Latest / The Matt Walsh Show / I Watched The Worst Netflix Woke Slop Ever Made, And I Barely Survived The Experience

Transcript

I Watched The Worst Netflix Woke Slop Ever Made, And I Barely Survived The Experience · The Matt Walsh Show

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: You know, I don't watch a lot of slop. Generally speaking,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: I am anti-slop, but every once in a while, a
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: bit of slop catches my eye. There's something about the
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: slop that I find intriguing, mysterious. I become slop-curious. And
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: when these occasions arise, I know that I will almost
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: always regret giving in to that temptation, but sometimes the
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: slop impulse is too strong. The siren song of the
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: slop is simply too much to resist. And that's why
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: today I'm going to offer a review of what is,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: at the moment, the most popular piece of slop on Netflix.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: It's also perhaps the sloppiest slop in the entire history
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: of slop. And the show is called Below. Okay, the
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: latest streaming hit that millions of people have watched and
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: already forgotten. My wife and I endured the entire thing
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: And now I'm going to tell you about it. With
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: all the detail I can remember, as the memory mercifully fades,
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: I do this partly as a warning to anyone who
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: might be on the verge of succumbing to the temptation
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: to watch this atrocity, and partly because I wasted five
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: hours of my life on this thing, so now I
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: will waste 20 minutes of yours. Fair is fair. The
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: logline of this show, which is again called Below, at
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: least as it was presented to me by a few
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: close associates who I will murder in cold blood if
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: I ever see again, is that it's Jaws, but with
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: a giant killer squid. Below is a sort of Jaws-like
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: story about a giant squid that's essentially terrorizing a town.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Needless to say, in theory, Jaws with a squid is
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: an excellent elevator pitch. That's what made it irresistible. It's
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: like heroin for white middle-aged dads. I don't think you
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: appreciate the gut reaction people have to these things. We
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: love Jaws, and we tend to think of, like, most
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: non-Jaws movies and shows in Jaws terms. That's how we
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: describe them to each other. Like, The Grey is Jaws
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: but with wolves. Anaconda is Jaws with a snake. Cujo
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: is Jaws with a dog. Tremors is Jaws with giant worms.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: The Godfather is Jaws with the mafia. The Devil Wears
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: Prada is Jaws with a fashion magazine. Jaws is Jaws
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: with Jaws, and so on. And Jaws comes in many forms.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: But as far as I know, nobody had ever done
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Jaws with a squid, which is an unfortunate and rather
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: baffling oversight. As a huge fan of Jaws, and really
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: an even bigger fan of squid-based horror, that seemed to
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: me like a match made in heaven. But then came
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: the Netflix sleight of hand trick. I thought I was
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: getting some entertaining killer squid action, but I got something
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: else entirely. You know, it's like in Jaws when Jaws
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: thinks he's about to eat somebody at the end, but
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: instead ends up with a scuba tank lodged in his throat,
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: which Brody shoots, causing him to blow up. That's basically
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: what Netflix does to its audience trillions of times across
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: billions of pieces of content. You would think I'd have
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: learned my lesson by now, and I have, but again,
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: It's Jaws with a squid. I wanted to see the squid.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: You can't blame me. And I'm not the one on
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: trial here. So back off. Now, the story follows Josh Hartnett,
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: who last starred in the movie Pearl Harbor and was
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: then exiled into the wilderness for 25 years to atone
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: for the movie Pearl Harbor. And now he's back. And
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: based on his performance in the show, it seems he
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: has not repented of his sins at all. Hartnett plays
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: a man with a tragic past that I won't get into.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. who lives at a remote fishing village
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: in Newfoundland. And I will note here that Hartnett and
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: all the other actors have adopted Newfoundland accents for this series.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: I have no idea whether the accents are accurate. If
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: that is really how people in Newfoundland speak, they should stop.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: you got to stop, okay? They should not speak at all,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: especially not on camera, where the rest of the world
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: might be subjected to it. And I mean no offense
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: to the good people of Newfoundland, but it is just
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: the worst accent I have ever heard in my life.
