Hi Vis Comic Con | One Geek Thing

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hello and welcome to Geeky Rummy at a rather breezy custom factory. [00:00:05] Speaker B: Today, the wind picked up. [00:00:07] Speaker A: Right, as you said, but the cameras just went. So I'm hoping we can fix that in post. I'm your host, Mr. Ryan Parish. Joining me today, Ms. Keith Linville. Hi. Ms. Lee Price. [00:00:16] Speaker B: Hello. [00:00:16] Speaker A: And Mr. Sam Edwards. [00:00:17] Speaker C: Hello. [00:00:19] Speaker A: Executive producer. Viv and Matt aren't here today, but they were a massive help yesterday because we were at hi Vis Comic Con in Kings Heath. You guys ran around, did a lot of filming. [00:00:30] Speaker B: I wasn't there. [00:00:31] Speaker A: Lee wasn't there. I babysat the two films. We were screaming as part of a Birmingham anime film festival, which was Mirai and Promare. Both went down really well. I think Promare, if you've never seen it before, is the most insane, crazy, over the top movie of all time. I think it was your first experience, wasn't it? [00:00:48] Speaker C: First time I'd seen it, yeah. It was stunning animation, but, yeah, a bit nuts in. In a great way. [00:00:57] Speaker A: How about yourself, Keith? Did you enjoy the little bits that you saw? [00:01:00] Speaker D: Yeah. Promo just seemed to escalate constantly as it went on. It was like, how much more outrageous can we get? Yeah. Hold my beer. [00:01:09] Speaker A: You haven't seen a robot the size of a planet. No, but, yeah, so that was good fun. And you guys got to meet a load of comic creators, which we'll be talking about shortly. So any particular guests that you enjoyed speaking to? [00:01:20] Speaker D: Probably Al Ewing, as usual. Al's really cool, so he's doing a lot of good stuff over at Marvel at the moment as well. He's just started doing one of the absolute books for dc, which is kind of cool. It's always good to speak to Al. [00:01:33] Speaker A: Yeah. And there's the legendary John Wagner as well. And Charlie Adlard, Walking Dead. And quite a few really nice, good comic creators. A few Beano people as well. Laura Howell and Emerson. Kevin F. Sutherland, Son Leong was there doing manga classes. I believe we had Cosmic Rays, which is Charlie's band alongside. Is it Phil still in the band? I can't remember. [00:01:57] Speaker D: I think so, yeah. [00:01:58] Speaker A: Yeah. Phil Winslade, another character. Some really good independent comic creators as well. Scratch Comics, Time Bomb Comics, the. What was it? The. What we calling him now? [00:02:09] Speaker D: The Stanley of Birmingham, Mr. Steve Tanner. [00:02:12] Speaker A: Even though he's not in Birmingham, he's bare wood. It's close enough. [00:02:15] Speaker D: Well, you know, we can let Birmingham have something. It's fine. [00:02:17] Speaker A: True. [00:02:18] Speaker D: You know. [00:02:19] Speaker A: So we're going to go into a few interviews. Bit water out today and we shall be back with you shortly. [00:02:46] Speaker D: Welcome. John Wagner, legendary co. Creator of Judge Dredd. This is the first hi Vis Comic Con. How has it gone for you? [00:02:54] Speaker E: Oh, fine. I had a bit of trouble finding my way here, but apart from that it's been all right. It's all the streets closed off and the sat nav kept directing me up them, so. But anyway, I'm here. [00:03:11] Speaker D: What's the reception been like here? Have people been talking to you about Judge Dredd or Rock of the Red? [00:03:18] Speaker E: Well, pretty much anything that I've done. You know, I've had a lot of Judge Dredd stuff, some bogeyman stuff, sold a lot of posters and sold a rock, so just a bit of everything. [00:03:35] Speaker D: Has there been more interest in rock now? It's being reprinted in the magazine? [00:03:39] Speaker E: No, not enough. Not nearly enough. It's such a good story. I'd like everyone to have it and own it. I like Disney or Pixar to film it. [00:03:56] Speaker D: What's coming up next for you in 2000 AD and other comics? [00:04:01] Speaker E: Well, I've got the new Rock Part three coming up in the magazine and there's a six part dread with the Batman artist Mike Perkins, which will appear in 2080 sometime during the year. That's pretty much it. Plus, on my website I'm doing my memoirs. John wagner.co.uk you'll find my life in comics in it. [00:04:29] Speaker D: That's likely to be quite the story. [00:04:32] Speaker E: Well, when it's finished, if I ever get it finished. [00:04:36] Speaker D: Hello, I'm a Tatavision here at hi Vis Comic Con and I've been doing