50:59
  the TV series and the coming If that if she doesn't have a
• 51:03
  character arc in this movie and she's just gonna be drunk the
• 51:06
  whole time and feeling guilty and then just beating the crap
• 51:08
  out of people for no reason, that's that's gonna be a
• 51:11
  problem. But I'm hoping it's a character
• 51:13
  arc that you'll become Supergirl and, you know, embrace herself
• 51:18
  for who she is and realize this is not a competition between my
• 51:23
  cousin and myself. This is about me becoming the
• 51:26
  hero that I was destined to be. I just became a hero in in my
• 51:29
  own way. And that's fine.
• 51:31
  That is fine. Just become Supergirl that I
• 51:34
  know from the comics that I read, that I've read from the
• 51:38
  80s and the ones that I saw in Smallville with Laura Vandevoor
• 51:41
  playing the character of Cara in Smallville, which by the way,
• 51:44
  that is the best right now, the best live action on screen
• 51:50
  representation of Cara Zarrell that I've ever seen.
• 51:53
  Or Ben Fort is the queen of Supergirl.
• 51:56
  Melissa Benoits. No, Helen Slater, beautiful
• 52:00
  woman, wonderfully talented, and she was a good Supergirl for
• 52:03
  what she was in that movie. But the movie itself around her
• 52:05
  was crap, you know, so and everyone else who's played
• 52:10
  Supergirl in between, the voice actresses, they're good.
• 52:12
  They're really good. I don't mind the voice
• 52:13
  actresses, but if we're talking live action interpretations of
• 52:16
  character, Sam, Laura Vandervoort is the cream of the
• 52:18
  crop now. I'm hoping I would agree.
• 52:20
  Billy Alecock will overtake that.
• 52:23
  I would love for her to do it, but it all depends on the movie.
• 52:26
  Sam. Yeah, I think, I think the thing
• 52:32
  that, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to put words in
• 52:36
  your mouth and say that you and I have similar gripes.
• 52:40
  I think my biggest gripes, like, like you said, were again with,
• 52:47
  you know, Jimmy Olsen slash, you know, Lex Luthor's like
• 52:52
  supermodel girlfriend who was taking that whole thing felt
• 52:58
  like a kind of like one of James Gunn's like I I don't know gun
• 53:03
  ISM if we can use that term, like inside, you know, like like
• 53:08
  like. Yeah.
• 53:09
  Like, you know, like James Gunn has his like own, you know,
• 53:13
  quite quirky sense of like, you know, humor, which I'm, which I,
• 53:18
  I will say I'm glad that he didn't like put his own brand on
• 53:23
  it like as much as he has in like other movies, like, you
• 53:27
  know, Guardians of the Galaxy and what not, you know, so it
• 53:33
  wasn't as present in Superman as like it could have been.
• 53:37
  And, and I'm very, you know, grateful for that.
• 53:40
  But on the other hands, on the other hand, in the areas where,
• 53:45
  you know, it showed a lot like with that whole, you know,
• 53:48
  girlfriend thing, it really, it really did show.
• 53:51
  And it was kind of like I, I was all, I was also kind of
• 53:54
  scratching my head being like, you know, really, where, where
• 53:57
  is this going? So also, you know, not be not to
• 54:04
  be rude or, you know, like just respectful.
• 54:07
  But yeah, like, like you, I don't want super.
• 54:10
  I don't want a Supergirl to just be like a drunk, a drunk call,
• 54:14
  you know, a drunk college sorority girl, the entire, you
• 54:20
  know. 2 1/2 hour movie. So.
• 54:24
  That's going to be bad if it is, if it is the case.
• 54:25
  But we'll see. We don't know yet.
• 54:26
  The movie's coming out next year and I'm going to be there.
• 54:29
  I'm going to see it because I like the look of this actress.
• 54:31
  I like how she looks in the suit.
• 54:33
  She looks fantastic in the Super girls suit, like fantastic.
• 54:36
  And when she's laying the smack down on those guys towards the
• 54:38
  end of the trailer, I'm thinking to myself, OK, this is it.
• 54:41
  It's on now. This, this is what I want to
• 54:42
  see. Let's see it.
• 54:44
  But I gotta be honest with you, though, that trailer was weak,
• 54:47
  man. That I didn't, that trail was, I
• 54:50
  didn't get any hype for that. I didn't get any excitement out
• 54:53
  of that trailer like I did with the Superman trailer.
• 54:55
  But then again, this Supergirl was a lot different than the
• 54:57
  ones we've had in the last 45 years.
• 54:59
  And I get that you have to be different from the pack.
• 55:01
  But that teaser trailer was just yeah, it's fine.
• 55:06
  But it it, it didn't really, in the words of Randy Jackson,
• 55:09
  didn't really do it for me. Yeah, you could.
• 55:11
  You can, you can, you can be different from the pack.
• 55:13
  But, but like I said, I I don't think what what I don't think
• 55:16
  drunk party girl. There's being different from the
• 55:19
  pack and then there's being disrespectful to the character,
• 55:24
  you know, and, and drunk party girl is not who I've ever seen
• 55:28
  the Supergirl character as. Yeah, and the.
• 55:32
  And the and the song for the trailer I thought was a bit odd.
• 55:35
  It's like, come on, you can't include it.
• 55:37
  Doesn't Supergirl have her own anthem by now?
• 55:39
  Use the Supergirl anthem or use the Superman anthem and just
• 55:42
  twist the lyrics or twist the instrumentals a little bit like.
• 55:46
  Well, again, again, that that goes back to, I think James Gunn
• 55:49
  being quirky and bringing, you know, like his own.
• 55:52
  Music, yeah. Oh, yeah.
• 55:56
  I mean, I'm glad you and I have. I'm glad you.
• 55:58
  And I kind of have the same, you know, critique of, you know,
• 56:02
  James Gunn even. We'll see how it goes, man.
• 56:08
  I mean, there's, there's a lot of unknowns here.
• 56:10
  You know, if it if Supergirl comes out, it's a good, it's a
• 56:13
  good success and James going to be able to keep his job.
• 56:15
  But if the film bombs, then he may not have a job after
• 56:20
  tomorrow after that movie comes out.
• 56:22
  If that movie bombs, it does not do well at all.