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: It is the ugliest accent of all time. It's basically
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: what you would get if you took the most grating
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: parts of the Canadian accent and the Pennsylvania accent and
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: you mushed them together and then added like a tablespoon
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: of Irish and a cup of speech impediment and a
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: little dusting of Elmer Fudd. It is an ungodly sound.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: It is the sound of some ancient curse issuing forth
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: from the bowels of the earth. It is such a
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: bad accent that the New Jersey accent sounds like a
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: romance language by comparison. But even this I could forgive
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: if the show were competently made or at least watchable
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: or at least not the most unpleasant thing anyone has
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: ever put on film to include the Hindenburg crash and
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: the JFK assassination. Now, Josh Hartnett, I don't remember any
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: of the characters' names and it doesn't matter, lives in
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: the village with his annoying deadbeat son, played by an
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: actor apparently named Charlie Heaton. And with all due respect
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: to Charlie Heaton, and, you know, I don't know whether
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: this just is because of the makeup they use for
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: the show or whether he has some kind of genetic condition,
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: but he looks like Harry Styles if Harry Styles had
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: a decades-long methamphetamine addiction. Put more generously, he looks like,
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: he's kind of like a Rite Aid brand version of
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: Harry Styles. Again, I'm not trying to be rude, but
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: Every actor in this thing, it's actually pretty remarkable, resembles
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: a Rite Aid brand version of a better actor. So
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: Hartnett's daughter is Rite Aid Ellen Page. before she went trans.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: Hartnett's love interest, the brilliant female scientist character, looks like
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: Rite Aid Emily Blunt. The actor who plays Hartnett's other
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: son is, I think, a guy who actually just works
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: at Rite Aid. And of course, Josh Hartnett is Rite
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: Aid John Bernthal, who himself was once Rite Aid Josh Hartnett,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: and they're both still Rite Aid Christian Bale. In any case,
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: these are the principal characters, along with Hartnett's sister, who
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: lives in the village and appears to be involved in
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: some kind of thruple arrangement that is hinted at but
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: never explained or shown in detail, thank God. There's also
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: a boyfriend of the pre-trans Rite Aid Ellen Page, who,
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: and I swear I'm not saying this just to stretch
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: the joke out, it just is true, the boyfriend of
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: pre-trans Rite Aid Ellen Page looks like post-trans Rite Aid
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: Ellen Page. So there are Ellen Pages running all over
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: the place in this show. Except for the real Ellen Page,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: who apparently decided that this series was even too woke
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: for her. Now the boyfriend character doesn't do anything essential
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: to the plot. You could remove him from the story
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: and it wouldn't make any difference at all. And this
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: is in fact true of every other character in the show.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: And every random subplot that pops up and goes nowhere.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: The brother character, not Meth Head Harry, but the other one,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: is being chased by two evil henchmen. because he owes
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: money to a mob boss or something. It's never explained
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: why he owes money or who the mob boss is
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: or how much money he owes. At the end, one
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: of the henchmen gets eaten by the squid and the
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: other one, who has no dialogue through the first five
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: episodes except to tell us that he's a Somali immigrant,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: survives and suddenly becomes best friends with the brother he
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: spent the entire show trying to kill. This whole subplot
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: could be cut from the show. It would change nothing
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: in the story. It appears to be there just as
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: a very convoluted way of wedging a Somali immigrant with
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: a heart of gold into the plot. I have to
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: imagine there were much more efficient ways of achieving that goal.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: I mean, you could have made the brilliant female scientist Somali,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: for example. That's much more efficient. But I guess that
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: even for a show about a giant homicidal squid, the
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: idea of a brilliant Somali scientist... would stretch the suspension
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: of disbelief beyond its breaking point. So they couldn't do that.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Fall leaves have one of the best marketing campaigns in nature.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: When they're attached to trees, people drive for hours to
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: look at them and take pictures. The moment those same
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: leaves land in your gutters, they become wet garbage, threatening
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: your foundation. Same leaf, a dramatically worse location. This is
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: where seasonal charm turns into home maintenance. Clogged gutters can
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: send rainwater spilling over the sides onto your landscaping and
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: around your foundation, waiting for a storm to expose the problem.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: is a very expensive way to remember that your gutters exist.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: LeafFilter helps protect your home before that happens. Their local
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: pros inspect and clean out your gutters and repair or
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: replace them if necessary before installing LeafFilter. It's surgical grade
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: stainless steel micro mesh keeps common debris out while directing
