Episode 256 - 10 Year Anniversary Reflections and Burlesque

[firsttimecallerlongtimelistenr 3590]

just a little update since 2016 or whatever ... minis + movies + eps = a 36.78 day old child (don't tell June)

[GrahamS. 803]

On 1/2/2021 at 12:10 PM, Elektra Boogaloo said:

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CJjd882JBIo/?igshid=vs2gucut3yl9

for NYE, Paul and Jason discussed WW84 with a baffled Natasha Leggero and Rob Hubbel. I have a lot to say about this film. I both loved it and hated it. Because everyone was great but it made no sense and kept taking me out of the movie. I kept wanting to tweak things myself or give notes. 

Seems like we may get a HDTGM about it? 

Also, I have a question. I haven’t seen the first WW in awhile but isn’t there a scene where she tells Steve she doesn’t have a dad? (That the movie is adhering to the original origin story for her where her mother made her out of clay?) But then in this movie she mentions her dad hiding Themiscyra and I was like, wait is it also in the new timeline where Zeus is her dad????

Help a nerd out.

 

I just watched WW84 with my Mom last night. I agree, everyone did the best they could (and I like the first one) but somewhere around the Middle East section, both of us just started laughing at the movie. It felt like they were throwing every idea that they could against the wall with nothing (like WWI) to ground it in a sense of reality. That fucking President—is that supposed to be Ronald Reagan???—threw me for a loop. I also thought the fact that Kristen Wiig didn’t burst into song ala Jennifer Hudson was a wasted opportunity.

The main thing that bothered me was...where was Pedro Pascal’s kids’ mom? He’s a terrible father, but she’s just non-existent or is perpetually out with her boyfriend? This kid is wandering streets packed With rioters with no parental supervision. Someone call child protective services already.

[GrahamS. 803]

23 hours ago, RyanSz said:

Loved Color Out of Space as well and was utterly suprised by how decent Underwater was. Also ended up really enjoying Sonic the Hedgehog and wondered why we can't have more of THAT Jim Carrey these days, as well as The Hunt which ended up being a pretty good action flick. If you've been playing as many games as I have and are on a Lovecraft kick, definitely check out The Sinking City which is set in the world and works of HP Lovecraft and goes about breaking down how kind of fucked up he was as a real person with his beliefs.

RE: The Sinking City: glad to hear it! So many bad/underwhelming Lovecraft games. I’ve been curious about that one for awhile. Got a PS4 for Christmas (skipped the PS5 hype because fuck scammers) and I’ll add that to the list of the many game I’ve yet to play.

[GrahamS. 803]

23 hours ago, AlmostAGhost said:

I love Deep Sea Diver, I have all their vinyl and their early EP on cd. There's some great songs and I love her voice. I met Jessica a time or two years back when she was touring with Beck. She was very nice and it's been a blast to follow her band from early on. Back in around 2009 or 2010, they did this one show in Hermosa Beach I went to, which was crazy because it's not a place bands play and it was right near where I lived at the time. Turned out it was a charity benefit in the local auditorium and not many people were there and I watched them jam out up close too.

 

Awesome! I’m more of a friend of Peter’s  and an acquaintance of Jessica’s, but Peter works at the coffee shop that’s close to my apartment andI saw them both frequently (pre-COVID, of course). They’ve worked really hard on their new album and have worked really hard trying to be successful. I hope their new album helps them—it’s really good.

[GrahamS. 803]

22 hours ago, RyanSz said:

So finished watching She Dies Tomorrow and boy was that a misfire. It's definitely not the worst artsy horror film I've seen, that still belongs to Kuso and Be My Cat: a Film For Anne, but it definitely pushes the Mumble-horror notch up to ten. What was worse was that it's a fairly interesting idea of basically Inception where the planted idea is your death, but it doesn't do much with it to make it worthwhile.

It’s an intriguing idea, it just doesn’t really go anyplace. I watched it this summer and can’t remember how it ended, although I might have watched it in an altered state, so I won’t blame the film entirely for that.

Also, I watched it really close to watching Relic, which I did like but was another slow-moving art house horror film (but it is more traditionally satisfying than She Dies Tomorrow). I think watching two slow-moving art house movies in a row was a mistake and probably not entirely fair to She Dies Tomorrow.