• 56:25
  People are going to start wondering, Oh, was James the
• 56:27
  right person for this? Or are we kind of like second
• 56:29
  guessing or. And the other thing is what's
• 56:31
  going to happen between Warner Brothers and Netflix by that
• 56:33
  point? So I mean, James Gunn may not
• 56:35
  may be out of a job. You know, him and his crew may
• 56:37
  be out of a job because if Netflix, you know, with Netflix
• 56:40
  taking over, they may want to reshape stuff.
• 56:42
  Who who knows? We don't know.
• 56:44
  There's a there's a million unknowns about this.
• 56:46
  But I'm just hoping that DC continues what it's doing.
• 56:49
  Make movies, let the storytellers tell their story
• 56:52
  and take some of the characters from the comics that haven't
• 56:55
  been adapted yet and give them a shot.
• 56:56
  Honestly. Yeah.
• 56:57
  Let's see the Huntress. Let's see Black Canary.
• 56:59
  Let's see the question, you know, let's see what was the
• 57:03
  other one like Impulse or or the Cowboy or the Silver Knight or
• 57:08
  whatever, Just these these obscure, not so well known
• 57:11
  characters that we know from Justice League Unlimited
• 57:12
  television series and incorporate them into the movies
• 57:15
  because that would be so cool. Definitely with the question,
• 57:19
  since I'm a big fan, I I want to see the Victoria Sage.
• 57:23
  Like I want to see Victoria Sage, the Objectivist reporter
• 57:27
  from the Denny from the Dennis O'Neill run in the 80s.
• 57:30
  Really. OK.
• 57:32
  Which is like, you know, that I'm not saying I feel like set
• 57:36
  in the 80s, but like, but like the, but like the question.
• 57:41
  Well, I mean it. Yeah.
• 57:42
  It would be like the question is like an is an is like an
• 57:47
  investigative journalist and I love it.
• 57:50
  You know who who they could do, they could do something like
• 57:53
  really similar to like, you know, the first season of
• 57:56
  Daredevil with that, with that character.
• 57:59
  I would love that. I mean the put in the heck.
• 58:03
  I'd like to see Doctor Fate get another shot because I know he
• 58:06
  was in Black Adam, but that was a separate iteration of of
• 58:09
  Doctor Fate. I'd like to see another
• 58:10
  iteration of Doctor Fate thrown into DC, because Doctor Fate is
• 58:13
  a fascinating character. Yeah.
• 58:16
  And so, yeah, I mean, I, I think, I think there's a lot
• 58:21
  they could, they could do. I, I think the one thing that
• 58:25
  really is kind of, I'm glad that DC is kind of trying to separate
• 58:31
  from is they don't seem to be like directly trying to compete
• 58:34
  with Marvel anymore to just like, you know, to just like be
• 58:40
  the exact opposite of the MCU. And I think that, I think that's
• 58:44
  the other thing too, is I don't think we need a superhero movie
• 58:48
  every single year from, from Marvel.
• 58:54
  I, I was told my my Coast, like if they want to wait like 2 to
• 58:58
  three years between Spider Man movies like they did with, you
• 59:02
  know, the Tobey Maguire ones, I would be perfectly fine with
• 59:07
  that. So with the anticipation, yeah,
• 59:09
  I don't, I don't mind it either. I mean, you know, if a Superman
• 59:12
  movie comes out and then a year later we get a Green Lantern
• 59:14
  movie, you're fine with me. I'm down because it's different
• 59:17
  characters, different movies, different storytellers.
• 59:20
  Let's see it. I want to see it.
• 59:21
  So yeah, we'll see what happens. I know Lanterns is getting their
• 59:24
  own television series between Kyle Chandler and that other
• 59:27
  actor. I forget his name.
• 59:27
  I apologize. But looking forward to seeing
• 59:29
  what they do with that. Because a grizzled, battered,
• 59:32
  you know, Hal Jordan and then a Jon Stewart working together in
• 59:36
  the same show. That is awesome.
• 59:38
  Like that is going to be, that's going to be something to see.
• 59:41
  I think was in itself. I mean, Kyle Chandler playing a
• 59:43
  grizzled Hal Jordan, Coach Taylor from Friday Night Lights,
• 59:47
  that's awesome. That actor was great.
• 59:51
  Yeah, and but, and by the way, that's, that's a, that's a great
• 59:54
  show too. Friday Night Light.
• 59:57
  Dude that that is such an underrated show.
• 59:59
  So underrated. Not enough people watched it
• 1:00:02
  when it was on and it's being rediscovered through streaming,
• 1:00:04
  which is great. But you, everybody who's
• 1:00:07
  listening to this program right now, you need to stream all five
• 1:00:09
  seasons of Friday Night Lights. It is one of the best well
• 1:00:12
  written, well acted shows that we've had in 25 years.
• 1:00:16
  Well. That's, well, that's where,
• 1:00:18
  that's where Taylor, that's where Taylor Kitsch got his, you
• 1:00:22
  know. Star John Carter John Carter.
• 1:00:25
  He was John Carter. Well, I mean, everyone, everyone
• 1:00:27
  likes to, you know, bring up, you know, that he was that he
• 1:00:33
  was, you know, in John Carter and.
• 1:00:37
  And X-Men. Yeah, I mean, and he, he's a,
• 1:00:40
  he's a terrific actor, you know as well, like.
• 1:00:43
  He was good as dammit. I'd love to see, I'd love to see
• 1:00:47
  him in more stuff and he's already great in the Terminal,
• 1:00:49
  as you know, series. Oh yeah, it's in the Terminal
• 1:00:54
  List. Yeah, I got to sit my keister
• 1:00:55
  down and watch that because I have the Terminal List book
• 1:00:58
  written by Jack Carr right here. Oh awesome.
• 1:01:01
  Yeah, read the read the book first before you.
• 1:01:05
  Read the book first all. Right, I got you.
• 1:01:07
  I got. You it's sitting right here.
• 1:01:08
  Like it's literally on my bottom shelf.
• 1:01:09
  It's right there. Yeah, it's it's the first
• 1:01:12
  terminal list book is 1 is one of the is one of the best I.
• 1:01:16
  Got a copy? Ever.
• 1:01:18
  I'll have to read it then, because it's sitting right there
• 1:01:20
  on my on my shelf. Yeah, I got it.
• 1:01:22
  I got it in paperback. So why I've got it?
• 1:01:26
  I've I've still got it on Audible so still got it on.
• 1:01:31
  It's all good. It's all good.
• 1:01:32
  A lot of people experience their books that way through Audible,
• 1:01:34
  and that's fine. You know my best.
• 1:01:35
  One of my good friends says, Oh yeah, I don't read.
