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The Star Wars Years · Large Nerdron Collider

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Speaker 1: The Large nerd Drunk Collider Podcast is a production of
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Speaker 1: My Heart Radio. Hey everybody, welcome to the Large Ner
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Speaker 1: Drunk Collider Podcast, the podcast that's all about the giggy
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Speaker 1: things happening in the world around us and how very
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Speaker 1: excited we are about them. I'm Ariel Casting, and with me,
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Speaker 1: as always is the super fragilistic, expialidocious Jonathan Strickland. What
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Speaker 1: would you do if I sang out a tune? Don't
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Speaker 1: answer that. That's not your question, Hi, Ariel, that would
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Speaker 1: be an easy one. Just stand up and walk out
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Speaker 1: on me. But I have a different question for you,
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Speaker 1: all right, Ariel, you got a new career coming up.
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Speaker 1: All right? That career is to be the sidekick to
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Speaker 1: an established superhero. Which superhero do you pick to be
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Speaker 1: a sidekick of? Yeah? I mean that's every person's dream
1:14
Speaker 1: is to be a sidekick, isn't it. Look you gotta
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Speaker 1: start somewhere. Not all of us can be. Not all
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Speaker 1: of us can have our our parents killed in a
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Speaker 1: dark alley after an opera and have access to billions
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Speaker 1: of dollars. Okay, we gotta work our way up fair enough,
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Speaker 1: I think, But I would be I didn't stall long
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Speaker 1: enough for this one. Um, trying to share this with
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Speaker 1: her beforehand. I'm trying to think, So here's the thing is, like,
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Speaker 1: I want to say Hulk because Hulk is my favorite
1:51
Speaker 1: hero and I think it would be cool, except for
1:53
Speaker 1: I don't want to get on his bad side. Right,
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Speaker 1: So I'm trying to think of what it would be
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Speaker 1: star Lord because and even as a sidekick, you're not
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Speaker 1: really a sidekick, You're part of the team. Plus he
2:03
Speaker 1: seems like a lot of thought fun because I was like,
2:05
Speaker 1: well maybe thor mm hmm, yeah, you would have to
2:10
Speaker 1: be star Lord. Okay, that's cool, So you wouldn't you went, Marvel,
2:14
Speaker 1: I'm gonna surprise you because I went to see, oh,
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Speaker 1: who who would you sidekick for? Because I thought for
2:21
Speaker 1: sure you'd say squirrel Girl. I decided, no, no, no,
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Speaker 1: squirrel Girl doesn't need a sidekick. She's undefeatable. Um, I
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Speaker 1: I would I would pick a truly iconic DC character,
2:32
Speaker 1: one that I think, uh, as far as I know,
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Speaker 1: has never had a sidekick, so that that knocks out
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Speaker 1: like Batman and Superman right away, right, Plastic Man. You
2:41
Speaker 1: know what I thought about Plastic Man, I really did,
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Speaker 1: But he has like a criminal pass. So I feel
2:46
Speaker 1: a little weird about that one. So I decided to
2:49
Speaker 1: go with armfull off Boy because someone needs to pick
2:53
Speaker 1: up his limbs. But like, so, wasn't he created just
2:59
Speaker 1: for the suice i'd squad? No, that was not arm
3:02
Speaker 1: fall Off Boytachable Kid. You have the Detachable Kid, which
3:06
Speaker 1: was essentially based off arm fall Off Boy, but no
3:10
Speaker 1: arm fall off Boy. Uh. Technically in the reboot, I
3:14
Speaker 1: think they call him something else. I can't remember what
3:17
Speaker 1: the name is, but yeah, arm fall off Boy, because
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Speaker 1: like I said, it's I think of it. I don't
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Speaker 1: know if you've ever seen any burlesque aerial, but they
3:25
Speaker 1: have these stage kittens, and it's the stage kitten's job
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Speaker 1: to go in after an act and just pick up
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Speaker 1: all the scraps of costumes that have been thrown everywhere.
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Speaker 1: I'm essentially arm fall off boys stage kitten. Okay, I
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Speaker 1: mean it's a little bit more gruesome, but there's no blood.
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Speaker 1: I mean, he doesn't. It's not like he pulls off
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Speaker 1: his arm and there's like sinew and blood and bone
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Speaker 1: or anything. I mean, I don't know that. I'm not
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Speaker 1: very familiar with arm fall Off Boy. If I had
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Speaker 1: to pick a DC character, it would be Aquaman because
3:54
Speaker 1: I really like snarkeling and scuba diving and I'm a
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Speaker 1: water baby, like but I felt like that would be
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Speaker 1: like the easy answer. There's also the great song Aquaman's Lament,
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Speaker 1: where Aquaman is singing to Vicky Vale and saying that
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Speaker 1: he's a better superhero than Batman, which is a great
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Speaker 1: song and everyone should listen to it. Um all right, well,
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Speaker 1: now that we got that out of the way, let's
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Speaker 1: let's segue into some of our news items. In the
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Speaker 1: first one is about a virtual fan event d C Fandom.
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Speaker 1: That's uh d O m E. They had one last
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Speaker 1: year and they're having another one this year on October six.
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Speaker 1: Is free, so you don't have to register and pay
4:34
Speaker 1: or anything. You can register so that you can watch
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Speaker 1: it and everything. But um, yeah, they're gonna show off
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Speaker 1: some trailers, some sneak peaks of different stuff, things that
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Speaker 1: involve not just the films, but also animation, TV, comic books.
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Speaker 1: So you're gonna get a lot of DC stuff at
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Speaker 1: that event. And I think it's pretty cool. Yeah, me too.
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Speaker 1: So it's good to hear you say that it's pretty cool,
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Speaker 1: because I know that you've been a little bit grumpy
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Speaker 1: about the d C EU as have I in all fairness,
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Speaker 1: but they are, you know, they're they're going to talk
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Speaker 1: about some video games. I've really enjoyed DC video games,
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Speaker 1: like Injustice. I quite enjoy picking up on a random day.
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Speaker 1: I'm really excited for the return of Doom Patrol and
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Speaker 1: Young Justice, and uh, also for the new the new
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Speaker 1: series Naomi that they're coming out with, because it's it's
5:27
Speaker 1: kind of going to just be a new thing. And
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Speaker 1: I look, I have enjoyed DC's television for the most part,
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Speaker 1: so I look forward to seeing kind of a new property.
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Speaker 1: Plus I'm really enjoying Sweet Tooth. I'm watching through it.
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Speaker 1: I enjoy that. And they're they're getting ready to say
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Speaker 1: goodbye to Supergirl that's going into its final season. Um.
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Speaker 1: There's also a lot of anticipation for another trailer for
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Speaker 1: The Batman. They showed off a trailer for The Batman
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Speaker 1: at the last Fandom and back then the plan was
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Speaker 1: still to have that film come out this year. That
6:01
Speaker 1: obviously isn't gonna happen. It's now going to at least
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Speaker 1: it's scheduled to release in early March of next year,
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Speaker 1: which makes me wonder if the new trailer is going
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Speaker 1: to end with question mark zero question mark question mark
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Speaker 1: because at the end of the last one, because the
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Speaker 1: riddlers in it, they replaced the two's in two thousand
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Speaker 1: twenty one with question marks, so now we just get
6:25
Speaker 1: extra question mark. I mean, I feel like they need
6:29
Speaker 1: to do that, and then they need to replace the
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Speaker 1: zero with a question mark, and then need to fill
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Speaker 1: the screen with question marks until it explodes into like
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Speaker 1: this question mark frenzy, which feels more jokery than riddler e.
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Speaker 1: But I also think I feel like that's it's the
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Speaker 1: right five and and only that area. You've already solved
6:46
Speaker 1: another problem. If they replace all the numbers with question marks,
6:50
Speaker 1: it could come out whenever, I mean to be fair.