cardboard superhero masks today. It's been a lot of fun, it's been a lot of paint, a lot. [00:04:49] Speaker A: Of happiness, a lot of tears. [00:04:51] Speaker D: It's been a magical day. [00:04:58] Speaker F: Hi, my name's Al Ewing reporting for the geeky Brummie. I'm here at Hoviz Comics Festival. It's. It's going well so far. I've. I've really enjoyed like the kind of. We're in a nice space here. I've really enjoyed like people kind of coming in, chatting, shooting the breeze, what, what little breeze there is in this muggy weather. Yeah. And you know, I'll probably, I'll probably head around and, and see the other venues later, but so far. And the. The area, if you're ever in Birmingham, highly recommend coming down to Kings Heath, checking it out. It's a lovely area. It's a beautiful, great place, full of some great bars and restaurants and. Yeah, very happy to be here. I'll be back next year. [00:05:53] Speaker D: Are there any books coming up that people should be on the lookout for? [00:05:56] Speaker F: Al there's the 2880s sci fi special, has my first Dredd story in a little while. It's a one off that sees Judge Dredd go back to a location we haven't seen in a while and fight an old enemy who we haven't seen in a long time. So there's that. Aside from that, it's all of the. Oh, there's the new My Thor run is entering Act 2. The Immortal Thor is going away with issue 25 and will be replaced with a new Thor comic. That will be a big change for the Thunder God given that he's dying at the end of the Immortal Thor. You know, you'd expect that. So yeah, if you're following that story, keep following. If you want to jump on board, it's a good place to jump on board. And then, yeah, there's all new Venom and of course absolute Green Lantern, which is the mystery is continuing to unfold. [00:06:56] Speaker G: Hi, I'm Castle Wingard, comic book artist. [00:06:59] Speaker A: On titles such as the Power Fantasy. [00:07:02] Speaker G: Homesick Pilots and All Against All. Currently here at hi Vis Fest in Birmingham. [00:07:09] Speaker A: And other than the swampy weather, it's been absolutely fantastic. Really enjoyed myself and yeah, so currently. [00:07:19] Speaker G: Working on the Power Fantasy with Kieran. [00:07:21] Speaker A: Gillan at Image Comics. [00:07:22] Speaker G: It's nominated for best new series in the Eisner's this July and couldn't be happier with it. [00:07:30] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:07:30] Speaker G: And you can check me out at castlewingard on Instagram. Hello there. I'm Christian Ward. It's lovely to be back in Birmingham. I actually went to Bournville at art college. It's lovely to return to the same sort of area. I'm having a lovely time here at the hi Vis Festival. And you can pick up my next book which will be Event Horizon, which will be out in August, or the collection of my two faced book which will be out the end of September. [00:08:01] Speaker H: Hi, I'm Sprite. I'm here painting along with other artists including Title Ginger Dan, he's over here. So K Snub and Bunny, we're doing a collaborative wall, all with 2000 AD characters. I'm doing Halo Jones over here and then we've got Slade Hammerstein. I'm not sure what's. What's your dude over here, Jack? Dan who? Whistler, Mongrel. Am I gonna have a Judge Dredd here as well? Yeah, I've come all the way from Brighton with Snub. Snub's been painting 2000 AD characters since he was a kid. So it was a great opportunity to come up and paint his favorite character, Mongrel, the size of a building. So, yeah, and I've taken on Halo Jones because I just need a bit of girl in here. Get some girl in here, just to make it a bit more feminine, you know? Yeah. Really happy to be here. It's a great event and really well organized. Yeah, it's been wonderful. Thank you. [00:09:09] Speaker G: Hi, I'm Lisbot. I've been doing graffiti for 15 years around Birmingham, worldwide, really. I'm so proud to be a part of Hyviz Comic Con this year. Long ago, they gave me my first ever opportunity to kind of introduce my street art to Birmingham. So I'm always proud to help out with Hyvie's in any way I can. Today I'm selling my T shirts, my paintings, my prints and my sticker packs. It's all robot themed. So my work I sell from my bigcartel.com, lisbot big cartel. And I also have an Instagram which isbot L I S K A B. [00:09:45] Speaker I: O T. Good afternoon, My name is Noel Khannan. I'm a writer and publisher of Rawhead Rawhead Books. Here we are at. Hi, Viz Comic Con. Why did I come here today? Well, I live like two minutes up the road, so having