• 1:01:37
  I just listen. It's like OK, I, whatever works.
• 1:01:40
  I do a high, I do a hybrid of the two.
• 1:01:43
  Yeah, it's fine. Helps me to.
• 1:01:46
  It helps me to, you know, consonate and like track the
• 1:01:49
  words. Visualize.
• 1:01:51
  Yeah, the story a little bit. I don't know.
• 1:01:53
  I prefer to turn a page in a book, but that's just me.
• 1:01:56
  Well, yeah, I, I, I do the, I do the same like.
• 1:02:00
  So that works anyway, though, as far as like you know, you, as
• 1:02:06
  far as like our work goes, like what are you looking most for to
• 1:02:12
  you know, and and in the new year?
• 1:02:15
  Well, other than the fact that we're getting a Supergirl movie
• 1:02:17
  for the first time in 45 years, which is a big deal, by the way,
• 1:02:21
  that is a huge deal that we're getting a new Supergirl movie
• 1:02:24
  because like I said, the one in the 80s, Sam, it's rough.
• 1:02:30
  It's very rough. And the fact that Ellis from Die
• 1:02:33
  Hard is in that movie and he plays the love interest to to to
• 1:02:37
  Supergirl with a clean shaven face when I'm so used to seeing
• 1:02:41
  him with that thick beard and that Wall Street suit from Die
• 1:02:44
  Hard. Bobby, I'm your white knight.
• 1:02:48
  Yeah, you come in here, you think you're going to run the
• 1:02:50
  place, You run into this little problem.
• 1:02:51
  Hans Booby, I'm your white knight.
• 1:02:55
  I mean, that is just one of the greatest.
• 1:02:58
  It's just one of the coolest lines you've ever you're ever
• 1:02:59
  going to hear in a movie, period.
• 1:03:00
  But anyway, enough about. Yeah, I must have missed 60
• 1:03:05
  minutes. What?
• 1:03:06
  What? Do you say?
• 1:03:07
  Yeah, It's it's great. It's hey, John boy.
• 1:03:11
  I mean, it's, Oh my gosh. I know, I know people love Alan
• 1:03:16
  Rickman as as snakes Uber Yeah. But yeah, he will always be Hans
• 1:03:21
  Cooper first and foremost to to me.
• 1:03:25
  So I also read recently that like that they actually dropped
• 1:03:31
  him out of the window. Wow.
• 1:03:34
  Like that, that like that was actually, that was actually Alan
• 1:03:38
  Rickman. And they didn't they and they
• 1:03:40
  didn't tell him. Oh jeez.
• 1:03:42
  So that, that that look where he is shocked, terrified.
• 1:03:47
  Yeah, that's that's genuine. Wow, I did not.
• 1:03:50
  Do. That.
• 1:03:51
  And you know, like, like they hadn't, they had like a giant
• 1:03:54
  like. Inflatable, yeah.
• 1:03:56
  Yeah, they had a giant. They had a giant.
• 1:03:58
  It was inflatable. But I guess the entire time the
• 1:04:01
  director was like, please land on that thing.
• 1:04:03
  Please. Oh my gosh, you know if yeah, if
• 1:04:08
  he missed it by 1/4 inch, he would have missed it that.
• 1:04:10
  Would end that that movie would have, you know, taken.
• 1:04:14
  A tank. Yeah.
• 1:04:16
  Yeah. Wow.
• 1:04:17
  I did not know that. That's insane.
• 1:04:19
  That's insane. Wow.
• 1:04:20
  Well done, Alan Rickman. Yeah, no, that's it's a classic
• 1:04:24
  movie for all times. But what am I looking forward to
• 1:04:26
  in 2026? So I'm looking forward to seeing
• 1:04:28
  the Supergirl movie because I'm curious to see how Millie Alcock
• 1:04:29
  is going to take over the role. That's one thing.
• 1:04:31
  But one I one of the things I'm really looking forward to in
• 1:04:33
  2026, Sam, to keeping things on the rails here.
• 1:04:36
  I'm just looking forward to continue to write, writing more
• 1:04:39
  stories, writing more short stories, putting them out in the
• 1:04:41
  world and putting out short story anthologies.
• 1:04:43
  I actually wrote my goals, my writing goals on a, on a dry
• 1:04:47
  erase bar on a whiteboard for 2026.
• 1:04:50
  And I took a picture on my phone of these goals that I wrote down
• 1:04:54
  in this board, right? So I have this on my phone to
• 1:04:57
  look at it at all times. So I'm just looking forward to
• 1:05:01
  continue to write, to continue to learn and continue to get
• 1:05:04
  better at it, get stronger, get faster.
• 1:05:07
  You know, all the things that you know, anything you do in
• 1:05:10
  life is like a muscle in your body.
• 1:05:12
  You just got to exercise it every day, right?
• 1:05:14
  Repetition is key. So I'm looking forward to
• 1:05:17
  reading more books because I looked at my Goodreads account,
• 1:05:20
  Sam, and you're going to, you're probably going to hate me for
• 1:05:22
  this. I only read like 8 books in the
• 1:05:27
  span of a year and some of those were one offs.
• 1:05:31
  They were short story books, you know, ones that had what were
• 1:05:34
  they called quick reads. Quick reads, right?
• 1:05:36
  Like Charles F Milhouse has his quick read series.
• 1:05:39
  And then you have the Veritas Entertainment books that were 50
• 1:05:43
  pages, which are, you know, short, short novellas.
• 1:05:46
  So that was, you know, quick reads.
• 1:05:49
  With all due respect, it was. Hey, man, that that's better
• 1:05:52
  than that's better than a lot of people.
• 1:05:54
  It is, I mean to a certain extent it is, but I read 8 books
• 1:05:57
  and only four of them, if not three of them were full length
• 1:06:01
  novels. Now one of them was some
• 1:06:04
  something we've been talking about for a good good while now
• 1:06:06
  in our discord, respectively, King Solomon's Minds by H Writer
• 1:06:10
  Haggard. I don't know if you're familiar
• 1:06:11
  with that or not, but I read that and I thought it was good,
• 1:06:17
  but I don't think it was great. You know, like it's good in the
• 1:06:22
  Mens of retrofiction genre, but it's not one of the greatest
• 1:06:23
  I've ever read. But then again, I still got a
• 1:06:25
  long ways to go, you know what I mean?