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Speaker 1: If they leave the zero in, it still has what
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Speaker 1: I think, seventy seventy nine more years that it can
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Speaker 1: come out in. Only that then you can wait another
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Speaker 1: millennia and then start over again, because it could be
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Speaker 1: the first numbers of three, not at two because it's
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Speaker 1: a question mark. I mean, it resembles a two, but
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Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be a two. All those all
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Speaker 1: those young girls in three thousand and twenty two who
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Speaker 1: fall in love with Robert Pattinson just to find out
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Speaker 1: that he's long gone. Unless he's bionic by that time,
7:26
Speaker 1: I mean, who knows. Maybe we'll have become one with
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Speaker 1: the matrix. But wait, that's a spoiler alert. That's a
7:31
Speaker 1: later story. Um yeah. Anyway, we thought that this was
7:34
Speaker 1: cool that it's going to be a virtual event. I mean,
7:36
Speaker 1: obviously there's a lot of people are missing the real
7:41
Speaker 1: events here in Atlanta. Actually, this this coming weekend, dragon
7:45
Speaker 1: Con is going to take place in person. They are
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Speaker 1: requiring that all attendees either be vaccinated or provide proof
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Speaker 1: of a negative COVID test within a certain number of
7:56
Speaker 1: days two hours. Um yeah, which with with current weights
8:01
Speaker 1: is actually pretty in Atlanta, pretty difficult to get. I
8:05
Speaker 1: drove past a testing center the other day and there was, uh,
8:08
Speaker 1: like a line drive through testing center. There's a line
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Speaker 1: like a half a mile long waiting to get in. Well,
8:14
Speaker 1: and Georgia is a state where there's still, sadly a
8:17
Speaker 1: large number of COVID cases and lagging percentage of the
8:22
Speaker 1: population getting vaccinated. It has improved over time, but no,
8:27
Speaker 1: thanks to I won't go there. This episode is not
8:31
Speaker 1: about that, but I will if you want to hear
8:33
Speaker 1: me grant about it, just hit me up sometime and
8:35
Speaker 1: I will. I will spend hours complaining about leadership in Georgia.
8:39
Speaker 1: But uh, we just want to say to all of
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Speaker 1: those going out to Dragon Con, we hope you have
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Speaker 1: an amazing con Be safe, take care of yourself. Wash
8:49
Speaker 1: your hands all the time. I mean you should do
8:53
Speaker 1: that anyway. Wear your mask, definitely wear your mask, wash
8:56
Speaker 1: your hands. That should happen anyway, because concrud is for eyels, y'all. Yeah. Yeah,
9:01
Speaker 1: like years when there's not COVID, a large number of
9:05
Speaker 1: the population go home feeling sick. We have a mutual
9:08
Speaker 1: friend who got like strep m mono in one weekend
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Speaker 1: from the convention, and I don't think they were doing
9:15
Speaker 1: anything particularly risky to do it other than just being
9:20
Speaker 1: at the convention. So yeah, be safe. Also, you know
9:23
Speaker 1: at dragon Con, and if there's another convention, you're going
9:26
Speaker 1: to be nice to the staff. They're volunteers, and if
9:29
Speaker 1: they're asking you to do something, don't give them a
9:31
Speaker 1: hard time. We've we've heard about people doing that at Disney,
9:34
Speaker 1: and yeah, just be nice. Yeah, we're just hoping trying
9:38
Speaker 1: to have make sure everybody has a good and safe time. Yeah. Yeah,
9:41
Speaker 1: it's not like any request is a personal affront to
9:46
Speaker 1: any of the attendees. It's literally to make sure that
9:49
Speaker 1: everyone is safe and has a good time. But hey,
9:52
Speaker 1: I'm sure if any of our listeners are planning to
9:56
Speaker 1: go to Dragon Con that they're already going to be
9:58
Speaker 1: super cool to all the volunteers and do everything they're asked.
10:00
Speaker 1: I mean, they wouldn't be listening to us otherwise, right,
10:03
Speaker 1: because they would be insufferable. Uh. Someone who the the
10:09
Speaker 1: leader of the Ten Rings finds insufferable is Trevor s
10:13
Speaker 1: Thank you. Um so, yeah, you might remember that in
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Speaker 1: iron Man two they introduced the Mandarin Um and uh
10:26
Speaker 1: wait no, that was iron Man three. Iron In three
10:28
Speaker 1: they introduced the Man. Iron Man two was Whiplash, and
10:32
Speaker 1: Iron too. I fell asleep during in the movie theater,
10:35
Speaker 1: I mean I kind of fell asleep during. Um. The
10:38
Speaker 1: first iron Man is still my favorite of the three,
10:41
Speaker 1: but the but Ben Kingsley played the character who was
10:44
Speaker 1: posing as the Mandarin, a a traditional Iron Man villain,
10:51
Speaker 1: and everyone was wondering how Disney was going to handle
10:53
Speaker 1: it because it's a character who in the comics has
10:56
Speaker 1: like really kind of racist overtone as far as stereotypes go.
11:02
Speaker 1: So they ended up creating this this character who's actually
11:05
Speaker 1: an actor playing the part of the Mandarin. He's been
11:08
Speaker 1: hired to take on that part. Well, they shot a
11:11
Speaker 1: one shot video years and years and years ago that
11:14
Speaker 1: was part of the for the Dark World Blu Ray release. Um,
11:19
Speaker 1: that gave some more information about the character of the actor,
11:23
Speaker 1: who's this you know, oblivious idiot uh and linking him
11:28
Speaker 1: to the the real Mandarin. And uh. If you didn't
11:33
Speaker 1: get that Blue ray, you probably haven't seen the video.
11:36
Speaker 1: I hadn't seen it. I had heard of it, but
11:38
Speaker 1: I've never seen it. But now it's on Disney Plus,
11:40
Speaker 1: which is great because it does give you a little
11:43
Speaker 1: bit of linking tissue between Iron Man three and the
11:48
Speaker 1: upcoming Shung Chi. Yes, yes, because Tony Leung is the Mandarin.
11:55
Speaker 1: I actually missed the Disney one shots, like I didn't
11:58
Speaker 1: catch this one because I didn't buy the Maybe that
12:02
Speaker 1: was their effort to try to get people to buy
12:03
Speaker 1: though in the Dark World, which is which is the
12:07
Speaker 1: Iron Man two of the four series. Yeah, but I add, well, yeah,
12:14
Speaker 1: I didn't fall asleep during that one. Maybe that's because
12:16
Speaker 1: Christopher eccleston was in it, and I really like him
12:19
Speaker 1: more because there was a little bit more fantastical, so
12:23
Speaker 1: I can forgive more. But um I I really liked
12:27
Speaker 1: the one shots they did between the movies, even like
12:30
Speaker 1: tying in the Hulk movie to the m c U
12:33
Speaker 1: before we knew what the m c U was. Um
12:37
Speaker 1: So I'm glad to have a chance to see this. Yeah,
12:40
Speaker 1: it was fun. I went ahead and watched it before
12:43
Speaker 1: we did our our show, so because it was like,
12:46
Speaker 1: I've got time, I can watch. It's fourteen minutes long
12:49
Speaker 1: and definitely stay through the credits because there are elements
12:54
Speaker 1: in the credits within the credits that are important or
12:58
Speaker 1: at least entertaining. If not important, they are entertaining, and
13:02
Speaker 1: it is cool to see that Disney was thinking, oh,
13:05
Speaker 1: we should go ahead and release this because it does
13:07
Speaker 1: tie into this upcoming release. And I remain super excited
13:12
Speaker 1: about shuan Chi, even though I suspect I will be
13:16
Speaker 1: waiting the forty five days for it to come to
13:17
Speaker 1: Disney Plus because I am not quite ready to go
13:20
Speaker 1: back to the theaters yet. Same same, but I wanted
13:23
Speaker 1: to do really well. At the same time, I'm so
13:25
Speaker 1: torn Also, I have a little bit of geek shame
13:28
Speaker 1: because you kept saying shan chi and I thought for
13:30
Speaker 1: sure it was shang Chree. And then I watched a
13:31
Speaker 1: trailer on television and they said shang chi, and I'm like,
13:35
Speaker 1: I'm wrong. All the shame upon me in my house. Sorry, mom,
13:38
Speaker 1: h Well, it's it's one of the reason why I
13:41
Speaker 1: know full disclosure is because my my partner used to
13:46
Speaker 1: go to school with some people from UM from China,
13:54
Speaker 1: and that's where I learned that the right pronunciation was
13:58
Speaker 1: that aw sound not an ass. Sounds like. She had
14:02
Speaker 1: a colleague named Young, not Yang. It's spelled y a
14:07
Speaker 1: and G, but young and um. Not only that, but
14:10
Speaker 1: her last name rhymed with that. I won't go into
14:13
Speaker 1: everything because I want to. I don't want to talk
14:16
Speaker 1: about people without their permission. But but yeah, you could
14:19
Speaker 1: just imagine like the eye rolling you would have to
14:23
Speaker 1: get used to after hearing your name butchered over and over.