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: water away from your foundation where it belongs. Every installation
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: comes with a no clog guarantee and a lifetime transferable warranty.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: So enjoy the leaves while they're on the trees. Once
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: they reach your roof, the admiration period is over. Protect
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: your home. Before issues arise with Lee Filter, America's number
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: one rated gutter protection system. Schedule an inspection for free
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: by visiting LeeFilter.com slash Walsh to secure an estimate. Locked
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: in for a full year. Take advantage of saving up
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: to 35% off when going to LeeFilter.com slash Walsh today.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Requires minimum purchase. Certain restrictions apply. Contact representative regarding warranty
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: and promotional details. Between work, errands, and family, we're all busy.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: And with elections around the corner, it can be hard
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: to find time to vote. Waiting until election day is
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: a risk. A flat tire or a sick child could
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: mean you miss out on making your voice heard. That's
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: why I need you to go vote early. Go to gopvotes.org,
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: find your polling place, and bank your vote today. If
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: you live in the critical Senate battleground states of Alaska, Michigan, Maine, Ohio, Iowa,
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: or Texas, early voting is already underway this week. The
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: radical left has won Democrat primaries across the country. and
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: their turnout machine is ready to swarm the polls this fall.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: That's why you need a plan to vote too. President
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: Trump is counting on you. Our movement is counting on you.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: I'm counting on you. Don't wait. Head to gopvotes.org and
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: make your plan to vote early today paid for by
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: SLF PAC, not authorized by any candidate or candidates committee.
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: So anyway, The story kicks off with the arrival of
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: a giant iceberg in the harbor. And along with the iceberg,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: various villagers and tourists start going missing. And it turns
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: out that eating ice from the iceberg will make you
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: extremely sick and it might cause you to go insane
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: and drown yourself in the ocean. Now, you would think
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: that a toxic psychedelic iceberg wouldn't prove to be much
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: of a threat because all you have to do is
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: not eat it. And the temptation to eat a giant
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: iceberg floating miles away in the ocean should be pretty
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: easy to resist. Like, I know that if I were
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: in a fishing village, and I don't mean to Monday
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: morning quarterback this thing, but if I were in a
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: fishing village... and somebody pointed at a huge iceberg offshore
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: and said, don't eat that. It might make you drown yourself.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: I would say, sure, fine. Like, I really wasn't planning
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: to eat the iceberg anyway. Why would I do that?
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: But now that you've told me that, I will continue
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: with my plan not to eat the hunk of ice
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: floating in the harbor. Not eating that iceberg is one
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: of the easiest things I've ever not done, I would say.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: And that'd be that. But for the residents of this village,
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: and I don't know if this is a Newfoundland thing
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: or what, but they have like this fetishistic urge to
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: eat the iceberg and it overwhelms them. Like you have
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: to understand that so much of the plot hinges on
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: the unwillingness of the characters to stop eating an iceberg
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: and And many of them consequently get sick and drown themselves.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: And meanwhile, the giant squid is stalking the waters and
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: killing anyone in its path. And to make matters worse,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: there's apparently a ghost. There's a skinny white girl with
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: long black hair hanging over her face, which is the
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: form of every ghost in every horror movie from like
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: 98 to 2017. And now again in 2026 for some reason.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: And she's stalking the village. And in particular, she is
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: tormenting poor meth head Harry Styles. Now, early on, meth
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: head Harry Styles goes out in a boat with a
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: friend and shoots at the iceberg. And the squid doesn't
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: like that very much and responds by chopping Harry's friend
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: in half, but leaves Harry himself alone, I guess because
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: he already looked mostly dead from the first scene of
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the episode one, so it was no point in killing him.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: And this speaks to one of the problems with a
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: premise like this. And to some extent, this is a
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: problem shared by Jaws also, which is that the deadly
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: threat is, again, extremely easy to avoid. If there's a
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: weird poisonous iceberg in the harbor, and a monster squid
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: murdering random sailors and swimmers, all you really need to
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: do is not go in the water. Now granted, this
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: is infamously a problem for the horror genre in general.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: Like if there's a haunted house, just don't go in
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: the house. If there's a chainsaw murderer living in a
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: creepy cabin in the middle of nowhere, just go literally
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: anywhere except the five mile radius around that guy's property.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: If there's a demonically cursed videotape that will kill you
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: if you watch it, just don't watch it, and so on.