• 1:06:27
  So we'll see. But I'm looking forward to
• 1:06:30
  reading more. I'm looking forward to writing
• 1:06:31
  more. I'm looking forward to all the
• 1:06:33
  great guests we're going to have on and I quote for the Saturday
• 1:06:36
  show and all people we're going to have on our Friday night
• 1:06:38
  shows where we're doing movie, you know, movie watch alongs
• 1:06:40
  respectively. I'm just, I'm looking forward to
• 1:06:44
  all that. But the things I'm looking
• 1:06:45
  forward to the most are just, and this is one thing I'm very,
• 1:06:47
  very big on. Consistency is the key, Sam.
• 1:06:50
  So I'm looking forward to getting up at a specific time
• 1:06:56
  every day and writing for an hour to an hour and a half.
• 1:07:00
  And then I go to work, right? I do my job.
• 1:07:03
  I come home from work, have my dinner, and then when I'm done
• 1:07:06
  dinner and I wash up and brush my itty bitty little teeth, Sam,
• 1:07:08
  you know what I'm going to be doing?
• 1:07:09
  I'm going to be reading for the last two to three hours a night
• 1:07:13
  before I go to sleep at night. And then I'm going to get up the
• 1:07:15
  next morning and do it all over again.
• 1:07:17
  So that's what I'm looking forward to because that's a new
• 1:07:19
  habit I want to do is get up at 4:00 in the morning before
• 1:07:22
  anybody else and get to writing for an hour and a half in
• 1:07:27
  between taking my shower, you know, putting my clothes on for
• 1:07:29
  the work day and, you know, eating my breakfast, which as we
• 1:07:32
  all know, Sam, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
• 1:07:35
  So getting all that done, going to work, make that money, come
• 1:07:39
  home, read books for three hours after you've had dinner, boom,
• 1:07:43
  go to bed and wake up the next morning, do it all over again.
• 1:07:45
  That is, those are the things I'm looking forward to the most.
• 1:07:47
  And also I'm looking forward to going to conventions and
• 1:07:49
  networking with as many people as humanly possible.
• 1:07:53
  One of those events, Sam, being Pulp Fest in Pennsylvania, to
• 1:07:58
  see Luke, to see Nate, to see Casey, to see Terrance, to see
• 1:08:00
  you. Everybody from the Veritas
• 1:08:02
  family at Pulp Fest, brother. I'm I'm gonna have to, I'm gonna
• 1:08:07
  have to look into that. So.
• 1:08:10
  Yeah, 'cause it's it. Well, it's in the, it's in the
• 1:08:12
  last week of July, early August. So book your flights, book your
• 1:08:16
  tickets, get it done now, man, 'cause Pultfest is coming.
• 1:08:19
  And I think it's high time for the Veritas family to take over
• 1:08:24
  that convention floor and own the place and tell people, hey,
• 1:08:28
  we may be the young bucks of this crew, but we are putting
• 1:08:31
  out great stories, great books, great short stories.
• 1:08:33
  Great. What do you call it?
• 1:08:35
  Sub stack material? And we're not going to stop
• 1:08:39
  until we clap for that mountain, so.
• 1:08:41
  Sub stack, I mean, I mean sub sub stack is an interesting
• 1:08:48
  platform. And what are your?
• 1:08:51
  Thoughts on it you think it's worthy of pursuing or you think
• 1:08:53
  you're you still investigating? I definitely think I, I, I
• 1:09:01
  definitely think it's worth pursuing if you don't have an
• 1:09:07
  audience elsewhere. And I say that because I've been
• 1:09:13
  on Twitter for like, since 2011. Oh.
• 1:09:21
  Long time. Yeah, and like I like for so for
• 1:09:25
  writing long form content, I love subsec.
• 1:09:29
  Like I love the way it's laid out and and what not my problem.
• 1:09:34
  And maybe maybe it's just a me problem that could be entirely,
• 1:09:38
  but it's really hard. I've noticed to, you know, to
• 1:09:44
  say, Hey, guys, like I, you know, if you want, if you want a
• 1:09:47
  long form content or, you know, my, my short stories free, go
• 1:09:54
  read them on sub stack, You know, because like some people
• 1:09:59
  they, they don't want to go over and create like another account
• 1:10:03
  or something. So that that can be that can be
• 1:10:06
  difficult. I I'm I'm trying to get more
• 1:10:08
  people over to sub stack, but so that's going to be one of my
• 1:10:12
  things. So.
• 1:10:14
  All right, I look forward to hearing your thoughts because
• 1:10:16
  you know, I've thought about that.
• 1:10:20
  What is it sub stack? But then again, I'm a very new
• 1:10:22
  fish in the in the sea. So I I got a long wait.
• 1:10:26
  You know, like I said, one of my my goals for 2026 are simply
• 1:10:29
  this write as many short stories as I can, put together 3 short
• 1:10:33
  story anthologies with different short stories focusing on
• 1:10:35
  different genres and put them out in the world and get people
• 1:10:37
  to, you know, hopefully buy copies of them or purchase them
• 1:10:40
  on what is it ebook, right? Get on KDP, read it, enjoy it,
• 1:10:44
  give me feedback if you want because reviews help.
• 1:10:47
  Reviews help. They do.
• 1:10:49
  And one of my other goals for 2026, Sam, I don't know if you
• 1:10:52
  knew this or not, but I want to turn one of my short stories and
• 1:10:54
  adapt it as a comic book. Because comic books are awesome.
• 1:10:58
  And comic. Books.
• 1:11:00
  Can give you a whole new audience that you can tap into
• 1:11:04
  and bring them into your circle. Who knows?
• 1:11:08
  I mean, I got ideas for it. I mean, honestly, I could adapt
• 1:11:12
  Wolf of the West as a comic book.
• 1:11:14
  I think that'd be cool to have a Western comic book out there.
• 1:11:17
  I think that'd be fascinating. But then again, I could take one
• 1:11:20
  of my other short stories and adapt them as a comic book.
• 1:11:21
  We don't know. So I haven't decided which story
• 1:11:24
  is going to be adapted as of yet to that comic book format, but
• 1:11:28
  I'm looking forward to discovering what that is and
• 1:11:31
  putting together a team that is going to adapt my story like I
• 1:11:36
  can write it. And then I'm going to have, you
• 1:11:38
  know, to find a letterer, an inker and artist, all that
• 1:11:40
  stuff. And I have resources that I can
• 1:11:42
  go to to find these things, which is great, which is
• 1:11:44
  fantastic. So I'm very excited to to see
• 1:11:47
  where that goes. That's one of my 2026 goals is
• 1:11:49
  to adapt something as a short story into a comic book.