14:25
Speaker 1: So it's just one of those things that I tried
14:27
Speaker 1: to I tried to avoid I fall into the trap
14:30
Speaker 1: all the time. All right, Well, we only have a
14:32
Speaker 1: little bit of time for this last segment, so let's
14:34
Speaker 1: just cover this super quick, uh, Matrix four. It they
14:39
Speaker 1: released some footage that Ariel and I really had trouble
14:43
Speaker 1: finding in a way that wasn't packaged with like jerk boards,
14:47
Speaker 1: like us talking over it. Yeah. Yeah, but they released
14:52
Speaker 1: a little bit of footage. It's CinemaCon in Las Vegas,
14:56
Speaker 1: I think last week, and um, you know we know
15:01
Speaker 1: from that footage because everybody likes to describe what happened,
15:04
Speaker 1: even though I can't find it, that Kanna Reeves will
15:08
Speaker 1: be at least part of the time in his Matrix
15:12
Speaker 1: persona or his pre Matrix persona, and that Neil Patrick
15:15
Speaker 1: Harris is playing a therapist there. I want to see
15:17
Speaker 1: it automatically because of that. Yeah, if there's a musical
15:20
Speaker 1: number in Matrix four, then I will forgive Matrix too.
15:24
Speaker 1: I mean, they do show. They show Neo or Anderson
15:32
Speaker 1: whatever his name is, Yester Anderson, Mr Anderson. Yeah, I
15:36
Speaker 1: should know that looking at a mirror taking pills while
15:39
Speaker 1: they played Jefferson Airplane's White Rabbit. So at least which
15:43
Speaker 1: is the from a material, you know. Yeah, It's like
15:48
Speaker 1: when when when Breaking Bad finally played Crystal Blue Persuasion
15:53
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh, come on, this is a little
15:55
Speaker 1: on the nose, but yeah, like I think, you know what.
16:00
Speaker 1: As I've been reading about this, it has me curious because, Okay,
16:07
Speaker 1: full disclosure, I never saw the third film. I saw
16:10
Speaker 1: the second movie, and I hated it so much. I
16:14
Speaker 1: just had no desire to see how the story ended,
16:16
Speaker 1: because I just felt like the first film was its
16:20
Speaker 1: own encapsulated thing and that's all I needed, right because
16:24
Speaker 1: the other the second one, went on a pathway where
16:26
Speaker 1: I was like, I don't like this. Um. So I
16:29
Speaker 1: never watched the third one, but I understand that certain
16:32
Speaker 1: things happen in the third one, which really makes me
16:35
Speaker 1: wonder how the heck the things that are happening in
16:38
Speaker 1: the description of the fourth one happened. Yes, no, I
16:42
Speaker 1: I agree. So I did watch all three, all the
16:44
Speaker 1: and the Animatrix, which I did. I did enjoy the Animatrix.
16:48
Speaker 1: Um but they all blended together after the first one,
16:51
Speaker 1: So the second and the third one, I'd have a
16:53
Speaker 1: hard time telling you specifically the plots of each. But
16:56
Speaker 1: I agree. I'm my curiosity is peaked, and it's been
17:02
Speaker 1: long enough that I will probably give this fourth one
17:05
Speaker 1: and go and see what they do with it. Yeah, yeah,
17:09
Speaker 1: I am I am willing to give it a shot.
17:11
Speaker 1: I mean, I can hold a grudge for a very
17:14
Speaker 1: long time, as will likely become evident the longer this
17:17
Speaker 1: episode goes spoiler alert. But but in the meantime, we're
17:22
Speaker 1: gonna take a quick break and when we come back,
17:25
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk. We're gonna talk about some things that
17:28
Speaker 1: Disney is doing that um, we have some thoughts about.
17:33
Speaker 1: But before we get into our fighting, fighting mode, let's
17:36
Speaker 1: take this quick break. All right, we're back in Ariel.
17:49
Speaker 1: I want to apologize to you first, because I said,
17:52
Speaker 1: we get into a fighting, fighting mode. That's putting my feelings,
17:56
Speaker 1: that's projecting my feelings on you, and that's not fair.
17:59
Speaker 1: So I apologize for that. You know what, It's totally fine.
18:03
Speaker 1: I just got excited because my bro went, let's fight.
18:08
Speaker 1: I'm already Okay. You gotta know, guys, Folks shouldn't use guys.
18:13
Speaker 1: I do it all the time. Folks. You should know.
18:15
Speaker 1: When Ariel said that, she actually made the fists up
18:19
Speaker 1: rocking back and forth in the Street Fighter get ready
18:22
Speaker 1: those which I think is awesome. Um, one of these
18:25
Speaker 1: days we're going to record video because there's all kinds
18:28
Speaker 1: of gestures and body language and stuff. We have our
18:32
Speaker 1: cameras on, but we don't record the video part. But
18:35
Speaker 1: let's talk about some of the stuff we want to cover.
18:38
Speaker 1: One of the things we want to cover, there's there's
18:39
Speaker 1: a lot because Disney has recently made some announcements and
18:45
Speaker 1: collectively they're starting to really rub a lot of fans
18:49
Speaker 1: the wrong way. And by Disney, I'm talking specifically about
18:52
Speaker 1: the parks here, and really I'm talking about Disney World
18:55
Speaker 1: and Disneyland. So one thing that we know, all right,
19:00
Speaker 1: let's let's I guess we can hit the Genie stuff first,
19:03
Speaker 1: is that Disney's got an app coming out called Disney Genie.
19:07
Speaker 1: It's actually more like a suite of features that are
19:09
Speaker 1: going to be lumped in with the existing Disney apps.
19:13
Speaker 1: And this one is just supposed to help you plan stuff, right,
19:15
Speaker 1: Like it gives you ideas of what wait times are
19:17
Speaker 1: for different attractions, that kind of thing. Well, and it
19:20
Speaker 1: also is supposed to You're supposed to be able to
19:23
Speaker 1: tell it what you like in your park experience, and
19:26
Speaker 1: then it can suggest timing, It can suggest rides, shows
19:31
Speaker 1: things like anything that food service I don't even know, um,
19:34
Speaker 1: but just basically it can help tailor your park experience,
19:40
Speaker 1: so you're cutting out all the stuff you're not interested in.
19:42
Speaker 1: It says value. It seems like a really good idea,
19:45
Speaker 1: and that and that one's free. That part is free,
19:47
Speaker 1: which I think is great. Actually, I really like that.
19:50
Speaker 1: Like if you have the if you have a smartphone,
19:53
Speaker 1: and if you download the app, the basic version of
19:56
Speaker 1: Disney Genie is free to use. How Over, then we
20:01
Speaker 1: get to the add ons. Add On number one is
20:03
Speaker 1: Disney Genie Plus, and this is where you have the
20:07
Speaker 1: replacement for what was the fast pass system. And even
20:11
Speaker 1: then there's some major differences. Before COVID and before the
20:17
Speaker 1: shutdown of the parks, it was pretty much standard for
20:20
Speaker 1: you to go into Disney system uh sometimes up to
20:25
Speaker 1: I think it was at least sixty days. It might
20:28
Speaker 1: have been more than that. I think sixty days for
20:30
Speaker 1: fast passes if you were staying on property, and you
20:33
Speaker 1: could reserve up to three fast passes per day uh
20:37
Speaker 1: ahead of time, and you would just select the time
20:41
Speaker 1: or whatever times you wanted as much as you could.
20:44
Speaker 1: I mean, if the fast passes were all gone, you
20:45
Speaker 1: were kind of stuck, and you would build out your
20:49
Speaker 1: day that way. Then the COVID happens parks shut down.
20:53
Speaker 1: When the parks reopened, fast pass was no longer a thing.
20:56
Speaker 1: For one thing, it wasn't really necessary. They were operating
20:58
Speaker 1: the parks under really restricted attendance, so there wasn't nearly
21:02
Speaker 1: as many people in the parks. But now they're bringing
21:06
Speaker 1: back a version similar to fast pass, similar to the
21:09
Speaker 1: first incarnation of fast Past, where you can only have
21:11
Speaker 1: one at a time, which I don't think is a
21:13
Speaker 1: bad thing. No, you can you can only hold one
21:16
Speaker 1: at a time. Once you redeem it, you can immediately
21:20
Speaker 1: make your next fast Pass reservation based upon ability. I
21:24
Speaker 1: remember back in my day when you had to walk
21:26
Speaker 1: up to a kiosk can get a little printed fast pass. Yeah,
21:30
Speaker 1: and you can only have one. And eventually they had
21:33
Speaker 1: it where different rides had different kind of levels of
21:37
Speaker 1: importance where you could hold one really like choice ride
21:42
Speaker 1: like Space Mountain, and then you could hold one that
21:44
Speaker 1: was you know, good but not like not typically as
21:48
Speaker 1: busy as that one, And then eventually it got to
21:50
Speaker 1: the three. Well, now we're back down to one. That
21:52
Speaker 1: part is not bad, but you're gonna have to pay
21:54
Speaker 1: for it. You've gotta pay if it's disney World fifteen
21:57
Speaker 1: dollars per person per day to have this feature. At Disneyland,
22:03
Speaker 1: it's twenty dollars per person per day. And then they're
22:06
Speaker 1: also expecting that for certain premium rides there will be
22:09
Speaker 1: an up charge for that ride. So if you're paying
22:12
Speaker 1: fifteen dollars per person per day, you can get most
22:14
Speaker 1: of the rides, but maybe not you know, Star Wars
22:16
Speaker 1: Rise of the Resistance, that would be an extra five.