a Comic Con on your doorstep is very nice. Usually we have to travel to the other end of the country, but it was great. Ollie's done a great job pulling this together. Absolutely fantastic event. What have we got here today? Well, Rawhead is my publishing company. Self publishing. We do unit 666, which is a World War II weird war story. Did that as a Kickstarter. We've got Galactic Geographic. Bit rude. Galactic Geographic Uncovered Adults Only did that as a Kickstarter. Lots of the other things that you see here are Amazon Kindle direct prints. We use print on demand services. So we've got the Zombie series, things to do in Derby when you're dead. We've got Air Warriors. The Skunk Works series. Basically collects all the short strips and short prose stories from the last 35 years that I've been doing this. And then our kind of big one at the moment is Chuffing Billy here. We can see his 3D model and his little Lego minifigure down there as well. And he's our kind of most sort of popular character here at the moment. And you can find a lot of these books on Amazon or find me anywhere online, all over the Place can see that. And you can find me on Instagram, Facebook. There's only one Noel Khannon. Hi, I'm Shane from Scratch Comics. I've had an absolutely brilliant show today. It's been a real steady flow of people all day and I've actually managed to sell lots of these beautiful books. We've got some new books out that haven't seen a show before, including the new Hedrick Collected Edition. We've got some Dinosaurs versus Cowboys, Hedrick Hardback Edition and a few prints as well. But it's been absolutely fantastic. Seen lots of new faces, people I've not seen before buying comics, which is great. There's an art market next door, which is also great because they've come in as well. And I've walked down to the library, met some people there. It's been a really good show. Well done, Ollie. Well done. Kings Heath. [00:11:57] Speaker J: Hi, my name is Sam Gardner Jr. And I'm the writer and creator of Capital P. We have just released. Well, we've done book two and we're working on book three. Essentially it's about what happens. So book one is actually a two in one. So you've got like the comic within the comic. And the idea is that this guy here, Capital P, the patroller, he becomes inspired to become one of those sort of real life superheroes reading the exploits exploits of this guy. But what we deal with and what we'd like to dig into is what happens when you take that kind of four colored, traditional American morality, American comic book morality and apply it to the real world. What happens when that morality goes crashing into the American legal system and all of its complexities? And how far would this chap as a vigilante to somebody who really does work outside the law, how far would he go to take the law into his own hands to defend those beliefs? Essentially we're at hi Viz. It's an incredible atmosphere. There's just such a buzz kind of going on. So many smiles, so many comic enthusiasts. I've had an amazing time despite the heat. It's been very hot, but I think everybody's been smiling through it. If you'd like to find out more about Capital P and cape verse and what we do, we've got social media, so we're apitabcomic or ape verse comics. We've also got cape versus comics.com which is sort of a hub where you can find all our socials from there. [00:13:24] Speaker G: Hi there, this is Steve, I'm with Timebomb Comics. I'm here at the hi Vis Comic Con. Timebomb is a Birmingham based publisher. We've been going since 2007 and we publish a lot of one shots and graphic novels. But we also do the Quantum anthology comic which you can find find in newsagents and WXmiths. And I must say hi, Vis Comic Con has been a great show. I mean, full credit to Ollie McNamee who's organized it. It's a really nicely put together show. There's lots of things going on. The people that we've met today have been really friendly, really interesting, and it's really a celebration of comics, which is what a Comic Con should always be about. So, you know, hats off to Ollie and his team for putting together a really brilliant event. Hopefully they'll be back next year and hopefully we'll be back with it next year as well. Well, hello and thank you for having me at. Hi, Viz. [00:14:24] Speaker D: I've had a lovely day. [00:14:25] Speaker G: This is being recorded at the end of the day. [00:14:27] Speaker D: There you go. [00:14:27] Speaker G: There's trade secrets you didn't need. Hi, I'm Kev F. The guy who's worked for the Beano, worked for