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: So the job of the writers, then, is to manufacture
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: plausible reasons why the characters would put themselves in the
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: path of whatever hellish force the plot revolves around. And
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: writers have varying degrees of success in that regard. But
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: in Below, The writers dispense with any plausibility concerns whatsoever,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: and they have their characters do things like get drunk
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: and take a boat out to the pathogenic iceberg in
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: the middle of the night in squid-infested waters to shoot
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: the iceberg. They also rely heavily on my least favorite
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: dopey Hollywood trope of all the dopey Hollywood tropes, which
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: is that characters possess important life or death information, but
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: fail to convey it to the other characters Or they
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: do convey it, but the other characters don't believe it
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: for some reason. I hate this trope in any show
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: or film. A plot where, like, this whole thing could
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: be solved if you just told the other person this
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: information that you have. And there's no reason to not
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: tell them. At one point, Josh Hartnett and the scientist lady,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: they watch camera footage of the evil squid dragging two
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: unsuspecting tourists off the beach and into the water, where
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: they're then eaten alive. And for anyone who's ever lived
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: in a tourist area, this is one of the feel-good
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: moments of the show. But later, Hartnett and Scientist Lady
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: are trying to convince the other villagers that there's a
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: giant squid in the water. And for reasons that are
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: never explained, they don't show the footage they have in
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: their possession. The villagers, they're like, there's a squid out there.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: And the villagers are like, there's not a squid. What
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: are you talking about? It's on tape. Just watch the tape.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: But they never do. So the villagers therefore spend a
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: while believing that there is no squid and that all
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: the suspiciously squid-like deaths happening in the neighborhood must be
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: the result of COVID or something. So if you're keeping track, okay,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: we have four major problems facing our heroes. There's a
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: giant killer squid, pretty big problem. There's an iceberg with
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: apparently supernatural mind control powers. There's a ghost, a white
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: girl with a bad haircut haunting the village. And there
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: are really terrible accents that cause anyone who hears them
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: to gouge their eardrums out with ice picks. That last
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: is more of a problem for the viewer than the characters.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: So that leaves three problems the characters have to sort out. Now,
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: I don't need to spend much time explaining how these
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: issues are resolved because they aren't. The show spends several
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: episodes implying that there might be more to this squid
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: than just a squid. Because of like the mind controlling iceberg,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: there's the ghost. There must be more to this squid.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: This is not just a normal squid, you think. But
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: then it turns out, no, the squid is just a
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: regular squid. It's just a squid. That's all it is.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: The iceberg is the nest where the squid has laid
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: her eggs. Why does it have mind control powers? Who knows?
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: It just does. It just does. I mean, that is
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the answer to every mystery in the show. Sorry to
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: spoil it, but the answer to every mystery in the
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: show is that it just is that way. Why did
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: that happen? Well, just because it did. And the end.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: The white girl ghost. Okay, remember the ghost that's haunting
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: people's dreams? It turns out she's just a regular white girl.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: She lives on a nearby island. She's not a very
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: nice person, it turns out, but there's nothing paranormal about her. Well,
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: that's a problem because she shows up in people's dreams.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: She haunts them in their bedrooms. There's a scene where
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: meth head Harry Styles is sleeping. He wakes up. This
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: ghost is drenched in water, her hair over her head,
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: standing on his bed, creepily looking at him. And then
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: she disappears. It turns out she's just a girl from
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: like a few doors down. Why was she doing that?