22:19
Speaker 1: So I have such mixed feelings about this because on
22:24
Speaker 1: the one hand, I've heard so many people say that
22:27
Speaker 1: last past or fast past is the reason that lines
22:29
Speaker 1: are so long for everybody else because people are skipping ahead,
22:33
Speaker 1: which means that anyone who's in the regular standby line
22:37
Speaker 1: they have to wait even longer before their turn because
22:39
Speaker 1: other people are effectively skipping ahead of the line. Yeah,
22:43
Speaker 1: and you know, so on the one hand, if that's
22:46
Speaker 1: the case and they limit and it reduces the number
22:48
Speaker 1: of people who do that, maybe lines will get better. Anyhow,
22:51
Speaker 1: I don't know. We'd have to see. The second thing
22:54
Speaker 1: is like, I love Disney, but my husband doesn't, and
22:58
Speaker 1: part of his because he just hates waiting in lines,
23:00
Speaker 1: especially in summer heat and so in Florida's summer heat
23:04
Speaker 1: lasts until about mid February. Yes, and then it's gone
23:08
Speaker 1: for a week and then it's back. I've been there
23:11
Speaker 1: the week that it's gone. Uh, you don't want to
23:14
Speaker 1: camp during that week. It gets a real cold. But uh,
23:17
Speaker 1: you know, if we were going to Disney, which is
23:21
Speaker 1: a mighty high you know budget point already, he would
23:26
Speaker 1: probably find it worth it if we could afford it,
23:30
Speaker 1: to pay that extra fifteen dollars a day so that
23:32
Speaker 1: he has a better experience because he can afford it,
23:35
Speaker 1: you know, um, and and so on the one hand,
23:39
Speaker 1: I want him to have a better experience. I want
23:41
Speaker 1: lines to get better for everybody. But it certainly does.
23:43
Speaker 1: And and this is going to kind of be our
23:44
Speaker 1: theme of this segment. It makes everything else. It makes
23:49
Speaker 1: it for for the person who maybe is saving for
23:52
Speaker 1: two years to go to Disney, and makes it less
23:55
Speaker 1: attainable for them, you know, it makes it not fees
23:59
Speaker 1: all for your average Joe. No, it might mean that
24:04
Speaker 1: they say, for two years, they go to Disney and
24:06
Speaker 1: they can't ride the rides that they were most looking
24:10
Speaker 1: forward to. Because other people like annual pass holder and
24:14
Speaker 1: DVC members like yours. Truly, I'm both of those things.
24:17
Speaker 1: I am the problem. People like me might be going
24:21
Speaker 1: in and jumping ahead of the line, and then you've
24:25
Speaker 1: got this person who's been, you know, waiting for this
24:28
Speaker 1: opportunity for a couple of years, maybe like they're bringing
24:31
Speaker 1: their kids for the first time and they really want
24:33
Speaker 1: the special experience. It does hit me like I'm like,
24:37
Speaker 1: I'm like, I I feel extremely conflicted about it because
24:40
Speaker 1: I can I'm in a stage in my life where
24:42
Speaker 1: I could afford to do the up charge thing. I
24:45
Speaker 1: we don't know how much the extra charge will be
24:48
Speaker 1: for those premium attractions. Disney has said that that will
24:51
Speaker 1: be variable pricing. It'll be it'll vary upon availability and demand.
24:55
Speaker 1: So for like days where there's a real heavy demand
24:58
Speaker 1: for say Rise of the Resistance, it's probably gonna cost
25:01
Speaker 1: more to get that premium Lightning pass Um. Yeah, same
25:05
Speaker 1: for the Seven Dwarfs Mind Train probably well. I'm sure
25:09
Speaker 1: the Guardian's Jalaxy ride will be that when it opens.
25:12
Speaker 1: Tron light Cycle, when that opens, all those rides that
25:16
Speaker 1: I want to I want to ride, and I usually
25:18
Speaker 1: can only go for a couple of days at a
25:20
Speaker 1: time just because of my schedule, and the more expensive
25:23
Speaker 1: it gets, the less plausible it makes it for a
25:27
Speaker 1: short trip, like I can I can justify that expense
25:31
Speaker 1: over five days if I'm going for five days, but
25:34
Speaker 1: since I'm usually going with just a couple of friends
25:37
Speaker 1: by myself, it's usually just a couple of day trip,
25:40
Speaker 1: and that it gets it gets harder the short amount
25:44
Speaker 1: of time you're there to justify that cost. I mean,
25:46
Speaker 1: we're like, we're like eight hours away from Orlando, right
25:49
Speaker 1: my car. Um For folks who are even further away,
25:53
Speaker 1: who have to fly or whatever, obviously it gets to
25:55
Speaker 1: be an even bigger financial burden. I didn't mention we
25:59
Speaker 1: neither of us main that for that premium right experience,
26:02
Speaker 1: you are limited to two of those per day, So
26:05
Speaker 1: that at least is one limiting factor where you don't
26:08
Speaker 1: have to worry about everybody just eating up all the
26:12
Speaker 1: premium passes across all the parks, you know, because they've
26:15
Speaker 1: got like ten of them or whatever. They're limited to
26:18
Speaker 1: two per day, So that's one thing that helps limit
26:21
Speaker 1: this a little bit. However, we have some other complicating factors,
26:24
Speaker 1: one of those being the Star Wars Galactic Cruiser hotel experience.
26:29
Speaker 1: That's opening up. We talked about it a bit to
26:31
Speaker 1: day to night experience. Immersive Star Wars experience. You are
26:35
Speaker 1: encouraged to take part in an ongoing story that unfolds
26:39
Speaker 1: during your stay. You can pick one of several different
26:43
Speaker 1: roles to kind of play as you do it well.
26:45
Speaker 1: Part of that experience includes a trip to Galaxies Edge
26:49
Speaker 1: at Hollywood Studios. Presumably part of that experience also means
26:54
Speaker 1: that you are not having to stand in line for
26:58
Speaker 1: Smugglers Run Rise of the Resistance because you are able
27:02
Speaker 1: to ride both of those rides as part of this experience.
27:04
Speaker 1: That means that not only if you're going to Hollywood
27:07
Speaker 1: Studios do you have to contend with the people who
27:09
Speaker 1: are using Genie Plus for Smugglers Run or the Lightning
27:13
Speaker 1: Lane for Riser Resistance. You also have all those guests
27:17
Speaker 1: from Star Wars Galactic Cruise that are ahead of you
27:20
Speaker 1: as well, and that starts to pile up, well, but
27:24
Speaker 1: you know Galactics, it will pile up. Maybe maybe the
27:28
Speaker 1: park Genie will help organize that mess so that it'll
27:33
Speaker 1: cut down on the like the bottlenecking of what everybody
27:36
Speaker 1: wants to do at any given time. It'll maybe it'll
27:38
Speaker 1: help um encourage crowds to disperse over a more steady
27:43
Speaker 1: stream as opposed to large crowds. UM. But that you
27:46
Speaker 1: know that being said, there are not a huge number
27:49
Speaker 1: of rooms et pretty I think it's just one d total.