Marvel and now Shakespeare works for me. I turned Shakespeare it into graphic novels for kids and my most popular and the one that's almost sold out today, Richard III. For fans of Dogman and Bunny vs. Monkey, I hope you'll have me back next year. [00:15:00] Speaker A: Hope you enjoyed that. It is time for our regular round of stuff that's been going on in or outside Birmingham, the Midlands area. Our one geek thing. So what's the one geeky thing we've been up to in the last few months or weeks since we did recording and what we want to recommend to our audience. So kick us off, Keith. [00:15:20] Speaker D: I've not long come back from a trip to Rye, which is an ancient town which has lots of kind of historical bits and pieces in it, lots of historical buildings, castles, all the rest of it. But as a geeky brummy on tour, what I enjoyed Most was Ashby's 100, which is an art gallery kind of in the centre of town, which has taken over what used to be the purveyor of fine meats building. It still has the sign up outside and it's number 100 on the street, hence the name Ashby 100. But what it contains is a load of graffiti art, prints, original artwork, lots of great stuff. So while I was there, I was totally taken by the work of an artist called James Duffy. So I picked up a original Oscar the Grouch, a four sized Piece of art, which is very nice, gotta find a room to put it in. But they've also got other stuff in there, so a lot of the other pop car art characters, Danger Mouse, Hong Kong Phooey, Bat Fink, tons of stuff. And there was another artist's work that they were exhibiting, which I'll just put the details on screen. Who had done a large Batman and Robin art. But Robin was actually the bird. So part of his thing is like doing bird related bits and pieces. So it was incredible to find that in like this weird kind of like Twinkie town, kind of like, you know, next to all of the kind of high brow shops, there was this beautiful art gallery. [00:16:56] Speaker B: There were a lot of other art. [00:16:57] Speaker D: Galleries in Rye as well, which are well worth visiting with different bits and pieces. [00:17:00] Speaker A: So where is Rye from? [00:17:03] Speaker D: Birmingham, past London. So it's down. Yeah, I think it's got a name, that area. But I don't know past. Once you get past the M25 feel like I'm like it's. It's not Devon, it's not Cornwall, it's the other bit. But they got a beach, they got Rye Harbour, which is nice, a beautiful shed, black and red roofed shed, which is quite nice because we didn't have the opportunity to get across to Dungeness and over to where Derek Jarman's little house is, which would have been quite nice, but you could see Dungeness power station from where we were, which was. Which was cool, you know. [00:17:42] Speaker A: Graffiti art seems to be having a bit of a resurgence in popular culture at the moment, I've noticed. [00:17:46] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:17:47] Speaker A: As we just had, which is probably finished by the time the show goes out. But that big graffiti exploration in Birmingham back In the old 70s, 80s New York, subway train artwork. [00:18:00] Speaker D: Yeah, it's just become an acceptable form of art now. There are a lot of big collectors, big name people who are collecting graffiti art and obviously Banksy legitimizes it in a way when he can sell his work for millions of pounds. So it's just another art form and I really dig it. And it kind of like, you know, there's a lot of really nice work off there. We were in High vis Comic Con yesterday, so Blissbot was there and like the reception for people seeing that as prints and art rather than just on a wall being able to take a piece home with them as well. [00:18:34] Speaker A: And there's a beautiful wall that they're doing around the back of Institute Road, I think. Opposite the Iceland. Yeah, there was quite a few artists snub 23. Ginger Dan. Yeah, a few people we've interviewed. So that'll be in the video that you just watched. [00:18:46] Speaker D: Yeah, a whole bunch of kind of 2000 AD related characters, which is quite nice having all the guys from 2000 AD there yesterday as well. [00:18:53] Speaker A: Yeah, nicely. A bit of love for good old ABC warriors. Don't get enough story lines nowadays. I think everybody just remembers them from the Sliced Alone movie, unfortunately. [00:19:03] Speaker D: Yeah, the only. Only the one. Only the Hammerstein one. One. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:19:07] Speaker C: It's cool. [00:19:07] Speaker D: But yeah, so it was good. I was quite surprised to find it. I looked at the building directly on the opposite side of the road the day before, didn't see it, and then was wandering around late at night when all of the other visitors had gone to bed and was like, what's this place? How have I not seen it? So luckily they opened the next day and I was able to get in and get some work. So, yes, if you're in rai, check it out. I'll do a piece on the Instagram as well so you can see a little bit more. [00:19:31] Speaker A: Awesome. Thank you. Lee, how about yourself? [00:19:35] Speaker B: So, main thing that I have been up to is it's outside, not just Birmingham, but also the uk because I played the most French game this year, which is CLAIRE Obscure Expedition 33, I guess. Yes. The only game where they announced an English cast reveal perfectly normally and then announced the French cast reveal by changing everyone's costume to the most stereotypical French outfits they possibly had in the game. Just the striped shirts, the berets, a baguette just on their back. [00:20:08] Speaker A: So this is an ex Ubisoft development team. Only a small team was about 10, I think. [00:20:14] Speaker B: So the founder of the studio, whose name escapes me. I know his first name is Guillaume, but yeah, he. He's ex Ubisoft and he had the idea for the game and knew that Ubisoft were never going to commission it. So he was just like, I'm going to use my generational wealth to found a. A new studio and make this game. And a lot of this. It's a 30 person core team, but they have used a lot of outsourcing. I feel it is important to bring up that. But a lot of those people, like one of the lead writers on the game, it was like her first project originally. She was brought on as a potential actor in the game, but ended up writing the script instead. The composer was someone who was just found on SoundCloud, which is impressive considering. [00:21:06] Speaker A: Like the music soundtrack has been. [00:21:09] Speaker B: The music in that is so good in Fact, so much of that game is really, really good. It's one of those few games where I'm like each aspect of it, I'm recognizing the artistry of it in a different way. It's like the voice acting is brilliant, the gameplay design is brilliant. The visuals are great because it's all very sort of inspired by 19th century French paintings and all this sort of. But in terms of like, gameplay design, they have basically taken like all the best bits from like JRPGs the last, like 20, 30 years and just combined them all together. [00:21:41] Speaker A: The best. I've seen it on Twitter. Sorry, no, not Twitter, Instagram, where somebody described it as a J, as in J rpg. Rpg, which is probably the best description possible. Yeah, I played for the opening act. I'll play for the bit where the ship first lands. I'll leave it at that point for not spoilers. But yeah, it's kind of quite harrowing. [00:22:00] Speaker B: To start off the game. [00:22:01] Speaker A: Pretty much. [00:22:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Because obviously the premise of the game is quite, quite a difficult thing really, because it's. You know, there's a woman known as the paintress who every year paints a number on a monolith and everyone who's that age or older just disintegrates. Like in like whatever. Whichever one. Whichever one of the Marvel films had everyone disintegrated. [00:22:26] Speaker A: They're like Infinity War with the snap. [00:22:27] Speaker B: There we go. [00:22:30] Speaker A: But it means that the people are getting younger and younger, but there's less and less people to go on this expedition to stop. [00:22:37] Speaker B: So they're going on this expedition to try and stop the paintress from doing what she's doing. But this is like one. It's like been doing several over the years. Like the numbers. It's hard to tell how many there have been because the numbers go backwards. They started on zero and then they had like 66 and then just went back from that. And this is obviously Expedition 33. And yeah, so it's basically just a group of people who are just trying to travel across this continent that's just full of weird creatures and get to the paintress. And it's such a good story in the sense that they set up the world, but they give you no exposition. So it's just there's a mystery at the heart of everything. So as you're playing, you're figuring things out as you go, and often as the characters are figuring out things there as well. Like I said, the gameplay design is just some of the best RPG stuff. It's like, let's