• 1:11:50
  So, and I want to do it as a one off.
• 1:11:53
  I don't want to do it as like a series or anything.
• 1:11:55
  I just want to do it and and try it out and give it a shot and
• 1:11:58
  put my best foot forward and do it and we'll see what happens.
• 1:12:01
  You know, put you know what I mean?
• 1:12:03
  Like put your cards out on the table, see or put your chips
• 1:12:05
  about like on the table. See what kind of cards we get.
• 1:12:07
  Yeah, I would. I would love to do that like for
• 1:12:10
  one, for one of my books too. And I I have looked.
• 1:12:14
  The assassin? No, I'm just kidding.
• 1:12:17
  Well, yeah, maybe. Maybe since the assassin, maybe
• 1:12:19
  Night of the Vigilante. Any.
• 1:12:21
  Oh my. God, Night of the Vigilante.
• 1:12:23
  Sign me up, Sam. Any, I mean, I mean, I mean any
• 1:12:26
  of them. My whole, my whole thing is just
• 1:12:29
  from like talking to, you know, artists and like people in the
• 1:12:34
  industry like it is, I mean it, you know, it takes time to write
• 1:12:40
  the books just as is. As is.
• 1:12:43
  Right. And then, you know, as far as
• 1:12:47
  like, as far as like producing on comic book, I mean, I don't
• 1:12:51
  have, I don't have, you know, the money to like really pay any
• 1:12:55
  artists, you know, outright. So like if there were a way
• 1:13:00
  where like, you know, I could split, like, you know, the, the
• 1:13:05
  royalties with, you know, you know, the artist too or whoever
• 1:13:13
  like it, it's just there, there are lots of moving parts to it.
• 1:13:16
  So I would be very curious like, you know, to hear like what your
• 1:13:20
  experience, what that would be if you do pursue it, because
• 1:13:27
  that's one more. It's like if if I had, you know,
• 1:13:29
  if I had like if I had, you know, lots of cash, just like
• 1:13:33
  lying around, I absolutely would pursue it.
• 1:13:36
  But. Duffel bag full of cash.
• 1:13:38
  But like, yeah, just just like, I don't know if you know, I
• 1:13:40
  don't know if you know who like Eric July is.
• 1:13:45
  Sorry, I'm not familiar with this one.
• 1:13:47
  He's a Eric July is a is a YouTube who he he also does his
• 1:13:53
  own. He actually he acts like has his
• 1:13:56
  own in the in the comic imprint. Oh, that's.
• 1:14:00
  Cool. And he said it's cool, but like
• 1:14:04
  the amount of like the amount of money that they've had to like
• 1:14:07
  raise just that off of like Kickstarters and whatnot.
• 1:14:10
  I mean, like, it's, it's a lot. It's work.
• 1:14:12
  So it's work. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's a
• 1:14:15
  lot of work. And once again, you know, once I
• 1:14:17
  get once I get the wheels turning about what story I want
• 1:14:20
  to adapt. And then I got to look for all
• 1:14:21
  these pieces to the puzzle. It's going to be, it's going to
• 1:14:25
  be a process. Like anything in life, it's
• 1:14:28
  going to be a process. So we'll see what happens.
• 1:14:31
  I mean, obviously I'm going to talk to my friends in these
• 1:14:32
  circles who know more than I do. And I'm going to say, hey,
• 1:14:35
  where's the best place to start? You know, what, what do I do if
• 1:14:38
  I don't have the funds to pay the letterer, the anchor, the
• 1:14:40
  artist, or I can only pay like one or two of the five people
• 1:14:43
  who are going to work on this? Like what, how do we do this in
• 1:14:46
  a way that's going to be great for the fans, but also
• 1:14:49
  accessible for me And my there's only so much money that I can
• 1:14:52
  throw around without going bankrupt.
• 1:14:54
  And the other thing is I looked at and it's funny too, you know
• 1:14:59
  how when you spend money, you're not really thinking about the
• 1:15:02
  end game. You're just like, oh, I have
• 1:15:03
  enough money to pay for all this, so I'm going to be fine
• 1:15:05
  next month. And then when you look at your
• 1:15:06
  funds, you realize, oh, I'm spending this amount of money
• 1:15:09
  per month. Oh my gosh, I didn't know I was
• 1:15:11
  spending this much until you actually sit down and do the
• 1:15:14
  math and realize, oh, I owe this amount of money per month for
• 1:15:18
  rent, this amount of money per month for renter's insurance,
• 1:15:20
  this amount of money per, you know, for the storage lockers
• 1:15:23
  that we have or whatever you just whatever it is, you
• 1:15:26
  realize, oh wow, I'm making enough money to keep the lights
• 1:15:31
  on. But I don't know if I make
• 1:15:32
  enough money to pay someone else to be my artist or be a letterer
• 1:15:37
  or anchor. I don't know if I'm ready for
• 1:15:38
  that because I don't make enough money yet.
• 1:15:39
  But like I said, it's going to be a learning curve.
• 1:15:43
  It's going to be a process. And I have resources that I can
• 1:15:46
  go to and talk to people and say, hey, what is the best way
• 1:15:49
  for me to work this out without bankrupting myself and without
• 1:15:54
  hurting anybody's reputation, You know, 'cause the last thing
• 1:15:57
  I want to do is tell somebody, hey, I want you to be my artist.
• 1:15:59
  And then I can't pay him, right? So who knows, right?
• 1:16:04
  It's, it's honestly at this point, it's a crapshoot.
• 1:16:07
  You know, life, you know what we, you know what we learned 30
• 1:16:11
  years ago, Sam? Life is like a box of
• 1:16:13
  chocolates. You never know what you're going
• 1:16:15
  to get, honestly. True and true words have never
• 1:16:20
  been spoken, Sir. We have America's dad, Tom
• 1:16:24
  Hanks, to thank for that one. Indeed, we do so well.
• 1:16:30
  You've got, you know, you've certainly got an ambitious set
• 1:16:36
  of goals for 20/20/26. Let's hope I can do.
• 1:16:40
  It let's hope I don't mess it up.
• 1:16:43
  So and well, you know, you've always got, you know, support
• 1:16:47
  from me and the others in the in the Men's Adventure Fiction
• 1:16:51
  Discord. I mean, if that meme we got from
• 1:16:54
  Grayson is any indication, 2026 is going to be a hilarious year
• 1:16:58
  for memes because clearly Terrence has influenced Grayson
• 1:17:02
  and Terrence and Grayson are throwing memes at each other.