27:55
Speaker 1: So that's that's potentially one parties if they all go
28:00
Speaker 1: on the same day. We don't know yet if they're
28:01
Speaker 1: going to stagger that where another that could be like
28:06
Speaker 1: four people, yeah, and uh, I guess you could take more, yeah,
28:10
Speaker 1: because you could have like tons of people in some
28:13
Speaker 1: of these cabins. But like if you, UM, if you
28:16
Speaker 1: want to feel a little better about it, at least
28:18
Speaker 1: you'll know that the people who are doing that paid
28:21
Speaker 1: out the wazoo in order to do it, because we
28:23
Speaker 1: learned what the pricing is going to be for the
28:25
Speaker 1: basic standard cabin aboard the Star Wars Galactic Cruiser, which
28:30
Speaker 1: is that if it's two people. This is one of
28:32
Speaker 1: those things where on a per person basis, the amount
28:35
Speaker 1: goes down the more people are there, but the total
28:38
Speaker 1: obviously goes up because you're talking about more people. So
28:41
Speaker 1: for two people for that two night experience, you're looking
28:44
Speaker 1: at one thousand, two hundred nine dollars per person per night,
28:50
Speaker 1: So ultimately collectively that's four thousand, eight hundred nine dollars
28:54
Speaker 1: almost five grand for two people to stay there. Now, granted,
28:58
Speaker 1: meals are included with that at as it is, including
29:01
Speaker 1: alcoholic beverages if you're an adult and you drink. I
29:05
Speaker 1: don't know that. I don't know that all your alcoholic beverages. Yeah,
29:09
Speaker 1: I was about to say one alcoholic beverage and then uh.
29:13
Speaker 1: And also the entrance to Hollywood Studios for the Galactic
29:17
Speaker 1: Galaxy's Edge part and dinner gratuity, so that's yeah. I mean,
29:23
Speaker 1: I don't tend to drop five dollars gratuity at my
29:25
Speaker 1: Disney dinners, but I mean if if you're like Mr
29:29
Speaker 1: money Bags and or miss money Bags or them money Bags,
29:32
Speaker 1: then maybe you do. Obviously, more people who go in
29:36
Speaker 1: stay in a cabin at the price per person goes down.
29:39
Speaker 1: So if there are four guests in a cabin, which
29:43
Speaker 1: Disney indicates would be three adults plus one child, it
29:46
Speaker 1: would be seven nine dollars per guests per night, So
29:50
Speaker 1: collectively you're looking at just under six thousand dollars, but
29:54
Speaker 1: per person, the price has come down. Um yeah, so yeah, well,
29:59
Speaker 1: Wicked expect again, I'm I'm I'm torn on this as well,
30:04
Speaker 1: because obviously you're going to have a lot of people
30:07
Speaker 1: who have to be in character and performing for you,
30:09
Speaker 1: even if their front desk staff. We know that they
30:12
Speaker 1: do this on Avenger's Campus in Disneyland and also at
30:14
Speaker 1: Galaxy's Edge. All of the park staff are essentially performers
30:21
Speaker 1: or should be are expected to be, So you're on
30:24
Speaker 1: all the time while you're working there, you know, And
30:27
Speaker 1: I want them to be paid. I want them to
30:31
Speaker 1: be paid for that, you know. But so there's a
30:34
Speaker 1: there's a high cost I'm sure of operation, but it's
30:37
Speaker 1: i'm a feeling that Disney's revenue streams could easily cover
30:40
Speaker 1: this without the prices of the hotel itself being I mean, granted,
30:44
Speaker 1: if you're saying we want the hotel to be able
30:47
Speaker 1: to cover the cost of the operation of the hotel
30:49
Speaker 1: plus ad profit, that makes sense. But we're talking about
30:53
Speaker 1: a company that almost completely dominates every aspect of media
30:59
Speaker 1: right now, so it's hard to I mean, granted, it's
31:02
Speaker 1: built in different divisions. The Parks division is a different
31:05
Speaker 1: division from the Motion Picture division, which is different from
31:08
Speaker 1: the animation division, etcetera. But still, um, so there's that.
31:14
Speaker 1: Then there's also annual passes are making a return. They
31:18
Speaker 1: were gone once COVID hit and the parks shut down.
31:22
Speaker 1: If you did not have an annual pass, you could
31:25
Speaker 1: not purchase one. Um. I happen to have one, so
31:28
Speaker 1: I was able to renew mine. Uh. But now the
31:31
Speaker 1: annual passes are coming back in a slightly different form.
31:34
Speaker 1: There are I think four levels of annual pass now,
31:38
Speaker 1: but only the last only the last one is available
31:42
Speaker 1: to people who are not Florida residents and are not
31:46
Speaker 1: part of the Disney Vacation Club. And that's the most
31:49
Speaker 1: expensive one, which is like a thousand fifty dollars or
31:53
Speaker 1: something like that, something like that. Yeah, it's well, no,
31:58
Speaker 1: no longer no longer includes the photo pass either the
32:01
Speaker 1: old the old annual passes did so you got you
32:05
Speaker 1: automatically got all the pictures that that the Disney's photographers
32:09
Speaker 1: are taking. That was part of your package. Now it's
32:12
Speaker 1: an add on, So now you have to spend an
32:14
Speaker 1: extra hundred bucks if you want to add it on. Yeah,
32:17
Speaker 1: I mean, I think they just don't want people to
32:18
Speaker 1: get annual passes, is really what it is. And I
32:23
Speaker 1: can get that for certain places like Disneyland. One of
32:26
Speaker 1: the biggest issues that they've run into there is that
32:29
Speaker 1: the park can get overrun by annual pass holders and
32:32
Speaker 1: annual pass holders, I mean, they're spending a lot of
32:36
Speaker 1: money to get those annual passes, but they don't tend
32:38
Speaker 1: to spend a lot of money on stuff like food
32:40
Speaker 1: and merchandise, whereas like people who are visiting for the
32:44
Speaker 1: first time or tourists, they spend a lot more in money.
32:48
Speaker 1: So Disney does prefer there to be more like day
32:54
Speaker 1: of ticket holders as opposed to annual pass members. I mean,
32:57
Speaker 1: I wish that all of these increases in costs would
33:00
Speaker 1: help cover and make the non annual pass hold or
33:03
Speaker 1: visit a little bit less expensive potentially, because you know,
33:07
Speaker 1: if I pay less to get into the park, I
33:08
Speaker 1: will buy more food, I will buy more merchandise. You know,
33:11
Speaker 1: I'll get higher on those ticket items. Though, another thing
33:16
Speaker 1: you mentioned, and we're just going to touch on this
33:18
Speaker 1: briefly because we could talk about this for probably like
33:21
Speaker 1: twelve hours. Um. You know, one of the things that
33:24
Speaker 1: I really enjoy at Disney, and I this is something
33:27
Speaker 1: that's new as an adult, is I love the entertainment
33:32
Speaker 1: at Disney and and how you can run into it
33:35
Speaker 1: in many places, Well, you can't do that as much anymore.
33:37
Speaker 1: They cut a lot of their entertainment, at least their
33:39
Speaker 1: street entertainment. I don't know about stage um when COVID happened,
33:44
Speaker 1: and you know, there are people who are saying that
33:48
Speaker 1: maybe they just wanted to get rid of them anyhow. UM,
33:52
Speaker 1: I don't have insight into that very much, but I
33:57
Speaker 1: do note that there was a difference between being like
33:59
Speaker 1: streets of a Mary to cast versus a face character,
34:02
Speaker 1: and that was a pretty big difference. So well, let
34:04
Speaker 1: me put it to you this way. Before pandemic, uh,
34:08
Speaker 1: the the Disney World Parks employed around seven hundred eighty
34:14
Speaker 1: equity members. After pandemic, they let go of seven twenty
34:20
Speaker 1: of them, so only sixty out of seven remained, and
34:24
Speaker 1: that was as of October of last year. And so
34:28
Speaker 1: there Ariel and I feel very strongly about this because
34:32
Speaker 1: we have had parallel experiences in a in a different
34:37
Speaker 1: live entertainment world. But we've also seen issues with the
34:43
Speaker 1: difference between the way a a parks cast contributes to
34:50
Speaker 1: the experience versus how management values that cast. Um and
34:56
Speaker 1: this this is unfortunately another example of a large corporate
35:03
Speaker 1: entity seemingly viewing entertainment, which is an enhancement, as not
35:10
Speaker 1: that important and from like a from like a pencil
35:13
Speaker 1: pusher approach, you could kind of see like, Okay, they
35:16
Speaker 1: don't directly contribute to the bottom line, right, They're not
35:20
Speaker 1: generating revenue by entertaining people in the streets like on
35:25
Speaker 1: Main Street. But from a guest perspective, that adds such
35:32
Speaker 1: a level of depth. And you know, magic is the
35:37
Speaker 1: way Disney would describe it, like magic to your visit
35:41
Speaker 1: that to lose that is really unfortunate because I think
35:45
Speaker 1: a lot of Disney fans have said, this collection of
35:49
Speaker 1: different announcements that have all hit right around the same
35:52
Speaker 1: time feels like a diminished magical experience overall. And that's
35:58
Speaker 1: unfortunate because I mean that's what Disney's brand is built upon.