take bits from Persona, bits from, like, Legend of Dragoon, and let's take, you know, bits and pieces from, like, Final Fantasy and just kind of combine it all together. And it's probably one of the most interesting sort of JRPG systems I've played. It's got, like, sort of a parry and dodge system, which people like to say comes from Dark Souls, but it comes from Super Mario rpg. [00:23:53] Speaker A: It doesn't come from Dark Souls because you're not just constantly rolling around in a circle around the enemy. That's why everybody does. But yeah, Super Mario RPG had a brilliant parry system. I remember because if you timed the parry perfectly, you did more damage than a normal attack. So basically it was better to kind of get into sync with it. [00:24:10] Speaker B: But it's also just such an efficient system in, like, how the menus operate because it's like everything's assigned to a button and it's like a really sort of. It's kind of like someone. They played Persona 5 went, this menu design is great. What if we took it even further? And also just the way that all the different classes of each character is a different class and they all feel different and the way you're encouraged to use everyone's abilities properly because everything kind of interweaves in different ways. [00:24:41] Speaker A: You have an alpha squad, and if they snuff it, then you can bring in a second squad. [00:24:46] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:24:47] Speaker A: Finish the boss off. [00:24:47] Speaker B: Yeah. What it is you've got. If you're. Because you've got like a party of three, but you've got like a total of six characters. You kind of go like, if your foot. If your front line party dies, the backline party come in immediately as a replacement. And yeah, just. It's a really good game. I finished the whole thing. It's. It was just a great experience. And the way the. Where that plot goes is wild. And it's one of probably the most original games to release this year as well. [00:25:19] Speaker A: Do you think it's replay value or. [00:25:21] Speaker B: I think there's a lot to do. I have not done a lot of the stuff in Act 3. I did some of the main story side stuff, but there's a lot of optional bosses and stuff that's definitely worth going back and exploring. So. But yeah, it's. It's been like one of those games that even at this point in the year, people are like, this is probably game of the year. But yeah, obviously we've still got several months to go. [00:25:47] Speaker A: So you think that's because the main character looks a little bit like Robert Pattinson. [00:25:51] Speaker B: I do find that very funny that it's Robert Pattinson when, like, he isn't played by Robert Pattinson, he's played by Charlie Cox, which, although, like, you know, there's also, like, a lot of great voice talent elsewhere because Andy Serkis is in it. [00:26:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:26:07] Speaker B: And you've got Ben Starr and Jennifer English, who are best known as, like, Clive from Final Fantasy 16 and Shadowheart from Baldur's Gate 3. You can definitely tell it's them because it's the same. [00:26:18] Speaker A: Same voice. [00:26:19] Speaker B: Same voice. But. But yeah, everyone just knocks it out the park with their performances as well. [00:26:25] Speaker A: And I think it's on game pass again. [00:26:27] Speaker B: So, yes, I think so. [00:26:28] Speaker A: You can pick it up for free if you want. Xbox Games. [00:26:30] Speaker B: Yeah, I bought the physical copy of it and that was mostly because, like, I had an Amazon voucher that reduced the price to about 15 quid. So that's picking up. [00:26:39] Speaker A: Awesome. So Claire Obscura, 33, definitely recommend, if you like, any kind of RPG. Awesome. Sam, how about yourself? [00:26:47] Speaker C: I've been watching a show I'm watching it on now, which I've been meaning to watch for a while, and the second season came out recently, so I sort of took that as my excuse to get into it. But it's called Poker Face and it's got Natasha Leon from Orange Is the New Black and various other things. Basically playing a character who's got this kind of almost supernatural ability to immediately tell if someone is lying to her. She can't tell what the truth of it is, but she can just immediately know that they are either lying or they are telling the truth. And it's basically just her going around kind of solving murders in a very Columbo kind of style. So each episode starts with you kind of seeing how the murder actually happened, and then it sort of almost