[sycasey 2.0 2301]

Obviously there will be no Corrections & Omissions for a 10 year old episode, but since I just watched Burlesque for this week I feel compelled to chime in:

I don't think it's correct that the dance numbers stop being "burlesque" style after Christina Aguilera starts singing at the club, as Jason claims in the episode. Her first two dance numbers are definitely in the burlesque style (I speak from experience because my wife used to do burlesque dancing as a hobby, so I attended many a show while we were dating . . . though obviously not for $50 a head), first the one with the teasing lyrics here:

And then this one with the frilly fan dance (this has an actual striptease where she removes her top but quickly covers herself with the fan, ending on a cheeky joke with the bongos):

After that it's just modernized Pussycat Dolls style "burlesque," but I have to give the movie some credit for having Christina do some actual old-timey numbers too.

The plot is nonsense and the male love interest is useless, but I did enjoy some of the musical numbers here.

[sycasey 2.0 2301]

On 1/2/2021 at 12:35 PM, Elektra Boogaloo said:

The music was a huge let down. 

I think there was one 80s song during the gala scene where Diana meets the guy possessed by Steve Trevor (and boy do I have a lot of questions about THAT situation). But otherwise, nothing. It really doesn't make sense, because as I understand it, licensing a bunch of second-tier 80s hits for use in a movie shouldn't be all that expensive, as long as you're not trying to get Michael Jackson or Prince or something.

I enjoyed the early tone of the movie, but as it went along I just had too many questions about the plot and couldn't get into it. I still don't understand how the "granting wishes" power is supposed to work. In retrospect I also had a lot of questions about what the heck Diana was supposed to have been doing in the 60+ years that elapsed between the first film and this one. The movie basically only shows you that she built a shrine to Steve. Maybe a little detail about the hero stuff she was up to in that time? She didn't just sit around moping for multiple decades, did she?

[Cameron H. 23786]

56 minutes ago, sycasey 2.0 said:

I think there was one 80s song during the gala scene where Diana meets the guy possessed by Steve Trevor (and boy do I have a lot of questions about THAT situation). But otherwise, nothing. It really doesn't make sense, because as I understand it, licensing a bunch of second-tier 80s hits for use in a movie shouldn't be all that expensive, as long as you're not trying to get Michael Jackson or Prince or something.

I enjoyed the early tone of the movie, but as it went along I just had too many questions about the plot and couldn't get into it. I still don't understand how the "granting wishes" power is supposed to work. In retrospect I also had a lot of questions about what the heck Diana was supposed to have been doing in the 60+ years that elapsed between the first film and this one. The movie basically only shows you that she built a shrine to Steve. Maybe a little detail about the hero stuff she was up to in that time? She didn't just sit around moping for multiple decades, did she?

I couldn’t understand why Lord didn’t use his power to cause WW to just...cease to exist or something. 

[GrahamS. 803]

1 hour ago, Cameron H. said:

I couldn’t understand why Lord didn’t use his power to cause WW to just...cease to exist or something. 

He doesn’t seem to hate anyone.  I don’t think he even wants to get rid of Wonder Woman. For a villain, he just seems to want to snort up wishes like lines of coke and damn the consequences. And somehow the wishes are killing him???

i liked the first movie but I thought WW84 was a huge mess. And I do agree with Sycasey, I also wondered what she was up to for the past half century or so. It certainly seems like WWII, Korea and Vietnam made 0% impact compared to the heartbreak that was Steve.

It should definitely be a HDTGM movie, but I doubt they’ll do it.

[Cameron H. 23786]

13 minutes ago, GrahamS. said:

He doesn’t seem to hate anyone.  I don’t think he even wants to get rid of Wonder Woman. 

Even so, there are plenty of options. He could take away her power, he could give her amnesia, he could send her back in time, make her mute, break her leg, teleport her to Utah, etc etc.

I guess the issue I have is no limits were placed on his power. He’s essentially omnipotent. And with a billion + wishes giving him a billion + power points (or whatever), it shouldn’t have been close. Like, he can turn Kristen Wiig into a Cheetah woman, but he can’t be, like, maybe I should get rid of one or two of those nukes so my son isn’t fried?

 

[sycasey 2.0 2301]

Also, when Lord grants wishes to the entire planet, it seems like the movie is basically saying that EVERYONE made a selfish wish and that's why things are going to shit. But, really? No one made an altruistic wish to end world hunger or all wars or something? This is a pretty cynical view of humanity. (That's another of my problems with WW84; this cynicism seems entirely at odds with the hopeful ethos of the original movie.)