36:02
Speaker 1: Even just from a hard hearted business perspective, you're like,
36:06
Speaker 1: you're undermining your own brand. I mean, maybe maybe we'll
36:12
Speaker 1: see that these changes make a better park experience for everybody. Um,
36:16
Speaker 1: I hope that they bring the entertainment back. You know,
36:19
Speaker 1: it's hard because I am very very biased, being a
36:23
Speaker 1: having been a street performance performer, at an entertainment at
36:27
Speaker 1: least partially venue. You know, you've said we're both biased
36:30
Speaker 1: to this because we work the Renaissance Festival. That is
36:33
Speaker 1: that is very magical for me. I don't know how
36:36
Speaker 1: much everybody appreciates that sort of interaction at a park,
36:39
Speaker 1: So maybe we are the outliers in that. Yeah, it
36:42
Speaker 1: could be. I do hope post pandemic they're able to
36:44
Speaker 1: bring back some of the street cast me too, and
36:47
Speaker 1: like the same thing with some of the other shows
36:49
Speaker 1: and stuff like things that have been curtailed because of it.
36:53
Speaker 1: I would love to see that all phased back in.
36:56
Speaker 1: I think, I mean just based upon the way Disney
36:59
Speaker 1: handle this over the course of the pandemic, that the
37:02
Speaker 1: Disney Parks handled this, I should really be more specific
37:05
Speaker 1: because the company is so big that they burned a
37:08
Speaker 1: lot of bridges I think, with a lot of cast
37:11
Speaker 1: members who genuinely loved what they did up until the
37:15
Speaker 1: point where it felt like it wasn't reciprocated. Um, that's unfortunate.
37:21
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm projecting too much. I hope, I am. I
37:24
Speaker 1: would love to see a return to that form. Honestly,
37:28
Speaker 1: I think that the park the parks in in Orlando
37:32
Speaker 1: really need to focus on that. I mean, we've got
37:35
Speaker 1: the Magic Kingdom's fiftieth anniversary right around the corner, and
37:39
Speaker 1: it would be a real shame if live entertainment and
37:43
Speaker 1: like an energetic cast we're not part of that celebration.
37:48
Speaker 1: I mean, I agree. I do think part of it
37:51
Speaker 1: will just depend on health and safety as well, because well,
37:55
Speaker 1: well I've never had a street character outside of like
37:57
Speaker 1: a costume character during a photo experience. It all up
38:00
Speaker 1: in my business at Disney. UM, like you know that
38:04
Speaker 1: you do have crowding issues, you do have spacing issues
38:08
Speaker 1: still currently, so we'll have to see how it all
38:10
Speaker 1: plays out. I never went to the Georgia Renaissance Festival
38:13
Speaker 1: as a kid because it was pay to get in
38:16
Speaker 1: and then pay for everything you do, um, and so
38:19
Speaker 1: that kind of you know, and I didn't make a lot.
38:22
Speaker 1: I didn't have a lot of money UM at that time.
38:25
Speaker 1: So that kind of mentality is stuck with me throughout life.
38:27
Speaker 1: And I love Disney Parks and I don't want to
38:30
Speaker 1: get hit by that same door. I guess, yeah, Well
38:33
Speaker 1: I want to be able to continue going. My biggest
38:35
Speaker 1: hope is that this regular Genie not the Genie Plus,
38:38
Speaker 1: but the regular Genie part of the app helps folks
38:42
Speaker 1: plan out their day, make last minute changes and be
38:47
Speaker 1: able to adapt to whatever is going on in the
38:49
Speaker 1: parks and still have a magical experience and not have
38:53
Speaker 1: to I feel like you have to do the pay
38:56
Speaker 1: to win strategy, like the same thing that people who
38:59
Speaker 1: play video games absolutely hate. Right m hm, yeah, Well,
39:04
Speaker 1: we we need to take another break. That's gonna be
39:07
Speaker 1: this a long episode. We're gonna take another break, and
39:10
Speaker 1: then when we come back, we're going to mash up
39:13
Speaker 1: some stuff. Uh, some that we've already talked about and
39:16
Speaker 1: one thing we haven't talked about yet. So stay tuned.
39:19
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. All right, we're back. So our
39:38
Speaker 1: mash up this week, just gonna keep that train of rolling.
39:44
Speaker 1: It's a phrase now if it wasn't before. Um, So
39:47
Speaker 1: we're gonna mash up Star Wars because we've talked about
39:49
Speaker 1: that a bit. With the Star Cruiser, because I mean,
39:51
Speaker 1: I still want to go everything aside if I have
39:55
Speaker 1: a windfall that has some extra money after I do
39:58
Speaker 1: all of my donation plan. I mean, it's more expensive
40:01
Speaker 1: than an actual Disney cruise, which is already expensive. No,
40:05
Speaker 1: I'm not saying don't go. I'm saying I wanted to
40:07
Speaker 1: go to. I still want to go to despite all
40:10
Speaker 1: the things I just said, I still want to go to.
40:12
Speaker 1: It just blows my mind that it's more expensive than
40:15
Speaker 1: an actual like four day Disney CRUI Disney cruise. Yeah, yeah,
40:21
Speaker 1: so a lot. So we're gonna do Star Wars um
40:24
Speaker 1: and then the other thing we're gonna do is we're
40:26
Speaker 1: going to mash that up with Wonder Years. I'm making
40:29
Speaker 1: good sentences now, people, Um, yes, So we're matching Star
40:32
Speaker 1: Wars up with Wonder Years. Let's let's talk really quickly
40:34
Speaker 1: about the original Wonder Years and then you can talk
40:37
Speaker 1: a little bit about the trailer that was released for
40:40
Speaker 1: the new version of Wonder Years. So, the the original
40:45
Speaker 1: Wonder Years series was this series where you're learning about
40:50
Speaker 1: a boy named Kevin who grew up in the late
40:52
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties and early nineteen seventies, and the Daniel Stern
40:59
Speaker 1: served as the narrator. You never really, you never saw him.
41:02
Speaker 1: He was narrating the piece and Fred Savage played young Kevin,
41:06
Speaker 1: and it was a setup for things like kind of
41:09
Speaker 1: a coming of age tail of growing up in the
41:12
Speaker 1: suburbs in the late sixties and during this tumultuous time
41:17
Speaker 1: in America's history where you've got you know, the the
41:21
Speaker 1: Peace and Love movement, the anti war movement. You know,
41:25
Speaker 1: it was a big, big time during America's history. So
41:29
Speaker 1: it's kind of told through the lens of a young
41:32
Speaker 1: boy who is coming of age, and it was no
41:36
Speaker 1: kind of a drama, but mostly it was a drama
41:39
Speaker 1: with comedic tones as well. There's a lot of comedy
41:41
Speaker 1: in it, um and a lot of people have really
41:44
Speaker 1: warm feelings for it. And of course we're getting a reboot,
41:47
Speaker 1: a totally reimagining of the series. So Arie'll talk a
41:51
Speaker 1: little bit about the teaser. Yes, So they came out
41:55
Speaker 1: with a teaser and then they came out with an
41:56
Speaker 1: actual trailer recently, UM for this show. This time it
42:01
Speaker 1: will be it's still focusing on a family in the
42:03
Speaker 1: late sixties, but it's a bat black family in Montgomery, Alabama. Uh,
42:08
Speaker 1: Kevin still likes uh, the kids still likes baseball. The
42:14
Speaker 1: trailer hits all. Obviously, they deal with issues like integration
42:17
Speaker 1: and things like that that we're still dealing with today.
42:20
Speaker 1: But we're definitely an issue in the late sixties um.
42:24
Speaker 1: But the tone of the trailer absolutely hits every warm
42:30
Speaker 1: feeling I have about the original show, like every sort
42:33
Speaker 1: of beat um whilst not feeling like a complete just
42:37
Speaker 1: rehash of the same old material. Um do lay Hill
42:41
Speaker 1: is The dad is amazing and so funny in the
42:44
Speaker 1: little moments he has in the trailer. Like, I don't know,
42:47
Speaker 1: I watched this trailer and I just this show cannot
42:49
Speaker 1: come out soon enough for me. I highly suggest if
42:53
Speaker 1: you liked the original Wonder Years, even if you didn't,
42:55
Speaker 1: you should watch this trailer. I I feel like, I
43:00
Speaker 1: don't know because I haven't seen more than the trailer,
43:02
Speaker 1: but I feel like this sitcom hits hits a place
43:05
Speaker 1: where I haven't seen modern sitcoms hit in a while,
43:08
Speaker 1: of of just actual heartfelt and fun and you know
43:12
Speaker 1: there are a few of them out there, but um yeah,
43:15
Speaker 1: I'm just super excited about it. So with that in mind,
43:19
Speaker 1: we have decided to mash up Star Wars and the
43:22
Speaker 1: Wonder Years. Now, I'm gonna go ahead and tell you
43:25
Speaker 1: I I stuck with more like the the original run
43:30
Speaker 1: of the Wonder Years because that's what I'm familiar with.