• 1:17:06
  And then we become like victims of this in our Discord chats.
• 1:17:10
  And I'm thinking to myself, OK, these memes are good.
• 1:17:13
  What else can we mess up? What else can we create with our
• 1:17:16
  own warped brains? But no, it it.
• 1:17:19
  Listen, 2025 has been a challenging year for all of us
• 1:17:22
  in so many different ways. But for me, it's been a journey
• 1:17:24
  of self discovery and discovering what I'm capable of
• 1:17:26
  as a person and as a writer. Now, I can actually say this,
• 1:17:29
  Sam, I am a writer. I am a published writer.
• 1:17:33
  How many people can say that? Not many people in this world
• 1:17:36
  can say, Oh yeah, I've done this, that and the other.
• 1:17:39
  But by the way, I'm a published author.
• 1:17:41
  How about you? That is not many people can say
• 1:17:43
  that, so I am happy I am This is a word that gets thrown around a
• 1:17:47
  couple times, but I think it bears repeating.
• 1:17:50
  I am grateful for the Men's Adventure Fiction Discord.
• 1:17:53
  I'm going to say it right now, I'm I am grateful for writing.
• 1:17:57
  I am grateful for reading books. I am grateful for supporting
• 1:18:00
  indie authors around the world that you, I, and everyone in
• 1:18:03
  that discord and outside of that discord are supporting.
• 1:18:06
  I am grateful for new ideas and new characters, right.
• 1:18:11
  I'm grateful for just being on another episode of the Whitfield
• 1:18:15
  Report, because apparently Sam thinks I'm important enough to
• 1:18:18
  have on this show not just once, but twice in the same year,
• 1:18:23
  brother. I think you're, I think you're
• 1:18:25
  good enough to be, you know, on 3 * 3.
• 1:18:29
  Times, you know what they say, third time's a charm.
• 1:18:31
  The question is, Sam, when is when am I going to come back
• 1:18:34
  here for appearance #3 that is the big question.
• 1:18:37
  That the person who's watching or listening to this episode is
• 1:18:40
  going to be thinking about and talking about with their friends
• 1:18:43
  at the water cooler the next morning and thinking, boy, these
• 1:18:46
  two guys are really good. They've done this twice now, but
• 1:18:47
  when are they going to do the third time?
• 1:18:49
  When is this going to happen? When is it possible for Sam and
• 1:18:51
  Ryan to be in the same studio at the same time and crossing the
• 1:18:54
  streams, even though Egon has told us time and time again,
• 1:18:57
  don't cross the streams, why it could be bad?
• 1:19:00
  I'm a little fuzzy on the whole good bad thing.
• 1:19:02
  It may it may also be epic. You know, if if you're if you're
• 1:19:09
  available on Wednesday nights, we'll have to do some planning,
• 1:19:12
  but we can suddenly have have you on the the live show.
• 1:19:15
  Sure. Why not?
• 1:19:16
  I'm, I'm, do you have Wednesdays?
• 1:19:17
  I mean, it's the middle of the work week around.
• 1:19:19
  I have to get up the next morning to go to work.
• 1:19:20
  Which, hey, anyone look forward to that?
• 1:19:22
  Not really, but I can swing it. I can swing it.
• 1:19:27
  Yeah. And I mean, I might be, I might
• 1:19:30
  be revamping the, you know, the schedule with that as far as
• 1:19:33
  like times it'll still be on Wednesday night, but I might do
• 1:19:36
  a little bit earlier now that we're on now I'm back on.
• 1:19:41
  Yeah, YouTube that that's. And some of us do have to get up
• 1:19:44
  early the next morning to go to work, so, you know, the earlier
• 1:19:47
  the better. Well, that that's that's the
• 1:19:50
  interesting thing though, was so when I was streaming on rumble
• 1:19:54
  exclusively, still like we still multi streamed rumble.
• 1:19:59
  Love those people over there. Did you?
• 1:20:02
  Wow but like 10 at but like 10 at like 10:00 PM was like the
• 1:20:06
  peak viewer time right to like start.
• 1:20:09
  My gosh. To like start streams over there
• 1:20:11
  on on YouTube, it's like 9:00 PM or something right and then and
• 1:20:17
  then Twitter P and then Twitter, because we also multi stream to
• 1:20:21
  Twitter like people just pop on streams that over there right so
• 1:20:28
  that's. Where we live in.
• 1:20:31
  So it's like, yeah, it's like, it's like, which platforms do
• 1:20:34
  you want to get the most viewership on?
• 1:20:36
  You know, depends on like when for live stream.
• 1:20:39
  So it, it's like it's a whole thing, man.
• 1:20:41
  But yeah, we'll, we'll figure out a good time to have you on.
• 1:20:45
  I, I, we, I apologize. We were supposed to be on for
• 1:20:50
  the white Christmas for autism thing, which my, which my coast
• 1:20:54
  Max that's, that's his gig. And we we were going to have it,
• 1:20:58
  but then the power. But then there was a big power
• 1:21:03
  outage in New England, where he's from and.
• 1:21:06
  That's rough. He was buried under snow and
• 1:21:10
  without. Yeah, that's so good.
• 1:21:14
  So yeah. I look forward to that whenever
• 1:21:17
  that comes up. I'm down for that too.
• 1:21:19
  Yeah, well, we're we're not going to have we might have to
• 1:21:22
  do something else since we didn't do the do the white
• 1:21:24
  Christmas, but we might you. Do a New Year's rock and Eve.
• 1:21:29
  Wait, no, I'm sorry, that's another show.
• 1:21:31
  But. Well, ours would probably be
• 1:21:34
  better than now the Dick. Yeah, now that Ryan, the one who
• 1:21:37
  gives Ryan's a bad name that Seacrest is taking, I don't know
• 1:21:40
  why they did just call me, honestly.
• 1:21:42
  And the other thing is when they were announcing who's going to
• 1:21:45
  take over for Pat Sajak a little while ago, Sam, I thought to
• 1:21:48
  myself, why would you get that Ryan and not this Ryan,
• 1:21:51
  Honestly, Because if anyone is anybody who's watched any of our
• 1:21:55
  shows in the last five years, Sam, it's it's this I can only I
• 1:21:59
  can not only host the show, but I could be a game show host at
• 1:22:01
  the same time. I don't mind doing it.