Finally, it seems like the DC cinematic universe just doesn't care about continuity anymore. If Wonder Woman basically mass communicated with the entire planet in 1984, and no one's memories of this seem to have been wiped at all, why does it take Batman so long to figure out who she is in Batman v. Superman? Dumbest Batman ever.

[RyanSz 3140]

3 hours ago, sycasey 2.0 said:

I think there was one 80s song during the gala scene where Diana meets the guy possessed by Steve Trevor (and boy do I have a lot of questions about THAT situation). But otherwise, nothing. It really doesn't make sense, because as I understand it, licensing a bunch of second-tier 80s hits for use in a movie shouldn't be all that expensive, as long as you're not trying to get Michael Jackson or Prince or something.

I enjoyed the early tone of the movie, but as it went along I just had too many questions about the plot and couldn't get into it. I still don't understand how the "granting wishes" power is supposed to work. In retrospect I also had a lot of questions about what the heck Diana was supposed to have been doing in the 60+ years that elapsed between the first film and this one. The movie basically only shows you that she built a shrine to Steve. Maybe a little detail about the hero stuff she was up to in that time? She didn't just sit around moping for multiple decades, did she?

They gloss over the wish power by referencing the Monkey's Paw story, but instead of getting three wishes the person only gets one. Lord does the most obvious choice of a wish that every kid thought of the first time they saw Aladdin by essentially wishing for more wishes, but in this case Lord does it in a roundabout way with a loophole. So in essence he's able to get multiple wishes by directly deciding what will be taken from the person making a wish, while before the stone took something of equal value to what was wished for (Diana's powers for Steve's life, Wiig's humanity for her beauty/popularity/enhanced abilities). As for the time jump, that just unfortunately falls into the same issue I had with Captain America jumping back to his present to live his life with Peggy Carter at the end of Endgame, unless there is mention in the Phase 4 of the MCU where things like Vietnam and 9/11 had different outcomes, basically Cap just held all that info in his back pocket so he could be with his first love, which is incredibly out of character for him.

2 hours ago, Cameron H. said:

I couldn’t understand why Lord didn’t use his power to cause WW to just...cease to exist or something. 

As he had already used his one wish, he couldn't make another. The only way he could have done something like that would be to trick someone into making a wish on his behalf, as he was doing in the later half of the film.

1 hour ago, Cameron H. said:

Even so, there are plenty of options. He could take away her power, he could give her amnesia, he could send her back in time, make her mute, break her leg, teleport her to Utah, etc etc.

I guess the issue I have is no limits were placed on his power. He’s essentially omnipotent. And with a billion + wishes giving him a billion + power points (or whatever), it shouldn’t have been close. Like, he can turn Kristen Wiig into a Cheetah woman, but he can’t be, like, maybe I should get rid of one or two of those nukes so my son isn’t fried?

 

The end "fight" is definitely the weakest part of the film where it's basically a Gordon Gecko with everything being gained going up against the message of "don't be greedy" and he decides to follow that message. If anything I was waiting for the follow up concerning his son's wish to have his dad's greatness, which made me think that all of the burden of being the wishing stone was going to be placed onto him rather than Lord, but it never came up after the wish, which seemed like a big deal as Lord was utterly shocked by it and seemed almost regretful then of everything he was doing.

26 minutes ago, sycasey 2.0 said:

Also, when Lord grants wishes to the entire planet, it seems like the movie is basically saying that EVERYONE made a selfish wish and that's why things are going to shit. But, really? No one made an altruistic wish to end world hunger or all wars or something? This is a pretty cynical view of humanity. (That's another of my problems with WW84; this cynicism seems entirely at odds with the hopeful ethos of the original movie.)

Finally, it seems like the DC cinematic universe just doesn't care about continuity anymore. If Wonder Woman basically mass communicated with the entire planet in 1984, and no one's memories of this seem to have been wiped at all, why does it take Batman so long to figure out who she is in Batman v. Superman? Dumbest Batman ever.

The wish thing definitely seemed to play up to the stereotype of the "Me Decade" that the 80s has become to be known as, but also, did not a single person keep their wish? I'd love it for just a handful of people to be like "nah I'm keeping this sweet Porsche if that guy is keeping his nukes."