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Why was she drenched in water? Why is she in
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: the guy's room? They don't explain it. She just was.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Who knows? Don't worry about it. Don't ask questions. We've
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: all heard the radio ads about owing the IRS money.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: They try to scare you and frighten you into calling. Well,
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: tax relief advocates is different. If you owe the IRS $ 5, 000, $ 50, 000,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: or even $ 500, 000, TRA has a solution to resolve your
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: tax problem. Don't lose hope. TRA could reduce or even
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: eliminate what you owe. Their passion is taxes and helping
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: regular people and businesses fix their IRS mess. They have
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: over a thousand five-star Google reviews and an A-plus rating
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: with the Better Business Bureau. You don't have to be
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: afraid of the IRS anymore. Real tax relief programs are
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: available that can give you a fresh start. So don't wait.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: Go to TRA.com. That's TRA.com or call 800-575-1753. Again, 800-575-1753.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: Tax relief advocates. Real solutions for real people. Now, as
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: for the squid, not only is it a regular squid,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: but it's a nice squid. It's a mommy squid. The
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: squid has been horribly misunderstood. You see, she's a single
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: mom trying to make her way in this topsy-turvy world.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: She's a feminist icon, this squid. Like Lena Dunham. Now, sure,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: she's a giant gelatinous monstrosity who grabs her horrified prey
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: with long, slimy tentacles, drags them into the icy depths
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: and devours them whole while they scream in terror. But
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: that's just how Lena Dunham says hello. But back to
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: the squid. We learn that this girl boss cephalopod only
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: stalks and mass murders humans because she wants to protect
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: her babies. Now, granted, the tourists she killed were on
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: shore and nowhere near her babies. But they were tourists,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: so it's fine, I guess. Actually, none of the humans
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: she killed were threatening her babies in any way. But whatever,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: stop nitpicking, I guess. In the season finale, and I'm
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: not making this up, rather than trying to defeat and
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: kill the giant murderous squid, Josh Hartnett teams up with
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: the scientist lady to save the squid. The whole show
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: is like, what are we going to do about this squid?
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: In the last episode, they realize, oh, it's a nice squid,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: and they try to save it. And specifically, they want
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: to save her from the evil White male corporate guy
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: who shows up out of nowhere in the final episode
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: with a plan to bomb the village in order to
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: kill the squid, in order to secure the rights to
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: mine for minerals. What do any of those things have
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: to do with each other? Why would you need to
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: bomb the village to kill the squid? And how would
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: either step help you in your mining efforts? Nobody knows.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: He's just evil. And evil people like to build mines
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: and blow stuff up. That's it. Hartnett and the scientist
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: lady tried to explain to the evil corporate white man
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: that it's not the squid's fault. You know, she was
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: driven out of her natural habitat because of climate change.
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: But evil corporate white man doesn't care. You know, he
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: says that she's dangerous and she's already slaughtered 19 people.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: And so she must be exterminated. Which is actually a
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: pretty good point. Okay, I'm on his side when it
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: comes to the squid issue. And I'm also on his
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: side when it comes to bombing the village, actually, because
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: these villagers are some of the dumbest, most irritating people
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: who have ever been assembled in one location. So by
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: the end of the episode, by the end of the show,
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: I'm saying, yes, please just bomb these people. Kill all
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: of them. Please. But that's not the side the writers
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: want us to be on. So our heroes, well, the
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: writers' heroes, my hero is the evil corporate white man.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: I'm totally on his side at this point. But they
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: devise a plan to save the squid from the military,
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: which has arrived along with the white guy, to blow
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: the squid up. So what was sold to me as
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: Jaws with a squid actually becomes Free Willy with a squid.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: This is free squiddy, let's call it. And their plan
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: to free squiddy involves moving the enormous 150,000-ton iceberg out
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: of the harbor so that squiddy will follow it. But
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: the iceberg is too big to move, so the strategy
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: is to shoot it and break it in two. Now,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: that might make some kind of sense, maybe, if they
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: were shooting the mountainous chunk of ice with a bazooka
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: or a missile or something. But instead... They shoot this
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: iceberg the size of a mountain with a hunting rifle.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: And Meth Head Harry takes a couple of shots at
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: it to no effect, of course. So then Rite Aid
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: pre-trans Ellen Page takes the rifle and says, let me
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: do it, and shoots it. And with her magical feminine powers,
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: the bullet causes an iceberg bigger than the one that
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: sank the Titanic to splinter into a million pieces. Now,
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: you'd think, by the way, that, well, isn't that where
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: the babies are, like where the eggs are on the
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: iceberg or something? And so didn't you just kill all
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: the babies? Wouldn't that make Squiddy really angry since her
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: babies are in there? But I guess Squiddy understands that
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: they're trying to help her. So next, Josh Hartnett takes
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: a fishing net and somehow wraps it around the remaining
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: piece of iceberg, which is still probably like 90,000 tons.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: and then drags it into deeper water with a small
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: fishing boat. And that's enough to save the day. Although
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: he doesn't even take it that far into deeper water,
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: so the killer squid is still only about six or
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: seven miles from innocent women and children. But even so,
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: the squid appreciates the gesture. So at the final scene,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: she comes to the surface and locks eyes with Josh Hartnett.