kind of cuts back and you sort of see how her character was kind of placed into the scenario without you having seen it the first time around. And so she's working out stuff that we already know has happened, but it's still somehow really compelling to watch her kind of figure it through. And because of the events of the first episode, she spends most of the first season kind of on the run from the lore, so she can't go to the police or anything with what she knows and wouldn't be able to prove a lot of it anyway. So it's also kind of about her figuring out what to do with the information once she's got it, and find a way to kind of get some comeuppance for the. For whoever did the deed. Really, really good fun. And it's got some fantastic guest stars as well. So every episode has a completely different set of characters other than Charlie and one or two others sometimes, but first one's got Adrian Brodian and then there's also Tim Blake Nelson, Cynthia Erivo, Lil Ray Howery. Loads and loads of people. Steve Buscemi has popped up a couple of times now. Yeah, it's just really good fun. Easy watch. Very funny in places. There's a great gag in one episode where the kind of the set of dominoes that leads to the guy being murdered starts with the fact that Natasha Leon's character Charlie never saw to the end of the film Okja and thinks it's just a really sweet film about an animal and great. A great recommendation for animal lovers. Yeah, it's really good fun. Natasha Leon is always incredibly watchable and yeah, I heartily recommend it. [00:29:48] Speaker A: So do they play the Lady Gaga song at any point during it or do they avoid it? [00:29:53] Speaker C: Not yet. I've still got about half a season two to go, but, yeah, I haven't come across it yet. [00:29:59] Speaker D: It's more tied to. To the fact that she works in a casino to start with. Part of the reason that she could. She goes on the run is that she's played few poker games, so she can tell when everybody's bluffing or whatever it is. [00:30:13] Speaker B: So it's more so they. Basically they think that she's cheating. [00:30:17] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:30:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:30:19] Speaker A: That sounds a really interesting concept. It sounds similar to. Not similar, but Echoes of Lightening, the Tim Roth series with the micro kind of things where you could tell that people were lying based on their facial express expressions and things like that. [00:30:33] Speaker B: I mean, I just heard Female Columbo and Other Souls. [00:30:36] Speaker C: Yeah, that's literally what it is. [00:30:38] Speaker A: Does she smoke or something else? [00:30:41] Speaker C: She vapes quite a lot in season two. And the occasion. No. [00:30:47] Speaker A: Does she get reminded by anybody when she's leaving Premises? [00:30:54] Speaker B: One more thing. [00:30:56] Speaker C: Yes, actually. Yeah, no, that does happen. [00:30:58] Speaker A: It's fine. [00:30:59] Speaker D: Just double check it a few episodes. And it's created by Rian Johnson of. [00:31:05] Speaker A: Rogue One Thing and Knives out and. [00:31:07] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's kind of like. So it's a. It's. It's got. It's got that vibe. It's got that vibe of kind of. [00:31:14] Speaker B: Like, I'm sold even more because. Yeah, I liked the. It Is movies. [00:31:20] Speaker D: Yeah, it's a really good show. [00:31:21] Speaker A: They're doing a third one of those. Yeah, yeah. [00:31:24] Speaker D: Coming out this Christmas on Netflix Excellent. [00:31:28] Speaker A: Yes. Well, yeah, poker face sounds good. For myself, it was my birthday a few weeks ago. I am now the ripe old age of. [00:31:36] Speaker B: 27. Is that. [00:31:37] Speaker A: Yeah, 27. [00:31:39] Speaker C: The anniversary of your 20th birthday? [00:31:40] Speaker A: Yes. But we popped down to London and went to see a play in the West End, which is on at. I completely forgot the name of the theatre, Julian Lean Theatre, which is my neighbour Totoro. So I think it was on two years ago in London, in the West End, and then went away for a year or so. We watched Spirit Away last year, which was the other play that was on, that was at the Lyceum. And now this is back. And yes, it's until March 2026, I think Joe Hizashi pretty much rewrote the score for it. A lot more music in there. Just absolutely fantastic play. A real great reinvention of my neighbor Toto, because you think my neighbor Totoro is quite a short film. It's only 90 minutes, so to extend the out into a play, it