As for continuity, WB/DC did make mention that they are basically going a multiverse route with their films from here on out after trying to copy the MCU and its continuity to little success. The Flash movie that's coming out will be based on the Flashpoint story from the comics and that way writers and directors don't have to feel tied down to trying to make their project fit within a certain storyline or continuity. I understand why they did it and am interested to see where they go with it, because that just means more films based on some of my favorite comics. That's not to say they won't have a tinge of continuity running through some of the films but it won't be like in the MCU. As for Batman, no one really knew who Wonder Woman was at that time, Bruce Wayne may have remembered the wild wish incident from 1984, but not known that Wonder Woman was involved with it, especially since the people of the world only heard her voice, plus he had no idea she was a demigod in BvS until he found Luthor's file on other metahumans on Earth, he just thought she was a corporate spy given how she snagged the information that he was looking for on Luthor's servers.

[RyanSz 3140]

20 hours ago, GrahamS. said:

RE: The Sinking City: glad to hear it! So many bad/underwhelming Lovecraft games. I’ve been curious about that one for awhile. Got a PS4 for Christmas (skipped the PS5 hype because fuck scammers) and I’ll add that to the list of the many game I’ve yet to play.

Just a bit of warning in that it really does not hold your hand in regards to how you solve cases or where you go in the world as while you can set waypoints on your map, you will continually refer to it to find where the hell you are going. Plus some of the clue and reference searches can be a bit tedious if going through city archives and records and cross-referencing things isn't your cup of tea. I had no problem with it but being a librarian that was kind of already par for the course for me.

[sycasey 2.0 2301]

17 minutes ago, RyanSz said:

As for the time jump, that just unfortunately falls into the same issue I had with Captain America jumping back to his present to live his life with Peggy Carter at the end of Endgame, unless there is mention in the Phase 4 of the MCU where things like Vietnam and 9/11 had different outcomes, basically Cap just held all that info in his back pocket so he could be with his first love, which is incredibly out of character for him.

Yeah I had issues once I thought about that too, but at least Marvel had the courtesy to wait until the final scene of the final movie to do an uncomfortable ret-con about one of their main characters, so you don't spend the whole film wondering what is going on. WW84 was more like if Cap had come out in the first scene of Winter Soldier and said he hadn't actually been frozen, he'd just been hanging out playing solitaire at the North Pole and then got bored and froze himself.

[Cameron H. 23786]

18 minutes ago, RyanSz said:

As he had already used his one wish, he couldn't make another. The only way he could have done something like that would be to trick someone into making a wish on his behalf, as he was doing in the later half of the film.

I disagree. No one “wished” for Wiig to become Cheetah, and she had already used her one wish. He asked her what she wanted, and using wish currency, made her an “apex predator (). This means he can use the power of a wish to do whatever he wants — even self serving things. Therefore, he should have been able to use one of the billions of wishes to easily rid himself of or depower WW.

[sycasey 2.0 2301]

1 minute ago, Cameron H. said:

I disagree. No one “wished” for Wiig to become Cheetah, and she had already used her one wish. He asked her what she wanted, and using wish currency, made her an “apex predator ().

My other big question: did she become the Jellicle choice?

[Cameron H. 23786]

4 minutes ago, Cameron H. said:

I disagree. No one “wished” for Wiig to become Cheetah, and she had already used her one wish. He asked her what she wanted, and using wish currency, made her an “apex predator (). This means he can use the power of a wish to do whatever he wants — even self serving things. Therefore, he should have been able to use one of the billions of wishes to easily rid himself of or depower WW.

I’m just saying there should have been rules. Something to establish what he can or can’t do. Like, a wish cannot be used to directly harm someone, or the Amazonian armor protects her. We’re just supposed to believe this person with powers unto a God, never worked out a complication.

I also didn’t understand why he took so ling to heal himself. As soon as my health started to waiver, that’s the first thing I would have done. Or, after he hurt his son’s feelings, why not make it so his son forgot what he said? He should have a surplus of wish dollars and he spends it on making... traffic light?

[RyanSz 3140]

3 minutes ago, Cameron H. said:

I disagree. No one “wished” for Wiig to become Cheetah, and she had already used her one wish. He asked her what she wanted, and using wish currency, made her an “apex predator (). This means he can use the power of a wish to do whatever he wants — even self serving things. Therefore, he should have been able to use one of the billions of wishes to easily rid himself of or depower WW.