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: And the two like wordlessly express their love for one another. Again,
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: I'm not making this up. This is what actually happens
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: in the show, I promise you. Imagine if at the
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: end of Jaws, rather than blowing up Jaws, Brody was
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: a PETA activist who throws himself in front of the
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: shark as a human shield to prevent him from being killed.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: And then imagine if, recognizing this selfless act, Jaws came
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: to the surface and flapped his fin at Brody in
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: a show of gratitude. And then you will have an
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: idea of just how incomprehensibly retarded this show is. If
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: I made a parody of a woke Netflix series with
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: exactly this plot and resolution, you would think it was
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: way too on the nose and preposterous, even by woke
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: leftist standards. You would watch it and say, come on.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: There's a giant squid killing people because of climate change.
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: And so a female scientist and Josh Hartnett plus his
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: polyamorous sister have to save the squid from an old
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: white male capitalist in the colonialist military that wants to
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: murder the squid who's actually just laid a bunch of
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: eggs and is suffering from postpartum depression. Really? Give me
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: a break. But that is, again, I stress, the actual
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: plot of this show. A show I sacrificed five hours
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: of my life to watch. I am five hours closer
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: to death thanks to Netflix. And my only regret is
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: that it didn't come while I was watching it. Yes,
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: this is what I get for watching Netflix. You don't
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: have to tell me that. This is what I get
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: for falling for the classic squid jaws bait and switch.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: But it's not my fault. I didn't deserve this. I'm
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: the victim here. And let's not lose sight of that.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Now that we've spent some time, too much time talking
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: about an especially grotesque piece of Netflix slop, I think
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: now's a good opportunity to remind you that there are
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: other options out there. You can escape the slop. There
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: are people making non-slop content. And one of those people
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: is me. For example, we have our Real History series,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: which in many ways is the antidote to slop. It's
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: the anti-slop. Because it's dense, it's well-researched, informative, important. and entertaining.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Next week, we have perhaps my favorite installment of the
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: series dropping on Daily Wire. This is our episode on
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Hernán Cortés and the conquest of the Aztecs. It's not
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: exaggeration to say that this is one of the most
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: important events in the history of the human race. It's
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: also one of the least known, or at least it's
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: not nearly as well known as it should be. You know,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: the gap between how important it is and how well
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: known it is is wider with this story than it
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: is maybe with any other. So I'll leave you with
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: an extended preview of the episode. You can watch this
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: and then tune in for the whole thing next week
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: on The Daily Wire. Enjoy and Godspeed. By then in
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: his early 30s and living in Cuba, though not without controversy,
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: he was charismatic and young and he had a penchant
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: for womanizing. He had briefly been imprisoned by Governor Velasquez
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: due to a personal dispute. over a broken promise to
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: marry Velazquez's sister-in-law. At the time, no one thought he
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: was the man for the job, and yet, against all odds,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: he convinced Velazquez to make him the commander of the
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: upcoming voyage. It was a feat of shadow diplomacy that
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: foreshadowed much of what was to come. Cortes met with
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: the governor's secretary and the king's Cuba-based accountant and offered
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: to split his share of the spoils if they proposed
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: him for the job. They agreed to his terms and
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: convinced Governor Velazquez to appoint Cortes to run the mission.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: The appointment shocked the population of Cuba. Cortes had no
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: experience commanding an expedition, only recently he was considered a criminal.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Now he was gonna lead a voyage to Mexico? Cortes
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: bet everything on this mission. He invested his entire fortune.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: He mortgaged his encomienda, and used the money to buy ships, arms,
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: and provisions. He recruited 300 men and smartly won them
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: over through charisma and overt displays of generosity. He made
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: a huge banner embroidered in gold, featuring a giant cross
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: that bore the message, Brothers and comrades, in true faith,
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: let us follow the Holy Cross and we shall conquer.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Huge crowds turned out in support of Cortes, ready to
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: join him on his mission. As Cortes' force and popularity grew,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Velazquez grew jealous. It occurred to him that maybe it
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: wasn't such a good idea to give such a charismatic
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: and talented young man so much power. While Cortes was
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: gathering his fleet in Santiago, Cuba, he received a warning
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: that Velazquez was about to revoke his charter. Frantically and
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: despite not being ready, Cortes rushed to purchase enough food
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: to launch and set sail immediately. He moved west along
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: the south shore of Cuba, horses for the cavalry, raced
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: along Cuba's beaches as the ship moved west. The governor
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: sent letters to port officials and municipal leaders telling them
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: to stop Cortes and arrest him. But Cortes' men were enthusiastic.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: According to Richard Lee Marx's book, Cortes, the Great Adventurer
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: and the Fate of Aztec Mexico, their, quote, would have
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: been a ride of resentment. So the port officials and
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: Velazquez's relatives and friends chose to ignore the governor's entreaties.