needed a little bit more content. I think they've definitely handled that quite well. The sets are absolutely stunning. I don't know how much they managed to fit that much set decoration into such a small place. And when Totoro turns up for the first time, it is an absolutely magical experience and I'm not going to spoil it, but the puppetry is amazing, Catbus is beautiful, acting is amazing, the music's fantastic. It's kind of as close as I think you'll get seeing Studio Ghibli represented on the stage. So, yeah, I really, really, really, really, really think you've already seen it, Sam. [00:33:05] Speaker B: Have you? [00:33:05] Speaker C: No, I saw the Spirited Away, but I'm not seeing it. [00:33:09] Speaker A: Keith, have you seen it now? [00:33:10] Speaker D: No. I wanted to when it did its first run, but it just was tricky to get tickets at a. At a. At a good price at that time. So I'll look again. I would hope that it would tour a little bit to make it a bit easier to get. [00:33:25] Speaker A: I think that I have to do that much customization to the stage to make everything work. It's really good. I think it's won six Olivier Awards at the moment, so five stars in pretty much every single magazine. So, yes. Royal Shakespeare Theatre Company. Joe Hizashi is executive producer, Nippon TV or involved with Improbable and was adapted by Tom Morton Smith, who also wrote Oppenheimer. So interesting combination of the two there. My name is Houtarou and Oppenheimer almost heading back towards Grave of the Firefighters Toppenheimer, but Yes, I really, really would recommend it. It's just two hours of absolutely magicalness. They are rather strict about videoing and photography in the which I fully support because it kind of detracts from the art. If you've got people taking photographs and leaking it online, it's worth going in completely blind and experiencing it in, in a kind of new, clear way without having any kind of preconceptions how they do it. I do recommend it. Spirited Away was absolutely fantastic last year as well. The difference between this one, the Spirited Away. Spirited Away was fully in Japanese with subtitles on screen. This is an English adaptation, so it's English voice cast. They do have a singer who does between the English and Japanese. But yes, I would really, really recommend it. And I think we're going to wrap up in a second because before we blow away, I have summoned the storm. Golem Gale Totoro is on his way with his umbrella as we speak. He's just going to hover over just. [00:35:05] Speaker B: A cat bus just flying. [00:35:11] Speaker A: Thank you very much for joining us on Geeky Brummy this issue. I've been Ryan Parish. You can find me at Ryan Parish on Bluesky, and that's about it. Sam, where can we find you online? [00:35:23] Speaker C: You can find me at sdedwards89 on bluesky, Instagram threads, wherever, pretty much. [00:35:33] Speaker A: Lee, how about yourself? [00:35:34] Speaker B: You can find me on Bob Pepper on YouTube and on Bluesco. [00:35:40] Speaker D: It's Hardlock Hotel on Blue sky and Instagram and Wednesdays on the Geeky Bummy Channel doing the old comics roundups. [00:35:49] Speaker C: Yes. [00:35:49] Speaker A: And you can find these two fine gentlemen as well. Sam on Thursdays, Lee on Fridays with our movie and game roundups. What's coming up? What's our recommendation of the week? Sam, you started adding Trader of the Week, I believe, to you. And Lee picks some of the greatest indie games that you will never hear of in any of the public Gobble it. [00:36:06] Speaker B: So yeah, I'm very picky. But like, if, if there's a good hook, it's going to be in there. [00:36:12] Speaker A: And Keith always picks a trade of the week as well. So if you're not into regular comic buying, some really good trades to get really good collections, everything on geekyrum.com you can find us at Geeky Ry on Instagram, threads, Blue Sky, Facebook, all at Big geeky r or geeky.com and you can get the podcast if you're watching this at any of your podcasting services of choice or if you're listening to the podcast and you want to see. [00:36:34] Speaker C: What we look like and why we didn't. [00:36:38] Speaker A: You can find us at YouTube. Ike Brummy. But thank you very much for joining, and we'll see you all soon. [00:36:43] Speaker B: Bye. [00:36:46] Speaker D: This issue of the Geeky Brummy podcast was hosted by Ryan Parish with Sam Edwards, Lee Price, and Keith Bloomfield. Additional content by Matt Lovell. This issue was produced by Viv Parish, and this was a Geeky Brummy production.