• 1:22:04
  And if Pat Sajak came to me one day and said, Hey, I'm leaving
• 1:22:07
  the show. I want to pass the torch on to
• 1:22:08
  you for Will Fortune the next 30 years.
• 1:22:09
  You up for it, Lily? I would be, absolutely.
• 1:22:13
  I would. I would do it in a heartbeat.
• 1:22:14
  You know why, Sam? Because you get to meet new
• 1:22:16
  people every day. You get to make people's dreams
• 1:22:18
  come true with spinning of the wheel and them landing on the
• 1:22:20
  bonus, the bonus wheel or, you know, them solving the puzzle in
• 1:22:23
  the bonus. What is it called?
• 1:22:24
  The bonus round, Right. And you get to hang out with
• 1:22:27
  Vanna White every day. So it's like, yeah, I have no
• 1:22:30
  problem with that. And the other thing is they
• 1:22:32
  haven't done this yet. And I'm hoping that they do
• 1:22:33
  this. Sam, are you, are you aware that
• 1:22:36
  Deal or No Deal has transformed itself in the Deal or No Deal
• 1:22:38
  Island the last couple of years with Joe Manganiello as the
• 1:22:40
  host? Go back to the original, Go back
• 1:22:45
  to the original Deal or No Deal and have me as your new host
• 1:22:50
  because Howie is already busy doing America's Got Talent.
• 1:22:52
  You know what I mean? Oh, and he's got his podcast.
• 1:22:55
  I don't know if you listen to Howie Mandel's podcast, but let
• 1:22:57
  him do all that, dude. All right, you and I are going
• 1:23:01
  to talk off camera about a certain interview that occurred
• 1:23:03
  a couple months ago. I don't want to get into it
• 1:23:04
  here, but I'll talk to you off set.
• 1:23:06
  But I got to be honest with you, if they're going to reboot deal
• 1:23:09
  or no deal as the original and put it in a studio with 26
• 1:23:12
  wonderful ladies holding 26 wonderful kid, the whole the
• 1:23:14
  whole enchilada, I'd be honored to host that because I love the
• 1:23:19
  format. I think everyone who's on that
• 1:23:22
  show takes a huge risk by opening up those cases because
• 1:23:24
  every case you open could potentially be the $1,000,000
• 1:23:28
  case and then you have to set up for whatever comes after that.
• 1:23:31
  You know, you know what I'm saying?
• 1:23:32
  So it's a game of risk. It's a gamble and I it's fun.
• 1:23:36
  It's fun. So.
• 1:23:38
  Bring it back guys, get rid of the whole deal in No Deal Island
• 1:23:41
  format and bring it back to the studio format.
• 1:23:43
  But then again, Sam, I'm not in the studio and I'm not one of
• 1:23:46
  the executives who gets to make all these decisions.
• 1:23:48
  So who knows what they're going to do in the next 5 years.
• 1:23:52
  I have no idea. They could just continue doing
• 1:23:54
  deal in No Deal Island on the cheap.
• 1:23:56
  You know, with Joe Manganiello calling the shots and Claudia
• 1:23:59
  Jordan, who's one of the former briefcase models being one of
• 1:24:02
  the contestants or, you know, Co host of the show, whatever it
• 1:24:04
  is, that's fine. But it's not the same.
• 1:24:07
  It's not the same. It never will be.
• 1:24:10
  Nah, sorry, didn't mean to go off on a tangent about game
• 1:24:13
  shows, but you know. No, no, it's, it's perfect.
• 1:24:18
  So. Is it a perfect way to end this
• 1:24:19
  show on? I don't know.
• 1:24:21
  Well, I mean, I, I think that's the other thing is I, I think
• 1:24:25
  that like, you know, terrestrial TV is, you know, it's.
• 1:24:29
  Not the same. It's not the same it.
• 1:24:31
  Never. It hasn't been the same for a
• 1:24:32
  very long time at this point. But I mean, I think I think he
• 1:24:36
  would be a good, you know, I mean, you're, you're already
• 1:24:40
  great podcast host. I do it every week.
• 1:24:44
  I do two to three shows a week, Sam.
• 1:24:46
  You do? Yeah.
• 1:24:48
  Consistency is the key. Yeah, well, hey, that, that's
• 1:24:52
  how that's how I built a, you know, a brand with the Whitfield
• 1:24:56
  board. It's same thing with same thing
• 1:24:58
  with the books. It's Yep, it's consistency and I
• 1:25:01
  like. The background, too.
• 1:25:02
  You got the holiday festivities going on in your background.
• 1:25:04
  I like that. Thank you.
• 1:25:06
  Yeah, I, you know, I people. Sam, it's it's not on Christmas.
• 1:25:11
  You need to change it back to the default.
• 1:25:13
  Well, if it's, it's not the. Holiday season.
• 1:25:16
  It's not it's not January where yet and.
• 1:25:19
  It's not New Year's yet. You haven't put up your New
• 1:25:21
  Year's set yet, which I'm looking forward to see when you
• 1:25:24
  put it up. Not well, we you know, we're
• 1:25:27
  going to have we're going to have a good set.
• 1:25:29
  So I'm. Looking forward to seeing it
• 1:25:31
  when you post it or start using it.
• 1:25:34
  I I will so awesome shirt by the by the way to.
• 1:25:39
  Yeah, yeah. This is on brand for Veritas
• 1:25:41
  Entertainment. Go to veritasent.com and treat
• 1:25:44
  yourself and buy yourself some Veritas Entertainment swag.
• 1:25:47
  You know why? Because they are the best new
• 1:25:49
  publishers going today. So whether you like it or you
• 1:25:52
  don't like it, learn to love it because it's the best thing
• 1:25:56
  going today. Woo nature boy.
• 1:25:59
  Ric Flair, baby. Only one.
• 1:26:01
  Only one nature boy. Indeed so.
• 1:26:05
  Veritascnt.com folks took yourself to some merch.
• 1:26:07
  Sam, you deserve some merch too. Let's get to some.
• 1:26:10
  Yeah, what people have been at, people have been asking.
• 1:26:14
  Yeah, we'll be. Get that merch.
• 1:26:16
  We'll be, we'll be getting some merch out to people hopefully in
• 1:26:19
  2026. Well, before we sign off, is
• 1:26:25
  there anything you'd like to promote?
• 1:26:29
  You know, before we, before we head out here, Where can people
• 1:26:33
  find you and when is your when is your first upcoming show?