43:32
Speaker 1: I haven't obviously seen the new one. Yet um, but
43:36
Speaker 1: I went with the old one and uh, I'm gonna
43:40
Speaker 1: go second. So Ariel, do you wanna introduce us to
43:44
Speaker 1: your your genius work of mash up? Sure? So this
43:49
Speaker 1: is The Wonder Star Years war uh, because that's the title.
43:55
Speaker 1: Kevin Arnold loved everything about baseball, just like any other
43:58
Speaker 1: stereotypical boy his age in the sixties, but he wasn't
44:02
Speaker 1: very good at it. So when he went to try
44:04
Speaker 1: out for the baseball team with his friend Paul, instead
44:06
Speaker 1: of hitting the ball when it was his turn at bat,
44:09
Speaker 1: he got clocked in the head with the pitch and
44:11
Speaker 1: knocked out. When Kevin came to he had no idea
44:14
Speaker 1: where he was, but it certainly wasn't a baseball field
44:17
Speaker 1: or even his home. He was inside a largish, whitish
44:20
Speaker 1: metal room with worrying, rushing sounds all around him. But
44:23
Speaker 1: more pressing than that was the large, hairy, bare dog
44:26
Speaker 1: creature standing over him and staring at him. Hi. Kevin cried,
44:31
Speaker 1: cried the bear dog creature. After an appropriately funny amount
44:37
Speaker 1: of time of the two screaming back and forth, a
44:39
Speaker 1: hand reached down and helped Kevin up. The hand belonged
44:42
Speaker 1: to a weird looking pirate dude who said, this is
44:44
Speaker 1: no time to be sleeping. Kid. You're the one who
44:46
Speaker 1: wanted to save the princess in the first place, and
44:48
Speaker 1: we're almost there. Follow me. Kevin followed the weird pirate guy,
44:52
Speaker 1: who he found out was named Han Solo until they
44:54
Speaker 1: reached a room with a window, and that's when Kevin
44:56
Speaker 1: found out he was in space on a spaceship like
45:00
Speaker 1: in space. After pitching himself real hard and not waking
45:04
Speaker 1: up he is, he was told to strap in and
45:07
Speaker 1: help maneuver the spaceship until they reached the Death Star,
45:11
Speaker 1: and Kevin began to protest that he evedn't know how
45:13
Speaker 1: to fly this spaceship machine. He isn't even allowed to
45:16
Speaker 1: drive a car, but as soon as his hands touched
45:19
Speaker 1: the controls, he innately knew how to pilot the spaceship.
45:22
Speaker 1: When they came upon the Death Star, it's a it
45:25
Speaker 1: was immense and breathtaking. He asked hand Solo to remind
45:28
Speaker 1: him of their plan and purpose because like he knew,
45:31
Speaker 1: but he just wanted to be reminded, And after an
45:33
Speaker 1: all too brief rundown followed by the phrase we'll wing it, kid,
45:37
Speaker 1: they entered the Death Star to steal some Stormtrooper armor
45:40
Speaker 1: and save the princess. When they found the princess, to
45:43
Speaker 1: Kevin's surprise, she looked exactly like Gwendolene Cooper, the girl
45:47
Speaker 1: he had had a crush on. But when he shouted, Whinny,
45:50
Speaker 1: it's so good to see you, she screamed, don't winny
45:51
Speaker 1: at me. I'm not some eques, I'm a princess. Uh.
45:55
Speaker 1: They do save her, and after then he misshaps and
45:59
Speaker 1: cree easiness. They escaped the Death Star, and this marked
46:03
Speaker 1: the beginning of Kevin's adventures with Han Solo, the Princess,
46:06
Speaker 1: the dog bear creature, which he learned was a creature
46:08
Speaker 1: called a Wookie who you didn't want to get mad,
46:11
Speaker 1: fighting the wars and Stars, escaping space monsters, and piloting
46:14
Speaker 1: X wings apparently in a galaxy long ago and far
46:17
Speaker 1: away you don't need learners permits, and falling more in
46:20
Speaker 1: love with Winnie, I mean, the Princess. This is until
46:24
Speaker 1: one day when he encountered the main evil himself, Darth Vader.
46:27
Speaker 1: It was a tense situation and justice Darth Vader revealed
46:30
Speaker 1: that he was Kevin's father. Kevin did think that voice
46:33
Speaker 1: sounded familiar. Kevin blacked out. When he woke up, he
46:37
Speaker 1: was laying in his bed with his brother Wayne standing
46:39
Speaker 1: over him. Kevin screamed, Swayne screamed, and after an appropriately
46:44
Speaker 1: funny amount of time of the two screaming back and forth,
46:47
Speaker 1: Kevin's mom came in and he told her his whole story.
46:50
Speaker 1: She told him it was all a dream and he
46:53
Speaker 1: had nothing to worry about, but Kevin insisted it wasn't.
46:57
Speaker 1: Wayne later had Kevin recite the story to his friend
46:59
Speaker 1: George because he found it to be like a total
47:01
Speaker 1: gas and George said, man, that's lame, and Kevin believed
47:05
Speaker 1: George until years later when Star Wars came out and well,
47:10
Speaker 1: that is a story for another time. I love it.
47:15
Speaker 1: I love it, totally different from mine. So before we
47:19
Speaker 1: get to mind, because our episode is running along, we're
47:22
Speaker 1: gonna take another break. But before I get to that,
47:25
Speaker 1: I've got late breaking news. Oh you ready, Yes, we
47:30
Speaker 1: now know who's going to play the character of Will
47:33
Speaker 1: in the reboot of The Fresh Pence of bel Air,
47:37
Speaker 1: Jabari Banks. Jabari Banks, who was a newcomer. We'll be
47:41
Speaker 1: playing Will. Uh you know where he lives? West raised, Yeah,
47:50
Speaker 1: and Apparently Will Smith was the one to call him
47:53
Speaker 1: up and tell him he got the part. How cool
47:56
Speaker 1: is that? I'm so excited about that? Yeah, me too.
48:00
Speaker 1: I was like, wow, that sounds great, Like what a
48:02
Speaker 1: neat way of of tying it in with the original series.
48:07
Speaker 1: All Right, well, we're gonna take another quick break. When
48:09
Speaker 1: we come back, I will give my epic mash up.
48:16
Speaker 1: We'll have to. I guess we'll have to wait and see.
48:18
Speaker 1: You know, history will judge me, probably more harshly than
48:21
Speaker 1: I already do. We're gonna be right back. Okay, we're
48:41
Speaker 1: back and uh and here we go. Um. I feel
48:44
Speaker 1: pretty good about this one. I think it's a it's
48:46
Speaker 1: a short one. It's nice, it's accinct, you know. I'm
48:50
Speaker 1: really I had a lot of deep feelings, but because
48:53
Speaker 1: the Wonder Years really brings that out of me, and
48:55
Speaker 1: so does Star Wars. But I think I think I
48:57
Speaker 1: was able to rein it in. So Welcome to the
49:00
Speaker 1: Wonder Wars. Young Luke Skywalker has a problem. He wants
49:05
Speaker 1: to go to Tashi Station and pick up some power converters,
49:08
Speaker 1: but before he can do that, we get his opening narration,
49:11
Speaker 1: spoken by a much older Luke Skywalker, zero B B Y.
49:17
Speaker 1: I was nineteen years old. A lot happened that year.
49:20
Speaker 1: I met R two D two and his pain in
49:23
Speaker 1: the butt sidekicks C three p O. I found out
49:25
Speaker 1: Darth Vader totally killed my dad, and the Rebel Alliance
49:29
Speaker 1: mounted its major assault on the Galactic Empire, and I
49:33
Speaker 1: began my journey toward becoming a Jedi master. But we'll
49:36
Speaker 1: get to that. Then we cut to the theme song.
49:40
Speaker 1: What would you do if I stepped? Didn't poo do?