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: The original plan was for Cortes' fleet to rendezvous at
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: Cuba's western tip and travel together to Mexico. But one
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: of the ships left the north coast of Cuba and,
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: defying Cortes' orders, went directly to the island of Cozumel,
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: where they ransacked abandoned villages, stole gold from a prayer house,
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: and took dozens of turkeys. Once Cortes arrived the following day,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: he was livid and made them give the gold back,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: paid for the turkeys, and put the navigator in irons.
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Once again, he lectured his men that this new land
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: would be permanently pacified and truly conquered only if the
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Indians were induced to accept Spanish rule. It was his policy,
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: Marx wrote, that the Indians must be given the chance
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: to welcome Christ and the king. He had 508 fighters,
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: including 16 cavalrymen with mounts, plus a foal. He had powder, shot, cannons, arquebuses. servants,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: a translator who had been captured on the previous mission,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: and even, according to Marx, a few Negroes. While on Cozumel,
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: Cortes climbed to a temple where the idols stood in
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: a pavilion at the top and the walls were black
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: with blood. He had the idol smashed, the room whitewashed,
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: and set a painted figure of the Virgin Mary on
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: the altar where the men had been killed. The conquest
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: had begun. These Indians were vastly different from the American
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: Indians who inhabited the United States. The area spanning modern
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: Mexico had many tribes, but the most notable were the
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Maya and the Aztecs. The Maya lived on the Yucatan
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: Peninsula near modern-day Cancun, and their territory spread into modern Guatemala, Honduras,
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: and Belize. These were the first mainland Indians the Europeans
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: encountered in Mexico, and they spoke their own set of languages.
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: Further west and north along Mexico's Gulf Coast, the Europeans
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: encountered Nahuatl-speaking Indians, a language still spoken by more than
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: a million in Mexico today, It was the official language
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: of the Aztec Empire, the biggest and most impressive of
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: the Mesoamerican Indians. These tribes were, in many ways, civilized,
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: and their civilizations were complex and impressive. As Richard Lee
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Marx put it, Aztecs were, quote, amply productive, sustaining millions
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: of people in place without having them wander as nomads
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: in search of sustenance. And there was enough excess production
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: to support nobility, clergy, and an artisan class of builders
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: and artists. They had massive cities and impressive architecture, including canals, roadways,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: sophisticated levees, dikes, aqueducts, floating gardens. They also had accurate
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: calendars to keep track of holy days, and they built temples,
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: often on pyramids, the largest of which exceeds in volume
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: the famous Pyramids of Egypt. It was at these temples
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: that the Mesoamerican priests carried out their most notorious practice,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: human sacrifice. The anthropologist Marvin Harris, in his book Cannibals
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: and Kings, notes that the Aztec gods ate people. They
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: ate human hearts and they drank human blood. And the
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: declared function of the Aztec priesthood was to provide fresh
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: human hearts and fresh human blood in order to prevent
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: the remorseless deities from becoming angry and crippling, sickening, withering,
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: and burning the whole world. In his memoirs, the conquistador
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Bernal Díaz del Castillo described the gods as having distorted
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: and furious looking eyes, large serpents, monsters. He entered, One
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: temple besmeared with blood, and the stench was worse than
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: in a Spanish slaughterhouse, with five human hearts roasting there.
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: Victims were usually prisoners of war, and on the day
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: of sacrifice, they were taken up the steps of the pyramid,
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: held down on the stone, and the priest opened the
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: chest and tore out the heart. The body was thrown
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: down the steps, beheaded at the bottom, butchered, and the
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: flesh eaten.