• 1:26:39
  That's a lot of questions in the span of 20 seconds, so I'll try
• 1:26:41
  to answer as best I can, but no, I'm just kidding.
• 1:26:43
  Sam, you're awesome. We love you, man.
• 1:26:45
  My name is Ryan Van. I quote channel following across
• 1:26:47
  all forms of social media simply at anti quote where my point is,
• 1:26:49
  where's my hand? There it is at Anti Quote
• 1:26:51
  channel and all forms social media.
• 1:26:53
  My YouTube channel is how I put out all my great wonderful
• 1:26:56
  videos. Check them all out.
• 1:26:57
  We got interviews with some of the best creators from all over
• 1:27:00
  the world. I do and I quote on Saturdays
• 1:27:02
  12:00 Eastern where we interview indie creators from all over the
• 1:27:05
  world. We do movie watch alongs on the
• 1:27:07
  2nd, 3rd and 4th Fridays of every month Friday nights at
• 1:27:10
  7:00 Eastern Time where we celebrate movies turning a
• 1:27:12
  certain age. Our first shows for 2026 are
• 1:27:15
  going to be on Friday, January 9th at 7:00 Eastern.
• 1:27:19
  We're celebrating the 30th anniversary of Twister with
• 1:27:21
  Helen Hunt and built the late the late great Bill Paxton and
• 1:27:26
  the late great Philip Seymour Hoffman is in that too.
• 1:27:28
  So going to be so many, I know going to be so many 30 years of
• 1:27:32
  Twister. And then our first show of anti
• 1:27:33
  quota is going to be on Saturday, January the 3rd at
• 1:27:37
  12:00 Eastern Time, high noon, 12:00 PM Eastern Time with
• 1:27:41
  Hollis Joe McCollum, if I'm saying that name right, she is
• 1:27:45
  an indie author and we cannot wait to have her on the show and
• 1:27:47
  talk about her books. So TuneIn, it's going to be a
• 1:27:51
  lot of fun. And check out my short story
• 1:27:54
  Wolf of the West published by Veritas Entertainment, part of
• 1:27:58
  Western Tales Volume 1, which you can find an ebook, paperback
• 1:28:01
  and hardcover on zon Amazon.com. Just type in Western Tales
• 1:28:05
  Volume 1. You can find it there.
• 1:28:06
  Or if you go to the link in my bio on social media, there is a
• 1:28:09
  link in my link tree to where you can purchase copies of
• 1:28:13
  Western Tales Volume one with the Amazon link to the ebook
• 1:28:15
  paperback or hardcover edition of it.
• 1:28:17
  So check it out. 16 writers, 15 different stories, including Sam
• 1:28:21
  Whitfield and myself are a part of that anthology.
• 1:28:23
  And boy, that was fun to be a part of, wasn't it?
• 1:28:26
  Let's do it again sometime. We should do it again next year.
• 1:28:28
  And in the words of the Western genre, saddle up Sam, because
• 1:28:31
  they can purchase a copyright now and get that last minute
• 1:28:33
  holiday gift for their loved one.
• 1:28:34
  Or they can kick off the new year of 2026 right with diving
• 1:28:38
  in the Western genre, wouldn't you say?
• 1:28:40
  There you go. There you go.
• 1:28:41
  And I can't think of it. I can't think of a better sales
• 1:28:44
  pitch than that so. But thanks for having me, Sam.
• 1:28:47
  Thanks for having me. Look forward to making my third
• 1:28:49
  Time's a Charm appearance in 2026.
• 1:28:52
  Dude, we'll have you on more than just once.
• 1:28:55
  We'll have you on, you know, we'll have you on a couple of
• 1:28:58
  times that'd. Be on Wednesdays, we'll hang
• 1:29:00
  out, we'll have some fun, sit by the we'll sit by the fire, have
• 1:29:02
  a cup of coffee, talk about some books, maybe some writers, maybe
• 1:29:05
  some new things we're experiencing in terms of being a
• 1:29:08
  writer that year. Who knows?
• 1:29:09
  We can talk about our writing goals or writing, you know, the
• 1:29:13
  stuff we've accomplished so far in 2026 and do a bit of a read.
• 1:29:15
  You know, we could check off things on our bucket lists.
• 1:29:19
  Yeah, yeah, that would that would be fun.
• 1:29:22
  But anyway, well, Ryan, thanks for coming on.
• 1:29:26
  We love you and always happy to have you here.
• 1:29:30
  Thanks for being our our final guest for 2026 and man, the next
• 1:29:39
  the 1st guest for 2026 is going to have, you know, they're going
• 1:29:46
  to have a, you know, they're going to have a, you know,
• 1:29:49
  you've set the bar pretty high. So yeah, so I don't even know.
• 1:29:55
  There are a couple of people I'm waiting to hear back from
• 1:29:58
  regarding scheduling, but I will announce hopefully maybe on
• 1:30:04
  Wednesday where the first guests will be.
• 1:30:06
  But anyway, folks, thanks for tuning in and I will see you
• 1:30:13
  Wednesday night for the final live stream of 2026.
• 1:30:20
  Until then, take care, God bless and God this great nation.
• 1:30:26
  Thank you all for listening and take care.
• 1:30:34
  The right to offend is not some pesky little part of freedom of
• 1:30:38
  speech that we have to put up with.
• 1:30:40
  It is the heart and soul and lungs of freedom of speech.
• 1:30:44
  It is the coursing lifeblood of human progress.
• 1:30:47
  It is the instigator of liberty and modernity and science and
• 1:30:51
  understanding. What a laughing stock today's
• 1:30:55
  student leaders are that they can so casually dismiss the
• 1:30:59
  right to be offensive without realising that their lovely,
• 1:31:03
  enlightened lives are the gifts of individuals who gave offence.
• 1:31:09
  Offensiveness is not just something we have to
• 1:31:11
  begrudgingly accept. Offensiveness is the motor of
• 1:31:15
  human progress. Thank you for watching the
• 1:31:19
  Whitfield Report live on the Right to Offend Media Network.
• 1:31:23
  Make sure to check out Sam's books on Amazon, Audible, and
• 1:31:27
  Kindle. You can follow Sam on X at Sam W
• 1:31:32
  under Score NGC and the Right to Offend Media Network at RTO
• 1:31:37
  Media. Like, comment, subscribe and
• 1:31:42
  share with your friends. And until next time, God bless
• 1:31:47
  God save this great nation. God, freedom, legacy, in that
• 1:31:53
  order.