49:45
Speaker 1: Would you stand up and walk out on me? Lend
49:49
Speaker 1: me your ship and I'll go to all the rong
49:53
Speaker 1: with my best bud knob old baby. I gotta have
49:58
Speaker 1: a little help from old Ben. Yeah, you know, I
50:02
Speaker 1: need have a little help from old Ben. He's got
50:06
Speaker 1: my dad's saber. You have a little help from old Ben.
50:10
Speaker 1: WHOA okay? Theme songs over. Out of the theme song,
50:18
Speaker 1: we then see a montage of big events that happened
50:21
Speaker 1: in the year zero B B Y, which, by the way,
50:24
Speaker 1: that that stands for before the Battle of Yavin, And yeah,
50:28
Speaker 1: you know, I looked around for some other kind of
50:30
Speaker 1: dating system, because of course, no one in the year
50:33
Speaker 1: zero B B Y would have called it the year zero,
50:37
Speaker 1: because what the heck were they counting down to before that?
50:40
Speaker 1: I mean, it makes no sense, but I couldn't find that,
50:43
Speaker 1: so forget all about that. Anyway, we go to Old
50:46
Speaker 1: Luke's narration. There's no pretty way to put this. I
50:50
Speaker 1: grew up on a moisture farm. I suppose most people
50:53
Speaker 1: think of that as a place filled with blue milk evaporators,
50:57
Speaker 1: and they'd be half right. We had plenty of blue milk,
51:00
Speaker 1: but our evaporators had been going on the fritz for
51:02
Speaker 1: a while, and we really needed someone to help us
51:04
Speaker 1: figure them out. And by us, I mean me and
51:07
Speaker 1: my uncle Owen and my aunt Burrew, who had raised
51:10
Speaker 1: me since I was a baby. But really, those were
51:13
Speaker 1: the wonder years for those of us in the Outer Rim,
51:15
Speaker 1: beyond the Galactic Empire's long reach, before the War of
51:19
Speaker 1: the Stars, you know, sort of a star conflict or
51:24
Speaker 1: maybe star battles. I don't know what you call it,
51:26
Speaker 1: but on reflection, it was a good way to grow up.
51:30
Speaker 1: The montage cross fades into footage of Luke writing his
51:32
Speaker 1: land speeder up to a little dome house and Old
51:35
Speaker 1: Luke says, there, that's me, Luke Skywalker age nineteen zero
51:40
Speaker 1: b b Y, the year I'd finally leave tattooing. Now
51:44
Speaker 1: we cut and it's like essentially Star Wars episode four,
51:48
Speaker 1: only Luke has his best friend named Paul, who's waiting
51:51
Speaker 1: at Tashi Station for like five movies before he finds out.
51:55
Speaker 1: Luke totally became one with the Force through some sort
51:57
Speaker 1: of weird death by meditation thing. So that's sad, but
52:00
Speaker 1: we get lots of era appropriate music, like the Moss
52:03
Speaker 1: Eisley Cantina song over and over again because between that
52:08
Speaker 1: and Jedi Rocks, I'm gonna go Moss Eisley every time,
52:11
Speaker 1: and there's not nearly enough diagetic music in the Star
52:15
Speaker 1: Wars cinematic universe. Oh and we also see Luke develop
52:18
Speaker 1: a crush on this girl named Winnie, only it turns
52:21
Speaker 1: out she's his other sister, Like Leiah and Luke have
52:25
Speaker 1: a sister named Winnie, and no one is really sure
52:28
Speaker 1: how that happened. But it's okay because explanations in the
52:31
Speaker 1: Star Wars universe all change based on as Kenobi would say,
52:34
Speaker 1: your certain point of view. Not that I'm bitter about
52:37
Speaker 1: a lack of consistency in Star Wars lore. That is
52:41
Speaker 1: rife with revisionism and rhet conning. No, I'm totally cool
52:45
Speaker 1: with that. It's awesome. So yeah, Winnie is in this too, Okay,
52:48
Speaker 1: and she's Luke's sister too, because why not. Heck, it
52:52
Speaker 1: turns out she is raised mom and the whole you're
52:55
Speaker 1: the Emperor's granddaughter things a red herring because you know,
52:58
Speaker 1: we get a lot of those two in the Star
52:59
Speaker 1: Wars the universe. And you know what, I am mad.
53:02
Speaker 1: I am mad about Star Wars. Yeah, I'm a grown
53:05
Speaker 1: man who is mad about a fantasy series about magicians
53:08
Speaker 1: with magic swords. That it didn't go the way I
53:11
Speaker 1: wanted it to go. And sure, that's not the purpose
53:14
Speaker 1: of this mashup that I'm on my soapbox now and
53:16
Speaker 1: I ain't getting off of it. And another thing, let's
53:18
Speaker 1: talk about that whole subvert the audience's expectations thing. Okay, Well,
53:23
Speaker 1: that's gonna do it for episode this week. If you've
53:26
Speaker 1: got ideas of how Wonder Years and of Star Wars
53:30
Speaker 1: should be mashed up, you should write us. You can
53:32
Speaker 1: do so at l n C at iHeart media dot com,
53:35
Speaker 1: or reach out to us on social media. L n
53:38
Speaker 1: C Underscore Podcast is Twitter, where Jonathan can't rent this
53:42
Speaker 1: long at you. Uh. Instagram and Facebook are large nerd
53:46
Speaker 1: John Collider. Uh, we would really love to hear from
53:49
Speaker 1: you about topics you want us to talk about, hopefully
53:52
Speaker 1: again not to make Jonathan rant like this or um
53:56
Speaker 1: the ideas you have or thoughts you have on the
53:58
Speaker 1: things we've talked about already. If you like us, please
54:01
Speaker 1: tell your friends, please subscribe, hit that like button and
54:03
Speaker 1: share us. Uh. We love you all for listening, and
54:06
Speaker 1: we hope you love us too. Until next time, I
54:09
Speaker 1: am Ariel Casting and nineteen years he's been Well, I'll
54:15
Speaker 1: tell you why because in episode three Jedi were still
54:18
Speaker 1: relatively plentiful and scattered across the galaxy. Everyone knew who
54:22
Speaker 1: they were, people feared and respected them. But then you
54:25
Speaker 1: get to episode four and Han Solo talks about the
54:27
Speaker 1: Force being some sort of hokey religion, as of Jedi
54:30
Speaker 1: were never really powerful entities or just the stuff of legend,
54:33
Speaker 1: but the Jedi being a powerful presence are within the
54:36
Speaker 1: living memory of Hans Solo, who is clearly more than
54:40
Speaker 1: nineteen years old, Like he doesn't believe something that categorically
54:44
Speaker 1: existed in his universe less than twenty years earlier. I mean,
54:48
Speaker 1: I get that it's magic, but his best friend is
54:50
Speaker 1: an eight foot tall teddy Bear for goodness sake, So yeah,
54:54
Speaker 1: the timelines don't work. There needed to be a bigger
54:57
Speaker 1: gap between the extinction of the Jedi and episode four,
54:59
Speaker 1: but less than twenty years and it makes no sense.
55:02
Speaker 1: And don't get me started on how dumb the Clone
55:05
Speaker 1: Wars were. My goodness, when we got that throwaway line
55:07
Speaker 1: back in the late nineteen seventies, we all thought it
55:09
Speaker 1: was going to be the coolest thing ever. But it's not.
55:12
Speaker 1: It's lame. Anyway, Let's get back to how everything after
55:16
Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi was a terrible mistake. Okay, well
55:19
Speaker 1: not everything. I mean I actually kind of liked Ray
55:21
Speaker 1: a lot and Finn, but wat's his face, you know,
55:24
Speaker 1: Mr Hutt X Wing pilot guy played by the dude
55:26
Speaker 1: who did that wicked dance next Makina. He was pretty cool,
55:29
Speaker 1: but pretty much everything else was terrible. I mean, how terrible. Well,
55:32
Speaker 1: I've only seen episode three once because I hated it,
55:35
Speaker 1: and I still haven't seen episode nine, which is crazy.
55:39
Speaker 1: I mean, if you had told ten year old me
55:40
Speaker 1: that one day, the conclusion of the Skywalker Saga would
55:43
Speaker 1: come out and I wouldn't even go see it. I'd
55:45
Speaker 1: have thought you were nuts. But here we are the end.
56:00
Speaker 1: Mhm h m hm m m m hm. The Large
56:14
Speaker 1: Nur Drunk Collider is production of I Heart Radio and
56:17
Speaker 1: was created by Ariel Kasten. Jonathan Strickland is the executive producer.
56:21
Speaker 1: This show is produced, edited, and published by Tory Harrison.
56:25
Speaker 1: For more podcasts on my heart Radio, visit the I
56:27
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
56:31
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.