Going by comic film logic as well as Monkey's Paw/Wishmaster logic, she made her first wish with the physical stone that made her popular and 80s beautiful, but the apex predator one was made with Lord as the physical embodiment of the stone, so another loophole. In this instance it would have made more sense for Diana to grab hold of Lord and make a wish to set things back into reality where the stone wasn't found or it got destroyed in the jewelry store robbery, thus negating everyone's wishes, including hers and thus making a better resolution to her Steve wish. Whenever he took something for a wish it was something the person had to be able to give him, like taking the holdings of his business partner or the army of the king, so he couldn't say "yeah I'll grant your wish for a 12 pack of New Coke and in return Wonder Woman breaks her knee," unless the person had a good connection to her to where it would be a serious loss for the person. It's not great logic for a 2 1/2 hr movie but it's what they were going with.

[RyanSz 3140]

3 minutes ago, Cameron H. said:

I’m just saying there should have been rules. Something to establish what he can or can’t do. Like, a wish cannot be used to directly harm someone, or the Amazonian armor protects her. We’re just supposed to believe this person with powers unto a God, never worked out a complication.

I also didn’t understand why he took so ling to heal himself. As soon as my health started to waiver, that’s the first thing I would have done. Or, after he hurt his son’s feelings, why not make it so his son forgot what he said? He should have a surplus of wish dollars and he spends it on making... traffic light?

There was also brief talk of a checks and balance for Lord having the power where it's mentioned he should be dropping dead at any moment because the power is too much for a human body to contain, so he is in constant need of healing. It is also playing into the greed mentality of the 80s where he's wanting more but after a while realizes he needs to be alive to enjoy it so that's why he goes to the uber-tv station to in hopes find a way to beat the system of getting everything he wants while also healing himself enough to enjoy it because he's not banking the returns on wishes at that point so by the end he's hoping with every person wishing he can gain enough health returns to balance out the torment his body is going through making frivolous wishes for people.

[RyanSz 3140]

Am I also the only one wondering why that super armor she wore at the end, which was apparently made from all of the best armor on the Amazon's  island, basically came apart like aluminum siding in a Florida storm? In the flashback it looked like it served it's purposed of holding off the attackers, who didn't think to leap frog a guy from their shoulders to attack her in the giant opening over her head, but in the final battle the lightest touch would send strands of metal flying from it.

[Cameron H. 23786]

11 minutes ago, RyanSz said:

Going by comic film logic as well as Monkey's Paw/Wishmaster logic, she made her first wish with the physical stone that made her popular and 80s beautiful, but the apex predator one was made with Lord as the physical embodiment of the stone, so another loophole. In this instance it would have made more sense for Diana to grab hold of Lord and make a wish to set things back into reality where the stone wasn't found or it got destroyed in the jewelry store robbery, thus negating everyone's wishes, including hers and thus making a better resolution to her Steve wish. Whenever he took something for a wish it was something the person had to be able to give him, like taking the holdings of his business partner or the army of the king, so he couldn't say "yeah I'll grant your wish for a 12 pack of New Coke and in return Wonder Woman breaks her knee," unless the person had a good connection to her to where it would be a serious loss for the person. It's not great logic for a 2 1/2 hr movie but it's what they were going with.

No, she never wishes for it. After the broadcast, he says, “I take your strength, and your health and give her your rage and your prowess.” He is giving her abilities based on the wishes coming in.

[RyanSz 3140]

I've now put more thought and search for logic in a mediocre film than I have for any of the great films I have seen within the last year.

[Cameron H. 23786]

1 minute ago, RyanSz said:

I've now put more thought and search for logic in a mediocre film than I have for any of the great films I have seen within the last year.

And that’s (part) of what made it terrible. A line or two could have easily clarified things.

[RyanSz 3140]

3 minutes ago, Cameron H. said:

No, she never wishes for it. After the broadcast, he says, “I take your strength, and your health and give her your rage and your prowess.” He is giving her abilities based on the wishes coming in.

Then I misheard that line and I don't want to pull it back up with subtitles.

[Cameron H. 23786]

14 minutes ago, RyanSz said:

Then I misheard that line and I don't want to pull it back up with subtitles.

I want ahead and checked just to confirm. He asks her what she wants (not wishes) because he’s “feeling generous.” She never says “I wish.” So, again, without any limits to his powers, he should have been able to shut WW down real quick.